Finally made a start on my Christmas cards!

Hiya,

I love Christmas so I don't know why I always take so long to start my Christmas cards!!! (Just to explain to those of you reading this through facebook... All the other cardmaking girls have been making their Christmas cards for months - yes, really! MONTHS!)  Now I'm afraid I can't take much credit for this one.... I went to a demo at my local craft shop and it was my fave lady doing the demo - Stamping Stacey!  I wish I'd got a link to show you her stuff - I must ask her next time I see her.... She showed us how to make a card very similar to this, this is my version of it.

I cut two holes in a scrap piece of card with my nesties and fixed it over the card blank with low tack tape. Then I used a sponge to sponge red ink from the edges to the centre to create the baubles. I then used a Christmas text stamp from Forever Friends (the whole message reads "Hugs make it Christmas in your heart") to stamp over the top.... The branches are actually a Christmas tree stamp from the same Forever Friends set turned on it's side. I stamped it numerous times before re-inking to get different effects for the branches.

I tied a couple of little bows in some sparkly stuff I found in my stash and hey presto! Incredibly quick and simple card. This might just be my saviour when I run out of time to make my cards (again!) this year!

And just because Charlie wanted to join in on all the fun I dug out an old Christmas card making kit I've had for years and let him have a go! He loved the glitter and punching out the snowflakes - we got into a right old mess but he loved it :-)

Challenge:

Little Claire's - Christmas

Right I'm off for a nice warm drink.... it's been getting chilly these past few evenings! Might need to put the heating on too.... :-)

Love 'n' hugs,

Happy birthday, Ross!

Hiya,

I'm up at silly o'clock cos I tempted fate.... I posted on facebook about how well my little Charlie was doing without nappies overnight..... 3 weeks it had been, so I told the world and now I'm up and unable to sleep having stripped and changed him and his bed! That'll teach me! :-)

Today is the birthday of his little friend, Ross. Happy birthday, Ross! So I thought I'd share his birthday card with you.... I used one of my fave Forever Friends images and then only scraps from my scraps folder to do the rest - I'm quite proud of myself! :-)

As usual I coloured the image with promarkers....

A close up of the buttons to show the incredibly fiddly little bows I decided they needed!

I used:

Image - Forever Friends

Sentiment - Fizzy Moon

Promarkers

Papers - Tatty Teddy (spotty), Papermania Henbury Lane (stripy)

Papermania mini polka dots embossing folder

Quickutz cookie cutter stars

Papermania capsule collection buttons

Ribbon, pearls and embroidery thread from my stash

Challenges:

A Gem of a Challenge - Fab sketch

Creative inspirations - Monochromatic

Cupcake Craft Challenges - Buttons and bows (the bows are on my buttons!)

Forever Friends - Use a sentiment

Passion for Promarkers - Stars

Secret Crafter Saturday Challenge - White and one other colour

Totally Gorjuss - Bingo (middle line: stars, buttons, pearls)

Whoopsi Daisy - Free and easy

Right, I'm going to see if a mug of ovaltine helps me sleep! Night, night!

Love 'n' hugs,

Dream Valley Challenge 18 - Halloween!!!

Hiya!

I've got to keep this brief cos this is actually a scheduled post that I'm writing way past my bedtime because I'm going to be down on the allotment tomorrow, erm I mean today.... You know what I mean..... :-)

Our fab challenge at Dream Valley this time is HALLOWEEN and we're being sponsored by Robyn's Fetish who gave us some fab images to work with. I've used pumpkin magic here along with a freebie spider and web from meljen's....

I took it as an excuse to make my halloween party invites :-) So looking forward to it!

I used some tiny purple triangles from some halloween table confetti to liven up my background and some cute tiny plastic spiders.....

Can you see the glitter on the web....? Probably not... grrrrr! :-)

I printed the details on the reverse. The font for the Halloween Party bit is called candles.... Fab for Halloween, very spooky looking!

Challenges:

CRAFT - Recipe: 1 ribbon, 2 shapes (rectangle and little purple triangles!) and some glitter (on the spider's webs)

Cupcake Craft Challenges - Halloween

Meljen's - Use a ribbon

Sarah Hurley - Halloween Horrors

Simon Says Stamp - Halloween/Goth

The ABC Challenge - B for Boo

And just cos it seems appropriate I thought I'd show you my very first home-grown pumpkins! Erm, little and large springs to mind! I'm not the best at carving them or cooking them (I didn't know I could grow them!) but if I manage either with any success I'll make sure I post some piccies for you :-)

And just to share a little bit of good news.... my exploding box won a top 3 over at Paperplay Challenges - soooo thrilled! I'm a very happy bunny :-)

Make sure you go and check out the other spooky offerings on the Dream Valley Challenge blog!

See you again soon!

Love 'n' hugs,

An exploding box...

Hiya!

Warning - taken millions of piccies of this one so I'll try to keep my words brief!

My step-sister asked me to make an exploding box for her to give to some friends on their wedding day. You can just see one of my handmade scrunchy flowers on the side....

The sentiment on the lid is one of my faves from Sentiments 4 You:

The second box inside.... The butterfly is an xcut punch, the Mr & Mrs stamp is from papermania...

The image is from Pollycraft coloured with promarkers and glitter glue. I won the die cut heart and wedding outfit in candy wins and the glittered vellum in the background is from the Tatty Teddy range...

Another sentiment from Sentiments 4 You, more use of nesties and some beautiful rings from a candy win....

My first go at making a paper wedding cake! Flowers from papermania, ribbon from stash...

Another die cut heart from a candy win.... You can see the faux stitching on the cake from this angle...

Computer generated sentiments and lots of glitter glue!

Phew! That was a long post! Thankyou for sticking it out till the end :-)

Challenges:

Paperplay - White + 1 other colour

Charisma cardz - Love

The ABC Challenge - A for Anything goes

Simon says stamp - Anything goes

Wags 'n' Whiskers - Handmade (scrunchy flowers, wedding cake)

See you again soon! Thankyou for visiting :-)

Love 'n' hugs,

For a very good friend of mine.....

Hiya,

I want to share with you a card I have made for a very special pal of mine.... I bought the template for this card when I went to the craft show with her last year and as we're both planning on going again soon, I thought I'd better use it! 

I've used one of my fave Lili of the Valley images, coloured her with promarkers and oodles of glitter :-) The border punch is from xcut. The papers are from crafts too and I've added some of my almost compulsory butterflies and some cute little buttons.

When you open up the front you can tell that it's a special birthday for a special friend but I won't dwell on that too much! The numbers were cut using the sizzix bang! zoom! alphabet and the sentiment is from Daisy and Dandelion.

I made a little pocket in the back to hold part of her birthday present - a ticket to this year's craft show! The rest of her present was a surprise night out to a comedy club with some pals. It was a right laugh!!!

A close-up of the image. I gave her some tiny gems for buttons.... you can't see the glitter very well I'm afraid :-(

Challenges:

Lili of the Valley - Button it

CES challenges - Totally gorjuss/pretty girls

The ABC Challenge - A for Anything goes

Simon says stamp - Anything goes

I'm also entering this into the World Cardmaking Day celebration on the LOTV Ideas to Inspire blog.......

Anyway, the lady herself will be here in a mo cos she's very kindly agreed to come and help me put my wedding invites together!!!

See you again soon!

Love 'n' hugs,

Dream Valley 17 - Monochrome

Hiya!

Hope everyone has been enjoying the recent gorgeous weather! I've had a really busy week at the allotment and taking my littl'uns to a never ending stream of kids clubs, swimming and football lessons and other social events but I have managed to squeeze in some crafting time! I've got quite a few creations to show you over the next few days but this is for the new challenge over at Dream Valley. This time we'd like to see your monochrome creations!!!!

I always seem to do my girlie cards in pinks and purples but I've got some really pretty blue papers so I wanted to do a blue girlie card this time..... The image is of of Sugar Nellie's Manga Girls which I have not used nearly enough!

I've coloured her with my promarkers, cut her out and put her inside a nestie cut frame on foam pads to make her stand out a bit.... I took this photo at first but I'm struggling getting my piccies right at the moment....

so then I took this one.... The colours look better but then I've got all the shadows to deal with! I can't win!

I followed a lovely sketch at Sunday Sketch and Stamp although the deadline has now passed so I can't enter it.... :-( I've made my usual scrunchy flowers using scalloped circle layers that I've dampened and given a good scrunching before pinning together with brads.

I have used:

Image - Sugar Nellie

Papers - Forever Friends Pink Parfait (pale blue) and Papermania Henbury Lane (brighter glittery paper)

Promarkers

Nesties

Round corner punch

Ribbon, gems and brads from stash

Challenges:

Whoopsi Daisy - Make your own embellies (scrunchy flowers)

Wags 'n' Whiskers - Handmade (flowers)

Stampin' for the weekend - What a cutie

Simon says stamp - Anything goes

Paperplay - White + 1 other colour

CES challenges - Totally gorjuss/pretty girls

The ABC Challenge - A for Anything goes

Right! I'm off to the allotment before we run out of sun :-) Have a fab weekend and hope you can join us at Dream Valley soon!!!!

Love 'n' hugs,

A special birthday.....

Hiya,

My sister asked me to make a card for a friend of hers who is celebrating a special birthday :-)

I've used a Fizzy moon image and coloured it with my usual promarkers and added some glitter to the flowers.... The sentiment is computer generated. I'm sure I followed a sketch but I can't find it now so I can't tell you whose it is - sorry!

A close-up of the image - I think you can actually see some of the sparkle on this one (shock, horror!) :-)

I used:

Image - Fizzy Moon

Sentiment  - computer generated

Papers - Papermania Henbury Lane (background), Wild Rose Studio (2 panels)

Promarkers

Glitter glue

Nesties

Ribbon - dovecraft

Butterfly punch

Gems from stash

Challenges:

The ABC Challenge - A for Anything goes

Simon says stamp - Anything goes

Cupcake Craft Challenges - If you go down to the woods today

Right, I'm off to visit some more of your lovely bogs! See you again tomorrow with my DT card for Dream Valley :-)

Love 'n' hugs,