Penny Black Saturday #147 – Easter Extravaganza

Good morning everyone, and welcome to another Penny Black Saturday Challenge.  Thanks once again to everyone who entered last week’s Say It With Flowers challenge –what a frenzy of fabulous florals you came up with!! Don’t forget to check out the main challenge blog to see if you are a winner.

Anyhow, this week our challenge theme is seasonal .. yes it is

Easter Extravaganza

So it’s time to seek out those cute bunnies and chicks, spring flowers or any other suitable PB images you may have to hand. You can interpret the theme however you like, but remember that to be eligible for the prize you must submit a new piece of work that uses a Penny black image, large sentiment or stickeroo as its main focus.

This week’s fab prize is from our former teamie Carole, and is this gorgeous PB slapstick stamp, “Hedgehog Birthday”

 

The other ladies have made some fabulous and adorable Easter creations – here’s mine.

Recipe:
Main image: Penny  Black “Jonquils” inked with Marvey brushstroke pens;
Sentiment: See-D “Easter”;
Paper: Craft Creations;
Supplies: daffodils and pearls from Wild Orchid Crafts;  raffia lace from Hobbycraft; ribbon from my stash;
Tools: classic large ovals and large scalloped ovals nestabilities; Marianne D Creatables swirly leaf die.

Challenges:
Penny Black Blog Challenge -  flowers (use a floral PB stamp)
Creative Inspirations #107 – Easter
Die Cut Dreams #87 – Easter
Stampin’ For The Weekend #7 - Easter
Pollycraft Monday #88 – Easter
CRAFT #98 – Easter 
Daring Cardmakers – Spring Fling (Spring or Easter)
Top Tip Tuesday #29 – Spring Has Sprung
Rainbow Lady #148 – Springtime
Totally Papercrafts #62 - Springtime
Papertake Weekly – Truly Dimensional

Hope you can join us this week – looking forward to seeing your creations :-)

Penny Black Saturday #146 - Say It With Flowers

Good morning all, and welcome to another Penny Black Saturday Challenge. Thanks very much to everyone who rocked Domi's sketch last week - don't forget to check the main prize blog to see if you are a winner. I'm still struggling mightily with blogger and my recent attempt to install Windows Live Writer crashed and burned ... so I'll get straight to business ...

This week's theme is

Say It With Flowers

Easy peasy!!

And we also have a fantastic prize as always - this week it is a $20 online store voucher from our sponsor 1-2-3 Stitch.

Do check out the other ladies' lovely floral arrangements - here is my card for this week.

Recipe:

Main image: Penny Black "Hedgehog Bouquet" (1444K) coloured with Promarkers;

Sentiment: Craftwork Cards;

Papers: Papermania "Forever Friends - Springtime";

Supplies: flowers by Wild Orchid Crafts; ribbon from my stash;

Tools: large circles and lacy circles nestabilities; Martha Stewart "wild flowers" PATP edge punch; Leone Em "Ash Family" leaf punch.

Challenges:

Wild Orchid Challenge #20 - Sketch (flipped horizontally)

Crafty Pad #115 - Flowers

Paper Sundaes #63 - Spring Blossoms

PaperPlay #14 - Critters Galore

Creative Inspirations #106 - Punches & Dies

Pollycraft #87 - Old / Neglected stamp

Corrosive #110 - Pastel Colours

Craft your Passion #52 - Anything Goes

Hope you can join us this week - look forward to seeing what you create :-)

May All Your Wishes Come True

I have been desperate to play with my cute new LotV "dandelion clock" fairy ever since she arrived over a week ago, and finally I got round to it on Friday afternoon, in an attempt to perk myself up. Good job I did really, as my cold has gone absolutely streaming since then to the point that I have now given up on crafting altogether until I'm feeling better!

I absolutely love dandelion clocks, and everything about this darling stamp made me think about soft shades of lilac and lavender. I don't seem to be able to put down my FF "Spring Time" papers at the moment, and I think I went a bit crazy with the flowers lol!

Recipe:
Main image: LotV "Dandelion Clock" coloured with Promarkers and sprinkled with glamour dust;
Sentiment: Craftwork Cards;
Papers: Papermania "Forever Friends - Spring Time"; glitter dot cardstock from local craft shop;
Supplies: all flowers from Wild Orchid Crafts; pearls from The Hobby House; ribbon from my stash;
Tools: Fiskars "Victorian" cutting blade.

Challenges:

I followed the sketch for this week's Lili of the Valley #81


and would also like to enter for

Flutterby Wednesdays #138 - Open theme with butterfly, fairy or angel
CES #20 - Angels & fairies
Stamp Something - Cute Somethings
Crafty Pad #105 - Something Girly
Wee Memories #40 - Anything Goes

Hope you're having a great weekend ... I'm off now to dose myself up some more lol!

Pretty in Pink (+ silver + white)

Here's another card from my latest Christmas batch .... quite a few challenges were winking at me from my blog roll when I logged on this morning so I decided to make this one into a quick post. I would like to enter this card for: Wild Orchid #13 - Pink, Silver and White

Cupcake#121 - Non-Traditional Christmas

Incy Wincy #72 - Non-Tradional Christmas Colours

Stamp With Fun #89 - Christmas

Pollycraft #74 - White Christmas

The Pink Elephant #90 - Winter Wonderland

Catch the Bug - Walking in a Winter Wonderland

Stamptacular #89 - Winter Wishes

Keep It Simple - Season's Greetings

Sentimental Sundays #33 - Let It Snow

Totally Gorjuss #60 - Snow!

Daring Cardmakers - Snow Much Fun

Alphabet Challenge - G is for Glitter

Bunny Zoe's #7 - Sparkle & Shine

Stampalicious - Stampaliciously Simple

Recipe:

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

Sentiment: Penny Black;

Paper: pearlescent white card embossed with Cuttlebug;

Supplies: small roses from Wild Orchid Crafts; silver gems and ribbon from my stash;

Tools: Cuttlebug "snowflakes" embossing folder.

That's all for today :-)

Contemporary Christmas

Good evening everyone - just a quick post from me tonight.

At the beginning of the week I got so involved with using my new LotV Christmas stamps with my new vibrant and funky (and very unlike me) Bo Bunny paper, that I inadvertently got a ahead of myself and made a card for last week's LotV Challenge that would have been perfect for this week lol!

So for this week's LotV Challenge #66 which is non-traditional Christmas , I just had to make another one with the same paper ... but thistime I returned to James the Bear for my image.

This has to be a short post because it is a last minute entry using the sketch at this week's Create4Fun #38, which closes tonight.


I would also like to enter this card for

Papertake Weekly - Animal magic
Teddy Stampers #20 - Bear Acrostic

(B is for Bear/Bo Bunny/Bauble; E is for embossed edge punch/embellishment; A is for alcohol markers; R is for ribbon)

Pollycraft #62 - Cute & Cuddly
Delightful Challenge - Make it Sparkle

Little Red Wagon #47 - Glitter

Just Cute Bears #35 - Punch it
Spoon Full of Sugar #122 - Anything Goes

Recipe:
Main image: LotV "James the BEar with Tinsel" coloured with Copics and Promarkers, and tinsel decorated wtih lime green Stickles;
Sentiment: Craftwork Cards;
Papers: Bo Bunny;
Supplies: pearls from The Hobby house;
Tools: Martha Stewart "Embossed Snowflake" edge punch and "Arctic Snowflake" punch; Shapeabilties "Make A Flake 2".

Back tomorrow with a new Penny Black Saturday Challenge :-) ...here's a sneaky peek!

Going dotty about bears

I read recently somewhere that a fair proportion of British adults still sleep with their teddy bears ... I don't actually sleep with mine as sadly he fell to pieces years ago due to an over abundance of love and cuddles .... but I think I must be having a "bear moment" as I made three cards yesterday and coloured in an image for a fourth ... and yep, they were all teddies!!

For this card I followed the sketch at this week's Everybody-Art-Challenge #106

.. and I also made the card for

Lili of the Valley #62 - Let's Go Dotty for Circles
Passion for Promarkers #67 - Teddy Bears' Picnic
Papertake Weekly - Just the one (just one bow)
Pollycraft #59 - Add a Little Nature

Recipe:

Main image: LotV "Teddy with bouquet" coloured with Promarkers;

Sentiment: Craftwork Cards;

Papers: Papermania "Summer Bloom";

Supplies: flowers from Wild Orchid Crafts; ribbon from my stash (rescued from my mum's birthday cake!!);

Tools: small circle, large cirlce and large classic scalloped circle nestabilities; Martha Stewart "scalloped dot" edge punch.

Gotta go ... way past my bedtime .. but by the time I get home from work tomorrow I would have missed the LotV challenge .. and that would never do would it lol!?!

Creative Card Crew #52 - Thankyou

Hello again, and welcome to another Creative Card Crew challenge. Thanks to everyone who joined in my pink & green challenge over the past 2 weeks - sorry I wasn't able to get round everyone's entries as life's been a bit hectic ... but I'm sure they were all fabulous as usual! And don't forget to check the main challenge blog to see if you are the lucky winner of the challenge prize.

So onto this fortnight's fabulous challenge which has been set by Victoria, and is

Thankyou

And thankyou to Victoria herself, who is sponsoring this week's yummy prize with Stampin' Up products.

The rest of the DT have created some fabulous samples so I hope you will check them out ... here's mine.

Recipe:
Main image: WOJ "Melinda woth Bouquet" coloured with Promarkers, edges sponged with Colorbox Queue ink, and wings decorated with diamond Stickles;
Sentiment: WOJ;
Papers: Papermania "Rose Garden";
Supplies: roses and rosebuds from Wild Orchid Crafts decorated with diamond Stickles; lace was an RAK from Ruby; ribbon and pearls from my stash;
Tools: "Labels One" nestabilities.

Here's a closeup of my colouring and Melinda's sparkly wings.

... and here are my new yummy Wild Orchid Crafts large curly wild roses and dinky rosebuds ... the middle size rose was a birthday gift from Sue.

I used the brilliant sketch from this week's Whiff of Joy Challenge #80 ....

... and would also like to enter this card for a few other challenges:

Die Cut Dreams #52 - Angels
Charisma #22 - Flowers (2nd entry)
Spoon Full of Sugar #107 - Floral Delight
Paper Play #22 - Flowers & Sparkle
Pollycraft #47 - Ribbon & bling
Cupcake #94 - Dazzle Us
Colour Create #46 - Baby Pink & Pastel Blue
Corrosive #67 - Die Cuts
By the Cute & Girly June Challenge - something old, new, borrowed, blue

.... well that would be

old - my WOJ stamp
new - yummy Wild Orchid Crafts roses and rosebuds
borrowed - layout from this week's WOJ Challenge sketch, and the idea of cutting the wings outside the nestie shape (seen on several crafty blogs)
blue - colours of Melinda's headband and jeans.

Look forward to seeing all your creations.

Gone Fishin'!

Today is my darling husband's birthday, and he is a keen fisherman, so I have been hoarding this cute "Dandelion Goes Fishing" stamp set since last summer especially so I could make this card lol!

I was always going to make this card regardless of any challenges, but it's always nice to find some challenges to enter .. and here are a few that I believe this card fits.

Creative Inspirations #29 - Male Card
Double Dutch #28 - Boys only

Crafty Catz #23 - Something for the boys
Crazy 4 Challenges #28 - masculine card

Stamp Something - Something Cream & Green
Fussy & Fancy #6 - Green
Pixie Cottage #11 - Green

All that Scraps - Green

For Fun #2 - Green
Too Cute For Words - Green

Raise the Bar #8 - Go Green
Penny's Paper Crafting Challenge - Going Green

Clearly Inspired #9 - Think Green
Inky Impressions #31 - Think Green

Cute Card Thursday #103 - Celebrations!
Flourishes Timeless Tuesday #57 - Celebration!
Fun with Shapes & More #44 - Happy birthday!

Gingersnap #44 - Birthday Greeting
Die Cut Dreams #38 - No Flowers Allowed!

Pollycraft #35 - Distressing
Spoon Full of Sugar #94 - recycle (I have used buttons which were originally snipped from some garment or other!)
Secret Crafter #74 - Anything Goes
Ooh-la-la #49 - Anything Goes

Phew!! 23 challenges - a new record! not bad considering i didn't even consult a challenge list before I made this one ;-)

Here's a closeup of the cute fish charm I used - I also cut down a piece of raffia ribbon and stained it with distress ink, fondly imagining it might look like a piece of fishing net lol!

Recipe:
Main image: "Dandelion Goes Fishing" coloured wtih watercolour pencils, and edges of image distressed with "Antique linen" distress ink;
Sentiments: Hero Arts (main); "Dandelion Goes Fishing" (in corner);
Papers: K&Co - checked paper edges distressed using scissors;
Supplies: Hobbycraft raffia ribbon (stained wtih antique line distress ink); buttons, dewdrops, green ribbon and fish charm from my stash;
Tools: Fiskars paper cutter "deckle" blade.

Hope it will be a nice day for his birthday so we can have a little r&r :-)Hope you're all having a good weekend.

Penny Black Challenge #87 - Pins & Pearls

Hi everyone - hope you're all having a great weekend and are feeling ready to go with the latest Penny Black Saturday Challenge. It was wonderful to see last week how so many of you were able to make a card for someone special ... awww! If you entered don't forget to pop over to the challenge blog to see if you have won the fab discount voucher from PB Stamps.

This week's challenge is

Pins and pearls

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

To help get your creative juices flowing we have got another fab prize on offer for one randomly chosen winner - from our regular sponsor Valentine's - a PB clear "Robust" alphabet set.

The other members of the DT have created some really fabulous samples this week, so do go and check them out, including our fab new Guest Designer for February - Janneke.

Here's mine ....


Now I have to confess that I struggled with this a bit initially, as I was very nervous about the prospect of using pins on a card. All the fancy head pins I've seen seem to be proper sharp pins without any guards for the point ...and I'm very puzzled as to how people keep them safe and what they do about posting them?? Anyhow, I resolved this dilemma when I saw some double-ended "bar" type pins in Hobbycraft .... so that's the route I went down.... and now I'm unexpectedly pleased with the finished result so I'm glad I did lol!

I'm having a real roses and butterflies phase at the moment ... here are a couple of close ups of those embellies - I gave the roses a good dusting with diamond dust Stickles lol!

Recipe:
Main image: Penny Black "...dreams..." (2711F) inked with Brilliance pearlescent ink;
Papers: Kaisercraft "Wish Upon" (from The Hobby House);
Supplies: large two-tone rose from John Lewis; smaller roses from Hobbycraft; baby's breath pearl flowers from Edwin Allen; white lace and pearl gemstones from my stash; double ended pearl pin from Hobbycraft;
Tools: "Labels Four" nestabilities; Craft-Too "butterflies" embossing folder (used on green matting); Martha Stewart large "monarch butterfly" punch.

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

Pollycraft #33 - Things with Wings
Flutterby Wednesdays #95 - butterfly, fairy or angel
Crafty Creations #53 - Wings
Pile It On #4 - Enough of Winter Colours
The Pink Elephant #52 - It's All About Pink (not sure whether this is pink enough ... but I hope so :-) )
Crafty Calendar #5 - Love & Friendship (I see this as a friendship card)
ABC - N is for New. Well ... that would be my two tone and cream roses + my pearly pin ... and the nesties have only been used once before lol!

Have a great weekend, and look forward to seeing your creations.

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.

Sketch Saturday does Christmas in August

I've not been to work today as I've not been too well with stomach ache - pottered lazily around the house for most of the day, but later on I tried to make a card to take my mind off it (it didn't work lol!!)

I have made this card using the fab sketch for this week's Sketch Saturday Challenge #64.

It's also good for me that there are so many Christmas challenges around at the moment, as I'm very behind with my Christmas cards. There are also some fabulous prizes on offer right now! I'd like to enter this card for the following:

Christmas in August - this is the theme over at Our Creative Corner, Creative Card Crew #24, Simon Says Stamp and Dutch Dare #58

Papertake Weekly - this week they have reached their 100th challenge (well done ladies!) so have challenged us to take your pick from the previous 99 challenges - I have chosen Let It Snow... Let It Snow... Let it Snow (17/11/2008).

Pollycraft #22 - Favourite things ... I have used a Penny Black image - PB's are of course my all time favourites (as you will see all too well in my labels list!) , plus my nesties which are something else I can't manage without!

Pile It On #11 - oh boy! ... well it is blue and it's a snowman lol!

Woo hoo - that's 8 altogether!!

Recipe:

Main image: Penny Black (sorry don't know what it's called as it was an RAK) - coloured with watercolour pencils and decorated with diamond Stickles;

Sentiment: Craftwork Cards "Oh My Words!";

Supplies: snowflake papers, pearlised and holographic card, organza snowflake ribbon - all from my stash; sparkly brads by Doodlebug;

Tools: martha Stewart embossed snowflake edge punch; small snowflakes die cut using Cuttlebug snowflakes die.

Off to put my feet up now - hoping I feel a bit better tomorrow!