7 days to go….

to my Macmillan Open House fundraiser. I am ready, (kinda) but still focussing on getting more stock ready for people to buy (I hope). Saturday I was making box cards, these baby ones used up a few chipboard embellishments from my stash. There are about 150 more the same….

These two are more me, I made the flowers. Not sure why my photos all seem so washed out. Probably got something on the wrong setting.

Sunday went to Ally Pally and bought far too much as usual. Itching to play but for some reason quite a lot of it was Christmas stuff – like I need more Christmas stuff.

(In fact, like I really need ANY more stuff.)

Couldn’t resist, here’s a couple of cards made with my new stamping Bella stamp and some craftwork cards papers – only 1 set (the potting shed one) was new though!!

Back to the Craft Desk!!

‘CASED’ card

Saw a beautiful card made by KAZ at Slightly Wonky Crafts. (Couldn’t cut and paste so hop on over and have a look and leave some lurve)

It really caught my eye, and when I decided to make a contemporary style card for a friend this was the design I wanted try out.

Here is the one I sent:

and because I liked it so much I made a couple more in different colour ways. Yay, a use for some of that bloomin washi tape.

Really should find somewhere better than the top of my printer to take photos.  See ya!!

Getting my vintage on…….

Two birthday cards for two vintage loving ladies – oops, nearly put my foot in it there!

Good to know I can still get it together at a push!!

Something a little bit different….

Back from my hols and didn’t really get it together till this afternoon so no WOYWW post from me today. The reason for the title is that I am not entirely sure what style I was aiming for with this card – still, the recipient liked it!!

Whilst I was thinking about the person it was for, I was also keen to use up some of those chipboard stickers and those modern flowers.

The sentiment stamp is a freebie from Craft Stamper magazine and very useful it is too. Here’s another card for my sister in law using it.

I have the lovely Anna Marie to thank for the fold back centrepiece idea and indeed the lovely spotty card. The flowers are from some decoupage I made up at mums the other week – I wasn’t sure how I would use them but they seemed to work with this. I’m going to try and whip up a few more of these for my MacMillan Open House. See ya!!

Birthday butterflies

At some point over the last couple of weeks when I had those butterfly stamps out I made another birthday  card.

Just scraps really, and a bit of stamping (shhhh don’t tell the recipient…)

Hope you like.

Tags of 2014 - September

I fully intended to do a complete CASE of Tim’s tag this month. I was fairly jumping up and down because I had the Butterfly Frenzy die. But, not having used my alcohol inks for some time I was distressed to discover only the tiniest bit of alcohol blending solution left.

But I really wanted to use those butterflies. Never say never, I tried with several stencils and several colours of alcohol ink (none of them light) to try and get that resist effect for the background. Epic fail. Not happening. So of course I ran out of blender.

So I decided to go with Distress Inks through a stencil, letting the white of the glossy paper show through. I used Old Paper. Now that worked, effect wise.

Couldn’t find a suitable stamp, so I thought I would use a lovely stencil I have from Peerless Designs. Used archival ink to stencil through and that worked really well too (made a bit of a mess of my stencil but hey it’s only ink).

 

So then I could start adding those butterflies which I had made according to Tim’s recipe EXCEPT – I wanted some bright colours I didn’t have in alcohol inks so I used a sunflower yellow and a bright pink promarker. You’d never know!!

Found some 7 gypsies rub ons and have to say they looked really sharp against that glossy card (although one did wobble – grrrrr!!).

 

Finally, because I can, I remembered this Wendy Vecchi stamp and made another one. I added a single butterfly on its own to each card – 1 to hide an ink splodge (!) and the other because I thought it looked better.

 

 

 

Although I think Tim’s is probably a bit classier I love both of these they are so different and quite stunning (even without the butterflies!!).

 

Well, tag challenge done and dusted in the first week?

Never been heard of!!

Had better go for a lie down……..

September giveaway…

I did promise to upload this today – a little later than intended but I didn’t get home till nearly 9.00 pm tonight due to inconsiderate family coming to the desk at 1 minute to closing with about 30 books and 4 library cards none of which had room for the amount of books they wanted so we had to keep taking them on and off. GRRRRR. Sorry, rant over, here we go.

A simple little hanging this month with an inspirational saying (I suppose I could try and learn something from this…. change your job probably). It’s only diddy so won’t take up much space. Usual rules apply, leave a comment on this post if you want to be included in the draw, international players welcome. Feel free to link to your own blog, if you let me know you have I will put you in the draw twice. Closing date, 9.00 pm on Tuesday 30th September. That’s it!!

What’s on Your Workdesk? Wednesday - #274

Morning Deskers!! Well the Bank Holiday did for me last week (didn’t think about WOYWW till Thursday which was a bit of a shock as I had to go to work that day. Doh). And having just a couple of hours sleep last night meant I wasn’t exactly firing on all cylinders this morning. Still a trip to the hairdressers and several coffees later I’m starting to get my head together. Here’s my desk:

Not too much going on, been trying out my Tim Holtz Butterfly Frenzy die (amazing, this month his tag challenge includes something I actually own even if…er, I have to admit I haven’t used it before). Instead of getting a jump on the challenge I have immediately got distracted into thinking of ways to use up the waste. Typical. Butterfly mind.

Stuff still all over the table from now finished projects. Needs to go away. Top LHC a new sponge for needle felting because we got the cutest book of how to make needle felt animals at the library this week. I just have to try!

My current fave sentiment stamp ‘ have a lovely day’ a freebie from CraftStamper mag. Tag box down because someone is going to get one. That’s it, the decks are pretty clear in that I am a month ahead with all my birthdays etc. Just have to put the finishing touches to this month’s giveaway and then I think I am going to do a bit of splodging. But not until after my card making friend comes to visit tonight for our cardmaking 101 sessions. And MacMillan Open House is now less than 4 weeks away. Eek!! Better get a wriggle on.

Why am I showing you this? Go here and you’ll find out!! Have a great Wednesday!!

AUGUST GIVEAWAY WINNER

Morning all, a lovely morning today which is a nice change after yesterday!! In fact I think I may have picked up a cold from being damp all day - I certainly can't stop sneezing this morning!!

Just thought I would let you know that the winner of the August Art Draw is GLENNIS. Thank you so much for taking part hun, I do appreciate your regular commenting as well so it's nice for me to be able to give something back. If you could confirm your snail mail address to me I'll get it off as soon as possible.

Thanks everyone for playing and the new giveaway will be along on Thursday. 

Tim’s Tags, August

As usual squeeeeeeeaking in (thank goodness for different time zones that’s all I can say!!). Now Tim’s August Tag is here. It’s a rather good one. But Tim’s instructions this month are a bit different. This time round Tim says

this month i challenge you to create showcasing your own creative muse.

Oh heck. Where to start. Bloomin’ muse just walked out the door.

I decided to start where I normally would with Tim’s monthly tags which is:

- read through his post once. (Sigh because I don’t have EVERY ranger product ever developed)

- read through the post again breaking down the key techniques. (This month we have, tissue tape masking, texture paste, adding colour, stencilling, sewing, altered embellies, texture with distress EP)

- Collect all the product I need together, think of substitutions and select my stamps and bits n bobs. (there was however no way I was getting out the sewing machine for a few stitches on a tag).

Now I did intend to do a whole step by step thing documenting the process – but in the end I just carried on inking and splodging until I was more or less happy. After all, there really wasn’t a recipe to follow. There were so many detours from my original intention I’ll just show you the end result. 

I have come to realise that above all else it is the additions of all the odd bits of ‘ideology and ephemera that I find really difficult. Tim’s tags look balanced and complete, mine look laden and contrived so I tend to shie (Sp?) away from it. I actually prefer the one with nothing added at all!!