""Wild Horses" for the music prompt at #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
I am back again with another tag for the music prompt at the one little tag craft challenge. This tag is inspired by The Rolling Stones song "Wild Horses". I had my sister in mind when I created this tag. I was also thinking about my niece who lives in Northern Alberta. So far north that you have to use the ice roads to get there at this time of year. There are many wild horses where she lives, they have to put up fences to keep the horses out of the yard. As a matter of fact, she was recently late for work because two horses were having a scuffle in the middle of the road!

To create this tag, I used my homemade stamp positioner to stamp the horses first in brown archival ink. The stamps are from an Inka Dinka Doo set. Then I'm masked off the single horse using a mask I created from a piece of paper previously. I did not mask off the running horses. I use some makeup brushes that I got from the dollar store as ink brushes sometimes. They work quite well. (little tip!) I used various distress inks to create the background. A little bit of blue in the sky and various browns and green for the ground. I kind of swirled things around to look like dust and use my Copic opaque white ( ilovetostuff!) To create the dust clouds. Then I smooshed a few different distress inks on to my craft mat, spritz them with some water, and use my fan brush to add some splatters. I did the same thing with my copic white. Then I unmasked my single horse, and put my tag back into my stamp positioner. This time I used black ink to stand for horse, but I placed the ink strategically knowing that part of it would be Andy dust cloud so I didn't want it really dark.

To finish off the tag, I mounted it to a burlap paper mat  from a pad I got at the dollar store a while back. I thought the burlap really suited this tag. Then, as usual I finished it off with a black mat..

I hope you enjoyed today's take, and I hope my sister likes it!
Thank you so much for stopping by and allowing me to share some of my art with you.

Kim XO

"Tiny Dancer" tag for music prompt on #onelittletag

Hello again, my friends!
Here is another tag for the music prompt at The One Little Tag Craft Challenge. I am loving this prompt.  This tag was inspired by Elton John's "Tiny Dancer".

I used distress ink and gold ColorShine spray too create the background.  You may have already read this in my previous posts, but in case you are new here, I smoosh the ink onto my craft mat, spritz with water  and drag and pounce  the tag through the ink.  I do a few layers, drying in between, until I am happy.  I love the gold marbling effect created when I added the gold ColorShine.

I used a Cheery-Lynn Design die to cut out several ballerinas from a light pink card.  Then I edged them with purple and gold ink.  I arranged them on the tag finishing off with a gold dancer.  I used my label-maker to create the title.

Once the main panel of the tag was assembled, I used a gold mat and a final black mat to finish off the tag.

I hope you have enjoyed the process of creating this "Tiny Dancer" tag.  Thanks for, once again. letting me share my creations with you!

Kim xo

"Dreams" tag for music prompt on #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
This weeks prompt at The One Little Tag Craft Challenge is music.  This can be  interpreted any way we like, I have been using songs as inspiration.  I knew I would be fired up by this prompt, I have a hundred tags in my head that I would like to make!  This tag was inspired by Fleetwood Mac's "Dreams".

I started off this tag with some embossing.  I thought these bubble-like images would give the background a dreamy quality. I used a kaleidoscope  embossing powder that was glittery  with various sparkles of colour.  This would act as a resist to the ink that I add.

I did several backgrounds at the same time.  I smooshed distress ink onto my craft mat and spritzed with water.  I also added some Heidi Swapp ColorShine gold spray into the mix.  I dragged and pounced my tags through the inky goodness, drying in between layers.  I repeated the process until I was happy with the result.

As you can see here, the embossed areas resisted the ink.

I used a Spellbinders die to cut out the dream catcher from some blue foil board.  I love to use gold and silver foil board, but there is also red, blue and green in the package that I don't use as often, so I was happy to find a use for the blue.  I really liked the look.  I don't know why, but I think of blue when I think of dreaming.  I have heard that we don't actually dream in colour.  I don't know if that is true or not, my dreams seem to be colourful!

This is a "Kelly Creates" stamp set that I got from Michaels.  I love these sets and they are only $5 each! Even less if you have a coupon.  I usually find Michaels a little pricey, but was really happy with this purchase.   They all have about 18 - 20 words.  I thought this was a great deal.  Maybe I will do another post to showcase these stamps.  Anyways, Dreams was one of the words on this set.  I heat-embossed it with Rangers gold embossing powder on vellum.  I wrapped the vellum around the tag.  I did this so that it would mute the background enough for the word to stand out, but still visible behind the vellum.

Then I added a blue foil mat and my usual black mat to finish off the tag.

I hope you have enjoyed my process for making this tag.  Thanks so much for letting me share it with you.  Have an awesome day everyone!

Kim xo

Playing with distress inks and Color Shineto make some pretty backgrounds #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
I had some fun the other evening creating some backgrounds for some more tags.  I love playing around with different techniques which is why I always seem to be creating backgrounds for future art projects.  It's just fun!  This time I pulled out my original distress inks.  I squished them down on my craft mat, spritzed them with water and pressed and swiped my tags through the inky goodness.  I dried each layer and then dunked it again, adding more ink or water as necessary.  I like a little shimmer and  thought I'd pull out some Heidi Swapp Color Shine gold spray to mix in with my distress inks and I love the marbling effect it created.

This one actually has no distress ink in it, it is Gold and turquoise Color Shine spray, but done the same way.  I sprayed it onto the mat and added water and smooshed the tag into it!

I heat embossed a couple of tags to create a resist before inking them up for a different effect.

 I splattered the gold onto this tag

I just love how the gold marbled through the distress ink!

I will be using these backgrounds to create some more tags for The One Little Tag Craft Challenge.  It's all about the process and having fun!  This isn't a new technique for me, although it is the first time I thought to add the color shine.  But every time you do it, you get totally unique results.  So every project that you use them for will be unique, even if you finish them all off the same way.  I hope you have enjoyed having a look at my ink play, and I encourage you to give it a try, if you haven't before, and try it again, if you have!  You will be seeing some of these backgrounds very shortly on some new tags.

Thanks so much for stopping by!
Kim  xo

Pretty Tag made from scraps for #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
Well, Wednesday is usually an Art Club day (Ajax Creative Arts), but the weather did not cooperate, and we had a snow day instead.  That doesn't mean that I  couldn't have a crafty day, though.  I will confess, I did not leave the house and wore comfy p.j.s all day!

For those of you that are new to my blog, at the very beginning of the year, I created several background sheets using spray inks and stencils.  I call them my "spray play" sheets and I created them to cut dowm into tags, or collage or use as backgrounds for an art journal page (which I am determined to do this year!)

I have cut out several tags from these pretty sheets already. (if you scroll through my blog you will see many of those tags) and I have been saving some of the scraps to use later to create  a different background

Some of the offcuts just looked so pretty to me that I didn't want to throw them away.  I had little bits from other papers I had used as well and I decided I would save them and create a tag with them.  I glued them down to some card and them trimmed all around.  I edged all around with gold ink.

I also did some die cutting today.  I find die cutting therapeutic for some reason.  I think I get a certain satisfaction when I run a paper through my die cutting machine and it comes out as a beautiful and intricate embellishment.  Sometimes I will die cut for hours and never actually create anything. True story, a Mimi fact, lol.  A snow day is a perfect day to bring out the Cuttlebug!

So this tag has a lot of die cut elements.  I created the flower using some lovely vellum.  Now, here is the day coincidence.  The new prompt for OLTC had not been posted yet this week and it turned out to be "music", to be interpreted any way we like.  So this tag, with its music notes, qualifies although I had no idea when I was making it! I think I will have some fun with this weeks prompt.  Stay tuned!

Thank you so much for stopping by to see what I have been up to.  For those of you that are crafty, I hope I have inspired you to use up some of those scraps instead of throwing them away, and  create something!

Kim xo

"Walking in the Rain" tag for #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
This is a tag I created a few days ago for the watercolour challenge at The One Little Tag Craft Challenge.  For those of you who don't know what this is, it is a Facebook group created by Jenny Barnett Rohs of Craft Test Dummies.  The focus of the group is to encourage everyone to try and be creative every day, or as often as you can.  The theory being that by taking just a few minutes and doing a small tag, nothing elaborate, every day could keep the creative juices flowing. I enjoy making the tags, so I tend to spend a little more time on them.  I don't get to them every day, but I would say I do something creative most days.  I usually go to our art club twice a week and if I'm not being creative, I am often thinking about what I will do the next time I am!  So whether you spend 10 minutes or 2 hours on a tag, you are staying inspired!  It is also a good opportunity to do some experimenting without making a big commitment.  So if there are any of you that are looking for some inspiration or encouragement and would like to share some of your art, or just see what other are up to and to gain some inspiration, I would encourage you to check it out.  It is no longer just tags, anything you create can be posted, cards, art journals, drawings etc.  there is a weekly prompt, that is completely optional.  There are also random draws for giveaways.  A lot of fun and a good group of people.  Anyways, back to my tag, lol

Watercolour is not my medium.  I like to paint, but I paint in acrylics and I just don't have the knack of watercolour.  I suppose some lessons would help.  I do like to play around and drop paint onto a wet paper and let it blend organically, and play around.  I did a landscape, or attempted one, that I have to admit I scrapped.  But I was determined to do at least one scene.  So this is quite simple, but I don't mind how it turned out.  I used Winsor Newton watercolours, and Crayola brush pens on the stamp of the girl with the umbrella.  I struggled with watercolours this week.  But I also had a lot of fun with my "Purple Girl".  I stepped out of my comfort zone, which was the most important thing, more important than the result.  I hope everyone does that once in a while, it helps us discover new things.  I wonder how many things I would have missed had I never strayed from my comfort zone.

Well, lots of words tonight, I usually try and keep things short and sweet.  Thanks so much for taking the time to read and for letting me, once again, share my little pieces of art with you.

Kim  xo

A new "Purple Girl" watercolor tag for #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
Well, this has been another busy week (some of it involving plumbers!) and I haven't had a change to finish a tag until today!  The challenge this week at The One Little Tag Craft Challenge is water colour.  I had a bit of a head-start with this tag as I created this purple-haired beauty for last weeks purple challenge, but didn't get a chance to use her.  Well, I just happened to use water colours to create her, so guess what...!  She was created using a Penny Black stamp.  I used some Jane Davenport water colours and pencil crayons..  I created a couple of water colour background sheets for her dress and the tag background.  I had fin with those!  I dropped in all kinds of different water colours, including some metallic and just let them basically do as they pleased.  And now I have a few extra tag backgrounds left over as well!

I stamped her dress onto the paper I created and cut it out.  I stamped my favourite flourish stamp in gold ink onto the background.  It is so hard to pick up in photos, but there is a lot of shimmer on this card.  There is metallic watercolour in her dress and in the background, as well as the gold s metallic inked stamp.  I had some fin embellishing her dress and   giving her a choker.  I usually like to add a word or phrase to my tags, but there wasn't anything that popped into my head for this tag.  I may leave her a she is, or add something later if I am inspired.

I hope you enjoyed todays tag, I enjoyed creating it.  Thanks so much for stopping by!

Kim xo 

An Elegant Purple and Gold Card #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
I am a little behind in posting, but this is a card I made for the purple challenge last week on The One Little Tag Craft Challenge.   I just love the combination of purple and gold.  If you are following along, you may have noticed that.  Most of my purple themed cards or tags are using that combination.

For this card I used a Spellbinders die and cut out some gold foil board.  FYI, I get my gold foil board  at the dollar store.  Both Dollaramma and the Dollar Tree have the same foil board.  It comes in a package of 6 sheets 0 gold, silver, red, green and blue.  It's very handy at Christmas time!  I just wanted to mention this because I really like the foil card that I get there and it die cuts beautifully.  Sometimes a cheaper price doesn't necessarily mean an inferior product.   Anyways, I die cut my foil card and adhered it to some purple glitter paper, which I then adhered to a black card base.  It is sometimes difficult to stick to the glitter paper, so I ran it through my Cuttlebug just sandwiched between the plates to squish everything together in an attempt to make it adhere better, which it did. .  It almost made this look like a die cut inlay.  I really like the effect that created.  I added a few sparkly embellishments and left it as it is.  I will keep this in my stash and when an occasion comes up that this card will be suitable for, I will add a sentiment.  I think this is quite elegant with the gold foil details.
I hope you have enjoyed my latest card.  Thanks so much for stopping by to have a look!
Havve a great day everyone!
Kim xo

"Hugs" tag for "purple " challenge at #onelittletag

Hello again , my friends
Here is another tag I made for the "purple" theme this week at The One Little Tag Craft Challenge.  I used the negative space created whenn I punched out the "heart-shaped moon" for a tag I did last week.  I'm glad I didn't throw the scrap  away!  I backed the heart area with some purple glitter paper.  The background was made from some of the "spray play" papers I created previously.  I used a small punch to cut the little hearts out of gold foil card and a Recollections die for the word "hugs", I cut it again from black card that I used as a drop-shadow..  I mounted to a gold mat and a black mat to finish it off.  I am having fun with purple!
I hope you enjoyed my tag and that it will inspire you to make use of some of the scraps that you might normally throw away.
Have an awesome day, overtone!
Kim  xo

New "Dream" tag for "purple" t challenge at #onelittletag

Hello friends,
This weeks theme at The One Little Tag Craft Challenge  was purple inspired by the new pantone colour of the year.  We are doing any purple for the challenge, though.  I had a bit of a crazy week, so I didn't actually finish any tags until Friday night, but I did work on them, in bits and pieces, throughout the week.  Purple is okay.  It is not my favourite, nor my least favourite colour.  I didn't find it overly inspiring, or so I thought!  I thought I would look around for some patterned paper (of which I have reams and reams, lol) but not much in the way of purple.  It's just not a "go-to" colour for me.  Then I thought I would look through my "spray play" backgrounds that I created previously.  I was completely surprised to see how much I actually used purple. That was the jumping off point, suddenly I was totally inspired.  I created several tags this week, and may still make a few more!

I created this tag using a background I made using a variety of spray inks and stencils, this one on shimmer card from Recollections.  I thought the background looked kind of "dreamy" so I used a Recollections die to cut out the word.  One combination I really like is purple and gold, so since I am using purple, there is going to be a lot of gold in the cards and tags that I make!  It's hard to tell in the photo, but there is a lot of shimmer and veins of gold running through this background.  I liked how this tag turned out.

I hope you enjoyed today's tag, and thanks so much for stopping by.  If you did, I have made several tags for the purple themed week, so please come back and check them out!
Have a great day everyone!
Kim xo

Live Love Laugh tag for #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
I am back with another tag for The One Little Tag Craft Challenge I have to tell you, Ii have been taking pictures with my Samsung tablet and I am not very happy with the quality.   I apologize and I am going to be looking at alternative devices.  I hope you can bear with me in the meantime!

For this tag I used one of the backgrounds I created at the beginning of January using sprays and stencils.  I used a few different card stocks to work on, this was a shimmer card.  I couldn't capture that with the photo.  TBH, it's a pretty subtle effect , but I like it..

I used a Recollections die to cut the words out of some scrap copper metallic card and some black card as a drop shadow.  I used a butterfly embellishment that I rediscovered as I was going through my stash.  I'm not sure where I got it from, possibly a dollar store.  Then I mounted to a glitter paper and black card, all 1/4" larger than each other, to give my tag a double mat.

Thanks so much for stopping by.  Ii hope you enjoyed this tag and will be back to see the next one.  Have an awesome, art-filled day!
Cheers
Kim  xo

A new Love tag for #onelittletag

Hello!
Here is today's tag.  Still based on the "Love" challenge on tthe One Little Tag Craft Challenge FB group.  This tag was inspired by the Tim Holtz "Clippings Sticker".  I used a Recollections heart punch to punch a mask.  I use low-tac shelving vinyl as masking.  I positioned it on my tag, used some washi tape to create a horizon line and used a few different distress inks to create my background, blending in from the sides to leave a lighter area in the centre as the reflection of the moon.  I punched the moon out of some papers I had sprayed the first week in January to create some backgrounds.  I used my Spectrum Noir to add some shimmer. I added some shimmer to the water as well and to add a halo around the moon.  That didn't work out exactly as I would have liked, but I continued on.

I used some Penny Black stamps to create the foliage silhouette. Using some black glitter paper, I used  a punch from my stash for the dragonflies and a memory box die for the fairy (I love fairies!).  I added the Tim Holtz sticker and then mounted the tag to a black glitter paper backing.

Thanks for taking the time to have a look, I hope you enjoyed todays tag.  I have a few more ides, so there may be another tag today, so pop back if you are interested.

Cheers!
Kim  xo

"Love Tag for #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
I was gone for so long, and now here I am, back again so quickly after my last post!  Feast or famine! The theme for the One  this week was "Love"  I was really pleased with the outcome of this tag.  I would love to be able to take credit for the design, but I can't, it was totally inspired by a couple of different cards that I saw on Pinterest.  I thought the design was simple but so effective.  I really liked it and wanted to give it a try. I'm not 100% sure how those were created, but I did what I thought would recreate a similar look.  I used distress inks in worn lipstick and Barn Door as watercolours.  I "smooshed" them (very technical term!) on my craft mat and used an aqua brush to paint with them.  I didn't use watercolour paper, I used Strathmore Bristol, and it held up well.  I wet the card fist and added the colour..  Then I used a brush pen to write a long script "love".  Then I die cut a heart from a Spellbinders die in my stash to create a stencil.  I used the Barn Door ink to stencil the heart.  I flicked a little water around, as distress inks are water reactive.  Then I "Smooshed" some more ink on my craft ma, spritzed it with a little water and used my brush to splatter it on my tag (I just love splatter!)  Then I scribbled some black ink from my brush pen on the mat and did the same thing..  I mounted it to some heavy black card and called it a day.  Although I am considering mounting it to some red card as well to give it another slim border all around.  Hmmm...

This is the other tag I created this week.  I used some patterned paper from my stash that had the word "love" all over it.  I used some Spellbinders Celebrations Hearst die to cut some hearts out of some of the other patterned papers in the same pad.  I also cut the heaty out of the background and inlayed all the hearts. I used a Tim Holtz stencil with some Barn Door distress ink over the entire background.  I tried to use white ink first with the stencil, but it really didn't show up very well. Then added some white splatters with some watered down white copic ink.  I die cut the "Love" using a Recollections die out of Recollections card.  I used the same red card as a backer to my tag.

I hope you liked my tags.  I have some more ideas for the "love" theme, so I will be back soon with some more tags!
Thanks so much for stopping by
Kim  xo

A few more Christmas Cards - Using one basic layout

Hello my friends.  As I mentioned in yesterdays post, I have created a few more cards using the same basic layout as the card I did for my friend Margaret.  Each one is a little different and unique, but a lot of the work could be done at the same time, assembly line style.  All the stock could be cut at the same time, all the pieces cold be die cut at the same time and the assembly could be done at the same time.  What I like about doing some mass producing of cards is that it is a definite time saver .  What I'm not crazy about when it comes to mass producing cards, is that they are all the same and often one layer and fairly simple...sometimes.  Don't get me wrong.  There are some very beautiful and elegant, yet simple, one or two layer cards that are very effective (I should make a point of trying to make some of them, actually!).  If you have a lot of cards or invitations too make, that is certainly a wise way to go.  Bottom line, they are all still hand-made with love.  I like to go somewhere in the middle.  Using common elements is much more time efficient, but changing up the patterned paper, or colour of stock, the stamped images or the arrangement of the elements is one way to keep each card unique and personal.  Sometimes, the creation of one card will inspire you to create more because you like how it turned out.  This was the case here.  I liked the way Margaret's card turned out, but that card was very personal too her and her husband because of the dogs., so I made some changes.
These cards definitely still took  quire a bit longer than a single layer mass produced card, as each piece was distressed and inked and die cut or trimmed.  But they were quicker than designing four cards from scratch.  Often, I find that the designing of a card takes the most time.  Another good reason to recycle one that you like.  You can take one basic layout and keep it as simple, or make it as complex, as you like.

I don't typically follow a card sketch, but there are some great ones on-line that can get you going when you are stumped.  One that I have used is Mojo Monday.  They have loads of card sketches and do contests and challenges as well.  So if you find yourself stuck when trying to create a card, go back to some of your favourite cards that you have already created for some inspiration, or if you want to try something totally new, try finding a sketch on-line.

This is an example of a Mojo Monday card sketch, follow the link above to have a look at more sketches

Well, I hope this will be helpful when you find yourself in a creative card rut, which happens to most card makers at some point, and are looking for that little push.
Thank you so much for stopping by.  I am looking forward to sharing lots of cards and art and posts with you in 2017.  Please let me know in the comments if there is anything  you would like to see on my blog and I will do my best to make it happen.
Have an awesome and artful day! xo