Card of Many Patterns

Lythan loves her patterned papers, we all know that already, and this week she's challenged us to use at least three patterned papers on our card for The Daring Cardmakers. She say's she'll give us an extra point if we manage to use papers from different manufacturers. Well I've got 5 designs from the Fancy Pants "Celebrate" range on this card and then if I can get away with just a tiny weeny little cheat, the flowers are cut from one of the papers from the "Baylees's Garden" range from Dream Street Papers.
Definitely not the best card I've ever made - I was in far too much of a rush this time, I'm afraid. The photo is rubbish too, sorry!

There are much better cards to see over on The Daring Cardmakers blog, so do head over there to have a look, and then why don't you have a go at this rather tricky little dare yourself? We'd love to see your cards.

I've put a new sketch HERE this week, so if you enjoy using sketches, or maybe need something to help the mojo along, maybe you'll find it useful.

Calling at the Inspiration Station - part 2

So it's my turn again to put a project onto the Bubbly Funk Shop's very own emag/blog - aka Bubbly Scrumptious


This week it's the second part of my "Inspiration Station" wallet project. Last week I showed how to make the basic wallet from the big paper bags that arrived in the January Bubbly Funk kit, and this week I'm showing what I did to make my wallet work as a place to store crafty cuttings, ideas and also a place to turn to when the creative mojo has gone for a hike.

To make it easy for you, click HERE to go directly to Bubbly Scrumptious - and don't miss all the other Girl's fab work while you're there!

52Q week 2

OK so I'm already behind with Emily Falconbridge's 52Q journal, but I thought the least I could do was to put card 2 on to my blog as I've not shown that yet. I'll catch up with the next ones eventually, I hope! Actually, I've done the covers for my book too, but I'll save those to put on here in a few days time, I think. Sneaky, eh? Question 2 was "Am I afraid of change?" and my card looks like this: I bought Hubby a mini photo studio for Christmas. It comes with it's own little tripod (but we've got a couple of those already), two little lamps, and a few different cloth backdrops you can velcro on. The basic "studio" all folds up flat and becomes a carry case, and there are a couple of pockets on the front for the laps and the 'pod - clever stuff, eh? Anyway, obviously I had an eye to using it myself and I've been trying it out over the last few weeks. I know some of the lighting isn't right yet, but hopefully when I've got the hang of the thing it'll be fab for doing my card and makes photos on dismal winter days and summer ones when the sun doesn't bother to appear too!

Have a Heart!

After the tricky but fun dare Jo set for the Daring Cardmakers last week, this week see's Keryn's turn to come up with the challenge and she's shown true heart and come up with a lovely, gentle theme for us all to work with.
It's not long till Valentine's Day so this one is a good chance to get something special made for your Beloved One - it'll make a nice change not leaving that one till the last minute, for lots of us, won't it?
So all you need to do is put one heart, or lots of hearts on your cards - what could be simpler than that? Doesn't even have to be a Valentines Card, does it? It could be for an engagement, a wedding or even just a card for a friend to say you care.

I've made a card to give to my Hubby on Valentine's Day - it'll be such a treat not to be in my usual last minute "what can I do?" panic come the 13th Feb!

It's choosing the papers that's always the hard bit, I find, but I was really late getting this done so didn't have time to faff around deciding, I wanted something with some fairly dark red - I prefer that to anything too bright and of course anything too pink is a no-no! Heaven Forbid!
The paper that came to mind was BG Urban Couture, but as I hunted through the BG box I found the "Blush" ones and thought they might work instead.
I'd already made a gatefold card for another project which didn't actually happen and it was lying on the desk - the idea of a heart shape covering the opening seemed obvious at that point.
I found this bag of Bazzill "Really Big Chip" hearts - no idea where they came from - but they were the perfect size - "Don't you love it when a plan comes together....." - who was your fave in the "A" Team then? I thought Murdoch was such a fab character - oops! I digress....

The circles and scalloped circle for the message bit were made on the Robo and the letters are rub-ons (Doodlebug, I think)
Some brads on the heart, a big organza ribbon through the eyelet hole at the top, lots of inking and it was all done.
Now all I have to do is not lose it between now and Valentines Day.....

Please visit the Daring Cardmakers blog and see all the other cards the Team have been making this week - they're fab and will surely inspire you to get all Lovey-Dovey and Hearty yourselves!
Looking forward to seeing what all the Darers make this week.
Have fun

Calling at the Inspiration Station

We're having a lovely bright, if chilly day here - quite a surprise really as it absolutely threw down during the night and looked this morning as though it would be staying damp and miserable for the whole day!

I've been trying to get on top of my crafting this week - not actually succeeding, but there you go!
To those who've been asking about my finger injury - thank you so much for your concern and messages about other similar "self-inflicted" injuries, it's a relief to know I'm not the only one to do stupid things like that lol. My finger is healing really well and only hurts if I bash it by accident, or when I push on the cut bit too hard. It's still got a little dressing on, so that it stays clean and also so that I remember to be careful.

As it's Thursday today it's my turn to add one of my Bubbly Funk kit projects to the emag. Although not difficult, this project turned out to be quite lengthy so I've divided it into two parts and the second will be on Bubbly Scrumptious next Thursday.

Unfortunately, if you haven't already got your January "Simply Stated" kit, then you're just toooooo late as it sold out ages ago. Never mind eh? you can still toddle off to the emag and see what you missed hehehe

My project is a wallet which will provide a storage place for the mounds of clippings I make when I'm sorting through that huge stack of craft magazines that accumulate on the coffee table (I really don’t know how they get there, you know!). This week I'm showing how to make the humble large paper bags that came in the kit into the basic filing wallet. Next week I'll show the photos of what I did to make it a crafty "Inspiration Station!"

Hope you like the look of this one - you can see this article and lots, lots, lots more fabby projects, tutorials and ideas HERE

Right, now I've got to get back to working on the February kit! Oh it's a hard life.......

Crafty Two

We've had a really nice weekend here. The overnight weather has been pretty stormy, but although a bit on the windy side, the days have been all blue-skies and lovely. We used to take more advantage of good weather weekends and get out for a walk but lately we've been lazy and lost the habit.
So yesterday we made the effort and headed out to do a little bit of the walk that goes right around the town. There was no way we were going to do it all as it's about 15 miles I think! In the end we probably only did a couple of miles of the actual route as it got a bit too muddy and slippery to enjoy - we instead turned back and headed off on a different public footpath, making for one of the local duck ponds to watch the ducks, swans and geese. It's a favourite place of mine as it's quite a hidden place, I like places where you feell as though you're in on a secret. We did take the cameras but haven't downloaded them on to the pc yet. It was lovely to be out on such a nice day - obviously a lot of people had the same idea as we saw loads of people walking, cycling, and horse-riding and enjoying the countryside.

All weekend I meant to update the blog with a couple more Crafty Templates projects - all weekend I failed to do it. So that's my first job for this week.

The papers Leo's chosen for the Goodie Kit this time have a lovely romantic/vintage feel, and there are loads of fab ribbons, beads and other embellishments in there to inspire. The Templates are always fun to use and give lots of scope to do your own thing with them, this month's have templates for shaped cards and templates for shpaes to use on them - I love the way you can often use the templates to make the actual card, or to make a topper to go onto a card - they give so many opportunities to use in different ways.

I loved the dress template in this set and used it to make this shaped card.
I thought the flowery paper in the kit was perfect for a 50's inspired dress. I hadn't realised Leo had called the Goodies Kit "Audrey" when I made this card, but it was images of Audrey Hepburn that I was thinking of when I put this one together.

My next card is a good example of how flexible the templates are. I used this one to make a cut-out, stand-out heart in a regular 14cm sq card - but check out Tracy's blog for another idea on how to use it.
The papers, card and ribbon are all from the Goodies Kit. The sentiment is pc-generated and I used a Cuttlebug die to make the flower surround. The cute heart pin is also in the Goodies Kit, but I used beads from my stash rather than the gorgeous large pearly ones from the kit - they are so gorgeous thatI'm trying to come up with another idea so they can have the starring role! You can find more info about Crafty Templates and the Goodies Kits here

That's all for this time, I need to get busy on my to-do list as I've done no crafting over the weekend.

Companiable Card Dare and Crafty Templates 1

Daring Cardmakers Day today and Jo made us all gulp when we ssaw what she'd come up with this time:

This week starts nice and easy...

Any card, any theme and any colour scheme of your choosing - but the catch... some one else must actually make and assemble the card for you... (with your supervision)!

Friends, relatives, or if there is no one close to hand, why not send instructions via email.

The Daring Cardmakers have had loads of fun getting someone else to make their cards for this dare. Have a good week and I can't wait to see what amazing cards you all come up with.

hmmmm. My plan was to get hubby to make my card while I sat and directed proceedings, but what with one thing and another time was running out. Seeing the face he pulled when I mentioned this at the weekend I'm not entirely convinced some of those "got to do" tasks weren't somewhat engineered, but he's been great helping out with things since my finger has been out of action - he's even had to wash my hair!
So I came up with a Plan B which was to write up instructions for making a card and ask a fellow crafter to use them to make it. As by now I was running out of week I needed someone who wasn't just a fab crafter, but a speedy one too - not to mention one who'd be up for a challenge!
The name that immediately sprang to mind was Lisa, I'm always blown away not only by the wonderful cards, LOs etc that she makes, but also by the number of these projects that she manages - all combined with raising a family and running her own business - honestly, she makes me feel a right lazy wotsit!

I think she was too intrigued by my request for help to say no, but would hazard a guess that she wished she'd had more sense when my lengthy instructions arrived in her inbox!
Still, Lisa didn't try to wriggle out of it, she put her head down, worked out what the card would end up looking like and sat down to make it. Here's the fab card she made:
The first thing I'd done was to make a card of my own so that I could then write instructions on how to make it. Then while my poor guinnea pig was stressing about what she'd let herself in for, I made a layout sketch just in case my instructions were just too confusing - you know what they say about a picture telling a thousand words!
I sent the sketch over to Lisa, but she didn't need it and only looked afterwards - how clever is she?
A huge Thank You to Lisa, the fabulously talented Scrappy Fairy herself. You got me out of a tricky spot and really came up with a fab card in super-fast time. I really hope you enjoyed taking part and didn't find the whole thing too much of an ordeal!

This is the original card that I made to use for the instructions, the sketch will appear on the KathysWaffle Sketch File blog soon so that anyone else who'd like to have a go at it can!
We've got Swappers, friends, partners, neighbours and offspring making our cards this week so do head over to the DCM and see the results - we'd absolutely love you to have a go at Jo's great challenge - so grab yourself a helpmate and join in the fun!

I've been trying to catch up with my cards for Leo's latest release of Crafty Templates over the last few days. This month's templates have shaped cards and motif templates with a lovely romantic feel. Leo's also put together one of her Gorgeous Goodies packs to match the templates perfectly - check HERE for all the info
For my first card I've layered up some of the shape templates, along with some things from the goodies pack to make the main focus of the card. The papers, card and some of the ribbons also come in the pack.

Back tomorrow with more of my Crafty Templates cards.

Don't forget to have a go at the DCM this week - it'll be fun, honestly! lol

Poor Me

I've been a bit out of action this week
I did something really, really stupid last Friday.
Suffice to say it involved damp hands, a knife and an icecube tray full of frozen cream.
Fortunately Hubby was working from home that day because I couldn't sort this little mess out on my own!
The resulting injury to my right index finger has made for an awkward week. It's been sort of interesting too as I've discovered that an index finger is used in many different ways for various jobs. So some things I can manage because I'm not using the injured part but then I go to do something else - something as simple as lifting a plate of food - and the pain brings tears to my eyes!
I think this will take a few weeks to heal properly but it should make me stop and think before I do something as stupid as that again.

For a couple of days I couldn't do anything much at all, either in the house or with craft stuff, but I've started doing more now. I'm trying to get caught up with my craft stuff, I just have to be really careful not to put any pressure on the cut bit - craft knives, scissors, pens etc are a bit awkward to use!

I'll stop moaning now and you'll be able to stop wincing!

Thursday is my day for posting on the Bubbly Scrumptious emag which is the blog for Bubbly Funk online craft shop. My project today is this Birthday Book made with the fabulous (and now sold out) January kit "Simply Stated". I knew that I definitely wanted to make something to keep for myself with this kit, the papers and colours are just sooo gorgeous, so I decided that as I'm making an effort to be more organised about sending birthday cards etc out on time this year a Birthday Book would fit the bill. You can find out more about it and see more photos over on Bubbly Scrumptious

Well, those who know my "sticking power" will now be able to laugh their socks off - I've started Emily Falconbridge's 52Q journal - a quest to do a small page/tag/card every week with the Question on one side and my Answer on the other. I've done the first one and am "thinking" about the second.

At the beginning of 2007 I re-covered and tarted up a cheapo mini scrapbook album with the intention of doing just one 6x6 LO for each month. Surely I could manage to choose one photo and make a teeny weeny page a month to chart our year. I think there are three pages in that book. At least the cover was worth doing as part of it now forms the banner for my blogs!
So, take a guess - how many weeks of these questions do you think I'll manage?

And look - to make you chortle even more, I've actually chopped up my scrap card to make ALL the pages I'll need. Yeah, Right!
Should I even think about making covers, or is that just really taking the mick?

Here's my first card, for the question "What do I wish for this year to bring?"












Last up, a card I made a week or so back for my friend, who's mum died recently. I wish I'd had more time to do this one as I wasn't too keen on some bits once it was done. I think it would have looked better if I'd mounted the bits with words onto backing card. Not sure why I didn't actually as I pretty much always do. Still these things are more about the feeling behind them and letting people know that you are thinking of the,, aren't they?



Well, enough of my waffling, I've still got loads to catch up with and everything takes soooo much longer when you've got a finger that not only hurts if you use the wrong "bit" but it's also padded up to double it's normal size!
I know.
It was my own stupid fault.
And that just makes me feel worse!

Back next time with some Crafty Template stuff, hopefully.

Salvage!

It's Daring Cardmakers day again and we've been rummaging through those discarded Christmas decoartions, cracker rubbish and of course the Christmas cards we've been taking down this week.
All because our challenge this week is to do a bit of recycling and make use of something that was heading for the bin on our cards. There's no particular theme, but if you do find something left over from Christmas then you can claim "double points" lol!
Please check out the DCM blog and the Teamies' own blogs for more info

I was looking carefully at the cards as I took them down earlier this week for inspiration and eventually decided that if I kept to a black, white, red and shiny theme I could use bits from some of the cards and also use more of the ribbon that I'd salvaged from our crackers (I used some on last week's Thank You card).
I'm still using lots of squares as you can see!
These are all punched from bits of the old Christmas cards. Some have shiny or glittery bits on them but using only tiny pieces means they don't look too Christmassy - at least I don't think they are obviously Christmassy, are they?
The glossy red card used to back the message is also from an old Christmas card.
The only "new" bits are the card blank, flower, brad and the black card used for cutting the greeting.The greeting was cut using the Craft Robo.

MIL has been in hospital for an op and I needed a card to send to her, I made this one using a sketch by Bex of JB forum.
Papers are BG Periphery, the gorgeous layered flower is from Prima, and the rub-on letters and tiny flowers are Maya Road

Thursday Girl

Yep, that's me, I'm the Thursday Girl on the Bubbly Scrumptious emag lol
The emag is a fab free-to-all blog which showcases many of the wonderful things you can buy from the Bubbly Funk Shop - including the fabby monthly kits which I'm very proud to design for.
Today's project is a card using the January Kit; "Simply Stated". I really really love this kit - I was excited as soon as I opened the box, it's full of black, white and cream shades with a bit of soft blue and red thrown in for good measure. You can see the kit, and pre-order HERE. Caroline is launching her very own acrylic stamps and the first one is part of this kit - I didin't get one though, I don't think they were ready when my kitbox arrived a couple of months back.... boohoo...


Anyway, you can check out more photos of my card and find out how I made it over on Bubbly Scrumptious today, and make sure you've got a cup of coffee nearby as there's loads of fab projects and other stuff to browse through, just like you'd find in any other good magazine!

After much procrastinating I've actually sat down and made some thank you cards - funny how much better you feel once you've made a start on things like this. isn't it? I always feel guilty if I'm slow to send out thank yous as I know just how much I appreciate receiving a card when I've sent gifts to friends and rellies.
I'm into squares atm and I've used some bits of Christmas Stash to make these cards. I cut loads of 2.5 squares from a few odds and ends of the papers using Mr Robo, then cut the words with a Cuttlebug die. This is the first batch:

Back tomorrow with the new Daring Cardmakers challenge and another batch of Thank You cards.
I'm going to update the Sketch File blog too, it's been way too long since I added any new card sketches there, hasn't it?

The Last Christmas Post!

Weather report: still plenty of snow on the ground, but sunny so hopefully it'll disappear soon. Temperature - blinkin' freezing!

Youngest niece Emily likes to do a bit of cuttin' & stickin' so I like to indulge her with the occasional crafting "toy" or goodies - well, you've got to foster those budding crafters, haven't you?
Last year we gave her a Cuttlekids machine and for her birthday part of her present was some new dies to go with it.
For Christmas though, I decided to fill one of those brightly painted buckets I bought in Woolworhs a couple of years ago (they've been hiding at the back of the cupboard ever since) with various crafty goodies. The bucket is quite big - they did two sizes and I bought a couple of each, this is one of the bigger ones.

In went a load of K&Co "Berry Sweet" papers, embellishments, mini scrapbook and other goodies. I filled an old Prima bottle with layers of different coloured little flowers and added a bag of bigger blooms. By the time I'd finished I couldn't actually remember what went in tbh. I didn't decorate the bucket, Em can do that if she wants to.

For her mum I made this birthday book using Fancy Pants papers to decorate it, I love this set and it was such a joy to use such non-Christmassy stash in the midst of all the Christmas madness!










I think that's about the lot for Christmas cards and presents 2008. Having had a nearly 2 weeks with very little crafting I'm finding it a struggle to get back into it again - the procrastinator in me won out yesterday and I failed to make a single thing so today I really really must get on with those thank you cards as I've a huge list of other crafting to get to once they're done.

Not least writing up my instructions on how to make my first project for the January Bubbly Funk kit (and finish the work on the other things I've been making with it!) I do love this kit though, and I think that if you're suffering a bit of after-Christmas-mojo-missingness this one might just be the thing to get you all enthused and desperate to craft again.

Here's a bigger sneak peek of what I'll be making on my Thursday Bubbly Scrumptious spot.....but if you pop over today, you'll find our fabby Kaz with a project showcasing more of the goodies in the BF shop

Late with my DCM and BF posts!

On Friday the Daring Cardmakers returned after our week off for Christmas with a challenge to help everyone get at least some of those Thank You cards made.

I had a couple of days between Christmas and my family arriving for New Year to get some cards done - but I just didn't get the time to load them onto my own blog.

This is the one I made for the DCM
And this is another one I made while I was in the groove.

Both using the Cuttlebug "Thank You" embossing folder, the message on the first is also cut with a Cbug die. The little scrap of ribbon came from one of our Christmas crakcers.
The gift and patterned strip of paper on the second card are BG Wassail.

Don't forget to check out the DCM blog and all the fab Darers' cards for more Thank You ideas

Sadly the "groove" only lasted for those two, so I really do need to get back to making the rest of my thank you's - I hate leaving it too late.

New Years Day was also my turn to do the Bubbly Scrmptious emag entry and I managed to get it all done ahead of time so it could be scheduled for publishing at the right time - I knew there was no way I would be around to do all that with a house full.

My project for Thursday's page was a notebook I made for one of our nieces using bits and bobs from the Bubbly Funk shop, including one of the huge chipboard letters that Caroline sells there.
The Bubbly Scrumptious emag is open to all and has loads of info and projects to inspire (hopefully...). You'll find lots of projects made using goodies from each of the monthly Bubbly Funk Kits, lots of projects featuring items from the rest of the shop, recipes, fab fonts and all sorts of other things to inspire and entertain.
You can see the rest of my book and the instructions here but do spend a while browsing the other pages, there's something new nearly every day, and the emag team are all very different in the way we work and the things we make so there should be something for everyone.

Right, I'm now off to brave the outdoors again and fill the birdfeeder up brrrr

Then, with a bit of luck I'll stop procrastinating and do something about those Thank Yous....

Now where did I put that calendar Hubby so kindly gave me?

Snow Joke Monday

Well, everything should have gone back to normal today. Visitors all gone, Hubby back to work, Christmas Tree and decs down and back in their boxes, homes for pressies gradually being found - but what do we wake up to?

SNOW, that's what!

So rather than hubby get in the car and drive to work we went back to bed and had another hour's kip. lol.
Which was good because the alarm going off at 6.40 was a bit of a shock when we've not been waking till 9.30 at the earliest for the last week or so (ooooh aren't we naughty?), fortunately our visitors also came down with sleeping sickness!
Anyway, eventually Hubby decided that he'd go in by train rather than face the roads on "first-day-back! day, it always seems that those people with Stupid-Driver tendencies forget what little road sense they had over the Christmas holidays, doesn't it? Best leave them to it for a day or so, especially if there's the added fun of snow and ice about.

Once it was light enough to see I braved the Great Outdoors (well, only as far as our garden tbh) and took a few pics Back in a minute with some crafty stuff!