Girl with a rose...

Thanks to Sally with her Scallywags blog for introducing me to Birdie Brown digital stamps - I headed straight over to Birdie's Etsy shop and bought 2 images, but I had such a tough time deciding that I know I'll be back for more!

This is my first card using 'Girl with a rose' - how cute is this little sweetie?

The image is coloured with Flexmarkers & Promarkers, and I've added some faux stitching around the edge. One day I'll try real stitching on my cards - it would be quicker than the fake stuff!

The background papers are both from digikits from Sweet Shoppe Designs - the blue is from 'Blooming' by Jady Day Studio, and the green is from 'Her Name is Lola' by Libby Pritchett.

I've added some buttons that I found lurking forgotten in a drawer, from the My Minds Eye 'Bloom & Grow'  collection. I coloured the green button with a Promarker as the original green was too pale.

I'm entering this in the Cutie Pie challenge - real or faux stitching
One Stitch at a Time - stitch it
and By the Cute and Girly - use buttons

Thanks for looking!

Lesley x

So much crafting, so little time...

Apologies once again for the distinct lack of blog posts over the last few months. It's certainly not because I haven't been crafting, more like I'm so busy with the making and doing that I never seem to get time to tell you about it!

But after getting some bargain digistamps over at Jellypark earlier in the week I felt I should at least join in the Jellypark Friday Challenge. The theme this week is 'Boy Crazy', which I'm quite pleased about since the only finished card I've produced with a Jellypark image is this one

I have to apologise for the poor photo, but I haven't been home in daylight all week so I had to take this one with flash.

I've kept the card very simple, with the image coloured using Promarkers and Flexmarkers. The cardboard box is paper-pieced using the horrid Papermania Kraft cards I bought ages ago, with shading added with Flexmarkers. The sentiment is computer-generated and I've pricked and drawn faux-stitching around the image and the sentiment. It doesn't show very well in the photo, but the background of the image has been coloured in the same way as the sentiment.

Daft as it sounds, I don't actually know any little boys about to turn 4...but the space between the box and the sword-arm seemed to be the perfect shape for a big number 4 so that's what swung it. It'll keep in my 'to sell' box...

Thanks for looking!

Lesley x

Wow, long time no blog!

And it's not that I haven't been making cards, I just haven't blogged any of them for months. It seems I can only really concentrate properly on 1 project at a time, which since May last year has been my weight loss. I went back to WeightWatchers meetings back in May, and most of my free time on the laptop has been spent 'tracking' online, and keeping up with the message forums for hints, tips and support. With only half a stone to go now I'm hoping I can wean myself off the WW message boards and get some cards shared with my (slowly) growing number of followers before you all delete me!

So my first card of the year to share is this one, which I made with the Willow Sketchie Challenge in mind. To be honest I'm not sure I've followed the sketch closely enough, but maybe they'll turn a blind eye since I've used a digi stamp from the new Polly Pickleberry CD.

I've used a combination of Promarkers and Flexmarkers to colour the image - I love the very subtle colours available in the Flexmarkers. And then I used my Glacier Blue Flexmarker to colour the background of the Pink Petticoat backing paper too.

The sentiment uses an embossing folder that I think came in a Docrafts Goody Bag, and the embossing folder used on the backing strips was a magazine freebie.

The hyper-critical me doesn't love this card, so I might have another go at the sketch with a different image if I have the time.

Thanks for looking!

Lesley x

Happy Easter....Part 1...

I don't usually 'do' Easter cards, but there are so many cute Easter images around that this year I couldn't resist making just a few.

This trio were made for my sister's 3 girls and I was pleasantly surprised to find that they loved them - they're all aged 6 and under so I thought they might be a little bit too 'grown-up', but at least I wasn't worried that they'd turn their noses up at handmade - we've had a few crafty sessions together and I take craft supplies with me most times I visit.

The cards are all made from papers and images from the Creative Cardmaking special Pink Petticoat edition, coloured with Promakers (of course!) and measure a dinky 12cm square.

The first one I made was the one at the bottom of the shot, then I worried that the little ones wouldn't 'get' the buttons (added to hide a smudge in the bottom corner of the image!). I made the other two without any embellishments, then of course thought they looked too bare for little girls, so raided my stash for the little flower and (quite hideous) butterfly.

A last minute panic when I realised that I'd spot-glittered 2 of the cards and not the 3rd one, then they were safely delivered to their recipients this morning!

Spot the difference...1 card 3 ways...

when I bought this digi-image from Cuddly Buddly yesterday I couldn't wait to use it. But oh no, disaster! My Cool Aqua Promarker has run out.  That's the 2nd of that colour I've got through, I obviously use it far too much! This was the best I could do before it completely gave up the ghost...

Looking at it now I quite like the 'shabby chic' finish I got on the stove.  This card uses a combination of digital paper-piecing (the red polka dot areas) and hand-colouring, then the images were cut out and stuck onto the gingham backing paper.  I designed the sentiment myself using MS Word.

Of course I've ordered another Cool Aqua Promarker (and a few other colours that I 'need') but couldn't wait, and really wanted my stove in that colour  - I love the contrast with the pink gingham and red polka dots.  I decided to try to replicate the colour with more digital paper-piecing, and since the backing paper is also a digi I did it all in one layer to save on ink (and cutting out time) and this is version 2....

I decided to polka-dot the kettle on this one, and make her dress the same colour as the stove to add a bit of balance.The rest of the image I left white and hand-coloured. I quite like the colour on this one, but its more blue than aqua.  So, my final attempt at stupid o'clock last night....

Now this one is far too green! I feel like Goldilocks or something...! I do prefer the digital layering on this one though.  I've left a little white border around the images, to give a more obvious layered effect, I think it just about shows in the picture.

That's it for now, no more till the new Promarkers arrive!

I'm going to enter these in the challenge over at The Play Date Cafe which is a colour challenge, don't you think they're a perfect fit?

                                            

Vintage Heart

I don't really 'do' Valentines cards but there are a lot of love and heart-related posts out there in blogland right now...

But hearts don't just have to be Valentines, right?

I've used  Pink Petticoat Vintage Rose papers, on a Craftwork Cards scalloped card blank.  The scalloped heart was cut using my Craft Robo Lite, and the edges 'inked' with a Promarker.

I'm entering this for the Shabby Tea Room challenge - I know, no blogging for 2 months and I enter 2 challenges in 2 days...get me!

Hello Kitty...

This is a clock I've made for my sister who is busy decorating 2 bedrooms in preparation for (hopefully) adopting 3 gorgeous sisters.  Please keep your fingers crossed that all goes to plan!  I've got loads of block canvasses sat around so offered to make a clock for each room.

This is for the eldest of the girls who is 6 and will have her own bedroom with a Hello Kitty theme, please excuse the clashing yellow background on the photo...

Its a 12 inch square canvas with the background painted in 2 shades of pink.  The Hello Kitty image has been coloured with acrylic paint for the white areas and Promarkers for the rest.  I was going to use rub-downs for the numbers but found these stickers (5 sheets for £1) in our new local pound shop, and yes you've guessed it, I coloured them with Promarkers!

I sealed the finished canvas with Mod Podge then glued on the marabou trim with a hot glue gun before attaching the clock mechanism.  Simples....

My sis has yet to see the clock in real-life but I sent her this pic and she loves it! Just clock number 2 to create now, as well as some other bits of stuff I want to make for them - its great having lots of little girls to craft for!

Fairy Special Birthday Wishes...

this is the card I made for my niece Adel - yes an unconventional spelling of the name, but it means personalised gifts/cards can be even more special as you don't come across them in the shops.

The image is a digi-stamp from Cardmaking & Papercraft magazine, given as a freebie if you bought the mag or available to buy individually from the website. I paper-pieced the image digitally using papers from Zoe Pearn but left her skin and hair blank and hand-coloured with Promarkers. I've used Stickles on the wings and crown, which played havoc with trying to get a decent photo, sorry!

I've used rub-ons to add her name and age, although I'd usually do this digitally before printing too.  The spotty backing paper is also from Zoe Pearn and I ran the scalloped card base through the printer too so it co-ordinated perfectly.  Finished off with a little quilted star.

not just for Christmas....

I'm kind of doing this backside first - showing the non-xmas cards made with papers from this digikit from Sweet Shoppe Designs before the actual xmas cards I've made, but I have my reasons...

As you might have guessed I've made this one for my sister's birthday which is on Friday.  It's a bit of a sore point that I often get her cards to her late, one year she rang me on the morning of her birthday (a Sunday) and had a 30 minute rant about not getting her cards in time.  Soooooo, this year I'm determined to be prepared and will despatch this card today!

Its such a miserable and dull day (weatherwise) today that I don't think I'd get any decent photos of my cards today so popped this one into the scanner.  Unfortunately the xmas cards I made with the same kit have a bit of dimension to them so aren't quite so scanner friendly.

I've used a fabulous new image, Lulabelle Shopping, from Digistamp Boutique for my card as I thought her dress was ideal for a bit of digital paper-piecing to perfectly coordinate with the backing papers. I really do love Zoe Pearn's paper designs and have a few of her digikits now but did hesitate about buying this one as I don't do a lot of xmas cards but I've managed to use 5 different papers in this card.

Lulabelle's hair and skin are of course coloured with Promarkers.

I'm entering this card into the September monthly challenge over at Digistamp Boutique, the Charisma Cardz challenge, Anything Goes,  and the Allsorts challenge, Plain and Simple.

Fabulous Shoes

Another commission, this time from my work colleagues for our manager who has taken early retirement.  The only real brief was 'she loves shoes'.  As she's seen most of the work I've done lately I wanted to try something a little different and remembered I had a freebie digi of a shop-front somewhere. Unfortunately I can't remember who this one was from, will have to have a search of the web.

The brickwork and other aqua items were coloured with Promarkers and the green polka dot and pink stripe papers are downloads from Pink Petticoat. It doesn't show in the picture but I put acetate in the windows.

This is the view from another angle to show the dimension - the awning is popped up with a couple of generous dollops of pinflair glue gel. If I do a similar card again I probably won't cut around the doorway as there was only a very narrow strip left to attach to the base card

The card measures a massive 7 x 9 inches but I think it would've been too fiddly in a smaller size.


Edited to add - have found the website for the freebie, Crafty Boutique by GTC

Bubbling over...

...with fun and birthday wishes.

This is one of my favourite cards of the year, using my favourite Pink Petticoat Vintage Rose papers for the background and digital paper-piecing on the image, which is also from Pink Petticoat, from a set called Lola Rose - You Make Me Feel Bubbly.

The frame is hand-doodled and the skin and hair coloured with Promarkers. Fonts used are Auburn and Hiccups.

Pure Innocence...

Isn't she cute? I'm loving these digi-stamp images from Heather Ellis, who can also be found on Etsy.  At first I was using these the 'old-fashioned' way - printing off the black and white outlines then colouring with Promarkers then cutting out and sticking to my background layer, and hand-writing sentiments as in this card....

Then I decided to have a bit of a play around with them in Paint.NET, making the background transparent and converting to png files so I could layer up onto the digital backing paper before printing.  I've added the sentiment at this stage too.  

Don't worry though, the Promarkers aren't redundant - I've still hand-coloured the images, and I've gone over the red sentiment and other red areas of the design with a red Spica pen just for a subtle hint of glitter.


I think I feel a notelet set coming along....

Back in my comfort zone...

with a much simpler card, although it is another challenge entry (I know, 2 in 1 day, lol!)...

This one is for the Pollycraft Monday Challenge - Let's have a sing-song where the theme is 'inspired by a song'. I think my entry speaks for itself, no explanation needed, lol! This has been one of my favourite songs for years so thank you to Glee and of course Joe McElderry for bringing it back!

Image is the Lilybean Fairy Clover Butterfly Wishes digistamp from Pollycraft

coloured (badly!) with Promarkers

backing paper 'Ice Cream Curls' from Pink Petticoat

and the little butterfly in the top left is a dimensional sticker from Anita's (strategically placed to hide the black mark left by my printer - silly me coloured and trimmed the image before running back through the printer to add the sentiment!)

Time for tea?

Isn't she a little cutie?

I've finally taken the plunge and bought my first Lili of the Valley stamps - looking back now I can't understand why I waited so long....

And to celebrate I thought it was time I also entered my very first challenge, this one at the Lili of the Valley challenge blog. It's a sketch challenge, and this is also the first time I've worked to a sketch but I'm quite pleased with the result...

 image is 'Tea Party' from Lili of the Valley

stamped with Memento Inkpad onto Clarity Stamps postcard

coloured with Promarkers

Martha Stewart border punch

Nellie's die-cut frame

backing papers from Forever Friends, Papermania Honey and Hugs and a Pink Petticoat download

sentiment from Craftwork Cards and think the flowers are Prima, held together with a Dovecraft brad

Simply baby boys...

Just a quickie to post these two, have been wanting to use the images for a while so out came the Promarkers last night and these are the results...

This first one uses an image (think it was a freebie?) from Pollycraft, I'm not sure if he's still available.  My cool aqua Promarker is on its last legs so I inked the edges of the die-cut panel with the aqua colour from a Kaleidacolor Inkpad in 'Caribbean Sea' colourway. Simple matting and layering (love the textured cardstock!) and a few mini buttons to finish it off.

This was also a freebie image, this time from Bodils Scrapperverden and again I've left the matting and layering very simple. The gingham paper has been punched with my new Martha Stewart Doily Lace, then I decided to colour the edge with the PM used in the image. I haven't put a sentiment on this one as I thought it could be used as either a new baby or a 1st birthday card.

That's all for today folks - will have some girlier designs next time...

Heaven, I'm in Heaven...

Crafty heaven of course! Bank holidays are definitely bad for my bank balance, lol!  No pics just yet (I've just got home and the light is really poor) but this (extended) weekend I have bought

• 8 x 8 card blanks
• Forever Friends wall decor sets for a bargain £1.99 each - they're a perfect fit for an 8x8 card!
• 2 wonderful DCWV 12x12 cardstock stacks for just £7.99 each
• a Martha Stewart scoreboard
• some self-adhesive wallpaper border stickers (6 sheets in a pack) with diggers and cars etc for only 69p per pack
• a couple of 8 x 8 baby-themed scrapbook kits (10 sheets of paper, stickers and chipboard frames etc) for only 99p each
• oh yes, and a laptop!
• and quite a few other things as well - my friend did ask if I have any room left in my home ;-)

In my defence (as if it were needed between crafters!) I did spend a lot of time at the weekend making some cards for my office to sell at a charity fun day this coming weekend.  I'll hopefully get to take some pics tomorrow before handing them over....

Edited to add - here are the pics of some of the cards, images are Digistamp Boutique (I played around with a couple of them to create the image I wanted for my Fathers Day cards), papers are Zoe Pearn and Nitwit and some of the images are coloured with Promarkers...

and finally...those wallpaper stickers from The Range - once they're snipped up they'll have cost less than 4p per image!

Hang In There...

After all of the 'big card' fuss last weekend, I've been able to get back to something that's a bit more 'me'. What do you think?

The image is a freebie digi-stamp from Sassy Cheryl's over at Paper Craft Planet - here's a close up version

He's coloured with Promarkers (of course!), as is the cardstock used for matting, and the card candy - the perfect way to get an exact colour match.  The pink backing paper was in my goody bag from Craftwork Cards. Finished off with a computer-generated sentiment (printed directly on to the card before assembly).

Just a quick update on that wedding card though - I managed to make a box and a matching insert for the card just in time to take it to our tea-party! I wasn't entirely happy with the box but was told that I was being over-fussy and everyone else loved it...

I don't do big cards...

...so could someone please explain how I came to make an A4 size card???

I offered to make a wedding card as one of my colleagues is getting married on Saturday and we've clubbed together for her gift.  It seemed like a good idea at the time, until I realised that I know very little about this person's tastes,  not to mention the rest of my colleagues...

I decided to steer away from the lovely cute Lili of the Valley image I bought at Harrogate and had a picture in my head of an 8 x 8 inch square card with a 3D tiered wedding cake in ivory with red accents as the bride is wearing a red dress with full-length ivory coat.  Took the prototype in to show my colleagues the other day and got the impression they didn't approve of the colour scheme - eek!

Lots of hours later I ended up with this - the only thing it has in common with my original concept is the tiered cake

I finished it after midnight last night, then dragged myself off to bed knowing that I wasn't really happy with it.  So this morning I pulled it to bits!  This is version 2 - very little difference except the cake is now lower on the card and the springy wires connecting the hearts are gold coloured instead of silver.

I'm as happy as I'm going to get with it now so I think its time to make the box - I've got about 4 hours, lol!

For a large card it was incredibly cheap to make - the cardstock is from my bargain buy at Harrogate - pearlised A3 card folded in half to make the base card then decorated with a Rollagraph stamp wheel using Versamark and mica powder ( Harrogate spending spree again!). The cake tiers use Martha Stewart punches (yes, Harrogate!) with a bit of glitter and a few gems. The cake stand uses a couple of Fiskars punches - the curved sides were done using an oval punch. The glittered hearts were also punched from the same cardstock as everything else then run upside down through my mini Xyron before adding glitter.  And last but not least, the sentiment panel was created with my Craft Robo Lite - I love the gel-pen drawing function. Incidentally, the ivory cardstock used for matting and layering, and some of the cake elements is just the same cardstock but coloured with an ivory promarker!

On the subject of weddings I had to chuckle at this post last night by Kerry over at A Load of Old Pickle. Why do we volunteer ourselves for these things, lol?  I made my friend's wedding invitations last year, apparently I'd offered while under the influence of far too much wine (which I blamed on the shock of her finally getting hitched after 10 years together!).  I couldn't help but be struck by the similarities to Kerry's invitations, especially the insides

Can I just point out though - I didn't want the peel-off there  - that was a last minute addition when the bride's father thought a wedding invitation should feature wedding bells (even though it wasn't a church wedding...)

Happy Easter!

Hope everyone is enjoying their eggs and other Easter goodies :-)

Just a quick visit to share this card with you - not strictly an Easter card but it could've been...

I love this design, one of a set of cutting files for my Craft Robo, bought from My Scrap Chick.  Unfortunately, although it doesn't really show in this pic I had a bit of a disaster with the good old pinflair glue , put a bit too close to the edge when sticking it all together - if you look closely at the middle 'tuft' on the chick's head you might be able to see it. But, as any good crafter knows, there's always a way round - et voila (!) version 2...

...with a hastily designed and cut sentiment!

I managed to squeeze a bit of Promarker action in there too - instead of faffing about cutting the eyes and beak out of different pieces of card I cut them in yellow with the main piece and then coloured them in - genius, even if I do say so myself!

Off to do more tidying now :-(

Still Recovering...

...from a nasty tummy bug last week, and from a full 6 hours at the GNPE in Harrogate last Sunday. Well that's 6 hours excluding the dash to Sainsburys to get some more cash out of the hole in the wall...which also gave me an opportunity to stash what I'd already bought into the car to free up my hands and arms for more buying...
Sunday evening was like some form of torture - I stayed overnight in Harrogate but hadn't had the forethought to take a basic craft kit with me, so had to make do with lots of 'stroking' of new goodies...

I came back with a boot full of crafting goodies supplemented with the purchases made in Harrogate town centre on the Monday morning...oops!

Of course since I've been feeling poorly too I haven't really had much of a chance to create but have managed these 2 cards...

This one is made almost entirely from a Craftwork Cards goody bag - the middle flower stem was diecut and foiled and I just used the 'waste' either side to make the other stems.  The leaves were cut from waste at the corners of the same sheet. I used an apple green Promarker to colour them.  The mesh behind the flowers was originally plain white and also coloured with a PM (moss green I think)

This is the first card I made from my new stash and I think I managed to use 5 new products to make it.  The only things that weren't new were the rub-on sentiment and the black paper used for matting and layering.
Image is Indentz 'Funky Tree' embossing folder run through the Cuttlebug using Whitewash core-dinations cardstock. Card candy and backing paper from (another) Craftwork Cards goody bag, and of course the lace is a Martha Stewart punch.  The card itself measures about 8x8 inches and is made from an A3 sheet of pearlised card also bought at the GNPE. If I add in the envelopes and polybags bought separately that makes 7 of my weekend buys used for 1 card!

Off now for some crafting of a slightly different nature - I'm holding an Easter/Spring crafts session for children on Monday at the library where I work.  Watch this space...