I ♥ ProMarkers ... and Promarkers ♥ Me - Woo Hoo!

I was really thrilled and not a little surprised this last week, to receive an email from the lovely Karen at I ♥ ProMarkers, asking me whether I would like to join the  I ♥ ProMarkers DT. Woo hoo!! Well I love my Promarkers (and Flexmarkers!!) so I had to think about it for all of about 3 seconds lol!!

So here I am with my first I ♥ ProMarkers DT card for challenge #94. The rest of the team create wonderful creations every week so there was no pressure lol!! ... but I have done my best :-)

This week's theme is

Snowmen & Snowflakes

... and we are sponsored by Robyn's Fetish, who gave the DT some snowmen images to play with. This gave me my first challenge of the new DT as I don't normally work with digis, but it was easier than I thought, and this little guy "Carl the Snowman" was easy to colour and also quite adorable!

Stamps: Robyn's Fetish digi "Carl The Snowman"; Whimsy ticket stamp;

Media: Promarkers and Flexmarkers; glamour dust on scarf and mittens;

Paper: unknown offcut from my stash;

Supplies: sparkly gems from The Hobby House; peel off greeting and sparkly ribbon from my stash;

Tools: large circle and lacy circle nestabilities; Cuttlebug "Ice Crystal" die; Martha Stewart "Aspen Snowflake" punch; Crafts Too "Snowflakes" embossing folder.

Challenges:

Crafty Catz #110 - Snowmen

Sundays With Crissy #23 - Christmas Card Using Non-Traditional Colours

Sweet Stampin' - Punches & Dies

Craft your Days Away #34 - Buttons or Bows

Dutch Dare #140 - Recipe

(I used ribbon, image, patttterned papers, layers and rhinestones!)

The Ribbon Reel #16 - Anything Goes

The Pink Elephant #127 - Photo Inspiration

Sketch Saturday #183 - Sketch

Looking forward to being on the I ♥ ProMarkers DT and to seeing your creations this week :-)

Duckling and daffs

I decided I needed to get a wriggle on if I were to get a reasonable amount of Easter cards ready in time now that the season is looming up on us, and I felt inspired by the couple of sunny days we've had plus the lighter nights since the clocks went forward last weekend.

I absolutely love this Penny Black duck - I've had him a long time but he still always makes me smile, and of course think of spring.

Recipe: Main image: Penny Black "Duckling" (3347H), coloured with Promarkers; Sentiment: Penny Black; Papers: Papermania "Forever Friends - Springtime" (I've actually bought two packs of this paper, I love it so much!!) Supplies: pearls from the Hobby House; ribbon and small silk daffs from my stash; Tools: Martha Stewart "woodland bough" edge punch (just seen); "Decorative corners" Shapeabilities.

Challenges:

I followed this week's sketch for Sketch Saturday #149

Dutch Dare #107 - Spring Has Sprung

Simon Says - Spring Colours / Easter

I ♥ ProMarkers #60 - Easter

Everybody-Art-Challenge #136 - Easter

Stamp With Fun #105 - Easter

Ooh-La-La #77 - Happy Easter

The Pink Elephant #97 - Easter

Dream Valley #4 - Things With Wings

Crafts and Me #29 - Glitter

Spoon Full of Sugar #146 - At Least Two Different Textures

(glitter card and silk flowers)

My Partner in Crafting Crime #24 - Layer it Up

Papertake Weekly - Anything Goes

The Crazy Challenge #61 - Just Add Flowers

Still keeping the posts short as blogger is still runing all my text together unless I put all my div separators in manually. I'm looking to maybe install Windows Live Writer soon, in which case I will be able to get back to my chatty self :-)

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 :-)

Anya with flower basket

I had an image coloured in of Anya with flower basket from when I had been practising with my new Promarkers, so I thought I would use it to make a summery card ... looking out of the window at the weather yesterday that was unfortunately a triumph of hope over experience lol!! Still, I hope and believe the weather is supposed to be getting better towards the end of the week - will probably wait until everyone has gone back to work - typical!

This image was sent to me ages ago by the lovely Marcea and although it was on lovely card I wasn't sure what it was inked with ... so I just had a practice and hoped for the best - hardly any colour bleed so I was quite pleased :-) However I have now also got some of this image stamped for me by Uma which are defo using Memento on some very smooth card, so it will be interesting to compare results.

I followed the sketch over at Sketch Saturday #105, (happy birthday Sketch Saturday :-) !!)



and would also like to enter this card for

Everybody-Art-Challenge #93 - Summer
Stamp with Stampavie #97 - Summer
Cupcake #93 - Summer Delights
The Pink Elephant #69 - Gotta wear shades! (bright, fun colours)
Magical Crafts #16 - Metal madness

Recipe:
Main image: Anya with flower basket, coloured with Promarkers;
Sentiment: Craftwork Cards;
Papers: My Mind's Eye "Quite Contrary", with BasicGrey plain paper;
Supplies: flowers by Petaloo; spacers from The Hobby House; Doodlebug sparkly brads; ribbon and charm from my stash;
Tools: large classic ovals and large classic scalloped ovals nestabilities; martha Stewart "woodland bough" edge punch.

Bunny variations

As I mentioned last week, I got a mini production line going for a few simple Easter cards using this darling freebie bunny stamp. I never make any 2 cards exactly the same, but here's one where the slight variations were made with the following challenges in mind ;-)

Corrosive #57 - Easter

Everybody-Art #84 - Spring
Pile It On #12 - Animal-Riffic!
Ooh-La-La #50 - A button, a bow and some bling
Stamp Something - Doodle Something
The Pink Elephant #60 - Pastels
Totally Gorjuss #23 - Hearts

Recipe:
Main image: free with this month's Quick Cards Made Easy magazine - coloured with watercolour pencils, and edges doodled with Marvey and Gellyroll stardust pens;
Sentiment: free with magazine as above;
>Papers: Craft Creations;
Supplies: heart shaped button by Doodlebug; pearl gems from the Hobby House; ribbon from my stash;
Tools: none!!

Last Christmas stocking ...

... at least for the time being lol!! I guess you're all getting rather over-familiar with this little fella by now!! Though having said that, who could possibly resist his cute little face ??

Whilst making my little batch of Chrimbo cuties I specifically followed the sketch over at this week's Friday Sketchers #82 for this one.

... and here's the result. I would also like to enter it into The Pink Elephant Challenge #45 - Winter/Christmas.

Recipe:
Main image - Penny Black "fur collared" (3763H) coloured with watercolour pencils, and decorated with polar white flowersoft and glamour dust;
Sentiment: Stamps Away;
Paper: from stash;
Supplies: Snowflake ribbon from Warrington market; flowers by Floradoodle;
Tools: scalloped rectangle nestabilities

I still have a few more Christmas cards to make, but that's definitely the end of the current production run lol!!

Cute hedgie does the Christmas combo!

I have been on holiday from work this past week, but due to the schedule of jobs I'd set for myself, yesterday afternoon was the first time I managed to sit down for a good crafty session. I stamped out a few of this adorable PB image "fur collared" and made a few cards for various challenges, so you will be seeing more of this cute little fella over the next couple of days ....

Here's my first card:

I have followed the sketch for this week's Corrosive Challenges #41


This card also fits a number of other Christmas challenges, namely

My Time to Craft #69 - Christmas Foliage
Everybody-Art-Challenge #69 - green & red
Stamp with Stampavie #73 - red & green
Charisma #49 - green & red plus white or silver
The Pink Elephant #44 - Your favourite Christmas colour combo. Well mine is generally whatever I happen to be doing right now ... and at the moment green & red seems to be right up there lol!


Recipe:
Main image: Penny Black "fur collared" (3763H) coloured with watercolour pencils, and decorated with polar white flowersoft and glamour dust;
Sentiment; Stampendous;
Paper: Reminisce "Snowflake Spots";
Supplies: Flowers by Floradoodles; gems from my stash;
Tools: scalloped rectangle nestabilities; Cuttelbug "Snowflakes" embossing folder.

Here's my second card. I have deliberately made this card for just the one challenge as they don't allow us to combine - it is for this week's Stamptacular Challenge #36 which is Let it shine. I have got sparkle on the fluffy fur, holographic silver card on my matting, shiny silver snowflakes on the ribbon, and sparkkly gems in the flowers.

Recipe:
Main image - as before;
Sentiment: Stamps Away;
Paper: from stash;
Supplies: Snowflake ribbon from Warrington market; flowers by Floradoodle;
Tools: scalloped rectangle nestabilities.

Back tomorrow with a couple more of these cuties :-)

DC Combo Six-Pack

Today DC is for Docrafts, as this is my Docrafts July friendship card for Wakey Susan; and DC is also for "Daisy Chain", which is the name of this darling Penny Black stamp which I have had in my collection for some time (having paid WAY OVER the odds on ebay as it was supposedly retired ... and now it's not!!) ... but I have never inked it up until now.

I always knew that I wanted to team the stamp of the cute miceys making a daisy chain with this sentiment stamp - a friendship card is just the perfect opportunity.

So to square the circle I also looked out for some challenges to incorporate - no way could I use a sketch for this as the stamp is so big; but I managed to tie my card in to the following six:

Secret Crafter #41 - spots and stripes - which inspired me to use these yummy MME papers;

Our Creative Corner - triple play - which invites us to use at least 3 types of embellishments. Well for me that's not too hard to do lol! - and I have used flowers, brads, spacers, charm and crocheted ribbon ... so I guess that should just about cover it!

Dutch Dare #56 - using dies and/or or punches: again I have covered all bases with die-cute nestie shapes for my matting, punched leaves and my MS doily lace edge punch.

The Pink Elephant #24 and Lili of the Valley #32 - Animals

Paper Blooms - Animal Fun - well I think these li'l animals are having a lot of fun lol!

Here's a peek at the inside ....


Recipe:

Main image: Penny Black "Daisy Chain" (1690K) coloured with watercolour pencils, matted onto "Gemstones" cardstock cut using mega scalloped rectangle nesties;
Sentiments: Penny Black "Everything's ..." (2733K) (front); Penny Black "...second self" (3386D) (inside);
Papers: My Mind's Eye;
Supplies: crocheted ribbon and "friends" charm from Quixotic Paperie; spacers from The Hobby House; Papermania pearl brads; dragonfly brads and Prima flowers from my stash; green leaves punched using Leone Em "Ash Family" punch; edging punched wtih MS "doily lace" punch.

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!

Spring is multi-sprung!

I got down to business with making an Easter card the other evening, and decided to follow the fab sketch for the Double Dutch Challenge #14. This sketch really appealed to me as it demanded a number of papers, and I remembered that I have got a number of co-ordinating spring-like papers that came free with issue 1 of Creative Cardmaking magazine . I was also able to do something different with the 3 little dots on the sketch, as the magazine freebie included some cute matching die cut butterflies - I don't normally use these giveaways but those ones were rather better than the average imho.

I would also like to enter this card for a few other challenges - hence the title that spring is multi-sprung!

The Pink Elephant #8 - Easter

Lili of the Valley #24 - Easter

Created by Hand - Easter or Easter Eggs

Cute Card Thursday#54 - citrus colours

Here is a pic of the inside of the card, where I used another free diecut greeting from the magazine.

I used:

Stamps: Penny Black "Duckling" and "Happy Easter";

Colouring media: watercolour pencils;

Papers: all free with issue 1 of Creative Cardmaking magazine, inc. butterflies and inside greeting;

Supplies: ribbon and brad from my stash.