Sorry for the absence, I seem to be doing that a lot lately! But unfortunately work gets in the way sometimes, and leaving the house at 5.55am and not returning until after 8pm does not leave me a whole lot of time to do much including unfortunately making cards.

I received a card yesterday and I was overjoyed…why you ask? Well a. because it was an invitation to my youngest niece’s First Holy Communion, b. my sister had hand made all her invitations stating that she had been inspired by me (!) and c. someone has been illegally opening my mail but they had decided to forward this card on to me. (Royal Mail are currently investigating!)

I used this weekends sketch by Beate to help me make a Thank You card. I, like many of you (yes YOU) hoard my paper, I stroke it but I never cut it………..heaven forbid! But today I reached into one of my many many OK many piles of blocks of paper and pulled out Stella Ruby by Basic Grey, I loved it the minute I saw it when I bought it ages and ages ago, but I flicked through it decided it was to nice to use and put it away………but today I CUT it…..OK I cut two whole pieces out of a pack of 36, you wouldn’t even notice they were gone but I did it!

Since the main paper that I have used has such a vibrant busy pattern to it I struggled to find a stamp that fitted, but in the end I went for an Oriental rose, that although is not the same as the flowers in the Basic Grey Papers I think still works. I stamped the image onto the plainer Basic Grey Cardstock using my favourite brown ink – Brilliance Coffee Bean. Using some H20’s I lightly coloured the rose to give it some definition. The sentiment was again stamped directly onto the plainer Basic Grey cardstock using the coffee bean ink.

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Recipe
Stamps – Exchangeable Clear Stamper, Creative Expressions
Ink- Brilliance Coffee Bean
H20 – Moss Green, Ginger Flower
Paper – Stella Ruby Basic Grey
Cardstock – Bazzill Basics

Sleep deprivation kicks in....

I am owned by a 14 year old beagle who has developed Cushings
and some of the symptoms of the disease is excessive drinking which in turn leads to ...... and since his Dad 'Doesn't hear him' I have to get up with him when he needs to go out ...sometimes its once a night, more often it's 2 to 3 times a night but for the past 2 nights its been every hour...can you imagine being woken up every hour, getting out of bed, letting the dog out, waiting for the dog to do what he has to do, turn around and crawl back into bed...no wonder I have suitcases where I used to have bags under my eyes....it is hard sometimes, particularly at 3 in the morning, to remember that I love my little beagle!

Anyway enough winging....I created a card using the weekend sketch that Beate has done on her blog and I also checked out the challenge over on Cute Card Thursday which is Girls Wanna Have fun.

I think this little girl is yesterdays card older sister, and she pushed him into the water!



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Recipe
Making Memories - Cheeky Pad Abby - words and stripes
Stamps - Missy B - Beach Baby
Ink- Brilliance Graphite Black
Copics
foam pads
Sketch - Beate's Challenge

Did you know that today is Freedom Day in South Africa...its to celebrate the anniversary of the first non-racial democratic elections of 1994.

Serenity

I wanted to actually do some crafting today rather then sorting and tidying so I went to splitcoasters where todays challenge is Inspiration.......you can see the image to be inspired by here - the idea is that the image/colour/layout, well actually any thoughts that are provoked by the image are put in a card/LO.

So I had the colours and the mood but not the actually layout I wanted I just couldn't get my head in gear to come up with anything until I saw the weekend challege by Beate that you can see on her Fresh & Fun Blog.

So now I had the colours I wanted to use, the mood I wanted to create and the layout, I then set about to find the right stamps, ink, cardstock, ribbon/fibre, and emblesshments.

What I used:-

Stamps by Judikins - Carols Cube, HOTP

Inks- Colorbox Fluid Chalk in Bisque and Robin's Egg, Brilliance dewdrop in Pearlescent Beige and Coffee Bean.

Fibre - Perhaps by Basic Grey

Buttons - Making Memories

Cardstock - Willow, Deep Taupe by Creative Expressions

Basecard - Duck egg blue tall card by Kanban

The images were created by first stamping the square in Coffeebean. Thenthe square image was masked out and the leafy image was stamped with Robin's Egg, Bisque and Pearlescent Beige inks. Each of the squares then had its edges inked . The images were mounted onto Willow card stock (its a very pale green), the fibre was added and the 'Just Because' sentiment attached to the fibre which was created using Coffeebean ink and cut out with a circle nestability.

The Deep Taupe cardstock was then taped to the inside of the base card. Using a craft knife the front of the base card was cut in half, leaving a contrast of colour between the front of the card and inside of the card. The Willow cardstock is attached to the front of the card so that it overlapped the edge of the now shortened front of the card. As a final touch three matching minature buttons were added to the lefthand side of the card.

Dire warning and Going Bra-less!

Yesterday I had a duvet day, I took Monty out for a good long stroll and then I sat myself down on the couch and read or watched tv for the day........and I needed it, my brain was in overload!


Today I was up, dressed, having done a general house tidy including emptying dishwasher etc, making bed, and in the fields with Monty by 8.30! I came home and spent 3 hours doing ironing and putting it all away - I don't know which I hate more the ironing or the putting away...mind you as I explained to a good friend yesterday I would rather scrub toilets then iron!!


Anyway because I was such a good girl to do all my ironing and my house all tidy I treated myself to an afternoon of craft.....I can't show you all that I made yet as they will be posted to some people who read this blog, but I can show you the cards I made for a friends birthday and one I made for my mum to hopefully make her smile.


Dire Warning

I used the template from Beate's challenge this week

• The Birthday balloon lady and the sentiment are from I brake for Stamps
• The Base card is a soft pink/lilac and from Craftworks
• The pattern card is Pocket full of posies DCWV
• The image is stamped onto soft pink Smooth Bazzill card and then mounted on maroon bazzill card.
• The ink used is Pearlescent Crimson Brilliance
• The faux stitching is done using a HOTP template and Zig pen in Aubergine.

Bra -less

I got my layout inspiration in a round about way from the same challenge but more from looking at Beate's actual card.

• The lady in the towel and the sentiment are from I brake for Stamps
• The Base card is a white linen and from Craftworks
• The pattern card is Pocket full of posies DCWV
• The image is stamped onto yellow Bazzill card and then mounted onto navy bazzill card.
• The ink used is Blue Brilliance
• The brads are lilac and glittery and from Papermania
• The ribbon is lilac and from HOTP.

I joined in Beates challenge yesterday but it had gone dark by the time I had finished it so needed to wait until this morning before I could photograph it.


I used vibrant red cardstock as my base, I mounted some square smooth white cardstock in the middle of the card to give it some dimension, which I faux stitched (sewing and me don't always get along lol!). Using my Plain Paper Tearing Template I tore some DCWV christmas paper, following that I punched out a circle in the vibrant red card stock, on which I stamped using silver Brilliance ink a SEE Dee's Sentiment stamp 'Yuletide Greetings', and finally I used a white brad to attached the two circles to the basecard.


The Greeting is more visible in real life and has got snowflakes in the design which I don't think the photograph really picks up.

Beate's #26 Challenge

Beate is a life saver! I have several birthdays coming up in the not to distant future and two of them are males………….my worst nightmare….OK maybe quite my worst nightmare but I do struggle to make interesting masculine cards. So when I saw Beate’s weekend challenge I decided to use it as a base for my card layout.

I have just checked out Wednesday Stamper and they are having a wild west theme this week...freaky!lol

I used my new goodies from We R Memory Keepers, which were a joy to use, the ink is Jim Holtz Distress Ink in Walnut Stain and the stamp is from Tanda Stamps.