A pot of Lily's

Morning everyone, our new Allsorts challenge starts today and will run for two weeks so the next one will be on 12th August, this gives the Design Team a little extra family time during the holiday period. It's hosted by Lorraine and her theme is "No Squares" and the prize is a bundle of Christmas crafting goodies.

I have two recent Create and Craft/Highlight/TRR makes, both are freestanding acetate bases and built up with flowers and other elements. Above the beautiful  Lily, July Flower of the month, these were a delight to work with and really lend themselves to decoupage. Below various elements from the Secret Garden collection released a couple of weeks ago on Create and Craft TV.

As always my thanks for your kind visits and encouragement.

 

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Summer Blues, a Christmas snippet and a Wedding

Morning Peeps, a new challenge at Allsorts where Mervis's theme is "Summer Blues". Our prizes for July come from from Oakwood, Sizzix, AALL and Create and Craft Stash, winners will be announced this Friday 28th July. 

Above a masked frame, a stencil and sprayed with Oxides in shades of blue. The Arum Lily from AALL and Create Clocks and Flowers, little birdies from Friendship Florals and words from Power of the Word.

It's Christmas in July at the Snippets Playground so linking up with this one using a pretty old Penny Black Poinsettia stamp which was repeat stamped in the Timmy platform using DI's and spritzing between each stamping, then die cut with a coordinating PB die. The background is Oxides, some stencilled stars using texture paste and a sentiment from my Christmas Season stamp set.

My snippets and products....

Finally a tase of Azaria and Jordan's wedding last weekend, although the sun came out at times, the strong winds meant photo opportunities were limited and hats went astray more than once. But it was a wonderful weekend, the venue a Jacobean property once owned by Oliver Cromwell, now restored to a luxurious wedding venue with immaculate grounds, rooms and gardens. She's such a petite little thing and I still find it hard to picture her in a classroom of sixth formers teaching English.

At the top Azaria and Jordan and below myself and eldest daughter, Mum of the Bride. 

Below Margo the Flower Girl, at 22 months nobody was sure how things would go but she was so good through the ceremony and meal. And at the end of the evening her dress still looked pretty much as it did here before the ceremony......we did prize the personalised glasses away in exchange for a basket of Rose petals.

There were two Bridesmaids but this is the best I managed on the day, above Azaria's SIL Faith and to the left big brother Zachary. The other Bridesmaid was Sister Anysia who can be seen in the photo below.

Have a good weekend everyone and thanks as always for your visits.

 

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Bold blooms

Morning Peeps, it's mid month inspiration time at We Love Stamping and Stamping Sensations where out themes are Fabulous Florals and Summer Flowers. 

Above a rather bright creation using AALL and Create Wildflower, Elegant Stems and Power of the Word. Stamping the flowers on the base card with Versafine Clair, more flowers in the same green and cutting out along with the orange ones and arranging around the clocks which are also stamped and cut out. Words heat embossed with white EP onto black to finish.

It's A&C stamps again, this time Sent with Love stamped onto rice paper which was sprayed with Oxide sprays, the Rose paper pieced and the same colour Distress Pencil added to the circle. Words again from Power of the Word linked above.

 

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Poppies and Pups

Morning everyone, I'm your host at Allsorts this week and I've come up with a Summer Mood Board. Prizes from Oakwood, Sizzix, AALL and Create and Craft Stash which will be drawn on 28th July.

A scheduled post as it's Azaria's wedding today so when this goes live, all going to plan, we will be at the hotel in historic Ely, I say going to plan as been a tad hectic last few days, one of our girls Holly had to have an op throwing confusion on our plans. She's doing OK but fragile and on lots of meds so not ideal with a friend dog/horse sitting.

There's a distinct pink thing going on in my mood board which includes some of my own photos, that's Rosa, Sam the Squibble, an Oriental Poppy which have been beautiful this year, a Goldfinch on one of the feeders and couldn't resist popping the Reds Allison in the middle - in my defence his strip does match!

A photo heavy post as we have new releases from Highlight Crafts showcasing yesterday/today on Create and Craft TV, they are called Secret Garden and Deep Sea Darlings and the colour palettes of both are beautiful. My Peony wreath below is one of the samples made for the shows, plus a few more to give you a tase of what's included in the two collections.

So I picked our Rosa and pink Poppies from AALL and Creates Papaver, the doggie is TRR Clara, part of the Playtime collection, an inky background and some stencilling. I also used Seasons which is so useful and Elemental Notes proving old and new A&C work together perfectly.

 

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Pansies and Festive Favourites

Morning everyone, today sees our new challenge at Allsorts where Liz would like to see Embossing Folders, as an alternative there's always the A/G option. Prizes from from Oakwood, Sizzix, AALL and Create and Craft Stash.

Lots asked me about the show last weekend, I can confirm We Will Rock You was amazing, our son had booked a box along with bubbles, plus it was London Pride weekend so lots of atmosphere and colour.

I have used a Lisa Horton set which includes embossing folder, die and stencils along with a further embossing folder in the background which I lightly inked with a brayer to carry the colour of the Pansies. The focal sentiment is my all time favourite from Penny Black, been far too long since I used it. A simple card as Lisa's sets make it so easy.

Here are a few of my DT shares of the Highlight Crafts TRR Festive Favourites launching on Create and Craft today.

Today I am off to Cambridge for Azaria's hen do ahead of next Saturday's wedding. I asked if she was sure she needed Granny there and was left in no doubt, so it's brunch, cocktail making, punting on the Cam and an evening meal. I've got previous on the punting front so will be making sure I don't get a soaking today!

Happy Weekend all.

 

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Digitalis for Dad

Morning Peeps, we have new challenges today at We Love Stamping and Stamping Sensations, There's a distinct floral feel at both "Fabulous Florals" and "Summer Flowers", perfect doubling up opportunities here. Super prizes as always, a £25 store voucher from Crafty Individuals and Two A5 stamp sets from AALL and Create.

My card above is a nod to my Dad using the Digitalis from AALL and Creates Woodland, the flower has a special meaning, they grew in my Granny's beautiful cottage garden and Dad also grew them. So when he died I chose a newly created woodland burial ground in fields he used to farm, recently purchased by the Diocese of Ely. Digitalis are one of the few flowers allowed so what I planted on his resting place.

I wanted to keep my card bright and fresh with a Spring/Summer feel, Dad was an avid gardener and loved that time of year as I do and his love of Nature was instilled into me as a child and continues to be my crafting inspiration.

Other A&C stamp sets used are Seasons and Elemental Notes and the little Pheasant from the set by the same name Pheasant. Dad would have seen the humour adding that, I'll just say as a farmer they featured in his life especially from 1st October through 1st February, I'll let you decide what I mean! I am popping over to the Snippets Playground with this one, flowers stamped onto offcuts and cut out.

This one uses one of the images from Hexapetalistic and one from Anemone both sets in A&C's most recent Create and Craft TV release. Stamped very simply onto an inky background and placed inside an ornate frame I discovered the other day, a whole bag of them unused I'm ashamed to say, coloured with Cadence paint to coordinate. The sentiment from my Moments stamp set.

Hope you all have a sunny Sunday.

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Time spent in the garden for Allsorts

Morning everyone, this week at Allsorts we are going with the season and the theme of Summertime. Prizes from Oakwood, Sizzix, AALL and Create and Craft Stash.

Another short scheduled post, all went well but in the end I had two eye procedures, the planned laser treatment followed by Photocoagulation surgery for the macular degeneration.

My Summertime comes in the form of flowers, what else for me! For the top card I have used AALL and Create May collection Flower Trio and Bright Dawn, along with Seasons for the wording, the little 'Squibble' is Two Red Robins. 

One more share in sunny yellows using Bright Dawn, unusually for Tracy a silhouette stamp which is perfect for adding to a masked and inked background as I have done here. I also added a frame created with one of the stamps on a really old set (but still available) called Patches wording from Seasons again along with Power of the Word.

I am really hoping my vision perks up as we are off to London today, one of our Son's and DIL are taking us to see We Will Rock You as our Birthday treat. We missed out on seeing it twice due to Covid restrictions so really excited to be going to this short run of shows. We were lucky enough to see them live in concert back in the day and also the Freddie Tribute Concert at Wembley. 

I also have a few of my DT shares from this weeks C&C release of the My Craft Studio Winter Wanderings and A Winters Visit collection, although not able to make many due to the eyes! All are computer generated, totally flat so ideal for Christmas posting and really quick to create for mass production. At the moment only available from C&C here but will be on the Highlight website very shortly.

Hope you all have a good weekend and my thanks as always for your kind visits and words of encouragement.

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