BBTB and the Cutting Cafe

It was my turn to choose the challenge over on BBTB this week, and I chose the ribbon frame from the Joys of the Season cartridge, you should just see what the design team have done with this cut, pop over and take a look. I decided on blues and white, and cut an ornament to hang in the frame

added quite a bit of bling to bring it to life.

Over at the Cutting Cafe, Regina has this adorable little owl in a sentiment circle on sale for only 99 cents. Who could resist him? I know I couldn't. I printed it out twice, once onto white card, then again onto the spotty paper, and cut out the outer circle and hat from that. The background is a sissix embossing folder, and the snowflakes are cut with a martha punch

My birthday is turning into a month long fest this year, here are some more cards that I received last week, first from Cheryl, my crafting buddy here in Florida, what a gorgeous card..............



second, from Bev, another of my crafting buddies, I love the way she made the flower out of scalloped circles..............

and last, but definitely not least, from Joan, my pal from Port St Lucie in Florida, who has been quite poorly this month, but the first thing she did when she was well enough was head to her craftroom to make me this card, don't you just love that crunchy lace..............

Thank you all so much xxx

Whilst I am on the subject of friends, I have to make a very sad little post here, longtime readers of this blog may recall that back in the beginning of last year, I met up with a online crafting friend, Eileen, in London. We met on the cricut message board, and she lived just around the corner from my son, so were able to meet for lunch, a very long chat, and lots of laughs. Since then we have emailed each other regularly, and were planning to meet up again in January. You can see the apron card that she made me for my birthday in a post I made last week. I was shocked and deeply saddened to receive an email from her daughter at the weekend telling me that Eileen had passed away suddenly and unexpectedly on friday. She was a very talented crafter, devoted to her family, an encouraging friend, and a lovely, lovely person.
My deepest sympathies go to Karen and the family

I will miss her

Katies Kisses Stamps

The owner of the Stamping Studio, a local scrapbook store in Springhill, Florida, has just designed her own range of rubber stamps called Katies Kisses, and I have been making some samples for her. They are red rubber, mounted on cling, and stamp beautifully. Here's a couple of the cards I made, she doesn't have paypal set up on her blog yet, but all the contact and ordering details are on there.

Aren't they cute? I love the way they all have a little signature heart on their cheeks.

Good luck with your new venture Susan

I went shopping with Mike today, and after 20 minutes remembered why I like to shop alone, he is such a MAN when it comes to shops. Imagine the scenario, pull up outside a store, 'what are we looking for' he asks suspiciously. New luggage. Righto, so we march into the store and head for the luggage department, oh look, there is the handbag department, and they have this really cute little bag, which I hang over my shoulder, and look for a mirror to see if it suits me, yes, looks okay, let me just check all the little pockets to see if it has room for all my stuff, hmmm, maybe not. Repeat the procedure with another style, nope, decide against it I'll just look at the first one again to make sure............... , so off we trail to the luggage department again...............right past the sweaters, bad luck Mike. Do you know, there were ten different departments on the way to the luggage department, by which time my dear husband had left, and was sitting forlornly by the door, with that look on his face that men have when they have been forced into a living nightmare. So I finally get to the luggage, the suitcase we wanted was out of stock. Hey ho. 'Never mind' I say cheerfully, 'they are having a delivery on monday'. You should have seen the look of horror on his face, poor chap. I'll leave him at home with his book and footy next time.

Winner of the BBTB blog hop is

SHEILA

(crazy and lovin it blog)

Congrats Sheila, email me with your address and I will get the goodies out to you

Penny Black Saturday Challenge

On Penny Black this week, the challenge was a sketch, the design team samples were just lovely, so I had to join in

Mine is a really simple take on the sketch, I have gone into overdrive with my favourite tartans though

Before you look at the next photo, I have to tell you that it is only in the little creative bubble that I inhabit that I am such a slob, my house is very clean and tidy. However, when I get out there into that garage, stuff gets hurled to the floor, drawers get left open, it is frankly, chaotic. Every couple of days I have a major tidy up, which usually involves finding an element/stamped image/ that I searched for in vain the previous day. New year resolution maybe..........I have a feeling it may last until January 5th before I start hurling again.

Another Month - Two More Challenges......

Time for another Funky Hand challenge, set this time by Kath, who is a bit of a Christmas-a-holic, so of course she had to set this month's task, which is to make a decoration of some sort, do go over and take a look, the team have really pulled all the stops out on this one.

I found this JOY wooden word in the dollar bin at Target, it is covered in bright silver glitter, but I soon put a stop to that and covered the front with papers printed off from the Blue Christmas download

the snowmen were cut from the Snow Friends cricut cartridge, I gave them rosy cheeks, although a snowman shouldn't really be rosy, but it made them look cute
so get your thinking caps on, there is a £20 (about $30) funky Hand gift voucher up for grabs for the entrant that catches Kath's eye. You have until the end of the month to enter, and the only rule is that you use one Funky Hand paper in your design
The first of the month is also the start of the next Lily-Boo challenge, this month it's all about paper piecing. I printed out the image twice, once onto a pattern paper, and cut the tree out of that. It's really a summery digi stamp, but I fancied trying to make it look Christmassy, I think it worked? What do you think?
The base card is a pre-embossed one from DCWV - I was in a hurry as usual, and this saved time.

Again, you have a whole month to enter, it can be any sort of card, just paper piece something on the image. Quite a few new cardmakers come and visit, so a quick explanation about paper piecing, you stamp a base image, then stamp the same image again onto pattern paper, and cut out the bit you want - maybe a child's dress, a flower, you get the picture. Then stick the cut out piece onto your base image. This is a favourite technique of mine, and it cuts down on colouring too!


See you all tomorrow, I am off to clear up after the hurricane that swept through the garage, one of these days I'll take a photo of the mess I make, until you see it, you wouldn't believe it

BBTB Blog Hop Monday

The BBTB cut for the week is the old fashioned phone from the My Kitchen cartridge. I don't have this cartridge, so borrowed it for these cuts. In fact I think I should buy it, even though I don't do recipe books or anything like that, there are some useful cuts on there. I decided on all black and white, apart from the pop of colour in the bow and around the dial. The letter are making memories tiny alphas, 'hi' is DCWV chipboard. The border punch is one of Martha's new ones, punched twice and layered.

So what's all this about a hop? Leave a comment on this post, and on thursday morning I will pick a name from the hat to win a stack of colour box chalk inks, in shades of aqua and blues, some blue rub on alphas, a pack of rain dots, and some making memories metal frames. I will also give you this card, if you would like it. It will come with an envelope, all ready for you to use/give away.

From here, go to Krista's blog, where you will see another fab phone card, and have a chance to win her goodies, follow her link until you have hopped all around my buggy teamies blogs, by which time you will have a very good chance of winning a little something.

A couple of you asked what cartridges I bought over the weekend. I got Paisley, Sweethearts, Pagoda and Everyday Paper Dolls (I really dislike those little dolls, but the paper doll cartridges do have all sorts of useful extras on them.) The one I am most pleased with is Paisley, I will have a lot of fun with that. I do have a couple more on my wish list - Old West, just for the horses, and Serenade, but nothing urgent. Quite honestly, I haven't explored half the cartridges I already own.

Good luck with the blog hop, if you leave a comment, be sure to leave an indentifying name and don't forget to check back on thursday to see if you won.

White Christmas for DCM

On Daring cardmakers this week, the dare is to make a white card, you were allowed a bit of colour on stamps or sentiments, but I set myself the challenge of trying to make a totally white card, and except for a bit of bronze inking to define the edges, managed to do it. The trees were cut from the Christmas Cheer cartridge at 4", 3 and 2". and all the layers were run through the cuttlebug, using the snowflakes and snow folders

I added pearls rather than 'diamonds' as they added to the white look

everything was 'popped' to separate the layers and give it a bit of dimension

and still the gorgeous handmade birthday cards keep coming, this lovely apron is from Eileen, an online friend who has become a 'real life' friend, as she lives just a few miles from one of my sons, so we have been able to meet up....

this lovely card is from Denyze (love that image Den), another blog friend who has turned from virtual into reality, she lives locally to me, so we have been on a couple of crafty shopping outings together..........

and lastly from Jules, a longtime blog friend, who recently became a teamie of mine over on Funky Hand, I love the symmetry of this card, so clever. Thank you all so much x

So the shopping frenzy is over, and believe it or not, I do not have a shopping experience to share with you, unusual I know - that is if you don't count the people in walmart at 5 a.m who had fallen out of bed and gone black friday shopping in their pyjamas. Oh and the horrible grandmother in another store who kept clipping her toddler grandson SO hard around the ear, poor little chap. When he reached over and hit her (which of course was what he was being taught to do), she gave him such a whack. I glared and glared at her, until I remembered that guns are legal here and she looked like the type of woman who probably had a big old gun hidden somewhere in her pyjamas, so I moved to another line pretty fast. Apart from that, it was all quite cheery, and quite good fun

Polkadoodles Christmas....

On Polkadoodles this week, we were asked to use three different papers, and the Polkadoodles stamps. I didn't have a lot of time, because of this wedding scrapbook I have been working on, so I ferreted around and found a couple of scraps of my favourite papers from the Jingle Jangle CD, I stamped the snowflakes in red on a white base card, then stamped the tree onto a scrap of aqua and dotted some jewels about, plus a lot of doodling..........

I hope all my USA friends had a wonderful Thanksgiving. It is black friday here today, the day when there are huge sales on in all the shops, so I have been shopping since 5a.m. this morning - I know, crazy, but I have now finished my Christmas shopping and feel very smug. I have some lovely new cashmere sweaters to cozy up in when I get home, and five new cricut cartridges to play with. I also have a pile of cricut cartridges sitting here (lots and lots of them) that I bought as a favour for various online friends back in the UK, so they need to be parcelled up and sent off. I was only too happy to help, we just don't get the bargains at home especially as far as craft items go.

Time for a nap, all this shopping has been exhausting...........

Wedding Layout, my birthday cards and a deal for you....

First of all, a very special birthday wish, for a very special lady and friend, Anice, the owner of Funky Hand is having a birthday today, and boy, is she celebrating, read on to the end of the post to see how......................................

Another layout today, I am rattling on with the pages. This one is one of my favourites , the music notes are a cuttlebug die, and the sentiment is cut from the Plantin cartridge at 2.5" with the italic feature, the grey letters are american craft thickers, I like using a mixture of fonts and styles on scrapbook pages and cards

This is the first time I have used the welding feature on the gypsy, to fuse the letters together, and it worked! Here's a peek at the handmade cards I got for my birthday, first one made by Bev, my neighbour here in Florida,

Second from Kath, my good friend and teammate on Funky Hand and Polkadoodles



From Ruth, my teamie and friend on Funky Hand and Polkadoodles. Ruth leads an incredibly busy life and always manages to help others, send cards etc.............that funky hand team is the greatest!




From Carol, my friend and neighbour here in the USA


and from Allison, teamie and another pal from Funky Hand - it's her birthday this month as well, happy birthday Allison. Over at Funky Towers, november is a busy month for us, we have a lot of birthday girls in the house

Thank you all so much, I love them all, I know that there are a few more in the mail that are making the hop across the Atlantic, so will post them on here when they arrive.

How about this for a fantastic deal - Anice, the owner and designer of the Funky Hand CD's is 41 today - happy birthday Anice, and to celebrate, she is giving a 41% discount on anything in her store. Shipping is free to anywhere in the world, so and grab yourself a bargain, use the coupon code 41TODAY to get the discount

A Very Special Card................

Ta da..............fanfare...............this is the card that Kiki, my sweet little granddaughter who was five in August made for my birthday, which was yesterday. She did it all by herself, and even though I know that I am quite ridiculous when it comes to my grandchildren, I have to say that this is a fantastic effort for such a little girl. I think mummy helped draw the heart on the cake, Kiki was responsible for the other decoration (which I am sure is a strawberry)

Thank you Kiki, you are my most special little girl and I love my card

After the realization dawned on me that I have only three weeks to do a 20 page 12 x 12 wedding album, I have been working at full speed on it for the past couple of days. This page shows Lucy, the bride with her sister Nicola. I had all sorts of photos of the girls which were not really that good, so I chopped them into 1 1/2" squares and mounted them onto a strip of white card, which I stitched in pink. I added flowers (Martha Stewart wedding confetti from Michaels) to the sprays of the rectangle of pattern paper, and added another hand doodled spray in the bottom left corner of the plain pink card. The sentiment is chipboard alphas from DCWV. It looks quite pretty I think........

It has been so long since I had time to do any scrapbooking, that it took me a while to get into it again, then I remembered that I just treat it as a giant card, and that helps me get the proportions right most of the time
Did I have a nice birthday? Lovely! I went out for lunch with friends, and out to dinner, so I am rolling around with enough ballast in me to float a cruise ship. I also had some very yummy gift certificates, Michaels and Macy's - how well my friends know me :)

Joy - Christmas Polar Bear

This is a repeat of my polar bear card from last year, but this time I used icy blue instead of red for the scarf and sentiment. I cut the bear, from Joys of the Season, at 3" - he cuts BIG, and did a black shadow, then ran the whole lot through the cuttlebug. I freehand cut the snow drifts, in white and icy blue. The sentiment is a sudio G wood backed $ stamp

I have given myself a couple of days off this weekend, but have been spending time getting to know my gypsy, and do you know what? I am beginning to like this little machine. It's really useful not having to search for cartridges and overlays, and of course you can mix and match different cartridges on the same mat. I still have a lot to learn, and my cuts are just my usual straightforward ones, but at least I am managing to do those quite swiftly now. Apart from that, I suddenly realised that I have a 20 page wedding scrapbook to do before christmas day, so I am awash with cream papers and bling!

Mitten Book

I found this mitten chipboard book in the dollar bin at Michaels, what a bargain! I covered it in an American Crafts paper that already had a striped border on it, so that did for the cuff. The letter stickers are also from a AC pad, and I cut out tiny images of the children from those index prints that you get when you get photos developed

Here's a couple of pages from the inside, love those photos of Kiki playing in the snow last winter- the only snow she has ever seen in her 5 years living in London! Yes, I know I put a flower among the snowflakes on this page, but with these tiny books I go for making the pages look pretty and busy rather than telling a story. This little book will be James and Annie's christmas card this year.
It also fits in nicely with the challenge over on colour create this week, red, white and green.

Girlie Card for Polkadoodles

So Nikky, the boss lady over on Polkadoodles, who likes to set a fiendish challenge, asked us to make a girlie card using only the Just for Men CD. Ha, it was easy Nikky, I used the very pretty blue papers and sentiment, added a martha punch border and a bit of ribbon. The flowers are cut from the George cartridge on my cricut

I doodled on them in white, then covered them in glossy accents so they look like black patent leather, oops, missed a bit
I went to the post office yesterday, to mail some parcels and cards to the UK. Normally a visit there is quite an uplifting experience when lovely chatty helpful Jim serves me, but he was not there, so a chap I had never seen before served me. The parcels were no problem, the cards were another matter. "What's in these" he enquired, shaking the envelopes suspiciously, as if he suspected I might have a terrorist or two hidden away in there. "Cards" I replied meekly. "CARDS!" he yelled "HEY BUDDY (or Buster, or Hank or whatever his sidekick was called) LOOK AT THESE, THEY'RE CARDS, KINDA BULKY" "YEAH" yelled Buddy/buster/whatever - "SQUARE TOO, EXTRA FOR THOSE. TRY THE SLOT". I don't know why they were yelling, they were standing right next to each other. So my sweet mailman friend, the one with the phobia about square, bulky envelopes, tried determinedly to shove the envelopes through a little slot thingy, beloved of postal services the world over. Of course, they wouldn't fit. "EXTRA CHARGES" he yelled in a satisfied tone. I pointed out that the envelopes would not actually be going through a slot until they reached the UK, by which time it would be the Royal Mail's problem. "Rules are rules" he shrugged. Yes, and foam pads on handmade cards are foam pads.............................

Funky Hand Christmas and another doorway

Anice has bought out some sweet little digi images over at Funky Hand, the mittens were resized, which I am immensely proud about, out of all proportion to the achievement really, but it's the first time I have ever managed to do this, but Jules, a teamie on the Funky Hand gave me step by step, idiotproof directions, and it worked. Yeah! High five Jules! The papers are from Tis the Season, this year's christmas download. Little letter stickers by Making Memories

I have been fiddling around with the Art Impressions doors and windows stamps again. I printed the brick paper off the Polkadoodles Not for Girls CD. All the little elements are cut out and popped up
the sentiment, stamped inside the little open door says 'it's your birthday - indulge!'
For some reason, these little stamps fascinate me, although they are not really my style. When I have time I have a couple of ideas about what I can do with them......

Talking of time, I have finished my commission, written the text, and they are in the mail. Time to play.........

Golfing Card

I felt like making a bright and cheerful male card, they are often so dreary, the stamp is from an acrylic set by UK designer Clare Curd, paper is from a DCWV stack and the alphas are by DCWV (I think). The sentiment is a bit 'old hat' but it is such a useful one for golf cards

Here's something to make you smile, isn't she just hilarious? I do like a woman with a sense of style.......the stamp is by Art Impressions. the photo is a bit crooked, but that's okay, she looks a bit Brahms and Liszt (American friends, that's cockney rhyming slang, say it aloud a few times and see what rhymes with it.......)
Regina over at the Cutting Cafe has a free download - full of fabulous Christmas sentiments, I will make a couple of cards using them later in the week, in the meantime go HERE to pick up the file, it's available until thursday night

Two little christmas cards....and a DT call

We have a DT call going on over at Polkadoodles, a bit sad really because some of our team have moved to pastures new, Saskia has left to pursue other crafty interests, we will miss her and her fabulous funky style so much, good luck Saskia. In the meantime, Nikky needs FIVE new team members. If you love the Polkadoodles style, would like to get the CD's for free, make cards that will be shown on Create and Craft TV and can join us in our weekly challenges, then run over to Polkadoodles at once to put your name down. You can enter wherever you live.

Just a couple of very quick little christmas cards to share with you today, the papers are all by SEI, one of my favourite brands. The little angel and the noel stamp are $1 wood backed stamps from Michaels. The snowflakes are foam ones in the children's section of the same store, I'm all for cheating when it comes to christmas cards..... a jewel in the centre makes them look quite okay

This little image is from the Penny Black acryclic christmas set, I finally mastered the martha 'round the block' punches, all I had to do was read the instructions, they do look pretty though
Yesterday I escaped to the pool for a break, and just as we got there, we saw the space shuttle streaking across the sky on it's journey to space. It is about the fourth time I have seen a launch, never close up unfortunately, and each time I have been filled with awe at the incredible achievement of the scientists who make this possible. Well done America. That is the last time I will witness this probably, as the space programme has only one more flight before it ends

Snowman for Cute Daisy May

Over on Cute Daisy May this week we were asked to use texture. I used the quickest and easiest option, my cuttlebug and the snow folder. I ran the snowman through the machine after cutting him out and colouring him, and highlighted the 'snow' on his clothes with a white pen

this photo gives you a good look at the snow effect....................
I used my favourite making memories letter stickers for the sentiment. The papers are by mambi

There is a brand new photo of Kiki and Monty on my sidebar, look how that little baby boy is growing - he has hair now! I am going to see such a difference in the two babies when I get home.
I have been working all weekend on a magazine commission - would you believe I have been making Easter cards? Bizzare, no wonder I am so behind with my christmas stuff, I think it's April :) I have just sent an online order for photo printing to walmart for 122 photos, that have to be, somehow, turned into scrapbooks, mini albums and tag books before Christmas day, stupidly I paid extra for one hour printing, so if I want to pop up in my jammies they will be ready. Why did I do that when there isn't the slightest chance I will have time to do anything with them for at least a week? Search me.

Winner of the cutting Cafe little box is........

Penni - have fun Penni, email me and I will send the file to you. Those of you who didn't win, the file for the post-it box set is available for a tiny price over on the Cutting Cafe

A couple more for Creativity magazine

Here's a couple more of the cards that are in this month's Creativity. I was asked to do some new year cards using the freebie bear. For this one, I used some chipboard letters, but decided to use the negatives as well, the bit left over when you peel off the letters.

Another one from the designer challenge article, I did find using the mirri card really hard, and it's a bit of a rubbish photo, but this one looked quite cute. I made some little birds, using buttons for their bodies, and cut a wing shape out of the paper I was given to use. I drew the feet and tails.
A little reminder, don't forget you have until the end of the month to take part in the Autumn Woodland challenge over on the Funky Hand blog, great prize up for grabs there. The Lily=Boo challenge is also monthly, dead easy this month, all you have to do is use the colour purple

I had a birthday card in the mail today from Kiki (it's my birthday in 10 days, so I haven't opened it yet). My daughter in law made me smile, they spent all afternoon making the work of art, Annabel said 'Ma will love this card Kiki' 'No' Kiki replied, very firmly 'I don't think she will like it. I think we will keep it here in my house'. Already reluctant to give away her creations at the age of five. A true artist in the making.