Good morning

It's Wednesday again so that means only one thing........What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday! Don't know what I'm on about? Well take a look at Julia's blog,  Stamping Ground where all will be revealed. Julia is on holiday this week but her friend, Lunch Lady Jan is sitting in for her.
So onto my desk

The bag is a commission by a client. It was covered in tiny bugle beads but quite a few had come off so the lady wants is stripping and rebeading. I sat yesterday and took all the beads off and today I will start stitching new ones on. Once it's finished I will add the photos on here (I forgot to take 'before' pics!!)

This one just shows the untidiness at the other side of the desk and my ever present cup of coffee :)

Off to work soon, thanks for looking and have a good day.

Teas Up!

What a fab day we have had today. I've been outside since 9 o'clock this morning. I made myself a coffee and brought the papers out and st and read them, hubby got up and made us a bacon sandwich and then I started weeding. What an uphill climb that is. I have really neglected the garden since I opened the shop and the weeds are unbelievable, some of them reach about 3' high!! There are usually frogs hiding in amongst the long grass but we don't seem to have any this year, I don't know where they've all gone as we had loads of frog spawn. I hate the blooming things (and slugs) and always wear gloves in case I accidentally touch one. I was weeding round a huge hosta (cos I forgot to split them last year!!) and thought I had caught hold of a bramble. When I moved the leaves to see why it wouldn't budge it was a big fat hedgehog laid asleep....I don't know who was more shocked, it or me lol I've planted up some planters and baskets and it has all been watered so it's job well done. I have only managed to weed one side and across the bottom though. Our back garden measures approx. 140' long so it's like painting the forth bridge. Plenty of time to do the rest :)

I've had a shower and washed my hair and am now sat on the patio in my pjs with a cup of coffee and my lap top. DH and DD2 are both out and have been since 1.30 and DS is holed up in his room moaning about the heat. It's just me out here in the quiet and there is just a gentle breeze blowing.

So onto why my post is called Tea's Up....Anice at Funky Hand has just added a new download to the web site and yes, it's called Tea's Up and it can be downloaded from the web site. 

Myself and my team mates have had the download to play with for a few days so we could make some samples to show you how versatile it is.

I hope you like them.

Thanks for reading.

What started as one....

led to 7...cards that is! I bought a 6 x 6" paper pad ( First Edition - Hideaway) in the Range last week and decided yesterday morning that I would use it. It is so unusual for me to do that for two reasons, one is that it's very rare for me to actually buy papers at the mo (I'm still trying to deplete the paper and card mountain) and the other reason is that I have had it for less than a week and have used it already :) Normally I hang onto papers until they are well past their sell by date and I've stroked all the pattern off, and then I use them :)

I decided that I would use my pretty new papers to make a birthday card the new sketch on Kathy's Sketch File (which doesn't go live until next week). I then thought I would use the scaps to make another card and decided on an engagement card as I was down to the last couple on the rack, and this is what I came up with and it fits the new challenge at the Allsorts Challenge Blog, which is Lemon and Lime and the Papertake Weekly challenge which is "Here Comes the Sun - It was here yesterday but now it’s gone again, so for most of the UK girlies we will really have to use our imagination as we don't see the sun that often lol!!

So quite simply you just need to create a card that reminds you of summer or has a sunny summery feel."

The lace is from Creative Treasures, the ribbon, flowers and gems etc are from my craft stock and the butterfly is a MS punch.
Once I had finished this I thought I would use the remaining paper to make another card while it was on my desk but there wasn't enough so I had to cut into another sheet and I made this one which fits this weeks challenge at Passion For Promarkers which is "set by Andie and she has chosen “park life”.  We want you to dig out all your images that show what you can do in the park, such as play on the swings, walk your dog, ride your bike etc." It also fits the challenge for Penny Black at Allsorts and the remit is to use your favourite Penny Black Stamp. I really struggled with my choice of stamp as although I don't have many PB stamps, I do have a few faves :)

 The Penny Black image was coloured with Promarkers. 

The next card was made from the offcuts from the previous one (notice the pattern emerging?) with a strip from 

 another sheet used to cut the flowers and flourishes which are both Sizzlit dies. This card fits the Secret Crafter challenge of embossing as the brad was triple embossed and then dunked into some Glamour Dust.

 The next card was made for the DCM challenge from yesterday. It's Lythan's turn to set the Dare this week and her remit was to make a wedding card but I forgot my something blue, sorry Lythan. My card also fits the challenge at Moving Along With The Times which is "A card with clean lines, minimal elements, areas of white space and few or no embellishments." I haven't seen this challenge before but I love CAS cards.

I couldn't find a 'congrats' rub on so used a tiny peel off *sharp intake of breath* lol and the final card is made up of the tiny pieces left over from all of the above cards (Jules would be so proud of me :))

The image is from Pink Petticoat and the sentiment is a Papermania sticker. The gems are from my stash.


Well that's it from me for now. I am so pleased that I managed to do some challenges at long last and I'm off to bed now.


Night x

What's On Your Workdesk? Wednesday 107

It's that time of the week again....it's time to get nosey :) I completely forgot about WOYWW last week until Saturday then promptly forgot again. I have photos for this week and it doesn't actually look as though I've been doing anything lol

 What do you think? In my defence I've been making wedding stationery samples and have had a couple of appointments with new clients but tomorrow my desk will probably look like a tip again. Just in case you wanted a bit more than a tidy desk (with the all important cup of coffee) I thought I would photograph one of the top drawers in my desk!!!

It started out asan overflow for my bead shelf but as well as beads and wire it now houses any jewellery which needs cleaning odd left over beads and heaven knows what else....I do keep meaning to sort it but it's one of those jobs where I open the drawer then think I'll do it later and shut it again. I will get done at some point :)

Thanks for looking and now I'm off to start my nosiness. See you soon. x

100th birthday!!

This commission has come all the way from Somerset via my mum in law. It's from an old friend for her aunt who will be 100 in August. The lady in question worked in service from being 13 years old and eventually went to work at Cadbury's factory in Keynsham where she stayed for about 30 years. She actually retired about 40 years ago, that's almost all of my life. I hope she likes it!!

 

I have used an assortment of stickers, ribbons, flowers and charms from my stash and have also managed to reduce my paper mountain a little. I have also added an assortment of tags so that the family can sit with Nell and make notes about the photos etc.

There is still time for you to enter the challenge over on the Get Funky! challenge blog. As always, Anice has designed a freebie paper so everyone has a chance to take part.

There is also still time to take part in the challenge at Kathy's Waffle Sketch File and don't forget that we have a small prize to give away this month.

Good luck and thanks for looking.

Papertake Weekly

Well, I did the dads a couple of posts ago so this one is for the lads, albeit little tiny ones :) I'm still in the process of stocking up the card stand (in between appointments and orders) and am actually beginning to see results now so as you see it is the turn of baby boy cards.

Images from Penny Black, and the sheep was a freebie from when I was on the DT at ICS
Papers from Pink Petticoat, Funky Hand,
Prima flowers
Promarkers
QK and Cuttlebug die cuts
Ribbons from Ribbon Oasis
Charms and brads from stash
Sentiments from the pc

Get Funky June challenge

It is time for the new challenge over at the Get Funky! blog and this month it is Anice's turn to set the challenge. She has come up with a super sketch

and a funky new freebie which can be found here

Please remember that to be entered into the draw you must use something by Funky Hand which is why Anice posts a freebie every month.

 Don't forget to leave us a comment so we can come by and admire your work.

Lads and Dads ....

well lads' cards in general :) I know lots of people don't like making male cards but I don't mind. I struggle a bit for my dad but that's because he doesn't have any hobbies apart from football (watching not playing!) and there are only so many cards you can make with Glasgow Rangers on lol

Anyway, back to the cards

 The football boot is from the Colour Me Happy cd from Funky Hand which I enlarged and printed before colouring with Promarkers and threading with white grograin ribbon. The sentiments are from Craftwork Cards, the shirt was in my craft box and I added the die cut name and number

 

This cute little fella was a free download from Digital Delights some time ago. His name is Birthday Pippin and he has been coloured with Promarkers. The gingham paper is a download too but I've had it for so long I can't remember where it came from. The letters and the number were die cut.

Thanks for looking.

Allsorts challenge

Another challenge with a recipe this week is the Allsorts Challenge blog Now I used to avoid this sort of challenge and just stick to sketches but now I quite enjoy them, I also don't mind making cards for males either but I know there are quite a few people out there who hate it. This is the brief

"This week we have a recipe challenge for you but with a twist - and the twist is it's

A RECIPE FOR THE BOYS

so we would like to see your projects for a male using the following

1 design paper

2 punches or dies

3 buttons"

 and here is what I came up with

The papers and die cuts are all from My Mind's Eye, image is by Karen's Doodles and the sentiment is from Craftwork Cards.


Allsorts also have a DT call which ends tomorrow at 6 pm so I thought I might have a try!

http://allsortschallenge.blogspot.com/2011/06/dt-call-at-allsorts.html

and my card

Thanks for looking and good luck if you apply :)