Dare day!

I hope you all had a good Chistmas and Santa was kind to you.

After having a few days off I've decided that today is a 'me' day! We went to the Range this morning and I bought the new Marie Curie stamp from Docrafts. £2.50 from the sale of each stamp goes to the Marie Curie appeal and I have bought the stamps and punches for the last three years. This is the new one I also bought a couple of paper pads, a pack of 12 x 12 white card, Two packs of O Rings for my Bind it All (not very thrilling really!) and two kilner jars so that I can start sorting my ribbons by colour! I got the Organized and Inspired Scrapbooker for Christmas and it is fab. I don't know if it will make a difference in my life but I hope it will :)So onto my dare cards. I've combined the Daring Cardmakers Challenge with Di Hickman's template. The DCM brief is Hi All. Today we have decided to revisit your most favourite dares of 2007. The four top dares, decided by the number of comments you made on them are (in no particular order): 'buttons', 'ribbons', ...'and cut' and 'frames'. We would like you to use this week as many of those dares as you like to make your card in any theme and any style and this is Di's TemplateThis is what I came up with
I turned the card on it's side for the template and for the DCM, I hope I haven't cheated too much. ;) I've used buttons from stash, vertical and printed (paper) ribbon is the reverse side of the 2008 paper (which is Celebration by Junkitz). The numbers were cut on the Robo (my first ever welded 'word') and the zeros 'frame' the 'ribbon'!

O Christmas Tree

I've taken photos of my living room today so I can do a scrapbook page about Christmas. As I've only just got into scrapping it's not something I've done before. I'm quite pleased with the results (apart from the top. It's a new tree and I've had to fold the top over as it bends when the star is on)

The tree is gold and ivory with white lights. We also have a few bits on there which have been given to the kids over the years. We like it anyway :)

The fire place.

Merry Christmas

Elvin the elf

........has set his advent challenge over on the JB forum to and here is what he said.

After really enjoying seeing what you've made yesterday, today I would like to see the best handmade cards you've received from friends and family members this christmas.

I got this one this morning from my friend/Twinnie............Nick aka Pickle or Purplepenguin, thanks mate, that polar bear is just so damn cute I think I need him LOL

My next card is my Round Robin card from CBC forum made by Annmarie

The next one is from another great forum friend..........Andrea

and finally from another good friend...........Ang

DCM Friday

Christmas is an expensive time of year (although every day of the year can be potentially expensive to us Crafters ! ;) Anyway, we thought it would be a good idea to run a dare that was 'inexpensive'..This week, we the DCM team, would like you to design a card using a magazine 'freebie' . Either a craft magazine freebie, or indeed any other magazine freebie, papers, embellishments, tools, etc. anything really, as long as it came from a magazine.

Here is my card

The green paper on my card was free with the December issue of Cardmaking and Papercraft. The tree was from a pink kit from Craftwork Cards which DH bought me for Christmas last year! Everything else was from my stash.

I'm now going to wrap DH's prezzies while he's at work....................another job off my list.

Bye for now. xx

Almost there

These are two of the 'special' cards I made this year. The first one was a commision-a special card for a special sister. It was for the same two people for whom I made the 'Inside and Out' card to it had to be on a par with that one and this is what I came up with

I liked the card above so I made the one below for a special friend from me!


The verse reads

May all your Christmas wishes
and many dreams come true………
for no-one else
deserves them more than a
special friend like you
Merry Christmas,

With Love

I don't know where it came from but I think it's lovely. I use it quite a bit and just change some of the words (birthday instead of Christmas)

All papers used were old K & Co Christmas, the word Noel is from one of the fab kits from Scrummy Stash Cafe These were left 'au naturel' and just covered with Anita's 3D glaze and doused in iridescent glitter. All flowers are Prima mounted onto the Ellison Holly die cuts.

Thanks for dropping by!

Christmas prezzies!

Here are a few prezzies I've made for family members and friends

So much to do.............

............and so little time!

Today the fun begins. I've been so busy over the last few weeks that I'm now having to play catch up. Not nice crafty things though..........boring mundane things like cleaning windows, house etc :(

I finished my last Christmas card/jewellery order yesterday and took great delight in putting what's left of my Christmas stash away for the third time. The phone rang about half past seven last night and it was a panic order from a lady who had forgotten to get Christmas cards for her grand children and great niece. The only problem was that she needed one for today as it has to go to Dorset by post! Anyway, I managed to get them done last night and will deliver them today.

I finally got around to making our own Christmas cards yesterday morning too. Well I actually started them on Tuesday evening at 11.30 and finally gave up at 2.30 yesterday morning so I could get some sleep. I got up again at 7 am and managed to get them finished, written and posted. I challenged myself just to use what was on my table (scaps of paper, free papers etc) and was pleased when I actually managed it!!

I'm off to get dressed now as I have an appointment to have blood taken!

I've been tagged....

..........by Jo. (I think I'm just avoiding work LOL)

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? Wrapping paper
2. Real tree or Artificial? Artificial, don't know what it's like though. We bought it in the January sales and it ain't up yet!!
3. When do you put up the tree? usually about th 15th of the month. I'll do it tomorrow while I'm watching Strictly (sad or what!)
4. When do you take the tree down? asap. (I have been known to take it down on New Year's Day!5. Do you like eggnog? No
6. Favourite gift received as a child? can't remember, but I always loved jigsaws (still do)
7. Do you have a nativity scene? no
8. Hardest person to buy for? it's a toss up between my dad and my 19 year old son.
9. Easiest person to buy for? youngest daughter
10. Worst Christmas gift ever received? an iron-don't say a word!!
11. Mail or email? definitely mail
12. Favorite Christmas Movie? Miracle on 34th Street
13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? no set time-if I see something during the year I buy it
14. Have you ever recycled/regifted a Christmas present? No
15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? M & S iced madeira cake!
17. Favorite Christmas song? O Holy Night (it's just come on the radio!)
18. Travel at Christmas or stay home? home on Christmas day and at mum and dad's for Boxing day as it's dad's birthday.
19. Can you name Santa's reindeer? erm.........I think so
20. Do you have an Angel on top of the tree or a star? star
21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? Christmas day morning
22. Most annoying thing about this time of year? the rotten weather
23. Best thing about Christmas? seeing the kid's faces and spending the day together.

If you read this and fancy doing it, consider yourself tagged. Please leave me a message so I can read your answers!

And the good news is.........

...........I received a fabby parcel this morning with a note in it congratulating me on being a runner up in the Papercrafter of the Year competition! I seem to have lost my confidence in my work just lately so this came at the right time as I had forgotten all about it!

This is what was in my parcel.

All this lovely stash and no time to play but I will have over Christmas as I am taking a whole week off!

So here is what else I've been up to today.

Ok, now I must finish a reading which I'm doing for my sister to give to a friend for Christmas. Then to tackle the list on the previous post!

Thanks for reading. xx

Inside and out!

Hi everyone Gillian here, and it's my turn to dare you all this week.
I dare you to take the design of your card to the inside as well as the outside. Add a little finishing touch to match the theme on the outside, or Surprise the receiver with a flap, fold out, decorated journal block to write on, or one of those pop-out delights....It really adds so much to a card when there is attention to detail on the insideas well as the outside. I know some of you are finished your Christmas cards already so this week it's Any theme, Christmas or not But make the inside count too :)

My card is a variation of one I saw on Rachel B's blog I had a phone call this morning from the head at a local school to see if she could place an order on behalf of some of her staff. The card above was for her sister (who is a friend of mine) Papers are K & Co, snowflake eyelet was set with the Cropodile and the gold snowflake was stamped with Versamark and embossed with a gold sparkly powder.

The next card was part of the order too.

The greeting was printed onto the card and the image was stamped with a black Brilliance inkpad onto acetate and tied to the card using silver cord.

The next two cards were part of the order too :)

Again, the papers are K & Co and the stocking is a Sizzlit die.

The greeting was printed on the pc and the image is decoupaged and glittered.

Yesterday I had some ex collegues come round at lunch time to have a look at some jewellery and I sold quite a bit, I was well chuffed!

This is what I made yesterday morning.
I now need to make two more exploding boxes, two cd clocks and 37 place cards before Monday. Dh is working all weekend so the order will keep me out of mischief :))

Tags!

Just finished another order and it fits with the Little Extra from yesterday :)

This is the last Christmas Little Extra before we let Santa's Little Helper put his feet up and have a rest.
By now you've probably finished making you cards, so for a change we thought we'd get you making some gift tags. However, if you've still got cards to make, then you can always use tags on cards instead. It's up to you, as long as there's a tag involved it's fine by us!

These were both ordered by a lovely friend. Simon is a great Doncaster Rovers fan, hence the red and white. Die cuts used are Sizzix, rest is from stash. This is the other bag for Simon's sister.

I would just like to apologise for not visiting everyone's blog but time is very precious at the moment and I am rapidly running out! I will make myself look, I promise, as I do love reading what everyone is up to (I'm just nosey).

Back to work for now. Thanks for looking.

Busy Bee!

Well, I just haven't stopped since I last posted so I thought I had better show a sample of some of the completed work. Life is just so hectic at the moment, I haven't had time to make my own Christmas cards yet. I've decided though, whatever is left in the box will be sent out from us LOL I will make special cards for my parents and DH's mum and that's it. My Christmas stuff has actually been put away twice and got back out again!!

One of my cards fitted in with the Little Extra on the DCM blog last Tuesday. I know it's late but I'm going to show it anyway.

This is what the challenge was

It's Tuesday again so we have a midweek challenge for you to play with. Santa's Little Helper this week is themed "Buttons and Bows"Just in case you're one of those super-efficient types who've made all the cards they need already, you can still join in with a non-Christmas card for this one.

The snowman and snowflake are buttons and the bow is obvious! The image is from Cornish Heritage Farms and he is just so cute. I stamped him onto acetate using a blue Stazon ink pad and glittered him from behind using irridescent glitter. The trees are Cuttlebug and the snowflake is a punch. The ric-rac is Doodlebug.

My second card is for Friday's dare

This week is my turn (Saffa) to set the dare!I love the stripey candy sticks that are around at this time of year so inspired by this I challenge you all to create a card featuring stripes of some kind, the occasion is up to you but you must use some form of stripes on your card. Maybe stamps, or paper, or ribbon...This one was made as part of the same order as the one above. This time using papers by Making Memories, stamp by Papernation. I stamped it once onto card and then onto patterned paper and cut the dress separately. The card was finished off with ribbon from the pink kit at Ribbon Oasis and a 'silver' teddy charm from stash.

Next I made a couple of pieces of jewellery which were also part of the same order!

Sorry about the lousy pictures but the light has been terrible so they were scanned as I needed to record the items and get them delivered. The bracelet below is to match the necklace.Both necklace and bracelet were made from one necklace which my client asked me to alter as she didn't like it. The beads are mostly jet with a few small glass beads added. The clasps on both are sterling silver. I also made her a pair of matching earrings and she was really pleased with the set.

Well, that's about it for now as I have more work in hand. Today I need to make two gift bags and two more exploding boxes! I was going to do them yesterday but we ended up going to the Christmas market in Lincoln. It was absolutely superb but we got sooooooooooooo wet! We had to have hot chocolate and donuts while we were walking round to try to keep warm! LOL

DCM Friday

This week its Rhi here to Dare you... and the theme is to do with our feathered friends!(Are you remembering to feed them now it's chilly out)Robins, love birds, cartoon birds, stamped birds, paper pieced birds, dingbat birds. Its up to you. I dare you to make a card with a bird or birds on, it doesn't have to be a real species, the more weird and wonderful the better!

Here is my quick card for the dare yesterday.

Papers are K & Co and DCWV Christmas pads from last year (I have finally made a dent in the DCWV one :)) Penguin stamp is from Tanda Stamps and ribbon and buttons are from stash.

I received some of the lovely Nestabilities this morning, just the rectangle set to try them out. I ordered them yesterday from Joanna Sheen and they arrived at about 8 o'clock this morning! Their service is remarkable. I know of a few businesses that could learn a lot from JS!!

Back to work now. I have completely finished my first exploding box and am on to the second one. I haven't photographed the first one yet but will post pics as soon as I do.

Beads, beads, beads

I did my jewellery party last night and it was absolutely fab, I sold loads! I also managed to catch up with three ex collegues which was lovely.

Here are some pics of what I've been making over the last couple of weeks.

Please excuse the lousy pictures. I haven't had time to set up a 'photo space' so I scanned them for my records.

I made the bottom two today as they were for an order. I also got orders last night or ten cards, three exploding boxes, three pairs of earrings and a bracelet! Guess who is going to be busy again, I'm doing a wedding at the moment too!

Thanks for looking.