Floral Birthday

What a hectic couple of weeks it has been, made worse by colds and a mild dose of man-flu (poor dear!), and with Christmas rapidly approaching its only going to get more busy. I rely on my calendar so much - but I am often still rubbish at remembering things... like my friends birthday. This is her card, which I have posted a day late. Sorry Julie!!!

Sx

Paper & sentiment: Pink Petticoat

Blooms: Poppicrafts

Button & Sugarcoated black card: Doodlebug Designs

Ribbon: Ribbon Oasis

This Thursday...No.22: Paint!

This Thursday's current challenge is to produce something involving paint. Since its been a while since I attended my watercolour classes (I plan to rejoin in January - if I can get myself organised) and I've been wanting to paint a peg for a while - and who doesn't - I decided to indulge myself and play!

I'm rather pleased with the results - I love simplicity combined with bright colours, particularly pink and green (with a dash of orange for variety). I attached all the elements with Diamond Glaze. I cannot praise this produce enough: its so useful, though you do have to be quick!

Wrap up warm...

Sx

Flower and butterfly felt ribbon: Poppicrafts
Gems: Doodlebug Design
Stickles glue, own peg and freebie magnets on reverse
Paper: Traci Murphy Designs (available at Funky Playground Designs)
Paint: Crown paint in 'Shocking Pink' - I want this in my bedroom, but my husband isn't too keen for some reason.

A little snow

This card is for this weeks Papertake Weekly Challenge: Snow! ...which is apt as we've finally had the threatened white stuff overnight (and it looks like we're in for a lot more!).

The images, boarder and paper are all of Zoe Pearn's design - you can find her beautiful and very feminine designs at Sweet Shoppe Designs. The flakes are punched from household foil and I stitched my beloved pink seed beads onto the trees for a special finish.

I am now off to ice and decorate 50 mini cakes for my son's birthday party this afternoon - a fancy dress party for thirty-plus 5 and 6 year olds...

Keep warm,

Sx

This Thursday...Challenge 21

The card above is my entry to this weeks blog challenge by the lovely ladies of This Thursday...

The theme is 'marvellous metallics' - and being the mum of a car-mad boy, I naturally had a go at making a car out of kitchen foil. Humm - not as easy as it sounds as my (very cheap) foil tore in the most unanticipated directions… The final result wasn't even worth mounting onto a card - but it does represent another challenge in itself, which I vow to crack one day!

I then decided to make snow flakes punched from my foil (which did work!), but finally chose to make a night time card. I used some metallic silver mini-stars, metallic silver sequins and a lovely (you guessed it!) metallic eyelet charm to represent to moon. I really love the pea-pod baby image, which I coloured with chalks.

I can't wait to browse the other challenge entries.

'til next time...

Sx

Image: Scrap n Fonts, ; Papers: Lauraskathi (Alicia kit); Eyelet charm: Poppicrafts; Organza ribbon: Ribbon Oasis; Rub-ons: Doodlebug Designs; Dovecraft chalks; free stars & sequins from a magazine; Little Days font.

Wishing you a {very} pink Christmas...

I hope you like this girly pink card which I made as part of an order for my Mum.

Its been a bit hectic this week and I have missed adding to this blog, entering a couple of challenges and host of other things - but all for very good reasons: my husband had to go to Paris for some meetings (he claims this to be a hardship... hello: Paris!); helping with the school Christmas fair and, most importantly, it was my son's much anticipated 6th birthday! He was so excited to be 6, and can't wait for his party next week, which he's sharing with his best friend (and thirty 5 & 6 year old guests - it seemed like a good idea in September...).

You've seen the invites, so I thought I would also share these digitally-prepared thank you post cards for my son to send:

Enjoy your weekend.

Sx

Christmas card
Paper & image: Pink Petticoat
Sequins, card & ric-rac: Doodlebug Designs
Stickles glitter glue

Postcard
Background paper, frames and images: Heather Roselli (Construction Zone kit)
Notepaper: Traci Murphy Designs
'sequins' on notepaper: Tracy Ann Designs

Simple and bright

I promised a lime green and in-your-face pink card, didn't I? I used double sided tape to attach the (slightly overlapping) ribbon to my card template, and sealed the edges of the trimmed ribbon with some Diamond Glaze (amazing stuff). Its not so easy to see on the photo, but the snowflakes are punched out, so you can actually see through the front of the card - I like doing this.

Is anyone else humming 'Rain, rain go away'?

Sx

All ribbon and button: Poppicrafts; Paper: Pink Petticoat; Stick-on gems: Lakeland Ltd (they've stopped stocking them unfortunately - though you should check them out for their excellent blank cards).

Daring Card Makers: Scaredy Pants challenge

Ok, so may be Halloween was so last week, but here is a cute and spooky card regardless. It is my entry to the current challenge by the Daring Card Makers.

The spider image originally came with its own legs, but I ruthlessly (!) chopped them off and added wire ones which can be bent into any configuration - I also added a blob of diamond glaze for a more 3D nose (do spiders have noses?). I really like my 'boo' too - though I do think the web I stitched should maybe be a little thicker or darker... I live and learn.

I'm really enjoying the challenges I'm starting to enter - keeps me on my creative toes! Thanks for the encouragement, Dawny.

Have a good day!

Sx

Spider & papers: Nitwits ('Can I be Frank' & 'Eeriesistable' kits respectively); Sequins: Doodlebug Designs; Bloom: Poppicrafts; Sheer ribbon: Ribbon Oasis; Other products: Stickles, craft wire, free alphabet beads, DMC thread, Diamond Glaze.

This Thursday...(No.20)

I am so pleased with my card for this weeks challenge! As directed, I followed the blog trail to my fifth, which lead me to Tammy. Believe it or not, I found a challenge she had set - to use orange, purple, green and black for a Halloween themed creation. As Halloween is so last week (!), I decided to take these fab colours and make a non-spooky card - and here it is!

Take a good look at the wonderful orange background paper - just what's needed on yet another grey day.

Sx

Mini Blooms and brads: Poppicrafts ; the really gorgeous orange paper: Tracy Ann Digital Designs's 'Something fab' kit; Ric-rac and sheer ribbon: Ribbon Oasis ; green paper: lauraskathi's 'Gabs' kit; rub-ons: Doodlebug Designs.

Digital cards

I thought you might like to see two 'cards' I recently made. I put them together using digital papers and elements in Photoshop - though I have used Word reasonably successfully in the past - my main niggle with Word is it can be difficult to angle elements.

The first is an invitation for my son's birthday party later this month. I printed the image out as postcards for each child. I'm really pleased with how it has turned out - and will definitely make postcard invitations like this again, especially for young children.

The second is a digital card I'm sending to the son of a friend. It has been a little experiment to see if I like this means of card making. Truth be told, whilst it was fun messing about with the images on screen, I didn't find it nearly as enjoyable to make as the more tactile cards I usually produce.

I do plan to have a go at digital scrapbooking, but as for cards... I'm going to continue to print and play as usual!

Sx

Invite:
All elements and paper (except fancy dressers): Nitwit Collections
Fancy dressers: Kate Hadfield
Font: MA Googly Bear by Digital Design Essentials

Pirate card:
Pirate, ship, hat and map: Kate Hadfield
All other elements and sky paper: Kay Miller Designs (Dino-mania, The Blue Lagoon & Jungle Boogie kits)
Sparkly felt paper by Two Sister Designs

Bright flowers

I originally made this card intending it to be a sort of example for the Poppicrafts blog challenge, but I've just re-read the challenge parameters and completely blown the colour palate! Ooops.

...still its a pretty card with no images so I thought I'd show it to you anyway!

I'll just have to have another go (though I'll be out of time) using the black, white, green and pink palate as instructed. Lime green and a little in-your-face pink I think....

Term restarts tomorrow!

Sx

Mini blooms & brads: Poppicrafts; Paper: Nancy Kubo; Alpha beads (stuck on with Diamond Glaze) were free with an old craft magazine.