This Weeks Willow Sketchie Challenge

I'm sat posting this just before Sharon's 2pm programme on Create and Craft, hence the quick post. Just like to say well done Sharon and what a great new cd, will be getting that one. Polly Pickleberry is so cute and she reminds me of myself when I was a little girl.
plus use red and green.


A simple card this week. Right off to watch Sharon, enjoy.

Jo xxx

A White Christmas

Well that is what my Hubby keeps telling me. This is the theme of this weeks Alphabet Challenge - W for White Christmas.





To make this card I have used a couple of embossing dies and cutting dies. All the edges have been ink with the Milled Lavender Distress Ink just to help it pop a little bit more.

I was quite pleased with this effect and must remember to try this effect some more.

Jo xxx

More Christmas Sparkle

For the last few months I think I have probably used the most glitter ever. The whole family and house has been covered and it can be a bit embarrassing when you have visitors and they take a little bit home with them (unknowingly), or you just sit there sparkling away at them while they are deep in conversation with you.

This was my last splash of glitter, I have hidden the pot away until next year.




I made this card for the Papertake Weekly Challenge themed, I'm Dreaming of a ( choose a colour) Christmas. So I chose Blue my most favourite colour ever. The background paper is from Crafters Companion, lovely icy snowflakes. I've used several Spellbinders dies to create the flowers and for the sentiment. I have been watching quite a lot of Sue Wilsons demos recently, so I'm starting to look at my die in a different light.

Hope you like this card. Please leave a comment as they are all greatly recieved.

Jo xxx

Quick Challenge Post

This is the Willow Sketchie Challenge for this week.

And this is what I came up with. Plenty of sparkle and bling.

Hope you like it and I hope I am not too late for the challenge.

Yum! Yum! Yummy!

Sometimes we just need to give a little gift and this idea incorporates the card and gift together, it would be good for a teacher at the end of term.
I've printed the papers from Polka Doodles Sundae of Seasons CD Rom to make the easel card. For the stopper I made a box with an acetate lid. Box size 8 x 8cm and 2cm depth.

Decoration is simple with glitter on the christmas trees, 3 silver snowflakes with gem centres and a bit of faux- stitching around the edges. Then the fun bit. I filled the box with little jelly sweets in a cello bag.



I hope you try this out yourselves and let me know what you have come up with.

This card has been entered into two challenges this week:

Polka Doodles Challenge Secret Element

Raise the Bar It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas

Yet Another Walter the Owl Card

I can't help myself, I just love these little characters and they suit so many projects and papers, I just have to use them.




I made this card for the Papertake weekly challenge and this week it was a sketch, at first I wasn't sure of these types of challenges, but now I love them. I dug out some old papers from last years stash as I had already coloured my image. (hopefully they match okay). I was also tempted to put faux stitching all around the different layers, but walked away before I went mad with it.

Anything Goes!

Which is the title for this weeks Willow Designs Challenge. This week I decided to use up whatever I had left of my craft table at the time and put it all together. I usually try to have a clear up between projects, but just couldn't face it as I had so much stuff everywhere. Instead of sorting through my stash to find the right papers and image, I would just use what I had around me. I think I'll try this out again as I seemed to tidy as I went and managed to do two things at once and save time, wahoo!!

This is what I come up with in the end, hope you like it.

Something A Bit Different!

For months now we have been making christmas cards, talking about christmas, it's just been christmas, christmas, christmas, well it is so nice to do something different. We all need something bright and cheerful at this time of year when it is so dark and horrible outside. I like to start thinking about getting back out in the garden and soaking up the rays again, it keeps me going through this miserable depressing time. So here is something to brighten those dreary days!



All the papers used were from my stash. The fairy stamp is from Polka Doodles, I sparkled the wings, but it doesn't show on the photo unfortunately.

I've entered this card into the Raise The Bar Challenge - Thank You/Grateful and the Alphabet Challenge - V for Very Vibrant, which I think this card is, they were the loudest papers I could find.

Italian Christmas

This card was for the Polka Doodles Challenge - Italian Chirstmas, using the colours of the Italian flag, red, green and white. The background papers were from the HOTP Forever Christmas paper pack containing traditional reds and greens, ideal for this project. I've used a Polka Doodles stamped image and coloured with ProMarkers then decorated with white leaves, silver snowflakes and gems to give a frosty feel.

Brilliant News!

This week I had some great news. I have been accepted on the design team at One Stop Craft Challenge. This is so exciting and I can't wait to get going with the challenges and working with all the other team members. This is a new experience for me so wish me luck and check out the challenge site.

For todays card I've used the Winnie/ Walter owl stamp and coloured with a selection of ProMarkers and FlexMarkers to tie-in with the background papers from My Minds Eye - Snowed In paper pack.




Behind the main matt and layered image I've decorated with a layer of silk ribbon and them red felt ribbon then a matt of matching red cardstock.

I had a go at making a concertina flower from my lace edged Spellbinder die, (which I know want to do lots more of) held together with a circle of red card and decorated with a silver button with a jewel in the centre.

Below is the sketch we were challenged with.

My Brilliant Weekend!

I have had just the most fantastic weekend ever, with plenty of time to devote to my challenge cards.

There have been some great titles this week and have been able to put to good use my new toys from the NEC.

Suprisingly after such a marathon crafting session, I did actually tidy everything up and am all clear to start all the projects that I have waiting in the wings

Here are all the cards and challenges I've done this weekend, I hope you like them and perhaps get a little inspiration for you own makes.

Little Boy Blue

I am very pleased with how this card came out, especially the colouring of the boy in ProMarkers. You try and try these different techniques and they don't seem to work and then all of a sudden something goes right and you think to yourself, at last I'm getting there, it looks good. Even my husband thought it had been printed. So I am one happy bunny and will have to do another one to make sure it wasn't a fluke.

Every thing has been printed from the Polka Doodles Pretty Tuff and mounted onto Kraft card.

I've entered him into the One Stop Craft Challenge - Blue

Shaped Christmas Card

I must admit I don't think that I have ever made a shaped card like this before. They always seemed a bit fiddly and my cutting out is not that great, especially to cut two layers with the same pattern. Nikky has made it easy though with her designs, she really does think about us who are useless with scissors (it makes it alot quicker as well).

One thing that I did do and it's probably and old tip, but I sanded the edges and inked them, that seemed to cover any rough bits and I was more pleased with the finish of the card.



I used the Reindeer, holly and robin from the Sudae of Seasons CD from Polka Doodles, some backing paper from another of her CD's and a sentiment. He has got some sparkle to his antlers and the robins tail, but it doesn't really show up on the photo.




I have entered this card into the Polka Doodles weekly challenge - Shaped Christmas.

When is a card not a card..................

Well I think it is when it's a gift box as well.



This started out to be a simple cream box with an easel card on top, but I couldn't stop embellishing it more and more, I only stopped when I couldn't get anything else on it.

I made it to take my favourite choccies, so now I have somewhere to hide them away from everyone else in the house.

This project ( and it did turn into a bit of a project) into the Papertake Weekly Challenge.

Pure Indulgence!

This weekend while crafting I have been watching the wonderful Sue Wilson with the Spellbinders dies

This is my little homage to Sue, although it is no way to her standard but great to have a go just the same.




Background papers and yummy puds and cakes are from the Polka Doodles Sundae of Seasons CD and I have glazed all the strawberries and chocolate sauce on the ice cream sundae.

This card has been entered into the Raise the Bar Challenge - Time To Feast.

U for Under the Sea

U should be for unique as these challenges always are, especially this week. I was really stumped. I look through all my stash and just could not find anything that would work for this theme.

I had to go to the internet and find an image or something that would suit and found this gorgeous little turtle digi stamp and for the life of me I can't remember where it was and didn't save it on the computer either.

This image was coloured in using good old ProMarkers and a white fine line gel pen. The background was made from die cuts, coloured and then a little bit of sparkle.






This card has been entered int0 the Alphabet Challenge - U for Under the Sea.

Willow Sketchie Challenge

Doing these sketchie challenges are really helping me look at the layouts of my cards more and how to use several patterned papers together.

For this card I've used my willow stamp that was a prize on a previous challenge. They are such good quality stamps to use and I love this sweet little owl.




Willow Sketch



My card

Lace, pearls and swirls

I have had great fun making this card. Nice to make a really girly card with ribbons and pearl and loads of pearls at that.

This is an A5 card using backing paper and little girl printed from the Pretty Sweet CD from Polka Doodles. I've used a range of different dies for this card including Spellbinders Lace and Marrianne Designs swirls and round border.

I have entered this card into the Polka Doodles weekly Challenge - Swirls and Pearls, and also the One Stop Craft Challenge - Ribbons and Lace and wish me luck as I am going to enter the design team call also.

This Weeks Challenge Cards

With all that crafty stuff from the NEC I thought I would used as much as I could for this weeks blog challenges.



This card was made using the 6 x 6" frilly square card blank and covered with one of the papers from the Wild Blossom 12 x 12" designer paper pack, then stamped in black ink with a leaf stamp already in my stash.

Using the X-cut nesting shapes I cut out of white a matt and layered it with a contrasting pink paper from the same pack, then for the Polka Doodles Meeshelle stamp I cut her out using the Spellbinders labels die and coloured the image using ProMarkers and the fabby new fine nibs.

Extra pieces were used from dies already in my box and flowers cut out of scraps of the paper used in this design.

I have entered this card into the Polka Doodles Challenge - Shaped Card.

Now for my next card:





All the papers and the cute baby Rudolph are from the Polka Doodles Sundae of Seasons Cd-rom and they went so well with the stack of brown card I managed to get. I love the lace Spellbinders border die in this set and wanted to use it on this card, but the star is the Rudolph, he is so cute.

I've entered this card into several challenges:

Raise The Bar - No Embellishments.
One Stop Craft Challenge - 3 is the magic number.
Papertake Weekly Challenge - First Christmas.

NEC November 2011

This was a great family day out with Me and Hubby, our Son and his Fiance and Hubbys' Mum. We usually go on a week day so a first for a Saturday and boy it was packed. We didn't have much time to stop and talk to people there, but I am glad that we got to meet Nikky from Polka Doodles and have a little chat.

Here are a few photos of my goodies.



First stop Polka Doodles and grabbing the items that I had not got so far.

Card stock was a must and managed to keep it to a minimum this year. At last I got the fine nibs for the ProMarkers and they are wonderful, they were the first thing I tried when I got back home.



Of coarse I needed more dies' you can never have enough of them, but the rest were not on my list, but can't refuse a bargain.




I took a punt on this little lot, its was all done up in a bag for five pounds. I was so surprised when I got home and there were two punches in the bag, one a large corner rounder which I had been looking for, for ages and then a EK Success corner punch. What a find.

I am a happy little bunny now and can't wait to go a try out the rest of my stash.

This Weeks Willow Sketchie Challenge

This weeks sketch from Willow Designs Sketchie Challenge, designed by Shell.

Here's what I came up with. It's quite plain but I adore this stamp, he is so very cute. He usually carries a bunch of flowers, I cut those away so that he could be catching falling stars.

This card has also been entered into the Polka Doodles Weekly Challenge - Mystical and Magical and the One Stop Craft Challenge - No Sentiments.

Getting Back Into The Challenges

It has been quite a while since I have entered some of these challenges, but now that things have settled down a bit here I can devoted more time to them. The mojo hasn't been working too well just lately so here goes with the first attempt:



I've used the Papertake Weekly Challenge of a sketch and applied it to two other challenges.
Raise The Bar - Sew What! and The Alphabet Challenge - T for Tea Time.





I've used papers from a christmas themed pad, but these were the two that coordinated the best with the chipboard shapes the best. All the pieces have been highlighted with brown ink and faux stitching.

Coffee Morning Wash-out

Well we did everything we could to get people to come in, but unfortunately only two people showed up apart from family. They did however like what we had done and were very impressed and would put the word around at their groups they attend, so hopefully better luck next time.

These things although disappointing are actually a great learning curve and you find out what to do next time or what not to do next time. We know how we would like to set up our products and we also found that we had more stock than we actually thought we had, Mums living room was rather small for it all.

We took lots of photo's but they didn't turn out awfully well, I manage to get a few that I could use to show you what we had available.


Book bug Bookmarks for early readers



Boxes of 6 cards and envelopes, plus 6 gift tags




I designed this card for a recent challenge and wanted to try it out using different coloured mirri card. The silver for 25th Wedding Anniversary and the red for 40th.


Now for Lynns' talents:




She had a very impressive display of her knitted products that have taken her months to complete.

There was one good thing about the lack of people coming in..........





we had lots of cakes to eat. My sons girlfriend made these fantastic cupcakes they were really too good to share.

Well here's to the next one, this was a good practice run and we did have a lot of fun anyway.

Craft Sale and Coffee Morning

After so long me and my mother in law are actually going to have a craft sale at her house. I'm selling cards and gifts and she is selling her knitted toys etc. We have both been crafting away like mad these past few weeks to get enough stock together and enough different things to cover peoples different tastes.

We have been talking about it for so long now and we have finally bit the bullet so to speak. We set the date and put up posters around the village and family members who work in the local shop have been telling everyone what we are doing so everyone should know where to go and what to expect.

All that's left to do is to pack things up and have a last look to see if we need anything else and to get making the cupcakes to go with the coffee while they take time to browse all our wares. We are also taking orders for things so that we can give a personalised service to customers.

If this goes well then we will probably have more, we are really nervous about the outcome, but really excited as well. It's so nice to do things all together as a family and see how many different ideas we have between us.

So keep your fingers crossed that all goes well and I will put some photos on here of the day, good or bad.

Here are a few things that I have made over the last couple of weeks.






A box of six, C6 cards and envelopes with stamped decoupage images from Polka Doodles and two other misc stamps. The photo doesn't show it, but the card used for the box and card is a lovely hammered effect which I found went well for chrismas cards. The designs have been coloured using a mix of ProMarkers and Flexi Markers then glittered.




I have had these small notebooks for ever, I picked them up really cheap one day and thought I would decorate them, but I put them away and they haven't seen daylight since.

In one of my mags I saw this design of a japanese style girl, she was gorgeous and thought I would try to replicate this with my own twist and this is what she turned out like. The thing is if you are going to cater for the girls you have to be fair and cater for the boys too, so I came up with the little boy with his dungarees. They worked out to be just the right size for my mini notebooks, so on they went and now they are ready for the sale.

The only trouble with doing these I have now had more ideas and made bears also, I will add photos soon.

Noel

Here is the second card made from Nikkis' papers.

I've taken a section of an A4 design to make a square card and matted onto black then white card to tie in with the matching Noel topper. All the swirls have been glittered both on the backing paper and topper, then embellished with black and white spotty ribbon and bow.

This card has been entered into the Polka Doodles challenge - Ribbons and bows.

Cold hands warm heart

This is one of two cards I made using the lovely papers by the guest designer Nikky Hall in this months making cards magazine. I love this cheeky little snowman and the colours are so scrummy.

Using lots of matting and layering and faux stitching again,( just don't seem to be able to stop myself) the papers really don't need a lot done to them to create a beautiful card.

I've entered this card into the Willow Sketchie Challenge.

Using handmade flowers

I've made this card for the Week 40 Polka Doodles Challenge - Handmade Flowers.

This time instead of using the large flowers we are all making at the moment, I thought it would be nice to use small flowers that I used to make a while back before we had the intricate dies we have now.

To make the flowers you will need a medium and small daisy punch. With the medium, punch out two daisies in pink and with the small one punch out two daisies in yellow. Glue the two pink daisies together so that it makes a filled in flower and do the same with the yellow daisy. Next you need to take a pair of tweezers and pinch each petal up with the tweezers pushing down in the middle, do this for all 16 petals and do like wise with the yellow flower which ,when glued to the pink flower will help make the centre. When each one is dry you can ink the edges and add a pearl to finish.

These flowers would also look nice as the centres of some of our larger blooms or great as a more delicate touch.

all I want for christmas is.........

All I want for christmas is U card created using papers from the HOTP Forever Christmas Cards Paper Stack and the downloaded image of Walter the owl.

The matts and layers have been stitched together and inked with brushed corduroy. Walter has been decoupaged with one layer and had the white fluffy bits on his hat glittered. I have embellished with three snowflakes that have been glittered and a gem in the centre. The 'U' is a wooden letter coloured with promarker and sprayed with cosmic shimmer.

I have entered this card into the 6th October Willow Sketchie Challenge.

40th Birthday Card

Thought this image would make a great 40th Birthday card a man.

Materials used

8x8 black card blank
white and black card for matting and layering of 3 strips, topper and oval backer to main picture
Downloaded image from Willow Designs
Silver peel off rosette and 40 backed onto black card and cut out
3 small self adhesive black stones
2 tool charms
black fine liner for faux stitching effect
deckle oval dies for image and black matt
swiss dots embossing folder for black matt layer

I have entered this card into two challenges this week:
Willow Sketchie Challenge and Polka Doodles Birthday Ages Challenge.

Willow Sketchie Challenge

I've used Willow Designs download stampie and coloured in using ProMarkers for this card. The Promarker were also used to colour the matching matts as I usually use just plain white cardstock through-out.