Birthday Boy!

 Good morning and a very happy Wednesday, welcome to March!

After a lovely beginning to February (we were in Tenerife) we've had rather a poor ending as we both have Covid (again!) This time however I passed it on to Neil rather than him giving it to me as a birthday present. I will be able to let this go eventually, but not anytime soon!

Anyway, on to brighter things, it's time for a new challenge over at Country View Crafts, and the lovely Corrie has chosen Birthday Cards, but for a MAN! Yup, the thing all crafters love to make, a birthday card for a man who doesn't want it, already has it, or just can't remember where he put it!

As I've really been feeling quite poorly I haven't been in my craft room for ages. It's also the time of the year when it's soooo cold in there. So on Monday I literally found myself in need of a card for today (Wednesday)

So I decided that I had to keep it simple and pulled out a couple of sheets of designer paper. I knocked them back just a little with some gesso.

I added some stamping and stencilling and made the panels into tags.

These are my stamps, and of course Susan has a brilliant range here in the store. 

So it's over to you now, please join in with our challenge and show us your birthday cards for men,

Have a wonderful March, and thanks so much for looking x

Toxique!

Good morning and a very happy Saturday!

It's new challenge day over at Country View Crafts, and today my lovely teamie Miriam has chosen Halloween or Harvest as the theme. As always at this time of year I had to dig deeply into my stash but as usual Tim Holtz has come to my rescue!

Some of these supplies are nearly as old as me lol.

I made a very simple background with oranges and pinks/purples. 

And this is my Tim Holtz stash. I may have had this embossing folder for years but I think it's the first time it's been out of its packaging! All things Sir Tim can be found here in Susan's store.

I hope you join in with our fun challenge for the chance to win a £20.00 gift certificate.

Have a very happy September, and thanks so much for looking x

The Adventure Begins

 Good morning and a very happy Monday. Today I'm over at Country View Crafts with a journal page for my second "The Leaves Begin To Fall" piece.

We seem to have switched from Summer to full-on Autumn, then back to Summer in the space of a couple of weeks, but it's definitely Autumnal again today!

I started by making my background with a stencil and some distress inks.

Then I die cut, embossed, and coloured lots (and lots) of leaves.

My very happy Crazy Dog is loving playing in the leaves!

And this is what I've used.

Distress Inks here

Tim Holtz stamps here

Sizzix Dies here

Katzelkraft Stamps here

I hope you're enjoying our leaves challenge, and if you haven't already, please join in! If you have, please join in again lol.

Have a wonderful day whatever you're doing, and thanks so much for looking x

Trick Or Treat

 Good morning and a very happy Monday, I hope you've had a great weekend. Today I'm sharing my second 'Halloween make a scene' piece for this month's Country View Crafts challenge. 

Once again it was time to dig out my Tim Holtz dies, and remember a snow globe isn't just for Christmas!

And out from under the bed in the spare room came these! It's mad isn't it, I couldn't wait to buy these a few (maybe 10!!) years ago, but then I never used them.

Embossing folders anyone? I'm ashamed to say that this one has never been out of the packet. I really should use them more often and will try to do so in the future.

So after much cutting, embossing, and a ridiculous amount of faffing we have this! Although not a great fan of Halloween this does make me smile when I see it.

I hope you like it, and that you also join in with our fun challenge. Don't forget, you must be true to our theme to be in with a chance to win a £20 certificate to spend in the shop.

Take care, happy haunting, and happy crafting x

Spirits Take Flight

 Good morning and a very happy Wednesday. Autumn is certainly drawing in now and Halloween is filling the shops. With this in mind, I've made a non-spooky All Hallows Eve journal page using my Lavinia stamps for Ink Art Designs.

I started by making my background with Distress Oxides and stencils on some watercolour paper.

Then I just built up my design using lots of little stamps as well as the large ones. I love this tiny one, as it's a little bit like paint splatters but not as risky lol.

I've stamped the bird from the Crow set onto tissue paper as there was too much texture on my moon to get a good image. It also means that you can reverse the image too. On the right, I've stuck it down with decoupage glue, and the one on the left is decoart ultrafine glitter paint. The paint actually blurs the tissue better than the glue.  The sentiment is also a Lavinia stamp, I've just added an extra 's' to the 'spirit'

I added a few Tim Holtz bats - nothing says Halloween better than bats!

And we're all done! I hope you like it and that you join in with our monthly challenge. As always it's Anything Goes, you just need to use stamps from the ranges that Dot sells here in the store. 

I'm also entering my page into this months Lavinia challenge which is All Hallows Eve. 

Have a very happy week, and thanks so much for looking x

Keeeeeeep Dancing!!!

Good morning and a very happy Thursday.  Welcome to October, one of the best months of the year 'cos it's my birthday month! It's also Halloween, not something that I particularly celebrate as we're quite often on holiday, but guess what, this year we'll be at home, so if anyone is allowed out, we'll have a lantern lit and a spooky welcome awaits lol. The new challenge at Country View Crafts this month is Halloween - make a scene.

Now October is also the month that Strictly begins. My gruesome twosome have been practising the Hokey Cokey and they've put their left arms in!

It just goes to show that you should never get rid of your old Tim Holtz dies. I would have been lost without these as I don't have much of a Halloween stash.

I hope that you like our challenge and join in with us and make a Halloween scene. There's loads more inspiration over on the Country View Crafts blog so please go and check it out.

Thanks so much for looking, take care and have a very happy October x

 

It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year - Again

Good morning and happy Monday. Today I'm over at Ink Art Designs with my first Christmas card of the year.

 I started with a sheet of marbled card that I'd made a while ago. I thought that these were quite icy colours, and I just liked it.

 But just because I like it doesn't mean it all gets to stay! I pushed some embossing ink through a stencil then embossed with some white Frantage powder.  Then I cut into it with a Tim Holtz die. I also inked the edges and embossed with chunky white embossing powder.

Don't you just love these Katzelkraft Grumpy Penguins, they can be found here in the store. I've also used some Tim Holtz stickers and one of my Christmas dies.

When I said this was my first Christmas card of the year it's also my only one so far. I really must get myself in gear and get myself some elves and a production line!

Please join us over at Ink Art Designs and join in with our challenge. All you need to do is link up your stamped project using any stamps from the range that Dot sells in her store. Just click on the link here and you will be whisked across.  https://www.facebook.com/groups/InkArtDesigns/

Have a very happy week, and thanks for looking x

Fabulous at 50

Good morning and happy Sunday. I'm really pleased to be sharing my second project for Country View Crafts 'hand stamped' challenge, and this time it's a birthday card for my brother in law.

Whenever I need a fun birthday card I always seem to reach for my 'crazies' and my favourite Paper Artsy goodies.

 I started by making my background with my lovely bright fresco's and this fun JOFY mini background stamp.

And added some tactful 50's - just in case he'd forgotten!

 Then I cut out some frames and painted these in the same colours, and stamped and painted my sentiment.

Now for the Crazies! I've stamped and die cut the Crazy Dogs and accessories. 

 I've added Glossy Accents for their eyes.

 What's not to love about these guys?

This is one of my favourite sentiments for a birthday card, I think it really packs a punch.

I always love making these cards, they are such fun and never fail to make me smile.

I hope that you play along with our challenge, what's not to enjoy about stamping, it's my favourite crafting thing to do.

I'm entering this into the Craft Stamper TIMI challenge for November.

Have a great week, and thanks very much for looking x

Feelin' Groovy

Good morning and happy Friday, welcome to November and the weekend. There's a fab new challenge over at Country View Crafts which is 'hand stamped'. I'm really happy with this as I can't remember the last thing I did that wasn't based around a stamped image.

 Stamping has always been my first love, and since I got my stamping platform I love it even more. You can't beat the magic of watching embossing powder heat up, and as my drawing would have to improve loads just to be rubbish, I have quite a collection of stamps. 

Neil if you're reading this they are all really old, I've not bought any for years - honest!

Who am I kidding, I don't think he even knows what a blog is, to him it's all just 'messing about on the computer' after I've finished 'messing about with bits of paper' lol.

 I started by making my background. I've used some retro Craftascope stamps. I really like these as you get the outline and the 'solid' stamps so it's really easy to add colour straight from the inkpad. I've used Ranger Archival as they dry really quickly.

 They also have really groovy words - did you see what I did there...

So that's my background all done and trimmed to fit an 8x8 card.

 I wanted to background to stand out and be interesting, and also to let a much smaller focal point stand out, so I die cut some shapes out of a piece of black card.

What's not to love about this fabulous Tim Holtz goat! He's been stamped, coloured, and then cut out with the matching 'hipster' dies.

I cut the black card to exactly(ish) the same size as the background, then stitched it all to my base card. And we're all done, a guy card too, so that's definitely worth double points right?

I hope you like my 'groovy' card, and join in with the fun challenge. Just put your best stamping foot forward and hit the linky.

Have a fun month, and thanks very much for looking x

Beat It!

Good morning and happy Tuesday. It's my turn to host the challenge this month over at Country View Crafts, so I've chosen a theme that I love, which is bokeh. This is the Wiki definition

In photography, bokeh is the aesthetic quality of the blur produced in the out-of-focus parts of an image produced by a lens. Bokeh has been defined as "the way the lens renders out-of-focus points of light". Wikipedia

Well I'm glad we cleared that up! Here's my first piece.

 I made my background piece using a mixture of Distress and Distress Oxides in blues with a little bit of Twisted Citron just because it's my favourite colour at the moment. The twinkly bits are from Brusho 'Sprinkle It's' which are my VERY favourite thing right now. Then I used white gesso and my home made circle stencil to add the bokeh effect.

Then  I chopped a piece out 'cos I decided to make another shaker card, I think I've got that out of my system now for a while thank goodness.

 My nephew plays the drums in a band so I used this very old Sheena set in the cut out piece. The embossing has been done with Moon Glow embossing powders. These must be 15 years old if they're a day but they are still going strong!

 The stencilling has also been done with a Sheena stencil.

 And the Happy birthday sentiment with one of my top three birthday stamps from the man himself.

 I'm almost embarrassed to say, but these are the only 2 stamps I've used from the set. But I don't care, it's been worth every penny just for these 2, they are just so usable and stamp perfectly every time. They just work!

 I though we were all done, but it did look a bit bare, so I added some musical notes from a die that I've had since time began.

So now we're all done! I think I've used this stamp on his card before, but as there will be hard cash enclosed I'm sure he won't mind ;-).

I hope you enjoy our challenge, and join in with us this month. Just make sure to follow the theme and you could win £20 to spend in the store, and also guest design with us for a month.

Have a very happy October and thanks so much for looking x