Good Friends .......

Happy Friday folks ......

The end of another busy week ....... let the weekend start now!

Have you played along with this month's Craft Stamper challenge yet?  No .... well there's still plenty of time.  And ...... if you have already entered don't let that stop you joining in the fun again .... you can have up to three entries, just as long as they all have their own blog post!

The theme is Anything Goes ..... as long as there's rubber stamping somewhere on your project.

Here's an idea for you ....... a pretty little wall hanging

I spotted this idea of using black ink with this type of stamp, and stamping onto Kraft card and I LOVE IT!!!  Thanks to Heather Hoffman (one of the Penny Black DT) for showcasing such a fab technique, I'm hooked.

I simply stamped the image onto a piece of Stampin Up Crumb Cake cardstock, using an old Black Versafine ink pad. I used my MISTI so that I could repeat stamp the image (Penny Black's dancing daisies) until I got a good depth of colour ......

Even though you're using a black ink you still get all the shading on the stamped image ..... love it!

I then stamped and heat embossed in gold, the sentiment ....... you can see I've gone slightly over the top of the flowers with this as it's a lovely large stamp (from Stampin Up's Lovely Friends clear set)

A little tip for you ...... make sure that the black ink is completely dry first, and use an anti static bag over the card before you stamp the words .... this way when you sprinkle on the embossing powder it will only stick to the stamped sentiment, and not on the flower image too. Why am I telling you this ..... I've no patience so the first attempt saw gold powder everywhere!  Oh well .... it's only a piece of card.

I added a few splatters of Black Soot Distress Oxide ink onto the background and a few dots of glitter glue to the centres of the flowers.

I then mat and layered using black and white card and edged the white layer using a gold leafing pen to create the look of a pretty frame.

To mount the design I used an 8x8 square canvas ..... I added a little texture paste here and there using my favourite brick wall stencil

then I painted the whole thing black with a couple of layers of black gesso .... I love the matt finish.

I finished off with a touch of gold wax ..... gently rubbed over the brick wall texture to bring out the detail.

As always we have a challenge sponsor .... this month it's Keep On Crafting

And the prize for the challenge winner is ....... 2 fab stencils along with 2 great stamp sets (see the picture below)

All the challenge info can be found over on the Craft Stamper Blog, along with full details of the prizes ... don't forget we have a monthly Design Winner too!!
You'll also find more inspiration from the rest of the Design Team too ..... Happy Stamping!

Thanks for popping by .... enjoy your Friday and have a great weekend.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the weather holds out ..... we've got a whole load of friends coming round for a BBQ this evening, so guess where I'll be this afternoon ..... yep! in the kitchen ..... prepping!  Hubby does have these great ideas. At least I just have to get everything ready ..... he'll be doing all the cooking!

Cheerio until next time ....