Sunday Stampers Week 223 - Ribbon

Hello lovely blog friends

I would like to say a big welcome to my new followers and to my blog friends who take the time to look at my blog and leave me such lovely comments, you will never know how much it means to me - thank you!

This week Hels at http://pinkleart.blogspot.co.uk has set us the challenge based on 'Tie a yellow ribbon' and as ever, I have taken her quite literally with my entry.  I have tried really hard to do a bit of grunge but I don't think I have quite achieved it yet but I still keep practising.........

I have used my new stamp from Inkylicious, called Memoirs of a Lady.  When I saw this stamp I just had to have it.  It is one of the largest stamps I own and it is not easy to stamp and get a clear image with my dodgy wrists but here she is in all her glory:

Apologies for the shadows, it is bucketing down with rain at the moment and it has gone very dark outside.

I started with a No. 10 Manila Tag by Ranger and cut off a piece about 2 inches from the bottom.  Hels and her good friend Ellen did some tags a few weeks ago with a hinged bottom and in order to accommodate the whole stamp I did the same.  The holes are covered with eyelets from my Crop-o-dile set and I coloured them with gold mixative alcohol ink.  The pieces are linked with TH jump rings.

The image was stamped with Black Archival ink,  the face is coloured with spun sugar DI, the eyes with broken china and the lips with festive berries.  I masked off the face and coloured the rest of the tag with spun sugar and squeezed lemonade DI and a touch of wild honey and did all around the edges with vintage photo.  I then heavily distressed the edges of both pieces with a distressing tool and put a couple of rips in and then distressed again with black soot.

Her head looked a little bare, hence the butterfly.  The butterfly was coloured with dustry concorde and then I overlaid another butterfly cut from Clearly for Art and coloured with alcohol inks in cranberry red, sailboat blue and gold mixative.  I heat set it so that the wings looked more realistic. The dusty concorde beneath still shows through and makes it look purple.  I finished off the butterfly with an old pen nib from my stash (a purchase from a well know auction site).

The word strip is a Tim Holtz Idea-ology piece and says 'dream as if you'll live forever' and I covered this with a picket fence paint dabber and then rubbed off the excess.  I coloured the rose ribbon strip at the bottom, the lace and the vintage ribbon at the top of the tag with squeezed lemonade DI mixed with a touch of wild honey.

I think it has turned out more shabby chic than grunge but as I say, I will keep trying - I think my biggest problem is that I love colour so much it just feels wrong not to use it on everything. Is there any hope for me?

I hope that you will leave me a comment if you do visit, I love to read them and I will always try to return the compliment.  Crafty hugs, Anne x