My favourite......

LOTV stamp is the challenge over on the Lili's Little Fairies blog which is the second challenge on the Lili Of The Valley's new challenge blog. This is the first time I've taken part in a LOTV challenge and I'm not even sure how I came to find it but I did and as I had a wedding card to make so I thought I would enter.

I don't own many LOTV stamps but this has to be a favourite, it is just so cute.

I don't know where the pink and silver paper came from as it's from the snippet box again (sorry Di, you'll be sick of the sight of me this week :))
The frame and small pink flower are Nesties and the large heart is a new one from Memory Box. I can't say I am over impressed with it at the moment as I have to layer it with card 'shims' in order to get a decent cut so it doesn't fall to pieces when it's being removed from the die! The image has been coloured with Promarkers and the sentiment is from Craftwork Cards.

I shall be back in the morning for the Funky Hand blog hop, I hope you will join us :)

Thank You!

It's my turn to show my card for our Get Funky! December challenge (it seems a long time ago now!) which is to make a thank you card. There is still time to take part in the challenge but not much as it finishes tomorrow. There is the freebie paper too if you don't have any Funky Hand products and it's available here

I love this download and it definitely makes for a very quick and simple card.

Make sure you pop back here on Saturday morning to see news of our first BLOG HOP of the year to launch not one but two fantastic new downloads created by our wonderful leader, Anice. The winner will receive a copy of each download so you don't even have to make a decision as to which one you would like!

Thanks for calling by.

Nellie the Elephant

The theme at Passion For Promarkers this week is to be "inspired by a song" so I decided to go with my super cute elephant stamp by Penny Black and as per my title, I thought of Nellie the Elephant.

Image - Embrace 2892K by Penny Black
Paper scraps - Sweet Owl by First Edition
Promarkers
Ribbons and gems from stock
Flower die - Sizzix Flower Daisies #2

My card is also being entered for

Di's Snippet Challenge

Papertake Weekly -Die Cute Special, use a die cut somewhere on your card and also make it cute

Penny Black @ Allsorts - Love and hearts
Delightful Challenge - have a heart
Penny Black's Saturday Challenge - to case the following card

Thanks for looking.

What's on your workdesk Wednesday

This is my first visit of the year to Julia's Stamping Ground to show my desk and see what others have on theirs today. I took my photo last Wednesday morning then forgot all about it. This isn't the same picture though, lots has happened on my desk since then!

Sorry about the pants photo but the light is terrible here today.
This is my first time up after being in bed since Monday afternoon with this dreaded flu bug, as I have some cards to make. As soon as I'm done I'm heading back, I still feel awful :( I will take my lap top with me and have a pootle round the other blogs taking part today.

Back soon

Less Is More

I've never taken part in this challenge before so I hope I've done it properly! The girls over on the Less Is More challenge blog are asking for Predominantly Purple on our work and this is mine. I've had this stamp for years but don't use it very often!

Stamp is by Inkadinkadoo # INK8353
Sentiment stamp is by Debbi Moore
Paper (I think is by Nitwits - it's from the Snippet drawer again, Di!)
The little purple gems are from a Papermania wheel


I think I'm coming down with this rotten flu bug which is going round. My whole body is really painful to touch, I have a temp and I'm barking like I don't know what. One of my brides has it and she came over twice during the week and again this morning when I started with it. Oh well, I will soldier on :)


Take care and thanks for visiting.

Penny Black

The new challenge on the Daring Cardmaker's blog is a colour challenge and it's a lovely one. I decided on the colours for my image before I had actually seen the pallette, Mystic Meg eat your heart out!! (If only it worked with the lottery numbers)

My colours are slightly brighter but they're not too bad. I used last weeks Sketch Saturday sketch too but only because I thought it was the new one, DUR! I will make a card tomorrow with the new sketch as we have a few birthdays this month.
Image - Penny Black
Promarkers
Heart paper - Pink Petticoat
Other papers from the snippet box
The 'ribbon' was tied round some tea towels from Asda lol

See you tomorrow

UM stamp storage

Di was asking this morning how people stored their unmounted stamps and I thought I would stick my two penn'orth in and show mine as it works really well for me.

 

My son was chucking out his cd stand last year so I decided that I would have it and hubby djs so we get loads of cd cases as he prefers to store his cds in cardboard sleeves as he can get more in his case. I pull the middles piece out that the cd clips onto and it gives you two sides to stick the stamps to. I just use a labelling machine to label them. I still have loads to do but we bought my daughter a matching one when we bought this one so I have plenty of space to fill.
Tfl

Papertake Weekly

Papertake Weekly have the theme of "Anything Goes, with the option of  a new theme, so it could be a new baby, a new beginning or just something new from your stash" this week and I had a couple of birthday cards to make so I decided to join in with the challenge. Oh the joy of having internet during the day (I didn't haven't it at the shop so had to cram everything into an evening)

The Art Deco lady, by Kanban, is my new 'option'. I bought it before Christmas but it stayed in it's bag until Wednesday. I think she is quite elegant so I just kept the theme to black and white with the addition of silver mirror card (which looks black on the photo!)

I used an assortment of dies and punches to create this card

Martha Stewart border punch
Quickutz shoe and handbag dies
Cuttlebug flowers


The sentiments were on the sheet.

I am also entering the card into Di's first Snippet Challenge as the mirror card was from the 'snippet' mountain. 
Incy Wincy Designs - anything goes
Secret Crafter - anything goes
Pile It On - anything goes
Pollycraft Monday - Punches

I have a real mish mash of a day today as I need to make some DT cards and I have a photo album and a fascinator ordered so I want to at least start them.

Back soon, thanks for looking.

Sad or what!

 I hope everyone has escaped any damage from this terrible wind we've been having. It wasn't as bad today as it was yesterday but it's still blooming windy and I'm really glad I don't have to work outside!

I have so many off cuts now I thought it was about time I got them sorted so I knew what I had and whether or not I needed to cut into a new sheet of paper/card! (Heaven forbid ;)) So I started sorting all the bits out one evening over the Christmas break, as you do lol and finally finished at about 1.30 am. The stupid thing is that I have only made about three cards since I sorted them and didn't even open the drawer as I still had some bits on my desk.

The big, over stuffed folder at the front is full of white and ivory card, as is the bottom drawer of my desk.......I'm sure it breeds when I'm not in here!

I played along with the Snippet Challenge with Jules as often as I could but I will be making an even more determined effort this year to play along as I'm sure once I start sorting boxes again the off cuts mountain will grow. Di from Pixie's Crafty Workshop has taken over the Snippet challenge from Jules.

Take care, back soon

My news!!

I had a really good end to the year and a really good start to the new year as I found out last month that I was one of nine runners up in the Papercraft Essentials Papercrafter of the Year. I wasn't allowed to say anything until the magazine was published on 22nd December......and then I forgot! I was so busy with Christmas card that it totally slipped my mind.

Anyway, here is the piccies and the work I submitted

and on the day I bought the mag I also bought this months copy of Craft Seller only to open it to find out that some jewellery I made had been published and my entry was chosen as the winner and I've won a beautiful sewing box (I can finally throw the Quality Street tin away LOL)

 I made a key ring and a pair of earrings with some free beads from the front of one of the editions of the mag and I had some other green beads on my desk which were left over from another project, so I decided to make a matching necklace :)


Thanks for looking and I will be back shortly. I've decided to make this post a sticky for a couple of days so you will need to scroll down to see my recent work.

Promarkers

Jules is giving away a set of Promarkers on her blog Always With A Heart, courtesy of Handy Hippo and this is what she says

How do you fancy increasing your stocks of Promarkers?

"Oh, yes please" I hear you cry.

Well .. ..  even better than increasing your stocks .. .. .. how about choosing which colours you would like to add to your Promarker collection?

To celebrate single Promarkers now being available to buy from Handy Hippo you now have the chance to win a fantastic prize .. .. .. ..

20 SINGLE PROMARKERS OF YOUR CHOICE

Back soon when I've done some work :) 

 

Seating plan

This is the seating plan I made for the New Year's Eve Gala dinner on Saturday where the theme was diamonds and tiaras and the colour was black and silver, hence the decoration. The champagne bottles an tiaras were cut from a very sparkly glitter card but the photos haven't picked up the shine.

 I hope you like it, thanks for looking :)

Happy New Year

I just want to wish everyone a very happy and safe evening as we are off out now. Hubs is working and I'm going with him but we are staying over. Number one son and friend are cat sitting and number two daughter is working.

See you all tomorrow with my news :)

My top 9

I realise that I said I would be back with my top five Christmas cards but it has taken me until now (on and off) to choose and can't get down further than nine, so here goes

I hope you like them all. I will edit later to list all the materials used.
TFL, I will be back tomorrow with my news as I would like to see out the old and see in the New Years on a high :)

Passion........

..For Promarkers set the theme of "Celebrations" for their last challenge and as we have birthdays on Christmas day and Boxing day in our family it was easy to fit this challenge in with my last minute makes. I did a few different celebratory cards but am only entering the first one into the challenge as none of the others use Promarkers on them.

My first card is for hubby's nephew who was eight on Christmas day.

Image is Skateboard Ian from the Greeting Farm, paper is by Kanban (freebie) and MME, the rub on letters are Doodlebug and the rest is from my craft cupboard.

 Papers are Sweet Love by First Edition, sentiment stamp is from a set of Kids Quotes by Inkadinkadoo, greeting is from Craftwork Cards, flowers are die cut and premade paper roses and the ribbon is from my craft room.

 The guest book was a last minute commission which came in two days before the wedding!

 Quote is from a set by Stampendous (I just love them) and everything else is from my stock. I found the ribbon (it reads Health, wealth, happiness, fertility, long life) and the tiny silver stick on hearts when I was sorting through a drawer a couple of weeks ago...I don't know how long they had been there but I unearthed other stuff too which will make an appearance over the coming weeks :)

The last card was for my dad who was 75 on Boxing Day.

The big numbers are made using Word as I showed in a tutorial a while ago, I have 'misplaced' my large numbers since I put them somewhere where 'I would know straight away where to look!!' Papers are by MME again.

As well as the Passion For Promarkers challenge I am going to enter my cards in the following challenges

Secret Crafter - Anything Goes

Jules Crafty Snippet challenge #51

Thanks for looking. I have a table plan to make today for one of the Holiday Inn, Doncaster for their New Years Eve dinner tomorrow evening so must crack on. I'm hoping to come back later and show case my five favourite Christmas cards, oh, and I have some really good news to share.

Through the window

The week 50 challenge on the Polka Doodles blog is

The theme for this last challenge of 2011 is:

Through The Window...

and this is what I came up with (this is my first Polka Doodles challenge so please be gentle with me!)

 All the paper elements on the card are magazine freebies but I can't remember if the window etc are from Polka Doodles too as I threw away the strip from the bottom of the page! I did manage a few more cards from the papers though

 Image and sentiment from Pink Petticoat

 Image from Forever Friends, sentiment was generated on my lap top.

 Image from Digi Stamp Boutique and sentiment from Pink Petticoat

Stamped Christmas tree image is from Wild Rose Studios and the die cuts are from a download by Nitwit Collections

I like this set of papers so much that I have been onto the Polka Doodles web site this evening for a nose and was thrilled to see that they can be bought as a download..........guess what I bought :)

Daring Cardmakers

Good afternoon everyone, I hope you have all had a lovely Christmas and that Santa was kind to you and your family. It feels like an eternity since I last updated my blog but I've been so busy that I have just avoided the internet full stop! I get easily distracted so better to leave alone lol Well actually, I have dabbled a little bit but only to buy a couple of bits of crafty sale stuff.......it would be a shame not to when the store owners have spent so much time uploading everything ;)
So now I can finally get the rest of my Christmas/ birthday/ wedding items uploaded and into the challenges I'm not too late for lol
The DCM challengers wanted to see 'Spots and Stripes' for their challenge, of which I have two cards

 

Image The Digi Stamp Boutique
Papers Magazine freebies, but I think the second one is by Polka Doodles


Thanks for looking.

Funky Hand Sale!!!

Not long now, ends today

Keepsake card

I had a request for a Christening card for a baby whose 'birth congrats' cards I did in August! I decided to fish out my trusty old Bookatrix board which I haven't used for a long, long time. It was a success as my client loved it!

Short and sweet I'm afraid tonight but there will be more tomorrow as I am having a mammoth card making session tomorrow and no doubt I will be entering a few challenges along the way too :)

Take care my friends and sleep tight. Oh and huge huge to those of you who have had to endure that awful weather from yesterday....I hope everyone is ok. xx

Flippin' men!

Although I have quite a few of these sheets left I tend to forget I have them and don't use them very often. My friend mentioned the other day that it was the 60th birthday this week of the caretaker down at the school I used to work at. I don't usually send him a birthday card but I thought of this image as soon as she mentioned it :)

The image is from the Flipping Men series by Jak Heath and I added a screwdriver and hammer charm because he is into diy in a big way. As soon as anyone mentioned at school that they needed shelves up or whatever he had started the job before they had finished speaking lol

I'm entering this card into the Papertake Weekly challenge as their remit is

So onto this week and as it’s the first one of the month  we have our usual

Anything Goes theme

with the option of adding something dangly  ……

. but remember this is only an option and if you don’t want to dangle then you don’t have to dangle :)

Right, I'm off to do some colouring for a while then I really must do something else in my tip of a work room/studio.

Thanks for looking