Shades Of Spring At The Stampman

Hello everyone, I hope your week has gone well. Ours has been a bit of a struggle again, not sure what's going on with this year but I'm not impressed at the minute. Thank goodness we have craft in our lives to escape too sometimes, that's all I can say.

Now, over at The Stampman Challenge Blog it's my turn to host and I'd like you to use SHADES OF SPRING. It is my favourite time of the year and there are lots of occasions to inspire you with Mother's Day coming up and then Easter so lets see all those soft colours.

For my DT project I used distress inks on glossy card to make a panel and then used these gorgeous Aspects of Design Butterfly Garden stamps. They are reduced on The Stampman website at the minute so I couldn't resist them. I edged the panel with a black marker and then added the paper roses and leaves cut from the stamp. The sentiment is a rub on from the Blog Candy I won last week but the colours matched perfectly.

It's going to be the front page of another clear stamps storage folder. I still have so many to get organised.

There is a £10 Stampman voucher for the winner and if you need more inspiration don't forget to pop over to the Challenge blog to see the amazing projects the DT have created again this week.

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

WOYWW 142

Afternoon lovely crafters and dear WOYWW friends. I'm late again this week. No excuses this time because the weather is awful, but I'm very good at spending hours doing very little and then wondering where the day has gone.

Here's my desk today. I'm in the middle of some makes for my little basket where I sell my cards. It's being going great guns lately and I'm having trouble keeping up with demand, which is a lovely problem to have I have to admit.

I thought I'd show you the miserable weather I've been looking out on here in Yorkshire today so it's made my desk a little dark, sorry about that. As you can see I'm back in my craft room today. Bet you get dizzy with all this running around I do. I get on quicker in there as everything is to hand so tend to be more productive.

I was very lucky to win Kezzy's generous blog candy last week. thanks so muck Kezzy I love it all, there are some fantastic things that I shall get a lot of pleasure from using. She also enclosed a lovely card which you might be able to spot on my desk. It's under my nose so that I can keep admiring it.

I've shown you mine so lets see yours. Pop over to see the Desk Headmistress, Julia, HERE and get desk hopping.

It was half term here last week and as DD was still recuperating from her recent Chicken Pox we managed to do some crafting together which was nice. It was my Best Friend's birthday last weekend so we made her some special cards.

Mine was inspired by a card I saw on my WOYWW travels last week on Zoe's lovely Blog. I've had this Stamp from Sheena for ages uninked so it was high time to use it. I hope you don't mind me borrowing your idea, Zoe. I was really pleased with the end result and will try it with other flowers now.

DD used her new Gorjuss girl stamp and coloured her with my new flexmarkers. I think I have competition here, don't you?

My friend loved her cards so it was an afternoon well spent.

Well, that's me today. I will try and do better getting round more desks this week, time just ran out on me last week so thanks for stopping by and Happy Crafting.

WOYWW 141

Afternoon lovely Crafters and WOYWW friends and hello and welcome to all my new followers. I couldn't believe how many of you there were after WOYWW last week. Wednesday is definitely my favourite day of the week nowadays. It's always brilliant to make new friends and discover lots of new work spaces to rummage about on. If you haven't discovered it yet, pop over to see our Head Deskmistress, Julia, HERE.

I'm late this week as the sun has been shining so we've been out in the garden this morning. DD is much better now (thank you so much for all your good wishes) although still a bit spotty but I promised her some sunshine and fresh air would do her good as I was desperate to get out in the garden after being stuck indoors for weeks!!!!

Here is my desk as I left it last night. I'm in the middle of altering a plaque I got for my birthday with pegs and hooks on for displaying things. It was originally a dirty pink colour with plastic cup cakes, not really my thing so I've been doing a bit of a painting and stamping and just need to finish making some paper flowers and I'm done. I'll share it with you when it's finished.

You might also be able to spot my Valentines choccies.... unopened!!!! I'm being a good girl although not sure for how long!! They are sitting there looking very tempting.

Now that the garden is looking a bit tidier I can see the lovely snowdrops that have sprung up everywhere although my crocuses seem to have disappeared. I must have dug them up over the years so will need to make sure I replant lots in the Autumn. Here's one that has survived though.

Thanks for stopping by and enjoy the rest of your week. I'm off to make a cuppa now so that I can sit back and enjoy some desk hopping before it's time to start some tea.

When A Lilac Is Not A Lilac

Afternoon lovely Crafters and friends. I hope your weekend is going well. At least the temperatures seemed to have risen above freezing today so lets hope we have some better weather for Half Term.

While I was painting Lilacs recently my Hubby was peeking at what I was doing and asked if it was a Hyacinth. I put him right and he said it still looked like a Hyacinth flower to him, which got me thinking, so here is my Hubby's Hyacinth.

It's painted in exactly the same way as the lilac but just rounded off at the top instead of going to a point and flattened a bit at the bottom. I stamped some script with Stormy Sky Distress Ink to add a background and embossed the edges.

I am so lucky, not only do I have a DH who never minds about my crafting but also contributes in brilliant ways too.

Right, I think it's my turn to cook tea tonight so I'll say thanks for stopping by and I hope you have a great week.

Some Texture Required at The Stampman

Hello, lovely Crafters

Well, it's Friday again and time for another new challenge over at The Stampman Challenge Blog and this time our lovely team mate, Neil is asking you to create TEXTURE. It doesn't have to be complicated, just some simple embossing is great, but you can go completely mad if you want too.

For my DT project I used the lovely Tim Holtz stamp set, Papillion, my Mum bought me for Christmas. I've wanted this one for ages so am really happy to get a chance to play with it.

I clear embossed the large background stamp and then rubbed distress inks over the top. This has to my favourite technique at the moment. The butterflies had diamond stickles applied and I ran the swirl through a cuttlebug embossing folder before wiping Stormy Sky DI over it. I used the same ink to colour the white ribbon and made some paper beads.

The rest of the DT have come up with some gorgeous projects so it's well worth having a peek and Jill, Mrs Stampman is offering a £10 voucher for the winner to spend on their shiny new website.

It's perfect crafting weather so why not have a play and show us all your texture.

Thanks for stopping by and have a lovely weekend.

Another Sheena Sneaky Peek

Morning lovely Crafters. What miserable morning it is here today, wet and cold. Not a day for venturing out. I shall be so glad when Spring finally arrives.

I had a real touch of Summer last weekend painting these lovely new flowers from Sheena's new Paint Fusion range. There are three new stamps, the lilacs you saw yesterday, these Fuchsias and a full blown rose which, unfortunately I didn't have time to have a go at. Something for another time though.

I made a hanger with the Fuchsia's, using a sentiment from one of Sheena's Little Sketchy sets.

Short and sweet from me today so thanks for stopping by and keep wrapped up warm.

WOYWW 140 and some new Fusion Flowers

Morning lovely Crafters and dear WOYWW friends.

I really look forward to Wednesdays when we all catch up with each others desks. It never fails to cheer me up and I always find something unexpected or a new friend every week. There are not many places you can go that will do that is there? If you haven't joined in yet pop over to see our esteemed Deskmistress, Julia, HERE.

Just before I show you my not very interesting desk this week can I just say thank you for all the lovely comments on the card I showed you last week. You were all so lovely and Patsy from HeARTworks asked how the white flowers were done. Just to clear that up, they were clear embossed before any ink was added and then buffed up to remove any residual ink at the end. It's a lovely technique and one I shall definitely be playing with again.

Well, here is my desk today. Nothing happening I'm afraid due to my spotty dotty daughter in the corner who has been really miserable with chicken pox this week and also very fed up that she missed all the snow at the weekend after waiting for months for it to arrive. We had more tears over that I think than her itchy spots!!

You might be able to spot some of my lovely Birthday presents that I haven't really had time to play with yet. Hubby bought me some flexmarkers, I was really impressed. He didn't ask me what I wanted but chose those all by himself. I have him well trained. He also bought me a gorgeous wallet to store all my dies in.The rest is stuff waiting to find a home, a tissue box waiting to be turned into something interesting, DD's toothbrush being charged and a new CD waiting to be listened too.

If you've just popped over for WOYWW I won't be offended if you leave now without reading any further. I was going to do a separate post to show you some new Paint Fusion flowers I have been working on but, call me lazy, I'm just going to tag them on here.

Sheena Douglass is releasing three new paint fusion flower stamps as Pick Of The Week on Friday 10th Feb on Create and Craft and they are beautiful. As a flower lover I'm in my element when we get these to work on although I only had two days to do my samples this time so there are not many to show you yet.

The first set is a lilac and is so easy to paint. I promise you I am no master with a brush but these are a doddle.

Well thanks for stopping by and keep warm in these chilly temperatures. I haven' t been outside all week as we are in quarantine and for once it's quite nice to be kept inside warm and cosy.

A Little Chilly

Afternoon lovely crafters, I hope you are all staying warm and cosy today. We have gentle snow here but nothing amazing. It has given a covering but we were hoping for loads so that we could be snowed in for a few days!! Wishful thinking I think.

Anyway, I just popped in to share with you this photo I took of the inside of our Conservatory yesterday morning. Ice crystals on windows are just fascinating aren't they?

I hope you are having a great weekend. DD has started with Chicken pox today so it's a quiet one for us.

Stay warm and thanks for stopping by.

WOYWW 139

Morning lovely Crafters and WOYWW friends. As you can see by my desk this week, it's chilly here so I'm back downstairs making a mess on the dining table. I thought I'd better just reassure you that we we do have a table cloth for best. The blue one that you can see gets very inky and glittery and although the family are happy to eat in my mess I wouldn't expect visitors to do the same!!

I've been having an inky playtime inspired by a demo by Deby from Inkylicious on the TV at the weekend. I've had these wildflower stamps from Chocolate Baroque for years now and they are still among my favourites. I've been trying various colour schemes using brown distress inks as the base and then adding some colour with bright Adirondacks.

Don't you find it's so nice to just craft for the sake of it once in awhile. I love getting messy and can loose hours.

You might just be able to spy the new copy of Craft Stamper hiding amongst my mess where our esteemed WOYWW leader has got her name in lights, about time too!!!!! Well done, Julia, it's great to see you in print. Why not pop over to Congratulate her and join in with all this desk hopping.

Lastly. I was really honoured to receive this award from my fellow WOYWW buddy, Sue, today. Thanks so much, Sue. I am supposed to pass it on but as you may know, I can never choose just 5 people as you all deserve it so please help yourself if you haven't already go it.

Thanks for stopping by. I'm off to make my lunch and then have a hop around some desks. Stay warm and have a good week.