Very touched...

How heartwarming to receive this beautiful card from reader Rossella Cottrell in celebration of my recent wedding! The vintage look is right up my street and I love the vellum rose and butterfly embellishments.

Heartfelt thanks Rossella - you made my day!

Art In Bloom: Altered Beer Mats By Carol Fox

I was lucky enough to attend the Paperartsy retailer training day recently and even luckier to leave with this set of stamps by Jo Firth Young. Some of you may remember the bunting I did in the magazine a few months ago with a circus theme. I thought I would do a similer project here, but show how it can look completely different by simply using a different colour scheme and a softer style stamp.

What I did

• I created a crackle base on my beer mats using Fresco Finish paints and the crackle medium between the two layers of colour.
• I stamped my images directly onto the mats using black Archival Ink and dried this to heat set it.
• I used the Fresco paints again to colour my images, to do this I put a small spot of colour onto my craft mat, added a small spritz of water to dilute it, and then applied it to the painted image with a fine paint brush.
• I could see once my images were painted that the background was still too stark, so I dry brushed using the same pink shade I had painted the images with, brushing inwards from the edge so the colour was deeper at the edge and faded as it got towards the middle. I sealed it all with a coat of multi medium.
• I stamped my words directly onto the mats and coated them with Glossy Accents to make them "pop" a little bit.
• My smaller mat hanging from the centre is just a larger mat cut in half and coloured, stamped and painted in exactly the same way.
• I punched holes and added eyelets to each mat as shown. I used jump rings join the mats together, adding a length of chain to each end so it could be hung up.
• To finish I added a short length of beaded ribbon trim to each of the outer mats using a strong glue.

I used...

4 beer mats or hand cut your own from cardboard packaging

Paperartsy Rubber Stamps: JOFY10, ELB01

Paperartsy Fresco Paints: Mermaid, Nougat, Sherbet, Pansy, London Bus, Pumpkin Soup, Toad Hall

Multi Medium

Glossy Accents

Jump rings and chain

Beaded ribbon trim

If you have any questions at all please feel free to contace me via my personal blog where I will do my best to answer. Carol x

Take It, Make It Challenge Three- reminder!

Hello!
How are we all? Melting in this heat?
Why not carry that theme through to your craft room and get melting in there too...embossing powder that is!
(That was so cheesy I feel the need to apologise......!!)
Anyway.....
Don't forget about the Take It, Make It challenge! Challenge three still has another couple of weeks to run....there are some fab prizes on offer, and the winner will get published in Craft Stamper magazine!
Full details can be found HERE....
I have a couple more DT samples to show you, in an attempt to inspire you to join in!

Chris Dark

Trish Latimer

Backgrounds created just by the use of embossing powder...a fab technique to have a play with!
Go on, join in.....you know you want to!!
Trish xx

See your card in Craft Stamper!

Do you love cardmaking? Would you like to see your card published in Craft Stamper?

We are looking for reader submissions to our Ready Set Stamp gallery of quick and easy cards. We need new and unseen makes on the following themes.

GLITTER AND SPARKLE GALLERY
Deadline: 31st July 2013

Cold and frosty colours combined with bling, pearls, glitter and anything else that sparkles! Subtle sparkle is hard to photograph so make it bold! The colour scheme is lilac, icy blue and dark purple.



MODERN CHRISTMAS GALLERY
Deadline: 30th August 2013

A non-traditional colour scheme for a gallery of fresh, modern Christmas cards. The colours are rose pink, blood orange red, and sea green.

If you'd like to try out for the gallery here's what you need to do:
-Make a card using the theme and colour scheme shown
-The card should be easily completed in around 20 minutes
-Email a picture to cs@traplet.com by the stated deadline
-If you are successful, we will be in touch within one week of the deadline
-Please note that you will be asked to provide a materials list and a short write-up for your creation and will have to mail your finished card to us (it will be returned to you with a free copy of the magazine after publication)
-No discontinued stamps please - thank you.

We look forward to your makes! Good luck!

New issue out Friday!

Just in time for the sun we have bright summery issue for you! August issue is on-sale Friday 5th July.

LOADS of fabby stuff in this issue. Ways with mica tiles, glass paints, alcohol ink and wire. A fab Distress Stains background and faux embossed metal technique. Gorgeous projects featuring acetate and a fantastic rainbow inking technique (bottom left of cover) from reader Irit Shalom.

Our cover girl is Christine Dark.

A full list of contents is here.

PLUS the free stamp is a funky retro phone by Inky Doodles that we love!