Playing with grunge paste

Last weeks two very interesting courses for my work kept me very busy. I did not have time for crafting. Now these courses have finished, there is time again to get out the stamps, Fresco Finish Paints, and Grunge Paste. I watched all Leandra's videos on youtube about Grunge Paste. Of course, I had to try myself on a tag. This is the result.


I used a stencil with leaves. The right branch is applied directly on the tag, and I painted over it. This layer was probably too thin, I could not get the white back. For the left branch, I coloured some grunge paste with Hyde Park, and applied this on top of the paint. Here, I used more Grunge Paste, and the result is better.

Secret Garden

This weekend Ineke and I went to England to visit London and to attend Linda Brown's Secret Garden class.

Ineke had never been to London, so we googled for a walk that would show us the important places in central London. We walked along Trafalgar Square, London Eye, the Houses of Parliament, the Horse Guards, Buckingham Palace, Regent Street and Oxford Street. It was quite a long walk, but well worth it!

On Sunday we attended the Secret Garden class. We selected this class because we wanted to learn how to better use the Fresco Finish paints. It took some effort to get a place in this class, but with some help from Linda we managed. Linda thank you again! We learned a lot and had a lot of fun!

This is my final piece:

Inspired by Helen Chilton

This week Helen Chilton was guest designer at the Paperartsy Blog again. She made a very nice masculine hanging board. I used the same colour scheme to create this tag.

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The background is made with Fresco Finish Acrylic Paints Guacamole and Sky. The swirls is one of my favourite stamps from Stampers Anonymous. The swirls, the man and the crossword puzzle (Paperartsy Gentlemen Plate 2) are stamped with Sepia Archival ink.

On this tag I used Tim's Kraft Glassine Paper. I bought this kraft paper some time ago, but I did not know how to use it. This week's post on the Paperartsy blog and Tim's instruction video gave me some inspiration.

I stamped the leaf (Paperartsy Letters Plate 4) on Kraft Glassine Paper. I then crumpled the paper and applied perfect pearls. The purple piece of kraft paper was embossed with an embossing folder full of numbers. I then coloured it with Lilac Fresco Finish Acrylic Paint and Dusty Concord Distress Ink. The two pieces of kraft paper on the corners are crumpled first, and then coloured with Limelight and Beach Hut Fresco Finish Acrylic Paints, just as Helen did.

The text on the tag says General Failure, but for me it was not! It was fun to try out the Kraft Glassine Paper. I very much like the result with perfect pearls.

Birthday card

I enjoyed the video about the Paperartsy Crackly Tissue Paper. We do not have this stuff (yet?), so I tried this technique using filigree paper, the paper between sheets in a photo album. It worked out quite well, the only thing is that it crinkles a little when wet. In the end, I am quite satisfied with the result.

The stamp I used on this birthday card is from the Paperartsy Hot Picks 1007 sheet.

London Bridge Tag

This week the challenge at the Paperartsy Blog is to use Paperartsy stamps, and Fresco Paints together with metal. A great opportunity to try out the translucent paints that I ordered and received this week.

I coloured a tag with London Bus, then coated it with Crackle Glaze. Once that was dry, I put a thick layer of Baltic Blue on it. It immediately started to crackle, and some large cracks appeared. Wonderful! I love the bright red colour of the cracks.

In the bottom left corner, I played with Zesty Zing and Beach Hut. It created a nice opaque green colour, not exactly what I intended, but not too bad for a first time... The man is from the Hot Pick 1110 sheet. I first applied some Snowflake so that his face would not be too green...

The London Bridge is a stamp from Crafty Individuals, that I stamped with Stazon on metal. I then coloured the picture with Chocolate Pudding, Beach Hut, and South Pacific. I created some depth by puffing the bridge from the back.

Down under

In November and December, we went on a vacation to Australia and New Zealand. We had a wonderful time! This blog post about our trip is for our English speaking friends.

We started in Sydney, and walked along all the city highlights such as the Opera House, Harbour Bridge, the Rocks and Darling Harbour.

We also went to the Blue Mountains. We went to Melbourne by night train, and from there we went to Tasmania. On Tasmania we rented a car and drove around this very beautiful island. We walked in Cradle Mountain NP and had a very sunny day in Strahan on the Gordon River.

After Tasmania, we went back to Melbourne and did a day trip along the Great Ocean Road and Shipwreck Coast. Again we had beautiful weather and made lots of photos!

The next week we stayed in the Red Centre, where is was quite hot (40-45°C). We started in Alice Springs, went to King´s Canyon, and of cource to Uluru (Ayers Rock) and Kata Tjuta (the Olgas). The distances and emptiness were very impressive!

Our last week in Australia we joined a cruise on the Great Barrier Reef with the Coral Princess. Three days of snorkeling in marvellous reefs. We have seen a lot of fish and very beautiful coral.

Then we headed to Christchurch, New Zealand by Air New Zealand. On the plane, every passenger was watching the safety announcements, done by crew members dressed as elfs, dwarfs and hobbits from Middle Earth!

We stayed a day in Christchurch. The CBD is still fenced off, we could see the damage done by the 2011 earthquake. A corridor is made to Cathedral Square, so we could see the damage done to the cathedral. It is a pity... Everywhere buildings are being demolished. We had a pizza on the Mall where containers are used for shops.

We rented a car and left for a three week's drive through the South and North Island. We went to Mount Cook, and Dunedin. We drove around Otago Peninsula, where we visited the Albatross Centre. There we saw a lot of big birds. From Dunedin we drove to Te Anau. We had very good weather in the Milford Sound, which is rather exceptional.

We stayed a day in Queenstown, and then continued to the West Coast. We walked to Franz Josef Glacier.

The next day it rained, so we did not see very much on our route to Westport. We only stopped here at the Punakaiki Pancake Rocks.

In Motueka we had a day off before leaving to Picton. We were lucky to catch the morning ferry to Wellington, so we had the afternoon to walk around Wellington and visit the Te Papa museum.

The next day we headed to Tongariro NP, with the three volcanoes. From there we drove along lake Taupo to Rotorua. This is the area with the hot pools and thermal valleys. We made several stops, also at Wai-O-Tapu. Geothermal Wonderland.

We enjoyed the Coromandel where we stayed in Whitianga. Here we went to Hot Water Beach and walked to Cathedral Cove. Again we had beautiful weather.

Next we went to Northland via Takapuna and Paihia. In Paihia we went to the Waitangi Treaty Grounds and enjoyed a Maori Cultural performance.

We ended our trip in Auckland, we we stayed four days. We had a lovely time down under. Although the weather was too cold and wet for the kiwis, for us it was warm enough with an average of 20-25°C to walk in shorts and T-shirts every day!

There are still parts of NZ we have not visited, so we might go back in the future.

Mechanical Man

I am a big fan of Paperartsy. I have lots of their stamps and some 30 bottles of Fresco Finish Chalk Acrylics. Therefore, I am very excited about everything that currently goes on on their blog.

On this card I managed to get a nice crackled background. Believe it or not, this was the first time it worked out so good! Thanks to a tutorial on the Paperartsy Youtube channel.

The mechanical man is stamped on acetate and coloured the back with Pansy so that it shows up against the background. A nice tip given by Helen Chilton last week!

The cogs are from a metal sheet. I coloured them with French Roast and Claret, which gives a rusty look.