Good news and One for the stash!

Hello, crafting friends!

 

As the 25th of the month approached, I thought of how I used to always make a Christmas card thanks to the encouragement of the Rudolph Days challenge. We all thought it would have to close as Maureen, who ran it brilliantly for years, was unable to continue, but today I discovered that the amazing Helen has taken over the reins of the sleigh. Hurrah! Do spread the word won't you, follow the Rudolph Days blog and share the challenge badge. And come and join in - you have until the last day of the month to link up and it's Anything Christmas Goes!

 

I was a bit short on time but I found a little topper I made last year with Altenew's Clasic Pine Cones embossing folder, coloured with inks and daubers and trimmed with a Crimped Frame die from the Greetery. I had added lots of 'snow' with my trusty Posca white acrylic paint pen. To show it off, I made a Faux Book Binding card using three washi tapes that coordinated with my topper.

 

 

To finish, I added a banner-style sentiment from Uniko's Simply Said Blocks Christmas using a couple of tiny staples, and added two enamel dots for berries.

 

And there we go - back on track with my festive stash for the end of the year! Thanks Helen!

CHALLENGES

I'm linking this card up at Rudolph Days but have also been inspired by these challenges: Christmas Craft Creations where the challenge is to use Stencils or Embossing Folders; Christmas Kickstart where the theme is Out on a Limb (things you might find on a Christmas tree!); and Addicted to Stamps and More where the theme this time is Christmas.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

I found a new walk yesterday. Normally there's livestock in these fields, so I've avoided them, but there hasn't been anything for ages and the grass is not under water and is clean and dry... my heart sang I can tell you! However, it is with deep regret that I must tell you that golden retrievers are equipped with a special inner mud divining device and, as we frolicked along, both of the Beige Beasts discovered exciting ditches and puddles and turned into Mud Monsters. They did redeem themselves though... there was a cattle trough in the last field as we returned and the pups discovered that it was full to the brim with water from all the recent rain. Lulu mistook it for a spa bath to rinse off her mud masque and jumped in for a full immersion; I was quite firm in encouraging Eva to follow suit!!

Sending hugs,

The stars are brightly shining

Hello, crafting friends!

 

I thought I'd have heaps of time to craft now that I'm hunkering down with my golden girls and letting Lulu relax, feel safe and really learn about the life of a dog in our family. But it's like having a young pup again and we're doing lots of stress-busting walking, so I'm only crafting in short bursts! Today I managed to complete this simple Christmas card:

 

I found the starry sky paper pad in The Works about a month ago and thought it would make great Christmas card backgrounds. It's 6"x6" so I fell at the first hurdle as I'd selected a slimline card base! But I cut two short pieces the same width and joined them in the centre, mounting that on two vertical strips of fabulous gold washi tape that came in a prize I was lucky enough to win at ABC Christmas Challenge - thank you ladies!

 

To conceal the join, I cut a musical stave using The Greetery's Noted die set and, before attaching it to the card front, stamped the sentiments in Versamark and heat embossing them in gold. The 'Oh holy night' part is from Reverse Confetti's Greatest Gift of All, and the lovely curvy line from the song under the musical stave is from The Greetery's Sing a Song of Christmas. I finished the card with a little star punched out of gold foil card.

CHALLENGES

I'm linking this card up at ABC Christmas where V is for Vertical and U is for Use it Up - and I did use up a snippet of white card stock and a tiny piece of gold foil card! I'm also joining in with Rudolph Days, where each month on the 25th we make a festive card for the stash; and am choosing the Anything Goes option at Peace on Earth Christmas and Happy Little Stampers Christmas.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

No time to stay and chat as it's late and I'm off out into the real life starry night with two golden girls before bed!

Sending hugs,

The colour of sunshine

Hello, crafting friends!

 

It's Thursday and time for another round of crafting Tic Tac Toe courtesy of the Tic Tac Toe Challenge! Joanne is on Board Duty today and what an inspirational board it is:

 

I've gone for the diagonal from the top left: Letters/Yellow/Sunshine and made a card to bring some sunshine into a friend's life :)

 

I started with a yellow card base, left over from an old card kit. The Sunny Day stencil from Clearly Besotted was positioned over it and yellow ink stenciled into it for a tone on tone look. I found some coordinating washi tape that needed using up and made a border with it, then stamped a favourite Reverse Confetti floral stamp at the bottom in black ink and coloured it with yellow alcohol markers.

 

The sentiment is my 'letters' part of the board. I was excited to put a current Uniko sentiment with an older Clearly Besotted one which is a lovely wavy shape. To add a bit more interest to my card, I trimmed one corner with a Corner Rounder, then stamped the flowers and leaves again on a scrap of white card, coloured them, fussy cut them and popped them up on dimensional pads. 

Okay, so now it's your turn! Which row or column has grabbed your attention this week? Or is it one of the diagonals? Do hop over to the Tic Tac Toe Challenge blog to check out the gorgeous samples the rest of the team have made to inspire you. You'll find the Linky Tool at the bottom of the post and can use it to link up your own creation with us. Have fun! We can't wait to see what you make!

CHALLENGES

In the Color Dare Challenge #562, you get to choose whether to use 1, 2 or 3 of the three colours shown. I opted to use the yellow and team it with black; I'm also joining in with the Stencil Fun Challenge - not going for the optional Butterflies theme; I'm not going for the optional Butterflies at Allsorts either but I will link my card up there; It's the first outing for this charming floral set so I am sharing at Darnell's NBUS Challenge too.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

I am such a fan of the colour yellow. It is the colour of sunshine, positivity, warmth and happiness. There is a good reason that there are so many famous yellow logos! I was given a bunch of beautiful, deep hearted yellow roses the other day, and they lift my spirits every time I look at them!

 

 

I hope they have the same effect on you today :)

Sending hugs,

Snippety collage

Hello, crafting friends!

 

I was amazed to read that Miss Di has been running The Snippets Playground for no less than ELEVEN YEARS! Wow! I was around in Blogland when she took over but surely it was yesterday...?! I am enjoying a little free time at the moment so I immediately tipped out my Snippets Box and prepared to join in with the celebrations! 

 

We have been asked to include a photo of the snippets we used for this challenge and here are mine above. I made a collage style 'welcome home' card with them:

 

I started with the background snippet. This was an offcut from a piece that had been stamped with Stampin' Up's Hardwood background stamp. I taped pieces of coordinating washi tape on one side of it for a bit of extra interest. The leaves were a practice run of a Greetery die I bought last year and then *hangs head* have never used since. I tore the leaves into sections and glued them to the background. 

Next I die cut the little house from the tiny white snippet using an X Cut die. I taped some yyellow washi tape over the middle of the tiny wood effect strip of DSP then glued the house over it so the washi 'illuminated' the windows. I added the gem-embellished heart (found at the bottom of the Snippets Box) and popped the whole thing up on the background using dimensional pads. Finally, the sentiments were added.

Apologies for the appalling photos - light levels are very low :/

CHALLENGES

I'm heading over to The Snippets Playground with this card and a large cake piped with 'congratulations on eleven snippety years' in pink icing! I'm also nipping over to Darnell's NBUS Challenge as the Side of Greens die can now officially be removed from the Never Before Used Schtuff box!

 

AND IN OTHER NEWS

Yes, January is dull and dreary, but if you're a dog...

 

 

... there's still plenty of squirrel hunting fun to be had!

Although I have a feeling the squirrels were all blowing raspberries and cat-calling the 'hunters'!!

Sending hugs,

Hopping into easter

Hello, crafting friends!

 

Spring colours are really inspiring me right now even though the weather has Taken A Turn! In response, I put on a large pink jumper and carried on making Easter cards ;)

 

I broke open a new Easter die from The Greetery and fell in love with it! I had stamped, coloured and fussy cut a little rabbit from English Garden by The Craft Consortium and realised that the E of Easter could curl around his little body!

I started by stamping the grass image from Enjoy Life by Stampin' Up (retired) directly onto a card base. There's a little clump of flowers in the set which I inked up with SU water-based markers and added to the grass. Under the grass, I stamped the word Happy , then beneath that, I added a strip of yellow zig zag washi tape. Finally, I carefully glued the word Easter and the bunny in the space left.

 

EDITED TO ADD AN AWARD

This little rabbit was a top 3 pick at Perfectly CAS!

 

CHALLENGES

I'm linking this card up with AAA Cards where Tristan's challenge is Anything CAS with the option to use spring animals; I'm also joining in at Perfectly CAS where we are asked to use up to a third of a card front and the theme this time is Die Cuts; at The Alphabet Challenge Caz has come up with the theme for Z and it's zig zags, so I'm playing along there too; I'm hoping to enable some other crafters with my new Easter die so I'm off to Darnell's NBUS challenge where we share our Never Before Used Schtuff!

 

AND IN OTHER NEWS

Eva and I were snowed on today on our morning walk. I had given Eva her lead to carryy and she got her head down and made for home like a sensible girl, turning every now and again to check that I wasn't slacking. She has become my Personal Trainer! I'm sure I must have worked off all that chocolate by now. Might have to get some more to keep my strength up...

Sending hugs,

Shiny happy birthday

Hello, crafting friends!

 

I'm happy to say I'm still guesting at Seize The Birthday this month! Cathy has chosen a great Topping this time - a shiny, sparkly birthday card is always special I think - and I hope you all have as much fun with it as I have:

My starting pointy for this card was to gather together some gold crafting supplies and see how I could put them together! 

I found some gold washi tapes and decided on those as a background, criss-crossing them randomly on a card panel before trimming them to size with a stitched rectangle die. I added some sparkly paper to the mix, trimming it with the same die on a diagonal, punching out a heart shape on it then in-laying it with a shiny gold foil heart.

For contrast, I decided to top my background with a shiny pink balloon. I could not get a decent photo of this sadly, but it is SO shiny it's like a mirror! The balloon is from a retired Stampin' Up set called Celebrate Today. I stamped it in Blushing Bride ink, stamped the confetti balloon filling and embossed it in gold, die cut the balloon, then smothered it in versamark ink and heat embossed with clear embossing powder. The confetti lost it's definition in this process but I went over it with a gold paint pen for extra shine ;)

Finally, I had loads of fun adding sparkly details: A popped-up gold embossed sentiment label made with Uniko's Simply Said Blocks; a row of hearts from the same set, stamped below the sentiment and heat embossed in gold; a gold cord tied round the balloon; and a sprinkling of pink and gold sequins, clear gems and sparky stars. 

 

Do hop over to the Seize The Birthday challenge blog to check out the beautiful shiny, sparkly birthday designs the design team has made to inspire you. You'll find the Linky Tool at the bottom of the post so that you can share your own creation when you're ready. Have fun!

CHALLENGES

I'm linking this card up with Watercooler Wednesday where Helen is hosting the All Occasions challenge.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

Eva and I met up with some friends for a walk today. It was quite an eventful walk with all sorts of unexpected ponds and manure heaps turning up which we successfully navigated. In fact, Eva was 'angel dog', walking nicely past the obstacles when I gave her the 'Not There' command. Right at the end of the walk, there was a muddy puddle. I swaggered past it, full of confidence, clicking my fingers at Eva to bring her to heel like a top dog trainer... only to find that she wasn't paying any attention to me and was wading into the puddle! I dropped the dog trainer impression at once and called her out in querulous tones. She sashayed out and and shook all over me with an expression that said "Well, why didn't you say so before?!"

Sending hugs,

Nuts about you

Hello, crafting friends!

 

I've been enjoying making a few valentines this year! This one features a pair of bushy-tailed cuties from a new-to-me stamp set from Clearly Besotted called Foxy Friend.

 

 

The squirrels are supposed to be skunks but they make excellent squirrels! I coloured them with coloured pencils, fussy cut them and attached them to a die cut stitched circle that I'd masked with a stencil and sponged with blue ink.

I wanted to create an interesting border to the card base so I trimmed 1/2" off the front flap using a large stitched rectangle die. Pale blue card stock was glued underneath the flap and then ran a heart design washi tape along the edge. The squirrel circle was placed slightly overlapping the border and I finished with a die cut heart and a sentiment from MFT.

 

CHALLENGES

I was inspired by Lisa's photo choice at this week's Just Us Girls challenge, using the background and swapping the snow couple with the squirrels; I'm also joining in at Just Add Ink where there's a Just Pick Two challenge - Fancy Edge/Circle/Twine - and I've gone for Fancy Edge and Circle; I also made this card for Time Out Challenges where the theme is In Love; and am sharing at Darnell's NBUS challenge, the place to show off our Never Before Used Schtuff!

 

AND IN OTHER NEWS

I had to whisper the word 'squirrels' in case a certain young lady got a bit excited but...

 

 

... having had a long walk this morning with an impromptu swim in the river, nothing other than the rustle of a cheese wrapper would have had the power to rouse her!!

Sending hugs,

Slimline tonic

Hello, crafting friends!

After all the excitement of Eva's birthday celebrations, a little crafty time this weekend was a delightful bit of relaxation. I enjoyed making another slimline card and have realised that it's the photographing of them that is my problem!

I pulled out a never-before-used wreath schtencil (Oh Darnell, what have you done to my vocabulary?!) and inked up two half wreaths on a narrow piece of card stock. The holly and berries are pretty close together on this stencil so I used some small foam tipped eye shadow applicators to apply the inks and found it worked pretty well. When I'd completed the two half wreaths I added detail with coloured pencils and gave the berries some 'shine' with a white  Posca acrylic paint pen.

The panel was glued to a piece of textured red card stock and I added a piece of striped tape below it. To complete the card, I heat embossed a sentiment from Clearly Besotted's Picture It Christmas in white on a strip of black card stock. The end of the strip was trimmed into a flag before attaching the sentiment to the card front.

CHALLENGES

I used Karren's sketch at Freshly Made Sketches for this card so I'm linking up there; I'm also joining in with The Sisterhood of Crafters where Darlene has chosen Stencils as her theme; I'm playing along with Happy Little Stampers stencil challenge where Anything Goes; and at The Rudolph Day Challenge where we must link up a Christmas card by midnight on the last day of the month. I'll link up at Darnell's NBUS challenge too, the place to share projects made with your Never Before Used Schtuff!

AND IN OTHER NEWS

I often say that my walks with Eva in the countryside inspire my cards...

... even if it's on a subconscious level!! This is a pond in a village near us where Eva and I go walking sometimes :)

Sending hugs,

Let's bee friends

Hello, crafting friends!

If anyone is feeling a little blue today, I have a card that is sure to cheer you up!

I found this gorgeous yellow textured card stock at the bottom of a drawer the other day and decided it would be perfect to bring a little sunshine into someone's life! I topped it with a piece of white card that I'd added a strip of striped washi tape to and scalloped the edges with a nesting die.

I used a floral stamp from So Much by Uniko, stamped, coloured with coloured pencils, fussy cut and popped up with dimensional pads. The card was finished with the sweet sentiment from Sugar Pea Designs' Beautiful Books and I added two friendly little bees from Missing You by Inkydoodles.

CHALLENGES

I am linking this card up with The Flower Challenge where the theme is stripes and/or dots; also The Paper Players where LeAnne is hosting a CAS challenge which must feature a bee; I'm joining in at the Uniko challenge where the theme is Flowers with optional twist of Slimline; and Allsorts, where the theme is Feminine/For A Lady.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

My little Eva has not been very well for the last couple of days. At first I thought it was the heat but then she had an upset tummy, waking me up at 5am in distress because she needed to go out. She didn't want her breakfast and then she threw up spectacularly later on. The following day she was a bit better but still not very energetic and still off her food. Today, you'll be glad to know, she has thrown off whatever it was and demanded her breakfast with the face of a golden retriever who promises to be the goodest girl if only her owners will give her a few meaty chunks!

Sending hugs,

The Gardening square metre

Hello, crafting friends!

Since the weather isn't enabling me to get out into the garden, I've decided to do some gardening in the Craft Square Metre instead! 

It's a bit early for an apple crop as we're still at blossom stage, but I wanted to give some love to this apple branch from Apples and Pears by Clearly Besotted. I stamped it in green ink, watercoloured it, left it to dry  and then fussy cut it. The background was made in the same green with a mix of stamping (from Stampin' Up's Waterfront), ink blending and watercolouring. 

When it was dry, I added a gingham border with Kaisercraft's Gingham. Under that, I glued a piece of red card stock and embellished it with a strip of patterned green washi tape. The panel was cut out with a stitched rectangle die from Heffy Doodle and the apple tree glued over the top. In all the excitement, the top left hand corner got damaged so I added a photo corner style trim with the washi tape and I think I got away with it! 

The sentiment is the Thank You Border die from Lawn Fawn, which I trimmed down for a different look. To finish the card, I knotted some twine round the card and made a little tasseled end, and added a tiny die-cut heart to the gingham.

CHALLENGES

Festive Friday are celebrating National Gardening Week and I have chosen plants, green and twine from their inspiration list; I was also inspired by the mood board at Create A Smile so I'm linking up there too.

AND IN OTHER NEWS

This card feels as if it was made by someone else! I normally make quite CAS cards but this one seems to have a lot going on. Do  you ever find that you've made something completely out of your normal style?

Sending hugs,