Love's light wings

Hello and welcome - it's lovely to have your company for a while here at Words and Pictures.  What a weekend it's been!

I'm still on a Romeo and Juliet kick at the moment, though in slightly merrier mood than before!  But the primary inspiration for this tag was the genius of the Funkie Junkie herself, Linda Coughlin, and her 12 Tags of Christmas challenge, sponsored by The Funkie Junkie Boutique. The R&J quote just turned out, in the end, to be the right words to go with what I'd created.  Let me show you...

Once a week, between now and the 17th December, Linda is offering up an inspirational tag from which you can leap off in any direction you like.  

You can play the challenges in any order, at any time you like up until the deadline - Tag 2 has already appeared, but I'm on catch up with week 1 for now. This is the glorious tag Linda created to start us off.  

I did mention she's a genius, didn't I?!  If you've never visited her blog, The Funkie Junkie, or the Frilly and Funkie challenge blog - go now!

Some of what I've chosen to play with, inspired by Linda's tag, is pretty obvious, as are some of the changes.  I love the pinky-browns of hers, but whenever I do pink, it seems to go all girly - not what I like at all, so in the interests of staying happy I swung to my favourite blues!

I loved the embossed stars, so I decided I would have some embossed embellishments, and although the heart with wings is a popular motif in Craftyblogland, I'd never played with one - so I decided it was time to break that duck. 

I also wanted to include some of the lovely baroque flourishes in the background, but went about it slightly differently.  And the general levels of sparkle are not in my usual style - but I decided to give them a go!

The one thing I was unequivocally pleased with in my Romeo and Juliet journal pages was the background, so I decided to play in a similar way on this tag.  

I collaged text and music onto the tag, and then wrinkled tissue paper into the spaces between.   The whole thing then got a coat of gesso to tie it all together.

As I said, I wanted to use some flourishes to echo Linda's lovely glittery ones - but I decided to dry-emboss mine using the Tim Holtz Texture Trades flourish from the French Connection trio of baby embossing folders.  

I love that the text is still so present within the texture of the embossing - text and texture... what more could a girl want?!

I rubbed Rock Candy Stickles into the raised landscapes of the tissue paper, and then brushed on some Perfect Pearls mica powder - I love the lustre of this... it gleams with a kind of other-worldly beauty.









I love how it looks at this stage.  I'm definitely going to do this again and stick to the white palette at some point, but it was just a little too ethereal for me in today's mood.

Today, I wanted colour!

I am so happy that the mica gleam survived being blended over with the Chipped Sapphire DI.  And the flourishes got a fingertip-full of Frayed Burlap Distress Stickles each, for extra glamour.

The hearts are made out of Grungeboard (Tim Holtz), as I knew I'd be hitting them with lots of paints, inks and textures.  They're cut with a Sizzix die, and then embossed with the Music Notes Texture Fade folder (Tim Holtz - need you ask?).  

I started with a coat of white acrylic, then built up via Pumice Stone to Chipped Sapphire DI.  Finally they got heat-embossed with some StarDust embossing powder my sister-in-law passed on to me.

I don't have any wings in my stash, but one of the other folders in the French Connection trio is a wing, so I embossed that onto some Grungeboard twice, and cut them out.  

(It does mean that officially one of them is 'debossed', as you have to turn one over to get a symmetrical pair!)

And then the quote... I was tempted to follow Linda in that too - Holy Night is simply one of the most glorious Christmas songs of all time.  And the blues seemed night-timey.  I toyed with Silent Night for a while (one of the few to top Holy Night in my Christmas charts!) but in the end, I'm not quite ready to give in to Christmas fully yet.  (Yes, I know - what am I doing playing the 12 Tags of Christmas then?  But it does say you're allowed to take the inspiration in any direction...)





And I am still very wrapped up in A Tender Thing, the Romeo and Juliet adaptation I've been talking about.  In fact I'm back to Stratford upon Avon tomorrow to see it through to Press Night. So what with the wings and all the sparkling going on... this quote became inevitable!


I had great fun colouring some of the seam binding with Chipped Sapphire and Dusty Concord and then fraying the ends - romantically shabby chic, and very pleasing to me!

So from the vulnerable and raw state I found myself in, this weekend of crafting time has restored me to a sense of calm and well-being.  

It started with working through some of the turmoil in the journal pages; took a huge step in a very good direction reading your comments, and hearing the positivity of your support, for which I was very thankful; and that led to the 'postcard of gratitude', which gave me such joy in the making... and now I'm even prepared to look on the bright (and sparkling) side of love, with one of the strongest statements about the power of love you could find.

With Love's light wings did I o'erperch these walls,
For stony limits cannot hold love out,
And what Love can do, that dares Love attempt,
Therefore, thy kinsmen are no stop to me.
Romeo and Juliet
William Shakespeare

I'm entering this in the following:
The Funkie Junkie's three month 12 Tags of Christmas challenge - Tag 1
Simon Says Stamp and Show are doing it For the Love of Sparkle this week
Anything But a Card have just, very helpfully, started a new theme called Shiny, Sparkly, Blingy 
That Craft Place Challenge would like us to Make Your Own Background - done!
And finally, I'd like to share my lightened heart with Hels Sheridan and her Sunday Stamper challenge Happy Heart.  As the last paragraph of the post says, being able to craft in itself is what has made my heart happy this weekend.