A wonderful day of Owls and Eagles

Meg bought me a bird of prey experience for two for my birthday. We booked it to take place in August so Meg could be there too. Steve came as an observer and chief cameraman (apologies to him that forgot to change the watermark!)  It took place at Thorseby Courtyard in North Notts with Hawks of Steele. What a wonderful time we had!

 We met a lanar falcon,

 the cutest boobook owl,

 A barn owl,

Sooty is a baby great grey owl.

 Karl flew Sooty between our heads and he was totally silent!

 Our favourite though was Rambo, a golden eagle weighing 7 1/2 lb (just a little more than Meg weighed when she was born) and quite a weight sitting on your wrist. He was magnificent!

Thanks for looking!

Meg's Birthday Card

It was Meg's birthday on Monday, and I decided to make her card using Oliver the Owl from Hobby Art. I used ink dusters to create the background and stamped grasses and seed heads from the set for the background. I coloured the owl with alcohol markers. Later I decided to try and create more of a night time scene using the same stamps. After hubby told me it wasn't straight, I added some ivy to Oliver's perch in order to disguise the wonkyness 😁

I am quite pleased with the result. As the challenge at Allsorts this week is  I spy and needs to begin with B, a Barn owl (also a bird) would seem a reasonable choice, so I'm entering it there.

We had a lovely meal in Sheffield at a place called the Italian Kitchen. Before I go here is a photo of the cake I made to take with us 

Thanks for looking and enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Snippets, Rudolf days and a few photos

 I've been very good using up snippets this week. I made some Christmas cards with a stamp from Indigo Blu that fell into my basket and some Be creative embossing Crystals.

 Three very similar DL cards but none with a traditional feel

 This third one has a lot more contrast in real life, but I couldn't seem to capture it in a photo. The embossing Crystals are from the more recent Be Creative  sets. I used Winter Wonderland, Pistachio and Summer Berries. There are more lovely exciting colours coming next week on Hochanda on Wednesday 31st August.

My final card is a mixture of imagination crafts sparkle medium on  Kraft and a very old sentiment from Stamporium. I did some faux blanket stitch in Sakura Jade stardust pen around the sentiment.
Four this time makes up for the fact that I didn't get round to doing Rudolf days cards for July. I am entering these into August Rudolf days with Scrappy Mo and Miss Di's Snippet playground.
Finally here are a few more photos from our holiday in Wales. I've kept it to Butterflies, Birds and a rather handsome beetle this time.

 First we have small tortoiseshell on some Hemp Agrimony.

 Next is a common blue,

Followed by a Wall Brown,

 and a Gatekeeper,

 Anyone know their beetles? I love his turquoise sheen! 

Finally we have a Fritillary, possibly a Dark Green, but I can't be sure - they all look so alike! He had definitely been in the wars too.
If you are ever near a Pembrokeshire Falconry Display I highly recommend it! Here is a photo of Meg with a Harris Hawk and sporting her new short hair do, not that you can see it very well through the rain!

I'm finishing off with a photo of me, which I very rarely do, but my companion was so cute! He went by the name of Frodo and I really wanted to bring him home!

Thanks for looking and all your lovely comments. Back to work next week so I may be around a bit less.

June's challenge at Stamping Sensations

Good Morning! It is the first Sunday of the month and time for a new challenge at Stamping Sensations. Our Theme is Feature a Creature and we are sponsored by Be Creative. Your creatures can be furry, have wings, have 6 legs, eight legs or no legs if you like! They can be real or mythological (Everyoneloves a unicorn, lol) - it really is up to you.
 The usual rules apply, you can enter up to three times, combine with other challenges, use any make of stamp......but can I please remind you we are a stamping challenge and stamping must be the focal/predominant element of your work. Conventional rubber/acrylic stamps and digital images are acceptable, but pre-coloured digital images and toppers are not.
 For my card I used a Crafty individuals stamp, CI-225. I stamped the image on to silk art card with Archival ink and coloured with distress markers and a water brush.The background layer was stamped with Inkylicious old wood floor stamp and memento rich cocoa ink.  the backing papers come from the Be Creative Natures Portrait paper pad. The lacy border down the paper is also from Be Creative.
'What is the prize?' I hear you ask. You get a big stash of the new wonder crystals and embossing powders, in fact some brand new colours that Justin and Gordon have been busy creating! Take a look on the Hochanda Website and Once Upon a Stamp's Website for Be Creative goodies.
Do pop over to the challenge blog and take a look at all the fantastic creations by my lovely teamies. There are some absolute stunners again this month! Hope you get the chance to join in and I'll look forward to seeing all your lovely creations!
As this post goes live I am off to Doncaster Dome for Stamp Magic and a chance to spend some birthday money! Sadly I am going alone as Lynne hasn't been able to come down due to a nasty virus. I have her shopping list though, and  I am also going to select some blog candy, because after all of Mr Blogger's shenanigans, I now have 300 followers again! Come back soon for more details. Hope your Sunday is a good one!
Thanks for looking!

Christmas at Stamping Sensations

 Good Morning! It is the first Sunday of November and so it is time for a new challenge at Stamping Sensations. This month we have the Theme of Christmas and we have the wonderful Little Claire sponsoring us. Here is my card featuring the Little Claire stamp 'Stocking owls'

I stamped it in Memento Tuxedo Black and coloured with promarkers. I added some inkylicious 'fluffy Puffy stuff ' (Like liquid applique if you remember that!) and heated it to make it puff up. The retro DP is the last sheet of a very old dovecraft pack. The sentiment is also a Little Claire stamp from the set 'The magic of Christmas.'

Whilst I was here I thought I would show you another fabulous Little Clare stamp - Robin Redbreast. This one is very popular with all the bird watchers in my family!

Again it was coloured with promarkers and I added lots of diamond stickles for the snow. The DP is another very old one from Dovecraft. The border was cut using a tonic border punch.

 

Our prize this month from Little Claire is a £35 voucher to spend in their online shop. How cool is that? I could spend it very quickly, lol!
Do pop over to the challenge blog and take a look at the gorgeous projects from the DT. They really have excelled themselves this time! Thanks for looking!

Autumn Owls

I am rushing in last minute for Allsorts this week! I made this card with Inkydoodles (owls, mushrooms, branch and butterflies) and Inkylicious (delicate vine) stamps, ink dusters, Adirondack inks and promarkers. I also added a bit of sparkle with a gellyroll clear sparkle pen, which hopefully you can see here...

The theme at Allsorts this week is Autumn, and the weather is definitely getting more Autumnal by the hour!
Thanks for looking!

Owl be thanking you!

Thanks for all the lovely messages wishing me Happy Birthday last week. I spent a bit of my birthday money on this gorgeous stamp by Little Claire. I made a quick one layer card with it to say thank you to my friend Sarah for the money, and for buying lots of my cards too. The sentiment is from Inkylicious and the background is dusted with memento grape jelly, lilac posies and dandelion yellow. The image is stamped with versafine black. I don't think it looks quite so grainy in real life!

On the subject of owls I got a lovely treat a couple of days before my birthday. We had organised for a company called Hawks of Steele to come in to school to bring owls to the year 2 class who are learning about nocturnal animals. Knowing how much I love owls I got invited through to have my photo taken.

Isn't he a beauty? He was so friendly too. Not sure if it was this one or one of the others that was in Harry Potter (as an extra!)  You can read more about the wonderful work Hawks of Steele do on their website.
I will leave you with  a photo of  belated birthday flowers given to me on Thursday. I have never thought of hyacinths as a cut flower before, but they look and smell amazing!

Thanks for looking!

A few Christmas Cards

Well, I've only been home for half an hour, as it is Panto Week at school (Oh yes it is!). We just have two matinees to go now, so the late nights are over. I made a few Christmas cards at the weekend, but just haven't got round to posting them until now. These are all using stamps from Little Claires, which I bought or had bought for me (Thank you, Lynne!) at Doncaster.

The first two feature the Christmas Owl tree (so cute!) and some rather old Dovecraft papers. I added a ribbon and a sentiment from Craftwork Cards. The image is coloured with promarkers, which I tried to match to the papers. The first one here is for Crafty Cardmaker's challenge where I used the photo inspiration (Tree and colours).

For the next two cards I used Robin Redbreast and more old papers! I coloured again with promarkers, and then went a bit mad with stickles!

The border on these two is a tonic punch.
Challenges:
Little Claire's Monthly challenge 27 - Christmas
Thanks for looking!
 I hope to catch up with you very soon x

Photos from my holiday

Well, I've been back from holiday for 3 weeks and have realised I haven't shared many photos with you, so I'll do a quick post today and then maybe share some cards with you tomorrow.
Whilst in Suffolk we visited Suffolk Owl Sanctuary, and got up close to some beautiful birds of prey. There was the Red Kite...

and the Buzzard...

and so many owls!

Great Grey owls,

Eagle owls,

barn owls

and spectacled owls, that have the most beautiful soft hoot you could imagine. Thanks for looking!