Homer the Raven

Monday morning and time to share this weeks Prickly Pear DT piece and give you a heads up to check here on Friday as there are going to be some awesome goodies up for grabs.

I have used this cute little image called Homer the Raven, stamped him and coloured with Pan Pastels which I also used to create a background, then stamped the spiders web ATC stamp and cut an oval aperture. Some Bo Bunny DP for the base, a flower made with Tonic punch and stamp Rose set and the leaves are Cheery Lynne. I would like to enter:

Crafting when we can - make your own flowers
One stitch at a time - Boo

Hope you all have a good Monday.

Fairies at the end of the garden

Good Morning to you all and I really must start by welcoming my new followers this week, it's lovely to see you and thank you all so much, I always love reading your comments and I do try to get round visiting when I can, even if sometimes my wonky body won't let me do that as often as I might like.

As some of you may have seen in my last post, yesterday I had a surprise trip to the NEC. We were there bright and early for when it opened but by linchtime I was shattered and ready for home, although not without a good haul of goodies. If you're reading this Sal, then I confess to a couple more tree stamps..........as we both agree, a Treeaholic girls can never have enough of them.........some Lavinia stamps along with a few more Panel Pastels, rather a lot of card stock, some more Imagination Crafts stencils and glitter as well as a few Christmas presents.

I have to say though that in some ways I found it a little disappointing, it's two years since I last went and I found this time there seemed to be an awful lot of paper products and the like and rather less stamps than I remember before. And as I said to hubby on the way home it must be a sign of age as I was utterly disappointed to find not a single wood mounted stamp.

So now for Allsorts this week where my lovely teamie Tracy is feeling 'Young at Heart', a theme that can be interpreted in so many ways.

I dibbled and dabbled what to do and in the end I decided on a LOV fairy one of my bloggy friends sent me for my birthday, thank you Tracy,  I figured anyone of my age who still believes in fairies has to be a little bit young at heart still............well doesn't everyone have them at the end of the garden ?

I coloured the image with watercolours, the DP is from stash which I think might be Bo Bunny, a Nestie frame and die cart flowers and leaves, liquid pearl fairy dust and in one of my favourite colour combos.

I hope you all have a lovely weekend.

Pick of the Bunch

Background and main image form Pick of the Bunch Crysanthemum stamp sheet, butterfly from the Rudbeckia set

Saturday morning means it must be time for a new challenge at Allsorts and the lovely Nicola has a bit of a recipe for us this week '3 flowers, 2 stamps and one DP'. 

Now I know I have been a dreadful blogger this week, time has really got the better of me, but I have been deep in craft mode with a magazine article which needed to be off my desk this week.................I'm told I also have something in the new edition of Papercraft Inspirations, but not checked that out as yet............then samples for Stamp Addicts C&C programme next week and Tonic Studios programme tomorrow with Ruth's stamps........you can also see the stamps and top card at Tonic Studios website here, more about them and some shares in a moment. Then there's the huuuuuuge pull of the Olympics, have they been great so far or what ? So apologies if I've not got round to you this week, but I promise I am going to try and rectify that in the coming days.

For my Allsorts DT piece, the easel card above, I have gone for a Penny Black sunfolwer stamp which I inked with distress markers and spritzed with water before stamping onto a piece of Fabriano watercolour card. I inked the edges whilst the piece was still in the die and also inked through some sequin waste to add a bit of interest. The DP is BoBunny, the sentiment another Penny Black stamp, the swirl is Cheery Lynn and the flower made with punches.

Next it's time to share some of the cards I have been making using Ruth's (A Passion for Stamps) wonderful new stamp sets, there are six of them distributed by Tonic Studios and they are called 'Pick of the Bunch', the first four sets Rose, Fuchsia, Lilies and Peony premiered on Create and Craft a couple of weeks ago and tomorrow at 5pm (Tonic Studios show) the Rudbeckia and Chrysanthemum sets will be released.

Background has images from the Rudbeckia and Rose set, flower from Crysanthemum set, butterflies from the Peony, Rudbeckia and Fuschia 

I believe they were pretty much a sell out last time round, but I can tell you that I spoke with Colemans Craft Warehouse this week and they are going to stock them along with the matching dies also designed by Ruth that are due out very shortly, will tell you a bit more about that in due course as it might be a week or so before they arrive in store, so meantime you can get them right away from C & C.

A simple approach using the Rudbeckia set

I have lots more samples in the pipeline.................well you know me and flowers and butterflies and I will be sharing some more with you next week.

Have a lovely weekend and thanks as always for dropping in.

Flowers to brighten the day

Morning Peeps, so what's this weather all about ? We saw a glimpse of sun Saturday and ever since nothing but rain.

The meadows have grown like triffids, but it's just too wet to get the hay cut, last year it was the opposite, no rain so it was sparse. Bit it still ends up with the same result, the price of hay going through the roof. At this rate it will cost more to feed the horses than the family.

Since our holiday crafting has been on real go slow and my mojo is nowhere to be found, the few bits of crafting that I have managed to complete are DT pieces so not for sharing yet, so these are a few samples I have made for Ruth, A Passion for Stamps which I had not blogged before. You will find all of Ruth's lovely images here. 

For the card at the top I printed the image into printable acetate, then laid that onto one side of a piece of double sided adhesive sheet. But before doing that I prepared the reverse side of the adhesive sheet by laying on a piece of tissue which I first scrunched up, inked with distress inks and added some glitter. The roses were then coloured with Copics thought the tissue...........if you place it against a light or window you can see the image clearly and don't be afraid of tearing the tissue, it's very resilient.

The blue card has a background created with a mask, I inked the mask with versamark, laid a piece of card stock over then ran it through the Grand Calibur, removed the mask and brushed perfect pearls to reveal the pattern. The image is paper pieced with BoBunny DP, a bow made from seam binding and a little chipboard bird which I inked with distress inks.

My final share is another paper pieced card using snippets of DP, over a background inked with distress inks and stamped with a script stamp and some random inking using a piece of sequin waste.

Hope you have a good Wednesday and if you are in the UK, don't let the rain get you down, perhaps we will have Summer in December ?

Meet Poppy, the latest addition to the family

Morning Peeps, it's Nicolas turn to host this weeks theme at Allsorts and she would like us to do some 'Paper Piecing', so one I have really enjoyed doing. But before I move on to that, I would like to introduce you to Poppy, the latest additional to our four legged family. 

She is a ten week old rough coated Parson Jack Russell and the children's surprise Fathers Day present for hubby and my was he surprised when she arrived last evening. Luckily I was already in on the secret and have been covertly collecting things ready for her arrival all week.

She seems to have settled in as if she had been here for weeks and was soon comfortably asleep on Dad's lap after an hour or so's rough and tumble with Pixie who is now six months, whilst the more mature watched on in resigned acceptance that the family has grown again.

It seems to be taking forever to get back into the crafty and blogging mode, holidays are great but I always seem to take ages to get my train of crafty though moving again, so I am hoping this weekend I can buckle down and get those juices flowing again and actually make a card.

As Ruth from A Passion for Stamps is our sponsor this week, my card is a double DT piece using her lovely Orchid image which I have paper pieced with some Bo Bunny DP's. The spotty background was created using a mask which I inked with versafine before running it through the GC, then brushing with perfect pearls which stick to the inked sections and the spots create a resist. Some swirls, flowers and pins and finito.

I would like to enter this card in to the following challenge:

Pretty Little Ribbons - Lots of Layers

Finding her way around

Playtime with Pixie

Happy weekend to you all.

Beside the sea

Morning Peeps, another scheduled post as today I should be in Florence, so hopefully Mr Blogger is playing fair and I can tell you all about this weeks challenge at Allsorts where my teamie Fluer is thinking about Summer days by the beach with the theme 'Oh I do love to be beside the seaside'.

So it's an easel card for me and a stamp from Joanna Sheen. I have kept the colours all very soft. the DP's are from stash, the flowers made with TH distress floral die and the little labels use stamps from the same stamp set as the main image. I added some glossy accents and glitter for waves in the background and few little sea shells which I collected on the beach in Majorca a couple of years ago............was amazed I got the bag full through Customer, I was sure they would relieve me of them.

Have a great weekend everyone.

Bright and sunny card despite the weather

Hello Peeps, it looks like the weather men got it right for once, it's pouring here and black as Newgate's Knocker.............it's phrase I've used since a child after hearing my Granny often refer to the phrase yet never actually knew the origin. So I just Googled it, logical really the knocker on Newgate prison !

I wanted to enter this months Pretty Little Ribbons challenge so am sharing the Easter card I made for my Cousin who lives on the Norfolk coast, the nearest to a brother I ever got and we've always been close. I included the card in a package I sent to him and his partner yesterday with some pretty pots to grow herbs in their conservatory and a fruit cake.............why fruit cake, well like me he is diabetic and the occasional piece of cake is a real treat and a bit of a standard joke every time we talk on the phone.

I have used lots of Spellbinders in true Sue Wilson fashion, the border ones are Fleur de Lis and the circle ones picot edges Nestablilites. The flowers are a mixture of Spellbinders and Marianne and the leaves are also Spelbinders and the DP Bo Bunny. The ribbon and seam binding is from Pretty Little Ribbons and a stick pin to finish it all off. Oh and there had to be a bit of stamping, that't the Hero Arts sentiment.

I hope all those dies make this suitable for this months challenge at Pretty Little Ribbons whose theme is 'To die For'.

Whatever you have planned I hope you have a good Tuesday evening, mine involves one of our sons and his wife coming for dinner.

Penny Black all the way............

 

Can you believe it's April already, for me March seems to have disappeared in a flash but what better start to the new month than some new challenges at Stampalot and Penny Black and More. This is a bit of a long post, but so much to tell you about so hope you can stay with me.................

It's our second Birthday at Stampalot...........yes 1st April to be precise.................and we have a very exciting month lined up, in total there are fourteen prizes up for grabs with a Blog Hop as well as the challenge itself where the theme just had to be 'Happy Birthday'.

To join in the Blog Hope you need to staRt off from the challenge blog here and make youR way down the list of DT's who all have prizes on offfer. To be in with a chance of winning the individual pRizes you need to leave each DT memberR a comment then collect a letter from each, arrange the letters into two words and send your answers to me brenda@ibas.co.uk and a winner will be selected at random from all correct answers. When you arrive at my blog on the Blog Hop route you should have come fRom Clare's blog and make youR way next to Ruth. In case you've not guessed, my letter is 'hidden' in this paragraph and here's the pRize for the lucky person selected from all comments left on this post.

And at Penny Black and More we are getting all cute with the theme 'Oh so Cute', what a toughie for me, but I know so many of you love that theme and create some stunning pieces of work with your pretty images and beautiful colouring so this months it's especially for you.

My card at the top was an 'extra' make as I was totally blown away by the cards Kathy Racoosin made which you will find on her blog here. That stamp Penny Black 3431K Lace Flower was not one I initially bought from the new releases, but when I saw what Kathy done with it I had to have it as it totally lends itself to the technique. In her post Kathy asked people to give it a go, but I felt it only right to ask her before I blogged it and she gave me her blessing, so thanks so much Kathy. I won't bore you with what I did to make the card as Kathy explains it so well in her post.

I added a Penny Black sentiment, Spellbinder leaves, seam binding bow and a couple of roses which I made with some lovely new organzie ribbon from Sarah at Pretty Little Ribbons, the quality is superb with a lovely sheen which picks up the light beautifully when scrunched together in flowers.

My second DT piece for Stampalot uses another of the lovely new stamps from Penny Black 40-099 Black Soft Wings. I must accredit the inspiration for this card to my friend Paula who gave me the will to get my head back into crafting last month when my mojo had gone totally off the boil. Paula does amazing things with inks and stamps and had made the most beautiful tag here which spurred me into action to break open my new Penny Black stamps which had been gathering dust since they arrived. Thanks so much Paula. 

I stamped the edges of a piece of Fabriano watercolour card with Penny Black 3857H Footnote using versamark and embossed with detail clear. I then inked the piece with TH peeled pain and spun sugar and over stamped with Hero Arts 2365H Old French Writing..............I know again.....with peeled paint. I stamped the butterfly out twice to decoupage the centre and coloured with Derwent watercolours. The swirl is an old Inkadinkado stamp and the sentiment Darkroom Door.

Penny Black 40-042 Good Friends forms the focal image of my Penny Black and More DT piece, this was actually a Birthday card for one of my DT's but I know she has received it now so I am safe to share it. The image is coloured with watercolours. The background Bo Bunny DP has been nicely distressed and a piece of cheesecloth which I died with tea to give it a bit of an aged feel, swirls and flowers cut with Marianne dies and the little sentiment comes with the slapstick stamp.

Have a good Sunday everyone and I really hope you will join us in the new challenges this month.

Sunny and Bright

Good Afternoon all you crafty Peeps.

The weather here today is absolutely glorious again, the overnight minus four frost and fog gave way to beautiful sunshine and I have had the french windows of my office open since lunchtime. The dogs are laid about everywhere as thought they had a hard morning..............I must have missed something because as far as I know the most energetic thing they've done is eat breakfast.

I thought I would share a couple of the cards I made for Ruth using her new Fritillary image which you will find at A Passion for Stamps here. The card at the top was made using the scrunched tissue technique, rather than go into it again you will find what I did here. I used some scraps of DP for the background and alternated them with some embossed squares. The roses were cut with a Memory Box die from plain copy paper, then lightly coloured with distress inks, the swirls are the same make of die and the leaves Spellbinders.

The second card is paper pieced with Bo Bunny DP. The harlequin background was created by inking a stencil with versamark, placing on a piece of white cardstock, running through the Big Shot Express then brushing Mica Powder after removing the stencil. I did exactly the same with the shaped mat, but kept the Nestie frame in place until I has added the mica. The little picket fence is a new Memory Box die, I am amazed with how very fine and detailed it is yet how perfectly it cuts.

Enjoy the rest of your day and thanks for visiting.

Meet Pixie and a bit more Penny Black

Happy Monday Peeps, hope you all had a good weekend and those of you in the UK enjoying this lovely weather.

The little lady above is Pixie, a ten week old Jack Russell who joined the family gang this weekend. She's such a tiny little thing but seems quite capable of giving the large dogs a run for their money and has already sussed that if big guys play gets a bit too rough for her she can slide into spaces they can't. I will do my best to get a picture of the whole gang one day soon, but it's easier said than done keeping them all still for long enough.

I am still loving the new Penny Black 4237K Awakening so here's another share of another card I made with it. Again I inked the stamp direct, this time with Aquamarkers, spritzed with water and stamped onto Fabriano watercour card, inked the edges with TH tumbled glass and sponged through some sequin waster to give a bit of background interest.  The DP is Bo Bunny, some embossed and sanded Coredinations and a piece of cheescloth in the background and ribbon.

Have a good day everyone and as always thanks so much for popping in.

Be my Valentine

Hello peeps, two post on consecutive days is a bit of a rarity for me nowadays, but the sun was shining and I got some decent photos of a batch of cards I've been waiting to take photos of for days, so thought I would share one.

I have used Ruth's A Passion for Stamps Stargazer Lily..............when I first went on her DT she asked if there were any flowers I particularly like, well I love all  flowers as you know, but lilies have to be one of my favourites and a few days later Ruth had drawn this lovely image. 

I had lilies for my wedding bouquet much to the horror of my elderly aunts......... in those days you most definitely did not have them for weddings. As we married in October they had to be sourced from France as they were out of season, now they are available year round as standard and our daughter had  them for her bouquet when she married on the same Saturday in October as us.......not 'the' same Saturday of course, twenty odd years later.

I used a sheet of Bo Bunny DP to create the pleated rosette, which I mounted onto a doily, then used another smaller one to mat the flower onto.......these pretty little ones are available from Sarah at Pretty Little Ribbons, as are the pins and seam binding. I printed the lily out a second time onto the same DP, cut out and decoupaged. Two hearts using an MS punch and corners using Spellbinder Fleur de Lis.

Now this bit really is more than a rarity, I am going to enter my card into a challenge, it's almost a year since I did so as these dodgy eyes of mine have great difficulty dealing with all the links, but as I seem to have used several of Sarah's products I am going to give it a try and enter it for:

Be My Valentine theme at Pretty Little Ribbons challenge

Have a good day everyone and as always, thank you so much for popping in, I really do appreciate your visits and kind words.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Hello again peeps, two posts in one day, quite rare for me these days.

But I wanted to take the opportunity to wish everyone a Very Happy Christmas and Wonderful New Year.

I've had another fabulous crafty year with oodles of cards, some on TV, demos, classes and even had my work in a few magazines, but most importantly it's been made all the better by all the lovely people out there in blogland whose friendship I really appreciate and cherish. Lots of you will know I don't enjoy the best of health at times and am not able to get round blogland as much as I would like thanks to my light sensitive eyes, but despite that, my blogland friends are still there and have given me wonderful support and I thank you all most humbly.

So I think I had better share a couple of cards, both of which use the same Floral Bouquet stamp which you will find under the 'new' section at Stamp Addicts. I have been having a whale of a time the last couple of weeks working on samples for them using some really yummy stamps which will be released in the New Year and on Create and craft, so not able to share those yet, but when I saw Sarah and Vicky yesterday they said I can let you have a peek at these two. 

I'm not big on colouring in, I'm more of a get down and get messy girl, but I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed colouring this image............could be the fact it's floral has something to do with it ?

For both of these cards I used Aquamarkers, the top one I coloured the stamp direct with the pens, then spritzed with water before stamping onto Farbiano watercolour card. I dragged a little coloured out with a damp brush and matted onto Bo Bunny DP. The second card has been stamped with versafine black and heat embossed with detail clear powder, then simply watercoloured with the same pens and cardstock and the DP is Nitwits.

Whatever you have planned, have a super holiday season.

It Takes Two

Good Monring peeps, how are your Christmas preparations going ? I think I am just about there and tomorrow we have a big family day with about twenty coming, so quite a bit of preparation to be done although I confess M&S are taking a good bit of the effort out of it.

It's my turn to host the theme at Allsorts this week and I would like to see creations on the theme "It Takes Two".................basically use just two colours on your work, but you can use white as well as your base colour.

Two DT cards for me, the one at the top of my post............yellow and black...............uses Ruth's A Passion for Stamps Narcissus image which you will find here, coloured with Aquamarkers and decoupaged onto a mat cut with Nestabilities, stamped with Hero Arts H2635 Old French writing and inked round the edges with TH mustard. The DP is Kasier and the sentiment is Penny Black 3096F.

For the second card I have used one of the Christmas stamps from Stampendous JGS157 which I fell in love with as soon as I saw it and ended up making quite a few with it as it lends itself to all occasions apart from Christmas, in fact I'm not sure I actually made a Christmas card with it.

For this one I stamped the image onto vellum using versafine black and embossed with detail clear. I coloured the image from behind with Copics and decoupaged some of the flowers. I machined round the edge of the Bo Bunny DP and tied a simple seam binding bow at the side. I love the fresh colours of this one, make me think of Spring...................

Our sponsors this week are A Passion for Stamps and Scotch Tapes whose restickable tabs I used on my both my cards....................you will find a bit more about them on the challenge blog and also here on a post I did last week where I also used them.

Have a good weekend everyone and as always, thank you so much for popping by.

Birthday Bingo

Good Morning all, it's the first Sunday of the month so that means new challenges at Stampalot and Penny Black and More. 


In case you missed it, I have a little weekend candy giveaway details here, just leave a comment to be in with a chance.

At Stampalot we invite you to play Bingo with us and at Penny Black and More we are celebrating "Birthdays".

The card at the top is my Penny Black DT card using Penny Black 4164K A Rose stamped simply in black versafine, embossed with detail clear and coloured with Copics.Matted onto bazzil, a punched border with some added pearls and a sentiment from Darkroom Door.  A really quick and simple card.

On both of my cards I had a play with the new tabs from Scotch which are so effective and as the name suggests they really are re-stickable, how cool is that. They are double sided, easy to use, will stick to any surface, remove cleanly and because they are clear you don't see them when they are used for such things as hanging Christmas decorations. Best of all, when you are finished with them you can simply wash them in soapy water and they are as good as new.

For my Stampalot DT card I selected the Bingo row "Pearls, Flowers and Punch". The base card is some really nice ribbed Kraft cardstock, swirls cut with a Marianne die and accented with pearl drops, a flower cut with TH tattered floral die from the same DP as I used along the bottom of the card.............it was scraps from stash and I am note sure of the make, but could be Doodlebug. I stamped two butterflies with versafine sepia and embossed with detail clear.........they are Hero Arts ones but unmounted which typical me means I have no idea of the code as the packing has long since been lost.

Have a good Sunday everyone and thank you so much for dropping by.

Brayering.............again !

Good Monring peeps, a really quick share of some brayering I did the other day.

No sooner had I mentioned toadstools to my friend Ruth of A Passion for Stamps, than the image was making it's way to my computer. I did a couple with them last week, but wanted to try one with a fairy........the two sort of go together in my fantasy world.

So I brayered a background with Adirondack dye inks........the colours do look a bit intense in the picture, but are not that bad in the flesh. I stamped and heat embossed a fairy, cut her out and glittered her wings then mounted her in the sky. I printed out the toadstools three times, coloured with Aquamrkers and placed behind a fence cut out with a TH die and embossed with some yummy new Frantage embossing powder from Stampandous............it's a sort of a cross between normal powder and UTEE.

My second share is using the same toadstools, but printed out larger, again coloured with Aquamarkers, some Bo Bunny DP, a TH hinge and a Marianne die rose. The leaves are also Ruth's images, coloured with the same medium and covered with Glossy Accents.

Thanks for dropping by and hope you have a good day.

In the frame

By the power of Blogger, at least I really hope so because I scheduled this well ahead as I will be teaching all weekend at Stampalot. More of the special Blog Girl days and lots of new faces from as far afield as Australia via Newcastle, as well as some familiar ones as well, all of whom I am so looking forward to seeing.

Lots of laughs, lots of chatter a lovely buffet lunch.....did I forget anything ? Oh yes and a bit of inky crafting.......and brayers will roll, although they don't all know that yet !

On to our new challenge at Allsorts where I have chosen the theme "You've been Framed", basically I would like to see you incorporate a frame somewhere on your work.

I did have two DT shares but now it's three as I thought I really should have one with Molly as our sponsors are Sir Stampalot who are giving away two Molly stamps to the winner of this weeks challenge. And it does have a little frame as Molly is painting a picture on her easel. I have paper pieced this one using some of the super Scribble Scrabble DP's. You can find all the Molly Blooms stamps here.

My second card is using Ruth of A Passion for Stamps Cosmic flower which you can buy here. I love to paper piece this image and have used Bo Bunny DP for both the flower and the frame which is cut with a Nestie. The little row of butterflies is the border/bar code edge of the sheet which I thought was too pretty to throw away. The sentiment is computer generated and I tied some of the lace and made up a pin with coordinating beads.

And finally my third share uses Penny Black 4039K Candid, stamped twice and decoupaged and framed with a nestie. The DP is Bo Bunny and the scalloped border EK Success.

Have a good weekend everyone.