Music and Dance

Our August challenge at the Berkhamsted Creative Challenge is "Music and Dance".

I made these bunting pieces while away. This meant I had to pack up some of my crafting stash to take with me, and this is what I took.

Pretty restrained, I think!

This is everything packed into it...

.... and unpacked.

The only other thing I brought was a heat tool, although I could have managed without. And I have had plenty of fun playing with this selection, I quite pleased with my capsule craft stash.

I brought:

• Distress oxides
• Permanent inks in a range of colours
• Brushos
• Distress markers
• Stamps - Clarity alphabet, music notation and a Christmas set
• Stencils - music, brick, a few Clarity petite stencils
• A4 cutting mat with copier paper
• A4 blending mat
• Ruler
• Spritzer bottle
• My bag of tools - knife, pencil, scissors etc
• Acrylic block
• Sponges
• Watercolour card, stencil card, some previously made backgrounds

I have to confess that I also bought quite a lot of craft things whilst away, but all I used for this was a white pen and water pen, both of which fitted in the tool bag. I also have to confess that I struggled to get everything back into the box when I'd finished - I couldn't remember how it had all gone in so it wasn't quite so neat!

So, getting started with the bunting. At the Clarity Open Day in June, Sam Crowe mentioned that she makes bunting with her spare gel plate pieces, and I thought that would be a great idea. This is the first I've done about it though. We have a new shed in the garden, so if I can get a few more pieces done they'll look good on there (with exterior mod podge to protect them).

I used watercolour card, the music stamp and distress oxides - vintage photo and broken china.

I then spritzed with water to "activate" the inks.

This is it wet - the vintage photo in particular reacts and spreads.

Once dry (I made good use of the sunny windowsills in our cottage) the chalkiness has come out - I think this looks great for a background.

I cut the bunting shape. (I have made myself a template so all my pieces will be the same size. It is 14cm wide by 17cm high, chosen to ensure I can use both A5 and 7x7 backgrounds.)

I blended round the edge with vintage photo, and dragged the pad round the edge as well.

To fill in the gaps at the top and bottom, I used the petite leafy swirl stencil from Clarity, and the broken china distress oxide on a sponge. I did a little in the centre as well.

Finally, I stamped the word "Music" in stazon spiced chai, using the Clarity alphabet stamps.


For the dance piece, I started with a scrap piece I'd made from the left over ink from another project I was working on simultaneously (I was having a real full-on crafternoon, it was great!)

This uses fired brick and fossilised amber distress oxides.

I cut the triangle, then stamped my ballerinas. These come from a "Twelve days of Christmas" stamp set.

I stamped them in vintage photo distress oxide, then use the water pen to blend out the hair. I then added some coloured ink to the blending mat and picked it up with the water pen to paint in the dress. This one is broken china, the others are wilted violet and fossilised amber. The colours mixed with the vintage photo to give gorgeous shades.

I stamped the word "DANCE" with Claret stazon.

To fill the top right corner, which looked a little neglected, I sponged through a music stencil with fossilised amber and fired brick. I blended vintage photo round the edge, and dragged the ink pad along the edges.

It needed a little something else, so I looked at my stamps to find something suitable. At home, that would probably have taken half an hour to choose what to use, but the very limited range I had available streamlined the process. I chose a bow from the Twelve Days of Christmas set, and stamped around the edge in fired brick - mostly off the edge so it looks like loops. I also did some second generation stamping in the centre, for more interest.

So, the first two pieces of bunting finished. I'll punch holes in the corners and varnish, then when I have enough I'll string them up on the shed.

I don't think they'll all be this detailed - the idea is to use up my stash, so I hope a lot will just be a matter of cutting the triangles, with the odd finishing touch.

But I'm really pleased with how these have come out - I had a lot of fun trying different things with my distress oxides, I'm already looking at which ones to get next, probably from the new colour range. And a suitable celebration of music and dance for our Berkhamsted Creative Challenge.