Good morning all, Go and make yourself a cup of tea/coffee or whatever your tipple is (depending on what time of day you are reading this) and take a look over at Yours Artfully she has the most fabulous Tutorial on making a metal flower pin amongst other things.....truly inspirational.....the type of thing I can only dream about

Have a good day and thank you for stopping by today x

Hugs x

Messing about with inks......

Happy Friday to you in blogland, I have been messing about with this gorgeous image she is just truly stunning and it's an image that gives so much inspiration...... The image was stamped directly with distress inks, and some butterfly eliments were then coloured........

The edges were distressed with the same colours, and stamped with small flower stamp

The butterly in her hair was stamped a second time, cut out, glittered and added to image

nestie stamped, coloured, then mounted onto card along with ribbon, I had such fun making this.

Happy crafting, and thank you for stopping by to my humble blog today x

Hugs x

Emmerald Craft: Tuesday Challenges

Good morning my bloggy people

Let's have a 'Totally crafty Tuesday' click on the link Emmerald Craft: Tuesday Challenges: for a list of Tuesday Challenges to get your teeth into -

Have a happy day, and thanks for dropping by today

Hugs x

Colouring with distress inks tutorial.......

Morning happy crafters, I have stumbled across another great tutorial over at Poppy Petal Designs , colouring with distress inks, it's a great blog and step by step tutorial, we sometimes forget other ways to use our ink etc......so go on give it a go!!

Happy crafting x

Hugs

Carol x x

sketch book........

Good morning lovely people, found this book which has been hovering around in my craft room since christmas with no important use whatsover.......so it had a makeover, I was fed up with having bits of paper with sketches on hanging around on every available space (and we all know space is a valuable comodity).....so it now has a use, all my sketches in one space for when I get crafters blog......must go to the doctors for that, I am sure their must be a cure!!! ;0) the book was covered with scrap papers from my scrap box......woo hoo, I knew they would come in useful, that's two pieces down only another 3million and twenty to go!!

I think the stamp was a freebie with craft stamper magazine

micro beads added......

and words added using my beloved cuttlebug......and voila!!

Have a good crafty day.

Hugs x

Emmerald Craft: Thursday Challenges

Good morning all and I hope I find you all just fine and Dandy this Thursday morning, thought I would post a pic of the gorgeous Lilys that I have at the moment they are just simply stunning and I couldn't resist a pic!!! click the link Emmerald Craft: Thursday Challenges: for a list of Thursday Challenges to get your teeth into - and have some fun..........go on challenge yourself!!

TTFN

Carol x

Congrats on new job.........

Good morning my lovely crafting bloggers, hope you are having a good day so far, having a busy week again with my little boy still on his summer holibobs, and still not a lot of time for crafting. I was nosing at the challenge on Cute card Thursday and thought I would give it a whirl!!

This card has been made for a friend who has just got himself a new job as the caretaker at the school my DS attends, so I thought this would be rather appropriate.

It's using one of the Joanna Sheen Messy Rabbit stamps which are rather cute (note to self must buy more stamps for men), the image was stamped and coloured using promarkers, and baking paper from stash.

Happy crafting everyone

Carol x x

Watercolour tutorial.....

Independant Stampin up Demonstrator Wendy Todd has a great watercolouring tutorial on her blog here......pop along and have a look, and if you are a bit intimidated about watercolouring this may give you the confidence to give it a go.

Happy watercolouring x

Carol x x

Peridot...............

So that's the end of another exhausting week, and I feel like I am living on a building site at the moment.....next door are having an extension done and on the other side they have been digging the road up all week laying new gas pipes so it's jack hammer city........
I made this card and thought I would enter it in the Daring cardmakers weekly challenge, it's a birthstone themed challenge and the August birthstone is Peridot which is also the national gem of Egypt, the Ancient Egyptians called it "the gem of the sun", so the challenge is to make a card with yellow, greens, limes.....the colour of the birthstone..............so I thought this image and colours were just perfect
I love these stamps they just remind you of being carefree and whymsical.....

backgroung was coloured and stamped with distress inks, and image was stamped and embossed, nestie added with sentiment.....and of course some lovely gems added.....

Hope you like, and thanks for popping by today...

Happy crafting

Hugs x

Football boy.....

So here is the story......I know it's not craft related but......we don't do football in our house...OH is into the sport where the cars drive around the track for a v long time making lots of noise.....formula 1 ;0), so anyhow getting to the point....we don't do football, but DS wanted to go on this 4 day football thingy with STF for 4 days because a lot of his friends were doing it (and who am I to refuse), he has had a blast!!!!! and more to the point only won himself a blinkin' trophy......where did that come from?????? but am I proud I hear you ask....HELL YEAH!!! I actually heard myself squeeling with delight when they called his name out....quite embarassing in a huge stadium with lots of echo.....

So I think I now need to make a brag book........the trophy is pride of place on his windowsill and will probably be dutifully dusted by mother every day!!! How cute is he in his kit, I love this boy he's the best!!!

Emmerald Craft: Thursday Challenges

Emmerald Craft: Thursday Challenges:

Good morning happy crafters - Follow the link above for a list of Thursday Challenges to get your teeth into -

TTFN x

Carol x

Fab demo for a mini album.....

Morning crafty people, if you are starting to think about presents for christmas (I know it's only August) or gifts for birthdays Dawns craft place has a fab demo to follow, it demonstrates how to make a mini album out of one piece of 12 x 12 paper and really worth a look, very simple to follow.........guess what I am going to be doing lol.

Happy crafting everyone

TTFN x x

Carol x x

Just Magnolia challenge 66

Yes I know it's only August I hear you scream!! and please don't throw tomatoes at me ;0) but I thought I would follow this lovely sketch over at Just Magnolia and follow the Stamp something challenge.................
so it was a perfect excuse to get started on my christmas cards..............and poor Tilda has been itching to get out of my craft drawer after hubby bought her for me last christmas as a christmas present......so it's her coming out party!! ......and I know it's not traditional christmas colours before you throw even more tomatoes, but I got these christmas papers free in a mag last christmas after I had already finished my christmas cards, so they have been stashed away all year waiting for usage!!! and I am also a bit partial to pink, actually I luuuuurve pink (confession over)

Gorgeous Tilda has been stamped and coloured using promarkers and cut out

her hat is glittered (gotta have glitter at christmas) and she is raised up on a nestie

sequins added. amd sentiment added.......
flower is made using nesties, scrunched up and distressed around the edges with Tattered Rose

Thanks for passing by today.....happy crafting x

Carol x x

What's on my workdesk Wednesday.....

So what's on my workdesk? This actually is quite tidy ;0), I have bought 2 pink boxes from the pound shop to store my distress inks and nesties in......I don't know about anyone else but I seem to tidy up and make space and then the walls start closing in on me again and I end up working in a space about 1" x 1" lol................on here there is also the reminants of a card I made at the weekend, I suppose it will end up in my scraps box along with the other 3 million bits of paper that I am hoping to find use for!!!!

Hmmmm my beloved pro markers..........

and the essentials...baby wipes....I am such a messy crafter!!! Maybe I ought to start a weekly (WUYWDT) what's under your workdesk Thursday lol as I seem to have more under my desk than on my desk...........

Happy Crafty Wednesday everyone!!

Carol x x

Cards for boys............

Happy crafty Tuesday everyone, hope you are squeezing some crafting in today, my little man is off to football academy for a few days so I will have a little spare time to myself in between the dreaded, ironing, washing and housework. Thought I would start off with a simple card using the sketch from Sweet Stampin and also following the challenge from Cards for men the theme is "Off on an Adventure"

and had to be a card suitable for a man or a boy..........so here it is. the image is from crafters companion stamps for boys, the rocket was stamped, embossesd, and coloured using pro markers, backing paper from stash, the planets were stamped, coloured, cut out and raised up using pinflair, glitter and embelishments added.......

I have put 6 on it as it's my little has a party to go to in a few weeks so this will be perfect.

Hope you like!! Happy crafting.

Ta ta for now x x

Carol x x

More lovely candy...............

Good morning campers and happy Saturday to you, I have a day booked for crafting so will post some cards later, but in the meantime just to wet your appetite over at http://dawnscrafts.blogspot.com/search/label/blog%20candy there is some lovely candy to give away to celebrate the fact that dawn has acheived 300+ followers lots of lovely goodies!!!!!

See you all later and happy crafty Saturday .

Hugs x x

Carol

Scoff. scoff

So another busy day today and going to be catching up with friends, so just to get you drooling I thought I would share the tiffin cake with you (diet starts tomorrow) ;0)



I have been trying to catch up with blogs and stumbled across this http://craftstampingquartet.blogspot.com/ it's four friends crafting together choosing a project from http://www.craftstamper.com/blog/ very inspirational and worth a look, hoping to catch up with some crafting this weekend a friend has asked me to make something for her partners 30th birthday....she has written a poem and wants it mounted onto card and made all arty farty (as she puts it)......I am really stuck with this one as I don't know him and have no idea of the kind of things he may like..........answers on a postcard please!!!

Have a good day ;0)

Carol x

Busy, busy holibobs and not much time for craft!!

Having a busy week this week with the little man being on his summer holibobs, we have had lots of places to go and people to see, and not much time for crafting........I took him to see shrek (how cool are those shrek 3D glasses!) and couldn't resist this picture in the cinema as we came out......please note big yellow duck in arms who goes nearlly everywhere with us !!

Last Thank you card for teachers at school.............sorry to bore, but I love these patchwork polly stamps :0)

The gorgeous image was watercoloured, and her feet were decoupaged, background papers are from stash.....hope you likey!!!

More candy, more candy!!!!!

Fabulous blog candy here at http://pinkgem-janet.blogspot.com/2010/07/pink-gem-candy.html

Goodies include Pro markers, pink gem stamps, mulberry paper and lots of other goodies up for grabs.................good luck!!

Carol x x

Let's Ink It Up: DESIGN TEAM CALL

1st Submission - card made for hubby for his birthday

2nd submission - Valentine card for hubby

3rd submission - birthday card for best friend.......she liked it at least!!!

Let's Ink It Up: DESIGN TEAM CALL: "Do you want to be involved in an exciting new challenge blog?Do you love rubber/clear stamping?Do you like to get inky? http://letsinkitup.blogspot.com/2010/07/design-team-call.html

So anyhooow the above cards are my submission for the design team.........what a brave girl I am :0)

BLOG CANDY ALERT.................

Lots of lovely blog candy up for grabs click here http://letsinkitup.blogspot.com/ they are aiming for 100 new followers for their new stamping site so pop along and register here

http://letsinkitup.spruz.com/ The winner of the blog candy will be announced on September 4th, Good luck everyone x

Carol x x

Good luck card - Le blac chat noir

Made for a friend who is going back to work after being a SAHM for a long time.......

The stamp is a freebie from http://www.craftstamper.com/ , the background was inked with Tim Holtz distressed denim ink, I masked a moon, inked around, stamped cat then stamped again on post it note, masked the cat and stamped flowers around............very serene I think

Nannys 70th birthday

So below we have the card done for my mum, and above we have a 70th birthday card for Nanny made by Connor (5) using crayons and glitter glue........gotta love the boy!

Mums 70th Birthday........crickey!

So it's mums 7oth birthday on wednesday and she is dreading being 70.......she made me promise not to put 70 on her card........I promised nothing ;0) I was quite reserved though lol. I had such fun making this card and have been dying for an excuse for a long time to use this image, the stamp is borrowed from a friend so dont know who it's by...sorry

She is such a glamour puss don't you think! With her blue rinse.....had to be done!

Image was stamped and coloured using pro markers, the lace on dress is glittered
Background paper from stash.....magazine freebie, finished of with ribbons, feathers and flowers.....just what a girl needs!

Lovely jubbly candles

This is my first proper attempt at making candles, and was really pleased with the outcome, I tried making some at christmas but it was all done a bit rushed and they didn't turn out so good, Connors teachers were really chuffed with these ones ;0)

If you dont know how they are mad its quite simple, stamp your image on tissue paper (the type you get in shoe boxes, colour in and cut out (doesn't have to be too accurate) place onto your candle, I normally put a tiny bit of glue stick on candle to hold image in place. Wrap some greaseproof paper around candle and heat your image with heat tool.....DON'T MAKE MY MISTAKE AND OVER HEAT!!!! or you end up with a waxy mess :) the image should gently melt into wax as soon as this is done remove heat and VOILA!!!!! cheap lovely present.

HAPPY CANDLE MAKING ;0)

I love, love, love these Patchwork Polly stamps they are gorgeous, this one was a perfect image for Connors teacher. the image was stamped and decoupaged, thoroughly enjoyed making this

The second image is from cute companions set and I love these stamps Jayne is such a clever lady, the background was stamped and water coloured and the mouse was stamped and cut out and raised up with some pinflair...a very simple but lovely card.