Why Do Printers Hate Me? Oh, and Tulips by Bonnie Lavish Kits......

When I moved into my new workshop I decided to donate my HP all in one printer to the family once and for all. That printer hated me from day one and never worked when I needed it to so I was glad to see the back of it. Plus it's huge and glowers at me and I wanted a petit user friendly one with which I could become friends.

So I bought a compact Epson one. We had an Epson many years ago and I am sure I got on with that one. This afternoon with the rain battering down I decided to set up the new printer to work with my Mac. Well suffice to say I am not at all convinced this blooming printer is going to like me anymore than the HP.

Only time will tell!!

I have, however, managed to make some tulips. I am a huge fan of the kits by Bonnie Lavish who has unfortunately for all of us recently retired. Good job I have quite a few tucked away!!

 They are very easy to understand and each pack contains everything you need, well except for the fingers of a pianist and patience!! I have started to only buy kits in white as they can be painted whatever colour you fancy.

 I have used a pale pink acrylic wash and then tipped each petal with a pink watercolour pencil for added effect. No matter how basic the flower kit is, they are still fiddly and I 'lost' two of the stamens and tulip heads due to over washing and rather too casual knife skills.

 This has still left me with ten tulips which I think is very good value from a kit that was about a fiver I think. I also washed the leaves in two different green acrylic washes and sealed everything with a matt acrylic varnish/sealer before I curled them all with a ball stylus. I stupidly glued the leaves too far down the stem for tulips, they should really be much closer to the flower head but never mind.

I decided to try out a few of them in a glass beaker with caviar beads for my cake box. I decided to drop Judkins Diamond Glaze on top of the beads to keep them in and provide a glued 'soil' for the tulips. Hmmmm, not sure that worked as well as it might have done. As you can see a few beads have still made there way onto the stems.

One more item for the shelves, although I have painted a flower pot as well for planting so I will make that up with some more of the tulips and then decide which one looks best.

I hope you all have a lovely weekend whether it rains or shines.