Dora's Horses

Here is a card made with one of Dora's new Horse Digi stamps. You can find them on her blog here. I coloured it with promarkers and used that Inkylicious splatter stamp around the edges. The papers came from Canon Creative Park, although this exact colourway doesn't seem to be there now (Some similar ones though). Do pop over to Dora's blog and take a look at all her lovely digis as well as the DT's beautiful creations!
Thanks for looking and for all your lovely comments.

Rudolf days for August

I can't believe the end of August is approaching already! Five weeks of summer holiday has flown by and I am getting everything ready to start back at work next week. As usual, I am finding lots to do that aren't school related - Procraftinating is an excellent word for it!
As it is the 25th August it is Rudolf Day, and the perfect time to get distracted by Christmas cards! I was away for July Rudolf day and had intended sharing 4 card with you today, to make up for it. Unfortunately, one of my creations became bin fodder, So here are 3 cards
First is a card made with dylusions, a poinsettia stencil and some silkies from Imagination crafts, and a sentiment from Inkylicious.

 I heat embossed the sentiment using kaleidoscope embossing powder. You can see a bit of the sheen and sparkle on the photo below.

I added a bit of extra sparkle using a clear stardust gelly roll pen.
There was some of the silkies paint left over, so I used it up on a scrap of white card and added a touch of sparkle medium to made my next card.

 I added a Craftwork Cards sentiment and some gold liquid pearls.

 If you add the sparkle medium on a baby wipe in circular movements through the stencil, it just goes round the edges and gives quite a subtle effect.

 Finally I made a very traditional card using some new papers from Dovecraft, some added snippets and a very old stamp from Stamporium (No longer available) I coloured the image with Promarkers and added quite a lot of  stickles. here is a glimpse of the sparkle.

The circle and the border were two different snippets of red card that weren't quite the same colour, but I used a promarker to try and make it more uniform.
I am of course entering Scrappy Mo's Rudolf Day challenge, but I am also entering the second and third into Di's snippet playground.
Thanks for looking!

Creative Stamping Magazine or more birds!

Hi There
Thank you for all of your lovely messages for Megan in the last post. You are all so kind. Thanks also for your lovely comments about my bird photos. Truly appreciated x
Talking of birds, have you seen the latest copy of Creative Stamping Magazine that came out on Thursday?
There are some wonderful bird stamps with it this time. I have some cards on pages 10, 11 and 12. Here is a little taster...

If you would like to know how I made them then you will need to buy the magazine, which will of course get you the stamps as well!

Stamp Magic Time!

So who is going to Doncaster to Stamp Magic tomorrow? I will be there, but on my own as Lynne is not able to visit this time, and Meg is deep in revision as her A levels start on Monday. I have already made my shopping list and am very excited to see some different exhibitors this time. I will of course be visiting the stalls of all my favourites like Inkylicious,  Inky Doodles and Little Claire.
No doubt I will bump into some lovely friends. Drop me an email if you fancy saying hello.
My card is made using Inky Doodles stamps, promarkers and ink dusters.
Thanks for looking!

Flowers and Pearls at Allsorts

 

This week the theme at Allsorts is Flowers and Pearls. I found this DP in my drawer and decided to use it. It is a digi download from Pink petticoat and I love it! I stamped the flowers (Kanban) in Memento Espresso truffle and coloured with coordinating promarkers, adding a tiny bit of sparkle here and there with a sakura gelly roll stardust pen. I also dusted around the die cut and the main card with Tea Dye distress ink. The sentiment is from Woodware and was stamped in versafine black.
After mounting the die cut with 3d glue onto the card front I added some pearls onto the panel.
Thanks for looking!

A snippet make

Hi There!
Here is a card I made at the weekend. I decided to have a play with the Inkylicious toadstools1 set and a grass stamp from Essential grasses. The toadstool was coloured with promarkers and a white sakura gelly roll pen. I also stamped the paper behind the main image with French style script before dusting it with Tea Dye Distress ink. Everything was a snippet apart from the base card, so I am taking it to Miss Di's snippet playground.
 Hope you enjoyed the sunshine today. It was a beautiful day here and I had a lovely 15 minutes out on playground duty this afternoon.
Thanks for looking!

Spring, lambs and Creative Stamping

 Hi There!
I had a lovely trip out with a friend at the weekend to a tea shop a few miles from here. Beauvale Abbey is between Watnall and Eastwood to the west of Nottingham.

There is a wonderful tea shop in one of the farm buildings, and we indulged in a pot of tea and some lemon-iced ginger cake. The pot of tea for two had more than seven cups in it and the cake was delicious (that is high praise indeed from me!)
On our wander around the remains of the Abbey we met some very very new lambs...

They reminded me that the latest copy of Creative Stamping is now out, and there are some wonderful springtime stamps with it. There is a particularly lovely lamb, which I used on this card.

All details of how I made this and several more are in the magazine.
I will leave you with a photo of a beautiful primula that I treated myself to at the garden centre down the road.

Spring wishes to you, and thanks for looking!

March at Stamping Sensations

Good Morning! This month at Stamping Sensations our theme is 'One for the boys!'. It was an easy one for me as three out of four males in our immediate family have had their birthday already this year! . The card above was the one I made for my Dad's Birthday. The Garden shelf stamp is from Little Claire, and the stripy paper is a free download from Canon Creative park. I used promarkers to colour the stamps.

I stamped the watering can separately and attached with 3d glue. I also added flat backed pearls for the drawer handles.
My second card was my brother's birthday card.

This was made using a range of Inkylicious stamps, ink dusters, a mountain and valley stencil and memento inks.

We are sponsored this month by Foil Play who are offering a wonderful prize of £35 to spend in their on-line store.
Do pop over to the challenge blog and take a look at the stunning inspiration that our DT have created. I am looking forward to visiting and seeing all the wonderful creations you produce this month.
Thanks for looking!

Some snippet makes

Here are a couple of cards that I made from snippets. The first is a small card, using a snippet of cotton braid and leaves (Inky Doodles) stamped on snippets of white card and coloured with promarkers. I picked up the embossing folder in the Range sale for £3.00 I think - a bargain!

My second card used all snippets apart from the base card. The dylusions sprayed paper was left over from a crafty individuals card I made last year, and the snippets of black may well have been there for decades, lol! I added stickles to the top of the chloe stem die cut (Memory box). Unusually for me there is no stamping on this one, although a sentiment could be added as needed.
I am off to see Miss Di in the snippets playground for a huddle round the stove with the girls. It is way too cold and slippy to skip, and I am not chancing the slide in case of frostbite in the derrière!
Hope you are all keeping warm and dry. Thanks for looking!

Creative Stamping Magazine

 If you haven't got your copy of Creative Stamping magazine yet, here are two of the cards I made using ink dusters and the free cover stamps. They really are a very useful set of stamps called 'New Beginnings'. I am also chuffed to bits to see that Laura the editor chose the card below as her favourite card in this month's issue! The magazine has lots of great inspiration for using the stamps too.

Now I have seen the inspiration from the other designers I am looking forward to another play with them. Please forgive me if my visits to blog land are a bit spasmodic at the moment. We are pulling out all the stops at work as we are due to have Ofsted soon. I will try and get round to visit you all next week hopefully.
Thanks for looking and for all your lovely comments.

My Top 5 of 2014

Good morning! Still plenty of the crisp and even stuff here. Hope you are managing to stay warm. I am joining in again with Debby's Top 5  for the year. I had to go back through very carefully and had completely forgotten some! It was so hard! I think my choices are based on the reaction of the people who received them more than anything. Here goes then. My first card was inspired by a photo and stamped with Inkylicious stamps- the post about it (and the photo) is here.

 My second card was for a dear friend and colleague. Softy that I am, the sentiment on this card was so pertinent that I it made me cry. All stamps on this one are from Inkylicious and the original post is here

 My third card, using Inky Doodles stamps, was for another dear friend who loves foxes.

 My fourth card was the one I gave Steve for our Silver wedding Anniversary

 My fifth card was Steve's Birthday card

I couldn't just choose 5 though, so I have three runners up!

 First is Meg's birthday card using a mixture of Inkylicious and Crafty Individuals stamps. Find out more here. I was pretty pleased with the realistic shadows and waves breaking on the shore!

Next is one of the cards that I produced as a part of my third video tutorial

and finally a play with my dylusions, treasure gold, distress markers and Crafty individuals stamps which was a DT card for Stamping Sensations. More details here. Do pop over to Debby's blog and take a look at her lovely top 5 (+)!
Welcome to my latest followers Joey, Desire, Rita,Barbara and Viv. Sorry it has taken a while to welcome you! It is great to have you here. Thanks for looking and I will see you on Sunday for a new challenge at Stamping Sensations!

Snippet Birthday Card

I made this card for a friend using lots of snippets. The leaves and framed parts were stamped onto snippets of white card before colouring with promarkers and cutting out. The pale green snippet at the bottom was run through my cuttlebug with a stencil and my no shims mat before dusting with crushed olive Distress ink and stamping with the tiny acorn in the same ink. the faux stitching was drawn with a distress marker. All stamps are from Inky Doodles using the Woodland Walk set. 
I am popping over to Miss Di's snippet playground with it, and hope Parsnip has something warming stashed in the tree house ;). I think I have finished the Christmas shopping apart from food, so I'm ready for a hot toddy x
Thanks for looking!

Baby cards

 I needed a new baby card and a first birthday card recently, and, after seeing this baby card by Debby, using a new Mo Manning Baby Digi called Hush, I had to have it! I printed it and coloured it with promarkers. I stamped the base card (not very well - I need to practice with these stamps!) with Inky Doodles Little Patchwork stamps in various shades of pink, before giving a general dusting of Tea dye distress ink to make it look a little bit shabby chic. I added a sentiment and a ribbon to finish it off.

My second card is for my great Nephew's first birthday. This Mo Manning Digi (called 'I Love it!') was particularly apt in that he loves his train, but the little boy in the picture has quite a lot of hair compared to Elliot! The base card was stamped with another inky Doodles stamp from the Country checks set, in two shades of distress ink (tumbled glass and tea dye). The stitched alphabets are from Inky Doodles and the sentiment is from Little Claire.
Thanks for looking and for all the lovely comments. I hope I will manage to visit you soon!

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!

A get well wish and a birthday card

 I needed a Get well card quickly last week, so reached for my ink dusters and inkylicious stamps. The background was dusted with Memento Dandelion and Rosebud and crushed olive Distress ink. It looked a bit flat, so I added a few dots and leaf highlights with a gellyroll clear stardust pen. You can just about see it from this angle...

The next card was the birthday card I made for the same person. Whenever I get to work she is generally applying her make-up, so I thought this stamp from acid drops and whatnots was ideal! The Best Wishes sentiment is from Inkylicious.

Minimal colouring with promarkers on this one, but all my matting and layering is from my snippet drawer, so I am taking them to Miss Di's snippet playground.
Sorry I am not around as much at the moment. We have university open days for Meg on consecutive Saturdays throughout September. I think I am going to be crossing my fingers rather a lot!
Thanks for looking!

Anything goes at Stamping Sensations for August

Good Morning! It is the first Saturday of the month and time for a new challenge at Stamping Sensations. For one month only we are launching on Saturday rather than Sunday. This month we are giving you free reign and saying anything goes for our theme. I am sharing with you a couple of cards I have made recently.

First up I have a birthday card for my brother- in- law. He loves the outdoors and so I had a good excuse to use the old beech tree set from Inkylicious again! For those of you that missed previous posts about it, this stamp has been made in the image of a tree that my dear teamie Lynne can see from her front garden - how exciting! The background was dusted with memento inks in Grape Jelly, Bahama blue and dandelion. I used Adirondack Peach bellini around the sun.
My second card is another birthday card for a lovely friend who loves foxes. For this I used all products from Inkydoodles.

The leaves and fox were coloured in with promakers. The background was created by putting an Inkydoodles stencil through the cuttlebug and then dusting it with rusty hinge DI. The blackberries and acorns are also inkydoodles stamps.
Our prize this month is donated by Tonic studios. It is a fabulous die set...
and matching punch! Pop over to the challenge blog and see the fabulous inspiration from my lovely teamies. I look forward to seeing your entries!