Happy Christmas and a Happy and Prosperous New Year!

Sorry I haven't been on here lately, there's a lot of family problems here which need to be sorted out. I would like to wish all my crafting friends, old and new, a very Happy Christmas. I hope you get all you wish for and more, and that you have a really good time.

Love to you all! 

Karen xxx

woohoo I've won!

Hi everyone! 

I just wanted you all to know that I've won a lovely stamp from Crafty Sentiments Designs! 

I'm not sure yet which of the lovely stamps I have won but as soon as I find out, I'll let you all know!

Have a good day/night everyone! 

xx

Stampin' For The Weekend No 13

Stampin' For the Weekend Challenge No 13 have  a theme which this week is "Paws for Thought" (Animals... Cats.... Dogs... Anything with 4 legs!!!), so I thought I'd use this cute digital image of a Giraffe. OK so a giraffe doesn't have paws but they DO have 4 legs! I love the colours of this card. When I stamped the giraffe, before colouring the giraffe itself, I used a make up sponge, and got sky blue promarker and daubed the end of the sponge with ink, then made a blue mottled background effect to replicate the sky with wispy clouds, and then I coloured in the giraffe and tree approriately.

Though I've added a few gems to the corners to take the plainness out of the paper, I have tried to keep this card simple as it is intended for a child. 

Thank you for viewing my card!

Papertake Weekly Sketch & Crafty Catz Weekly Challenge

Papertake Weekly Sketch # 58 are asking us to follow a sketch (copied below), I had to slightly move things from the design given, as the image I printed out was a bit too big for the card I had planned but I have stuck to the basic shapes asked for. 

For the Crafty Catz Weekly Challenge # 92, I used either purple or lilac based colours along with the grey for the groom's suit, so this would fit in with the "No Pink or Blue Allowed". 

I've made this a wedding card as I had originally planned to enter this into a "happy ever after" theme but  due to other commitments today, sadly I was too late to enter it into this one.

Alphabet Challenge and Stampalot July Challenge

Hi! The weather here the last few days has been terrible, I think the same can be said for the whole of the UK so I know I'm not alone. I just hope we see a bit more sunshine before the Summer turns eventually to Autumn.

Thanks for taking a look at my blog. I'm entering my card into 2 challenges today, the theme for the Alphabet Challenge Blog is "K for Kitty Cats" and the Stampalot Challenge  for July is "Anything Goes".

 I started by using my Hougie Board and scoring a brick pattern into some dark brown card, which is slightly smaller than the A5 card blank which I am using for this project.

I had some  stamps  which I printed out some time ago, sorry I forgot where they come from, I cut out the cat after colouring her in a Cool Grey Promarker, and the bowl and window. I stuck some paper behind the window to give the effect of either wallpaper or curtains behind the window, and I placed the cat as if she is sitting on the window ledge, and placed the bowl next to her. 

There was a sentiment which came with the images, which said "Have a Purrfect Day!" so this was purrfect (lol sorry) for the theme of the K for Kitty Cats.

Crafty Sentiments Design Challenge

The card I made today,  I am entering into the

 Crafty Sentiments Design Challenge 

Their theme this week is "Use Stitching Challenge".

    I intended making an easel card for this challenge originally,  but then I was messing about and made a couple of card blanks and when I looked at this one, I had an idea.

I found some black card, and some silver thread, and remembering a pattern I used to do at school I started to sew a pattern on to  it. Then I found a lovely image I've had for a while, and coloured it with Rose Pink, Mint Green and Red Promarkers.

The card I used was a cream pearlised card which I scored using my Hougie Board, then I used a nice striped but subtle paper to matt onto the card, and found a silk flower in my collection, then used a pink sparkly brad to fix it to the card.  

I fixed some ribbon onto my card with double sided tape, and then I made a bow with the same ribbon and stuck it onto the card.

For the sentiment, I printed out the words Happy Birthday using the Quiggly Wiggly font, then cut it out. 
I then  cut another piece of white card, slightly bigger than the piece with Happy Birthday on, and coloured it with my Rose Pink Promarker.  Then I matted and layered the Happy Birthday piece of card onto it, and then fixed it to the card with double sided foam pads.

I finished the card off by cutting out the image of the girl, and stuck it onto the black stitched diamond shape with foam pads. Then I finished it all off by adding gems to the corners for a little more sparkle.

I hope you like my card, thank you for looking.

Crafty Sentiment Designs Challenge

Hi there,  today I thought I’d enter a challenge over at  Crafty Sentiment Designs  and this week they are challenging us  to 'Craft With A Child'.

I do have children, but they are a bit old now to want to craft with me, so I am going to enter this challenge based on me Crafting for a child, which is also allowed. A son of  a friend of mine is turning 2 years old next week so I took this opportunity to make a simple card for him. 

I  saw a  free stamp which was available last night from Sweet and Sassy Stamps, and the bear is called Rhubarb, he was so sweet, I just had to use it on this card.

Crafty Sentiments "Christmas in June" Challenge

I'm entering this challenge even though all my Christmas crafting items were tucked away in a corner, I felt they needed dusting off, to give them a little "outing" and this challenge from  Crafty Sentiments fitted the card I made perfectly, as their theme is Christmas In June.

The card had an oblong aperture in the front the card, and I stamped the Santa image onto the inside of the card, so it was visible through the aperture. I coloured the Santa Claus' suit, hat and mittens Berry Red, and gave him a caramel coloured belt and boots. I used pearl gems to simulate the snow. Then for the sentiment I  used a stamp which I've had for ages, since the first Christmas I crafted, but not used yet.  I matted that onto red card, and stuck 3 pearl hearts onto the side of the sentiment.

Thank you for viewing my blog, I hope you enjoy my card as much as I enjoyed making it!

Whiff of Joy Blog Candy

Katharina is giving away a fabulous, summer blog candy, 5 Whiff of Joy summer stamps of your choice!!! 

Hurry on over there, it ends on 9th July!

Good luck everyone.

Crafty Sentiments Challenge and Sunday Sketch and Stamp Challenge #59

Sorry I've not been making that many cards recently but I've not been too well. I'm hoping to get back in the swing of things now.

I've entered my card into 2 challenges, listed below.

1) Crafty Sentiments Challenge - "Add Some Sparkle"

2) Sunday, Sketch & Stamp Challenge #59 - Follow the sketch (pictured below)

The digital stamp I've used  is from teddybo.com and it's called "Bea's Tired & Needs a Cuddle", I love them, they're so cute!

First of all I placed some pink mirriboard on the card, then I found some coordinating patterned paper, to place on the card too.

I have an oval embossing folder with leaves in the bottom corner, and I used this around the digital stamp of Teddy Bea. For the sparkle, I used some flower/star shapes which have a holographic effect on them. I also used some pink stickles glitter on the ribbon and around one of the pieces of backing paper and also on part of the digital stamped image.

Overall, I'm quite pleased with the card and it only took me  a short while to make too!

Thank you for looking!

Alphabet Challenge Blog

I made this card for my daughter's boyfriend's 18th birthday, which is on Sunday, but I couldn't  pass the opportunity by and not enter it into a challenge, so I'm entering it into the Alphabet Challenge Blog who's challenge this week is "M for Men"

I bought the football decoupage from Wilkinson's in town.

I got the "18" from a craft shop in town to go on the card, and matted and layered up a Congratulations sentiment and added some gold ribbon  to it.

My card is pictured below.

I Love Promarkers Challenge, Truly Scrumptious Challenge and The ABC Challenge

I have made a card to enter into 3 challenges today. 

The card blank I used was a magenta colour but it looks slightly reddish on the picture but it really is pink. I'm saying this because one of the challenges I'm entering into is a colour challenge.

Here are the challenges I'm entering today: 

1) I Love Promarkers No 49 - KISS Keep It Sweet & Simple

2) Truly Scrumptious No 49 - Colour Challenge Brown, Pink & Green

3) The ABC Challenge- M is for Magical. There was an optional extra of a sketch to follow but I didn't do this part as it was a bit fussy and it wouldn't have fitted in with the Promarkers challenge.

The promarker colours I used for this challenge were  Cinnamon for the hair, Baby Pink for the tights, wings and belt, Rose Pink for the shading on wings, Ivory for the skin, Magenta for the tights, bow and belt and Lime Green for the dress.

I used a Magenta A4 card folded in half to make an A5 sized card.

I cut some green embossed hand made craft paper and placed this on the card. Then I used a digital image which I bought yesterday and coloured it  in, cutting it out and adding it to front of the card with foam pads, to give it depth. Then, on the wings, I used Anita's 3D clear gloss finish, to give the wings a bit more definition. It's a shame it hasn't shown up on the photo, as it looks really effective. To finish, I added a pale pink ribbon on the left, I clipped the corners with a rounded corner punch and I used some alphabet clear stamp letters for the greeting. As the card colour was quite dark, you couldn't see the inked greeting too well so I went over it with a thin marker to make it stand out more.

Sorry about the blurry picture, my hands were shaking taking the picture, and this was the only  one I had which showed the colours best.

I hope you like my card. Thank you for taking the time to view my blog.

Truly Scrumptious Challenge No. 48

When I made this card for the Truly Scrumptious Challenge Blog last night I was feeling less than well. I had planned so much for it and nothing went to plan. Not to mention spilling something onto the project half way through and having to disguise the mark with something or start it all over again.

Anyway, eventually I got it finished!

The challenge was to follow the sketch given, which I did. Rather than use a stamped image, I thought I'd use a decoupaged image as I felt it fitted in rather nicely. Hopefully this will be ok. I decided to rotate the image too, as it fitted in better with the picture I was using.

Though I didn't actually set out to include the optional extra of "Dreaming of Summer",  looking at the woman's face on the picture, she looks like she's daydreaming so she very well could be!

I hope you enjoy my card, thank you for taking the time to view my blog! 

4 Challenges, 1 Card!

I made this card last night, hoping to incorporate it into 3 challenges at first, but then realising I could enter it into 4.

2 of the challenges are for Thank You cards, one offers a sketch and the other asks to make a card for a man or boy. Listed below are the challenges I have entered into and below that is the sketch and photo of my card. 

1) Crafty Sentiments Challenge - "Thank You card"

2) A Spoonfull of Sugar Challenge number 134 - "Thank You card"

3) Corrosive Challenge Blog Challenge no. 98 - Follow a Sketch

4) Forever Friends Challenge Blog  - Card for man or boy

Thank you for taking the time to look at my blog, I hope you have a good day! 

Love Karen xx

Happy 2011!!!

Happy New Year everyone! I'm sorry it's a bit late, but I've only thought to do this now. I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and New Year! 

Here's to a fantastic crafting year ahead! 

Love, 

Karen xxxx