Sazzle Craft

Don't fall down, but here's a mid week post from me!!!!

I can't believe that there was frost on the car this morning and the temperature gauge read minus one degrees.  Only last week it was 21 degrees, no wonder there are so many people with colds.

Talking of colds, Mark and I have been without heating for the last three weeks as our boiler was condemned - booooo.  The boiler men have been here for 3 days now fitting a new one so fingers crossed this evening we will have some heat.

Anyway, my reason for being with you today is not to complain but to show you one of my projects from the Clarity Stamp show on Create and Craft at the weekend.  Were you watching?

When my parcel arrived with this months stamps and stencils I knew immediately what I was going to do with this one, it was shouting "iris folding" at me.

After drawing an outline of the stencil onto a piece of copy paper, I began working out the pattern for the dress.  I then used the red and blue backing papers from the stencils to create the folds.  If you'd like my pattern please give me a shout and I can pass it on to you.

The outline around the edge of the card was created using the bottom of the Clarity Style dress stamp and coloured in with Spectrum Noir pencils.  I love these pencils as they blend so easily and give a great effect.

Welcome to November and thanks for popping over to my blog, I hope you can stay a while and have a look around.  My inspiration is there to give you inspiration in the hope that you can go away and create a piece of art.

Over on the Clarity blog our new monthly challenge has just started with the theme of TRAVEL. Hands up who wants to come and join in the fun?

Here's my inspiration for the challenge:

Welcome to October where the leaves are starting to fall off the trees and the darker nights are starting to rear their ugly head.  It's miserable without some sunshine isn't it?


As we've just entered Autumn we thought a good challenge would be to focus on "The Seasons" and with four of them to choose from we hope to get a variety of projects.  Why not pop over to the Clarity Stamp Challenge where you can see the rest of the design teams inspirational projects and our guest designer, Susan White, who was the winner of challenge 18.

My thoughts behind this card were to try and bring all of the seasons onto one card creating a scene for each.  As you can see the tree follows through all of the scenes and changes its appearance according to the season.  I hope you get some inspiration from my project.

Welcome to a new month and a new challenge over at the Clarity Stamp Challenge.

Where did August go?  I blinked and it was gone!  Now either I'm getting older and losing my marbles (no comment) or time is genuinely going quicker each month.

I saw a post on facebook the other day and they were actually counting down to Christmas.  I haven't even started thinking about Christmas yet let alone making cards or plans or anything.  I bet there are plenty of crafters out there that start in the new year and set themselves a target each month aren't there?  You put me to shame!!!

By the wonders of modern technology when you read this post I will be sitting on the beach in Cyprus soaking up the sun, hopefully with a glass of something cool in my hand.  On second thoughts I'll probably be fast asleep still when the challenge goes live.

The challenge this month is all about "Nature", so you can take your pick whether you use your animal stamps, leaves, trees or any of the stencils within the Clarity collection.  Why not go to town and create something 3D or paint a canvas.  We would love to see your nature creations and you could also win a £50 voucher if you are randomly selected as our winner at the end of the month.  I bet you like the sound of that one don't you?

Here's my card for inspiration:


If you've never tried using the gelli plate you're missing out on a technique that creates backgrounds for your stamping, but be warned it's very addictive!!!  I'm sure you've seen Barbara using the gelli plate at the shows, on the TV, on her blog or during her YouTube videos.  Check them out for more inspiration as this technique gives you another use for your stencils too.

Good morning crafters, how are you this morning?

Today I'm bringing you one of my samples from the August Clarity show on Create and Craft.  If you didn't see the show you can check out the Clarity Challenge blog to see what products were included.

When I saw these stamps they immediately reminded me of a stained glass window, so with my Clarity stash at hand I started to bring this together.  This set is very versatile and lends itself to many occasions.

July was a great month with lots of crafting amongst good friends.  I went to the Crowborough retreat with Barbara Gray along with another couple of design team members and we had a great time.

Last Saturday was the one year anniversary of my Peterborough Clarity workshops.  We celebrated in style covering the tarmac technique and then all went out for a meal afterwards.  Thanks to my ladies and Matt for a great year and to Steve, Hazel and Mark for helping me.




It's the start of a new challenge over at the Clarity Challenge Blog so why not pop over there and check out the design teams artwork?

The theme for August is "FEMININE".  This is your chance to really get in touch with your feminine side whether it be flowers or the new elegant lady stencils.  Barbara has shown us so many techniques on the Clarity YouTube channel and on her blog.  There must be something that you're dying to try!