Blue and white

This is for 365 cards day 64, a white space sketch:



The white scalloped nestie die cut has a bit of a pearlised sheen to it - this was run through the cuttlebug with a dotty embossing folder. The layered felt flower is from Poundland. The dark blue background is from my offcuts box and the spotty ribbon is a stick on one. All corners were punched to round them.


This is also for:

Mark's finest papers speedy the cat 55: monochromatic blues

Crafty pad 121: holes (in between the scallops of the die cut)

Frosted designs fabulous Friday challenge: ribbon or twine

Aud sentiments 28: no sentiment

Mami doodles 26: spots and/or stripes

Card cupids: no patterned paper

Creative card crew: May flowers

Everybody art 141: flowers

Delightful: flowers

Shannon's sentiments 26: 3 flowers and no patterned papers

My time to craft 140: scallops

Tuesday throwdown 48: use die cuts

My mum's craft shop 5: to die for

Wags n whiskers 54: circles

Craft your days away 20: white + one

Really reasonable ribbon 24: anything goes

One stitch at a time 62: anything goes

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

Red and white, lace and ribbon

I'm trying to catch up on some of the 365 cards challenges that I've missed - thought I'd start with yesterday's (day 75) sketch:



I didn't find this an easy sketch, but once I got the idea of what I wanted to do, I loved it. The dotty paper at the top is unknown, the striped paper at the bottom is We R memory keepers. I then had the idea to attach two pieces of white lace to the back of the red stitched ribbon - this was then a bit bumpy because of the lace underneath, so I stuck a piece of DCWV flowery ribbon on to the middle of the red stitched ribbon. I corner rounded at the bottom.

I chose red and white for Alota 58 May day challenge, also for Craft your days away 20: white + one

It's also for:

I did it: lace and ribbon

Bunny Zoe 12: lace

Stamping vacation: have you tried challenge: ribbon over lace

Frosted designs fabulous Friday challenge: ribbon or twine

Aud sentiments 28: no sentiment

Mami doodles 26: spots and/or stripes

Catch the bug: polka dots and stripes.

Really reasonable ribbon 24: anything goes

One stitch at a time 62: anything goes

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

Keep your chin up

On the BF forum we are having a non-retreaters minicrop for the weekend. Joanne gave us this link to try doing some acrylic distress. Well, I think I must be feeling too woolly with my cold - and a bit too impatient! I gave it a try, but managed to take off the surface of some of the paper while sanding - the effort ended up in the bin. Meanwhile I had stamped a giraffe (rubadubbadoo stamp) to use with the acrylic distress panel.

In the end I resorted to a known method of embossing some yellow card (instead of coating with yellow acrylic, which was my original intention) using a creative expressions embossing folder. I then sanded (being more careful this time) and distressed the area with brushed corduroy DI. I used this too to distress the surrounds of the giraffe panel to take some of the brightness off the yellow - although the whole card is still looking quite bright!

I seem to have lost the 'keep your chin up' stamp that should be with the giraffe, so I printed it instead - had to have a few goes with plain paper before sticking the panel on to get the print in the right place. Everything is mounted on a brown linen card, with the addition of the piece of ribbon,

This is for:

Pollycraft 92: boyz to men - think this is suitable as an encouragement card for a man

Stamps R us: for the men in our lives

Nadia 6: men's card

One crazy stamper: boys and men

Ann's creative nook 134: anything goes with animals

Paper pretties 153: add texture to your card

Dream valley 7: dig out the old to use with the new - the embossing folder is new, but everything else is old

Stampavie 141: ribbons

Frosted designs fabulous Friday challenge: ribbon or twine

Creative craft: distressed

Cute card Thursday 164: it's so distressing

Card cupids: no patterned paper

Really reasonable ribbon 24: anything goes

One stitch at a time 62: anything goes

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Stamp something: anything goes

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

It's snow time

This is another card for my CHNC challenge 20 'don't get stressed about distressing!' - I simply tore the card with the image around the edges. If you haven't joined in my challenges yet, why not start now - we're nearly five months through the year already and Christmas will come round so soon - if you make a lot of cards, now is the time to start, if you haven't already done so - and I know lots of you have because I enjoy seeing all your creations on the challenge blog.

Back to this card, I've used the sketch for Cards & things 78:

On the silver grey stardream card, I used two different Basic Grey papers - the main background is ambrosia and the panel that's got the image on is sugar rush - neither of them are Christmas papers, but I think they work well for the colour combo, so this is for Basic Grey 44, which is to mix and match a couple of BG items.

I've used one of my favourite stamps, Penny Black fantasy, stamping with versamark and heat embossing with detail silver powder. So this is another entry for Penny Black's Saturday challenge 151: clean & simple, as well as Jac-inks 8: heat embossing.

I then added a couple of ribbons, one on top of the other and a glittered snowflake.


This is also for:

Bah! humbug 19: snowflakes

Christmas stampin all year long: you've got me in stitches (the narrower of the two ribbons is stitched at the edges)

CES 36: holidays

Gingerloft 17: plant a tree

Stamping vacation: inspiration station challenge: dancing tree

Stampavie 141: ribbons

Frosted designs fabulous Friday challenge: ribbon or twine

Sisterhood of crafters: let it shine

Pixie dust 74: make it shiny

Little Claire 7: sparkle

Creative craft: distressed

Cute card Thursday 164: it's so distressing

Really reasonable ribbon 24: anything goes

One stitch at a time 62: anything goes

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Stamp something: anything goes

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

Ice cream

This is for the sketch for Pink elephant 99:
This is also for the 'ice cream' challenge for One stop craft 131. I chose to use a stamped image featuring ice cream, but also ice cream colours for chocolate and strawberry. The image is Penny Black hot but cool. I had a couple of these in a rubber stamp swap quite a long while ago. I wasn't sure what ink had been used to stamp them, so I tried copics/promarkers on the first one and it was a disaster, so for this I got out my old colouring pencils - that made a change! The brown paper is from Dena designs. The pink card was embossed with a Crafts-too dots embossing folder. A pink foiled sentiment and a few flowers finished off the card.

I chose the Penny Black image for Penny Black Saturday challenge 141: clean & simple.

This is also for:

Irish teddy's: embossed

Freshly brewed 45: beach or summer

PaperPlay 19: celebrating summer

Mami doodles 26: spots and/or stripes

Make it colourful 18: dotty backgrounds

Incy wincy 93: girlie

Prairie fairy Fridays 52: here come the girls

Crafty Ann 40: happy birthday

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Stamp something: anything goes

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

Make it Monday: 36

Time travel

I put together a couple of digital images - one that I adapted a while ago for my latest Circle Journal - I used this as a background and then added a steampunk clock picture, changing it to match the colour of the original and using a fade effect to reveal the background picture.



This is for:

Crafty cardmakers 45: steampunk or machines

Altered Alice chapter 4: time

Challenge up your life 43: travel

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

Make it Monday: 36

Magical butterfly spiral

For this card for Paper sundaes 68: magical & mythical creations I've used one of my all-time favourite digital images - butterfly spiral by Dewdrop crafts.

I kept to the black, white and red colour combo for Ladybug: black and white plus one, The paper shelter 13: black + white + one, If the shoe fits fashionista Friday 79: primary splash - black and white with a splash of red, blue or yellow - it's also one of my favourite colour combinations for Stamp dreams challenge 81.

This is also for:

My partner in crafting crime 26: incorporate numbers

Drunken stampers 67: by the numbers

Stampavie 141: ribbons

Frosted designs fabulous Friday challenge: ribbon or twine

365 cards day 65: mythical creatures

Thank you, thank you ...

This is for CPS card sketches 217:

The colour combo is for Paper players 46:

A piece of red card was run through the cuttlebug with the 'thanks' embossing folder and then swiped to distress with victorian velvet DI - this was than mounted on an offcut of navy blue card. The 'thanks' die cut label is a Cosmo Cricket 'drop me a note' sticker - this is for Wee memories 56: anything sticky.

The embossing is for the current Irish teddy's challenge and the 'thanks' is for Stamp n doodle: thank you.

Green apples and oranges

This is for the colour combo for Raise the bar 66: green apples and oranges, using MME spotty spring paper background with squares of Ethan Kate left over from making my star box earlier. The middle panel was rescued from my 'odds and ends box.

I used the Claire's sketch for Sunday sketch & stamp 54:


This is also for:

ECP 38: pretty pastel colours

Crafty pad 120: spots & dots

Mami doodles 26: spots and/or stripes

Wags n whiskers 54: circles

Crafty Ann 40: happy birthday

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

Make it Monday: 36

Salt: a time for everything ...

Update: Thanks to Blogger - my original post for this was eventually returned - you can see it here.

Thanks to Jaqi for sending me copy of my Salt post that she had on Google reader, I am able to re-post this. You never know, Blogger might still restore the lost posts, but in the meantime this is a copy of what I wrote on Thursday.

It was Ruth's turn to choose the topic for today's challenge on Salt and she chose 'a time for everythin' based on the passage from Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 - you can read what she wrote here.

This turned out to be a very poignant topic for us at Salt because, after much discussion and prayerful consideration, we have decided to cease the challenges, although the blog will remain open - we hope it will continue to be a blessing to those who visit.

My LO is very simple because the K & Co paper I used is very 'busy'. I added some Hero Arts stamped cuckoo clocks and a few other clock faces. The passage from Ecclesiastes is The Message version - I printed on to an identical piece of K & Co (I so wish I had a printed that could cope with 12 x 12 - one day, perhaps) and used the stitched ribbon over the join. You can read the scripture verses if you click on the image a couple of times.

Please go over to Salt and see what the rest of the team did for this challenge - and join in if you can.

I'm linking this for:

Let's craft and create 19: sew lovely
Stampavie 141: ribbons
Allsorts 102: stamp a lot - use at least three different stamps
My partner in crafting crime 26: incorporate numbers
Crafty creations 118: anything goes
Creative Belli 117: letter S - stamping, stitching (my neglected embellishment: the ribbon)
Stamping vacation: No! No! challenge: no embossing of any kind
Stamping vacation: when I grow up: clockmaker
Crafty catz: give us a quotePenny's 53: anything goes

Make it Monday: 36

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Flourish timeless 117: anything goes

Altered Alice chapter 4: tme

Sorry that I can't clear the spacing that's appeared just above here. Of course, I had some comments that had been made on the original post, but they disappeared with it.

Pastel does it

This card is for Corrosive 115 sketch time:
The spotted and striped papers are Craftwork cards vintage rose and the paper used to cut the scalloped nestie circle is K & Co boutique (I've had this for years). I distressed the little circles with tattered rose DI while the die cut was still in the nestie, distressing the edges of the card and the striped squares as well. The butterfly stamp is Stampotique by Janet Klein (stamped with tattered rose DI ink to keep to the pastel look).

I kept the whole card pastel for ECP 38: pretty pastel colours; it's also for Craft your days away 20: white + one, I did it: monochromatic, and Annabelle: say it in monochromatic tones.

The spots and stripes are for Crafty pad 120: spots & dots, Mami doodles 26: spots and/or stripes, Sunday stamper 153: the star spangled banner - stars and/or stripes, and Catch the bug: polka dots and stripes.

The butterfly is for Daring cardmakers: the darling BUGS of May, Totally stampalicious: bugs, Cutie Sunday 140: butterflies, Claudia & company 81: butterflies, Sarah Hurley 40: butterflies/things with wings, Stamp magic 35: butterflies, Whoopsi Daisy: things with wings, Paperminutes 165: wings, and Dutch dare 112: winged things.

It's also for:

My time to craft 140: scallops

Tuesday throwdown 48: use die cuts

Wags n whiskers 54: circles

Creative craft: distressed

Cute card Thursday 164: it's so distressing

Stamp, scrap, doodle: old supplies (the K & Co boutique paper - at least 8 years old)

Aud sentiments 28: no sentiment

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Stamp something: anything goes

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

Make it Monday: 36

Divas by design 1: anything goes

Origami star box

Quite a few of the bubblies from the BF forum are on retreat this weekend (wish I could be there), but there are quite a few of us stay-at-homes, so Kathy has been organising a little Non-retreaters mini crop for us. She shared a link to a video to make an origami star box and I've just had a go - it's not perfect (some of the folds could have been neater), but not bad for a first attempt.

Like Kathy, I chose a 10 x 10 square of paper cut from Ethan Kate ripple stripe - I chose this because it was double sided but not too thick.

Now I need to think of something to put in my star box.

I'm sharing this with the following challenges:

One stitch at a time 61: fancy folds

Design dollies: time to fold it together

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

Make it Monday: 36

Divas by design 1: anything goes

Card and a half challenge blog

There's a new monthly challenge blog starting soon - details are all here. There will also be some 'just for fun' challenges throughout the month - sounds good. Helen is Clare's sister (Clare is one of the Christmas gang - links in my sidebar).

Invertage and pyramage

These look almost identical, but the first card is invertage, the layers looking inwards, and the second card is pyramage, with the layers stacked up, on to A5 stardream card. These were part of a set purchased two or three years ago from Create & Craft.

The birthday greetings were made with my dymo letratag label maker.


These are for:

Crafty Ann 40: happy birthday
Pollycraft 92: boyz to men
Cardmadfairy 8: for the boys

365 cards day 33: boy oh boy - masculine with a touch of pink (the pink flowers)

Kaboodle 66: lots of layers

Challenge up your life 43: travel

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Stamp something: anything goes

Make it Monday: 36

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

CHNC challenge 20: don't get stressed about distressing!

Can you believe it? It's Saturday again and that means there's a new challenge on my Craftyhazelnut's Christmas Challenge blog - challenge 20, which is all about distressing - this could be inked/sponged edges, torn paper, sanded embossing ... anything that counts as distressing - I look forward to seeing what you come up with. To find our more about the challenge and to enter your card please visit here.

For my card I used half of a white shaped card and used a small Brilliance pearlescent poppy ink pad direct to paper, concentrating more on the edges. I then stamped with three different stamps from a Tanda Holly Doodles set designed by Sheila Oliver - Sheila is a clever and creative crafter who is such an inspiration. I coloured the holly with my newly acquired (arrived in the post this morning) Marvy le plume alcohol pens and dotted the berries with glossy accents.

I then mounted this on to a piece of Craft Creations paper, having torn the bottom edges and mounted on a red linen card. Just the addition of the sentiment and the card was done.

(Why are the berries looking more orange and red on the photo - perhaps it's the effects of the glossy accents!):


I'm linking this for the following challenges:

CES 36: holidays

Creative craft: distressed

Cute card Thursday 164: it's so distressing

Sentimental Sundays 54: anything goes

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Stamp something: anything goes

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

Divas by design 1: anything goes

Birthday garden

I needed to make another commissioned 80th birthday card (there seem to hav been a lot of them recently - 80th birthdays, that is).

The patterned A5 base card is by Dena designs, to which I added some DCWV stitched ribbon and the invertage garden design, a purchase two or three years ago from Create & Craft, with the addition of a computer generated sentiment, both mounted on to silver mirror card.


This is for:

Crafty Ann 40: happy birthday

My partner in crafting crime 26: incorporate numbers

Your next stamp 42: pop it up (I used foam tape for the invertage)

Kaboodle 66: lots of layers

Theme Thursday: garden

2 sisters 39: how does your garden grow?

Freshly brewed 45: beach or summer

PaperPlay 19: celebrating summer

Sentimental Sundays 54: anything goes

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Make it Monday: 36

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

Creatures birthday party

This is the photo inspiration for Cupcake inspirations 110 this week:

so I have made this card, using some paper that was in a Poundland scrapbook kit ages ago and some rather lovely creatures from a Tesco go create set of stickers - the eyes move.


This is for:

Crafty Ann 40: happy birthday

Ellephantastic 26 for May: birthday party
Cat's corner 50: very colourful birthday balloons (a cat needed to be included)
Ann's creative nook 134: anything goes with animals
Pollycraft 92: boyz to men (suitable for a boy's birthday)
Cardmadfairy 8: for the boys

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Make it Monday: 36

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

Blogger posts temporarily taken off

As most of you know by now, Blogger has had major issues for the last couple of days and have announced that posts made from Wednesday until earlier this evening were temporarily disabled. This means that my Salt challenge post isn't available. I'll wait a day or two to see if it is brought back before I do it again (didn't keep a copy, so would have to start from scratch again).

A fish called Wanda?

When I went into Ryman's a few days ago to get a couple more Really Useful Boxes, I happened to see some fish shaped cards - a pack of 5 - which I thought might come in handy.

I coloured the fish body with Caran d'Ache watersoluble neocolor II, scribbling the colour first and then wiping over with a wet baby wipe. The tail was coloured with a Caran d'Ache water resistant neocolor I (this has a more pearlised look). I added a bit of colour here and there with a copic pen. A copic was also used to colour the sea and turquoise stickles added.

This is for:

Aly's 41: shaped cards

Some odd girl: get into shape (shaped card)

City crafter 56: by the sea

Gingerloft: under the sea

The paper variety: lights, camera, action (A fish called Wanda)

Craft us crazy 8: use your favourite embellishments and/or something new - the shaped card is new

Creative inspirations 59: glitzy & bling

Use it Tuesday 7: bling

Shelly's terrifically thrilling Thursday: bling is

365 cards day 40: clever colouring - 4 different methods of colouring - watersoluble pastel, water resistant pastel, copics, stickles

Aud sentiments 28: no sentiment

Freshly brewed 45: beach or summer

PaperPlay 19: celebrating summer

Flourishes timeless 117: anything goes

Crafty creations 118: anything goes

Penny's 53: anything goes

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Sew many challenges 53: anything goes

Stamp something: anything goes

Make it Monday: 36

Inspire me Fridays 6: anything goes

CAS Lily of the valley

This week on Daring cardmakers the theme is Flowers for May - either hawthorn or lily of the valley. I used a clipart picture from Publisher and digitally tweaked it a bit. The base card is pearlised (haven't used any of this pearlised card for some time) and the dark green textured card is some that I came across when I had my sort out last week - no idea where it came from or how long I've had it - from my early days of cardmaking. The background paper behind the picture and the sentiment is from Dena. The sentiment was computer generated and printed, using one of my favourite fonts, Lucida Calligraphy.

This is also for:

Paper pretties 153: add texture to your card
Rainbow lady 152: let's feel it
I did it: monochromatic
HLSC 21: green
If the shoe fits fashionista Friday 78: May goes green
Dream valley 6: flowers
Sunday postcard: April showers bring May flowers
Card cupids: flowers
Creative card crew: May flowers
Everybody art 141: flowers
Top tip Tuesday 33: flower frenzy
Delightful: flowers
Raise the bar 65: flower power
Crazy 4 challenges 86: April shwoers bring May flowers
Pear tree 48: spring
4 crafty chicks 37: spring has sprung
Stamp something: May digi day
Tanda teaser 171: get well soon
Paper crafting journey 10: get well soon
My Sheri crafts 56: get well soon
Penny's 53: anything goes

Make it Monday: 36

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Flourish timeless 117: anything goes

Salt: a time for everything ...

It was Ruth's turn to choose the topic for today's challenge on Salt and she chose 'a time for everythin' based on the passage from Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 - you can read what she wrote here.

This turned out to be a very poignant topic for us at Salt because, after much discussion and prayerful consideration, we have decided to cease the challenges, although the blog will remain open - we hope it will continue to be a blessing to those who visit.

My LO is very simple because the K & Co paper I used is very 'busy'. I added some Hero Arts stamped cuckoo clocks and a few other clock faces. The passage from Ecclesiastes is The Message version - I printed on to an identical piece of K & Co (I so wish I had a printed that could cope with 12 x 12 - one day, perhaps) and used the stitched ribbon over the join. You can read the scripture verses if you click on the image a couple of times.

Please go over to Salt and see what the rest of the team did for this challenge - and join in if you can.

I'm linking this for:

Let's craft and create 19: sew lovely
Stampavie 141: ribbons
Allsorts 102: stamp a lot - use at least three different stamps
My partner in crafting crime 26: incorporate numbers
Crafty creations 118: anything goes
Creative Belli 117: letter S - stamping, stitching (my neglected embellishment: the ribbon)
Stamping vacation: No! No! challenge: no embossing of any kind
Stamping vacation: when I grow up: clockmaker
Crafty catz: give us a quote
Penny's 53: anything goes

Make it Monday: 36

Scrappy frogs: anything goes

Flourish timeless 117: anything goes