In the frame!

I can't believe that I haven't blogged since last Wednesday! I haven't actually had anything to show as my time has been take up with prospective clients visiting and making wedding stationery. Today, however, is different because I crafted for me (well sort of)!!! I made a couple of new seating plans as I have a big wedding fayre tomorrow at the Millenium Galleries in Sheffield city centre so if anyone is in the neighbourhood, pop in and say hello. I haven't photographed them yet but will do so tomorrow and put them on here.

I made a card for hubby as he has got a wedding this evening

Papers are from the McKenna mat stack by K and Co and the hearts are Sizzix inked with gold (which hasn't shown up in the scan).

My second card is for the DCM dare from yesterday. It was Lynne's turn to set this dare

This week I’d like you to use a FRAME or FRAMES on your card. You can use any type of frame you so wish. How about a die cut frame or a hand cut frame. You can frame your card with brackets or flowers or how about some doodling - the choice is yours.

The papers used for this card are the remaining pieces from the card above! The cute little stamp is from the New Home set from Tanda Stamps they are absolutely lovely and only £2.95 a set. The frame is cut using a Sizzlit frame and finished off with a couple of diamantes.

Well I think I have everything ready for tomorrow so I am going to have a drink then it is shower and bed.

Va Va Vroom!

Another combined challenge from me today and I thought I would use it to make a birthday card for my brother! He will be 39 on 10th October and doesn't do serious at all so this card will really appeal to him! The card fits the midweek little extra on the DCM blog and a challenge set by Nicky on the Just Bex forum
This is what the DCM team set this week
Cars, Boats, Trains & Planes is the theme for our Little Extra challenge this week. A good chance to stock up on kids cards and make a few of those poor, unloved "cards for men", maybe? How about "congratulations on Passing your Driving test" or "Got your Wings" for newly qualified pilots? - ok so we may be reaching a bit far with that one, but you never know! Basically, what we'd like you to do is put some transport on your cards this week, how you do it is up to you
and these were Nicky's instructions
And your next challenge is...........to make a folding card like the one below . It's made from one sheet of cardstock, and is very straightforward! Take one sheet of 12"x12" cardstock, and score lines at 4" intervals both vertically and horizontally to make a 3x3 grid, like this:
Then cut away each corner square, and you'll be left with this:

and here is my card.

All card, paper and rub ons are by Doodlebug.

That's it for now. Wedding stationery calls!

Yippeeee

So what have I been up to since Saturday? Well, I had my first appointment at 10.00 am and sold a tiara. I then went onto my mum and dad's to deliver the OoS and seating plan and they are over the moon with them! We then went on to the next appointment at 7.00 pm and they weren't in!! We drove around the block and went back and they still weren't in so we came home. It so annoys me when people do this. She has my phone details so could have rung to cancel. I know anything can happen at any time but it doesn't make it any better when it happens! Moan over :)

I spent yesterday in the garden and we are now weed free and all the daffy bulbs have been planted.
I had a leaving card to make for a collegue of DH and a very good customer of mine! They work for a railway company and this is what I came up with

I just love the little Cuttlebug train and carriage and thought it was appropriate for this card!

My next card is the DCM challenge from Friday. I got a lovely bag of lace from a charity shop a couple of weeks ago so thought I could use some on a card. There was loads in the bag and it all looks brand new and cost me the grand total of..................50p!!! So, this is their brief OK, here's this weeks dare:Let's go Charity shoppingor Op shopping (as we call it in Australia)
I DARE you to visit your local Charity Shop & make someone else's
TRASH your STASH!
.........and make a GORGEOUS card from what you find.You'll be amazed at the special little treasures you'll find if you only take the time to look with CREATIVE EYES

and this is my take on it

I can't remember where I got the foil printed card from as I found it in one of my drawers! The lilac backing card is DCWV, the 'baby' is a Sizzlit die, the lace is from my cheapo bag and the little hands are from Crafts by Carolyn

I've also started the favours for mum and dad's do today. I've done the 3 children's favours and 10 adult so far. Will show piccies when they are done. I have also made a wedding invitation sample to be posted off tomorrow.

I must clean up in the morning too, I have a couple coming to see me about a stationery order!

Take care. x

Have a peep

I finally got them finished and meant to post yesterday afternoon (as midnight has come and gone without me noticing!) I got the Orders of Service and seating plan for my parents finished and here they are

I have an appointment tomorrow morning at 10 oclock (from one of my wedding fayres) so am going from there straight to my mum and dad's to deliver these and some other stuff for the 'do' then I have another appointment tomorrow evening at 7pm so will do that one on the way home. (the evening appointment is from last Sunday's wedding fayre).

My last weekend off was 8th and 9th September, my next weekend off is at the end of October!! Then I will sleep LOL

Bed time now. Whatever you are doing, have a lovely weekend. xx

Almost the weekend!

Does anyone know where time is going? The weeks just seem to disappear along with my time management!!

Yesterday disappeared in a blur and I got slightly distracted from the order of services. Well, I say distracted...............I didn't actually make any *blushing icon* But this is what I did make

On the stand
In the box. The lid has an acetate panel so the card can be seen. I don't make many Bookatrix cards now, just special orders. I got put off slightly when I had to make 16 with boxes for a shop!!!

The phone charm is for one of my best customers. It is made with black and clear glass beads.

I still feel ropey as I can seem to shift this head cold/sinus problem. Not good when you spend all day with your head down.

Right, I really must do the order of service today. I have the seating plan to do as well and I am delivering them on Saturday. Next week I am doing the favours and then that is mum and dads stationery finished. I have a leaving card to do today too so if I revisit, I need a size 10 up the bum!!

With this ring....

....I thee wed!
Just had a look at the DCM midweed Little Extra and realised it fits the order I'm working on at the moment. They are the Order of Service for my parents' Golden Wedding/Renewal of Vows ceremony.
Here is what the team came up with this week
This time we are giving you just One Word as the inspiration for your card making and that word is GOLDEN You can use the word in any way you like - the word itself doesn't even have to be on the card, for instance you could make a card in golden shades, or maybe inspired by the seasons of Spring or Autumn which both feature lots of golden colours. Or maybe you could make a card to celebrate a Golden Anniversary, and of course Gold is a great colour for Christmas cards.....It's up to you - just go for Gold

The dragonfly is hand crafted using seed and bugle beads and acetate and mounted onto gold organza ribbon.

Right, back to work for me. I have another 52 of these to make today then get the seating plan made!

TTFN xx

Look what I've got!!!

A clue...................it starts with C and ends with J and it is just luuuuuuuurvely. Another busy day in the Party Nights household so I thought I would show my third CJ which came home to roost about a fortnight ago. The groups involved were all members of the JB forum. We kept the groups small and the turnaround quite fast as there were a few peeps who were interested in joining but had never done one before. This acted as their 'taster' and everyone so far has said how much they enjoyed it.

Front and back covers

welcome and rules pages My pages

Baabaa's pages
Funky Fairy's pagesIosagan's pages

My sign in pages.

I was tagged by Hazel last week and after my 'harrowing' week ;), I promised I would do it today so here goes

1. YOUR ROCK STAR NAME: (first pet & current car) Sox Astra (I suppose it could have a 'famous' ring about it LOL)

2.YOUR GANGSTA NAME: (fav ice cream flavor, favorite cookie) Vanilla Jaffacake (!)

3. YOUR "FLY Guy/Girl" NAME: (first initial of first name, first three letters of your last name) JWes

4. YOUR DETECTIVE NAME: (favorite color, favorite animal) Yellow Cat (I like that one)

5. YOUR SOAP OPERA NAME: (middle name, city where you were born) Eleanor Glasgow (has a definite soapy ring)

6. YOUR STAR WARS NAME: (the first 3 letters of your last name, first 2 letters of your first) Wesja

7. SUPERHERO NAME: (2nd favorite color, favorite drink put "The") The Black Coffee (which is what I spend my days drinking! lol)

8. NASCAR NAME: (the first names of your grandfathers) John William

9. STRIPPER NAME: ( the name of your favorite perfume/cologne, favorite candy) Miss Dior Fudge! (I'm saying nothing)

10. Witness protection name {mother & fathers middle names} neither of my parents have middle names

If you feel like playing along, please consider yourself tagged.

What a week!

I can't believe it is 10 days since I last blogged. The second week in September is always chaos in our house as DH and DD have birthdays within two days of each other. However, this is how my week went. (I hope you're sitting comfortably :))

I spent all day Monday and Tuesday making a new collection of wedding stationery as I had a wedding fayre on Tuesday evening. The photos are on hubby's camera and not mine, but they will be on the web site shortly if you want a peep. I then remembered that it was DH's birthday on Wednesday and in true crafter's style, I hadn't made his birthday cards!! So this is what I came up with. The first is from me, the second from DS and the third from DD.

This card was made using the QK Cricket set and Doodlebug rub ons.

Another QK die. This time it was the single Party Hat die.

I bought these clowns on our local market about 4 years ago and keep finding them. I think they are cute. He is mounted onto paper from the Je Taime range by My Minds Eye. I just adore this paper, it is really bright and cheerful. The second and third cards fit the peel off challenge on the JB forum so I shall add them later.

So on Tuesday evening we trundled off to the wedding fayre which was on from 6pm until 10pm. I have done loads of wedding fayre but never an evening one so didn't know what to expect. When we got there we just had a bare trestle table. All the wedding fayres I have exhibited at until now have all provided plain white table cloths for you to dress as you please. Luckily DH had a black cloth which he uses to cover all his wires etc when he is DJing. He had forgotten to take it out of the car! So I set up in my little corner. I had requested electricity but we had to unplug everyone elses to plug our extension lead in. Anyway, it was a good job I had my halogen lamps because once it got dark outside it was like the black hole of Calcutta in the marquee!! We packed up at 9pm and were home for 9.45. I've got two appointments this week from it so I don't suppose it was all bad.

Wednesday was DH's birthday, I'll bet you can't guess how old he was :) We spent the day running around trying to find mountboard for a seating plan as my usual supplier had run out of the colours I wanted. We had a BBQ in the garden for tea and it was lovely. He had chosen a Thornton's toffee and chocolate cake as his birthday cake, as I didn't have time to make him one, and it was absolutely scrummy.

On Thursday I made 2 fairy cards which were ordered from the web site. I haven't made these for ages and the order was for two the same.

I still think they are cute! The fairy's dress is cut from gold glitter card and her hair is vivelle. All the dies used are by Sizzix. A friend came for lunch so we sat in the garden and while she had her lunch I sat and cut snowflakes from glitter card, for a stationery order.

On Thursday I made DD's birthday cards

This one is a bit cheeky as I am going to say that it matches the DCM Midweek Extra from last week. This was the challenge Big & Little We'd like you to use items in pairs of Big and Little - so you need to have both sizes on your card ie big & little buttons, big & little die cuts, big & little hearts, big & little circles etc The theme of your card can be whatever you like this time, so that's nice of us, isn't it? So, I have used big and little squares!!! The big square is Spongebob 'Square' Pants and he is mounted onto 4 small squares. Sorry girls but I thought it was good. ;) DD was actually 14 on Friday but she is Spongebob mad! Is this normal? LOL

This was the card I made her from DS. Playboy is another passion (a bit more normal me thinks!!)

DS had come downstairs on Thursday teatime complaining of a pain just above his right hip. He took two paracetamol and went to bed. The pain was still there on Friday morning when he got up so his dad took him to the doctor's. (he is almost 19, by the way) The doc took one look at him and admitted him to hospital, query appendicitis!! I packed him an overnight bag and they picked me up on the way to hospital where he was examined and put on a saline drip as he was nil by mouth in case he needed surgery. We finally left him at 9.30 pm, still in pain. Meanwhile poor DD had to make do with a Chinese take away with her big sis and two pals! We were supposed to be going out for Chinese! I rang the ward at 9.15 on Saturday and by this time they put him back on fluid but were keeping him under obs until tea time. Both DDs went to see him at lunch time and his dad went about 2pm and rang me to say that he could come home. I was just finishing a seating plan before we went to see him! Oh and I had made 72 lottery envelope favours and 7 table names on Friday too.

Here is the plan I delivered at a wedding fayre yesterday. The bride to be was really pleased with it.I was tagged by Hazel on Friday too. I'm so sorry Hazel, I promise I haven't forgotten and will do it tomorrow.

So we are now back up to date. Today I have printed 53 OoS and made beaded dragonflies to put on them. I posted the favour order from Friday and the phone hasn't stopped all day. I have people coming to see me tomorrow about an order so I really need to tidy my craft room. Oh and I am pooped so am off to bed.

And I would also like to say that if you have stuck with me this far, well done!!

Night night. xx

Wow...

.....after all the water we have endured this year, it is absolutely fantastic to have such beautiful weather. It has been shorts and gardening all week and I am just about on top of the weeding. I have a small patch outside the back door to sort (which is my target for tomorrow) then the plant catalogue comes out. I've planted loads of spring bulbs so I would like to fill the borders with shrubs, then I can just add a splash of colour with bedding plants. I'm quite pleased with the way it's looking now because I haven't got a clue what I'm doing. LOL

Yesterday I worked all day making proofs for wedding orders and got them posted. I also finished sorting out the order of service for mum and dad's 'do' and got the 'thumbs up' from the vicar conducting the service. I then printed off and made covers for the readings in church.

I made the DCM dare card this morning from this brief:

Well, the time has come for our first Christmas card dare of 2007.But as loads of you have already shown some fab Christmas cards on your blogs, we thought we'd make things a little more Daring, interesting, tricky or downright mean - depending on your point of view!
So, we'd like you to make and show a Christmas card which incorporates the following:
Some Paper Tearing
The colour Purple
AND
It has to have at least one hole somewhere in the design!
......BUT by "hole" we don't just mean the sort of hole you poke a brad through, or the holes you make for/with stitching - or even the hole you make to put an eyelet in - although you can use all those techniques too if you want.
We want you to be a bit/lot more inventive and creative than that, and we think you'll be able to come up with some wonderful ideas for making cards to fit this recipe.

I stamped the snowflake onto acetate using a white Brilliance ink pad and added some iridescent glitter. It is fastened into the 'hole' with silver wire threaded with a silver lined seed bead. The 'Merry Christmas' paper is from last years Papermania Christmas pack torn at the bottom, stuck onto purple card, then onto the white base card. I then finished it off with some purple fibres and a snowman button.

I nearly forgot to tell you that I was very naughty this morning, well I wasn't so much naughty as led astray by Dollydimple and this is what I ordered.........The Bind It All I have received an email from Craft Obsessions to say that it has been despatched! Yay!

Oh baby

Today's card is another mixture of two challenges, one from Just Bex and the midweek extra from the DCM.

First up is Lis's challenge

September challenge 2 - Get Tearing......

.......for this next challenge !!! You've guessed it...cards or LO's tear them to your hearts content.

and this is from the DCM

We're being really gentle on you for the Little Extra this week (which might indicate that there's a "stinker" in the pipeline for Friday, of course.....), in fact we're feeling so soft and fluffy that that's going to be our theme for this one:
"You Big Softie" We want you to use something soft on your card feathers, velvet paper, fluffy fibresall that soft, strokable stuff counts for this one and that's it, easy-peasy, lemon-squeezy!

So here it is

Stamped image with pink feathered wings. I made this topper over a year ago and wasn't happy with it cos I wasn't sure how to finish it off, so it got chucked in the drawer. Anyway I found it whilst looking for something else a few days ago and last night I decided to finish it. I added the feather wing and the baby feet and mounted it onto a larger piece of card. This was torn using my tearing ruler (for the second time, but have had for a long time and wasn't sure what to do with them either!) and mounted it onto the card with Quicklets. The greeting is a peel off, but don't tell anyone!

Challenge Tuesday

I have managed Di Hickman's template challenge again which is

and here is my effort :)

Papers are Making Memories Cosmopolitan Collection. This collection is still one of my favourites but I keep forgetting I've got it. It gets buried in a drawer and of course, I use whatever is on the top!! Ric rac is from Ribbon Oasis and the flower is a large fabric one from Papermania layered with a brown and a pink Prima Sprite held together with a pink brad. Sentiment is Doodlebug rub ons.

Off to have a look at the DCM midweek extra now. Hopefully back later.

Two becomes one!

I have felt absolutely lousy all weekend. My head feels as though it is about to explode, my nose has started running but I have a horrid smell at the back of my nose and a foul taste in my mouth so I think it might be my sinuses.

Yesterday I beaded the bodies for 42 dragonflies for the Order of Service for my mum and dad. I made a couple of dare cards and threw them in the bin!! This morning I decided that, despite having loads of work on, I am going to do at least one challenge or scrapbook page a day. We went to my parents' house last weekend and brought thousands of photos back so I have those to sift through and scan to scrap too. So here is my first double challenge. It is a combination of Sue's template

and Friday's DCM challenge

As a reward for all the brain power that went into the Little Extra this week, this is a simple one. From simple LythanWith a cryptic clue.Which, as I discovered to my embarrassment, when I laid it on the team, is only really possible to understand if you live in the UK. And even better, are Welsh.So... a trio of Welsh Barbers means that on your card you need to have 3 die cuts!( Dai is a common Welsh nickname for David and as there are a lot of Dai's around they are known by their jobs so a Welsh barber would be known as Dai Cuts. I'll get my coat.)
The team roused themselves from their bafflement and came up with these brilliant cards - can't wait to see yours!Here are Lythan's "simple" rules:If you don't have access to die cuts in any shape or from, you can still play along. You can then use punches. And if you don't have punches then you can do hand cutting. See how nice I am?BUT no cheating now! No reaching for the scissors if you have a machine to hand - or even some old die cuts you bought ages ago (that would be me then!) You CAN use punches and scissors etc as well as die cuts though. See, very nice!!

Here is the card

All papers are K & Co. The floral paper is from the 6 x 6 Somerset pad and the others are from the new McKenna mat stack. Flowers are cut using a Cuttlebug die, layered (there are 3 of them) and held together with a Papermania brad. Sticky ribbon is by Papermania too. Stamp is one of the super cheap Studio G range and the diamantes are from my stash.

Back later.

I'm sorry.....

.... that I haven't been around for a couple of days but I have been working my little (oh ok then, big) butt off. I have several wedding orders in as well as my parents' golden wedding anniversary and individual card orders. I even turned an order down the other night because I just knew I wouldn't be able to fulfil it in the alloted time period! I haven't had time to take part in any challenges for a few days, but I have found a card I made for a challenge on the Just Bex forum and forgot to post!

This was Nicky's instruction
Your challenge is to make a card featuring a slide mount - any colour, any size, decorated in any way you wish. (If you don't have any ready-made slide mounts, you could always cut your own from card or chipboard.)
and here is what I came up with

Backing paper is from the Making Memories 'Kate' pad, the slide mount is cut from pink pearlescent card, the candles are cut using a small punch, the greeting is printed using the pc, the small butterfly gem was a freebie on the front of a magazine last month and the ribbon is from Ribbon Oasis.

I will try to get the DCM dare done tonight, but I'm not promising. I have just finished typing in 8 pages of OoS for my parents "do" so I'm going in the garden for an hour as it is gorgeous outside.