Cards For Two Special People

Evening lovely Crafters. I hope you enjoyed your Bank Holiday Monday despite the weather. It was great crafting weather wasn't it. I've managed to catch up on a few things that needed to be done so am a happy bunny tonight.

May and June are extremely busy for Birthdays and Special Days for me and I'm on a bit of a production line at the minute. I made this card for two ladies who have birthdays days apart but live at the opposite ends of the country so I knew there was no risk of them seeing each others.


The flower is a Papermania build a rose stamp which I've had for ages and not used. I painted it with Cosmic Shimmer watercolours paint and was pleased with the finished result although it was bit time consuming cutting out all the separate petals to build it up.


The background stamping is using a Colour My World background stamp. The top and bottom panels were stamped in Bundled Sage Distress Ink, my new favourite colour and the middle one is clear embossed and the ink rubbed over it to create a negative effect. I coloured the mat layer with a grey promarker and the greeting was stamped onto an inked Nestie that has been cut in half and finished it off with perfect pearls.

I'd like to enter it into the Dream Valley challenge this time which is to Stamp Something, no digi images allowed.

Thanks for stopping by and Happy Crafting.

WOYWW

Afternoon folks. You really are the most encouraging and supportive group of people I know. Thank you so much for your wonderful comments about my Paint Fusion. Showing you painting is a bit more personal than paper craft as there is no where to hide and, as my Hubby will tell you, I am very self critical so your support is more appreciated than you'll ever know.

Thank goodness the wind has died down at last. Although we've not had the sunshine they promised us it's been a bit warmer and I've spent most of the day in my greenhouse so my poor craft desk has been neglected and as we speak there is nothing on it so for WOYWW this time I thought I would show you my outside work desk again.


Everything is growing nicely and once these chilly nights have gone for the Summer hopefully things can be moved outside. At the minute I'm busy potting on and planting up tubs ready for the Summer but it's a constant juggling of space.


I like to grow things that live in the greenhouse too so that there is something nice to look at and these are my favourites. They are called Lewisia and don't like getting wet so are no good in the garden but I can give them the attention they need inside and they reward me with these beautiful little flowers. I have all shades of pink and orange but this little beauty is a bit different.


Outside the Aquilegias are at their best and at last I have some colours other than blue.


And here is a long shot of the garden. It is only small but I cram it to the rafters.


The excitement is mounting as there's only one more week until Julia celebrates the 2nd Anniversary of WOYWW with her Pass It Forward and it was hilarious how many closed desks were on view last week with people hiding their makes. If you are wondering what it's all about pop over to see head desk hopper, Julia and get involved in this mad world. It's totally addicitive I warn you.

Thanks for stopping by and enjoy the rest of your week.

A Finished Corn Field

Evening lovely Crafters. I've been singing "Just blown in from the windy city" all day today. Hasn't it been breezy, although I know we have nothing to complain about compared to those of you who live in Scotland. Are you still standing up there?


It certainly hasn't been a day to be outside gardening, apart from tying things down which I have had to do from time to time so I managed to finish off my Paint Fusion field of Poppies, although now it's finished I'm more happy with the daisies. The poppies still need a bit of work to get right, the petals look a bit flat to me. Still it's a good excuse to do another painting.


I did the ears of corn in the same way that Sheena does the Lavender and I was quite pleased with the results of those.

The whole thing is done on canvas and I created the crackle background with the matt emulsion and PVA glue. It gives a lovely surface to paint on and is very forgiving in that you can correct any mistakes with the acrylic paint while it is still wet by rubbing it away with water without spoiling the background layer, something I am eternally grateful for. I envy people who paint effortlessly, I fiddle around for ages!!

I want to try the poppies again but maybe in a different colour. I have lots in my garden but very few red ones, I love the pinks and mauves of the Oriental poppies so maybe that'll be my next play.

Thanks for stopping by.

A Game Of Bingo At The Stampman

Afternoon everyone, hope you are all well. The end of another week. I sometimes wonder whether I doze off for a couple of days each week, they seem to get faster and faster. We've had an afternoon of rain too, I can see all my plants reviving as I look at them.

It's time for another challenge at The Stampman and Lisa Sparkle has given us a bingo card to play with. You can select any line vertically, horizontally or diagonally and must use all the ingredients in that line although you can use other things too. Pop over to the challenge blog to see what delicious things she's included.


I chose the bottom line which included Die cuts, Homemade paper and Bling or Sparkle and made a door hanger.

I daubed Starburst stain over the base and then stamped some stars from the Starburst Fairies set over the top before edging it with Lapis Blue Cosmic Shimmer embossing powder. It was from the UTEE set so gave a rougher finish but I quite like that.


I then made some homemade paper for the tattered flower by putting distress ink on my craft mat, spritzing with water and swooshing cartridge paper around in it. For the darker one I used Broken China, Chipped Sapphire and Vintage Photo and the lighter one was Broken China and Bundled Sage which I then stamped text over with Broken China. After cutting them out with the Tim Holtz die I dipped each layer into some melted clear EP. I used a large pie dish for this and my heat gun not having a melting pot and although it was a bit messy it worked OK.


The letters were cut out using Tim's Vintage Market die and the swirl was yet another of Tim's dies.

The rest of the team have come up with some amazing projects so make sure you check them out and don't forget the prize is a £10 Stampman Voucher so it's well worth joining in.

Thanks for stopping by and enjoy your weekend whatever you are up to. We are hoping for a nice day tomorrow. It's our local country show and I'd rather not have to put my wellies on.

WOYWW and A Lovely Award

Afternoon lovely Crafters. Blimey, is it Wednesday again!! These weeks are just flying. I have spent the morning making pom pom spiders with my lovely class of 7 year olds. I did wonder when the teacher suggested them whether the kids would get bored winding wool, but how wrong could I be, they absolutely love it and are so thrilled with their finished spiders. We still have many to make but they are looking great hanging from the classroom ceiling.

If it's Wednesday , it must be WOYWW again. Only two weeks to go to the 2nd Anniversary and my Pif is finished and ready to go so I'm a relieved bunny this week. If you're wondering what on earth I'm talking about, then pop over to see the lovely Julia and she will explain all.


I'm in the middle of a bit of Paint Fusion at the minute. I had the idea of trying to represent a cornfield full of Poppies and Daisies. It's still a work in progress but I'll share it with you when it's finished.

I also have a photo printed off ready to do a LO when I've finished painting and the Scrapbook mag is open ready to provide some inspiration.


I was also thrilled this week to receive this lovely award from the very talented and inspirational Emma. If you haven't come across her blog than it's definitely worth a look, she is on the Clarity Design Team and does some fantastic work with Barbara's superb stamps and is a very supportive blogging buddy.

I am supposed to tell you seven interesting facts about myself which is really difficult but here are some that I've come up with.

1- I love my bed and hate getting up in the morning so we are always rushing about to get out of the house in time.

2- I have a button phobia so my poor husband has to sew his own on and I will never wear anything with them on, apart from jeans or trousers.

3- I was an Insurance Underwriter in a previous life.

4- I was born in Nottingham so am not a true Yorkshire woman.

5- I couldn't live without my garden and spend as much money on plants as I do on craft stash, forget shoes and handbags!!!

6-I am addicted to Neighbours and can't miss an episode, sad I know.

7- I feel truly blessed to be apart of this wonderful Crafty Blogging Community and treasure all the friends I have made through it.

I can never choose who to pass awards onto as you are all worthy, so if you haven't already received this one, please feel free to help yourself.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope your week is going well so far. It's still chilly and windy here but there is promise of some better weather at the weekend, here's hoping.

Friendship

Afternoon lovely Crafters. What a strange weekend with Mr Blogger going AWOL on Friday. He seems to have eaten some of my lovely WOYWW comments from last week too so if you stopped by and left a comment and I haven't visited you back, thank you so much for them and please forgive me. I will try and get round a few more desks before this Wednesday!!!!
I do know that you eagle eyed folk spotted the tin of Science Putty on the table and wondered what it was used for. Sorry, I don't have any mysterious new crafting technique to share, it belongs to DD and is a tin of neon orange squidgy stuff that she molds into shapes and then it gradually goes all flat and smooth again. Very weird but she loves it!!

Also for those of you who are interested, there are some choccies left inside those boxes. I can make chocolate last. My downfall are the sour chewy sweets. Give me a bag of those and they're gone in 10 minutes!!

Now on to more sensible things. We are half way through our Friendship ATC swap at The Stampman and Lisa Sparkle is providing some extra inspiration if you want to join in. I am still find ATC's a challenge but after scouring Craft Stamper for some inspiration here is what I came up with this time.


I printed the Friendship definition off the Internet and then inked up the background with Broken China, Chipped Sapphire and Dusty Concord distress ink, using a Tim Holtz Swirl die as a stencil. I then doodled on the stencil swirl and stuck it on as well adding some more doodling in white and black gel pen. A couple of brads and some fibres finished things off.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope your Monday has got the week off to a good start. If you are in the part of the country with the warm temperatures and sunshine, please can you send some back up North. It's so windy and cold up here at the minute. I don't like having to put jumpers back on after the gorgeous weather we've had.

WOYWW 101

Evening lovely Crafters. Two posts in two days, wonders will never cease.

I've been AWOL from WOYWW for several weeks but was determined to join in this week. I've been missing my weekly fix of nosiness. If you're not sure what I'm wittering on about, pop over to see Julia at Stamping Ground and all will become clear.


Here is my desk as I left it last night. Nothing has changed today because I've been out on a school trip to RHS Harlow Carr with DD's class, pond dipping and running round a meadow with an insect net. Great fun!! It's absolutely amazing what is all around us that we never even see.

Anyway, back to the desk. My friend asked me if I could make her a bookmark and just said she liked purple. My first attempt was using a Kanban set of birds and I decided yesterday to make a more arty one with the TH Umbrella Man so that she had a choice. The second bookmark has just been gessoed and is waiting for it's coat of Cosmic Shimmer glitter paint before being decorated.

You can also see my books of clear stamps in their handmade covers ready for some quick thank you cards that need making and also hiding in the corner two, yes two, boxes of delicious Thorntons choccies, my Easter eggs!!


I can report back that my friend chose the bird bookmark and here is a close up of the front and back. I stamped and clear embossed the images onto Grungeboard and then painted them with H2o paint before rubbing the edges with Dusty Concord Distress Ink.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope your week is going well so far. We are over half way to the weekend yet again!!

Cards, Cakes and Hearts

Morning lovely Crafters. I hope I find you all well on yet another sunny morning. I really hope this isn't Summer and come next month Autumn will return!! Is that being pessimistic?

We have had a really busy, fun weekend. It was DD's 10th Birthday on Saturday. I can't believe my little baby is so big, where do the years go? Anyway, after the horrible birthday she had last year when she was so poorly, we were determined to make it really nice for her this year and so we spent Saturday bowling and eating Macdonalds with some of her friends at lunchtime and then various members of the family came in the afternoon. She was thoroughly spoilt but said it was the best birthday ever. Can't ask for much more than that.


She has gone completely off birthday cake and buttercream so asked for buns instead. I forgot to take a piccy of them all but these were what was left at the end of the day and no I didn't make the flowers, they were bought, how lazy is that!!


Her card was inspired by one I saw in the new Creativity magazine and I used the free Tatty Teddy stamp that came with it. The F was printed on the computer and then cut out of Kanban paper. I stamped the Teddy 3 times and coloured it with grey die ink and promarkers and decoupaged it and then decorated the letter with flowers and punched butterflies and doodled swirls.


Thankfully, Mr Mojo has come back so I have been busy with all sorts of things, but none of them finished yet so I thought I'd finish by sharing with you the completed wall hanging I made using Sheena's Paint Fusion Sweetpeas and heart die cuts recently. It is now hanging in our Conservatory and spurring me on to do more fusioning, I just need more hours in the day if anyone has any to spare.


Thanks for stopping by and for all the generous and supportive comments you always leave and welcome to my new followers, that counter is creeping up to the 100 slowly which I can scarcely believe. I remember being so excited when I had one follower, my blogging buddy Sally, who has been a brilliant follower and friend right from the beginning.

The Stampman Poppies Challenge

Happy Friday everyone. I hope your week has gone well.

It's time for another challenge over at The Stampman and this time the lovely Janet has set us the theme of POPPIES.

Her husband is organising a fund raising concert for The British Legion in Skipton on 25th October and thought it'd be great to have some handmade cards to sell. So if you'd like to be challenged, dig out all those lovely Poppy stamps you have in your stash and get creating. If you'd like to donate your cards to Janet, via The Stampman, she'd be thrilled, but there is absolutely no obligation. You will still be in with a chance of winning the £10 Stampman vouchers whether you donate them or not, so have fun.

Here is my Design project this time.


I used a Hero Cling stamp coloured with distress inks and then cut out and decoupaged with some stickles and glossy accents to highlight the lovely flower.


It is mounted on some embossed card using the Script Cuttlebug folder which had lime green chalk ink lightly rubbed over. The other embossed card is some Core'dinations Black magic which has been lightly sanded to show the red through.

The Sentiment is in an Aspects of Design Framie and I coloured some white nail heads with a promarker to match.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have a lovely weekend.

Our Day Out

Evening lovely Crafters. Weren't we blessed with amazing weather over the Bank Holiday weekend. It was quite a shock to wake up to cloud today, although it did brighten up later but has been much cooler here. We desperately need rain,though, the garden is like dust and with the strong winds my pots were looking very sad and wilted last night. I had to go out and generously water all of them which is something I expect to do in July, not early May.


I thought I'd share some pics of our day out yesterday. I bet all my Yorkshire Blogging Buddies will recognise where we went, but if you don't know, this is a local beauty spot called Malham Cove. Aren't we lucky to have this on our doorstep. There were plenty of people about but everyone was very friendly and when we climbed all the steps to the top, and there were plenty I can assure you, everyone was encouraging each other and there was lots of banter about. I think the good mood of the Royal Wedding was still in the air. It was a lovely atmosphere.


This was the view from the top looking over the limestone pavement. Pretty stunning isn't it. We could actually see the huge fire burning on the top of Halifax Moor which is a good distance away, the air was so clear.

It was a lovely day out but now we are back to normal so I must knuckle down and get some crafting done.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope your Tuesday has gone well..

Happy May Day

Afternoon lovely Crafters and apologies for my poor attendance this week. It's been a funny week with holidays all over the place and the spectacular Royal Wedding on Friday. Wasn't it just perfect. A day for us all to be so proud to be British. I loved every minute from the beautiful music in the service, the wonderful dresses, didn't Kate look beautiful, to seeing all the happy, smiling people fill The Mall. What a sight!!

My Mojo also seems to have gone on holiday without me so I haven't touched anything crafty all week. I hope it packs it's bags and gets back here soon, I have things I need to do and this lack of enthusiasm is worrying!

So, as you might guess I have nothing crafty to show you today, so instead I'll share the Maypole dancing we went to watch in town this morning. The weather was perfect, if a little breezy and the children had a great time.


I hope what ever you have been doing this long weekend, you've had a relaxing time and enjoy whatever you do tomorrow.

Thanks for stopping by and DD would like to thank everyone for the lovely comments you left her for her tin. She is more excited about receiving her own comments I think than actually doing the project.