Dolly Mixtures.....

 Here is a quick card made with one of the ready-coloured images I bought from the show at the NEC. My new paper pad called Cheryl, from the Dolly Mixtures range by Craftwork Cards were a perfect match. The Dolly Mixtures paper pads are gorgeous, lovely coordinating tiny patterns - perfect for cards

A few have asked the name of the teen girls on cards that I featured from the show. They were from The Hobby House, and come in ready coloured die cut sheets from their Kenny K range

If you are looking for a bargain this weekend, Letraset are offering a 20% discount in the store. Go HERE to browse, and enter the code EAEGG13 at checkout. I am not sure if this works with the sale items that have up to 50% off, but it's well worth a browse. Those of you from the USA and Canada who find it difficult to find the limited edition colours, here is your chance, and if you spend over a certain amount shipping is free worldwide (try hooking up with a friend to make a joint order...) If you are not from the UK, click on the flag at the top of the page to get the currency changed to yours



Talking of bargains, I was browsing Poundland today and look what I spotted, gorgeous little tubes of micro beads in different colours. The whole pack for £1. Apparently they are meant to be sprinkled onto nail varnish before it dries. I can imagine it would be very irritating to have bumpy little nails, but sprinkled onto a drop of glue in the center of a flower.....perfect

The floor is more or less done - edges etc to do after Easter. We had it laid from the front door/hall into the kitchen, it makes a big difference, the whole space looks bigger. I am finding this whole process quite exciting!

I hope you all have a lovely Easter weekend x

Sorry.........

I am still battling to catch up with things, working at the moment on something I can't share just yet so thought this 'sorry' monkey card that I made for Papercraft Inspirations magazine was appropriate. All the papers, and the monkey image and sentiment were printed out using the Paper Boutique (vol 1) CD from Polkadoodles...................check out the new digi stamps by Nikky while you are over there, called Fredericka they really fill a gap as they are images of women, not cute girls or children. I will be working with them over the weekend so you will see what I mean next week

and just in case anyone is at all interested, here's a sneak peek at how the kitchen is coming along - shiny new stainless steel appliances in situ, the trouble is, they look so shiny and new, I don't really want to cook, I might dirty them.......I did however bake a cake, for the first time in years. I read somewhere that the best test of a new oven was to bake a cake, so despite the fact that we don't often eat cake and it is a matter of supreme indifference to me whether the cake rises evenly, I had to have a go, and found it quite relaxing. I think I may try hot cross buns next. US friends probably wonder what on earth I am talking about, I don't think I have ever seen a hot cross bun over there. In case anyone is wondering, it's a yeast based dough with currants and cinnamon which has a cross baked on the top, we eat them by the million over here at Easter time. I have no idea why they are called 'hot' as they are usually served cold, spread with butter. Another British idiosyncrasy

and I love my new Metro tiles with an inset made from little stainless steel squares, rock, and tumbled glass, lots of texture there

The floor is being laid tomorrow, then the decorator comes in next week. I hope I have chosen the colours wisely because I am going down to London for a couple of days and won't be around to scream 'STOP' if I got it wrong

See you tomorrow

   

Which Craft?

One of the joys of going to a craft show is that sometimes you come across a company new to you whose display enchants and inspires......this time I just loved all the projects on the Which Craft stand. A Yorkshire craft store, they design and sell a whole range of templates and ready cut and scored cards - like their scalloped step cards, all ready to use, none of that tedious measuring and cutting

I loved this little vintage book box, that opened to show a sweet little accordion mini book inside.....

 

 These little box templates make the cutest gifts, they would be great for wedding favours as well.....

and some of the precut cards - loved this pop up one, and the scalloped rocker in the background......

and here is another clever idea - all the stamps are by Molly Bloom, also available from the shop

 and open............

a ready made scallop edge step card......

and a precut and scored twisted easel card......

and just look what they did with this step card and some Molly Blooms.....apologies for the shadows, show lighting was bright!

 The good news is that they do mail order go HERE to see. I am not sure if they ship internationally

Back to reality now, sigh. I have a few projects I need to be working on, but a lot of kitchen stuff has made it's way upstairs and finding a route to my desk may be difficult, I may need to take a compass and a packed lunch

More NEC Photos.......

Some more photos of the samples at the NEC Hobbycrafts show - I always think samples give great ideas for colouring and card layouts, so I hope you enjoy them........

 a whole wall of the latest Memory Box dies, and I didn't buy one!

So what did I buy? I was quite restrained really, some ready coloured and die cut Mo Manning images for quick cards, some 6 x 6 embossing folders,  three masks and tape, three Clarity tree stamps, my favourite silicone glue,  and a Gelli plate - why I bought this I have no idea except that I had heard it was the latest must-have. It's like a slab of gelatine that you slap acrylic paint onto for different effects. Mmm, now the excitement of the show has receded, I can see this one making it's way to the 'I had to have it but never used it and now I feel guilty' drawer...............

See you tomorrow with the last photos of the show, but don't miss them, they are gorgeous...

The winner, and a trip to the NEC

Firstly, apologies for the delay in posting the winner of the Polkadoodles CD, who is

Daisychain

Congrats, email me with your name and address and I will get your prize in the post

The kitchen and other stuff really have kept me so hectically busy this past week, but I was thrilled to get my latest parcel of design team stuff from Craftwork Cards, gorgeous papers and this trio of little ladies that I coloured to take with me to the craft show at the NEC. They come printed on postcard sized cards, so no messing about with stamping and you have plenty of space to cut around them with label shapes if that suits your design 

Here is the Craftwork Cards booth at the show - you can see Julie answering questions from the crowd.....

and some of the lovely samples, Craftwork Cards stands always look so pretty at the shows...... 

I love these little scottie dog die cuts, I can't wait to do something with them...

then it was time for a coffee and gossip with Nikky Hall and Kath Stewart, boy did we put the world to rights.....

I have lots more photos of samples to show you in the next couple of days.

Now we really don't expect this at the end of March..........

The other 'incident' that set me back a bit last week was a visit to the cinema with my girlfriends. A visit to the loo before the film (why is it always women who do that? Do men have cast iron bladders I wonder?), and my iPhone which was in the back pocket of my jeans fell out - right into the loo. Dead, kaput, nothing on the screen, not even a flicker. So I googled, and the advice was to put it in a bag of rice on a radiator and let it dry out. Much anxious peering into rice bag......still dead. I took it out of the rice after a couple of days (I was a bit obsessed with throwing the rice away, considering where the phone had been) So off I went to get a new phone, luckily my contract was due for renewal anyway. Problem solved. Then Mike helpfully put my phone on to charge - only he charged the old one by mistake.
Yes, you guessed the punch line.....
Old phone is now in perfect working order 

Not much crafting....

There hasn't been a whole lot of crafting going on Chez Nous this week, but I can share with you this card from this month's Papercraft Inspirations Quick Cards magazine. My commission was to make four cards with a theme of 'drinks with friends' and this is one of them. The magazine has a lovely stamp set as the cover giveaway this month, look out for it on the newstands now........

and this is the reason for the lack of crafting, the whole house seems to be in uproar, but now that it's ongoing, I am rather enjoying it and keep stroking my new hob and worktops........

the only bit of colouring I have done is slapping some paint samples onto a wall, whoever thought of those little tester pots is a genius, the colours look so different on the wall compared to the colour charts, and different again when the paint has a couple of coats and is totally dry

Don't forget it's your last chance today to put your name down for the Polkadoodles CD, I will be drawing the winner tomorrow

Any of my UK blog friends going to the Hobbycraft show at the NEC later this week? I will be there on Friday.......  

Win A Polkadoodles CD

Today I have another card using the new Polkadoodles digi stamps to show you - sorry about the stray bit of cotton that got onto the lens of my camera and which I didn't notice until the light had gone! Coloured with ProMarkers, I decided to make her a bit funky with a trendy hair colour!

I used:

Lime, lime zest, bright green, green for her hair

Skin - blush, coral, soft peach

Jeans - cool grey 1, 2, 3 & 4

Top - spice, cinammon, ginger

Everyone who leaves a comment on this post is in with a chance of winning a Picknix CD rom by Polkadoodles, with masses of papers for you to print, digi stamps, all sorts of goodies for you to play with. To see the CD go HERE
All you have to do is leave your name, I will draw a winner on Wednesday. Good luck! For those of you who can't wait, there is a great offer on at the moment, ALL of Nikky's CD's are on sale for a bargain £9.98, that is only around $14.00 and you get free worldwide shipping as well for orders over £10, so you will just have to throw some ribbon or dewdrops into your cart to take advantage of that. You could pay that for a single stamp, so these packed CD's really are a bargain

The kitchen saga goes on.....and on..... the garage is full of stuff waiting to be installed, we have all the ducks in a row - apart from the door handles which are a bit of a nightmare. I am a bit bored (very low boredom threshold) with all the nitty gritty stuff now, and I am itching to get on to the nice stuff like blinds and accessories. The painter guy came today and said he will be here for two and a half weeks, starting the day after Easter. I bought twelve tester pots of paint - I think we are going to be living in a patchwork world for the next few weeks. 

Polkadoodles Digi Stamps

Thanks to all of you who entered the Flexmarker skintones draw, the winner has been drawn and is:

kathr

 Congrats kathr, email me with your address and I will get your markers in the mail to you. If the prize isn't claimed by Sunday, I will draw another winner from all those who commented on the relevant post.

On to today's card........

Polkadoodles have got the cutest new digital stamps in stock, the beauty of digis is that they are instant gratification - buy, instant download, print, colour.....saves space and money as well! I tried  a while ago to move from wood mount stamps to cling, the problem with that is that I keep losing the cling stamps! They probably get swept up in the hurricane that is my desk while I am working.  These digis are a joy to colour, I'll have another card to show you tomorrow, and a Polkadoodles treat for you as well

Who would have thought that revamping a kitchen would be such hard work. Of course, the fact that I seem paralyzed in the decision making department isn't helping. I am usually very decisive, and know exactly what I want, but I seem to be changing my mind about all the details. We ordered some worktops (countertops), after about three hours of searching in a single store. Later that evening, I was hit with the terrible knowledge that I had made a terrible mistake...I was at the door of the store as it opened, to change my order. I almost took a packed lunch with me. There was a definite lift in the voices of the staff as they finally wished me goodbye. I bet they talked about me after I shut the door - 'I thought she would NEVER leave.......' They even called me later that day to say in a tentative voice 'we are just going to place your order. Is there anything you want to change before we do?........

So today we moved on to the tiles......no, I can't even begin to bore you with that. Tomorrow is another day, yes folks, tomorrow is door handle decision day. Yawn

See you tomorrow if you can bear all the kitchen waffle.....

Getting Krafty.....

It's my turn to post on the blog over at Craftwork Cards today, here's one of the things I did for the post. They make the neatest boxes to hold heavily embellished bulky cards, but I turned this one into a gift box and matching card, it's big enough to hold a pretty piece of jewellery as well as the card.....

the pretty die cut flowers are such fun to work with, I twisted the petals of the top flower and glued them down. I love the subtle aqua patterns......

If you have time for a bit of blog hopping, I would really love it if you could pop over to the Craftwork Cards blog to see what else I created, and leave a comment there, the team does such lovely samples and there is a new post every day, so worth signing up to for a bit of inspiration

Those of you on my email contact list, apologies if you got an email yesterday with a link to another site. It was not from me, someone hacked my personal email and sent out spam messages to all my contacts. Apparently, the email told you that you could sign up to earn $5,000 a week. Now that was definitely not from me, if I knew how to earn that much, I would be sunning myself on a beach in the Caribbean not sending out emails to all and sundry. Passwords have been changed, so hopefully that will put a stop to any more nonsense from idiot spammers

Have a great weekend x