A Crafting Niche 52 Week Mini Art Card / Tag Challenge 2024 - Week 28

The Crafting Niche 52 Week Mini Art Card/Tag Challenge 2024:

This is a weekly challenge. I provide you with a prompt/theme each Sunday morning through out the year.  The challenge is very relaxed.  You can do as much or as little as you like.  You can create cards, tags, Artist Trading Cards (ATC's) or index cards, the choice is yours. You just go with what ever is in your head at the time.  You can stamp, get inky, use patterned papers, texture, embellish it is all down to you.

There is a dedicated private Facebook Group, with a lovely bunch of people who are already sharing their makes from previous challenges.  You can find the group by clicking this link.  I'd love you to join in.

The prompt for Week 28 is "Insects"

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This is the tag that I have made for the Week 28.  There were lots of stages making this tag and several times it was going in the bin, but I kept going with it and the end result isn't too bad.

I used two Distress Oxide Ink sprays:  Scorched Timber and Mowed Lawn.  I then gave the surface some water splatters.

Down the vertical central area of the tag I used "Scorched Timber" Distress Oxide ink pad with the Tim Holtz "Strings - THS004 stencil".

Next I used "Night Sky" Ranger Archival Ink throught the Tim Holtz / Stampers Anonymous "Shifter Layering Stencil - THS127".  I used the same "Night Sky" ink through the Tim Holtz "THM101 dots" stencil.

I then used "Jet Black" Ranger Archival Ink through the Tim Holtz / Stampers Anonymous "Grime Stencil - THs130".

Next I stamped the script from the Tim Holtz / Stampers Anonymous stamp set called "Entomology - CMS328" over the surface of the tag.  I then stamped the insects down the middle of the tag.  The insects are also from the "Entomology" stamp set, stamped in "Night Sky" Ranger Archival Ink. I stamped the insects again on white card in the same ink and again in Versafine Clair "Golden Meadow" ink.  I die cut the insects using the matching Sizzix/ Tim Holtz Framelits die set - 663068.

Around the edge of the tag, I used Tim Holtz "Matte Texture Paste" through the Tim Holtz "String Stencil - THS103", creating the horizontal lines.  Once dry, I used the paste again through the "Dots - THMM101 stencil.

Once the paste was dry, I mounted the tag on to some co-ordinating card.

I added the die cut insects to the middle of the tag, mounted on foam pads.  On the wings, I added a few brush strokes of "A Wink Of Stella" to give a shimmery look to the wings.  I then coated the bodies of the insects with Ranger "Glossy Accents".

Finally, I added a small word sticker saying "Stay Curious", which is part of the Tim Holtz / Idea-ology "Small Talk" sticker set.  I added colour using Versafine Clair "Golden Meadow" ink, I decided I wanted to break up the dark colours a bit, so added some dots of white Ranger "Enamel Accents" to some of the dotted paste areas.

Lavinia Stamps Textured Seascape Card

Last Friday, the lovely Amanda Branston did a demo of using texture paste with the new Lavinia Stamps Dinkles.  I was impressed, so decided to have a go myself. 

I lay a Sweet Poppy aperture circle stencil over my piece of card, then lay the Lavinia Stamps "Honeycomb Stencil" over the top, securing it with a piece of low tack tape.  I then applied Tim Holtz/Ranger Matte Distress Texture Paste with a palette knife.  I then used my heat gun to dry it. 

Once I was happy the paste was set, I repositioned the circular Sweet Poppy metal stencil and then spritzed the inner area of the circle with water. I then tapped small amounts of three shades of Lavinia Stamps "Dinkles" on to the spritzed surface, using Deep Yellow, Lime Divine and Sea Blue shades.  I gave an added spritz of water t ensure the powder dispersed then used my Tim Holtz hand held air puffer (I can't remember the proper name for it, but it's in the photo above), to blow the surplus water off the textureed area onto the white card. I continued to rotate the card so that the ink was blown outwards all the way round. I used a heat gun to dry off the area.

At this stage, I really wasn't sure what I was going to do with this textured circle, then I thought of a fishing net and that gave me the idea of a seascape.

I stamped a selection of Lavinia Stamps ocean stamps (Shoal of fish, Fish Set, Seaweed 2, Seaweed and Urchins) in Versafine Clair inks. I coloured them with Derwent Inktense pencils and then fussy cut and stuck the images on to the textured card.

Finally, I added some touches of silver glitter gel pen and then mounted the card on to a dark mauve piece of cardstock and then on to a card blank.