I've been tagged - TWICE!

Wow, so I've been tagged twice..... does that mean I have to twice as interesting???

Thanks to Jane and Toni for thinking I might have something useful to say... I'm going to add my facts now and have a think over the next few days who to tag, as it's Jack's 2nd birthday tomorrow and I need to get things ready!

I have to share 7 random or weird facts about myself, and nominate 7 other blogs to tag. So:

1. I home educate my boys (with the help of their dad, and various family members) and would eventually like to train to be a forest school practitioner.

2. I have my ears, nose and eyebrow pierced and have done for about 10 years.

3. I don't have a TV (but I still watch Alias and Scrubs on DVD a lot!)

4. I can't swim

5. I hate the water, probably the cause of number 4!!

6. I spend way too much time blurfing, and end up not actually making anything

7. I hate, hate, HATE clowns and spiders

Now you know something about me!

Blog Candy from Rach

Rach is giving away some Whiff of Joy blog candy HERE, check it out for a chance to win.

Business Card Holder

I have a business card holder for when I do fayres and the likes, but thought it might actually be nicer if I made my own for when I leave cards in shops etc. So, I had a play and came up with this:



I used Kanban Vintage Deco 300gsm card, and you can see from the second picture that I made the template a panel longer at each end (that's the back and the smaller bit at the front) so that it could be folded over to cover the joins. This way there's pattern on the back as well as the inside.








Thanks for reading,

Birthday Cards

This first card was really quick and easy, but it actually looks quite smart in real life. The base is black cs (A4), and on that I have a mat of red with the oriental paper. Then I have matted Core'dinations cs on some more red. The image is a peel off that I thought I would use as I'm trying to use them all up (but it's hard, cos I hate using them now!). I finished with three gold mini brads.

*CASEd from Julie

For the second card I used blue A4 cs for the base and cut it down to make it square. The dp is from the Dovecrafts Masculine 12x12 pack and I have edged this with a strip of blue, which I trimmed with a wavy edged cutting blade and then faux stitched using a machine and white Sakura Glaze pen. The greeting panel is the same cs as used for the base and strip, and the greeting itself is another peel off coloured using peel off markers. Again I finished with 3 mini brads.

Thanks for looking

Hanging Christmas Decorations

This will only be a quick post as I have too much stuff to do, and not enough time in which to do it!

I made another of these decorations using coasters today. This time I used paper from Anita's 'Classic Xmas Blue' 6x6 pack, and silver ribbon with a Christmas greeting on it. The letters are the same as before, again embossed with silver. I have to say these letters are great to work with, I'll definitely be buying more (from HERE)

Sorry about the picture, the weather's been horrible and dull so it's hard to get a good one :(

Thanks for looking!

Gift Voucher/Money Wallets

These money wallets or gift voucher holders were really simple to make, but I think it's much nicer to put cash etc in something like this.... I think it makes it feel more like a present!




The two Christmas wallets are made with Papermania 'A Wonderful Christmas Time' papers, and misc cs. The 'Merry Christmas' part was cut from another of these sheets and matted on the same cs as the wallet and band are made from. I finished the band with some green grosgrain ribbon.

The second uses the same paper pack, but this time I used my square scallop punch with an image from another sheet. This one is slightly larger as originally I made them to fit up to a £50 note, but figured if they are DL size, they could be put into an envelope easier if you wanted to mail them, and they would be more likely to fi a shop voucher too.






The final one uses paper from my favourite pack, Dovecraft 8x8 Retro Flowers. The wallet is made in the same way but has a grosgrain ribbon tie instead. I've attached the ribbon to the back of the wallet with dst.

Thanks for reading

Coasters

I finally found somewhere that sells white coasters (as opposed to the printed ones I used to have to use that showed through!), so I did some experimenting:




I covered both sides with dp from Papermania 'A Wonderful Christmas Time' set. I sanded the edges and punched holes using my Crop-o-dile, and added red eyelets. I threaded red grosgrain through, using dst to secure it on the back. The letters are chipboard, covered with Versamark and embossed with silver embossing powder - these came from Handy Hippo and are 1 1/2" tall.





For this pen holder, I again covered both sides of the coasters with dp from the Dovecraft Masculine set. I sanded them and then used ribbon to join the sides (the holes were made with the larger side of he crop-o-dile). The base was stuck on using Diamond Glaze, and the dividers were added at the end.


Thanks for reading

A Couple of Birthday Cards

These were for 3 year old twins.



For this one I used Dovecraft Retro Flower dp layered on yellow Core'dinations cs. I used the ticket punch and added an eyelet to each corner. I stamped 'Lola with Bird' from Funky Kits, and paper pieced her dress and hat. I coloured the rest using Whispers pastel markers. This I matted onto red Core'dinations cs, and then onto yellow - and also layered the name in the same way. I coloured the brads to match the dp, and added a flower and spotted brad.



The second card uses another dp from the Dovecraft Retro Flowers pack, layered on pink Core'dinations cs. I stamped 'Lola with Flowers', watercoloured her and layered her on green cs. I finshed the fron off with the lettering and some ribbon.



The inside of the card uses some more of the same paper, with a panel of cs with the white for a message.

Thanks for looking

Notelet Set #3

Another notelet set, but with a different box. I'm not too keen on the notelets themselves - I think the stamped image is too small and that the colour is a bit strong - I might do another set and make the cards more like the top of the box. Not to mention that I put the corner pieces in the wrong corners on the green ones... didn't notice until I uploaded the photo now!

There are 6 notelets in the set, 2 each of green, pink and purple to match the colours of the main image, which is 'Modesty' by Penny Black, watercoloured and pierced in the corners. I also roughed up the edges a bit as they looked a bit flat without.

Thanks for reading, and as always any feedback is very welcome!

Post-it Pad

This was a really quick make.

I used a piece of white Core'dinations cs 9cm x 19cm, scored at 9cm and 10cm. For the top I used a dark blue piece of Core'dination cs cut slightly smaller than the white and used my concave punch on the corners. On top of this is more of the same but slightly lighter, and a couple of mm smaller. Sorry, I don't know the exact colours of the cs, as they're from a pack and don't have it on. The top is a dp from the Dovecraft Retro Floral pack with the corners rounded, finished with a (Papermania I think?) flower and brad, and peel off lettering coloured using peel off markers from Imag-e-nation. The post-its themselves are from Tesco.

I'm fairly happy with the results, but I think in future I wouldn't use white cs for the base.

Thanks for reading

A Quick Make...

...well it would've been if my bind-it-all had co-operated, but I got it going in the end and produced this pad and pen set.

The pad measures roughly 9cm x 9.5cm, the pages being just under 9cm x 9cm. The purple is misc cs, and the paper on the pad and pen is from the Dovecraft Retro Floral Prints 8x8 pack. I thought I would have multicoloured pages to add a bit of interest so I picked colours that matched the dp (blue, green, pink, orange and yellow).

The pen is made in the same way as these here with the exception that I heated the tape for about 40 seconds before adding the beads - apparently it helps the beads stick better, so I'll see if it works.

Notelet Set 2

This set is different to the first in that it opens out, instead of having a flap.

I made 6 A6 cards, and used the Chick-a-Doo range of Sei papers and some more Core'dinations card. The papers are double sided, so the cover consists of the front side of Chick-a-doo layered on slightly larger pieces of the reverse side IYSWIM. The front of the top three cards are Pee Wee's Kiwis from the same paper range, and the bottom three use the reverse side, so all six cards are made with one sheet of 12x12. The scallops are from the Core'dinations card, which I've drawn dots on using a Sakura glaze pen, and the pictures are 2" circles taken from a sheet of the paper I used for the covers.

I didn't plan to use these for the scallops but I put a message on them and when they were all put together I didn't like them and needed to cover them up!

The ribbon used to tie them up is American Crafts... I thought it was too dark, but the opinion so far is that it's a good contrast, so it's staying. Oh, and the box itself is another sheet of Core'dinations white cs.

Thanks for reading

Notelet Set

Six notelets with envelopes in a box





I made these A6 notelets and box using the Core'dinations ColorCore cardstock. I bought one of their 6x6 Super Assortment pack, and found them really good to work with. The orange scallop square, the green panels, the box and the band are all made using the card (although the box and band are 12x12 sheets).

The flower is a stamp which I coloured using Whispers pastel markers. I covered the whole square in clear versamark and embossed the whole thing, then put it on the scalloped square. The green layer has silver eyelets on each corner, and the picture was put on glue dots for a bit of dimension. The sentiment says 'Just a Note...' which was printed directly onto the card in Fine Hand font in Olive Green (3).

The box was a bit of guesswork really, and it took me a couple of goes to get it right, but now it works I can make a pattern and hopefully make a few sets.

Thanks for looking

Another Set of Blocks

I've managed to get another set of blocks finished, this time NOEL. I used the same sized blocks, same set of papers, but this time I tried the letters with clear Versamark ink and white embossing powder and I think it worked much better.... even if the E is a bit wonky!

Thanks for looking, I'm off to bed in a bit!

Christmas Blocks

I made these blocks to go on my table at the 'evening gala' I'm doing next month. I figured I'd aim to make more Christmas stuff as most people seem to be starting to think along those lines by now.

They're 2in blocks from Opitec, which I have given a couple of coats of white acrylic paint. I've used papers from a 6x6 Christmas pack, but I can't remember which brand - I'll try to remember to look next time I go to the craft shop and update later. I stamped the letters using the Plain Jane alphabet stamp set from See D's in white with white embossing powder. I wasn't completely happy with how they turned out, which I think is because of the ink... it was a bit patchy. These were glued on with PVA, and once they were dry I used a snowblock (like those used in nail bars) to sand the edges. They're finished off with a layer of acrylic sealer.

Thanks for looking

I've received an award

...although I don't deserve it! I was given this back in April and completely neglected to put it up on here and pass it on. So, sorry to Toni who gave it to me.... that will teach me to pay more attention! Thankyou!






I'm to pass this Artey Pico award on to five other bloggers and here they are:

Lauren, Liz, Amy, Nettie, and Jak.

Another Girly Birthday Card

This card is similar to the last one I posted. It's the same size, and I used the same papers. This time I covered the entire base with the pink piece, and cut two triangles from the black. I matted these onto white card. The triangular pieces weren't particular sizes and they weren't matted centrally, just to make it a bit less formal. The whole thing was matted on black, and finished off with the centre piece. This was a cuttlebugged layer that Dimps sent me (thanks!), layered on black, then onto silver and onto black again. I popped it up on glue dots to add a bit of dimension.

Thanks for looking

Girly Birthday Card

I used a white base for this A5 card, with a slightly smaller piece of black matted on top. I cut four rectangles of the two papers - not sure what brand they are, it doesn't say anywhere on them - and made one large rectangle. I think if I did it in future I would cut one full sized piece and stick the two contrasting pieces to it - a bit of a waste when you're as short of stash as I am but definitely easier. I'm not sure if you can see it properly from the photo but some of the flowers on both papers are outlined in silver, so I wanted to carry that on in the other layers. I cut the middle layer from some silver card I pinched from Cory's craft box (I swear that boy has more than I do!) and used my ticket punch for the corners. On top of that is another rectangle of black. The flowers are single layers of what are actually 3D peel offs, stuck onto acetate and coloured from the back using the peel off markers from Imag-e-nation. I popped them up on glue dots for a bit of dimension, and added the greeting - again with peel offs, as I don't have enough stamps :(

Hope you like it, and thanks for looking!

Cards for Father's Day and a Birthday

Ok, so I know Father's Day was a while ago, but never mind! These were made for my dad, and for my Grandad from my mum.





For the background I used Basic Grey paper, and used my sanding block to soften the edges a bit, as I did with all of the layers. The dp is from my local craft shop, but I don't know who from. The layer with the lettering on is cream card coloured with chalks, and peel offs. I finished it with 3 page pebbles.




This card looks simple, and had I had a bit more stash it would've been! I knew what I wanted to do with this card, and I had the dp but no paper that matched for the background. So I dug out the coffee - can't stand the stuff personally, but it seems it does have it's uses! - and stained a piece of white cs. When it was dry, I added darker patches with more coffee and chalks.


The dp is mounted on some paper I got from the freebie pack from Readicut - you can't see it but it's metallic. The tag - which is off of some clothes from Asda - is also covered in this paper, and the edges have been sanded. The ribbon is American Crafts, and I finished the corner with some mini brads.





For this card I layered pink cs onto the base, and the green and patterned paper are a double sided dp layered on more white. The page pebbles use the same paper, and the Cuttlebugged butterfly is one from Dimps (thanks!). Simple but effective.

Thanks for looking

Sketch pad

I made this using my Bind-it-All. It's A5 size, so just right for popping in a bag (well, one of my cavernous hold-alls, anyway!) and carrying around with me, for when I'm feeling 'inspired'!

The paper I used for the cover is Basic Grey, and on the inside I used a blue to match that in the paper. The letters are from a pack that Dawn from the Imag-e-nation forum sent me, so thanks Dawn! I left them as they were, as they did have a very light pattern on them and I think they show up well against the background. The ribbons are from American Crafts and Dovecraft.

A few new things

This is the first of several posts I'll make today, seems as I haven't posted for three months.... which is just shocking!

Beaded Pens

I've wanted to make these for ages, and I finally bit the bullet and ordered some Mini Micro beads from PennyWise Arts - which arrived in a week and I was only charged $8 for shipping, so I would definitely recommend them. The pens are from Tesco - a pack of 6 is £1.00.

I cut a piece of paper the length of the clear part of the pen and wide enough to wrap around with a slight overlap, then used 3mm dst to attach it to the pen. All of the pens here used 6x6 DCWV paper - the patterns are scaled down, and on an area as small as the pen I prefer this to bigger pieces.

I then cut a piece of double sided tape from an A4 sheet (from Stix2), the same size as the paper. I attached it to the pen ** CAREFULLY **, as it's pretty much permanent; then I removed the other side of the tape and rolled it in the beads. I rolled it around between my hands for a couple of minutes just to make sure they all stick - as yet, they're all still on there!

Well, I hope that made sense... here's the picture

Thanks for looking