Fingers crossed

Hello, crafting friends!

It's Mothering Sunday in the UK today so I hope those who are celebrating will be spoilt :) Now, what would I like to do today? Hmm, maybe a little crafting...!

I've spotted some 'lucky' and 'green' challenges around Blogland so that's what's been on my mind, and I thought it would be the perfect moment to reach for my new Caring Hands stamp set by Waffle Flower. I stamped the crossed fingers hand, coloured it with alcohol markers, then added a lucky four-leaved clover from a very old Clearly Besotted set. Once I'd added a stem with a marker, I cut the whole thing out and attached it to a pale green circle layered with die cut vellum hearts

For the background, I used Background Builders Classics by Uniko to stamp a diagonal pattern onto a card panel in shades of green ink. I trimmed this to size with a Stitched Rectangle die by Heffy Doodle, then added my hand circle. Finally, I stamped a good luck sentiment from Uniko's Simply Said Blocks, snipped it out, and popped it up with dimensional pads.

CHALLENGES

I've used the sketch from Freshly Made Sketches, flipping it upside down, and the theme of luck at CASology. The photo at Inspired By also helped with the luck theme and I've stretched out the green rainbow into straight lines! The challenge at Just Add Ink this week is Just Add Green, which I have done :) I shall also share this card at NBUS, the place to share our Never Before Used Schtuff! Thank you to all these challenges for entertaining me for a couple of hours!

AND IN OTHER NEWS 

It's been a difficult weekend with my little Eva. When she was a pup she was quite anxious so I had to train her to overcome her fears one step at a time. I often forget now that she ever had these kinds of problems but every now and then, something triggers her. Fireworks is an obvious one, but a strong wind often makes things seem alive and that can worry Eva. Yesterday, we were walking past a building site where there was a fabric barrier, and a gust of wind sent the fabric billowing out in front of us. Poor Eva tried to drag me into the road to get away from it and has been quite jumpy ever since. We will need to return to training for a while.

Sending hugs,

Lucky Green

Hello crafting friends!

I've been seeing a lot of St Patrick's Day and green challenges in Blogland and since green is my favourite colour it would have been rude not to join in! Come and see what I've been up to:

Just look at all those lucky four-leafed clovers! They were stamped with a very old Stampin' Up single stamp called Lucky Day.

I stamped it repeatedly along the bottom of a piece of water colour paper that had been moistened. Shabby Shutters distress ink was sponged below the shamrocks and splattered with water to create pattern and texture. Once it was dry, I added gold speckles with a gold marker.

The blocky good luck sentiment is from Uniko's Simply Said Blocks, It was inked up with Versamark, heat embossed with gold embossing powder. I snipped it out with sharp scissors and popped it up on dimensionals.

Each shamrock was given a green gem centre to finish the card.

EDITED TO ADD AN AWARD
I was thrilled that this card won an outstanding award from CAS Watercolour!

CHALLENGES
I'm linking up with a few challenges. First, a new-to-me weekly challenge that looks fabulous - Always Fun, where the theme is Shades of Green; The Double D Challenge, where there's a fabulous mood board and it's All About The Green and/or St Patrick's Day; The Rainbow Card Challenge where Especially Emerald is the colour of the month; and last, but not least, CAS Watercolour where they are looking for watercolour effects and the theme is Luck of the Irish.

AND IN OTHER NEWS
It wasn't a very lucky day for me yesterday. I went to London and it was windy and pouring with rain so I took a hat. I left it on the train. That hat is the difference between me arriving looking relatively human and me turning up looking as if I had a drunken fight in a hedge! 

What have you left on a train that you just can't get on without?