In the Pink.....

I am not a huge fan of Magnolia stamps, but every so often I have the urge to colour one, especially as a friend loves them, she calls them the 'little girls with no faces!', and it's her birthday next week.....I do love the clothes these little children wear, this stamp is probably about four years old and she still looks trendy

I punched some flowers and leaves to make a spray 

Maybe I was too harsh - she does look cute!

We have rebooked our flights for early next week, so if all goes according to plan, my timetable over the next few days will be:

Washing and ironing - 3 hours

Cleaning the house - 4 hours

Packing - 1 hour

Sorting and packing my craft stuff - 2 days!

I have been doing a bit of armchair shopping again, Blitzy have some Sissix Tim Holtz alterations embossing folders on sale, I only have a couple of these and I love the way they emboss, really crisp, so I ordered four sets, they should be waiting for me when I get back to the States. One of the sets is this one, I just love those pine trees, and I have some ideas for the bare tree as well...........then I couldn't resist the sewing set, those wonky stitches look just like my sewing! 

 Hop over there and see what all the fuss is about, they have some great bargains, and if you refer friends you get credits as well.....can't be bad

See you tomorrow

A card for Daddy......

I love this little boy image from Sugar Nellie - it's a digi stamp so I can just print it out and start colouring. I think it's the perfect card for a little boy to give to his Daddy for a birthday or fathers day. 

Coloured with Promarkers:

Skin ivory and blush

hair ivory, buttercup and caramel

shirt sandstone, caramel tan

shorts denim blue and pastel blue

toy lipstick red and red

I knew I would use this Nellie Snellen punch over and over. I didn't have a matching ribbon in the right width, so I cut a sliver of the plaid paper and used that to thread the tags

What did I tell you? Went down into the town today to get some groceries, hair washed, smart (ish) clothes. Did I see anyone I know? Nobody. Not a friend to be seen. I was approached by an old tramp who asked me if I could spare a pound, so obviously I looked the part to him at least!


See you tomorrow.

Simply Fabulous......

Here are two of the first cards made for Kanban, for this first one I used their red striped paper and the flowers are rolled roses, which I sprayed with water first to make them pliable, before distressing and curling the edges. The scroll is a Sissix die, and the sentiment and pearls are also from Kanban

For this next one I used one of Kanbans aperture cards and butterfly background stamps. I stamped the background in embossing ink and clear embossed it, then I swiped the panel with various colour distress inks, before wiping with a tissue. The butterfly on the front of the card was also coloured with distress inks. Punched flowers and a Sissix leaf spray finished it off......

Thanks again for all the good wishes. Mike is doing well.


I have made a discovery. Going shopping with freshly washed hair and nice clothes means that you will never meet anyone you know. However, if you go shopping with hedgehog hair and old jeans, allow extra time, because you will bump into everyone you know, including that girl from long-ago schooldays,  who was always the prettiest/best dressed and irritatingly hasn't changed much.........


See you tomorrow

Yo ho ho.........

Here's one I made using an adorable little pirate stamp by Nellie Snellen. The ribbon tags were done with a Nellie punch, and the letters are little alpha stickers from her. All these are available from Scrappy-go-Lucky - I certainly haven't been able to find the teensy alphas here in the UK, mores the pity. I love these clip punches that she does, and will be using them a lot. The papers are old ones from a DCWV stack

Coloured with Promarkers...

Skin: blush and soft peach

blues: pastel blue, denim blue and cornflower

browns: sandstone, caramel, tan

Not a lot of time to sit and absorb the funny side of life at the moment - it's hard to do that when you are sitting in a doctors surgery for the seventh time in a week. However, I was cheered to read a horoscope while we were waiting. Mine said
'This past week has been very stressful, next week, the moon is in alignment with Mars and your stress will lessen. Soon you will be wondering what you were stressed about........'
Phew. What a relief, I felt instantly much much better, quite perky in fact (although I only believe horoscopes when they say something nice...). Then I saw the date on the magazine. February 2010. Oh dear. Gin and tonic anyone?

April Challenge

Here we are - mid April already, so I'm a bit late with this. This month's challenge will run until May 1st, so slightly less time this month. Two winners - one my favourite card, one chosen randomly, will be able to chose a Collectors set of 6 Promarkers of their choice from Letraset. Go HERE to have a little daydream about what set you would choose if you win.......

Here's what Letraset say about the sets

There are 6 sets, each set contains 6 markers and four collectible swatches. The first swatch acts as a reference for the ProMarker colours included in the set, while the remaining three swatches suggest further tonal combinations. Once you have collected all 6 collector’s sets, you can complete the swatch book (referencing all 148 ProMarker colours in tonal groups) with the swatch cover and fastener (available separately).

• ProMarker Collector’s sets have been carefully chosen to compliment and work well together, meaning you can easily mix and match sets to suit your own personal style.


• Each set contains six ProMarkers grouped by tones, offering a balanced and logical way to build your marker collection.


• Buying in tones is a great way to build your marker palette. Even if you only have one or two sets, you’ll have enough colours to start designing straight away.

Read more: http://www.letraset.com/products/2193-ProMarker-Collectors-Sets/4700-ProMarker-Collectors-Set-1---Vibrant-Tones/#ixzz1s7DbECmQ

So here's the challenge for April, 

Make a card for a child - any age, boy or girl

Here's mine, made with a Nellie Snellen stamp

Please link your photo to Mr Linky below. A new card made for the challenge please, no back linking to old posts on your blog. If you don't have a blog, you can still join in, either by putting your photo in an album like Picassa (preferred method because it saves me a lot of faffing about!) or by emailing your photo to me, and I will put it on this post. You can enter as many times as you like, please link back to the challenge on your blog. Good luck x

A big thank you to everyone for your kind get well wishes for Mike, he is doing well now, back to his old self, so we can start to move forward.......... 

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March Challenge and Blog Hop winners

Time for the Polkadoodles weekly challenge, this week, it's Pretty in Pink, I used a scene and image from the new Sugar plum CD, I printed the little girl out twice, once onto spotty paper and cut out her dress from that and paper pieced it. I added some punched flowers to the fence scene. Do join in with the challenge if you fancy making a pink card - you don't have to use Polkadoodles products

On to the winners of the March challenge. The entry I chose for originality of the use of 'found' items was this one by Brenda (Brenda was the random draw winner last month, and the favourite of the month this month! Just shows, it pays to keep trying.....). She used all mannner of stuff, including dyeing a shelf liner, and building a fence out of matchsticks! Well done Brenda

and the random winner was Gra, with this lovely mermaid card,  using wrapping paper very effectively to create a watery background for her mermaid card - congrats Gra

If you would both email me with your address and telephone number, telling me which stamp set you would like Letraset to send you, your prizes will be in the mail to you


On to the winner of the Sugar Plum Polkadoodles CD blog hop winner. The name that Mr Random.org pulled out of the hat was.......

MelodyR aka Ry&MysMan

Congrats Melody, email me with your address and I will get your CD in the mail

The next challenge will be posted tomorrow, be sure to call back and see what I have come up with for this month. 

A lot of you have noticed a rather deafening silence this week, I don't think I have ever gone so long without posting, and thanks to all my regular blog friends who noticed and emailed me. Without going into detail, Mike my husband was taken ill rather suddenly and dramatically on Sunday night, this week has been a constant round of tests and treatments, he is getting better and the doctors are pleased with him, but our trip to the USA has had to be postponed for the time being, so I have had a lot to deal with this week, and any thoughts of crafting or blogging were very firmly on the back burner! I'm back now though, so I'll see you tomorrow with the April challenge x

More Sweet Peas.....

As soon as I saw this weathered wood paper from the new Sweet Pea collection by Craftwork Cards, I knew what I wanted to do.....use my memory box window die with the shutters, and build a spring scene.........

The flowers were punched from the pastel papers, and shaped with a foam mat and a ball tool before being arranged into the window box, which I cut by hand......

I put some blossoms onto the twig branch, to make it more Springlike. Do you know what they are? I punched holes using the largest punch on a cropadile, and collected the little punched circles. They are perfect!

Max and Milo were on great form - sometimes Max's enthusiastic hugs leave his little brother looking a bit bewildered.........

Out grandchildren call us Ma and Pops, but Milo has developed his own unique way of addressing us - he always calls each of us 'MandPops', so he has turned us into a sort of generic pair of grandparents, interchangeable and with the same name. 


I will be sorting out the winners of this months challenge over the next couple of days, forgive me but I have had a few problems to deal with. I need to think of the next challenge as well.......... watch this space

Happy Easter - and some Sweet Peas....

I have been itching to make stuff with the new Sweet Pea collection by Craftwork Cards, the colours and textures are just gorgeous, my all time favourite I think. I love the whitewashed weathered wood look, and it makes it so easy to make lovely cards. For this first one, I just used two of the textured squares as a background to some stamped flowers (also by Craftwork Cards), and stamped the blooms a second time onto the taupe paper, and cut out.....

and this second one was made in much the same way, but using one of the diecut blooms as a focal point.....I get a lot of queries asking if these papers are available in the USA, Craftwork Cards will ship to North America, but there is a flat rate shipping charge of £22 which is $35, so if you are desperate to get hold of some, it may pay for you to club together with a couple of crafty friends to share the shipping costs. Card Candi and the messages are available in the States now though....

I mentioned news..... woo hoo! I am going to be doing stuff for Kanban Crafts, I have always loved their stamps and the gorgeous patterned cardstock, so I am very delighted to be joining a brand new design team, the postman has already staggered up the path with a huge box of goodies, so watch this space.........  

just to remind you, here are a few of my past cards made with Kanban products........

The monthly challenge closes tomorrow night, so if you have a bit of time on your hands in between scoffing all the Easter eggs, you just have time to get a card done.......


Off to London now for chocolatey hugs with Max and Milo.....

Fancy Flowers

Here's a card I made using some foiled grey and lilac papers from the Dreamcatcher paper pad from QVC (UK)

I punched the flowers, then sprayed them with Perfect Pearls mist for a lavender sheen....

the sentiment is from Clarity Stamps, the mat was cut with Elegant Edges

I hope you all have a peaceful and joyous Easter weekend. We are off to London on Sunday, bearing eggs galore, to see Max and Milo. Max of course is learning to read - C A T says cat, that type of thing. So they were in Pizza Express and he was 'reading' the menu. 
'They have chocolate cake' he announced
'Show me and tell me what it says' said Daddy
'I can't tell you, I don't speak Italian' said the boy wonder..........


I'll be back tomorrow with some news x

Craftwork Cards Design Team Call, and it's fun being a tourist.....

Here's an exciting opportunity for those of you looking for a design team place, Craftwork Cards are looking for four new team members, as one of the existing team I can tell you that it is a lovely, friendly team to be on, headed up by the super talented Julie Hickey, and I don't need to tell you how lovely the products are that you will be playing with...... if you have any questions, and to see the full requirements, go HERE.  Here's what they say.....

We have 4 Design Team places up for grabs!We are looking for talented paper crafters to join our existing Craftwork Cards Design Team.

Being a part of the Craftwork Cards Team means that:
* Every month you will receive our latest collection in the form of our exclusive Project of the Month kit.* Your work could be featured on our blog, facebook page, on the website, in our inspiration galleries, appear on QVC and could even be published in one of the national craft magazines.

* You will receive Craftwork Cards gorgeous products, before everyone else and will be part of our very talented and friendly team

No card from me today, I have been too busy playing hostess, but I thought those of you outside the UK would like to see where we went yesterday - this is the home of the Ferrers family, built in the late 1500's. A lovely moated manor house, called Baddesley Clinton, not far from where we live....... 

  The Spring flowers were lovely, I loved this ancient horse trough filled with primulas.......

and this is a flowering quince in full bloom...... 

the house was a sanctuary for Catholic priests in the days when Catholics were persecuted - there are several hidey holes where the priests were hidden when the house was searched......

I could use these colours on a card, isn't that a gorgeous shade of pink/lilac? 

 We went for a walk by the lake, the field was sprinkled with wild primroses

I'll be back tomorrow with some crafty stuff to show you hopefully, I need to get back to my desk....I have those lovely Sweet Pea Craftwork Cards papers to play with

Shades of Brown.....

Here's another of the Saturated Canary images I bought - isn't she lovely? Coloured with Promarkers, I decided on shades of taupe and brown.......

I just folded a piece of ribbon in half and attached with a button tied with string for an embellishment.....

Promarkers used
Hair vanilla, saffron, tan, umber, burnt umber
Dress Tan, caramel, ivory, blender
Skin blush and soft peach


Busy busy doing hostessy stuff with our visitors, will be back tomorrow.....

Funny?

Here's one of my cards from this months issue of Papercraft Inspirations magazine - my brief was to make funny birthday cards for a female, for the Quick Cards section of the magazine. The cards in this section of the magazine have to be designs that the readers can reproduce in about thirty minutes, so another challenge - this was quite a challenge altogether actually, most humorous birthday cards have a punchline on the inside of the card, and obviously this wouldn't do for a magazine publication, but I managed to come up with some - here's my favourite!

I have spent a weekend cleaning and cooking - we have friends coming to stay today, so glitter has been abandoned, stray bits of paper swept up, sticky pads removed from the floor........


I have also found another passion. Does anyone play Draw Something on their phone or iPad? Every ten minutes or so, I dash off to scribble another drawing, it's addictive. If anyone wants to join me, my user name is Enfysc - you will be astonished, amazed and amused at how bad I am at drawing stuff!