Not sleeping...honest

I'm back... I really dislike oops sorry its been ages since I updated my blog posts...and yet here I am faced with typing those very words. There is a reason behind my silence (Yipee! I have a proper excuse this time!) but it is boring (dislocated elbow and torn tendon)  and I want to get back to the good stuff...crafting!


While I may have been a poor injured crafter, the world has not stopped needing cards and gift ideas...





and so with a few adaptations to my usual processes, I have been managing to keep up with orders as they come in....                               Since I was last here I have made a variety of birthday cards, including a couple  for milestone birthdays...

Like this pretty sparkly 50th Birthday card (shown right)  with its delicate scrolls and hand made flowers....

to this  card on the left which was made for a one year old boy called Henry,  and features primary brights  along with  shiny and sparkly elements and an all important (to a small boy)  red car  constructed using dies, punches and velum for the glass panes.

Both cards were commissioned and designed specifically to incorporate information provided.

If you have an idea for a card for someone in your  life please do get in touch 

 Until next time, take care

C xx

BBQ

I must admit I am not a huge fan of the BBQ   but this week there was a BBQ at a local sheltered housing scheme and  I was asked to make a Thank You card from the residents to the person who made it all happen.

The request was a late one  (the I need it by tomorrow kind of late) and the remit was something BBQ-ish if possible ... so with the help of punches, embossing folders, fringe scissors, ink and bling, this was the end result.

Thanks for dropping by

Until next time, take care
Cxx

Blooming Lace

Today's card is one I made for my niece using one of my favourite colour combos...hot pink and silvery grey ... and I decided on a black base card for extra drama.

The lace background is stamped using the I Love Lace background stamp from Stampin' UIp! and the flower is also a SU stamp called blended bloom. 
The flower was coloured using blendabilities alcohol markers and I added perfect pearls liquid to the centre after I popped it up on dimensionals.

The picture doesn't really show the rather cute and snazzy bow I made although the pink brad gives you an idea of its location. I'm not sure where I got the ribbon but it is gorgeous embossed satin.

I popped up a punched sentiment panel and ink edged it in hot pink and blended it with smoky slate ink to match the card. I hope my niece will like it - I was pleased with how it turned out

Bye for now
Cxx

Birthday Beauty

I was recently asked if I could make a card for someone who loves different and ornate hairstyles and pretty bling...and immediately knew this was the prefect time to pull out one of my favourite - but sadly underused - stamps. 

The stamp is called Entangled and features a beautiful woman whose elaborate hair is made up of flowers and butterflies and beautiful greenery. I love it!

Taking inspiration form my chosen art collage backing, I coloured the image using promarkers, added layers of glitter for the dress and die cut a frame form blue glitter paper. I added a bow, lots of perfect pearls. 

I was pleased with the way this came out and the customer was delighted. I hope that this card put a smile on the face of the beautiful birthday girl too.

until next time, take care

Cxx

Happy Birthday Sunshine

 I may not be a huge fan of the hot weather but I love this cute Ray of Sunshine stamp set from Stampin' Up! and I used it to make cards for my Sister-in-Law's birthday...

and since I have two Sisters-in-Law  (from different branches of the family) with birthdays in the same month, it made perfect sense to use it twice.

The card to the right I made for my husband's sister's birthday earlier this week.  He was involved in the design of her card and we really wanted to give her a smile in an envelope. We added a few rhinestones to give it a little bling.






The card to the left  I made for my brother's wife who has a birthday coming up.  This one is a little more focussed on the sunny yellow and is minus the added bling...but the key is in the greeting...Happy Birthday Sunshine!

Until next time, take care

C xx

Alien waves

 I was recently asked to make a card for a boy ...and these fun alien images from VLVS immediately came to mind.

I started with plain black cardstock for the base and embossed and debossed some blue and silver mirror board using circl;es and dots embossing folders. I cut the aperture in the blue debossed card and added the waving alien. I then added the silver embossed  'planetary rings' and hand cut a smaller alien to cling to the  lower ring containing the sentiment.




                                                     
When the card is open there is another alien face waving through the porthole on the reverse front  and because the card base is black a panel insert was needed.

It was a fun card to make but shiny surfaces are difficult to photograph so apologies for picture quality.

Until next time, take care

Cxx

Getting Chunky

 These were a first for me...chunky ATC.

Artist Trading Cards have been around for ages but it seems the 3D wood based versions are a more recent development, merging ATC with alterable art.

These were a lot of fun....but I found it surprisingly difficult to get my hands on the wood needed to begin the project. Websites talk about getting offcuts from a 4x2 but of course none of the big stores or wood merchants keep offcuts, nor do they cut anything smaller than 9 inches wide. Eventually I located a huge length of wood, paid my tenner and then two of us battled for twenty minutes trying to fit it in the car. Thankfully the store was only 2 miles away.

 Once I had my plank of wood it was over to hubby to cut it down into 2.5 inch pieces. He then delivered me a bag of cut chunks  said here you go and handed me a few sheets of sandpaper. There was dust everywhere by the time I had finished sanding but I had my beautifully smooth edged blocks and I was ready to go... But where to start?

This was a new process for me and the possibilities were endless... logic dictated I should start with paint and so that is what I did... drying each layer before adding the next, playing around with different media until I was happy with the result.

Once I had my base blocks ready it was time to decide on how to finish them. These were always destined to fly to the USA  as part of an International swap and so that is where I finally drew my inspiration.

All of the stamps (images, sentiments and alphabets) used on these projects are from the wonderful Viva Las Vegas Stamps.

The wings I made from white card which I embossed, cut and stained with layers of  distress paint in solids and metallic and of course I used my trusty promarkers too. There are 5 surfaces to address in a chunky ATC and I tried to make a logical link all the way around.

These are already on their way to Las Vegas ...I just hope they have a good trip and arrive safe and sound.

Until next time, take care
Cxx

Since I used promarkers and spotted the theme was things with wings I also entered these into a challenge over at  Ilovepromarkers. Wish me luck ;)

Girly birthday and Father's Day.

Today I wanted to share a couple of cute girly cards using shades of pink.

The card on the right has an embossed background. The stamped image (by Prima) was coloured using promarkers and the little hearts on the waist and head bands were punched  using a new punch from Stampin Up! The flower and sentiment were from a goody bag bought from craft works cards about a gazillion years ago...there was always so much stuff in the goody bags I never managed to use even half of it.




The card on the  left was made using background papers form an art colage stack bought in the USA along with a selection of Memory Box dies...the hearts along the bottom of the card were the punch outs from the top bunting die... I dislike waste and this seemed like an obvious way to use the perfectly formed mini hearts as added accents.

The card on the right was the card I made for  my Dad this Father's day. Its a far cry from the riot of colour in the card he got last year...

This time I went for a more dignified approach and a totally monochrome look across the black to white spectrum. I incorporated grey striped washi tape and a metal button with black and white twisted paper twine
.

That's it for now
Until next time, take care
Cxx

Birthdays, birthdays everywhere....

It seems June is a very busy month for birthdays - I even have one coming up  myself shortly -  and I have  been very busy this week indeed.

Today is my lovely Mother-in-law's birthday and this is the card I made for her...with a teeny bit of  minor consultative input from my husband - she is his mother after all...

Happy to report that she was as thrilled with her card   as she was with  the two cakes we took along. Hopefully someone will send me photos of the cakes - they were very pretty as well as being delicious.

I  should point out I am not being boastful about my cakey prowess ...I did not make the cakes...I played it safe and  ordered them from a fabulous local place and collected them and stored them in my fridge until party time. They were yummy...and disappeared really fast.

So happy that our Mummy had a happy birthday... we will be celebrating my Mum's birthday at the end of the week...and I will be starting on her card tomorrow...

Busy busy...

Bye for now

Cxx

Birthday Blocks

Today I thought that rather than show a finished project, I would share something I am still working on.

 This is a block cube card and this cute and clever fold stands as 3D but folds completely flat to go into a standard envelope.

This style of card presents lots of fabulous options, including mounting it onto a base board and turning it into a keepsake - something I plan to try out later this month as there is a special family birthday coming up soon.

But for now - and while I wait (rather impatiently I must admit)  for a delivery - this is a  work in progress. Hopefully I will be back to share the completed project at a later date.

What are you working on right now?  I would love to know...

Bye for now
Cxx

In the pink...

Today I thought I would share a couple of recent cards... both in shades of pink.

The 25th birthday card (on the right) was made using the Tied Together embossing folder with perfect pearls as accents. The central flower panel was made using a Spellbinders die and secured in the centre with a candy dots brad (from Stampin' Up!) I really like these brads because they come separately form the centres so you can use any shade of candy dot to suit your project or as I did here, you can add a pearl or other gem. I distressed the edges of the panel and added a line of faux stitching with a white gel pen.

The birthday card on the left was made with a new (to me at least) die from Taylored expressions which produces an A2 panel of swirlyness.  I matted the die cut panel on to a piece of white card and offset this on the front of the base card, adding 3D stamped butterflies along the remaining edge and a mini sentiment panel in the centre.

TIP:  as this is a very intricate die I put strips of double sided tape on the back of the cardstock before I ran the die through the big shot. This meant that the adhesive was already on the back and I did not have to mess about with trying to put glue on the teeny strings of the pattern.


If you have any questions about any of the projects, products or techniques please leave me a message.

That's all from me for now.

Cxx

Grow your dreams

When I was in the USA earlier this year I came across a stamp set with this sentiment

 "Dreams come a size too big so we can Grow into them..."

and I just had to have it... because all too often our dreams, especially our creative dreams, can get sidelined by the practicalities of life and so many times we neglect our dreams or dismiss them as being unattainable...or inconvenient                                                    

But aren't dreams meant to be lofty so we can stretch ourselves to reach them, aren't we meant to aim high to achieve these goals? ... Sometimes it seems we need a little reminder and this sentiment says it perfectly.

I made this project to send to a friend. I intentionally kept the design simple and natural because I wanted the sentiment to be the focus of the project. It will be going in the post to her this week. I hope she will like it...I'll let you know.

Bye for now
Cxx

A new era

I have not been as idle as the lack of blog activity might suggest, it is simply that blogging here became a casualty of a busier than expected life...but hopefully things are about to change.

I am a Stampin' Up! demo and I have a blog specifically for my Stampin' Up! adventures. It has lots of fun projects made using SU products as well as specific promotion info. Feel free to check it out HERE ... but THIS BLOG  is dedicated to all my creative adventures and is free of restrictions. As such I am hopeful that there will be lost of fun as I move ever onwards in my creative journey...

So I thought I would kick off with a little update and a project sharing too...

I decided that it is time to get a little more involved with swaps and challenges and so I signed up for a few of each...and I had forgotten just how much fun they could be.

I am currently involved in a one to one card swap with Debby,  a crafter in rural Canada. The lilac butterfly card (pictured right) was the first card I sent to Debby.


I recently took part in a card candy swap (hard work but huge fun). For this we each chose a stamp set and made ten packs of card candy using that set as the base.  It takes a fair bit of time to create all the elements and then assemble each one and package them, but it is lots of fun and the end results can be surprising.

I took part in my first card candy swap  (pictured left) late last year
 and  the set pictured   right was my second time...and definitely won't be the last.





I have taken part in a tag swap over at VLVS and I am waiting for my return tags... The inspiration point for the tag swap was sunshine  and these are a few of my tags. The headless unicylist and the wording were from a collection of quirky VLVS stamps.



If you are ever in Las Vegas you really must pop in and say Hello to DeeDee and Jeff in their amazing rubber stamp store on Sahara. It is a truly amazing place... you will not regret spending time there, I promise!

Finally my last swap was a birthday card swap on ILWS. For this I decided to go against the cake (shock horror) and brightly coloured card styles and opted for a simple design and muted colour palette with this card.

Unfortunately I realised after I had sent them off that the photo does not clearly show the detail involved in this card and what shows as a blank space between the mounted squares and the candy dots is in fact staggered embossing. I have always known that my photographic 'skills' needed some work but this really brought it home. Must try harder eh?

Anyhow that is it for now... a little update and a few project shares...and time to move forward.

I am delighted to report that I have booked a one day jewellery workshop next month. I am really looking
forward to  trying something new and totally different. Watch this space as they say...

Bye for now

Cxx