Monday 25 December 2017

Christmas Day!!

Happy Christmas to you all.
May God bless you with peace and joy at this wonderful time of the year.


Tuesday 19 December 2017

December Birthday

Not the best day to have a birthday and I know how she must have suffered while growing up! My birthday is also in December but a bit before ... not on the day!  
No doubt she had the 'I haven't bought you a birthday present cos I thought you'd like a big Christmas present'.  Bet they never said it to anyone with a birthday in July!!  lol

Anyhow, when I first saw this Woodware stamp I just knew that I could use it for C's birthday.  Once I had removed it from its backing paper, I used my craft knife to cut out the 'Christmas' word.  

My theory was that once this was removed, the stamp would leave a blank space on which I could write the word 'Birth'.
So I now have a customised stamp for C's Birthday.

This year I have made her card in Teal, Turquoise, Blue - its December's birthstone.

I used Versafine Onyx to stamp the image onto watercolour paper and then trimmed the paper to fit onto a piece of glitter paper (6 x 6in pad from The Works) which I had already trimmed to fit my white base card.


I used my Neocolour crayons to colour in the digits, holly, border and highlight the word in yellow and, using a very fine (size 1) brush, added some water.

Once the image was dry I attached it to the glitter paper, which I attached to the card base. 

I used some blue paper to make an insert, punching a rose out of each corner to complete the card.

Oh! I forgot to say - I wrote the 'Birth' word with a fine nibbed black unnamed pen!

I have posted the card now so, if you're reading this C .. happy Birthday Darlin'.

Wednesday 13 December 2017

November Swaps

Noobie Swap
I made this card some time ago and couldn't think of an appropriate sentiment but looking at it today I don't think it needs a sentiment.      The teabag tiles are split tiles and I embossed the corners the old fashioned way using my Fiskars embossing board ... such excitement when they brought it out !!!





I have received this very pretty decoupaged and embossed card.  Thank you LindaS.




Sketch Swap

I used some of my stash paper for the background and then couldn't really find an image to fit the card.  I am not very good with square cards so I have bought a pack for me to practise on next year.
I found this image, also in my stash and managed to cut it to a better size using fancy edged scissors.
I die cut the sentiment and added it as near to the sketch position as I could.  
I hope partner likes it.




My return card is beautiful, extremely well made and thought out.
Thank you ChrisN.




Technique Swap - Parchment
I really looked forward to this swap but when I settled down with my image and started to emboss, I realised that it's been a long time since I last attempted parchment!!!
I embossed the image and coloured the back of the parchment with Inktense pencils.  It didn't look right so I added small amounts of water to the back and outlined the 'stained glass' sections with a black gel pen.  Once it was all dry I wanted to attach it to a dark blue card but could not think how ..... in the end I used glue dots along the long sides.  I sealed the edges of the parchment with a peel off ribbon and border, not only hiding the glue dots but securing to the card.




I was thrilled to receive my partner's card.  She had gone to all the effort of finding a design with a 'C'.  Clever!
Thank you Olive.

Tuesday 12 December 2017

October Swaps

I have only entered one swap this month, I always try to keep away from celebrating the end of October ..... I find it very pagan but that is just my opinion.
Noobie Swap



This is my card .... courtesy of Helen who was a member of CardWorkshop.  I love the impression of Autumn and happiness and a really cheeky face that makes me smile....
.... and there's glitter!







My return card is fabulous!  I don't know how it was made, I shall certainly have to look into it a bit more closely!!!






It opens out like this .......





...... and there are gold peel off decorations.......

Thank you MaryC.