Sunday, November 28, 2010

Christmas traditions

My lovely Docrafts friend and Stamp Man team member Janet wants to know about our Christmas traditions. She's offering a Christmas Stamp set, so it's worth taking a look at her Christmas Preparations blog.

My little tradition is that I always make both of my children a Christmas ornament for their trees. When my son was born I was a cross stitcher, so there are several stitched ones, plus a few sequinned ones. This year I've found these fabulous beaded decorations, so these will be appearing on this year's trees.



There are quite a few people leaving from my work this year- most of whom I've worked with for many, many years, so I'll be making a few more of these little blingy stars to give them when they retire.

What other traditions do we have? Well, there's the letter to Father Christmas that goes up the chimney, and he always writes back!! We watch lots of Christmas films, particularly It's a Wonderful Life and listen to lots of Christmas songs. We always go to the candlelight carol service at the local church- such a lovely chance to have a good old sing song and get a good dose of what Christmas is all about. 

A beauty of a card

This is my son's birthday card for his little sister. She adores Beauty and the Beast, so George knew these Disney stickers would be a hit.


He punched the corners with a Martha Stewart punch, then designed his layout and layered up the card. Once he added some glittery dots and her age, he'd made her favourite card this year. Isn't he a clever boy?

George is entering this into the Stitchy Bears Kids challenge which is Glittery blingy anything goes for this month.

Birthday card for my Little Legs

My Little Legs was 5 last week. Unbelievable where the time has gone to. She's a wonderful, special little girl and we're so very proud of her. Well, a special girl had to have a special birthday card, right?


The image is a lovely House Mouse stamp of Kay's. It's coloured with Promarkers (of course) in greys and lilacs. The outer flower petals were coloured stamped and coloured again and layered up for depth. The card it's mounted onto is stamped with a gorgeous Stampin' Up Baroque Swirls stamp and flower.



The sheer white ribbon is some I've had in my box for ages, it originally came off a gift bag years ago. Plus lots of bling and her age!

I'm entering this into-

Speedy the cats challenge- Bow on card
One Stitch at a Time- Glitz it up
Allsorts- Monochrome
I <3 Promarkers-Anything goes (plus sparkle)
Passion for Promarkers- Old and New (new big square white card from NEC, old ribbon)
Charisma Cardz- One for the girls

Ingredients
Stamps- House Mouse- Sleeping in crocus, Stampin' Up- Baroque swirl
Inks- Distress Ink Milled lavender, Memento black
Stash- gems, chipboard 5, sheer ribbon

Friday, November 26, 2010

I actually made some ATCS..... no fainting now!

It's been a while since I concentrated on ATCs. There just seems to be so much more crafting to be done!!

I've decided to make my CRAKs this year with this fantabulous Tim Holtz stamp I picked up at the NEC. Before any of you non-ATCers start sniggering, a RAK is a Random Act of Kindness (an ATC given without getting one back in return) and a CRAK is a Christmas RAK. Us ATC types send CRAKs instead of Christmas cards.


Inked in Distress Inks and Stickled for extra shine.

I'm entering this into the following challenges:
Totally Gorjuss- Christmas in non traditional colours- brown's non-traditional, right?
Simon Says Stamp and Show.....your Distress Inks
Crafts and me- Snowflakes
Fussy and Fancy Friday- Christmas with no red and green

Ingredients
Stamp- Tim Holtz Winter Wonderland
Inks- Versafine Onyx Black, Distress inks- Tea Dye, Vintage Photo
Stash- stickles

Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Punch it out!.....and another win, wahoooo!!!!

I'm feeling a little punch drunk after making this card......



Actually that's not fair. I did use my new gorgeous Martha Stewart punch on the edges of the green card, but I have a little box full of punched flowers to use. I save my scraps and then occasionally have a punching session in front of the telly!

The centres are glitter glued, I've drawn on some swooshes and added some red glittery dots to try to pull the colours together.

I'm entering this into Papertake Weekly Challenge- Cut it out.

And......I've won another blog challenge prize, this time from Inkurable Stampers for last month's sketch challenge- you can see my entry here. I'm now off to work on this month's challenge.......... oh OK, I'm off to look what goodies I can spend my prize on..........

Monday, November 22, 2010

A little bit of news.....I'm joining the I Brake for Digis Design Team!

digisinklingadscs

I'm really thrilled to have been invited to join the I Brake for Digis design team. Yippee!!!!! I'm currently busy printing out digis and deciding which little gems to use and what to create for my first DT project. There are some fabulous creative ladies on the DT with me, so it will be fantastic to see what gems they come up with.

It's a happy dance day!!!!!!!

Friday, November 19, 2010

The Stamp Man Challenge 10- Tim Holtz Christmas

Challenge 10???? WOW!

It's a looooovely challenge this fortnight over at The Stamp Man- we want to see your Christmas projects using Tim Holtz products. As ever there is a wealth of inspiration on the challenge blog, the DT have really excelled themselves this time, and there's a prize to be won!!!

My project was a little bit last minute. I was 3/4 through a card, but when I came back to it, I wasn't feeling it- we all know what that's like, right? So, there I am on Wednesday evening, inking for all I'm worth......

My project is an altered coaster or beer mat thingie. Not really sure what to call it- it started life as a coaster book, but I decided to join it together so that I could display it more easily. It's double sided, there's a blue and silver side......


.....and a more traditionally coloured side....


I cut out card in the right size to cover each side and decorated them before adhering the card to the coasters. The stamps are all Tim Holtz and all available from The Stamp Man, as are the Distress Inks I used. 


These blue ones were both dusted with Perfect Pearls to get a lovely shimmer.


I added some of my beloved stickles to give some Christmas sparkle!

Over to you now. Show us some of your Tim Holtz Christmas creations, can't wait to see what everyone comes up with!!!


I'm entering this into the following challenges:
Totally gorjuss- traditional Christmas colours
Stamp and Create- Tis the season
2 Sisters- Christmas
Sir Stampalot- Christmas traditions- 2nd entry- different project type


Ingredients
Stamps- Tim Holtz stamps- Holiday CollectionsReindeer Flight and Santa's Wish
InksDistress Ink pads- Stormy sky, Chipped sapphire, Tea dye, Peeled paint, Pine needles, Brushed corduroy, Barn door, Mustard seed
Memento ink pads- Rich cocoa, Paris dusk
Stazon- black
Promarkers- Black, Berry red, Grass
Stash- White card, beer mats/coasters, jump rings, Stickles, white gel pen, Tim Holtz ink blending tool and foam

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

WOYWW. Bad WOYWWer.....

Wednesdays are difficult for me,. They're work days, which means an early start, shooing the children along as I go. Plus, the work has changes a bit lately, so it has been difficult to snatch moments to blog about my desk.

I know....I should schedule the post the day before, but that would require some level of planning and self-control, and as you can see from my desk this week, those are qualities in short supply chez moi at the moment....


OK, so for the Where's Wally enthusiasts amongst you.... can you spot......

My delicious new Sir Tim stamps, bought with some of my blog challenge winnings?
The goooooorgeous Baroque Swirl stamp from Stampin' Up that I used on my daughter's birthday card?
Tougher one this- the purple mesh from the 3 cloves of garlic I bought the other day?

3 Sparkle points if you get them all!

How do you neat and tidy folks do it? Where do you put all the interesting bits of tat that might be useful in some way, at some point (see purple mesh above!!!)?

Righto, if you want to know more, please hop on over to Julia's Stamping Ground for more WOYWW madness.....

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Christmas card number 2!!!!!

Whew, another Christmas card!!!! That's a grand total of two now......


I've used the Lili of the Valley Little ballerina stamp again, and it works quite well as a Christmas card I think! The image is coloured with Promarkers, and there's lots of doodled stitches on there as well.


I'm entering this into the following challenges:

I love Promarkers- Icy colours
Papertake- Sketch
Crafty Cardmakers- Stitching
Sir Stampalot- Christmas traditions
Speedy the cat challenges- Snowflake
Crafts and Me- Glitter

Ingredients
Stamps- Lili of the valley Little ballerina, Free Christmas stamp from Craft Stamper
Inks- Memento Tuxedo black
Promarker- Blue pearl, Powder blue, Cornflower, Gold, Honeycomb,vanilla, Saffron, Cinnamon
Stash- Snowflake punch, ribbon, gems, Stickles

Awww, sweet!

Another NEC buy to show you! The new Lili of the Valley stamps are soooooo cute. I don't usually think I'm a cutesy card maker, but I do seem to have a lot of cute stamps in my collection (mind you, some would say there are just a LOT of stamps in my collection, lol)......

Here's the Little Ballerina.


I wanted to enter the Old Photo colours  challenge over at Passion for Promarkers, which was really interesting, trying to colour in sepia tones. I also rediscovered my very useful Stampin Up circular sentiments set, hurray!!



I'm entering this into the following challenges-
Allsorts- sketch
Passion for Promarkers- Old photo colours
My time to craft- Roses
Lili of the Valley- Anything goes

Ingredients
Stamps- Lili of the Valley- Little Ballerina, Stampin' Up
Inks- Memento Rich cocoa
Promarkers- Ivory, vanilla, tan, cinnamon, cocoa
Stash- 7 Gypsies Musique paper, paper roses, gems, glitter paper

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Blood red, my favourite colour.....

....maybe that's why I like to watch True Blood so much!!!

Another of my NEC bargain stamps........


It's called Pop Stems by Hero Arts. The main image is heat embossed and the edges of the cream card are embossed as well with gold powder. The edges of the card stock are stamped with the top of the Pop Stems stamp in red, then with a swirl in white, then again with the Pop Stems and gold heat embossed. 

Ingredients

Stamps- Hero Arts Pop Stems, Crafty Individuals swirl
Inks- Distress Ink in Fired Brick, Brilliance Moonlight white, Versamark
Paper- 7 gypsies
Stash- GOld and clear embossing powders, decorative border punch, red card

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Beautiful dreamer

Guess where I went on Sunday???? I made a last minute decision to go with my lovely friends to the Hobbycrafts exhibition at the NEC. I know I said I wasn't going to go, but........hey, a girl can change her mind, right?

One of the things I was on the look out for was this set of stamps called Beautiful Dreamer by Curious by Design that I'd seen someone demoing with at the Artisan show earlier in the year. I really regretted not getting it at the time, so when I saw it at the NEC, I snapped it straight up. Isn't is gorrrrgeous?

Last night I had a little play and came up with........ATCs!


The background is out of my box of preprepared ATC backs and is sprayed with Glimmer Mists. The image stamped in Russet Archival ink and then parts of it watercoloured in with distress inks to pop it out a bit. The red microbeads at the bottom were hidden away in a drawer, lonely and forgotten about, but when I saw the challenge over at The Craft Barn to make an ATC using microbeads, I dug them out!!

I made a few in different colours- this one is really delicate.


Again, it's a preprepared background with glimmer mists, then popped out with Distress Inks as watercolours. The little flower is an almost see through pressed real flower. These are both going as RAKs to some of my chums over at the Docrafts ATC forum, where I've set them a little challenge to guess how many stamps I bought at the NEC show.........


Ingredients


Stamps- Curious by Design- Beautiful dreamer
Inks- Russet Archival ink, Distress Inks in Pumice Stone, Rusty Hinge, Bundled Sage and Pine Needles
Stash- Premade backgrounds, red microbeads, pressed flower

Saturday, November 6, 2010

Woohooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I won again, and AGAIN!!

Got back from a very busy day's errand running and shopping to find out I've won another challenge and come second in yet another!!! I'm having a verrrrrry lucky week!



I won some gorgeous stamps at Sweet Pea Stampers with my easel card.



Then I won second place and a voucher for Joanna Sheen at By the Cute and Girly with a spooky ATC.

Now I need to go and make sure we've got a lottery ticket..... I'm feeling lucky.....:)

Friday, November 5, 2010

The Stamp Man Challenge 9- Christmas!

Oh my goodness, where are the weeks flying to? Challenge 9 already!!!

It's an easy one this fortnight, we want to see Christmas projects. Well it's given me a kick up the you know what to get going!!! Here is my very first Christmas card of 2010....


I'm totally in love with this Stampendous Perfectly Clear Jumbo Snowman stamp . He's acrylic and just the outline of the snowman, so you can squidge his outline about and make him all sort of shapes and sizes. Then you add his hats or gloves or buttons, so make lots of different snowmen from one stamp set. Fabulous.

Here it is open.


I had made this a sort of off centre gatefold card, but I ended up adding a section of red card for the bodies to stand on so that they looked like they were peeking round the card.

I coloured the snowmen with Promarkers for the bright bits and watercolour pencils for some bluey grey soft shading round the edges. 

The Let it Snow words are another Stampendous stamp and these are stamped in black and embossed with Golden Pumpkin/Blush Moonglow 2 tone embossing powder . It's a bit hard to make out on the photos, but it gives them a lovely shimmer. If your black ink pad isn't good for embossing (like my beloved Versafine), try inking the stamp up with clear Versamark or another embossing pad first, then inking up the black on top before stamping. It works, and it means you can use most ink pads to emboss with.

Some Sparkly red paper, a few punched snowflakes and a squidge or two of Diamond Stickles and I have officially started on my Christmas cards.......


Ingredients

StampsStampendous Perfectly Clear Jumbo Snowman, Stampendous Snow stop
Promarkers- Pumpkin, Bright orange, Red, Berry red, Ruby, Black, Cool grey 2, Cool grey 5
Watercolour pencils- Faber Castell Cold grey 2, light ultramarine
Stash- Diamond Stickles, Red glitter paper, Black and red card, snowflake punches

Wednesday, November 3, 2010

Industrial Grunge

Well, seeing as I won the Compendium of Curiosities Challenge last week (and no I haven't spent my money yet, there's WAY too much choice!!!), it's only appropriate to give this week's challenge a go as well. It's Inductrial Grunge, and I've used the technique on some die cut grunge board to use on a mirror I've altered as a Christmas present.

Here it is, already attached to the mirror..... I didn't use the industrial technique on the whole piece, as I want' to give it a bit of contrast, so some of the die cut grunge is coloured in a brighter silver.


And here's the full mirror.....


This is a basic Ikea wooden mirror, and I'd painted it and sprayed it with Cosmic Shimmers weeks and weeks ago (if not months and months......). It's been hanging around waiting for inspiration, and once I'd made the heart with wings it all seemed to work out. The background is stencilled with a Tim Holtz music mask and red Stazon (less permanent ink pads don't stick to the cosmic shimmers). 



The black corner edging is waste from a die cut panel, the swirls and flowers are die cuts and punches and the M was inked in back then stickled all over for added sparkle!




My painting wasn't so hot around the edge of the mirror itself, so I covered it up with lots of shiny red, silver and gold beads (sssshhhh, don't tell!).

As ever, I overdosed on stickles and sticky gems, but then it is for a girlie!!!! 

Monday, November 1, 2010

I won!!!!!

I won at the Compendium of Curiosities challenge. Wahey!!!!!! For my World Domination notebook. I only entered it last night!!!!!!! Doing the happy dance.......:)

The Stamp Man ATC swap- November- Take a Letter

I've not been in blogland for a few days, we're been on our half term holiday, and a lovely time was had by all!!!!

I'm back just in time to sort out my post for the Stamp Man ATC swap

This month's theme is Take a Letter

Which gives huge scope for anything, but which I found a bit of a challenge!!!! I made some backgrounds using a big Tim Holtz stencil and yellow and green ink pads but got no further for ages. In the end a little bit of inspiration struck!


It's called F is for Flower. I used a cute flower and flower flourish from The Stamp Man's aspects of design butterfly beauties stamp set and lots of punched flowers and gems. I save all my scraps of papers and backgrounds and then have an evening sitting and punching loads of different flowers so I always have a box full when I need them.

Righto, your turn. Get ATCing and join in with our swap. Take a look at the Stamp Man ATC Swap Blog for more inspiration and all the details!