N is for ... Neige

Time for another entry for The Craft Barn's Dictionary Challenge. This time round it's letter N with no twist. So before we go any further I need to apologise to Izzy for playing fast and loose with my word choice.

As you know I'm using an old French-English dictionary and I'm using the French half of the dictionary for this challenge. I have chosen the word neige meaning... snow. My interpretation, as you can see below, is a snowman, which in French is really un bonhomme de neige, but I'm hoping that since my bonhomme is made from neige (OK if you're going to be picky - cereal box, acrylic paint and ink) Izzy will forgive me?

I have used Tim Holtz's Winter Wonder die, painted with white acrylic and inked with DI. The hat and carrot nose have been flocked and the seam binding stained with Fired Brick DS. The snow and snowflakes are heat embossed with Stampendous Winter Wonderland embossing powder.

I'm really quite fond of my jolly snowman :0)

L is for.... Lune

Oh my giddy aunt - squeezing in under the wire with this one!

The Craft Barn's Dictionary Challenge is letter L this time around - but with the twist of incorporating a window in to the design.

It took me ages to decide which L word I was going to use from my English-French dictionary, I finally plumped for lune meaning moon.

My happy man in the moon is a vintage image downloaded from The Graphics Fairy, the window is a Molly Blooms stamp with a Graphic 45 Olde Curiosity Shoppe blind and Artemio stamps "wallpaper".

Thank you for visiting.

J is for... Joujou

Can you believe it's time for another entry for The Craft Barn's Dictionary Challenge? This fortnight's challenge is the letter J with no twist. As you by now know, my dictionary is a 1970's French-English dictionary and the word I have chosen is the joyful sounding  joujou meaning small toy or plaything.

A little bit of fun - a yo yo hanging from the pointing finger...

I've been looking for a place to use my noughts and crosses stamp for ages!

Another clean and simple page from me - mainly because I've been up against it time wise but also because the vintage image (downloaded form The Graphics Fairy) kind of speaks for itself.

Thank you for visiting.

G is for... Guirlande

As I'm sure you can tell from the title, it is time for another entry for The Craft Barn's Dictionary Challenge. This time it is letter G with no twist.

As you know I am using a French-English dictionary and so I have chosen the word Guirlande which means garland or wreath.

Quite a simple page this time with not too much dimension. It is getting quite difficult to work on the pages in the book now as the pages are no longer lying flat. All the elements for this design were made off-page using die cuts (Memory Box Grapevine Wreath for the wreath and Tim Holtz's Tattered Flower Garland for the flowers). See how considered this page was? - "Wreath" and "garland" dies - all totally deliberate! ;0)

The cardstock is all core'dinations and the red flowers were embossed with a text embossing folder.

The gems are from Kaisercraft but have been toned down a little with some Butterscotch Alcohol Ink.

Thanks for looking, hope to catch up with you soon.

Z is for ... Zingaro

How quickly these fortnights come round!

It's time for another entry for The Craft Barn's Dictionary Challenge. The latest challenge letter is Z, with no twist. Another easy choice for me as there were very few words to choose from. If you remember I am using an old French-English dictionary so I have gone for the romantic sounding Zingaro meaning Gypsy.

Another outing for the sweet Molly Blooms gypsy stamp (MB-0226I), but rather than colouring her with my usual Copics I have stamped her on watercolour paper and coloured her with Caran D'ache Neocolor IIs, in an attempt to try and get a more vintage feel to a not very vintage image.

I have kept to my usual colour palette and re-introduced some washi tape to ground the image, a smattering of Lavinia Stamps toadstools adds to the gypsy feel.

Thank you for looking.

O is for... Oiseau

Hello there!

Time for another entry for The Craft Barn's Dictionary Challenge. (My don't these fortnights come round quickly!) This time it is the letter O - with no twist.

An easy pick for me this time round. As I'm using a French-English dictionary (and if you know me well) my O word could only be Oiseau - which is French for bird.

Put my love of all things birdy together with my Inkadinkado "Bijoux oiseaux" stamps (gem stone birds) and we have an un-ashamedly simple entry for the challenge.

I have taken these pics under a halogen light to get the effect of the gold embossing, but it seems to have bleached the colour a little... any way here are my pages.

I've kept to my overall feel with this simple gold and red colour palette.

I quite like the peculiar way the embossing powder has clung to the text.

That's all from me, thanks for looking.

Oh yes, a special message to my Craft Barn visitors who use Facebook - sorry I can't leave you any comments, but I always come and look and thank you very sincerely for the lovely comments you leave here.

D is for ... Dirigeable

Hello lovely visitors!

The Junior Moonshine's are enjoying a week with their Grandparents, so I'm making the most of the opportunity to have a bit of Maisie Time and potter about doing nice stuff. So first off the crafting table this week is my latest entry for The Craft Barn's Dictionary Challenge.

This fortnight's challenge is the letter D with no twist. I thought this would be an easy letter - loads of pages with D words, but when I actually came to choose a word (two nights of NOT very inspiring bedtime reading - can you imagine that - taking a French-English dictionary to bed with you - sometimes I must look like a right saddo! - poor Mr M.) I REALLY struggled. Most of the words were either "un verbs" such as undress or virtually impossible to illustrate, such as derouiller - to rub the rust off. So on the second night of tedium I was delighted to come across Dirigeable, which translates as balloon or airship (phew!).

This page is very simple - especially compared with my last tarabiscoter page. The balloon stamps are from Hampton Art and methinks I will be using them again very soon...

up close...

(the birds are Crafty Individuals CI 234)

The large balloon is stamped on to watercolour paper and coloured with Antique Linen, Festive berries and Faded Jeans DIs applied with a water brush.

That's all from me for now, more projects in the pipeline...

Thanks for visiting

T is for... Tarabiscoter

Of course it is!

Good morning and welcome to this fortnight's entry to The Craft Barn's Dictionary Challenge. I am using an old French-English dictionary and although there are pages and pages of  T words, my shortlist was very short indeed. I had a final choice of three words, tournesol (sunflower), tissuterie (ribbon weaving), or my final choice tarabiscoter meaning to overdecorate, to over-elaborate. (Actually I could have gone with tampon meaning rubber stamp, but thought it might be misinterpreted!)

So, having chosen tarabiscoter (once again because I like to choose something a bit different if I can and I like the sound of the word) I have gone all out for overdecorating my page - whilst still producing something that is

1. reasonably pleasant to look at 
2. flat enough to let me close the book!

Here it is...

Some detail shots...

Thought you might like to know how overdecorated this page is, so here are the layers that went to make up the page:

1. Layer of Antique Linen DI - as per all my pages
2. Frayed Burlap DI pressed through That Special Touch - Ivy Background
3. Gathered Twigs DI Harlequin stamp
4. Walnut Stain DI  CArt Us - Birds on Branch stamp
5. Frayed Burlap DI  Craft Stamper freebie - Tempus fugit text stamp
6. Gold embossed Artemio Flourish stamp - I'd forgotten how much fun heat embossing is!
7. Rayher decoupage motif, embellished with Cinnamon Stickles
8. Papermania adhesive star gems
9. Eyelet with gem embellished tassel
10. Lace bow with 2 heart stick pins
11. Crafty Individuals birdcage charm
12. Red pheasant feathers

I'm quite pleased with how this page has evolved, I've managed to stay true to my vintage colour palette with the odd red highlight and it certainly has a vintage feel to it!

I haven't tried closing the book - but I think it might be a bit tricky!

Oh yes - for those who are regular visitors, it saddens me to report that Youyou "Escape" is listing heavily to starboard with all hands lost :0(

Thanks for taking the time to visit.

Y is for... Youyou (what else?)

OK, so it's time to post my latest entry for The Craft Barn's Dictionary Challenge, and this fortnight's challenge letter is the letter Y - with the twist (gee thanks!) that we had to use the colour Yellow - you see what they did there, don't you?

Letter Y, fine - it had to come sooner or later, didn't it? But what a STINKER. By now you will probably know that I am using an old (1979) French-English Dictionary, so my chosen words are all French. I've got to say, this is the first time I was tempted to cheat and go for a word from the English-French end of the dictionary! I had a total of 18 words to choose from, which when narrowed down to those which were

1. NOT the same word as the English equivalent
2. NOT a town
3. Something I had actually heard of and so had a chance of depicting

I was left with 2 words, yeux (eyes) and youyou. Throw in the yellow twist and short of trying to make some jaundiced eyes in to a reasonable page I was really only left with the wonderful sounding youyou.

The OTHER problem I had with this page is that there are so few Y and Z words in the dictionary that I can't give each letter its own page as I have with the letters completed so far, so I only had a space roughly 2.5w x 3h inches to play with...NIGHTMARE!

"So what is a youyou?" I here you cry, it is (of course) a... dinghy. I am sure that TECHNICALLY it is a rubber dinghy, which, whilst it would have worked brilliantly with the yellow twist, I couldn't for the life of me work out how I was going to make. I have opted instead for a sailing dinghy, cunningly contrived in origami, with a yellow sail and jaunty blue flag. I hope you like it - 'cos it was a right fiddle to make!

The definition - just to prove I'm not making it up!

Some close ups...

I name this ship...

So there you have it, a teeny tiny youyou - I tell you what - if nothing else, this challenge has been an education!

Thanks for visiting, please let me know you came and I'll try and reciprocate.

B is for .... Bimbelot

Hello again!

It is time for another submission for The Craft Barn's Altered Dictionary Challenge.

This week's chalenge is the letter B with no twist. I was spoiled for choice for words this time around, even though I am using a French-English dictionary. I finally decided to go with bimbelot meaning knick-knack. Why? Because it is such a lovely word - in both languages - and you can't beat a bit of crafty knick-knackery now can you?

So here is my offering...

The table is a digi download from Free Vintage Digital Stamps (click here to go there), which I coloured with Copics. The knick-knacks are as follows:

Lamp and bird cage - Papermania Signature Vinyls Vintage Decor 1 and 2
Cameo - Pink Paislee Phantom stamps coloured with Copics
Vase - Plastic tube with mulberry paper roses
Bird - bead from Spellbound beads (here)

I'm quite pleased with how these pages turned out, especially with the 3D look of the piece, that table looks as though it is popping out of the page.

Thanks for looking, please leave a comment so that I know you came.

U is for... Urbain

Good afternoon all.

Now don't fall over with shock... but I have finished my entry for week 12 of The Craft Barn's Dictionary challenge - AND it was only posted yesterday!

This week's challenge is the letter U - no twist this time - the letter is challenge enough!

I have decided to go for Urbain in my French/English Dictionary which translates - not surprisingly as "Urban, pertaining to town life".  So here it is...

Some detail shots...

The Crafty Individuals CI 274 stamps were the perfect choice!

I stamped the "town" street three times and the "village" street once onto super smooth cardstock with Jet Black Archival ink. Then using a fine paintbrush, a little water and various DIs (Antique Linen, Gathered Twigs, Pumice Stone, Black Soot, Tattered Rose, Faded Jeans, Shabby Shutters, Dried Marigold and Fired Brick) I "watercolour" painted the various houses, trying to make them all different.

I then fussy cut them out (you will notice a certain lack of chimney pots!) After the bottom tier of houses I cut up between the buildings to break up the repeat, and then adhered them to the page with  a strip of hi-tack tape along the bottom of each row of buildings. Leaving the tops unattached, I hope, gives an impression of depth - and that there might be streets running between the houses.

This was a fun - yet fiddly - page which, on the whole, I'm quite pleased with and it was nice to get these stamps out again!

Off to link now - have a happy and creative day.



P.S. New post over at my gardening blog Maisie, Maisie, Garden Crazy  if you fancy a peep at my "outside studio".