Bling It On

Hello.
This is NOT the year to hold back on the bling! 

I've been admiring these full panel, shaker cards for a while, and now was the perfect time to give one a go. I started by making my card front in the usual way, with my car packed with cute critters, loaded with gifts, on a die-cut snow background, and layered onto the blue card. Then I popped this inside a thin cello bag (I get mine from The Works) and added all my bling.
Ok, I went a bit crazy with the bling - using sequins, some super, glittery Diamond Dust, and some powdery/snowy Flower Soft in polar white.
Then I used ds tape to attach this to my card blank. Because I used a thin cello bag it's really easy to fold over the sides and tape it in place.
Voila - a super, cute, full of fun, shaker.

 We're not going to mention the snow and glitter that gets trapped INSIDE the car!! :o)

Challenge

Addicted to Stamps and More

This is my 2nd entry - is that allowed?

mft  - special delivery, cute caravan, beast friends (tree)

copics    Avery elle - falling snow die
Pinkfresh studio - diagonal stitch rectangle
diamond dust,   polar white flower soft

Birthday Road Trip

Hello.

Before I share my card with you today, I want to say a big thank you to everyone that sent their best wishes for my mum. Unfortunately, mum passed away in hospital last Sunday. In some ways it's a relief, as the dementia was making it increasingly difficult for mum to remain at home, but it's still hard.

We managed to get a funeral booked for the 22nd and right now, I'm consoling myself with thinking of my mum and dad being together again.

As always time in my craft room is a big help. Focusing on tiny die-cuts and colouring calms the mind.

Here's my car, all loaded up and setting off on a birthday road trip.

Challenge
Addicted to Stamps and More

mft - special delivery, cute caravan, party animals
pinkfresh studio - diagonal stitch rectangle
avery elle - falling snow die
copics

A Whole Lot of Happy is Coming Your Way

Hello.

Loaded down with suitcases and presents this car is chugging slowly up the hill - I hope it makes it without losing anything!

I inked up my background with that gorgeous violet colour, and attached some white snow banks. Then I added my packed car, making it's way up the hill, and completed the scene with a few trees and some falling snow.

It's my first time playing along with the Global Design Project and I just have time to get my entry in. Check them out for some amazing inspiration from their design team.

mft - special delivery, cute caravan,  snowglobe sentiments
lawn fawn stitched hillside borders
distress ink - wilted violet and evergreen bough
concord and 9th - tiny trees
copic markers

Bark the Herald Angels Sing

Hello.
Red sky at night, shepherd's delight.
And I was delighted with how this rich 'festive berries' sky turned out.

The caroling pups were fussy cut, coloured with copics and added to that red background, I also squeezed in a Christmas tree behind them. For the 'snow' I usually splatter some white paint, but this time I just used my white gel pen - super quick and easy to do.

Inspired By Challenge

(I've used the red, green, brown and grey)

clearly besotted - howl it's christmas, coloured with copics
distress ink festive berries
pinkfresh studio diagonal stitch rectangle, mft - sttitch scalloped basic edges

Driving Home for Christmas

Hello.

I'm so behind with my Christmas cards, that I thought I would make a few together. Don't be fooled by the CAS design of these though, they took me all afternoon to die-cut, colour and make up.

I chose pink, blue, red and green for my car colours, and used a panel of the same colour for some easy layering.

It was fun putting these together and  I mixed and matched the critters, presents and suitcases to  the families that these are for. I even managed to squeeze a christmas tree in there somewhere :-)

Challenge

CAS Christmas Card

mft stamps - special delivery, cute caravan, beast friends, snow globe sentiments

copics, pinkfresh studio diagonal stitch rectangle

Home for the Holidays

Hello.

Just a quick post today, with a simple card. My brain is on a go slow. My mum was taken into hospital 2 weeks ago with a stroke and pulmonary embolism. We found her on the bedroom floor. The dementia is making treatment more difficult. It's tough.

It's nice to get half an hour in my craft room, where I can focus on die-cuts and glitter, and forget about the everyday for a while.

sorry about the rubbish photo, irl this card really sparkles! 

Challenge
 Inspired By 

wplus9 - neighbors coloured with copics

concord and 9th - tiny trees stamped in distress ink, lucky clover

avery elle falling snow die, stickles glitter - star dust, mft - snow globe sentiment

Winter Wonderland

Hello.

I'm back in my comfort zone today, with a little, winter scene.

I really love background dies, with a stitched edge. I think they add such a pretty and subtle detail. Here I used a diagonal stitch rectangle and some stitched hillside borders. Then I added my die cut trees and popped up my animals with foam tape.

I wasn't brave enough to stamp the sentiment right onto the card, so it's on a little strip instead. 

To finish, I added a few snowflakes, and some glitter to the trees.

Inspired by Challenge

I was inspired by... the white background, the green trees, the reindeer and snowflakes and the black sentiment

wplus9 - winter wonderland / concord and 9th - tiny trees / distress ink - festive berries, vintage photo, lucky clover / altenew ink - evening grey / lawn fawn - stitched hillside borders / pinkfresh studios - diagonal stitched rectangle / stickles glitter - star dust

Time Spent Amongst Trees Is Never Wasted Time

Quote: Katrina Mayer

Hello. Today I'm sharing another colour combo with my turnabout trees.

This stamp is definitely a challenge for me - choosing a colour palette is hard! What I've discovered is that, instead of choosing 4 colours, I can stick to just 3, and still get a lovely effect. This means that my first and last stamping are in the same colour.

For the sentiment I had some printed vellum sayings from The Works, and I adhered one of these to a piece of coloured card and popped it up with foam tape. Then I just added a few red gems for that little bit of Christmas bling.

Challenge

Stamping Sensations

********Christmas********

concord and 9th - tiny trees turnabout stamp.   distress inks - festive berries, iced spruce, salvaged patina.    pinkfresh studio stitched rectangle die.     the works - vellum sentiment

It's All About The Trees

Hello.
This week I splashed out on my first turnabout stamp. At first I thought it was kind of pricey but, in this set, you get the turnabout stamp, 5 separate trees, 2 sentiments and a few other elements, so you do get a lot for your money. That's how I sold it to myself anyway :o)
Here's my first attempt with the turnabout.

I didn't have one of the turnabout jigs, so I just used the alignment guide that came in the set, to place the stamp in my platform, and it worked fine. My head is now buzzing with possibilities for this set, colour combos, monochrome, embossing - I NEED more time in my craft room!!

Challenge

Addicted to Stamps and More

concord and 9th - tiny trees turnabout
pinkfresh studio - diagonal stitch rectangle
distress ink - fossilized amber, faded jeans, salvaged patina

WIP Temperature Chart

Hello.

Today I'm sharing something a little different. A temperature chart.
 I've wanted to make one of these for a long time. There are some amazing quilts and cross stitch designs all over Pinterest. However, I can't quilt, and my budget wouldn't stretch to all those embroidery supplies, but  I can STAMP! So I created my own chart with a tiny flower stamp. 
I used the small stamp so that I could keep it A4 size for framing.

I used my Zigs to create a colour chart, -2C to 30C+, each colour representing 2 degrees, so 17 colours in all. Then I  keep a record, in my bullet journal, of the daily temperature at 12pm and simply colour the flower in according to my chart.

This is a fun little project, and I've enjoyed doing it. There are definitely things I would change next time though.

• I would take more care stamping the flowers - they go a little wobbly towards the end, but hey, I guess that's the handmade look, right?
• I would change the colours a little. It would be nice to see more reds/oranges in there,  so I would make those come in at a lower temperature. 
• I'm not sure about using 12pm for the daily temperature. I might switch that to the highest daily temp.

Challenge

Love to Craft

November Anything Goes

flower stamp from mftstamps, sweet somebunny
zig clean colour real brush markers

Boo to You

Hello.

Today I'm sharing a cute, and simple Halloween card, using the animal ABCs from Clearly Besotted. I resisted buying this set at first, because it has no dies, but fussy cutting does get easier the more you practice and it's turned out to be a really versatile set.

This was a quick and easy card to put together. I fussy cut my BOO letters and coloured them with Copics, then attached them with foam tape to a distress ink background. Then I added the black and orange layers for a little more interest.

Challenge
Cupcake Inspirations 

clearly besotted - cute as ABCs - coloured with copics
distress ink - wilted violet, dusty concord
pinkfresh studios - diagonal stitched rectangle

Baby's First Boo

Happy Halloween everyone.
This year it's our grandson's first, so it's extra special for us, and we've already seen him in his little, dracula outfit. Too cute!

I think I threw everything at this card - it's definitely not my usual more CAS style, but I just went with the flow and had fun. I started by stamping and heat embossing 'Bailey's First' - I tried this using my misti for the words, but the gap between the letters is too much, so I had to revert to stamping the letters individually. If you're quick the versamark stays wet enough for the embossing powder to stick.

With the embossing done I inked the background up with some stencils and distress ink. Then I stamped and coloured the BOO, fussy cut it, and popped it up on foam tape.

Challenge

Inkspirational

mft  - stamps (well connected alpha) stencils (grassy edges, cloud edges)
clearly besotted - as cute as ABCs
pinkfresh studios- diagonal stitched rectangle
distress inks - cracked pistachio, wilted violet

Autumn Leaves Are Falling

Hello. Do you love colouring? I seem to have rekindled my love for copics, and I had fun colouring this pretty, wreath with some autumn shades.

I'm not the best at colouring. I have no real idea of where to put shadows, or highlights, but I'm learning to just let go and enjoy it. Easy to do when you have such a pretty image to work with. After colouring I added some white dots (went a bit crazy with them!), some little gems,  and, at the last minute, I squeezed in that little blue bird.

Challenge

Inkspirational

clearly besotted - ring around autimn, coloured with copics
wow  - metallic gold embossing powder
pink fresh studio - diagonal stitch rectangle

Happy Pawlidays

Hello. The theme over at Inspired By, this week is scrappy! That's perfect for us crafters that never throw anything away. Which is ALL of us, right?

My scrappy hoard not only contains things from card making, but also odd bits of packaging, pieces of string or wool, fabric cut offs, buttons and bows, and those annoying pieces of ribbon they sew into all your clothes.Tell me I'm not the only one!

So, for this challenge I had a rummage, and came up with a couple of brown paper bags. These came from my Gousto box. Gousto has helped keep me sane through lockdown. For those of you not familiar, it's a recipe box, where they deliver everything you need to make your meals. They use these paper bags to put the garlic in, and, of course, I keep them. I even found one with the white snow already on it, that must have been from a Christmas delivery.

Inspired By Challenge

I was inspired by the brown paper bags, with some red stripes and green 

mft - happy pawlidays, star from oh christmas tree
coloured with copics.

lawn fawn stitched hillside border die

Autumn Leaves and Pumpkins Please

Yay! It's Autumn. My favourite time of year. I'm looking forward to wrapping up for our woodland walks, pumpkin spiced lattes, slow cooker casseroles, and curling up on the sofa with a good book. What are you looking forward to?

I'm so happy I bought this cute autumn set. My daughter is an autumn lover too, so I thought it would be perfect for her wedding anniversary card. Five years already !! Where does the time go?

I fussy cut the wreath and critters and coloured them with copics. Then I  tried them on various coloured backgrounds, finally settling on that dark green.

I admit. I am a born again Clearly Besotted lover. I avoided their stamps for ages, because of the lack of dies. Crazy, right? Don't be scared of fussy cutting people! ;o)

Challenge
Time Out Challenges

clearly besotted - ring around autumn, coloured with copics and a few gems
mama elephant - labeled messages

Penguin Pyramid

Hello.

Hope everyone in the UK is enjoying their long weekend. We have had fun and games here looking after our Grandson, overnight for the first time. He's just 6 months old. Last night he was awake at 10pm, 2am, 3am, 5am and 7am - so I may well fall asleep in the middle of this post!! When he was safely delivered back to his mum, along with the lorry load of all his things, I managed to finish this penguin card.

This was a super quick card to make - a little distress ink blending on the background and then those die cut penguins, with just a smidgen of colouring, popped up on foam tape to form the pyramid. Then I spattered some white paint for the snow and attempted some little, cross-style twinkles. Yeah, that's something I'm going to have to work on!

Challenge

Inspired By

mama elephant - arctic penguins, coloured with copics
mft - snowglobe sentiments, star die from 'oh christmas tree'

distress ink - tumbled glass, salty ocean, stormy sky

Bark the Herald Angels Sing

Hello.

I'm a sucker for doggy stamps, so I don't know how these caroling pups got by me last year. I'm glad I have them now though, and here's their first outing.

This is such a cute lamp post die, that I found in my Christmas stash. For some reason I don't think I've ever used it before. I cut it a few times, for added 3D and coloured it with copics. The background was inked with distress inks and the pups coloured with copics.

When all that inking and colouring was done, I held my breath whilst I spattered some 'snow' around.

Challenge

Addicted to Stamps and More

clearly besotted - howl it's christmas
cheery lynn designs - colonial lamp post die
distress ink - foss.amber, tumb.glass,salty ocean, stormy sky