Saturday 28 March 2020

Butterfly Tree and Calm Waters


Well after all my excitement yesterday reserving a Tesco delivery slot it went a bit pear shaped at Boots, after almost three hours in the virtual queue, I was invited into the website, placed my order, paid and then got a message there were unable to process any more orders. I know I'm not alone as we are all experiencing these frustrations, but grief does it test the patience.

Before I move onto Allsorts, I wanted to invite you to be a Social Butterfly and extend the wings of friendship among the crafting community by joining Lesley of Chocolate Baroque in her daily 1.30pm Butterfly Tree Facebook Live chats. Anyone who knows me is aware I don't do Facebook, I do have a Facebook page somewhere but it's just a presence and I'm never active on it. However I felt I needed to add my support and much to my surprise managed to load the above card onto their new page here.


Now moving onto Allsorts where Wendy is this weeks host and she would like to see creations suitable for 'Boys and Men. We have a lovely A4 stamp set from Rare Earth for this weeks lucky winner.  

My card is a Chocolate Baroque share for Hochanda TV, using acetate to create the reflection, DI's and Pan Pastels for the background and really a pretty simple card which I though would work for a man.

Stay safe and well.
 
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Friday 27 March 2020

The blue lorry..........

Tesco shoppers left disappointed while booking Christmas delivery ...

Whoever thought my morning would start with such excitement, I have a Tesco delivery slot for next Friday 😃😃😃

Yet another migraine woke me at 5am, so got up checked my mails and there was one from Tesco saying they were restricting the number of items in a shop to 80, so that prompted me to go look to see if there were any slots, whoo hoo there were on 3rd and 4th April, nabbed one, sent a text to daughter and she got one as well. Five minutes later all gone. Now I'm at Boots, apparently no 43,516 in the queue and should be into the system in an estimated two hours. Even if I felt like crafting which I'm afraid I just don't as my mojo is far away, I wouldn't have time with all this internet activity.

And yesterday an Angel delivered my prescriptions, surgery unable to help, chemist the same then someone told me our village timebank team had become NHS volunteers, within two hours they were on my doorstep and popped into our contactless delivery box which hubby sorted last week............have to say these delivery drivers are doing a sterling job in such difficult circumstances.

How things change, a month ago a Tesco deliver slot would have been the last thing to excite me let alone lead me to do a blog post. Have a good day everyone, hard frost here but looks like the sun will shine again.
 
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Monday 23 March 2020

Have a crafty chat

Just a really quick post Peeps, if you are feeling lost, confused and isolated as so many of us are right now, me included, you can join Lesley here from Chocolate Baroque for a Facebook live crafty chat at 2pm this afternoon. There will be more in the future and I will let you know as and when.
 
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Saturday 21 March 2020

More from the Serengeti


Morning Peeps, I hope everyone is staying safe and well, such difficult times for everyone in the World. I'm house bound, a text from my GP said I'm vulnerable health wise so advised to self isolate for 12 weeks. 

So have been speaking to eldest daughter each evening on the phone, we can see each other across the courtyard, she's a senior ethics tutor so required to stay in school to teach the children of the key workers. And I was able to see our eldest son on TV the other day when he addressed the Commons Select Committee on how the Police are dealing with things. I guess you call it remote family interaction, the others are keeping in contact by phone as well but of course won't risk visiting this weekend despite it being Mothering Sunday in the UK.

I was pleased to hear some supermarkets were saving delivery slots for such as myself but try getting one, non of those who deliver in our area have a single one for as far as their calendars go which in most cases is three weeks. I know I'm not alone and it's worse in some parts of Europe but it's sobering realising this could go on for months.

Now onto our new challenge at Allsorts where our host is Tracy who would like to see 'Anything in the Animal Kingdom'. Stamp Addicts are our host offering the winner a £15 store voucher.

Stamp Addicts showcases some new Judikins stamps on Hochanda this week, so it's a perfect opportunity to share another of my DT makes for the shows. On the piece at the top I used both the large and shall Giraffes on a monalinth which I gave the acrylic paint and crackle glaze treatment before stamping the images, then stamping some again to decoupage.


And another card featuring Lavinia Hares and a little Fairy, all stamped in Versafine Clair and as I felt the background using Oxides and cling film was a tad dark I used some pale pink EP to emboss and lift the lavender in the foreground and ferns across the top

Take care and as always my thanks for your kind visits and words.
 
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Wednesday 18 March 2020

Love and thoughts to the world of crafters

Good morning, for my mid month post I am merely copying what I have written on the challenge blogs at Stamping Sensations and Penny Black and More, it's self explanatory....................

"I hope everyone is keeping safe and well during these unprecedented troubled times, it's all quite surreal and the daily news bulletins from all around the World suggest we are going to have to weather some stormy times before it improves. 

Amidst all that's going on posting a mid month reminder seems futile, but I know craft has helped many through difficult times in the past and perhaps now more than ever we will be grateful of our hobby to help us through and keep us sane. We as a team send our love and thoughts to everyone".

 
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Saturday 14 March 2020

Serengeti sunset


Morning Peeps, it's Saturday and time for a new challenge at Allsorts where our host is Mervi and is sending us all dotty with the theme of 'Lots of Dots'. Our prize this week comes from Craft Stash. I also have a few shares from my post over at the Chocolate Baroque blog.


It stands to reason that my dots would be in the form of stencils and ink as I rarely use DP's on my work preferring to create my own backgrounds, so the top creation is a lolly stick plaque made for Stamp Addicts Hochanda TV shows on Tuesday 17th. Stamp Addicts have sold Judikins stamps for many many years and I have a good number of lovely wood mounted ones in my stash from way back, well on Tuesday they are launching some of the original images under their own name. 

I used Dylusion sprays for the background and then stamped the Giraffes, masked them and then added the Serengeti trees and Zebras. Using a mask and texture paste I added the dots to fit in with this weeks theme.

My chipboard ATC heart was a Chocolate Baroque Hochanda TV sample, the background inked with Oxides, the flower stamped centrally and the lattices and spots are worker stamps from one of the sets in the show as is the sentiment stamped onto vellum.

And here are a few of my shares from my post over at the Chocolate Baroque blog.........


Happy weekend all and always my thanks for your visits and comments which are always much appreciated.
 
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Saturday 7 March 2020

Anything with wings at Allsorts


Morning Peeps, it's Saturday and time for a new challenge at Allsorts and this week I am your host and my theme is 'Anything with Wings'. I'm giving away a lovely Lavinia Fairy stamp to this weeks lucky winner, in fact one just like this called Faith.........there is a secret behind this, I placed a couple of orders with Lavinia recently only to find three of the stamps were ones I already owned. Hubby's comment went along the lines of too much craft stash and I have no idea what I actually have, fair comment although I'm not admitting that to him!

So, all stamps are Lavinia, Pan Pastels for the background, the moon stamped with Distress Ink and everything else stamped with Versafine Clair.


And one more Lavinia share, it does look rather garish, my new computer which is an iMac has a good editing system and I think I got a bit carried away playing with the colour on this one. The background is Oxides, all stamps Lavinia and some glitter to highlight the moon and Fairy wings.

Happy weekend all and I hop hope you will come and join us this week.
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Sunday 1 March 2020

Spring blooms in abundance


It's time for our new challenges at Stamping Sensations and Penny Black and More where our themes are 'Spring Florals' and would you believe 'Spring Flowers'.......before you wonder why on earth we came up with the same theme at both challenges, it was actually our Stamping Sensations sponsor who chose that one, but it's a beautiful theme and one we all enjoyed creating for. 

Again it's a short post, I'm counting the days as I can have my eyes tested this coming week, Friday to be exact, it's seemed like forever waiting for the go ahead from my consultant to get them sorted.

So above a pretty Spring feel with all the yellows for my Stamping Sensation card using the beautiful Penny Black At Grace along with Clarity sentiment and a stencilled background which is from our sponsor Thirsty Brush.


The new Secret Garden collection was released by Penny Black last week and John posted me a selection super quick across the pond so I was able to make a card for today's challenge. I think this one looks very much like Peonies, it's called Petal Poetry PB 40-738, I have also used the new Blooming Sentiments 30-703. 


Another Country and another marathon for one of my super hero athletes, there were one or two well known Kenyan's in this one and they can always be relied upon to set the pace and grab the podium positions, but Alex got another PB knocking a whopping seven + minutes off his previous time to 2hr 32.43. He's off to Lisbon now for the next event, then will be back at the end of March for some UK race meetings and the family wedding so counting the days till he's home.


And no Spring would be complete if I didn't use my lovely Wordsworth PB poem at least once and here I've used it along with PB Daffodils.

Please do pop over to the challenge blogs and see the inspiration from my lovely teamies.
 
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