Stargazing in the secret garden

Morning Peeps, it's mid way time at We Love Stamping and Stamping Sensations where our themes are Feminine selected by Lynn and Four Legged Friends chosen by Pinky. Some gorgeous prizes for four lucky winners from Lavinia Stamps and Grafton Crafts

Stamps on both cards come from Lavinia Stamps, no links again I'm afraid, as explained in my previous post, whilst all went to plan and seeing the benefits of reduced pain, fighting an infection and my mojo has taken a hike! Hopefully normal service will be resumed soon. Just noticed the above looks rather blurry, not sure why as fine irl. 

I noticed on a fellow DT's post the theme at Cards 4 Galz is Fantasy and as we have Fairies in the garden also Ellies Garden Party, so felt I should link the top card to both.

Stand up tag

Morning all, it's mid month time at Tag-Along (and ATC's) where you have really wowed us with your support, we can't thank you enough. This months Anything Goes theme runs until noon GMT on 28th May for the chance of winning the lovely die set from CraftStash.

A double tag which I often make, cut the tag twice, score one about a third down and stick the top sections together. An inky background, stencil and crackle texture paste, an A&C flower stamped twice onto oddments, coloured and cut out. There are several snippets so I'm popping to the Playground with this one, hopefully there's some homemade lemonade left. 

Other than the above I rarely enter challenges due to visual problems with linking and save that activity for my challenge essentials. But thought I would give it a go with a couple, the first is Sweet Stampin's Spring, the Daisies are all popping up, Sunday I sat a while with three year old Margo making Daisy Chains, despite the years some things never change. Also Stencil Fun, who doesn't love using them, know I do, this follows their A/G route.

My ATC and little envelope use Lavinia stamps onto an inked and stencilled background, simple as that. Following on from what I mentioned above about challenges, my ATC will hopefully fit at The Card Free Zone.

I've not detailed all products as only meant to be sitting at my desk in short bursts, whilst all went OK with my treatment, I had ten cannulas down my lower spine bilaterally (five each side) and a couple of areas are being slow to heal.

Don't forget to pop a note in your diary for 24th May, a special challenge at Allsorts for our 16th Birthday.

Blue bloom and Poppy Dog

Morning all, time for a new challenge at Allsorts where Lynne would love to see Paper Piecing, as always theres the A/G route as well. We have a super prize of a £25 store voucher from Personal Impressions, we are so happy to welcome them to Allsorts for the first time and thanks must go to Lou Sims for organising it all.

A week of no craft and one I won't be sorry to see the back of, apart from the hospital stay, we lost our little Poppy on Tuesday, she was 13. She coped with so much for a little one, a tracheostomy early 2021 followed by surgery, but last December they discovered a Liver mass and gave her weeks. 

We pampered her with a diet of home cooked chicken and fish and she was doing so well until a couple of weeks ago when her cognitive functionality wavered and she went downhill culminating in the decision we all dread. She's been buried under a tree up towards the orchard, a part of the garden we called her happy place as she would spend hours just mooching. She also enjoyed watching activity outside from my craft room.

To add to that eldest Daughters Terrier, same age as Poppy who we look after most days in term time had a stroke Monday, no movement in back legs, but since a course of steroids started yesterday there is a glimmer of hope with some movement. 

For my card at the top I have used a Stampers Anonymous Tim Holtz stamp set called French Garden along with a very old TH corner die. Some stencil work to the base piece using crackle texture paste, the blooms were stamped onto the base and again onto a piece of MCS DP, cut out and paper pieced and another sheet of the same DP used to mat and layer to carry the colours. Some twine to finish and of course an envie.

Some of my Stampers Anonymous stamps have been neglected for ages so it's nice to have a prompt to get them out and play again and I'll confess to a new set, I've had my eye on Mr Rabbit for so long and this seemed like a prompt to actually buy him.

Mr Rabbit paper pieced beautifully using MCS DP, some background stamping with stamps from the same set and a matching enive. I think he's such a handsome fellow and sure he'll be used a lot.

Our next Allsorts challenge celebrates our 16th Birthday, we have some very special prizes and we would love you to share our logo on your own blogs to help us spread the word and make it a really special occasion. 

Gentle Whisper

A new month means new challenges at We Love Stamping and Stamping Sensations. At WLS our theme has been selected by Pinky and is Four Legged Friends and at SS Lynn has chosen Feminine for her theme. We have prizes from Lavinia Stamps and Grafton Crafts.

Unusually for me a CAS design for my SS share, but this is such an elegant PB stamp called Gentle Whisper feel it needs little more than a masked border with soft inking and sentiment which is also PB. Colour was added to the stamp using Ecoline pens and stamping platform stamped 2/3 times to add depth of colour.

My WLS share features Lavinia's Lupin gazing into the sky and a scene built up using Tree Stem, Open Dandelion, Leaf Spray, Group Poppies, Snow Shrub and Fairy Path and a mixture of Clair and Element inks. I'm charing this at Lavinia's Secret Garden challenge.

Finally, my share for the Card Chain Challenge, all stamps Lavinia following the colour palette of Chocolate, Orange and Slate and the optional Rabbit, my card went to Pia in Norway and I received one also with a Rabbit from Robyn in Australia.

I'll leave you with a photo of the gangs new fly protectors, naturally selected by Anysia, why else would horses wear ones with Unicorns? Penelope and Merlin still had theirs on next morning, whereas Heskey had deposited his in the water trough, clearly not masculine enough for him.

Apologies I've not been around visiting too much, rather under the weather, only a couple of days migraine free since mid March and new diabetic injections not agreeing with other meds, so rather ropey. Going into hospital this week for some treatment.

Tag-Along (and ATC's)

Morning all, it's the day of our first challenge at Tag-Along (and ATC's) and we so hope lots of you will come and join us. One very lucky winner selected at random will receive a set of dies from the lovely Peeps at CraftStash who are sadly closing down. But it does mean they have a huge sale going on with some super bargains to be had so worth popping over to take a look.

I've always enjoyed making tags, although admit ATC's something I've not made that often, but throughly enjoyed preparing work for our new challenge. 

Lots of ink for my first share above onto a piece of corrugated, it's very finely ridged and what they use in the packing from the London Italian deli I order from. After inking with a variety of colours I stamped an A&C background stamp, the pattern is very muted but the effect I wanted. Next stamped, cut out, coloured and applied crackle glaze to the A&C Flowers. I found some gold lace, added two little gold 'twirlies' found in a box of odds and sods, placed the blooms centrally and finally black cord and gold button.

When I researched ATC I discovered that historically they were often given in little pockets so I devised one to fit and did a quick photo tutorial which you can find on the page here on the challenge blog. Also being so tiny they are a perfect way to use up snippets which is a bonus as I can pop over to the Playground with it.

For the ATC I inked a background then built up the scene around Herbalum Bob, all from Lavinia's Herbs and Delights collection. Decided to also decorate the pocket with more stamps from the same and finally white Posca dots to finish.

We are really looking forward to you joining us in our new venture and look forward to seeing what you create.

You'll Never Walk Alone

Morning all, time for a new challenge at Allsorts where Sarah has selected the theme of Inspired by a Song along with the usual A/G. We have some lovely dies as prizes from In2Crafts.

Had lots of thoughts about the song, was initially going to be my fav band Queen, but this is a song I sing every week during the fottie season, much to the annoyance of everyone as I'm tone deaf. We (the Reds of Liverpool) are on the cusp of becoming Premier League Champions for an equal record breaking 20th time, just one point needed from remaining five games so celebrations in the City ahead, maybe as soon as tomorrow.

You'll Never Walk Alone was originally written in 1945 by Rodgers and Hammerstein for a musical, a number of artists did their own versions including Elvis. Then in 1963 Gerry and the Pacemakers a Liverpool band and lifelong Red fans made their own version, it went to No 1 and became the anthem of Liverpool FC. I was a schoolgirl and will admit I don't remember the song from that time.

The little girl and her Dog, an Andy Skinner stamp called Best Friends, both cards simply stamped, coloured and some stencilling. The stickers on the first are envelope seals I bought from the club shop years ago and the words of the song computer generated, it looks a bit wonky in the photo but seems OK irl.

It's a stamp I use a lot and sells well at the RSPCA shop. And You'll Never Walk Alone with a Dog, the best companions anyone could ask for.

It's also time for a new Rudolph Days challenge and above my share using Lavinia stamps. Not a new make but not blogged before, I wasn't initially sure about stamping and colouring onto grey card but it grew on me. The centre was toned down with white Pan Pastels, stamped in versafine ad coloured in with Posca sparkle pens.

Finally, it's almost time for the first challenge at our new Tag-Along (and ATC) challenge on 1st May when we have a nice simple theme to get things going, it's Anything Goes. Yesterday we announced the winner of another little giveway and if you've not already been over to take a peek, here is the link.

Pris in the secret garden

It's mid month inspiration day at We Love Stamping and Stamping Sensatiosn where our themes are Favourite Stamps and Animals, Birds, Flowers, Nature We have prizes from Fairy Hugs and Lavinia so lots of magical goodies to be won.

There's also a new post with a little giveaway at our new Tag-Along (and ATC) challenge, if your signed up do check it out to see if you were the lucky name in the draw, if you've not found us yet we would love to have you join us. Here's a few tags I recently made, I like to pop one in with prizes when I send them. And they are perfect for using up left over pieces of card.

My card at the top of the post uses Gideon who is my favourite of the Lavinia Fox family, stamped cut out and coloured. I stamped Leaf Spray grasses and Garden Poppy onto an inked background using versamark and embossed with detail white.

This one used Lavinia's new Dreamatorium collection along with a few older stamps. Pris is in the secret garden daydreaming on her swing in the archway taking in the scent of the Foxgloves (which are coming on nicely in our garden, can never wait for them to bloom) and the blossoms above.