More country scenes

Good Morning Peeps, I hope you are all having a good week. It's somewhat cooler than it was at the weekend but it was lovely to have a few warmer days and spend some time outside.

I have a couple of shares of samples I have been making for Stamp Addicts next show on Create and Craft, the date has gone back to 28th May, but the stamps are all available on their web site here under 'what's new'.

These stamps have been a joy to work with and I have been indulging in inkiness as well as Pan Pastels which is what I have used on both of these samples. The one above is called 'Hunting Scene Country Gent' and could easily be my Dad, although he never had a spaniel for hunting, always labs. I also used Stamp Addicts Poppy stamps on this one and coloured that and the background with Pan Pastels, then coloured the image with Derwent watercolours.

I have some sad news to share as well. As you will see from the logo here Sarah is closing her Pretty Little Ribbons shop and is having a mega sale of all her stock, you can go check it all out by clicking here as there are loads of bargains to be had.

I would like to enter the above card into:

Crafty Ribbons - No DP's
Paper Pretties - No colouring markers
Paper Craft Star - Sun
Loves rubber stamps - Anything goes

This stamp is called very simply 'Farmland' and I have created a bit of a frosty day, again colouring with Derwents and Pan Pastels and some Judikins snow glitter. The image is so detailed you don't need to do a lot more to it. And this one into:

Papertake Weekly - Anything goes

Paper Playtime - Emboss wet or dry

There are lost's more to come which I will be sharing over the next couple of weeks.

Have a lovely day everyone and as always many thanks for your visits and kind comments.

Way out of the comfort zone

Before I tell you about my card and our new Allsorts challenge, I must say a huge thank you to everyone for you kind comments and thoughts with my little problems this last week. Also to my lovely challenge team mates for picking up my commenting for me this week, you are all stars ********* 

Holly is home from hospital.....I don't know how many of you are familiar with the Animal health Trust at Newmarket, but they really are a wonderful organisation with some of the best vets from around the world and way out there with their research, specialist knowledge and care. And we are so lucky to have it within an hours drive so can easily be referred there.

The bottom line with Holly is that she is incontinent and at the moment not a great deal more they can do until her female anatomy develops enough for them to operate to try and rectify several issues. Bless her she constantly asks to go outside.....like every ten minutes......but of course it's often too late and very distressing for her as labs are by nature such clean dogs. So we are ploughing through kitchen roll and puppy pads like there's no tomorrow and the washing machine is working overtime with dog beds. In some ways it's worse than a baby because you can at least put a nappy on them and put them in their pram ! Here's a picture of her in the little 'recovery' coat they sent her home in yesterday, not something you get with your average vet's practice.

My speech is slow, I had another drain put in Thursday but at least the pain seems to be easing today, so some light on the horizon hopefully and perhaps something more than soup for a change. 

Now for some craft and it's Jo's turn to host the theme at Allsorts this week and she is challenging us to 'Get Cute' which certainly is a challenge and way outside my comfort zone, but I have been very good and didn't even get my distress inks or Pan Pastels out of the draw.

I've used what to me is cute, or at least as cute as my stamp drawers get, a Penny Black image and some Magnolia DP, lace and lots of die cuts. I used just a little watercolour to lift the image and decoupaged the tiny elements.

Hope you have a good weekend and as always thank you for popping in and I know I've said this several times this week, but I really am trying to get round to you all, even if it's only a few words.

Country cottage window

It's Saturday again which means it must be time for another challenge at Allsorts and this week Sarah would like us to get to work with our dies and punches. We have also got some new teamies, so welcome to Catherine, Tracy, Samantha and Wendy.

So a perfect chance for me to have another play with my Crimbo present from Northern Ireland all designed by Ruth and distributed by Tonic Studios............ thank you so much Ruth, I'm having great fun with them. For this card I have used the Domed Window and Window Basket dies and the matching Country Cottage stamp set which includes three different scenes to use inside the window as well as lots of other worker stamps. I was especially taken with the brick wall elements which Ruth has cleverly designed with left and right corners, the arched stamp as well as several others which all fit together with total ease. You really could spend hours with these stamps and dies and come up with so many different variations and I should add that the dies cut like butter.

I stamp the wall with TH tea dye and pulled out the colour a little with a damp paintbrush, coloured the garden scene with watercolours, added some sky with Pan Pastels and stamped a few birds. The flowers along the bottom are from the window basket die set and the topiary trees from the stamp set.

And for my second card I have used one of Ruth's A Passion for Stamps digi images Morning Glory, which I coloured lightly with watercolours and mounted onto a trellis background created with a Cheery Lynne die and Marianne swirl. The DP's are Nitwits and the sentiment computer generated.

I am thinking this will be quite a popular theme and look forward to seeing all your creations. 

Enjoy the rest of your weekend and thank you so much for visiting.

Vintage Stamping

Hello Peeps, this really is going to be a mega quick post because I've almost lost my voice and my voice recognition program is typing all sorts of bizarre interpretations of what it thinks I'm saying............I won't even go there, but I certainly won't chance any commenting at the moment !

This is a very belated post due to a couple of days of blog problems............. of my November piece for our Flonz Craft Vintage stamping challenges where we have a traditional Christmas feel to this months theme. You shared some lovely creations with us during our first month and two very lucky people have won online vouchers to spend at the store, so make sure you check out to see if you were one of them.

That's it folks, have a good week, I'm off for some honey and lemon........... probably with a dash of whiskey thrown in for good measure, the bizarre thing is I don't have a cold or anything just this croaking voice.

One for the guys

Time for another challenge at Allsorts and this week my great teamie Sarah wants us to create something 'For Men Only'.

This is one I made for one of the girls boyfriends who is a farmers son and loves his tractors both old and new so this old Massey Ferguson from Stamp Addicts fitted the bill perfectly. These are the tractors I grew up with, now they're more like mobile homes on wheels complete with air conditioning of stereo systems.

I masked an oval on a piece of gloss card stock, brayered with Adirondack inks, stamped the images with black archival and added a little colour to the tractor and trees.

In case you didn't know, we have a DT call going at Allsorts so if you think you might like to join us please do pop over to the blog to see what you have to do to apply.

Whatever you are up to I hope you have a good weekend and as always many thanks for dropping by. 

Butterfly Flowers

Good morning Peeps, just a mega quick post to remind you that Sarah and Vicky from Stamp Addicts will be on Create and Craft TV this afternoon at 2pm.

They will be demonstrating with both old favourites as well as some brand new stamps..................I made these two cards with one of the new stamps called Butterfly Flowers, needless to say I loved working with this one and will share a few more samples with you shortly.

I kept both cards fairly simple as it's such a beautiful image, stamping with black archival ink and colouring with Derwent water colours. On both cards the butterfly and larger flowers are decoupaged to give extra dimension. You will find this stamp and all the others that will be featured on the show here.

Many thanks for dropping in and whatever you have planned I hope you all have a good Tuesday.

A real mixed bunch

Good morning Peeps, it's the first Sunday of the month so time for new challenges which means my post is a bit top heavy with photos again.

We have a real collection of varying themes for you this time round.................at Craft a Scene challenge we want to see 'Trees, at least three of them', At Stampalot  we have some photo inspiration which involves soft pastel colour a touch of lace and a feel of Victoriana and at Penny Black and More we are in Christmas mode with 'Early Christmas Makes'

My card at the top is some inky indulgence, lots of Art Impression stamps and with a bit of artistic licence could be the landscape very close to home. We have quite a lot of Monkjack Deer roaming wild in the fields,  they are such beautiful but timid creatures and we also have a large population on Canada Geese so those in my scene just might be coming down to land on the lake across the side field. Then the horses of course and when I was still fit enough I loved nothing better than an early morning hack across the Fens, now the best I can manage is to groom them, but it's still wonderful to be close to them and all these marvels of Nature. 

My Penny Black DT pieces both use some of the new 2012 Christmas releases, you will find links and details on the thumbnails below. For the card above I also used some of the new Madison DP's from Penny Black, the pads have 48 sheets with a real range of designs suitable for all year round.

On the card above I inked direct to stamp using distress markers and a spritz of water before stamping and distressing the edges a little. The DP is a new Christmas one from Imaginisce and is double sided which is always a bonus. The Poinsettia is made from a spellbinder die, it's one I bought this time last year after totally falling in love with, it soooooo useful.

My final share is my Stampalot DT piece and I've taken the colours and lace from the inspirational photograph. The image is La Blanche and I coloured in with Derwent water colours. For some odd reason the roses look somewhat florescent in the picture, but they really are not in real life.

I really hope you can join in with our challenges this month and look forward to coming round visiting all your entries.

More Pick of the Bunch

Using the Fuchsia and Peony stamp sets 

Good evening Peeps, well what did you all think to the Olympic closing ceremony ?

We thought it was absolutely fabulous, very typically British and a great way to not only close the Games but to showcase some of our wonderful musical talents. The highlight for me had to be Freddie on the big screen and Brian and Roger strutting their stuff and then the finale with the surprise appearance of the Who, then of course there was Take That, I could go on. And to see the athletes so enjoying themselves and getting into the swing of it all made it the perfect finale.

Using the Peony and rose stamp sets (the lattice die on this one is a new ish one from Memory Box, but I'm unable to add the link below as it's not on the stores web site)

As promised a few more shares of some of the cards I've made for Ruth using her beautiful new Pick of the Bunch clear stamp sets. They are a delight to work with and they stamp out so crisply and with at least  ten stamps on each set represent excellent value for money.

Using the Fuchsia and Peony stamp sets

And finally, I know most of the other girls who were at our blog girl get together at Sally's on Saturday..............thanks Sal, it was great.............have posted pictures of us all so I'm not going there again, for somebody who just doesn't 'do' photos there are more than enough of them out there already, but there's one that only I have !! 

Using the Chrysanthemum stamp set

Sorry about this Lisa Jane but it's too good to keep to myself and in case you wonder what she's up to, she's just delving into the little goodie bag I gave them all, as one of them said when it was time to leave with us all holding a piece of cake "it's just like a real party". And no, the goody bag wasn't filled with chocolates, just one little packet of buttons and crafty bits and bobs.

You have to agree though, she does look pretty happy doesn't she ? If you're still speaking to me after this Lisa, look forward to seeing you and the others on our next get-together. 

Sitting in a birdsnest

Yeah....................it's not raining this morning and I even caught a glimmer of sun, but yesterday was another real washout and our local tally is near enough 9 inches for the month.

But I had a really lovely surprise to distract me from the rain over the weekend, I found out I had won the challenge over at Pan Pastel, it was my very fist time of entering so call it beginners luck. I've not really entered challenges during the last year since my eyes and mobility decided not to play fair with me and just restrict it to a limited few, so that made the win an added joy and my thanks to the challenge organisers and DT.

So I thought it was only right I entered again this week with one of my recent samples for Stampalot, I think the new La Blanch image is a perfect one for the Springtime theme. The image has been water coloured and some light masking and brayering for the background. I made the rose from a five petal punch and added some beads to a pin to embellish.

All 'ingredients' listed below, but please ask if you want any specific details that I might have missed.

Have a good week everyone and if your not a confident swimmer, make sure you keep your armbands on, you might need to swim home from work or the school run today.

Pan Pastel Challenge - Spring Time

Spring blooms

Well it's still raining here in the Fens and construction of the Ark is well under way. According to my in house weather man who records the rainfall religiously, we've had 7.6" so far this month and it's rained 20 days out of the last 28. Do you get the impression I'm getting paranoid about the weather ? Well probably I am and April will certainly be a memorable month if only for the volume of water that's fallen.

I've been scooter shopping again this week, the mobility kind that is and not getting on too well so far. As we live well out of the village we need to drive to get anywhere, so what they call a boot scooter which break down into 4/5 pieces for transportation is required. All fit into hubby's car OK, but my boot is another matter, the new style MX5 has a more contoured boot and although the inside is just about big enough, the actual aperture is smaller. But I've not given up on the idea and have a man coming out next week to show me a US made one which folds rather than dissembles which may fit my boot, I did say may, I don't want to get my hopes up too much. I'll keep you posted.

Now about my card which is for this weeks  Allsorts challenge, I don't remember the last time I made a shaker card, so it was a nice surprise when Nicole chose that as here theme this week.

Our sponsor this week is A Passion for Stamps so this is a double DT piece really using one of Ruth's new pieces of artwork the beautiful Alstromeria which I have coloured with watercolours in soft lemons on watercolour card. The DP is from one of the pretty new Teresa Collins pads onto which I stamped the Penny Black sentiment.............think it's still my all time favourite sentiment stamp. I cut an aperture in the card blank and placed acetate behind, punched some tiny butterflies from the same DP for the 'shakers' and used double sided foam tape to create the space between the acetate and sentiment. Thumbnail pictures and links to all products below.

Some die cut swirls and border cut from the same DP and finally I threaded some coordinating beads onto a couple of pins.

Hope you all have a good weekend and thanks for visiting, I always appreciate your comments.

A Passion for Flowers

Good Morning Peeps, how's you week going ? Mine is all messed up and I am losing days, it's always the same with bank holidays especially this time of year as no sooner I'm sorted from one another comes along.

Two quick shares before I kick into work proper, both cards using stamps from Ruth's A Passion for Stamps and both making good use of my Spellbinders.

The Alstroemeria image on the top card was printed onto Fabriano watercolour card................I always used 300gsm HP.........and coloured with Derwent's and some Magnolia DP. The Crab Apple Blossom flowers on the bottom card are paper pieced with DP's from stash and on both cards I have used seam binding from Pretty Little Ribbons.

I am entering this into Pretty Little Ribbons April challenge 'To die For'.

Have a good Wednesday everyone.

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.

Molly Blooms in the pink

Morning peeps, hope your week is going well.

It's been an off mixture of weather here in the Fens this week, we've had rain, sun, fog and still the overnight frosts............my in house weather man reports it was minus four again in the garden last night, but at least that does usually lead to a nice day so fingers crossed.

It's no secret that I just don't do cute and always struggle when it involves anything other than flowers, fairies and trees, but I'm always ready to rise to the challenge which was what was called for when a bundle of the new Molly Blooms stamps landed on my doormat a few weeks ago. The samples were for the launch of the new Circus and Fairground stamps at the NEC Trade Show last month, which I can now share and you can buy them from Sir Stampalot.

The card at the top using the big top and ringmaster Molly were paper pieced using DP's from stash. The little tickets are also amongst the new release stamps. The card base was cut using Nesties labels 23, the rose is made from punched five petal flowers.

My second card uses the lovely carousel stamp which really is my favourite from the new releases which I coloured with Derwent watercolours, decoupaged and added a frame cut with a Go Create die. Then added a bow and stick pin to embellish.

Whatever you have planned, hope you have a good day.

All rather floral

 

Good Morning, I hope everyone is OK.

I had a bit of a crafty play at the weekend as lucky me had some of Ruth's latest artwork to play with which you will find at A Passion for Stamps as well as some still un-inked Penny Black stamps.

To create the top card I masked the edges of a piece of Fabriano watercolour card and gently inked with TH broken china, I then tore a piece of copy paper to mask the top right section of the piece and stamped the the section with Hero Arts S5264 Antique Flower Background using TH tea dye. Next I sponged both colours of ink randomly over the stamping and finally stamped Penny Black 4237K Awakening using TH stormy sky and Aquamarkers and spritzed with water before stamping................every time there's a new release of stamps you tend to have a favourite and this one is definitely one of those. After removing the masking I mounted the piece onto coordinating cardstock and added a button.

My second card using Ruth's Fratillary image which I printed onto Fabriano watercolour card and did my usual mad rush to get some clear embossing powder on as it came through the printer, then coloured with Derwent watercolur pencils. The sentiment is Penny Black 4261L Time. The background was created using a Touch of Mica mask which I inked with versamark, rand through the Big Shot then dusted a lilac cosmic shimmer powder over the inked sections...................I am quite pleased with the effect and especially how well the colours match which was more buy luck than judgement as I only have a few mica powders.

Thanks for popping in, catch you later in the week.

Onwards and Upwards

A Passion for Stamps roses image

Good Morning peeps, I am starting off on a rather different note and sharing a quote from Mother Theresa ................................

"Your honesty and frankness will expose you to problems but your work should not stop for it means the world to so many people"

I will not elaborate why I am sharing this quote as many of you will know and understand why I find it's content so inspirational and apt. Suffice to say it summarises recent events which I have overcome because of the support and friendship of you dear friends.

During the last few months, the inability to get out has endorsed my view.............. which I know is shared by many of you............that craft goes much further than just providing us with the ability to express ourselves artistically................it provides the far more important role of offering a distraction from the pain, both physically and mentally of the everyday rigours live throws at us.

So onwards and upwards as they say and I hope you all had a good weekend and enjoyed some of that lovely sunshine which was kind to lots of us here in the UK the last couple of days. I'm still not able to go far due to my legs unwillingness to play the game, so yesterday was a real treat to be taken for a drive in the sunshine. We went in my car so had the top down and it was really nice and warm, but it did mean not enough room for my wheelie, so apart from a few gingerly steps at the woodland where dad is buried, I took in the air from the car which was lovely.

And to prove I am still crafting and enjoying it, a few shares of cards I've made recently for Ruth at A Passion for Stamps. To create the one at the top of this post I printed Ruth's two roses image onto Fabriano watercolour card and coloured with Derwent watercours, then masked a sun and did some gentle sponging with Adirondack denim and meadow. The card base was cut using Go Create dies and the sentiment an old unmounted Hero Arts one.........sorry long since lost the code.

The second card  using Ruth's hawthorn blossom image was printed onto the same Fabriano watercolour card and coloured as above. The card bases is cut using Picot Edge and Grand Nesties, the Kasier DP is one of the brand new designs and the sentiment Penny Black 3419D.

Have a good day everyone and thanks so much for popping by, your visits are always much appreciated.