I Used My New Nellies!!

This is not only the first Christmas card I have made so far, but also the first time I have used my new Nellies (well, Luca!)

THESE STAMPS ARE FAB!!! I would love all of them, but it will have to be between now and New Year as I'm going on a major - and strict - stash diet (sob!). I've just got too much stuff and I keep buying more... particularly as I said a couple of months ago that I was going to lay off the card making and do more altered stuff. It was harder than I thought it would be, and I keep getting orders, so I started stamping more. The only thing I will buy early next year are some stamps from Gina K - her stamps are great! I'll call it an early Birthday pressie.

So, the card:



The colours are actually much nicer in 'real life' but I just couldn't get a decent picture. Luca was watercoloured - it's the first time I've stamped onto watercolour paper and I think it turned out well. I layered it up on DCWV papers and finished with some ribbon and a 'Merry Christmas' peel off (I haven't got any decent Christmas stamps)

Anyway, I'm off to play with Luca and Nellie!

More Christmas Decorations

I finally got round to finishing the blocks I started! I started off with a short word, just to see how I got on: JOY. I really enjoyed doing them, so will definitely do some more, including a set each for the boys with their names.


Here they are, the finished article:





I used 2" blocks from Opitec - bargain, £2.20 for 10! - and lightly sanded them, then painted them with ivory acrylic paint. I used papers from a Craft Creations scrapbook pack, and black versamark ink with See D's Ancient Alphabet stamps. Finally, I sanded the edges lightly to finish them off.

Getting nothing done...

... but a fun day had by all. Got up this morning to wind, rain and a generally murky day, and anyone with young kids knows that bad weather and little ones don't mix. So we decided to try an indoor play area that we haven't used before - Coral Cove in Devizes - and the boys really enjoyed themselves. Cory's been to similar places before and always has fun, but it was Jack's first time and he loved it! Now I argue that we should always go to this one, because under 5s have to be supervised at all times!!!!! I swear there were more adults than kids, and that they were having more fun!

Of course, according to Cory, at least, no trip out is complete without shopping... he could shop for his country, that boy! So we did the shopping, and then went to Avebury to look at the stones (and of course the gift shops!). Pity the weather was so crummy, but we'll go back again in the spring.

Christmas presents

I've been pretty busy today, after I decided that all Christmas presents this year (apart from the kids') are going to be handmade. These are a couple of the things I came up with - there will be more, but they'll be done another day!





So, the first two started life as beer mats! I was having trouble finding the coasters that a lot of the US craft sites sell; I had chipboard squares, but they weren't thick enough and they were way too big, so I bought about 100 beer mats for about £2 on eBay and this is the result. Pretty cute IMO!



This was a plain untreated photo frame from Wilkinsons - you get 3 for £1 so a pretty good deal. They're not as wide as I would've liked though. Anyway, I painted it - I mixed the colour to match some of the text on the paper - then used 2 matching DCWV papers to cover it. I left a couple of millimeters so that you could still see the pink around the edge of the frame, and finished it off with some ribbon.

I'm off to paint some blocks for yet more presents!

Thank-you cards

Well, I've finally got some cards made! Cory's been to stay with Nanny and Grandad overnight, so I made the most of the spare time.... I should really have been ironing, but I had to do thank you cards from Jack. His birthday was a week ago and I haven't sent them out yet... oops!

Here they are:


DCWV dotty, cream and blue papers, Dovecraft ribbon, 3" scallop punch, quilled butterfly


DCWV pink, brown and striped papers, American Crafts ELEMENTS ribbon, 'thank you' peel offs


Sandylion 'Butterflies' paper, Dovecraft ribbon, 3"scallop punch

I'm really into paper and ribbons at the moment, so thought I would give the stamping a rest for while. Although I am just about to put in an order for some Gina K sets, so watch this space! And I like the scallop punches so I'm on the lookout for some of those in different shapes and sizes, too.

Right, I'm off to make some picture frames out of some beer mats (pics to follow...)

Happy Birthday!

Today was Jack's 1st birthday, and we had a brilliant day! He had a really good day, and he and Cory really enjoyed themselves... they even loved the fireworks - we weren't sure whether they would or not, but Jack laughed the whole time. So cute!

I finally got his card done at about 10 o'clock last night - my stamping skills seemed to disappear and it just wouldn't do what I wanted it to do! Still, here it is:



Now, normally I make all of our birthday cakes, but since finding a fab shop we've decided that we will all have our cakes from here in future. This one is completely chocolate - chocolate sponge, chocolate filling and look at all that chocolate on top! And all those little animals in between the pieces.... needless to say, it didn't last long!!!



What I need to do now is digiscrap the photos... only I can't! My computer had to be completely rebooted and I have nothing on here. No programs, or at least none that I like using, and I lost everything except for my family photos which luckily I am totally obsessive about backing up on disc. So, now I need to go over to DSP and download/buy loads of new stuff! But for the time being here's the birthday boy (with Dad) enjoying one of his presents.



Oh and Do Crafts have a half-price sale on See-D's stamps at the moment ('while stocks last'), I'm off to choose mine!

Sorting, sorting

Another old card for you today, as I still haven't done anything new! I've been sorting out my craft room so I have more room for Cory when he wants to do his thing. He's really getting into crafty things which is great, but it means twice as much mess so I've had to get a bigger table and rearrange the room around it!

So, as I mentioned this card is quite an old one, but a technique that I really enjoyed doing. It's actually a lot easier than it looks, especially as this one used a printed image, peel offs and a couple of brads. That's it! I got the idea from here and there are some really great ones in the gallery there. I used Word to size up the image and used the quote 'Birthdays are like flowers; the passing time brings forth the most beautiful blooms' which I laid over the top. The peel offs are coloured using these pens, as are the brads.



My blocks from Opitec have arrived, so I will hopefully get some of those done in the next few days, will post them when they are done, along with Jack's birthday card which I really need to finish by Tuesday!

Christmas is coming!

First up, apologies for lack of blog entries... I haven't done much craft stuff at all the last few days. There's just been too much going on - don'tcha just hate it when life gets in the way of crafting?! I've been busy getting things ready for Jack's 1st birthday next week - where did that year go? - and I'll post his card when the paint's dry.


But for now you'll have to make do with these cute Christmas decorations. I've seen so many that various craft-blogging people have done and I thought I'd have a go.


I used a Woodware 3 inch scalloped circle punch on various DCWV papers. You can use more or less pieces, but I think 8 works quite well. You could also use a smaller punch - I used the 3 inch size because it's the only one I have!





The deccie on the left has 10 pieces, but I think it's a bit cramped. The one in the middle has 8, and the last one has 7 - I know, I know... it was supposed to be 8 but Cory decided he needed to cut one of them in half and it was the last of that paper! That last one makes all the difference!

Proof that I will alter ANYTHING!

Here's a jam jar that I just couldn't throw away - as if I don't have enough junk already! I just used a strip of DCWV paper, a couple of lengths of ribbon and a tag, et voila! Took all of 5 minutes. Still, it does look kinda cute....



Right, I'm off to look for more stuff to stash!

Cute Gift!

Here's what I came up with when I was asked to do a 'new baby' card for my cousin... I know, not exactly a card, but I'd come across the template for the shoe at http://www.bydonovan.com/ and was desperate to try it out! (unfortunately the site was lost and is being rebuilt from scratch, but check it out when it's done, cos there are some brilliant templates for all sorts of things). I had the baby toppers anyway so made a simple card that's roughly A6 size, and used one on the side of the box. The box itself was guesswork with regards to measurements, and the top has a panel cut out - it's acetate and vellum in the gap, with a peel off to finish.



I still haven't managed to get started on Christmas cards, I just can't seem to get 'inspired'! But I have just bought loads of craft goodies so once they arrive I'll - hopefully - be coming up with ingenious ways to alter them.

Better get cracking on the Christmas cards so I have plenty of time to play!

Crafts for outdoors...

So I've just had a new fence and gate put up outside, and the front door spruced up. Which meant taking all the door furniture off. Well, me being me, I figured why just put it back on when I didn't particularly like it in the first place? So when my dad turned up with a piece of wood shaped very much like a number plaque, guess what I just had to try?




All I did was paint it with acrylic paint that I mixed to match the paper, then cut the scrapbook paper about 2mm smaller all round. I glued it on using PVA and printed the numbers on tracing paper, which I then transferred onto green paper. Glued these on, again with PVA, and outlined with a brown pencil. I finished it off with a covering of acrylic sealant. All that needs doing now is to fix the brackets onto the back and voila! Took about 20 minutes if you take off the drying time.

Next time I probably won't use a pencil to outline it, but I was too impatient to get it finished to wait until I had bought something more appropriate!

More Digiscrapping...

So, it's been a pretty hectic couple of days, and I haven't managed to get any new stuff done - I was supposed to get Christmas cards and the boys' thankyou cards done, not to mention get stuff ready for Jack's 1st birthday, but no luck - so here are a couple more digital scrapbook pages. They're some of the first I did, and I'm really new to it still, so they're a bit clunky... takes a bit of getting used to using PSP for this kind of thing. Still, I think they're pretty cute!





These pages and embellishment all came from digitalscrapbookplace again.

My first blog!!!

Well, here it is.... my first blog.

To start with this site will just be a few photos of my work, with links to my best-loved websites and the odd tutorial etc, but hopefully with time (and, of course, readers!) it will become much more.

So, now for photos.

I'll begin with a couple of digiscrapped pages, until I get myself sorted

These page kits and embellishments came from Digital Scrapbook Place

More to follow soon..........