Warmest Wishes

Here is a little card that I have been trying to make for days... but lots seemed to get in the way, fortunately I think I still have a couple of days before the challenge at CAS Christmas closes!

Trina set quite a challenge for this one, as rainbow colours are not usually associated with Christmas greetings,  but I think that this little chap (a stamp from Little Claire) seemed to lend himself to having a jolly scarf!

I added a little twinkle to his hat and the snow on the ground, and used Copics to colour in his scarf. The sentiment is from Memory Box.

Merry Little Christmas - Anything Goes

Some of you may know that we have been waiting to have a new kitchen for quite some time, experiencing delay after delay due to problems with Covid 19 restrictions and limitations. However it is now all completed so I thought you might like to have a gander at the end result. It is fairly similar in layout to the previous one, but with several innovations, the main one being making space for a big old American fridge... which I love!

To do this, the point where the internet cable entered the kitchen had to be re-sited, which led to variety of problems of one sort or another, but now all is well. We had a little cabinet constructed to house all the various hubs for internet, tv, security, heating etc which we were told should be in an open aspect and not in a cupboard because of signal etc, however, once in situ I couldn't cope with the look of all the wires etc, so my kitchen provider had a framed door made for me, which would normally have had glass in, but instead I fitted a piece of navy mesh into the glass space, to obscure the wires and hubs etc and yet didn't impede the signal.

Here are some pics.

In this pic you can see the little cupboard under the tv where all the wires are semi-concealed! After the kitchen had been rewired and re-plastered, I did a count of all the sockets (outlets) ... there are 23! Six of them are in that little cupboard... 2 above it and one behind the tv. SO I have plenty left for the cookers, the toaster, kettle, coffee maker, Instant Pot, food mixer etc etc!

We are due to have our second vaccine tomorrow, so that will be another milestone!

Stay safe everyone!

Thinking of you

A card for a couple of challenges.

CAS on Friday want to see a musical reference and AAA Cards have an Along the edge challenge.

 I haven't gone for the optional  twist this time, as I wanted to use this old violin stamp from Rubbadubbado, and it doesn't have a die to match so I cut it by hand.

We are now into the third week of being without a kitchen. It is being painted as I type, we are waiting for a couple of cabinet doors, as I changed my mind about the layout a little so another couple of doors had to be manufactured. On Friday the quartz will be fitted, swiftly followed I hope by the installation of the hob and the sink and taps. We will then have a couple of days grace before the floor is fitted, after which we will probably retire to a darkened room to get over all the upheaval!

Hopefully the end is in sight!

 

Christmas Blessings

This is my first card for a challenge for quite some time. 

Having used all of the Christmas cards I had made throughout the year, I thought it appropriate to start on next year's batch!

It's a simple card, using the sketch from Freshly Made Sketches, CASology's SNOWMAN and the fact that it is Christmassy for Christmas Kickstart.

Today is my daughter's 40th birthday, I didn't know that I could possibly be old enough to have my baby reach this milestone. She is a wonderful person, a supermum, a hardworking executive, about to start a new job in a matter of days and the best daughter in the world. 

Happy birthday Libby!

WOYWW 601

Last weekend, it was good to see the animated faces of the crafters who look in on Julia's WOYWW  blog hop each week.

This week I'm not sharing a desk but just a bunch of Christmas do dahs from my home!

The tree is now on its 45th Christmas. My husband arrived home with it on the top of the car when we lived in Alexandria, Virginia in 1976. It stayed with us there for three years and then came home to Hampshire, where we have lived ever since. I did have one emergency call when I was teaching back in the 1980's, from our cleaning lady who was worried to death as the top half of the tree had collapsed over onto the floor. The central support of the tree is made up of two poles, which fitted together with a tube a bit like a toilet roll middle but made from tough cardboard. Over the years this had deteriorated and unraveled, so I took a quick trip to the hardware store and was given a little aluminium tube which fitted perfectly and has been used ever since. This year I had to give a little first aid to the  sections of bark, made from plastic, which separate the roundels of branches, but it's good to go for a few more years. The real question is how much longer I'll be able to scramble up into the loft to get it out and away again each year.

Since retiring we have loved to travel and I like to try to bring home tree decorations from places we have visited. 

 

Snowshoes from Quebec City

Mask from Venice

Emu from Australia

Cotton Flower angel from Georgia

Eagle from Alaska

This is our Christmas Nativity from Germany. The heat from the lit candles causes the windmill blades to rotate, so the characters move around too!. The trick is angling the blades so that they actually go forwards rather than backwards! 

Today I'll leave you with another watercolour of yet another Jack Russell.

Take care and stay safe everyone!

 

WOYWW #591

I'm sad to say that I haven't joined in with the workdesk fun for a long, long time, but today I thought I'd try to remedy that as my desk is really tidy (for me)!

It contains the detritus from a few days' play.

I see I left the top off my take away box which contains my Lawn Fawn shammy, it has obviously dried out, so a trip along to the bathroom to refresh that is called for. Speaking of bathroom, I see a toilet roll too... that's not there for emergencies, but I was trying my hand at papercasting... there is a little square there which was my first attempt, but I have just received a package with some plasticine so I'll be trying a slightly different technique incorporating that... if I can get it right.

The upright  magnetic sheet at the back is where I throw dies that have recently been in use or ones which I use quite frequently. Sad to say some unintentionally stay there for quite a while.

If anyone wonders what anything is or is for... just ask.

Have a great day and stay safe everyone!

Oops!  I forgot to link back to the lovely Julia.... how remiss of me here it is!

WOYWW #591

Sorry Julia!

 

Count on me

I was delighted to find this free download of friendly frogs! I had tried drawing some myself but was singularly unsuccessful, so was delighted to find these. The sentiment is from Simon Says Stamp. I simply cut out the frog which I had coloured with alcohol pens and popped him onto some dimensional dots.

It is my DT card for Perfectly CAS which as you can see is Animals this time.

Recently my time has been spent reacquainting myself with  my sewing machine. I started making scrubs as there is a real need at the moment amongst many health workers. The first set I made was from some fabric I had stored away, plus a bed valance which was no longer used.

I ordered some fabric online and once that arrived I began making some with that.

Since then I have made a few more and they will all be going to my son's practice in Worthing. As a GP, he hasn't had to wear scrubs for many years, in fact not since he was a newly qualified doctor working in hospital, but due to the situation at the moment everything has changed, hence his need for scrubs.

We are lucky to have our hobby of crafting to keep us occupied during lockdown, so do stay safe everyone!

Bunnies

When I saw the challenge at CAS on Friday, I immediately thought of Lili of the Valley images... their bunnies are so cute!

I stamped the image onto watercolour paper using Memento London Fog ink. I added colour with watercolour pencils and blended gently with a waterbrush.

The sentiment is from Sugar Pea Designs.
Addicted to CAS

Today is the first day of rain that we have had for some time. We are lucky that since staying at home, we have been able to spend

time in the garden or have short walks around some of the local pathways. When our area was developed, the council decided to include lots of walkways between the various groups of houses.

They make for very pleasant walks. People are very courteous when passing each other and make sure that social distancing is observed, but always exchange a friendly greeting.

Stay safe everyone!

You're so Special

I've had this Indigo Blu stamp for ages... years I guess... and it has never before seen ink. In fact it is a largeish background stamp, but here I just used the top bit to make an 'along the edge' card for AAA Cards.

There are some great expressions on these little guys' faces and I decided to highlight just a couple of them and add a sentiment from Sugar Pea Designs. There are so many sentiments in this set (Everyday Sentiments) and I find them really useful.

Yesterday we ventured out for a walk in the sunshine along the front at Lee on the Solent. Lots of people had the same idea, but there was plenty of room for everyone without encroaching on anyone else's space. Apparently some National Trust grounds have had to be closed today as so many ventured to them yesterday. We are fortunate to have a garden where we can sit in the better weather and get a little fresh air. Some of the Spring flowers are just emerging!

  Stay safe everyone!

More paper towel!

Here is another card for the Paper Towel challenge at CAS Mix Up

I rather liked the splotchy bit of paper towel here and so cut a circle from it to put behind this Alexandra Renke die cut. I cut a second circle in card to stiffen it, so that it could be popped up on dimensional pads. The Sentiment from Alley Way stamps was stamped using Ranger die ink in Electric Lime, which matched my spray shimmer ... from the project which was being mopped up! It will appear at sometime soon I hope,  but today we are on granny duties.. so this is a quick post.

Lots of people have enquired recently about the textured card stock I've have been using.. its Hemp from PaperMill Direct. I've had it for ages and thought it was about time it was used up, hence all the cards using it.

This is my almost completed first try at an Octopus for a Preemie. I was helped enormously my fellow crafter Susan Morris, she must have been so frustrated watching me try to manhandle a crochet hook, but it at least looks like an octopus. Sadly I don't think it would pass scrutiny as I have since realised that I have made more than a few booboos doing this. But put it all down to experience.. .the next one should be better!

Proud Granny

There are a lots of people who make me very proud, but two very special ones are my daughter and her daughter! My daughter has achieved enormous success in her career, despite struggling during her early education. She worked tirelessly to achieve a First Class Honours Degree and has gone from strength to strength in her career in Human Resources.

Daisy, her daughter.... and my older granddaughter, will be moving to senior school in September and has secured a place at The Royal High School in Bath. This is an independent school for girls. Last week I took her to get her uniform.... there's heaps of it needed. There seems to be quite a lot of sports kit!

She was very excited to try it all on! She'll probably be fed up with it soon enough!

I prefer the colour of hers to what I had, my High School uniform was Brown and Cream and I used to have to wear a brimmed velour hat too... a bit like Miss Marple!!

Anyway the card I have made for Daisy has a picture of her school on the front. Apparently the school was approached when they were seeking a location for Hogwarts, but the school declined the request as they thought it might be a little intrusive.

I took a photograph which I converted to a pencil drawing and printed out recessing it behind the front panel. I added Daisy's name and in Word Art made the arched sentiment for the banner.

I had to fiddle around with my SSS double stitched dies in order to make them fit the image and the name. For each aperture I used a larger die and cut from both ends to reduce their sizes. These dies are probably the most used of all the dies in my collection ... and there are quite a lot of those!

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge

BACK TO SCHOOL

It's your day

Here is a card for the challenge at Freshly Made Sketches

The butterfly in the sketch reminded me of these images from Stamplorations, which until now had remained unused, but I think they are really fun. I coloured the wings with wet on wet watercolour and added a few  NUVO crystal drops once the paint was dry.

The background die cut is from Sizzix and the sentiment from Alley Way stamps.

Yesterday was my birthday and today is my son's... 43 years ago he was the best belated birthday present I ever had!

He looks a little different today... maybe not quite as much hair!

Baby

Today is my first day back in may craft room after a couple of weeks spent to-ing and fro-ing between here and Bath on granny duties. 

Later today we are going to meet some friends for lunch whom we met on a cruise some time ago (I don't remember exactly how long ago it was). I dressed in the clothes that I will be wearing when we go out and so I didn't want to attempt anything messy in my card making this morning. Hence die-cutting and dry embossing.

I wrote the word 'baby' on my Silhouette, welded the letters and offset them before cutting out in pink for the background and white for the word itself. The heart shaped balloon from Paper Smooches was added to the card on dimensional pads and the string was cut with a thread die from Memory Box.

I decided to add a little twinkle to the pink parts of the card with some Glamour Dust.

I am adding it to the challenges at Addicted to stamps and More - Clean and Simple

AAA Cards - Dry Embossing

Just Us Girls - Photo Inspiration

Dies R Us   Challenge # 118 -Anything Goes - (Paper Smooches & Memory Box Dies )

Clean and Simple on Friday - Baby

Each Thursday I look after my youngest grandchild Cleo and I have started taking her to Baby Ballet classes! She loves it! Here she is ready for her class, She doesn't have baggy Nora Batty tights on, they are leggings which she wore over her ballet socks to get to the class...  it was a little chilly that day! Does the expression 'Good toes, Naughty toes' bring back any memories for any of you?

Musical birthday

Happy New Year to you all!

As most of my cards are sold as a fund raiser for my choir and purchased by its members, the purchasers often like to have cards with a musical link or theme!

Here is one such, for the CAS Challenge at Happy Little Stampers

I added a little extra texture to the front panel with an embossing plate from Papertrey Ink, over which I added a strip of Tim Holtz Washi Tape. The violin was stamped with a very old stamp from Rubbadubbadoo, using Versafine Black Onyx ink and then clear embossed. It was cut out and mounted on dimensional pads.

The sentiment is from Simon Says Stamp.

We had a great holiday for our anniversary and came home straight into the celebrations for Christmas spent with our daughter and grandchildren. 

We managed to find a rocking horse for our grandson... something which he has wanted for quite some time, but until this year my daughter didn't have space to house one, but having moved to a new property, we thought now was the time. Keeping him sequestered in the back of the car until Christmas morning was a challenge, but all was well!

He loves him!

Bravo

Some weeks ago I took my gorgeous granddaughter Daisy for her tap exam.

I watched the pre-exam practice and was really impressed with how well she was dancing in her set of 4 girls. The icing on the cake came when she returned to her dance school after the summer break to be told that she had gained a distinction in her exam.

This is the card I made to congratulate her.

The image was downloaded from the internet and the sentiment made from a die from Cutplorations, cut in three layers with her name added using the computer. The peekaboo frame was from a die by MFT. The front panel was cut with a stitched square die also from MFT, but extended a little to fit the front of my card.

Bravo daisy!

It's for the CAS challenge at Addicted to Stamps and More

Here's that sketchy elephant  from Stampers Anonymous again. This time I paired it with a simple die cut Birthday sentiment from Papertrey Ink. Sadly I don't remember the make of the 'wish' die. 

Just us Girls is asking for Hand Drawn elements, so this was hand drawn... albeit not by me!

I did think about using a stamp which I drew and which was on the front of Craft Stamper Magazine as their 'FREE' stamp, but I feel it's a little passe now!