less is more: christmas card- use a bird

The theme at Less is more this week is to use a bird on a Christmas card.
For the Christmas cards that I make for my book group each year I try to incorporate book pages somewhere on the card. So, that was what I had in mind while making this.
Also every time I see this leaf die from the grunge flower #1 set from PaperArtsy, it reminds me of a bird, so I thought it was time to try it out in that way.
I have used PaperArtsy paints too. The blood orange (for the red breast) and spiced paprika (for the body) are both translucent so show the words through well. The cinnamon (main body) is semi-opaque, so gives a bit more coverage but not too much. I only applied a tiny amount of the paints, anyway, for a subtle hint of colour.

I drew on the eye and feet with a fine tipped marker.

The words are from PaperArtsy's squiggly ink range.

p.s. sorry, I know it's tuesday, but I have no new chutney recipes this week!

Chutney Tuesday: Persimmon, fresh cranberry and chilli chutney

I didn't even know what persimmons were before I bought the ingredients for this chutney. They had them in asda and I thought they looked interesting. A quick google told me that they were a bit like mangoes so I thought they would be good for chutney. They also had fresh cranberries, so I didn't have to make do with dried ones. Then I saw these skinny green chillies and my ingredients were decided.

during the cooking this chutney looks particularly unappetising. it goes a disgusting shade of pale pink and turns scummy, but keep going, it sorts itself out in the end.

Watch this one carefully for burning. I don't know why but this one seemed to try to burn a lot more than other recipes I have done.

makes approx 9-10 200ml jars.
ingredients:

2 tbls veg oil
6 small persimmons (approx 1kg)
fresh cranberries (300g)
1 large cooking apple (420g)
2 white onions (approx 400g)
350ml cider vinegar (350ml is one bottle of asda own brand)
350g white granulated sugar
6 thin green chillies
1 clove garlic
1/2 inch fresh ginger
2 tsp ground coriander
2 tsp ground cumin

dice apples, onions and persimmons. finely chop garlic and ginger. finely slice chillies.

fry onions until starting to soften. add chillies, garlic, ginger and spices until thorougly soft.
add persimmon, apple and whole cranberries and cook for 2 more minutes turning all of the time.

add vinegar and sugar, cover and cook for 5 minutes until fruit looks soften abd cranberries split.
cook uncovered until jammy in appearance and a spoon can be dragged through leaving a clear channel (about 30 mins)

transfer to sterlised jars and store.

my third week as guest designer at PaperArtsy

This week on the PaperArtsy blog (here, here and here) I have concentrated on making cards suitable for batch-making for christmas.
Don't forget to take part in the challenge to win stamps! there's still time

less is more- photo inspirations

This week at Less is more, we are challenged to use this photo

to inspire our use of dark card with a splash of colour.

I made a simple heart stencil from post-it notes and then stamped through it using the small splatter stamp from this paperartsy set and some opaque paints from the fresco range of paints (I used guacamole, sky and cheesecake)


I finished by stamping the sentiment with cheesecake paint.

PaperArtsy opaque paints, work brilliantly on dark card, and a lovely to stamp with.