Let It Snow ... Let It Snow ... Let It Snow ...

While I was making my first DT card for I ♥ Promarkers the other day, it occurred to me that I could really do with some colouring practice, esp. with my new Flexmarkers ... so I practiced on several images of the cute Robyn's Fetish snowman that I used for my DT card. I also pulled out a stunning brand new pad of paper which I bought from Hobbycraft a couple of weeks ago - Crafter's Companion "The Snowman" -  must be one of the most gorgeous Christmas pads I've ever seen!

The result was the following three similar but different cards:

Stamps: Robyn's Fetish "Carl The Snowman"; LotV sentiment circles;

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

Papers: Crafter's Companion "The Snowman";

Supplies: white sparkle-edge ribbon from Hobbycraft; gems from The Hobby House; peel offs from my stash;

Tools: Memory Box "Snowflake corner" die (card 1); Martha Stewart edge punch (card 3); Martha Stewart "Aspen Snowflake" punch.

Challenges:

Delightful Inspiration - Snowmen

Paper Sundaes #97 - Winter Wonderland

Anything Goes #55 - Decorative or Altered Corners

Creative Card Crew - Monochromatic

Crafty Catz #111 - The Colours of Christmas + Sparkle

DYSU #48 - Ribbon (cards 2 & 3)

Fab 'n' Funky #101 - Anything Goes

Divas By Design #16 - Anything Goes

Simon Says - Anything Goes (2nd entry)

Creative Craft - Free For All (2nd entry)

The Ribbon Reel #16 - Anything Goes (3rd and final entry)

Back tomorrow with a new Penny  Black Saturday Challenge ... here's a sneaky peek.

Penny Black Saturday #167 - Make A Scene

Hi everyone, and welcome to the latest Penny Black Saturday Challenge. Loved all your interpretations of Nat's sketch last week - don't forget to check the main challenge blog to see if you've won the yummy prize from Fantastic Ribbons.

Onto this week's challenge, and this time we would like you to

Make A Scene

No ... we don't want you to fall on the floor and throw a diva-ish fit as per Kerry on Celebrity Big Brother lol! What we have in mind is more a charming scene that incorporates your PB's in a delightful manner !! :-)  Take a peek at the wonderful creations by my fellow teamies and you will soon get the idea.

This week we have fantastic prizes (you can always rely on us for that!) for 2 randomly drawn winners:

First - from Penny Black

This delightful stamp - 3905K Christmas Fairy

and second ... from The Ribbon Girl

this yummy Green Mini Ribbon Kit.

Don't forget to check the main blog for the rules if you want to be eligible for either of these delish prizes!

This was a bit of an adventure for me as it isn't something I normally do,  but here's the result of my efforts.

Recipe:

Main image: Penny Black "Christmas Critters" transparent set, coloured with Promarkers and dusted with glamour dust;

Sentiment; Pink Gem Designs;

Paper: Craft Creations (blue snowy sky);

Tools: white pearlised card embossed with Cuttlebug "Snowflakes" folder (then ripped and edged with glamour dust); Marianne D Creatables trees (in 2 slightly different card shades to give a bit of dimension); Cuttlebug "snowflakes 2" die.

Here's a quick closeup to show some of the glamour dust  on the cute hats!

Challenges:

Penny Black at Allsorts (September) - Get Ahead for Christmas

Crafter's Companion #16 - Christmas Wishes

Rainbow Lady #168 - Emboss It

Fab 'n' Funky #88 - Go Mad With Embossing

Charisma #35 - Anything Goes

Simon Says STAMP-tember Blog Hop - Anything Goes

Passion for Promarkers #115 - Anything Goes (2nd entry)

I ♥ ProMarkers #81 - Anything Goes (2nd entry)

Hope you can join us this week!

Bank Holiday Offerings

Hope everyone is enjoying the Bank Holiday in the UK despite the miserable weather ... I'm just pottering about wondering whether to brave going out this afternoon, but in the meantime I thought I would post a couple of cards I made on Saturday.

My first card was primarily inspired by Dawny's wonderful sketch for this week's Simon Says Challenge. I actually couldn't wait to get started as I have several deep border punches which would be ideal for this sketch. Here's what I came up with.

In the event I was feeling very flowery, so I used my Martha Stewart "wildflowers" PATP and made a card in restful tones of lilac ... I also managed to play with my gorgeous new Magnolia swirly butterfly; and I took the opportunity to incorporate one of my Marianne D Creatable dies as they really are my favourites, and it meant I could also enter the new Marianne's Design Divas challenge :-). I decided to slightly cut down diecuts from my swirly leaf die to make them suitable as a leafy frame for my large flower - I rather like the result and think I will use it this way again.

Recipe:

Main image: LotV fairy coloured with Promarkers and liberally dusted with glamour dust;

Sentiments: Penny Black transparent set "Party Critters";

Papers: Papermania Forever Friends "Springtime";

Supplies: large gardenia from Wild Orchid Crafts; Papermania gems;

Tools: Martha Stewart "wildflowers" PATP; Marianne D Creatables leaf flourish die; Magnolia doohickey "swirly butterfly" die.

Challenges:

Simon Says - Sketch by Dawny P

(rotated by 90 degrees to the right)

Flutterby Wednesday's #168 - Open Theme

Sparkles #19 - Punch It

Papertake Weekly - Dies To Die For (2nd entry)

Fab 'n' Funky #87 - Mono Madness

Marianne's Design Divas #1 - Anything Marianne D Goes!

Spoon Full of Sugar #162 - Happy Birthday (2nd entry)

For my second card ...this week Chrissie and Mandi over at Less is More are challenging us to combine any three of the previous challenges. I had a little time left over after making my previous card so decided to make a quick one ... and here it is.

I simply embossed the flowers onto pearlised white card and mounted onto pink and black pearlised matting, then added a die cute sentiment with a single gem heart on the "i" in "friend" plus two punched butterflies. This to fulfil the following three previous challenges:

Week 1- Pink, White & Black

Week 2 - Flowers &/or Trees

Week 15 - Embossing

Week 16 - Butterflies

Recipe:

Supplies: pink and black gems + heart gem from stash;

Tools: Cuttlebug Cut 'n' emboss folder; Martha Stewart small monarch butterfly punch.

Challenges:

Less Is More #30 - Take Three Challenges

I think that will be all for today .. enjoy the rest of your Bank Holiday.

Penny Black Saturday #155 - One For The Guys

Hi everyone ... another week had flown by, and here we are again at Saturday, which means it's time for another Penny Black Saturday Challenge.

Thanks to everyone for your doodletastic entries into last week's challenge - don't forget to check the main blog to see if you have won either of last week's yummy prizes.

This week we guess many of you may be gearing up for Father's Day ... or if not, then maybe you need a card for one of the men in your life. So this week's challenge theme is

One For The Guys

As always you can interpret this however you wish; but to be eligible for this week's prize you should submit a new piece of work which features a Penny Black image, large sentiment or stickeroo.

And to tempt you this week we have got another delish prize ... it is from our lovely ex-teamie Carole

and is this delish PB stamp "Love Nip".

The other ladies have conjured up some fabulous masculine cards - here is my effort for this week.

Initially I thought I would really struggle with this theme, as I have loads of PB stamps but hardly any "masculine" ones .. and those few I do have have already been seen by the only two male family members I need to make cards for! When I started scrabbling around amongst my stash I found these couple of images in a tranparent set called "Bubbly" - masculine and sight unseen by my nearest and dearest - but ... they are absolutely TINY and no way would they make a focal point of a card. I therefore decided that I would make my text big and artfully (?) place the images around it ... but then came the next problem - my die cut alphabet isn't big enough, and I don't have any templates for letters .... so I ended up making some letter templates using Wordart, and then cutting out the letters by hand from patterned paper. If you look closely they are a bit rough and ready, but the thought's there!

Recipe:

Main images: Penny Black transparent set "Bubbly", coloured with Promarkers and Copics;

Sentiments: computer generated, with "Dad" cut out from Wordart templates;

Papers: All My Memories (double sided paper), distressed with Vintage Photo distress ink;

Supplies:  buttons from stash;

Tools: Martha Stewart "scalloped dots" edge punch.

Challenges:

PaperPlay #23 - Father's Day / Man's Card

CRAFT #106 - Father's Day

Sparkles #13 - Father's Day

Alphabet Challenge - F is for Father's Day

Sew Many Challenges #56 - Father's Day

Creative Inspirations #115 - Card For Dad / Man's Card

Fab 'n' Funky #76 - Magnificent Men

Crazy4Challenges #91 - Masculine Card

Wags 'n' Whiskers #56 - One For The Boys

Everybody-Art #145 - Distress

Stamp Something - Something Punched

My Mum's Craft Shop #9 - Punch It

Passion For Promarkers #103 - Blue and Brown ( with accents of green)

Crafts and Me #38 - Stamp Something

Crafty Ann's #42 - Use More Than One Image

Cupcake Crafts #145 - Things With Tails

Papertake Weekly - Anything Goes

Hope you can join in with 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.

Penny Black Saturday #135 - January Sales!

Good morning everyone, and welcome once more to the Penny Black Saturday Challenge. Thanks to everyone who joined in last week and don't forget to check whether you have won last week's prize. Just a short post from me today as I'm still feeling pretty much under the weather, and also apologies because it also means I have not completed my commenting this week. So straight to business ... this week we have got a theme for you... January Sales Yes, we would like to see your bargain stash used on your project. Don't forget that the only rule is that you must submit a new piece of work, which must feature a Penny Black image, large sentiment or stickeroo as its main focus. This week's prize is four roll of ribbon of the winner's choice from Fantastic Ribbons, for one randomly drawn winner. Hope you will visit the main challenge blog to see the fab creations from the rest of the team - here's mine. I didn't actually buy anything in this year's January sales (aren't I good??) so I reached for a couple of bargains from craft fairs I have visited previously. Many of my PB stamps have been bought at a discounted rate from the "bargain bucket" on the Stampers Supermarket stall at Port Sunlight, including this one. I also got a good price for my MS border punch last year at Aintree craft show. Recipe: Main image: Penny Black "Crossing Bridges!" (3206J), coloured with Promarkers and Copics; Sentiment: Penny Black "the journey" (3177F); Papers: Papermania "Forever Friends - Spring Time"; Supplies: flowers from Wild Orchid Crafts; pearls from The Hobby House; ribbon from stash; Tools: large circles and lacy circles nestabilities; Martha Stewart "floral vine" deep edge punch; Leone Em "Ash Branch" leaf punch; Cuttlebug "Daisy pattern" embossing folder. I would like to enter this for the following challenges: Sketch & Stash #53 -

(new paper; neglected stamp, sentiment, embossing folder and border punch) Fab 'n' Funky #56 - Animal Magic Simon Says - Bingo!

(Punch/die cuts, embossing; ribbon) Crafty Catz #66 - A Forgotten Stamp Wild Orchid Challenge #15 - Let's Get Sentimental Top Tip Tuesday #18 - All Sentimental

Paper Sundaes #52 - Favourite Challenge from the Past Year (3rd entry)

(this time I have chosen #14 - No People) That's all from me - hoping to spend the day with my feet up :-)