Sall the Crafty Baker

It is an all about Nature theme or Anything Goes, you are not obliged to create something that meets the theme, over at  Ike's World Challenges . I have a real passion about animals and nature in general, it's beautiful, awe inspiring and deserves the utmost respect at all times. For this piece I have chosen to use some silhouette images from  Ikes Art .  Unfortunately I had a printing issue so I hid the bad printing by using a Ranger Embossing Pen and embossed over the images of the giraffes. I've used brusho's to create a sunset background and the whole thing has altered a plain brown notebook cover nicely. I added some gems for a nice sparkle.

It's Recycling fortnight at  International Art and Soul  and I've taken the lid from a biscuit tin Nan was gifted at Christmas and glammed it up. I've added glitter and gems to the picture.  I've used the crop o dile to punch holes in the side and use ribbon as a method to hang it up. If using a wet glue as I did I recommend leaving the excess glitter on until the glue has set.

These are using various techniques and a combination of digital and rubber stamps.

I don't write a lot of blog posts about books I read.  I read a LOT of books and quite honestly some aren't worth the energy to put them on the book shelf let alone write about them.  That said recently I stumbled across the Electra Brown series by Helen Bailey.  When I discovered the series I had never heard of Helen or her untimely death.  It was only when I was on the second or third book in the series the news of her tragic death by murder was in the news as her murderer came to trial. The Electra Brown series is aimed at teenagers but there is so much that an adult can take away from the books.  The books for me personally mirrors life in some instances.  There is humour all the way and real laugh out loud moments.  The last book in the series is bittersweet, the content is touching and pulls on your heart strings, I was sobbing for Electra's friend {and her friends family} and at the same time the knowledge that this is going to be the last boo...

It's anything goes with an optional twist of something that screams me over at  Ike's World Challenges:  I like this twist so decided I'd play with it.  I like something unique, unusual and lots of the darker side of craft appeals to me.  I get considerable flack for this, it's too different and too unusual and mostly too far from "normal" cute and cuddly for a lot of people.  The trouble is I don't do "normal" cute and cuddly very well, it never looks natural just as though I've thrown everything at it and tried too hard.  So I feel this says me, I quite often feel as though I'm the brainless zombie pig. Here's lots of close ups and the overall pic:

Hello and Welcome to  International Art and Soul .  Whilst this is a new challenge on the block the team are pro's and very much a little family.  They are starting the challenges with a theme of:  "Love is in the air". Now before I create a soap box about commercialism and the origins of Valentines {which could take days to write and read} I'm just going to say I discarded this idea and decided to go with something I love...craft and in this case the family at International Art and Soul.  I always need a book to organise me so I've altered one to show my love of this new challenge group. The images I have used are from Smeared Ink Rubber Stamps, sadly, as far as I know, they are no longer trading. I am entering in the following challenges: http://dragonflydreamschallenges.blogspot.co.uk/ http://dragonflyjourneys.blogspot.co.uk/