Colour Create & Pollycraft Challenges

First up, apologies for the wonky photo, the card is straight and a bit brighter in real life! But it was done this morning, on my phone in the porch - so it's not too bad! LOL

I saw the challenge on Colour Create which was to make a card all in white, apart from the image and the DT cards were stunning so I was determined to give this one a go and I'm really pleased how it came out, I will be doing this again. I used the sketch at Pollycraft as I was using a Pollycraft image (how cute!) so I can enter it there as well.

I bought some fluffy stuff yesterday and used that for the snow, trouble was I overheated it slightly and it went a bit yellow, so I've distracted the eye with some glitter! The sentiment was cut out on the Cricut on red shiny card and the image was coloured with ProMarkers, brad & ribbon from my stash.

Charisma #42 plus Creative Card Crew

This is my DT card for this week's Charisma challenge (apologies for the wonky photo!) and it's my turn to set the challenge, I went all out on a limb and said no backing papers to be used! Eeek! Now I love my papers as much as the next girl, but quite often in my Stampin' Up! classes we make cards without using papers and it's quite good to do something a little different from time to time! So I hope I haven't scared you off too much and you'll join in with us this week.

I'm also entering my card into the Creative Card Crew challenge, which this week had the theme of "Snowflakes" - think I've got that one covered!

My card is mainly using SU! except for the snowflakes which I cut out on a Cricut - not mine - sadly, a friend has lent me hers for a play and oh boy, it's love! Don't tell my Craft Robo though!

Recipe:

Stamp - Season of Joy

Ink - Elegant Eggplant

Cardstock - Elegant Eggplant; Bordering Blue

Ribbon - Whisper White, re-coloured with Elegant Eggplant marker

Non SU:

Snowflake embossing folder

Cardstock for snowflakes

Diamante - from my stash

Hope you can join this week, there's a fab prize on offer!

Check out my tabs!!

I'm very proud of myself as I've managed to add tabs to my blog - see above - aren't they all shiny and new and don't you just want to click on them - feel free!

Of course I followed a tutorial which laid it all out step by step but even so there's something so scary & so alien when I start changing HTML code & CSS code and all the wonderful & mysterious things that the "clever" people do to change the looks of websites and blogs - all way above my pretty little head I can tell you. I'm very good with my computer and am certainly what I would call computer literate, but what goes on inside heaven only knows and I don't want to know, I leave that to my hubby and sister.

So it's taken a couple of days, some gnashing of teeth & a few scary moments but I've done it and am feel mighty pleased with myself just now!

Sophisticat Challenge

It's Monday morning and so that means another challenge over at Sophisticats, we had some fab entries again last week, so thank you to everyone who took part. This week we're welcoming a new DT member Avril Ann, who has very bravely hosted this week's challenge, oh yes we threw her right in at the deep end!! So the challenge is to use Pink & Brown on your card plus flowers, of course it doesn't have to be a card, can be anything you like as long as you stick to the theme.

For my card I've used Stampin' Up! all the way (oops except for the sentiment) and my stamp is from the Level 2 Hostess set called Whimsical Wings, I wasn't sure about this set to begin with but I've seen some beautiful cards made with it and I really do like it now - to get this set you need to host a party or place a qualifying order, if you want to know more then just email me.

Recipe:

Stamp - Whimsical Wings

Ink - Chocolate Chip; Pink Passion

DSPs - Sweet Always

Cardstock - Chocolate Chip

Non SU:

Sentiment - printed from a Xyron Design runner (new toy! and see how I've managed to place it nice and wonky!!)

Brad - from stash

Hope you can join in the fun this week, there's a lovely prize up for grabs too!

Today's Stampin' Up! Class

Had my first Saturday class today, with some new ladies as well as a couple of regulars from my Thursday class and we made a couple of Christmas cards and a good time was had by all.

All SU! of course & here's the deets

Card 1:

Stamps - Tree Trimmings, Frames With a Flourish, Best Yet

Ink - Ballet Blue

Cardstock - Ballet Blue; Certainly Celery; Whisper White

Ribbon - Certainly Celery

Other - Stamp a ma jig

Card 2:

Stamps - Tree Trimmings; Circle of Friendship, Frames with a Flourish

Ink - Old Olive

Cardstock - Chocolate Chip; Old Olvive

DSPs - Merry Moments

Other - Dazzling Diamonds; Eyelet Border Punch; Corner Rounder; Circle Punch 1" and 1¼"

Charisma Delightful Daisies & Digital Tuesday

Our theme over at Charisma this week is Delightful Daisies, to be interpreted any way you wish and I've gone for this sweet Swiss Pixie sitting in daisies on some daisy themed paper. I've coloured my pixie with SU! markers & PM's and used my new SU! corner punch to round the edges. The papers are digi freebies from Forever Free, the sentiment is SU! from "Stem Sayings" and I've matched up the purple in the dotty papers with SU! Elegant Eggplant cardstock, the gorgeous chipboard daisy is from my stash.

I'm also entering this into Digital Tuesday's challenge (as it's a digi-stamp & papers I've used) where the theme is "Things with Wings" and although they're not very obvious this little pixie does have wings, which I've coloured with a glittery pen.

Hope you can join us at Charisma this week & TFL xx

Some good news & a Christmas Penguin

Feeling a bit better today but still a bit emotional after the weekend's events, yesterday it just hit me like a ton of bricks & I was dreadful, but onwards & upwards as they say & feeling brighter today. My good news is that my lil' sister who is in the country at the mo from New Zealand is coming up today and staying with us until next week & I can't wait to see her, haven't seen her for 2 years and she hasn't seen this house yet as we've been in it 18 mths, so she's just the tonic I need & I'm really looking forward to spending some time with her & having a good old laugh, which we always do.

My card today is using one of the new Doodle Palace images being released this week, I loved this penguin with his ear warmers on. A really quick card to do, a bit of colouring with my SU! markers, a bit of SU! Dazzling Diamonds on the snow, some backing paper from my stash, the sentiment is SU! from the (retired) set Best Yet, all on SU! cardstock Night of Navy with a bit of glittery ribbon.

Thank you again for all the lovely messages and thanks to Lisa for sending me some lovely images to put a smile on my face - it worked hun. Will try & get round to everyone's blogs today.

xx

Doodle Palace & Stamp Something

Second post today to enter a card into two challenges, the first is Doodle Palace who have a theme of Celebration (other than birthday) with a bit of added bling, which ties in with Stamp Something who have a theme of Bling! And we all love a bit of bling!

I've made this card for someone I know who is getting married, I had to put it together quite quickly as I needed to get it in the post on Saturday and then forgot to post it on here yesterday with all the goings on from Sat night!

The image is Stampin' Up! from the set "Fun & Fast Notes" which I've stamped onto Very Vanilla and coloured with SU! markers, I've layered into onto SU! Pretty in Pink & punched the edge of both bits of card using the new SU! Eyelet border punch. I've put it onto a pre-stamped card and added the lace, bling & chipboard flower (with extra bling) all from my stash.

TFL x

Sophisticats Week 7 meets Crafty Creations and Paper Blooms

First of all thank you all so much for the wonderful messages of support you've left me regarding our break-in, I'm really touched and appreciate the support & love you've all sent - thanks so much. Feeling ok this morning and determined to put it all behind me, Kev's sorting us a house alarm today, which we didn't have because we thought we were safe here! Obviously not, but it's onwards and upwards and thanks again for all your support.

It's week 7 over at Sophisticats and this week we've got a great sketch set by Lisa.

I'm also entering my card over at Paper Blooms, their theme is Monochrome and also at Crafty Creations as their theme is Blue and my card is done using Stampin' Up! Bashful Blue cardstock and Bashful Blue DSP's, which are gorgeous, I'm not normally a blue kinda gal, but I love Bashful Blue and use it again & again. My cute little mouse is from DigiStamp Boutique and I've just coloured his paws using PM's, a bit of grey around the outline and blue on the snowflake which I've then added glitter to. I've also added a tiny bit of blue chalk around the edge of the circle, which isn't too clear from the pic.

The sentiment is SU! from the set Circle of Friendship (you'll be seeing a lot of this one on my Christmas cards!), layered onto a circle of Bashful Blue, which I've also glittered. I've added some snowflake brads from my stash and that's it!

Hope you can join in the fun this week at Sophisticats.

Not a good day!

Woke up this morning to the realisation that we'd been burgled in the night - whilst we were all asleep upstairs, which is a horrible feeling.

Nothing much was taken, I think I inadvertently disturbed them as I woke up around 1am and got up to go to the loo, our house is very old & very creaky and our bedroom is above the lounge where it looks like they were in the process of trying to unplug the Wii as it was left pulled out, we think they heard me & scarpered. It looks like they got in via the small dog flap in the back door as there was no forced entry but the back & front doors were open when we got up. The main things taken were mobiles, the purse from my handbag and an iPod, the biggest pain is my iPhone was taken and that has everything on it, and I use it for my business, so it's all a major headache. Have spent all morning on the phone to cancel cards, insurance etc so that's all done now, Kev's mum is staying with us and she took us all out to lunch bless her. The worst thing is the feeling that they were in the house with us, that's quite scary, we're really tucked away where we live, down a quiet lane and the back is only accessible through other people's back gardens and we though we were quite safe here - obviously not!

I didn't feel like doing any crafting earlier but actually I'm not going to sit around and mope and hopefully will get one done later on, but it's not been a very good Sunday!

I'm such a Doofus!!

It was my turn to set the Challenge over at Sophisticats this week, so Sunday night I put the post together, added all the links and the DT cards, set it up to post on Monday morning & went to bed feeling very pleased with myself at having it done it all and totally forgot to post my DT card on here! It was only when one of my lovely commenters said they couldn't find it did I realise my mistake - so thanks Lorraine!

So here's my card, a little late admittedly! My sketch & theme was to go clean & simple, something I'm doing more of (inspired by the amazing Emma, who does it perfectly) and came up with this card. The little flowers are from the SU! set Fresh Cuts, stamped out in Pink Passion, Only Orange & Real Red, the sentiment is from the same set, and the papers are some digi-papers I've had in my stash for ages. I embossed some lines on it, not sure how clear they are in the piccie and that was it. Funny how such a simple, almost empty card can take so long!

So that's my card & if you want to pop over to the Sophisticat blog to join in with this week's challenge, you still have a few days left!

TFL x

Yummy Blog Candy Alert!

Marianne is giving away this lovely stash of goodies so head on over to her blog here to get your name down.

Charisma & Stamp Something

This is my DT card for this week's challenge over at Charisma and I'm also entering it into Stamp Something's challenge which is "brown plus one colour".

Our challenge this week is to use distressing on your card, so not in my usual style but I really enjoyed giving this one a go. I don't have any distressing inks so I've used some SU! chalks around the edges of the image, sentiment & flower and using my SU! distressing tool (which comes on the Cutter set) I've distressed the edges of the paper and the cardstock the sentiment is on. The image, a Pollycraft stamp, has been coloured with PM & SU! markers and I've paper pieced the dress, the rest is all Stampin' Up! as follows:

Markers - Pumpkin Pie; Creamy Caramel

DSP - Sweet Always (retired)

Sentiment - from Trendy Trees

Cardstock - Chocolate Chip; Whisper White

Buttons - Pumpkin Pie from Earth Elements set

Hope you can join us this week.

Using up my scraps for Funky Fairys

The challenge over at Funky Fairy's this week is to alter something, I was going to cover a large notebook I have but when I went to print out my Funky Fairy papers - disaster as my printer decided not to play. I changed my ink system over to one of these continuous flow thingies (that's the technical term!) and it's been a nightmare, when it works it's wonderful and yes it does work out a lot cheaper than cartridges, but it's so bloomin' tempermental and today it's not printing a thing!

So plan B, had a look in my scraps folder and I did have some Funky Fairy papers left over from a previous project so I cut them out and decorated a little box I keep my business cards in, the flower on the top is from an FF kit too. I'm really pleased with the result, the box now looks very funky & cheery!

TFL x

Cupcake Craft Challenge

Finally got around to entering the Cupcake Craft Challenge, I aim to every week, but somehow never seem to get around to it, I'm only just in the nick of time now as it closes tomorrow. So here's my entry, the theme was Thanks & I've used the sweet little bird from the Stampin' Up! set Fun & Fast Notes, the rest is all Stampin' Up! too, except for the punch for the flower.

Stamp Sets - Fun & Fast Notes; Simply Said

DSP's - Washington Apple

Ribbon - Certainly Celery

SU! Markers - Apricot Appeal; Certainly Celery

Cardstock - Certainly Celery

Off to walk the dog now, as the sun's shining for the moment, but it's a bit in & out & showery today!

TFL x

A girlie Christmas Card for 2 Challenges

Second post today, but it makes up for not doing one yesterday as I was out all day.

Bit of different Christmas card, but it's nice to be different sometimes.

I've followed one of Vee's sketches from her Sketchpad blog, if you haven't been over I can thoroughly recommend it, she does some fab sketches which are great to follow if you're struggling for a layout plus this week she's giving away a lovely prize too - so hop on over here for a look!

The image is a digi from Your Special Delivery and I just loved the idea of a ballerina snow-woman, they have a new challenge blog launched and the image was free. I've coloured her with pm's and watercoloured the skirt using SU! crayons, the two little stars are stamped out with SU! Snow Burst stamps, and I've then gone over the dots with the new glue pen & dipped into Dazzling Diamonds. I've also used a sparkly pen to go over some of the main image & the backing papers, but that doesn't show up too well on the piccie. The sentiment is SU! from the retired hostess set Best Yet and I've added a bit of sticky ribbon from my stash.

Piece of Cake (Box)

I came across this fab template for a cake slice box and decided to make one for this week's Stamp With Us Challenge, which is anything but a card and also Carly has set the Charisma DT a challenge to make a favour box so I'm going to enter it in that as well.

Really easy to make following the template and all Stampin' Up! products used (except the ribbon which came from my stash). The flower is made following another template with a brad in the middle

Cardstock - Chocolate Chip

Papers - Sweet Always (retired)

And that's it! Simple to do - you could say it was a piece of cake! ha, ha!

Charisma meet Little Paper Shop

Here's my DT card for Charisma this week, which is a recipe set by Sally:

3 papers

3 flowers

1 ribbon

1 charm

I spent an absolute age on my 'puter yesterday afternoon trying to find the right digi-papers to go with my image, and then we had a power cut! So I dug around in my stash, as you do, and found these lovely Christmas papers I bought last year and hardly used, and the rest of the card came together quite easily.

I'm also entering my card into Little Paper Shop's challenge, which this week was to make a Christmas card using non-traditional red & green.

My image is a Sharing Sherbert stamp which I was lucky enough to win and I've coloured her with pm's & a glitter pen. The cardstock is Stampin' Up! Lovely Lilac and Whisper White and the silver ribbon & charm are from my stash. I've made the flowers by cutting out with a punch and then stamping on them in Versamark using one of the swirly stamps from SU! Frames With a Flourish and finished off with some silver brads.

I'm still struggling with lighting for my pics, Kev has made a light box for me, but it's not quite right and now instead of my piccies being too dark they're overexposed and it's made this card look a bit washed out, it's more vibrant in real life. Will try & get an outside photo done instead as the sun's out today!

Hope you can join us over at Charisma again this week.

TFL

Get Sketchy #8

Another sneak peek of a new Doodle Palace image coming out this week - should be on Thursday, I thought this was such a sweetie and I've made my card following the sketch over at Get Sketchy, with the bonus challenge of using brads, so I've added two cute Christmas tree brads on my card.

The picture is a bit over-exposed so the colours are a bit darker in real life, I've used ProMarkers to colour in my image the DSPs are Pebble Ink, cardstock is Stampin' Up! Real Red, I've embossed the centre section using a snowflake folder and the sentiment is a clear stamp I've had for ages in my stash.

TFL x

CRAFT Challenge No. 19

I've followed the sketch over at CRAFT this week to make the above card using one of the Doodle Palace images being released this week, I just love her flip-flops - what a casual fairy! I've coloured her with ProMarkers and layered her up on SU! cardstock Chocolate Chip. The papers are from Forever Friends and the sentiment is one I've had for ages, don't know where it's from. Two of the flowers are punched out from SU! paper Sweet Always, the other is a paper flower, the ribbon and brads are from my stash.

TFL x

Sophisticats Week 5

Week 5 already over at Sophisticats and we've a lovely sketch by Cheryl to follow this week and this is my card.

I've used a stamp by Pink Gem Designs, and I'm going to enter it into the Pink Gem's monthly challenge too. I love the hand drawn quality to this stamp and I coloured it with Stampin' Up! Watercolour crayons to keep the whole effect soft, apart from her crown & wings where I've used a Sakura Stardust pen for a lovely glittery look. The sentiments is from the SU! set "Fun & Fast Notes" and I used my Stamp-a-ma-jig to place it on the card. I've used SU! DSPs Sweet Always, which are now sadly retired but I still love 'em, SU! cardstock Pretty in Pink and the bling, charm & chipboard corner are all from my stash. I decorated the inside too as I'd already cut out the Princess die-cut and then realised it was far too big for the outside, so put it on the inside instead!

Hope you can join in this week, there's a gorgeous Robin stamp up for a prize donated by Lisa.

TFL x

Scrummy Blog Candy

Iris is giving away these gorgeous goodies at her blog here - check it out!

Die Cut Dreams and Stamp With Fun

I've combined two challenges with this card - Die Cut Dreams whose theme is Ribbon & Trim along with Stamp With Fun, using their sketch.

I've used a lovely Tilda image that my friend Carly inked up for me - thanks hun, and coloured her with ProMarkers, the gorgeous papers are K&Co and I've layered it all up on SU! Always Artichoke cardstock. The sentiment is SU! Circle of Friendship; the flower has been cut with an X-Cut punch and the green ribbon is SU! Fairytales, the pink is from my stash.

TFL - off to walk the dog now whilst the sun is shining.

HouseMouse Challenge #53 - Buttons

Two of my favourite things - HouseMouse & buttons - come together on this card for this week's HouseMouse Challenge, how happy am I?

Took me ages to choose the paper and then once I had I was up & running and the rest of the card came together really quickly.

Recipe:

Stamp - HouseMouse Confetti Rain

Coloured with ProMarkers and Stampin' Up! markers

Paper - freebie from magazine

Cardstock - SU! Bashful Blue

Buttons - from my stash

Sentiment - DCVW Chipboard labels