Late daffodils

Hello, crafting friends!

 

It's time for another Tic Tac Toe challenge! There's loads of lovely inspiration on today's board so I do hope you'll want to come and join in with us :)

 

I've opted for the diagonal from top left - Flowers/Free/Die Cuts and made a belated birthday card for a pal whose birthday had disappeared under a load of random boxes in my chaotic little brain - aargh!

 

I started with Altenew's Daffodil Delight embossing folder, positioning my card panel in the folder at an angle and using my squidgy mat to avoid hard lines. I then decided to cut the panel into a tag with a nesting arch die from The Greetery which flattened my embossing a little but hey ho! Next time I will die cut first and THEN emboss!

I'd used watercolour paper as my panel so I could use my Arteza watercolour brush pens to colour the image - yes I managed to plan ahead for that bit! The watercolouring is what is called 'loose' when the professionals do it but that when I do it is probably more accurately described as 'messy'!

 

The little tag was stamped with a sentiment from Altenew's Birthday Greetings and cut out with a circle punch. I used a couple of small punches to make a hole and a hole strengthener, then threaded some yellow ribbon through it and secured with glue dots. Finally, the tags were attached to a card base.

Okay, so now it's your turn! Here's how to play: First, hop over to the Tic Tac Toe blog to check out the amazing inspiration from my team mates; Next make your own creation using the suggestions from a row, column or diagonal on the board; Finally, use the Linky Tool at the bottom of the challenge blog and share your creation with us - we can't wait to see what you make!

CHALLENGES

Jaydee's challenge at The Paper Players this week is Clean and Simple spring flowers, and I have used the fresh green, yellow and aqua colour palette at The Color Throwdown; I'm also visiting Can You Handle the Pressure as I used an embossing folder and am joining in with the All Occasions challenge at Krafty Chicks with my belated birthday card.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

After mentioning how fluffy Lulu is getting, I thought you'd like to see 'before and after' photos of her:

 

Here she is in November last year, looking very thin and short haired, and with no 'feathers' on her legs. 

 

 

And here she is yesterday, out on what I call 'a walk' but that the girls have decided is 'a rabbit hunt'!  Look at those floofy pantaloons and that luxuriant tail! What a beauty!

Sending hugs,

Envelope embellishments

Hello, crafting friends!

 

This morning, I was opening mail (just bills and promotional material I'm afraid!) when my eye was caught by the inside of one of the envelopes... and my craft switch was triggered! I immediately flew off to my designer paper drawer and rummaged around for some more snippets to go with the envelope.

 

Here's what I did with them: The green dotty piece was glued to a card base and the excess trimmed away. I cut the envelope into circles with punches and reached into the white snippets folder and cut matching circles to mount the flimsy paper onto. The flowery paper was a favourite back in the day and has been hoarded forever! I had cut some of the roses out of it for another project but today I was interested in the blue flowers.

 

After fussy cutting the flowers, I glued them on my envelope paper circles, ready to use as a border. I found a white piece of card that I trimmed to two thirds of my card base width and arranged the circles down the edge, adhering them down when I was happy with the design. This is when I realised I should have stamped the sentiment first!!

 

I masked the circle off where I wanted the sentiment to go but I'm afraid I did get a tiny bit of ink onto it. Someone once said to me "If you don't have any mistakes on your cards, how are people going to know they're handmade?" I didn't like to tell her that there wasn't any way on this earth that people wouldn't know, so I let it pass! I used a shiny blue pencil to colour the 'happy' part of the sentiment, popped the panel up on dimensional pads and finished the card with some yellow enamel dots.

CHALLENGES

I'm scampering off to the Snippets Playground with my homework - see you there! I'm also linking up at The Flower Challenge where the challenge is to include spots or stripes (or both) in our floral cards. I've got some dotty paper and the envelope paper has a chevron stripe pattern on it :)

 

AND IN OTHER NEWS

It was the resourceful Sarn from the Playground who inspired me to rifle through the recycling basket as I've been impressed with all the wonderful creations she has made with discarded packaging :) Of course, I have a fluffy pal here who is more than happy to help me look for likely items.

 

How about this Mum? Er, no thank you Eva! I cannot feel that your grotty tissue will enhance a card!!

Sending hugs,

Circle of thanks

Hello, crafting friends!

 

It's Thursday and that means being inspired eight different ways by a new board at the Tic Tac Toe Challenge! Let's have a look at the ideas Betty has put on the new board:

 

 

What a lot of fabulous ideas! I settled on the right hand column Yellow/Diecuts/Floral.

 

 

I had a lot of fun coming up with this layout! I started with two die cut stems and flower heads from The Greetery's Wildflower Mix die set which I coloured with sponge daubers and ink. While playing around with them I saw that the stems formed a circular shape so decided to create a medallion-style sentiment. Using a circle punch, I cut three yellow circles and and stacked them on top of each other (the photo hasn't picked up the yellow sadly), finishing with a white circle stamped with a sentiment from an old Stampin' Up set. The flowers and medallion together made quite a long shape so I created a sponged and stenciled background for them down the centre of a card base, scoring lines either side for a neat finish.

 

 

Okay, so now it's your turn! Which column or row is speaking to you this week? Or maybe you're attracted to one of the diagonals? Do hop over to the Tic Tac Toe Challenge site to check out the beautiful inspiration from the design team. When you're ready to link up your own creation, youi'll find the Linky Tool at the bottom of the post. We can't wait to see what you make!

 

CHALLENGES

I've just seen that our favourite craft challenge duo, Darlene and Diane, have come up with another great challenge: The Triple B Challenge! Get your Birds, Butterflies and Blooms ready for this one and there's an optional inspiration board. I'm entering with my blooms this time; I'm also joining in at Allsorts where Anything Goes with the option to Use Your Dies.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

This is Cody, one of Eva's pals.

 

He is rather concerned.

 

I asked if anyone fancied a Walk and he said Yes with his tail, but now I have disappeared into the kitchen to answer the ringing thing that humans call Telephone and Cody is a bit worried that I have forgotten the Walk. 

I hadn't forgotten though and it was an extra special Walk with Swimming! Cody was relieved - he knew he hadn't been mistaken in me :)

Sending hugs,

Texture and sparkle wreath

Hello, crafting friends!

 

Thursday has come around again and with it comes a whole bunch of inspiration courtesy o the Tic Tac Toe challenge! Felicita had Thanksgiving on her mind when coming up with this board but, as usual, the suggestions work brilliantly for other occasions too.

 

I chose the right hand column for my Christmas card - Any Shape Die/Wreath/Gold Foil or Glitter. This card was created mostly from embossing and die cuts with only the sentiment being stamped.

I partially embossed a square panel with a Honeycomb embossing folder from Hobbycraft, then layered a die cut wreath from Stampin' Up over the top.

 

The wreath was decorated with glittery gold baubles and red berries cut from snippets of paper and I added a die cut bow from a cocktail set by MFT.

 

 

The card was finished with touches of gold glitter glue, white highlights on the berries and a stamped sentiment from Uniko.

 

Right! It's over to you :) Which row or column will you choose this week? Or will you go for one of the diagonals? Do hop over to the Tic Tac Toe challenge site and check out all the fabulous inspiration from my team mates. You'll find the Linky Tool at the bottom of the post and you can use it to link up your own creation. Have fun - we can't wait to see what you make!

CHALLENGES

I'm linking this card up at the Snippets Playground where we are invited to make cards with snippets: m card panel was from a spoilt card base,  and all the die-cut and punched items were cut from off-cuts. I'm also joining in with Let's Squash It where the challenge is Make a Christmas Card, and Can Yyou Handle The Pressure where Anything Embossed Goes with optional theme of Wreaths. The challenge at Sparkles Monthly Challenge is to Use Dies and Punches so I'm joining in there, and I'm also playing along at Happy Little Stampers Die challenge where Anything Using Dies Goes.

 

AND IN OTHER NEWS

I love a wreath and my whole world was rocked when my sister showed me how to make one with just bits and pieces from the garden! Here's one of my favourite photos of my youngest son admiring my (slightly wonky) creation a few years ago!

 

My sister and I enjoyed making wreaths together so much we decided to make it a regular run-up to Christmas event :) Do you have any annual rituals as the festive season draws nearer? Do share in the comments below!

Sending hugs,

Sparkle berries

Hello, crafting friends!

 

Welcome to another Thursday of Tic Tac Toe fun! Elizabeth has come up with a wonderful board to inspire you this week:

 

Lots of options there - especially if, like me, you are frantically trying to get a whole stash of festive cards made! I've chosen the middle column Red/Sparkle/Hollyy to create this one.

 

I started by trimming a card panel so that it was slightly smaller than my card base, then cutting the centre out with a decorative stitched label die and replacing it to create a stitched frame. The pine branch from Uniko's Winter Foliage stamp set was stamped directly onto the panel and I added holly from the same set, stamped and cut out.

 

The sentiment is put together from different sets from The Greetery and from Stampin' Up and I stamped it in a dark red and a pink for an illusion of dimension. The berries were the final addition, cut out of lovely, sparkly, bright red paper using two sizes of circle punch.

So now it's your turn! Which column or row will you choose? Or will you opt for one of the diagonals? Do hop over to the Tic Tac Toe challenge site to check out the fab samples Team X has made to inspire you. You'll find the Linky Tool at the bottom of the post and you can use it to share your own creation with us. We can't wait to see what you make!

CHALLENGES

I thought I'd pop a second entry in at Allsorts where they team is celebrating the 700th challenge with the theme Let's Celebrate Any Special Occasion! I'm also linking up at Peace on Earth where they always have such inspiring mood boards; I'm also joining in with Merry Little Christmas and The Holly and the Ivy where Anything Christmas Goes.

 

AND IN OTHER NEWS

Well halloween is over thank goodness and hopefully all the horrible decorations will be cleared away soon! My fluffy girl had a bit of a scare on one of our river walks. Back in the summer, a group of lads were cooling of with a swim in the river and one of them left his t shirt behind. Someone hung it on the fence so that they'd see it if they returned and it's been there ever since. Every time we come near it, I notice Eva's body language stiffening and I'm sure she thinks it's a person...

 

 

only a weird person that isn't moving like a real person - aaaargh!  She always relaxes when we come closer and she realises it's just a shirt hanging on the fence!

Sending hugs,

The lesser spotted greetings card

Hello, crafting friends!

 

Another Saturday has whizzed around and we have another fun challenge to entertain you at Addicted to CAS! We loved seeing your stripy creations last week and now Vicki wants to see what you make of the code word DOTS!

 

I wanted to make my dots the focal point of my card and one way to do that is to highlight them with colour.

 

 

I tore some sticky notes and positioned them on a card base so that I could blend inks in the gap they made. The same ink blend was used on a scrap of white card and I used a small circle punch to cut my dots out. These were arranged over my ink blend and trimmed where they overlapped the white areas of the card base.

The sentiment was put together from a new-to-me set from Altenew called Sweetest Peas. I stamped it with black ink in a curve of the ink blend.

Finally I stamped one of the sweet peas in the set using black ink. The one I chose has a long stem which I curved around the sentiment. After stamping, I used a fineliner pen to fill in any blank bits and darkened some of the parts of the flower.

Okay, so now it's your turn! Do hop over to the Addicted to CAS blog and admire all  the gorgeous dotty cards from the design team. You will find the Linky Tool at the bottom of the post and you can use it to link up your own creation. Don't forget to keep your card clean and simple with lots of lovely blank space - and have fun!

CHALLENGES

The colours from Color My Heart Color Dare 499 inspired this card - I chose Flamingo, Capri and Lemonade; I'm also sharing this card at Darnell's NBUS challenge where we are challenged to use our Never Before Used Schtuff.

 

AND IN OTHER NEWS

In the summer months, the stream at the bottom of the fields behind our house runs low enough for us to cross over to a footpath on the other side. That's the route Eva and I took the other day. As we made our way through the undergrowth that leads to the ford, we met a man coming the other way with his dog. We greeted each other as dog walkers do. 'It's quite sniffy down there,' he said. 'It's because it's been raining,' I said and he nodded. 'That always brings up some interesting smells!' I added. As Eva and I crossed the stream, I thought about the way the man's expression had changed to one of surprise and suddenly realised that he had actually said 'It's quite slippery down there.' Aaaargh!

Sending hugs,

The Circles that you find

Hello, crafting friends!

It's time for a new challenge at Addicted to CAS and Sue has chosen a code word that really got me inspired so I hope it'll do the same for you!

Some stitched dies from Waffleflower were my starting point. I cut some overlapping circles in a card panel, inlaying the smaller one. I wanted a third circle, so used a little circle punch to cut out a 2021 I found in a magazine, mounting it onto another circle cut out of red card.

Positioning the card panel onto a card base, I traced round the inside of the large circle with a soft pencil. I used this as a guide for stamping on the card base. I sponged some neutral ink over the area, then stamped a fir branch and berries from Budding Beauties Winter from the Greetery. Finally, I assembled my elements - attached the card panel to the card front, positioned a die cut sentiment and the 2021 below it and finished with a single enamel dot.

So, now it's your turn and I can't wait to see how you interpret the word 'Circles'. There's amazing inspiration at the Addicted to CAS challenge site as always, and you'll find the Linky Tool there so that you can share your own creation with us. Remember to keep your creation nice and clean and simple won't you, and above all have fun!

CHALLENGES

I'm linking this card up at Watercooler Wednesday where Tristan is hosting the All Occasions challenge; and also Happy Little Stampers Christmas challenge where Anything Goes with optional Make a Scene.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

Do you ever get triggered to remember a song? The code word for today's challenge made me think of a sentence 'the circles that you find in the windmills of your mind' which, when I looked it up, turned out to be from a great song that I hadn't heard for a very, very long time! One of the things I like to do is to look songs up on YouTube and then play all the versions I can find. Here, for your listening pleasure is a version by the sublime Dusty Springfield whose voice was just so distinctive. Anyone remember this?

Sending hugs,