SS and SSS Challenges!

Hello lovely bloggers

This week at Sunday Stampers Challenge, Week 225, which is run by the uber talented Hels Sheridan and whose details can be found at http://pinkleart.blogspot.co.uk, is 'What Makes You Happy?'   Well I just love this time of year, Autumn is by far my favourite season and it makes me happy to see all the glorious colours of the trees when they change.  We are lucky to live beside a mill pond which is surrounded by gorgeous chestnut and sycamore trees and they are just starting to change - gorgeous.

At Simon Says Stamp and Show Challenge the theme this week is 'leaf-spiration' which is great for an Autumn theme.  There is a $50 prize voucher from Simon Says Stamp.com - what could be better than that!

The Artistic Stamper Creative Team have 'The Natural World' as their theme and there is a very generous £15 voucher to spend on Artistic Stamper stamps and they include the Kling-on to mount the stamps.  I hope I have included enough stamping to qualify for entry, I do not yet have any AS stamps.

I am entering these challenges.

My last post was an Autumn themed tag and I had a couple of leaves left over.  I had not used my Cuttlebug maple leaf die for years so I wanted to get some more use from it, than just one tag, so I cut a few more leaves and this is what I made:

I covered an 8" x 8" canvas with Adirondak Hazlenut paint dabber and once dried I gave it a good coat of PVA glue.  I wafted this with my heat tool and then immediately coated it all over, including the sides with Expresso coloured acrylic paint and left it to dry.  This gave a lovely weathered wood like texture to the canvas.  I made up some embossing powder by mixing three colours (red, gold and clear shimmer) and edged the canvas with this. I am totally obsessed with Fran-tage at the moment but did not have a gold colour.

The corrugated paper (a gift from my lovely blog friend May) was covered with Picket Fence Distress Stain and then the edges were coated with Antiqued Bronze Distress Stain.  The die cut maple leaves were scrunched up and distressed with Antiqued Bronze stain and Vintage Photo DI.  The oak leaves and acorns were stamped (Creative Expressions), cut out from metal sheet (a gift from my lovely (new to blogging) blog friend Mo), stained with Sunset Orange and Espresso Alcohol Inks.

The toadstools are stamped (Dyan Reaveley), the vintage button is from my stash and the three colours of string are Tim Holtz's Idea-ology paper string. The wording - Everyone must take the time to sit and watch the leaves turn - is computer generated.

If you do visit I hope you will leave me a comment, I love to read them all and will always do my best to return the compliment.  Crafty hugs, Anne xx