Woodware Design Team - Sketch Challenge 14

Hi Everyone.....!! Yes I am back. I have had a bit of time away from my craft room. As some of you know I had a few months of not feeling very well and everying was getting a little too much. Dorothy kindly gave me a month off the Woodware team and I resigned from some other commitments. I am starting to feel better and I am recently back from two weeks holiday in Harris. My son leaves for Canada in two weeks time so we have also been helping him get all his belongings back home. I am trying to get my head round to the fact that he could be away for a couple of years and may even settle out there if things work out. Thank goodness for e-mail and Skype, at least it will be easier to keep in touch.

Anyway to cut a long story short, I am back and hope to catch up with a lot of my favourite blogs and try and get back into crafting over the next few weeks. Thanks for those of you who sent lovely e-mails to wish me well. They really cheered me up. And a big thanks to the lovely Kim Reygate who filled in for me at Woodware during June. Her samples were all gorgeous.

This week at Woodware it's a sketch challenge and I am first to kick off!! All this football is taking it's toll. As I write this hubby is next door about to watch the European cup final ... best to stay out of the way I think.
Here is the sketch :

And here is my sample : 

I missed the metal challenge last week so I thought I would have a go using metal for my background. I used aluminium tape bought from a DIY superstore. I applied it to a sheet of card stock and then added lines and rivets etc with some metal tools. I covered the whole panel with brown and black alcohol inks and then sanded it to reveal this cool effect. I wanted it to look a bit like the metal on the side of a ship. 

The Stampendous steam boat CRP 155 was the perfect image for my focal point. I silver embossed some  metal cogs from another Stampendous set Steampunk Gears SSC 1143 on the black strip of card.

I added a Happy Birthday and some black nail heads (silver ones coloured with a black permanent marker) for the finishing touch.

I have just noticed my steam boat is listing a bit!!

Hope you all have a good week.

Siobhan x