First Christmas Card of 2023

 I love the stencil which was the November 2022 Clarity New Design Club offering and decised to use it all over this card.

Four Seasons Greetings

I decided to create four different seasons using just one stamp - the November 2022 Clarity Crafts New Design Club offering.

WOYWW 709: Back To Work

 Happy New Year everyone - I can hardly believe it's the first desk share of 2023 but as I am back in work today I have to lol.  Please visit Julia at Stamping Ground to find out more about WOYWW and join in with us all.

My desk today shows the new 1.0 generic reading glasses I have sorted between cataract surgeries for helping with marking, crafting and working on the computer.
Stoke City have lost their last home game of 2022 and their first of 2023 so I am consoling myself with a mug showing one of their best wins ever (sorry Helen).

This is the card I made using the die which was on my desk last week.

I am back working on a #dailydrawing2023 although I may have to catch up in February when I am hoping to have my second cataract operation.  I did catch up with the #dailychallenge2022 and you can see the remaining pages HERE if you haven't already seen them on FB.

So Happy WOYWW everyone.  I am hoping to be able to more than a generic comment this week when I visit.

Happy Birthday Mum

 It seems appropriate that the first card I made post my cataract surgery was a birthday card for my Mum as the last one I made before was a birthday card for my husband.  Their birthdays bookend the festive season.

Happy Birthday Hubby!

Being on Christmas Eve, my husband's birthday is always the first celebration over Christmas.  This was the last card I made before my cataract surgery earlier in the week.

Happy New Year - The Final Daily Journal Round Up from 2022

 Welcome to my first post of 2023 and the final round up of the #dailychallenge2022 that I managed to complete.  I have decided to do some drawing again in 2023 so have sorted a year's worth of prompts, two sketch books, a number of black Posca pens and will give it a go.  I may have to take a break after my second cataract operation but will endeavour to keep up as much as I can.  As always these pages were completed using Clarity Words stickers from one of their five collections.

I continued the festive theme for the rmainder of the year.

I also confess to pre-preparing the next few pages as I had my first cataract operation on 19th December.

Back to the daily pages from this point onwards.

Hubby's birthday.

A quiet family dinner together.

For my Mum on her birthday (not the correct year).

Grateful for belated Christmas presents from the extended family.

And for all my friends.

I finished the year with Studio Light die cuts.

I did it.  I refuse to leave 2022 with regrets but look forward to 2023.

New Year, New Beginnings - A Pair of Tags

This fortnight's  prompt over on Tag Tuesday is New Year, New Beginnings and I went with a Spring theme and made two tags.  I found the perfect background on my inky paper pile.

Cover a #8 manilla tag with the top layer of a piece of inky paper towel, seal with matte medium, dry and trim the excess.

Add one of the eggs from the Clarity Chicks and Eggs stamp set in Ground Espresso archival ink.

Stamp one of the chicks from the same set on top of the egg in Black Soot archival ink.

Add shading to the images using Faber-Castell big brush markers, blended out with a Pergamano blending pen and nibs.

Add yellow flock to the chick using a quickie glue pen and yellow fun flock powder.

Add a glaze to the eggs and the beak of the chick using a clear embossing pen and heat emboss in clear embossing powder. To finish, add the Clarity Spring stamp (NDC #100) in Onyx Black Versafine ink and heat emboss in clear powder. Colour using Faber-Castell big brush markers.

Cover a #8 manilla tag with another section of the top layer of the same piece of inky paper towel as before, seal with matte medium, dry and trim the excess.

Stamp some of the Wee Foliage stamps at the bottom using Library Green, Peat Moss, Ground espresso and Black Soot archival inks.

Add the foliage from the Birdhouse Garden stamp set at the top in the same manner.

Add one of the bunnies from the stamp set of the same name at the bottom in Ground Espresso archival ink.

Stamp the same bunny onto Clarity stencil card in the same ink.

Colour with a Faber-Castell Albrecht Dürer water colour pencil scribbled on the Pergamano mix mat and picked up with a watercolour brush pen.

Fussy cut (taking off the whiskers, edge with a brown brush pen and add to the tag.

To finish, add the Clarity Time for Something New stamp (NDC #113) in Onyx Black Versafine ink and heat emboss in clear powder. Colour using Faber-Castell big brush markers.

NB For those not sure what an inky paper pile is.  I keep all my sheets of copy paper and paper towels that I have used to mop up ink off blending mats, cleaning stamps and stencils and removing excess ink/paint from brayers.