Teddy and robin (2)

Just a very quick post from me this evening ... here's another card I made on Saturday but haven't really had chance to post until now. it's another outing for my new darling Gillian Roberts stamp.

For this one I followed the sketch at this week's Lili of the Valley Challenge #41 - I thought I may have missed the moment with it, but thankfully I've discovered it is on for 2 weeks - phew!

I would also like to enter it for the following challenges:

Pollycraft Monday Challenge #29 - Wonderful Christmas Time
Everybody-Art-Challenge #67 - Christmas
Papertake Weekly - Christmas Crackers
Flourishes Timeless Tuesday #43 - Christmas
Simon Says - Winter Love. Maybe I'm imagining it, but I think the teddy is looking very lovingly at the robin bearing the dinky gift!!
Cuttlebug "be inspired" #59 - Glitter
Fun with Shapes & More #30 - Gifts as an imprint ... I think this means a pic of a gift somewhere on the card ...and can you see what the little robin is holding??
Incy Wincy #19 - Anything Goes

Here's a closeup to try to prove there is actually some glitter on there .. not very successfully I fear lol!

Recipe:
Main image: Gillian Roberts "Bear & Robin" coloured with watercolour pencils and decorated with polar white Flowersoft & glamour dust;
Sentiment: Craftwork Cards "Oh! My Words";
Papers: Kaisercraft;
Supplies: pearls and red ribbon from my stash;
Tools: Cuttlebug "snowflakes" folder embossed onto white glitter card; Martha Stewart "Arctic Snowflake" punch used on white glitter card.

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.

Mum's birthday combo

Last night I made my mum's birthday card .. her birthday isn't until Thursday, but as she doesn't own a computer I think I'm fairly safe posting it on here lol!

This card is actually very similar to one I made about three weeks ago ... I love this particular stamp (whch I've never yet used to make my mum a card!) and these papers, also I thought my mum would like this kind of design;so I just went with it with a few small differences from my previous effort.

I'd like to enter this card for a few challenges:

Stamp With Fun #19 - Birthdays
Secret Crafter #44 - cute as a bug - well my paper is covered with dragonflies, and I have used a couple of cute dragonfly brads and a li'l silver butterfly charm :-)
Stamp Something - Charmed somethings - I'm really crossing my fingers with this one, as the prize is sponsored by Quixotic Paperie which has THE most fabulous lace and charms ... I was lucky enough to win some another time, but they're so lovely I'm quickly working my way through them lol!
Papertake Weekly - Four Seasons - this card makes me think of summer with the wisteria, dragonflies and butterfly ...

Here's a picture that tries to capture the shine and sparkle of the embossing and glamour dust, but sadly there wasn't a lot of light this morning.

And the inside ...

Recipe:

Main image: Penny Black "Fanfare"(3946K) embossed in detail silver, coloured with Marvey brushstroke pens and decorated with glamour dust;

Sentiments: Craftwork Cards "Oh my Words!"; letters cut from pearlescent white card using Cuttlebug "Hippie Chick" alphabet;

Papers: BasicGrey "Wisteria";

Supplies: mulberry paper flowers & pearl brads by Papermania; charm from Dolls Made Up; punched borders using Martha Stewart "doily lace" edge punch; dragonfly brads & ribbon from my stash.

Hope everyone is having a good evening, and thanks for looking :-)

Summer fruits

Here is a "Congratulations" card I made for a lady at work who has got a fantastic new job - I think hedgie looks so joyful he is clearly celebrating!

I made this card for this week's Simon Says Stamp Challenge, which is to use any two or more of the colours lemon, orange, apple green and pink: well my paper is lemon, apple green and pink so I kind of took it from there and tried to co-ordinate the rest of my embellishments etc.

The summery papers also made me think of entering this card for a few other challenges - Cupcake Crafts #46 and A Spoon Full of Sugar #58 both have summer as their theme this week, and One Stop Craft Challenge #35 is fruity colours (I have used lemon, apple green and raspberry pink!!).

Here's the inside .... I've been getting a bit lazy and short on time to keep up with this tradition, but I do like it when I get round to it!

Recipe:

Main image: Penny Black "Hedgehog Joy" coloured with watercolour pencils and decorated with little pearl gems;
Sentiment: diecut using Cuttlebug cut'n'emboss folder;
Papers: K&Co "Wild raspberry", cut with MS doily punch;
Supplies: flowers, ribbon and pearls from my stash; Doodlebug "sugar coated" brads in the centre of my flowers; charm from The Hobby House; leaves punched with Leone Em "Ash Branch" punch.

For my dad

It's now almost two weeks since I have made a card, and I'm sorry to say I have hardly done any blog-hopping at all, so I am sure to be missing out on a lot of fabulous creations! I'm still up to my eyeballs with my job application, presentation and interview preparation; but at least the deadline is now looming and by next Tuesday it will all be over (unless of course I am unsuccessful, in which case I will have to go through it all again for however many jobs in the organisation I choose to apply for until I get one.... but let's not dwell on that!!)

Anyhow, last night I just NEEDED a break, and in any case how I could possibly fail to make my dear dad a Father's Day card?? I decided from the start to ensure I incorporated this week's theme over at Stamp With Fun #11 which is dots - cos boy, have they got a fab prize on offer! (Penny Black - my favourites!) but I have also managed to tie the card in with the following challenges:

Cupcake Craft Challenge #44 - Father's Day

Cuttlebug Be Inspired #36 - Father's Day

Paper Blooms #12 - Men of Influence.

I used:

Main image: Penny Black "message from above" coloured with watercolour pencils, matted using nesties labels, with the edges inked with Brilliance "pearlescent ivy" ink.

Sentiments: Woodware "Tiny Greetings" (front); Whiff of Joy - from "Swirls" collection (inside);

Papers: BasicGrey "Boxer";

Supplies: punched edges made with MS "Scallop dot" punch; adhesive ribbon by DCWV.

Here's the inside.....

Now this card is safely in the post I guess I'd better get my nose back to the grindstone! hope to be back next week lol!

PBSC Week 52 - Blooming Gorgeous!!

Woo hoo it's Saturday again, so it's time for another Penny Black Saturday Challenge. We are now up to week 52 ... can you believe that this week completes our first year of challenges, and next week it is our birthday!! ..... but more of that later ...

Thanks as always to everyone who took the time to enter last week's challenge using Domi's fab sketch - there were some wonderful interpretations, and one lucky person should check the challenge blog later to find out that they have won last week's prize.

So .. onto this week's challege which is

Blooming Gorgeous!

Yep .. we would like to see lots of lovely flowers! Of course you can interpret this however you want, so long as we can see a Penny Black stamp or sticker somewhere on your creation! As ever the DT have all beena s busy as bees around a flower (sorry!) ... do check out their blogs because there is an absolute garden going on out there!!

As an incentive to get your creative juices flowing, we have got a fantastic prize this week by our new sponsor Fantastic Ribbons - a selection of 6 reels of ribbon, each containing 5 metres. Now I picked out these ribbons myself when I went to Port Sunlight, and I can tell you they are so gorgeous it's lucky they ever made it into the prize pot LOL!! Fantastic Ribbons has just launched a new online shop and I strongly recommend you visit ... they have LOTS of high quality ribbons and fantastic value prices .. what's not to like??

So here is my card, which I have to confess was a bit of rush job at the last possible minute - so please be kind!!


I embossed the beautiful floral panel onto iridescent pale pink cardstock using the Cuttlebug "Friends Forever" cut'n'emboss folder, and matted it onto pearlescent fuschia and lime green cardstock. The sentiment is Penny Black "... dreams ..." stamped in Brilliance pearlescent orchid ink and cut out using my deckle edge rectangle nesties. Paper is Bo Bunny with the bottom edge punched with my MS doily punch; flowers are from various sources including a birthday RAK from Helen; leaves were punched with my Leone Em Ash Branch punch; sparkly brads are by Doodlebug; spacers from The Hobby House, ribbon from my stash.

As I mentioned above...

next week is the PBSC birthday .... yes.. we will be ONE!! (awww!)

So save the date, because we are going to be having a big party!! There are going to be lots of lovely prizes plus some surprises - you won't want to miss it! Unfortunately I will be missing it due to personal commitments, but I will be really hoping the party week will go with a swing... given the fantastic efforts of the rest of the DT I'm sure it will!!

Have a great weekend!

Zeddy teddy does the combo

Here is a baby card I have made for the birth of my dear friend Sharon's grandson, who was born after a very traumatic time for her family last week ... sending all my love and best wishes...hopefully the card has arrived so I am safe to post!



I'd like to enter this card into a few challenges:

1. My start point was to use my favourite stamped image, which is the theme for this week's Creative Inspirations Challenge #9. I have lots of stamped images I really love but i think this one is without doubt my favourite .. he is even slumbering in my blog header lol! He also a very versatile teddy ... I have never used him for a baby card before but have seen him on other baby cards .. and he is so cute!
2. A Spoon Full of Sugar #52 - celebration! (Happy first birthday to SFoS too!)
3. Secret Crafter Challenge #33 - new beginnings
4. The Pink Elephant #15 - monograms and letters
5. Colour Create #16 - sky blue, tan & ecru -now I must hold my hand up and say it's mostly a happy accident that my card fits this challenge. Obviously we have blue for a boy + tan for a teddy; and as luck would have it I didn't think it neded much more colour ... I just did the flowers in pale blue and a kind of creamy colour. OK I hear you say, there is green in the leaves ... but nature is what it is, right?

Recipe:

Image: Penny Black "Sweet Slumber" coloured with watercolour pencils and flowers decorated with Stickles.

Paper: Forever Friends Christmas stack (!)

Supplies: Raffia lace from Hobbycraft threaded wtih two shades of blue ribbon from my stash; letters cut using Cuttlebug "Hippy Chick" alphavelt from ecru pearlescent card; flowers by Floradoodles; charm from Dolls Made Up.

Hope you are enjoying the weekend!

Penny Black Challenge #39 - Recipe!

Welcome to the weekend, and to the latest Penny Black Saturday Challenge. Last week there was a fantastic response as usual to the something you can eat challenge - I probably speak for the whole DT in saying we spent the week in a state of drooling hunger whilst viewing all your fab creations! Don't forget to check out who won the fabby PB stickeroos!

This week the challenge requires you to get your creative juices cooking in a different way, as this week we have a

Recipe - 3 brads, 2 ribbons, 1 flower

As usual you can interpret this in any way you choose so long as you include at least one PB image on your project.

This week's prize has been donated by our very own Kath, and is a couple of fab sentiment stamps by Debbi Moore Designs.

So here is my card .... I struggled with this a wee bit cos the thought of using only 1 flower sent me cold!! ... so I interpreted it loosely and used just the one flower head lol! Also I couldn't seem to get a matching combo of any given paper plus 2 co-ordinating ribbons (I clearly need to purchase some more ribbons!!) so eventually I used just a teeny bit of my second ribbon tied in the button.

Recipe:
Image: Penny Black "Jump for Joy" coloured with watercolour pencils and decorated with Stickles;
Sentiment: Cuttlebug "Everyday Greetings" set;
Flowers: new Papermania packs (white & pink), Prima (green);
Brads: Doodlebug sugar coated brights.
Paper and ribbon from my stash.

I'm going to be a bit busy this next week so apologise in advance if i don't get round all your entries .. but I'll do my best :-)

Have a great weekend!

An obvious thing to do ...

It's St. David's Day, the sun is shining and there are tentative signs of spring in the air .... so what could be more obvious than to make a Christmas card lol?

Actually this isn't as crazy as may at first appear ... the current theme for the Sugar Bowl Challenge #5 is Christmas, and boy do they have a fab prize on offer for one lucky winner! Not only that, but only own two SN stamps (so far!!) and they are both Christmas images ... so what's not to like?

Here is my card: I used SN "Juggling Snowman" for my main image; sentiment is by Stamps Away; paper is by Daisy Bucket; snowflake is Cuttlebug cut'n'emboss folder; ribbon, brad and gems from my stash. I'm also trying to get my money's worth from my new MS punch lol! so I thought the shape and holes mirrored the arc of the snowballs quite nicely!

Thanks for looking! Just off out shopping now so I hope to be back in time to do a bit of blog hopping later

4 into 1 does go!

I needed to make a "get well" card for a close friend who is having a knee op done next week, so looked around for some challenges to help me with some inspiration. I think I managed to fulfil 4 challenges with this card:


1. Colour create #4 - pink & grey, with the optional theme of cute and cuddly (well I think Ellie is exceptionally cute and cuddly, don't you?)
2. CCT # 49 - animal magic
3. Charisma Cardz #8 - Animals
4. Cupcake Craft Challenge #28 - sketch.


This is my first go at the Colour Create Challenge which I thought was Sunday, but I'm now hoping I'm not too late !! (eek!)

Recipe:
Main image and sentiment (inside) : Penny Black
Sentiment (outside): Cuttlebug diecut
Supplies: flowers - Prima; brads - Doodlebug sugar coated; charm - Dolls Made Up; paper and pearl gems from my stash.
Silver card border cut with my new Martha Stewart doily punch.

The inside follows the outside layout fairly closely.

I hope that this will cheer my friend up while she is laid up and that she'll soon be back to full fitness.

Have a good weekend and thanks for looking.

Special Christmas card

I always tend to be on the last minute with everything ... and last night I finally sat down to make mum & dad's Christmas card. I had already made a card that I thought I would send, but then decided against it as I wanted one that was more personalised plus I wanted to make them a "heartwarming" card as they have had an incredibly difficult year. Obviously I couldn't leave it any longer as the last posting date is tomorrow, so I set to work.

Having made the card I have decided to enter it into 2 challenges: Cute Card Thursday is an open theme this week, and also BasicGrey Challenge #15 which is Going Green (recycling) - the sparkly holographic card used to die cut the letters is taken from an Asda tissue box!!

I used: main image is PB "The night before Christmas", coloured with watercolour pencils and Twinkling H2O's, and the fluffy bits of Santa's hat decorated with white peewee glitter; sentiment is also by Penny Black; background papers are all BasicGrey "Figgy Pudding" (one of them may be "Dasher"); letters are diecut using Cuttlebug "Hippie Chick" alphabet; flowers are Prima Christmas bubble; ribbon and gems from my stash.

Hope you are all getting organised for Christmas ... I've only got my husband's card left to make now .. then the Chrimbo stamps and papers can go away for the next six months!!

BasicGrey meets Friday Sketchers in the snow

I always look out particularly for what's going on over at Friday Sketchers and BasicGrey Challenges, and find they are often great to combine. This week the Friday Sketchers #29 is particularly fab as it is multi-layered, and so encouraged me to break out a number of co-ordinating BasicGrey Christmas papers ... so while I was about it I embossed my card greeting in silver so that it could fulfil this week's BasicGrey Challenge #12 which is embossing.

Of course with Christmas looming so fast there are a number of Christmas themed challenges on the go right now, which means I was able to tie this card in to three other challenges, namely

• Papertake Weekly, which is Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow
• Cute Card Thursday #37, which is snow and snowflakes
• Rainbow Lady #40, which is snowman

I used: main image - Sugar Nellie snowman kindly given to me by Cathy (I really must buy a ccouple of these stamps!); sentiment - Rubber Soul; papers - BasicGrey "figgy pudding"; white sparkly ricrac and coloured gems by Papermania; snowflake diecuts by Cuttlebug; sparkly white brad by Doodlebug.

A Spoon Full of Sugar makes the medicine go down!

My blogging friend Cathy's daughter Ellie is due to go into hospital to have her tonsils removed ... she's not quite 4, bless her, so Cathy has asked if her friends can make her some cards to help keep her entertained while she is recuperating.

Now I have never made any small children's cards to speak of as there are no young kids in my family, so I was a bit unsure what a 4 year old might like ... so I settled on a FF teddy image with flowers which was a gift from my friend Kaz; and I spotted some bright cheeful paper whilst I was out & about at the weekend. I kept the layout fairly simple with sticky ribbon, a flower in one corner, and the word "hi" which I hope is nice and cheerful .. dunno if Ellie can read yet - if so then this is easy for her to understand; if not then it is easy for her mum to explain!

This is a last minute entry into this week's Spoon Full of Sugar Challenge #25 which is a card for a child ... didn't anticipate entering when it was set LOL! I would also like to enter it for this week's One Stop Craft Challenge which is Pretty Petals ... I hope I have covered this one off with both the image and the embellishment!

Main image: Forever Friends - coloured with watercolour pencil and Sakura sparkly pens, matted onto lemon glitter card cut with nestie.
Sentiment: diecut using Cuttlebug cut'n'emboss folder
Paper: BasicGrey "Oh! Baby Girl"
Flowers: WH Smith (yellow), Cardology (white), Prima (orange)
Sparkly brad: Doodlebug
Sticky ribbon: Papermania

Sketch & Sparkle for my 100th post

Wow! Here I am already at 100 posts ... that has really crept up on me! I was so busy watching my hit counter so I could give a way my 5,000 hits candy, I almost overlooked this milestone. I'm already looking forward to the next 100 posts as I'm well addicted to blogging by now LOL!

Anyway .. onto this evening's card (which I made yesterday evening, but of course had no light to photograph it by). My starting point as so often was a sketch, which immediately put me in mind of making a Christmas card (though of course most things make me think about Christmas cards right now !!) I also started thinking about multi-challenge possibilities, and believe I have managed to tie this one in to 5, as follows:

1. Friday Sketchers #27 - I really had fun with this fab sketch.



2. BasicGrey #10 is glitter: well, my Christmas cards do have a natural tendency to be glittery, and this card certainly delivers on that score. My large diecut snowflake and small centre snowflake are both cut from glitter card; I have decorated the snowflake with a Doodlebug sugar coated brad and glitter yarn fibres; I have used white sparkly lace from Hobbycraft, and put a few Stickle highlights on the snowballs. The BasicGrey element is the base paper which is from the "Dasher" collection.


3. This week's High Hopes Challenge#7 is Sparklemania - which I hope I've already explained above!!

4. Whilst visiting my new fellow DT member Domi's blog I discovered a new challenge called Everybody-Art, where this week's theme is brown and blue. I have done my best to reflect this in the 2 papers and the way I have watercoloured the image.

5. Last but not least, I found that this week's Cuttlebug Challenge #7 is to emboss a diecut. I think this card technically fulfils that challenge rather than the real spirit of it, as I have cut and embossed the large snowflake using the new Cuttlebug cut'n'emboss combo. I must admit I'm a little disappointed with the embossing aspect of this duo, as the embossing lines don't match up terribly well with the diecut outline, but nonetheless it does give the snowflake a bit of dimension.

Image: Sugar Nellie snowman gifted by Cathy, watercoloured with Marvey brushstroke pens
Papers: Basic Grey "Dasher" (base layer) and other paper unnamed from split stack at local craft shop
Brads: sparkly Doodlebug "sugar coated, and Dovecraft snowflake
Lace: Hobbycraft
Sparkly fibres : Cardology
Pearl gems: Create & Craft

Quick Cuttlebug Christmas cards

Well I don't know about everyone else, but I'm just starting to feel a bit of pressure now to get on a bit faster with my Christmas cards. Generally each make takes me at least 2 1/2 hours, so Ithought I'd better pull my finger out and make a few more quickly. So I pulled out my new Cuttlebug embossing folders and got going. The results are "quick" for me though still probably painfully slow by most standards LOL ... last night I managed to make 4 cards + toppers for 2 more in under 3 hours.

The Christmas trees have been embossed onto pearlised card using the Cuttlebug folder, and decorated with Papermania gems + an individual gem from my local craft shop. Flowers are from the Prima gold Christmas bubble, rub on greetings and ribbon from my stash.

The winter scene has been embossed using the "Winter House" folder onto dark blue pearlised card, (doesn't look as dull in real life as in the photo LOL!) then glittered with peewee glitter. Blue buttons are by Doodlebug, white button and ribbons from my stash.