The secret craft saturday challenge

The challenge at The secret crsfter was to use stitching on a card and as I needed a card because the team are taking out the admin lady tomorrow for lunch, she is changing her job slightly and will no longer work for our dept, so we needed a thank you card so i volunteered :0)
Here is the creation. Image from High hopes, coloured with promarkers, papers from papermania. Martha Stewart doily punch. Flower punches by woodware. Ran some white card throught the big shot with the swiss dots folder to give the flowers texture. Stitched around the edges - do love the stitched look! Ink used tea dye distress ink then the gems coloured with gold promarker to match the card 0 they were originally clear :0)Sorry the photo is not brill I was rushing!!
Details about the challenge can be found at http://thesecretcraftersaturdaychallenge.blogspot.com

Birthday gift

For the lovely Susan at work. Sue is a really good critique of my work as she has good taste and definate ideas about what works (Ive tried to pursuade her to get into crafting she would be sooo good!). Anyway she lives in a house full of males but likes girly things especially of a shabby chic nature. So here is her birthday pressie. A wooden heart, cant remember where I got it from but I need more NOW, K&Co papers I bought from the show yesterday. Heart painted with raspberry paint dabber. Paper edges torn then inked with raspberry ink. Happy birthday is a sprinkles, Faux stitching around the edges. Flowers punched with woodware punches (discovered my mum has the blue one as I have the yellow they go together perfectly!)tiny flower sequins then a gem stone added for some glamour. Book ring in the top and ribbon from stash added plus a little charm (also bought yesterday see I did NEED the stash I bought lol)which is in the shape of a hand and says hand made. Popped a greeting on the back. Think I will be making more of these if I can find out where I bought the shapes LOL!!

Colour create challenge

Way hey Im on a roll! Another challenge completed on the same day it was set - oh boy am I pleased with myself for being so disciplined. Okay Okay I confess I needed to play with my new goodies LOL.
Well heres my colour create challenge lilac and blue. Stamped image by little claires embossed with fine white embossing powder then inked with milled lavendar and weathered wood distress inks. Matted onto white then Blue and then lilac and blue ribbon knotted and a little friend charm I bought today added. Finished off with some lilac stickles to give it a magic sparkly feel. Not a complicated card at all but sometimes I like the less is more theory. Am sending this to a friend who is feeling a little low at the moment so hope it lets her know im thinking of her :0)

Day 2 of GNPE

Was there again for 8-45am and had a copic workshop. Although we were told quite a bit about the pens,and had a little play with 2 tiny stamped images, in terms of value (compared to yesterdays fabby one with Dy) I thought it was poor. Not even a 10% discount from the store for those attending the workshop still I know to stick to dyans in the future as I have NEVER been disappointed with her sessions be it 1 hour or 5.

Todays goodies!
2 stamps from Little Claires
4 from dimension fourth
1 k&co pad
2 rolls ds tape
1 silicone glue
1 angelina film
I fantasy fibres
4 copic pens
1 metre cream lace
2 sets jewels
lots of charms
a stack set for the charms
2 momento ink pads
card making book
and here is todays lunchtime meet up!






This little cutie is a sneaky peek of a little of my blog candy. Will be 2 weeks before the stamp set I really want arrives back in stock so you will have to hang on for it but I promise its worth the wait!!!

These are the fab pressies and atc swaps from both days :0)

The Show!

Back from the first day of the show. I hardly slept last night for being excited not just about the show bu meeting up with people I "chat" to on the internet. Picture above is my stash!
A distress ink pad cropper hopper tin (wanted one of these for ages!)
Frayed burlap distress ink pad
Milled Lavendar distress ink pad (I now have 22 ink pads only 2 more to go!!)
10x 7 gypsies papers
some 7 gypsies journalling tags
A sissex swirl die
Labels 1 nestabilities
A toadstool stamp,
A trombone stamp (FIL plays trombone)
A saxaphone stamp (OH plays Sax)
A fancy bird stamp
A house and home sweet home stamp
and a sheep stamp
A the stamps were from Dimension fourth fab quality polymer stamps!
Not bad to say I didnt need a thing!!!
Met up with crafty buddies for cake and atc swapping - Loved doing this you all made my day ladies! Hope to see them all again for the atc meet in May.
Am shattered as we also had an early morning workshop with Dyan Reaveley - FAB is all I can say to that! As ever we had hot tips crammed into an hour of inky fun and produced some fab tags ( I wasnt up to speed so need to finish off tomorrow so will show you then). Im doing it all again tomorrow but on my own this time - No Mum or Barbara and got to be there for 8-45am for the copic workshop Im booked on. Heres a pic of the lunch time meet - will be all new faces in tomorrows pics!!

On the same day folks!!!

My tag your it! Well it only began this morning and its a record that I have finished it! The criteria for this week is cute and cuddly - love this little fella who popped through my door this morning along with other goodies from the house of sugar! How cute is he! Now I thought he was a rabbit but when using my promarkers to colour him I noticed a tail not of the fluffy ball variety so not sure now! Basic grey infuse papers and ribbon from my stash. Flowers from stash as well and I think the pearl brads are from papermania, edges inked with combination of worn lipstick and brushed corderoy distress ink pads. I wanted to get this done so I can take it to the show tomorrow. I have been making cards for the troops, as have some of the ladies from my craft group, so i have more than 50 to pass onto Kirsty Wiseman tomorrow. Kirsty's new cd is out today so is going to be launched at the show and on exploring Kirstys site I came across the story of her daughters health issues. So I am going to give this tag to Kirsty to pass on to her little Belle - a real cutie who Im sure her Mummy loves to cuddle x

Kirsty's blog can be found here http://www.limegreenbogiegirl.blogspot.com/

1 card 2 challenges

Here is a card I made today fitting in with colour create (navy, turquoise, lime, no patterned papers) and a new challenge blog called creative inspirations www.cinspirations.blogspot.com where the first challenge is a sketch. The only thing Ive left out is the sentiment for the sketch and thats only to leave the window open to what I do with the card!
Here is the sketch
So - no patterned papers - well no one said anything about texture so the navy and turquoise card is textured! The lime card has been overstamped with a blonde moments background stamp using shabby shutters distress ink. The white card has been overstamped in the same stamp using denim adirondack dye ink pads. The lovely magnolia image has been coloured using promarkers and whoo hoo my new prisma pencils -
still need more practice with them but i do like the effect! Edwins wings have been glittered with fine white glitter and the image edges smudged with cloudy blue adirondack ink pad. The gorgeous little cap charm was from my Tag your it win a few weeks ago (what a super goody bag that was from Scrapz!) and ribbon from my stash. Hope you like it x

Recipe for tag you're it!

Taken all week to get on with this as I have been rearranging and organising my craft space - Goodness knows why Im going to the show to get more stash when i have so much already LOL. Anyway as I was sorting I collected bits along the way to use for this recipe buttons, ribbon and brads/ eyelets. I seem to have done quite a few purple tags and didnt realise I liked the colour quite so much. I knew of course i adore this flower - Blonde moments of course. This was my first stamp and is still among my favourites. So down to business. Tag is a pre-cut one from Kanban over stamped, with my favourite swirly stamp which I bought from Ebay last year, in archival teal. Papers from Blonde Moments Minasie Moo range. Dotty flower embossed in purple embossing powder then cut out and edges inked. Buttons from papermania, ribbon from stash - heart shaped eyelets from stash. I am quite pleased with this one so think I will hang it on my new inspiration string on one of my shelves in my craft room. Promise I will take pics when its all sparkling!

A lovely award

Thank you Michelle for this lovely award. Blogland makes me smile everyday so many fabulous people sharing their craft with us. Now Im no good at links so will have to get 1-1 lessons from Michelle next week. So bear with me folks! I have to pass the love so here goes.....
Jules http://jules-alwayswithaheart.blogspot.com/
PatR http://patscardmakingpassion.blogspot.com/
Diamonddoll http://diamonddollscraftyspace.blogspot.com/
Joey http://joeysworldofstuff.blogspot.com/
Lorraine http://craftycoo.blogspot.com/

Harrogate show Great Northern Papercraft Extravaganza!

Are you going to the show? Fancy meeting up for some crafty chat? then do leave a comment here and I will let you know where we are meeting up. If you are into atcs then we can do some swapping too :0)I am going both days and meeting up with people at lunch time to swap and will be bringing cake to share!

Surprise blog candy

Im almost at 3000 hits so when I get to 5000 I will be offering some candy! I will be going to the Great Northern Papercraft Extravaganza next weekend so will be on the look out for some hot candy deals! Watch this space!
This is a card I began on the craft weekend and finished off on Thursday. Its using adirondack ink pads to give a brushless watercolour effect.

Craft Club Last Wednesday the 18th March

This is a picture of Michelle (Midnight Crafter) and Debbie (Dee). Michelle led the evening having worked out the instructions to make a card with 4 boxes inside. Turned out one of the ladies had instructions and a template! Still Michelles instructions were fabulous - here she is helping Debbie work in inches as she only did cms at school! Thanks for being a fabulous Tutor Michelle xxx


Elaine and Christine looking extremely serious but they had been giggling away not long before infact we all needed tena ladies just watching them giggle!

Here are the other ladies heads down with serious concentration going on!



Sadly no finished articles to show as they were not put together on the night but to see what we made hop over to http://midnight-crafter.blogspot.com/2009/03/dt-needed-at-dies-to-die-for.html Its a gorgeous card with 4 boxes inside looking very oriental.
have a great day!

Time for tea

This weeks theme on "Tag you're it" has been "Time for tea". Took ages to decide what to do for this then I remembered this tea cup die and found the clock paper. The paper was given to me by a crafty friend so although its a download i dont know if its a cd or a website download. The scallops are from my nestabilities and the circle - well thats a very technical circle (tongue in cheek)I drew around around a small dish! Holes made with cropodile and time for tea handwritten.

Colour create and Truely Scrumptious!

Well heres my entry for the Colour Create this week. Green and red with the optional extra of wings. Papers are by Basic Grey - infuse. Butterflies from Blonde moments and buttons stamps from Clare Curds new range. The Truely scrumptious sketch seemed to fit this well too. I havent added a sentiment as I have used it to send to a Pal who is having a tough time just to let her know Im thinking of her. Red and Green are perfect for her as she loves traditional Christmas colours so it fit well.

Have just done 2 earlies and am shattered! Had a week off last week and am off next week too so hope to get lots more crafting done! My craft club tomorrow night. Michelle - midnightcrafter - is leading the class making a box card or rather a card with boxs inside. She has one on her blog under dies to die for I think. Always look forward to craft club Im lucky to know some fantastic people through it and all are great crafters - we all produce vastly different stuff and I love that. Its great seeing lots of ideas from the same project. I will see if I can take some piccies tomorrow of the ladies at work and their creations.

2 atcs and blog candy!

Blog candy first hop over to this blog and read all about it but give some thought to your fav choc before you do!!! http://egadesigns.blogspot.com/

Which should have found their new homes by now! The first was for the Rak attack. Every month on docrafts there is someone chosen to be sent lots of Raks or random acts of kindness. I think there is around 100 people in this every month so the chosen person will receive a Rak from each person. This month is the turn of dragonqueen so from the 1st March till the end she will be showered with Raks everyday! This is my Rak for her.
Raspberry and pool adirondack inks overstamped with teal archival stamped image from crafty individuals.
And for number 2 this is for the March PIF travel. Pif stands for pass it forward and so I send to the next person on the list.
Distress inks this time cant remember which browns I used! Stamp I bought from ebay and background stamp paperartsy. Travel runs all the way around the tag in tiny writing. Hope they like their new homes or rather their new homes like them LOL!

My boss asked me to make a card

For his parents diamond wedding. What a responsibility. So here it is. !
papers by papermania, flowers, Kanban, scallop heart and plain heart punch woodware, die cut letters, computer generated sentiment and ribbon from stash. Have made a box to put it in so flowers dont get squashed

Im a moonpig!

I was commissioned by my son to make a birthday card for his gorgeous girlfriend Eve whose birthday is today! Happy Birthday Eve! The brief - Her favourite colour is green and he wanted her name on it. So heres what I produced.
I was then asked do you have any wrapping paper? I only had tissue paper whoops! So I stamped happy birthday all over the green tissue paper (6 sheets) made some tags from the left over bits for the card and showed them to him. His words were "its like having your very own Moonpig.com" !!!!!

So the card - could have been a colour create entry as its yellow(mustard seed), orange (dried marigold) and green (peeled paint) distress inks lightly sprayed with mustard seed re-inker with gold pearl powder in it. Flowers - Blonde moments - sentiment blonde moments and I hand wrote her name. Right Im off for a shower and to fit my curly tail into my clothes LOL

Mojo Monday

My first time with this challenge and Im not over happy with it. Made it on Monday night and have been looking at it ever since. Ive decided to upload it as Choc has been such a topic of discussion on the radio and internet I thought id throw my doubts to the wind and do it! The image is from Kanban. I am lucky to have the Factory not too far away from me and i spotted this - not seen it before.
Im not a fan of the pre-printed stuff but liked the sentiment. I have used distress ink to smudge all the edges - comeon you didnt think id done it with chocolaty fingers did you???

Brilliant Bingo board!

Pop over to http://midnight-crafter.blogspot.com to see the fabulous altered bingo board my pal Michelle has created! Dont you just love her use of colour and wow those paperartsy stamps! Gorgeous gift for a couple of quid and a lot of fun! Go on take a look! Even better leave her a comment!

And if you like the tags I have on my blog go visit here for a gorgeous piece of work http://katysbloggeroo.blogspot.com I really need to learn how to make links LOL

CJ

Pressies!

Happy Birthday Dee Hope you have a fantastic birthday today and that you like your pressie!

Made Dees present about 3 weeks ago. Was struggling what to make her as at 24 she is a bit young for the journalling jar I made for my other pals then I came across this fabulous bingo board lurking in my cupboard so without further ado i transformed it using blonde moments minasie moo papers and paperartsy house stamp. A few bits of ribbon and buttons and it was done. Instead of faux stitching round the edges it says time and place in tiny writing. Hope she likes it!
Midnight crafter altered a bingo board at the weekend too as a pressi - its fantastic hope she shares it with you all! I have made a copy (with permission of course) and we are going to make the whole thing at craft club in May. Just need more £1 land visits to buy them all!!!

Happy Birthdays!

Some of the most special people I know have birthdays in March. Bees was last Friday, Dyan Reavely and craft buddy Michelle have birthdays today and Dee is tomorrow. The reason I was so happy to see last weeks colour create combo was because that was the colours I needed for Michelles card and def no cutsie but a grungy look! I gave both Michelle and Bee a journal jar and journal for their birthday, pics at the bottom of the page! Dees well cant post until tomorrow or else she will know but its altered!
Help me celebrate if you can by popping to their blogs and saying happy birthday. Cant make links (duh I know) so scroll to the bottom and see their blogs there.
Bee and Dee share one, Michelle is Midnight Crafter and Dyan is Dylans blog - go on make their day! Thanks xx

A couple of cards

I made at the craft retreat using my new pink gems stamps and some of Emmas stash of SU papers. Wow I have fallen for the yellows and rose pink gotta have some of those me thinks! Coloured in with promarkers I have done little more than matt and layer. For the first time I smudged the edges and quite like the look. what do you think?

Spiced and dusty

More playing with tags at the retreat. I cannot claim the idea for this colour combo as Midnight crafter did it first and it looked so stunning I just had to play. The colours used are dusty concord and spiced marmalade distress ink pads. the clock and man are stamped with black perfect medium then distress embossing powder over the top and heated. This was my first play with this stuff and although it may not look much on the blog it is quite tactile in the flesh so as to speak as it gives a worn rough finish - distressed! The words and speckles are stamped afterwards in archival black then black soot distressed the edges. Should have tried my distresser but I forgot I had it!!! The ribbon is more from my tag prize which I have black sooted so the orange looks mucky and fits in with the rest. Hope you like it. Am going to have another play day tomorrow at my local craft shop with more crafty buddies so may have more tags to show you then!

Tag your it and colour create -2 challenges I hope

Fabby colours at the colour create challenge this week Yellow, orange and green with the option of not being a card. I would normally use blonde moments spring fling (a card and tag earlier in my blog using these too) using the fabby mango embossing powder but I didn't take it with me on the retreat! "Tag your it" sent my Super Douper prize which arrived Sat morning so I wanted to use some of the stash on my this weeks entry "wings" and also The retreat girls collectively are called Malham Damselflies - we even have our own amazing forum thanks to brilliant computer whizz Emma xx so I wanted to use this stamp as although they look like dragonflies - I always think of these as damselflies as I bought this stamp after my 2nd retreat.

So this entry combines all those elements. Background of tag made using peeled paint, Spiced Marmalade and Mustard Seed distress inks, sprayed with mustard seed re inker mixed with mica powder to give a slight shimmer, then over stamped in Library green archival ink with the gorgeous Crafty Individuals stamp. A swirly stamp I bought from ebay filled in gaps then I used the same stamp to tone down the bright green ribbon from the prize bundle again using the library green archival ink. The final touch was the dragonfly charm from the tag your it stash (wow thanks guys it is fabby - Karen you got thank you mail x)

Craft retreat

Hello fellow bloggers! Best grab yourselves a cuppa this is a long one!!!I have returned from the most fabulous time deep in the Yorkshire dales (only 12 miles from my house actually) In the gorgeous village of Grassington. This is my fourth retreat but the first at this location. We normally go to Malham Tarn fieldcentre where we are beautifully looked after in the most stunning surroundings but alas they could not accomodate us this time so Midnight crafter Michelle and I set about sorting out our own so we could still see our fabby retreat buddies. Emma, Andy, Barbara and Kate travelled up from Grantham and Lincolnshire and stayed over in a B&B close to the art studio that Michelle organised for the weekend. We catered ourselves to keep costs low and had a lovely time relaxing with fellow crafters and admiring each others work and most importantly stash! Emma is a stampin up demonstrator and we joined her club last November. This time we got to play with her gorgeous products and are keen to buy yet more stash over the coming months. Emma has just reached first bronze status so gave us all a gift to celebrate! How kind and HUGE congratulations Emma! We were also joined by local crafters Bee and Dee who met our lovely retreat buddies for the first time but fit into the group really well and also were tempted by Emmas fabby stampin up stash!
I am really pleased with all my efforts this weekend but wont over face you all at once! This was my biggest project. A wooden house. Most of you know my passion for Art from the Heart and Blonde moments well Dy did this as a class at Christmas that I was unable to attend (fancy having to work when you just want to craft!! lol)so I bought the wooden house and Christmas papers to have a go myself. Needless to say the bare house was still sat in my craft room till Friday morning when it shouted please take me and show me some love. I came across some basic grey papers "Urban Couture" I had bought in a sale some time ago so thought the house may like these lovely colours and be displayed all the time.
Firstly I painted the house brown inside and out with some very smelly kids toy paint! Left to dry overnight and on sat morning I set to measuring the walls inside and out. Cut to size, tore edges, stitched and inked before sticking to the house. The roof was done with over 120 hearts! Blonde moments hearts stamped, cut, inked then curled before sticking onto the roof in the style of tiles. the roof ridge tiles were made using a stampin up scalloped punch both sides. In my minds eye I had not planned from this stage on so the next day I made windows out of chipboard then covered them with papers, inking where necessary then put a picture of everyone living at 8-10 so included my Mum and sis Amy. Just needs the finishing touch of the front door which needs drilling into the wood so can show you that tomorrow. Hope you like it Im really pleased with the results and have ignored everyone who says what are you going to do with it now??? Like that matters when it looks so gorgeous LOL!



Just added more pics now the front door has been added. You can just see Tim and I inside the door! bless!

Journal jar

Saw this idea last year but didnt get on with it and then when I tried to access the site after Christmas it had gone! Still a fabby docrafter gave me some other sight links and this is what Ive come up with. Papers by K & Co, image Dawn Bibby coloured with distress inks. Made the journal with my bind it all. there are 52 pages in it and 52 questions in the jar one for each week or the year. I thought it could be used to make an art journal so the card is textured and good quality to take any inks.
Heres another for another crafty pal.

I am Honoured

That Tag your it have announced my tag for the "diamonds are a girls best friend" as last weeks winner. It was touch and go if I would have time to enter this week as ive been working so much so i only just got my entry in on time. Scroll down the page to see the tag. Im off to find some wings for this weeks challenge. A very excited, bouncing round the room Clarky J x

Colour create blue and brown

I cant tell you how happy I was to see this colour combo but now I cant tell you why till next week!!! Had fun doing this and tried to avoid the cutsie which seems to have taken over my cardmaking lately. I never used cute images before just using flowers or this grungy sort of look but I actually found it harder than I thought to come up with a non cutsie card now Ive got in that mindset weird isnt it?
Anyway this is a fab image from paperartsy stamped with vintage photo. The background is inked with weathered wood - both distress inks my fav ink pads. The background paper is from Fresh print as is the flower and brown matting paper. The series is called Blue Raspberry. Edges torn and inked lace inked and ribbon too to give that grungy old sort of look. Couldnt find any pearls so used a pearl brad in the flower. I am one happy Clarky J with the end result Hope you like it too!

Hurrah - Finally

Found some time to make the tag your it entry for this week. The theme is Diamonds are a girls best friend.
Black card tag, papers not sure what they are as came in a goody pack from a friend. likewise with the diamante buckle and button. ribbon from stash stamped image by paper artsy added eyelets as extra detail.
Hope you like xx

Candy to be had x

http://stephmuchadoaboutnothing.blogspot.com/2009/03/dont-desert-me-while-im-away-blog-candy.html#comment-form
Wow pop over here for a chance to win fabby blog candy x

Award

I was given this by both pat and Michelle last week - sorry for not posting it sooner girls I am really pleased. I just need to sort our who to pass it on to!