Make My Monday - Winter Birthday

Make My Monday is back and our first challenge for 2015 is 'Winter Birthday' .

I think the snowdrop is a lovely flower, with a touch of winter and the promise of spring - this digi is by Pink Gem and I coloured it with Promarkers and liquid pearls. I also used a computer generated sentiment, Martha Stewart border punch, green glitter paper and stick-on pearls.

I hope you'll join in our challenge at Make My Monday. 

I'd like to enter:
Try it on Tuesday  favourite things - snowdrops and liquid pearls
Wags n Whiskers  anything goes
The Stamping Boutique winter birthday

Blast

Anything that looks navy on here, is in fact, black! 

I'm often reluctant to enter CAS challenges because of a fear that my card isn't CAS enough. I hope this card qualifies as CAS because I made it using the colour combo at Showcase Your Style - a challenge I found through Kylie's lovely card.

These stamps are from a 50s style set from Creative Stamping magazine. I wrote earlier that I have a difficulty with the stamps that come with this magazine - often there are so many samples in the mag that I feel there is nothing original left to do. So this time I used the stamps before opening the mag!

As well as Showcase Your Style, I'd also like to enter:
Red Carpet Studio  stars and new - new being the stamps.
Creative Card Crew for a child
Fantasy Stampers  birthday

Empty Box Project # 2 - Dovecote

On New Year's day I revealed my stamping shame - a big box of unused stamps - and started my Empty Box project. My aim is to work through the box , one stamp/ stamp set at a time and see if I can use them. If I can't use them, I will dispose of them. The aim is to finish with an empty box.

My son randomly picked out the first 3 stamps/sets for me. You can see the results of the first two here.  This is the third set: 

This set came with Creative Stamping magazine. Their USP is that they provide a full stamp set every issue and lots of samples in the magazine. But,perversely, after I've seen all the samples I feel less inclined to use them ! Anyway, the magazine is lost now and I've forgotten the samples but I was still stuck on what to do with these pretty stamps. 

I was playing around combining some of the smaller stamps in the set when I remembered a challenge I'd seen, and discounted at the time - anniversary at 4 Crafty Chicks . I don't generally make anniversary cards as I don't really have anyone to give them to, but I thought the sentiment (To love and to be love is to feel the sun from both sides) was perfect for this occasion. 

I stamped on some of the paper I made at my shaving foam session and added punched flowers, a die-cut fence and liquid pearls. 

As well as 4 Crafty Chicks, I'd like to enter: 

Love to Scrap - Liquid pearls, Text, Stamps, Corrugated card, Birds 

Ooh La La  words to inspire 

Creative Corner  Love is in the air 

Scrapping 4 Fun Guest Designer - Happy Birthday

Today I'm one of the Guest Designers at Scrapping 4 Fun  and the theme is Happy Birthday.

The papers I used for this card were made using shaving foam and acrylic paint. I have seen this technique demoed on the TV and no-one has ever got their arms covered in colourful foam like I did!

The stamps I used were given to me by my friend and teammie Sandie  and I paper-pieced them with the patterned paper I'd made.

Expect to see more of these shaving foam papers over the next few weeks, as I made a few.

I hope you'll join in the fun at Scrapping 4 Fun  with your birthday themed creations.

I'm entering this card into challenges for new things, as both the stamps and the shaving foam technique are new to me ( Crafty Boots, Shopping Our Stash, Country View) , and also Quirky Crafts CAS.

A Warm Blanket

I was going to take a break from Christmas cards, but before I’ve even put the decorations away, I’ve been inspired by a few challenges.

 Firstly, the blanket and snow in the photo at Curtain Call. 

The colour palette at Christmas Card challenges reminded me of Basic Grey’s LBD collection,which I have in a digital version. Some of the patterns look quite blanket – like. 

The sketch at Sunday Stamps  gave a structure to bring it together.

But it was missing a point of interest amongst the blanketyness(!). So I remembered I’d seen some challenges for using snowflakes  ( Tis the Season  and Merry Monday ) so I cut out a big snowflake I made from a Kerri Bradford Silhouette workshop.

I added glitter, a brad and a stamped sentiment.

Make My Monday - New Beginnings

It's the first challenge of the year at Make My Monday, and our theme is New Beginnings.

Just before Christmas , my daughter's partner started a new job, so I made this card for him. Inside I wrote (Hope you don't find one of these (typewriter) on your desk.)!

I used a digital stamp of a typewriter ( I think it's from a Craft Artist digistmap collection ), to which I added text and coloured. The papers are from my scraps box and I used an embossing folder to make a chevron pattern on the base.

I hope you'll join us at Make My Monday. 

I'd like to enter:
Natalie and Amy  all things new
Crafter's Cafe  new
Sweet Stampin  new
Pink Gem  something new
Crafty Calendar  what's new

Winter Walk

I was inspired by the challenge theme at CD Sunday , Winter Walks. Animals often enjoy going out in the snow. We used to have a pet rabbit who loved to run round the garden in the snow.

I used the My Craft Studio CD 'Setting the Scene Christmas'  and combined four different elements to make the scene. Then I stamped 'Warm Wishes'  and mounted onto scrap patterned paper. I attached snowfall acetate over the top.

I think you could use this for different winter occasions, but I will use it to kick off my Christmas card stock for 2015!

As well as CD Sunday, I'd like to enter:
Love to Create icy winter days
Come and Get it  snow much fun

Inkspirational Challenge - Note.

Our first challenge for 2015 at Inkspirational and we have a fabulous new look , designed by Kylie, and a wonderful guest designer, Marika. 
The challenge is:

My project is a notebook which I made as a gift for my (grown up) niece.  I used Amy Tangerine 'Yes Please' papers, a Bind it All cover and I cut the page tabs, tags, pockets on my Silhouette cutting machine. 

Inside front 

I made a bookmark my die-cutting a camera in shrink plastic, colouring it, shrinking it and tying it onto twine. 

Inside back cover pocket

somewhere in the middle

The whole thing was bound with the Bind-it-All. 

I hope you will come over to Inkspirational and share your project using the word prompt - note. 

I'd like to enter:
Seema Crafts anything goes
Silhouette Challenges  anything goes (Silhouette used for page tabs, tags, pockets)
Shopping Our Stash  3 patterned papers

Empty Box Project #1

Yesterday I posted a photo of my big box of unused stamps  and announced my self-imposed project to empty the box.

To get me started, I asked my son to randomly pick out three items from the box. I have used the first two.

The first item was this box of stamps:

This box came as part of a scrapbooking kit that I bought for the embellishments and papers. I tested the stamps and you can see below why I wasn't really happy with them:

I know I could take them off the block and trim them, but I just don't like the images enough to be bothered! So if anyone, (UK for postage costs reasons) wants them, I will pull them off the block and put them in the post, if you leave me a comment with your email.

The second item was the flapper stamp, from Artisitc Stamper,  you see in the card above. I can't remember buying it but it had a £1 sticker on it!  I have never used it, I think, because of her hand - it looks like it should be doing something, like waving through a window or putting a bauble on a Christmas tree. Using a bit of masking, I made her touch some hanging stars (Sarah Hurley), and added Docrafts text stamp and a Wink of Stella (which of course, you can't see in photo!).

I'd like to enter:
Darnell's Challenge  NBUS
Sweet Stampin  anything goes
Seize the Birthday party
4 Crafty Chicks  celebration
Simply Create Too  Let's Celebrate

My Stamping Shame and the Empty Box Project

See this box? All those stamps inside are totally unused! Shameful!

In my defence I will say that most of them have been acquired rather than bought - a great many of them were free with magazines. But there are some that were purchased with enthusiasm and then neglected.

So , new for 2015, I am setting myself the Empty Box Project. My aim is to work through the box , one stamp/ stamp set at a time and see if I can use them. If I can't use them, I will dispose of them. The aim is to finish with an empty box.

I hope you will visit my blog and see how I'm getting on.

Happy New Year to all the wonderful crafters out there, especially my regular visitors to this blog.