Haunted Design House - Steven King challenge

 Happy Monday folks, How is everyone keeping?
 Thank you for stopping by.
Today we start our new challenge over at Haunted Design House the theme being the Legend that is Stephen King, Now we do not mind what aspect of Stephen Kings career you focus on, His comic books, novels or movies, we want to see it all.
  I decided to go with one of his films, (also a Book) the one that scared the crap out of me as a kid and is probably the cause of a nation wide general fear of Clowns, thank you Stephen ;)
 Ive made another page for my little book of dark arts, a posh way of saying fat page.
I started by painting the page of the book with acrylic paints by Deco Art, mainly white but mixing in some subtle greens, Juniper and mint I think also a little bit of fawn, I mixed the colours on the page so they would blend together.I then flicked some red paint across the surface so it looks like some blood splatter.
 I then sourced the internet for a good picture of Pennywise and ran it through Photoscape to turn it into a threshold image (pure black an white, no grey) you can adjust the amount of black to white in the program.
 When I was happy with it I printed it out to the right size and then used a some Transfer paper from Deco Art (it's basically a carbon paper) You trace around the image and it leaves the marks on your painted surface.Once I had gone round the whole image, I painted the black parts black and Pennywise comes to life.To finish off I just painted the 'IT' in free hand. This technique was shown to me on an Andy Skinner live workshop.
 Head on over to Haunted Design House to see what else the awesome DT have created and remember to check back next Monday to see some more inspiration from the rest of the team.
As always we would love to see you join us by getting your freak on ;)

Thank you for stopping by x

De StempelWinkel - Pen Holder

A very quick post today, It's my turn over at De StempelWinkel to come up with something.

A few weekends ago I was at the big craft show at Ally Pally and I had my first encounter with the MDF man, I spent a small fortune and bought several of these really cool pen holders.

For more pics and a little more info on what I have done, head over to De StempelWinkel.

They have daily posts from their awesome DT show casing their stamps and productsThanks for stopping by, It's always appreciated xx

Fun With ATC's - Magic

Ok so I am not quite sure how I keep managing to have 3 posts in a row and then nothing for the rest of the week but it would be a shame to stop that pattern now ;)
 I have no idea where the time is going but we have started our new two week challenge over at Fun With ATC's the theme this time is Magic.
 I have cut my ATC from mount board and I used it to mop up a little bit of the red Dylusions spray, It looked like a blood splatter so I knew I had to keep it. I decided to go for a sinister looking advertising poster type look.
I left the Bg of the ATC white and stamped on the One eyed Gent, he is from DE StempelWinkel they have so many brilliant and different stamps. I also thought the playing card and the mystic hand from Tim Holtz fitted right in as well so I made a mask of the chap, over stamped the card with coffee archival ink, I did the same thing making a mask of the card and over stamping both images with the Hand stamp using pumice stone Distress Ink.To finish I swiped the edges with Black Soot Distress Ink.
 The Atc was then given 2 coats of clear Embossing powder. The letters for 'The Magician' are peel offs from Tim Holtz, to make sure they would not come off and to really make them part of the ATC I gave the whole thing a 3rd coating of embossing powder.

Of course we would all love to see you join us for this fortnights challenge,head on over to Fun With ATC's  to see what the rest of the DT have created for some inspiration. an ATC does not take that long does it? ;)

Thank you for stopping by x

Iron Man 3 Tags for the Octopode Factory

More tags from me today,thank you for stopping by, it is always great to have you here.
 Last week I was lucky enough to get an email from Lily over at the Octopode Factory asking if I would like to do something with the Iron Man Image she has created with the release of the new Iron Man 3 movie this week.Of course I jumped at the chance and made these two tags.If you head over to Lily's blog you can see some more Iron Man art and see what else the Ocopode Factory is all about.   The Iron Man image's were coloured with Copics fussy cut and clear embossed twice.The first one was coloured like the traditional Iron Man and for the second I thought I would have ago at using the colours of the character War Machine.
 For the Iron Man tag I used a technique from Andy Skinners Book Of Ruination to give a rocky steam punk look, the ribbon was coloured with Dylusion sprays.
For the War Machine tag I started with a mount board cut tag using the Tim Holtz tag die. It was given a coat of Gesso and then sprayed with blue Dylusions ink and a light spritz of the White Dylusion spray and blotted dry. I used a sun burst stencil and stippled some white acrylic paint through to give a ghost sun beam, the white paint drew up some of the blue spray.
I then over stamped in white ink some stars with a stamp from the Artistic Stamper, the black stars are from Tim Holtz.
The War Machine letters are from Tim Holtz and have been given a coat of a rub and buff in scarlet. The ribbon was coloured with Dylusions.
 I had great fun creating these tags. If you have never stopped by the Octopode Factory you really must, the images are great, If you have stopped by here before you will probably have seen I use them quite a bit.Lily has some amazing characters from things like The Wizard Of Oz, Alice In Wonderland,Charlie Chaplin, The Avengers even some David Bowie images.                          
Again thank you for stopping by. x

I would like to enter a couple of challenges.

Crafting When We Can are having an At the Movies theme.

Simon Says Stamp And Show are having a Colour challenge. They just want to see bright colours.
My post went up 1:30am Monday but the blogger clock is not set for uk times.

Anything But A Card - Rain

SO how is everyone doing?
First off a great big thank you for stopping by it's great to have you here.
 Ok we are half way through our latest challenge at Anything But A Card and our theme Is April Showers, we would love to see all your rain/water inspired makes, head on over to ABAC and see what the DT have created to get you in the mood.
 I have made another tag, I love making these and there are more to come tomorrow. For this one I gesso'd the tag and used some blue acrylic paint, I also sprayed with the white dylusion spray and the blue to get the mottled BG effect.
The Stamp is from De StempelWinkel I stamped him on to the tag directly but he looked lost so I stamped him onto a plain bit of craft card and fussy cut him, he has been coloured with distress markers.
The rainy swirl has been made using one of Andy Skinners new masks, I have used it with some Dream Weaver paste which has been given a coat of Treasure Golds Topaz rub n buff stuff.
To finish the I have gone around the edges with some black soot distress stain and the ribbon has been coloured with some distress stain and swiped with black soot to grunge it up a little.
The sentiment was first stamped in black and then over stamped with embossing ink and coated with white powder to give a shadow effect.

Again thank you for stopping by and as always we would love to see you over at Anything But A Card.

Dream - De StempelWinkel

Time for another De StempelWinkel Post from me, Just a teaser pic. To see the whole piece and more info on what it is and what I have done, follow the link to their blog.

There is a post on their blog pretty much everyday showcasing their stamps and other products available in the De StempelWinkel Store there is a link on my side bare or you can follow the link on the                                      De StempelWinkel DT blog.

Well worth checking out, I am like a kid in a sweet shop every time I stop by.

Paul                Neil           Me (Mark)

Here is a pic taken at Ally Pally on Saturday, It was my first time at the big craft event and I was not disappointed, although my bank balance maybe ;)

I travelled up with Neil of Neelz Expressionz and we met up with Paul of The Artsider.

Suzanne, Neils wife was also with us (but she is taking the pic)

I think we may have been the only 3 guys that were not there under duress ;)

It was a great day and was good to see some familiar faces and to meet some new faces as well.

Ill be looking forward to the Autumn show now.

As always a really big thank you for stopping by, leaving comments and or becoming a follower I can not tell you how much it means to me, It is very much appreciated.

xx

Haunted Design House - Skeletal Remains

 Happy Monday and another two weeks have passed over at Haunted Design House and that means it is time for another challenge.
 This fortnight we are lucky enough to have been sponsored by The Octopode Factory, If you have stopped by before you will probably have guessed I am a big fan of their designs, so many querky images from Alice in Wonderland And the Wizard Of Oz through to images of David Bowie and some awesome Skellies, and they are offering up a $15 voucher for their Etsy shop.
 So back to our new challenge, we want to see your projects using skeletons.Head over to HDH to see what our brilliant DT have created for inspiration.
 I have used the Valentine St Valentine image and made a tag.
The image has been printed onto some good craft card and coloured with Copic's, it was then fussy cut and given two coats of clear embossing powder.
 The embellishment was made from a heart charm from the bead shop in brighton and a skull charm that was sent to me from a blog budie. Thank you ;) I have used pin flare to glue the bits together and a brad to attach it to the tag.
The back ground has been made using a technique I have learnt on the new Andy Skinner on line workshop Book Of Ruination, I really love the texture this new technique gives.
The letters are the Tim Holtz plastic alpha parts, I glued them down and used some Treasure Gold rub in Spanish Topaz.
The ribbon was stained with Distress stain and a little black soot distress ink was added to grunge it up.

Thank you so much for stopping by and of course we would love to see you stop on by and take part.

I would like to enter this into a couple of challenges.

Eclectic Ellapu are having a 'put a tag on it' basically make a tag or use a tag on your project.

Sentimental Sundays are having a 'tag your it + a sentiment challenge'

The Sunday Stamper, the talented Hels Sheridan is having a 'Paint' theme. my back ground has been done with acrylic paints.

Smudgy Antics are having a 'Tic Yac Toe' challenge, I have used the line with, ribbon,paint and cardboard. mt tag is cut from mount board.

Left Of Centre's theme is ribbon and twine or be left of centre. I generally always aim for left of centre although I did use ribbon.

Over at the Artistic Stamper their April theme is 'Texture'

Fun With ATC's Windows or Doors

Happy Tuesday. Hope your all well?
 Today we have a new challenge starting over at Fun With ATC's with the theme of Windows or Doors.
You have two weeks to get something made so plenty of time and of curse we would love to see you over there where you can see the rest of the awesome DT makes.
 My Atc, as always was cut from mount board using the Tim Holtz ATC die.
The window is from Wendy Vecchi studio 490 range.
The first thing I did was mark around the inside of the window and cut it out from the ATC, The window was glued using Pinflair glue.
 The rest of the ATC was covered in Modeling Paste from Deco Art, I wanted to go for the old plaster falling off of the wall look with the bleached out blu paint and stains, Kinda works x.
The window frame was given a light coat of acrylic paint giving the frame more of a worn look.
 To finish off I used my Edgar Allen Poe image from the Octopode Factory and have him staring through the window. He has been coloured with Copics and gluees to the back of the ATC so there is a nice bit of depth between him and the window frame.

Again Thank you for stopping by, Sorry I have been a bad blogger, I have not been getting around to as many blogs as I would like the last few weeks, the Easter Holls have been manic for me, I hope to get back to normal very soon and I can not wait to see what everyone has been up too. x

See you over at Fun With ATC's

Haunted Design House Bare Bones

So how is everyone doing?
 As always a great big thanks for stopping by and a big welcome to all.

 Over at Haunted Design House we are just entering our second week of our Bare Bones Challenge.
We want to see what you can create in the clean and simple style, No embellishments of any kind.

Now I have a really struggle with these sorts of challenges as I like to work with textures and layers and am never sure when clean and simple becomes not clean and simple, so after a little bit of thought I decided to make some Atc's coloured with copic's and then clear embossed. Pretty simple ;)
All three images are from Haunted Design House's very own Teri. head over to her Delicious Doodles Blog to find these images and a whole load more.

As always we would love to see you over at Haunted Design House taking part, if not it's always worth a visit to see what the other members of the DT have created for inspiration.

Thanks again for stopping by. x

De StempelWinkel Door Hanger.

Ok so some exciting news for me, I was asked a little while back If I would like to be on the Design Team for a company called De StempelWinkel. Now I am blown away to have been asked,Honoured and to be honest I am papping my pants a little.If you do not know who they are please go and check them out, They are a stamp company/shop based in the Netherlands,They sell hundreds of amazing stamps that they press them selves as well as all the essential crafting supplies, Dylusions, Archival Inks etc, there is a very long list. The stamps are amazing and my want list is a mile long. They have everything you could think of, Oriental, Art Deco, Steam Punk,Flowers, Background and Texture stamps, you name it I am sure they probably have it.

They also have an amazing Blog with daily posts from their awesome Design Team so always worth checking them out. 

For a few more pics and a little write up of what I have made head on over to the De StempelWinkel blog. Ill be back with another post for them next week.