Penny Black Saturday #162 - Penny Black-Ground

Yippee, Saturday's here, and time for another Penny Black Saturday Challenge. I'm hoping that things are finally settling down for me after the distractions of the past few weeks, and I'm raring to go with a card for this week's theme. Thanks to everyone who entered last week's challenge - don't forget to check the main challenge blog to see if you have won.

This week our theme is

Penny Black-ground

... which is a not very subtle pun lol, to ask you to use your PB stamps for your background as well as your main image. There are lots of options for this and the DT have come up with some brilliant examples.

Our prize this week is a guest DT spot on the PBSC for September - woo hoo!!

So if you would like to join our happy band during that time, you know what you have to do ... just ensure you submit a new piece of work for the challenge, uisng a PB image, large sentiment or stickeroo as its main focus, and also following the theme.

This is what I did for this week.

I decided to go for a shabby chic look so that I could do a bit of background stamping onto a distressed background. First I cut a deckle edged square of paper, and distressed it with Tim Holtz distress inks in "Antique Linen" and "Vintage Photo". Then I stamped my main flower image (Penny  Black "Quite Dandy" (3623K)) off-centre using "Peeled Paint" and "Tumbled Glass". I stamped a few background lines in "Vintage Photo" using a stamp from the transparent set "Salutations", and overstamped with tiny dragonflies from the same set. 

My sentiment is PB "friends matter" (4073F), stamped in a blend of "Tumbled Glass" and "Faded Jeans". I finished my background stamping with some random dotty areas using Penny Black "fantasy" (3880K). Finally I assembled the card by tying some loopy trim from my stash, decorating with die-cut sparkly butterflies and pearls from my stash, and mounting onto crackle distress gold card.

I actually managed to use FIVE separate PB stamps on this card - think that's pretty good going lol!

Challenges:

Simon Says Stamp and Show - Anything Goes (2nd entry)

PaperPlay #30 - In the Garden

By The Cute & Girly (July) - Things With Wings

Crafty Cardmakers #50 - Flutterbies

Cupcake #152 - Shabby Sparkle

Hope you will join us this week - have a great weekend!

Penny Black Saturday #149 – Milestones

Good morning everyone – welcome to yet another long Bank holiday weekend, and it’s time for another Penny Black Saturday Challenge.

Thanks as always to everyone who entered last week’s Happily Ever After Challenge – there were some truly adorable and romantic entries. Don’t forget to check the main challenge blog to see if you have won last week’s prize.

This week the DT have very kindly allowed me to pick the theme in honour of the fact that I have a milestone birthday coming up this next week .. I am going to be 50 (yikes, when did that happen ???). So in honour of this momentous (!) occasion, this week’s theme is

Milestones

Now you could interpret this in many ways to celebrate any of life’s milestones, eg. special birthday, wedding, engagement, birth, retirement, graduation … the list of possibilities is almost endless!

Please just remember that in order to be eligible for this week’s prize you need to submit a new piece of work, with a Penny Black image, large sentiment or stickeroo as its main focus.

And talking of prizes … this week’s prize is a 15% off lifetime discount voucher form our regular sponsor, Dick at PB Stamps

Lovely!!

The other ladies on the DT have produced a fabulous selection of cards so please do check them out – here is mine for this week.

 

Recipe:
Main image: Penny Black “Unwrapped” (3693H), coloured with Promarkers;
Sentiment: computer generated;
Papers: Craft Creations (gingham) and Deja Views (alphabet);
Supplies: ribbon, lace and buttons from stash (inc. white button recycled from an old shirt);
Tools: large scalloped square nestabilities; number 1 die cut using Cuttlebug “Hippie Chick” alphabet set.

Challenges:

Papertake Weekly – Sketch #55

 

The Ribbon Girl #7 – Red, White and Blue
Crafty Cardmakers #44 – A Royal Wedding (Red, White and Blue)
Fab ‘n’ Funky #70 – Red, White and Blue
Penny Black Challenge – Bold and Bright
Top Tip Tuesday #31 – Squares
Stamptacular #108 – Pile It On (at least 5 layers)
Craft Your Passion #55 - Layers
Creative Craft – Recycling ( white button from shirt)
Simon Says Stamp and Show – Some Buttons
Simon Says – Anything Goes
Sparkles #10 – Anything Goes 
Make it Monday #34 – Anything Goes
Moving Along With The Times #96 – Anything Goes

That’s it for today … I’m off out tonight for a birthday meal with my husband so I’d better start getting ready in good time :-)

Have a great weekend.

My first ... my last ... my everything

This year I have made quite a lot of cards using the snowy scenes theme with swirls and flowers, and today I would like to show you the last and fanciest (though still relatively easy to make) card from the production line, which is this year's card for my mum and dad. Most similar cards I have made have had a totally white background; but as this one is bigger (C5) I have added a gorgeous piece of sparkly snowflake paper I found earleir this week in a local craft shop (they only had one piece so that was lucky!!) Once more this card is actually MUCH more sparkly than the photograph suggests!!

Recipe:

Main image: Penny Black "Snowy Park", covered with crystal Fine Art glitter;

Sentiment: Pink Gem Designs;

Paper: frorm local craft shop - no manufacturer details on the paper!

Supplies: hellebores and cherry blossom flowers from Wild Orchid Crafts covered with stardust Stickles; small glittered roses from Hobbycraft; silver gems from my stash;

Tools: Marianne D Creatables "Flower swirl" die; Cuttlebug "snowflakes" embossing folder.

I have made this card to fit the following challenges:

Simon Says - Silver, blue & white

Dutch Dare #93 - Winter
Fussy & Fancy Friday - Show Us Some Snow

Stampin' for the Weekend #53 - Christmas

Additionally, Crafty Cardmakers #36 is asking this week to see a latest card along with one of your earliest creations. Well, this is one of my earliest cards, and is the Christmas card I made for my mum & dad back in 2006! It makes me quite nostalgic, because back then I had very little equipment, only a handful of stamps and a small amount of papers and embellishments. Peel offs ruled the day to save costs on making different sentiments for different cards, I don't think I had got my Cuttlebug, and I had not yet heard of nestabilities, Wild orchid Crafts, Lili of the Valley or many other of my current favourite stores and supplies. As you will see though I HAD heard of Penny Black already - this is the first PB stamp I ever bought and is called "Winter Snuggles!" - awww!

Just off to do some ironing now before getting ready for my works Christmas party ... so I sure hope that the weather is going to hold and things won't be looking like the picture on my first card!!

Edited: by 7pm Friday the scene outside our house was well on the way to looking pretty much EXACTLY like the pic on the top card, so no Chrimbo party night for me :-( I definitely made the right choice ... my husband had to walk home over 2 miles from our local rail station after his afternoon party in thick snow ... if I had tried it in a sparkly dress and platform shoes I don't think I'd have made it lol!!

Christmas in August - just!!

Good evening! I've had an extra day off work today following the Bank Holiday, so I made this card this afternoon before I went out ... but I thought I'd better post it quickly as the title "Christmas in August" won't seem nearly so apt when we get to tomorrow lol!

I have inked up one of my darling new LotV stamps for the first time .. the difficulty is knowing which one to choose first, they are all SOOO cute!

I deliberately set out to make this card fit several challenges ....

Firstly, I used this fab sketch from Teddy Stampers #18 - I have not seen this challenge blog until now, but I'm guessing from the title that it requires a teddy image ;-) ... well that works for me with these LotV cuties!

I would also like to enter this card for the following challenges:

Creative Inspirations #41 - Christmas in August
Totally Gorjuss #45 - Christmas in August
Paper Sundaes #33 - Christmas in August
Secret Crafter #98 - Make a Start on Christmas
Crafty Cardmakers Spotlight - Glitter & Sparkle

.. and talking of gliiter and sparkle, here's a closeup of teddy's tinsel.

Recipe:
Main image: LotV "james Bear Wrapped in Tinsel", coloured wtih Copics & Promarkers, and tinsel effect created with Stickles;
Sentiment; Craftwork Cards;
Papers: Papermania "Silent Night";
Supplies: Flower, leaves and sparkly stars from Prima Chrstmas bubble; pearls, pearl gem and gold spacer from the Hobby House; ribbon from stash;
Tools: small, large and large classic scalloped circle nestabilities; Fiskars "Victorian" cutting blade.

Back to work tomorrow ... but I already have another card made and hope to have a third in the bag by then ;-)

Penny Black Challenge #96 - buttons galore!

Hello there and welcome to week 96 of the Penny Black Saturday Challenge. Thanks to everyone who entered last week's challenge - sorry I wasn't about as I had a week off to concentrate on some jobs around the house over Easter, but hopefully I'm now back in the saddle.

This week we have another great challenge theme for you .... we would like to see

buttons galore!

Yes ... we would like to see buttons on your project - don't forget that the only other rule is that you must use a Penny Black image or sentiment prominently on your project.

As always we have a grat prize for you - our regular sponsor

is offering one lucky randomly drawn winner a $20 voucher to spend in their online shop - lovely!!

Talking of lovely, the DT has been busy as always creating some gorgeous samples - hope you'll check them out. Here's my effort ....

I really do adore this cute hedgie from the "Tiny Wishes" set, and think she goes perfectly with the yummy new Papermania "Rose Garden" papers. I decided to challenge myself so that I could enter a few other challenges with this card, so I made my own paper flower following this tutorial on YouTube .... now I have to say I found the whole thing pretty tricky as the papers are quite stiff and therefore didn't want to crumple daintily, but I think I got there in the end!!

As a result of all this endeavour I'd like to enter this card for the following challenges:

Cupcake #85 - make your own flowers
Crafty Cardmakers #18 - A Challenging Challenge
(mine was the flower lol!!)
Allsorts #47 - Petals and Pearls
Cute Card Thursday #107 - Mono Mania!
... my card is almost exclusively pink, apart from the "natural" elements such as skin, fur and leaves :-)
Meljen's Designs #2 - Let's See Some Girly Colours
Stamptacular Sunday #53 - Sugar & Spice & everything nice
Daring Cardmakers - If the Shoe Fits (don't you just love those cute oversize trainers?? lol!)
Inky Impressions #33 - charm it!
C.R.A.F.T.#45 - buttons
Totally Gorjuss #25 - Texture
Magical Crafts #12 - Animal antics
Simple Doodles #15 - Inspire others

Recipe:
Main image: Penny Black "Tiny Wishes" transparent set, coloured with watercolour eoncils and decorated on rose with Stickles;
Sentiment & papers: Papermania "Rose Garden" pad;
Supplies: large pearl brad, large spacer and pearl gems all from The Hobby House; "Made with love" heart charm from Bunny Zoe's Crafts; lace was an RAK from Ruby :-); pink ribbon and buttons from my stash;
Tools: "labels 3" nestabilities; Leone Em "Ash Family" leaf punch.

Hope you can join us this week - look forward to seeing your creations.

Penny Black Challenge #86 - Someone Special

Good afternoon everyone ... sorry I'm rather late today - I only managed to make this DT card this morning!! So I guess I'd better get straight down to business, and tell you about this week's Penny Black Saturday Challenge #86.

The theme this week is

Someone Special

As always you can interpret this however you like so long as you use at least one Penny Black stamp or sticker on your creation.

This week's prize is a fabulous LIFETIME discount 15% voucher from our regular sponsor, Dick at

So without further ado, here's my card.

As I was so behind with everything I was able to follow the sketch for this week's Friday Sketchers #87.


I would also like to enter this card for the following other challenges:

Crafty Cardmakers #13 - Hearts & Romance
Cute Card Thursday #97 - Blooming Gorgeous (2nd entry)
Fussy & Fancy #3 - Hearts
Secret Crafter #68 - Hearts

Recipe:
Main image; Penny Black "Teddy & Co." transparent set, coloured with watercolour pencils and edged with aqua and green Versamagic chalk inks;
Sentiment: Penny Black "Teddy & Co.";
Papers: My Mind's Eye (free with this month's Cardmaking & Papercraft magazine);
Supplies: Prima, Woodware & Papermania flowers; spacer from The Hobby House; Doodlebug sugar coated brad; pearl spray, pearls and charm from my stash;
Tools: "Labels 3" nestabilities; Martha Stewart "Valentine lace" edge punch and "scallop lace heart" punch.

Looking forward to seeing all your creations this week. Don't forget to check whether you have won last week's prize, and to cehck out the other DT members' fab creations.

Have a great weekend.

I spy ... with my little eye ....

.... Something beginning with "B" ... That's what we were asked to use for this week's One Stop Craft Challenge #61, so I couldn't resist using my brand new Lili of the Valley Teddy Bear with Bouquet, BasicGrey paper, BasicGrey opaline pearls and pearl Brads :-)

I also spied several other challenges that I tried to incorporate into this card. I followed the fab sketch for this week's Sketch Saturday #84

I also used a few of my favourite things ... as Crafty Cardmakers #11 wants to know what were our fave new products and/or techniques for 2009. Well I have lots, but would have to include use of multiple flowers with spacers and Leone Em punched leaves - it just adds so much more dimension and interest to the card (as well as postage charges lol!!) Also during 2009 I discovered Hobbycraft raffia lace, which I just love to weave with narrow ribbon to co-ordinate with my papers!

I also used some new items of stash for this card, which puts it into the frame for a few more challenges. My LotV teddy stamp was a Secret Santa gift from a group of crafty friends (awww!); and I bought my "labels 4" nesties several weeks before Christmas but bizarrely have never used them until now! So I would like to enter this card for
Stamp Something - New Somethings
Fussy & Fancy #1 - New
Papertake Weekly - New Beginnings (can include something new on the card :-) )

I also decided to make a Thankyou card to enter for Totally Gorjuss Challenge #11, now that cards don't have to always contain a Gorjuss Girl stamp. Last but not least, I have done a bit of smudgy distressing on the edges of the image, in line with the challenges from Corrosive #46 and from Creative Card Crew #42 ... and yay!! I've just popped over there and discovered I've been picked for their DT call - woo hoo! So I guess I'd better enter this challenge whilst I still can lol!

Edited: Thursday morning (7/1) I have spotted that the new LotV challenge #44 is Thankyou. Now I know that backlinking is naughty and I never normally do it .... but seeing as this card was posted only a few hours before the challenge started, it is my first ever LotV card using my adorable first ever LotV stamp (first of many I hope!!) , and LotV is a "fun" rather than a "prize" challenge this week ... I hope they'll let me share it ;-)

Recipe:
Main image: Lili of the Valley teddy with bouquet, watercoloured and decorated with Stickles and BasicGrey pearls;
Sentiment: Penny Black "Salutations" transparent set;
Paper: BasicGrey "two Scoops";
Supplies: Flowers by Petaloo and Woodware; raffia lace from hobbycraft; pearl brads and spacers from The Hobby House; dragonfly brad , ribbon & corner peel-offs from my stash;
Tools: nestabilities "labels four"; Leone Em "Ash Family" punch; Fiskars paper trimmer "Victorian" blade.

Blimey! ... and a funky Rudolph

Blimey - I didn't make a card for a whole ten days until last night .... where has the last week and a half gone to lol?? I'm surprised I didn't have to go to the Priory for counselling to recover from my withdrawal symptoms!

Anyhow, I managed a little sesh last night and made two cards from scratch plus completed another two which had been hanging around the house for a while. Here's the first one, which I have nicknamed "Funky Rudolph" !


I followed the fab sketch for this week's Friday Sketchers #80 - suitably encouraged by the Magnolia-licious prize they have on offer this week :-)

I also chose my Christmas theme and contemporary colours for the following challenges:

Crafty Cardmakers #9 - Alternative Christmas
A Spoon Full of Sugar #80 - Non-traditional Christmas colours
Charisma Cardz #47 - Anything Christmas
Creative Card Crew #39 - Christmas
Stamp With Fun #35 - Christmas
Stamp with Stampavie #72 - Christmas

Recipe:
Main image: Penny Black "slapstick" stamp "Fancy Antler", coloured with watercolour pencils;
Sentiment: Penny Black "a wish...." (3502F), stamped with Versacolour chalk ink;
Paper: BasicGrey "Eskimo Kisses";
Supplies: pearls gems, and pink/brown dotty ribbon (just seen) from my stash;
Tools: Martha Stewart "embossed snowflakes" edge punch; Cuttlebug "snowlakes #2" die.

Off to have a cup of tea now and catch up with some telly - hope to be back tomorrow with another card :-)

How many "Snowflakes" make 11 challenges?

Answer ..... just the one lol!!

I really do love "Snowflake" by Sugar Nellie - I know she isn't one of the latest stamps but she is so pretty ... hadn't inked her up for a little while so I thought I would use her for this week's Sketch Saturday sketch #77.

Now when I first saw the sketch I was a bit flummoxed by the large circles on it .... couldn't quite picture any of my flowers or snowflake dies filling those spots on the card - inspiration just wasn't coming to me. But after rootling around in my Christmas papers, I found a Bo Bunny one with large and small snowflakes in circles ..... and hey! they fitted my nestie circles so I could cut them out perfectly :-) (I actually tried cutting out the paper circles by hand at first, but we'll draw a veil over that lol!) And as luck would have it the colours co-ordinated with another piece of Christmas tree paper (I think it is by MME but am open to correction on that) ... so off I went!

Here's the result ....

I also did my best to make this card tie in to the following challenges, making 11 altogether - yippee!

Secret Crafter #58 - Seasons ... now it is clearly snowing on my card, so at least if you're in the UK you can interpret that as any season of the year lol!!
Crafty Calendar Challenge #2 - Weather. Oops! I forgot the pearls (not like me! ... I LURVE pearls) so it's a good job they're optional lol!
Charisma Cardz #45 - Merry & Bright. As I'm quite a pastel kind of girl I think this card is quite bright anyway, but the sentiment was specifically chosen to tie in with this challenge :-)
Hand Full of Stamps #5 - Getting Ready for the Holidays
Cute Card Thursday #86 - Glitter Me Silly! Well I don't need asking twice when it comes to sprinkling the glamour dust liberally around!! Hope the poor light conditions can pick it out on the snowflakes and "Snowflake's" cosy muffler!
Creative Inspirations #36 - Sparkle!
Crafty Cardmakers Challenge #8 - Clear as Day. I used sticky back clear gems on the centres of my snowflakes ... a cop out, I know!
Frosted Designs - Bling It On.
Dutch Dare #64 - Felt like it - I have used Papermania white felt ric rac ribbon across the top of the card.
Kraftin' Kimmie Challenge #6 - Lotsa Circles - hope this is self explanatory!

Here's a pic to try to show the sparkle a bit more clearly - not easy given the prevailing weather conditions and shockingly poor light levels even in the middle of the day!

Recipe:
Main image: Sugar Nellie "Snowflake" coloured wtih watercolour pencils and white gel pen, and decorated with glamour dust and polar white Flowersoft (bit difficult to see ... I used a different glue from the norm and not much of the Flowersoft stuck!!);
Sentiment: Craftwork Cards "Oh! My Words";
Papers: MME (trees) and Bo Bunny (circles and pink matting);
Supplies: white felt ric rac by Papermania; snowflake brads by Dovecraft;
Tools: small and large circle and scalloped circle nestabilities.

Thanks for looking :-)

Crafty Cardmakers #5 Guest DT Card - and a bit of a photographic nightmare!

I was really thrilled when Vixykins asked me if I would make a guest DT card for this week's challenge on the new-ish challenge blog she has set up with some other fab talented ladies - Crafty Cardmakers.

If you haven't discovered it yet, then please do pop over and check it out .... here's what it's all about ...

"We are a blog designed for newer and less experienced cardmakers and bloggers with a new challenge every other Monday. Our design team also range from very new cardmakers through to more experienced with a special guest designer each challenge too! We also have tutorials and how to's which you will find links to down the sidebar. You don't have to be new to join in the fun but why not try something a bit different :)"

Hope you will be able to join in this fortnight, and to help get your creative juices flowing there is a great prize - a £10 voucher for Joanna Sheen - how great is that?


This fortnight challenge is

ribbons &/or fibres

... so I thought I would focus on using some "unusual" ribbon AND fibre ... and as my favourite fibre is white, turquoise and sparkly, that immediately suggested Christmas. I quickly got stuck in and tried an experiment, embossing using a brass stencil and my Cuttlebug (thinking of quick Christmas makes for when the production line really kicks in lol!) I was reasonably pleased with the result at the time .. but oh horror! ... when I tried to photograph it the next day I realised that taking an adequate photograph of mirri card is nigh impossible! As I've been out & about pretty much all weekend I didn't have time to make another .. so i hope youw ill all be kind (Vix was very kind - bless her!)

So here it is anyway ...


Recipe:
Main image: brass stencil of Christmas trees (sorry, no make on the packaging) run through Cuttlebug onto silver mirri card, matted onto pale blue and then white glitter card;
Sentiment; Cardology "Oh! My Words";
Paper: Reminisce; pale blue and white glitter card from Edwin Allen
Supplies: white felt snowflake ribbon by Papermania; fluffy sparkly fibre by Cardology;
Tools: punched edge on glitter card is Martha Stewart "embossed snowflake" edge punch.

Thanks for looking.