So true...

I saw this video on a forum I belong to.  It's so true!!!



Today I plan to be productive and actually use some of my stash... I have an order for a first birthday card that needs to be delivered to the sender on Tuesday.  More later...

Crafty Cardmakers and more...Challenge 108 - Black and White

This time at Crafty Cardmakers and more... Kim is hosting our challenge.  She has chosen the theme of Black and White.  Black and White will be the only colours allowed, apart from flesh colours for skin and normal hair colours, but no other colours should be visible.

For my card, I have used a plain white 6 x 6 card blank.

My latest toy is the inkadinkadoo gear system, and following a post I saw on the Gentleman Crafter's blog, I thought I would give a go to stamping on parchment using white ink and then embossing with the pergamano tools.  I did several bases, but this one came out best for my purposes today.  

When stamped and dry, I turned it over and embossed some of the flowers on the parchment.  I then cut the parchment base down to fit the black matt layer I had cut for the card.  It's not easy to stick parchment down without the glue showing, so I used some black brads in each corner through both papers to keep it together before sticking the matt black layer to the base card. 

The topper was a crafty individuals stamp - so versatile, I love it - and I stamped it on plain white card using archival ink.  Using Black soot distress ink, I shaded the flowers slightly, and also the edges of the card.  This was then mounted onto black card with a narrow border.  When the ink was dry, I used a Wink of Stella clear brush pen to give the flowers some sparkle.    I stuck the topper into the centre of the parchment base using a sticky pad.

I stamped some flowers onto the parchment using a Dreamees stamp set, and heat embossed the large flower.  The smaller flowers were stamped with White versamagic and black memento for the centres.  All the flowers were cut out and the large one stuck together in a group of 3.  You can't see it clearly, but I overstamped with a small daisy stamp in white onto the petals before sticking it.  The small flowers were cut out and stuck on individually.  I used a small silver gem for the centre of all the flowers.

The sentiment came from a set I recently got when I ordered some tattered lace dies (I think!) and I stamped it onto white, punched it out using a woodware circle punch and edged it with black soot.  I mounted this onto black card, diecut using a round scalloped x cut die.

Finally, I used a tattered lace die to make the embellishment behind the sentiment out of black card.

Sponsors for the challenge this time are:

We are sponsored by

WOODWARE CRAFT COLLECTION

With a prize of £12.00 to spend at your favourite Woodware Stockist, either in store or on line. 

Woodware are a Yorkshire based family owned business, as well as distributing Dreamweaver Stencils and Stampendous Stamps we have a wonderful range of stamps designed for us by Francoise Read and Jane Gill. We also scour the world for new and innovative products for the crafty card maker, and have a great range of punches and tools of the trade, to find stockists in your area or to see the range visit the website www.woodware.co.uk.

The Woodware design team are playing along with the challenge so check out  their blog, which is there for inspiration at www.woodware.co.uk/blog.

Happy Crafting! 

We are also sponsored by 

DI'S DIGISTAMPS

with a $12 Gift Voucher

I have been drawing since a child and studied graphics at College many years ago, I now work as a Medical photographer part time but my love was always drawing. I started cardmaking about 4yrs ago when I bought my daughter a cardmaking kit which we did together, but I’m afraid I got the bug! My daughter preferred scrapbooking. I then started looking online at other blogs and this then became my passion and I loved sharing my cards with like-minded people.
I love stamping and loved finding images, but sometimes I could not find what I wanted so I started to draw myself.
This then has become my second addiction and I have never looked back, I love thinking of new images, and its just fabulous to see others take them and make them into beautiful works of art. Long may it continue!  

It's a new year and a new name at Crafty Cardmakers!!

Crafty Cardmakers is starting the new year of challenges off with a brand new makeover, and a new name to reflect the slightly new direction some of our challenges will be taking - we are now Crafty Cardmakers and more...

We have also split the design team into three teams, two of which will alternate on weeks where we will be having our traditional type of challenge and the third team are responsible for our new venture.

Every 8 weeks we will be holding a Mixed Media style challenge, which we hope some of you will join in with. These challenges will run for 4 weeks instead of the usual two, and half way through them, there will be a new traditional style challenge, so that the end of the MM challenge and the other challenge will run concurrently and finish at the same time. Hopefully this sounds more complicated than in practice it will prove to be!

For our Mixed Media style challenges we really don't want to see cards, as we are hoping you will be inspired to show us something a bit more arty. So for example, you could make an album cover, or even a whole album, you could create a canvas, upcyle, recyle or repurpose something. Maybe you want to give a tattered old piece of furniture, box or jewellery chest a make over; or come up with something unusual completely from scratch. Whatever you do we would like to see a mixture of different media used and of different techniques.

Of course you will be welcome to add this type of project to any of our other challenges, as long as they fit the bill, but you might want to hold off to show them off in a challenge designed specifically for them.

The new challenge starts today, and our hostess Feebsy would love to see your creations along the theme of 'Bear With Me', in other words anything with a teddy bear, or more realistic image of a bear as the MAIN focal point of your project. Any sort of bear will be fine, so polar bear, grizzly bear, teddy bear etc., just make sure it is the MAIN focal point.

We are Sponsored by 

FLOURISH WITH A BLING

Flourish with a Bling is an Australian retail and wholesale company, owned by Lucy Patrick, Kate Settineri and Maggie Lloyd who are three passionate and avid crafting mums with a love for design, colour and everything Bling!

 “Our aim is to bring more colour and variety into the world of flourishes and embellishments. With our unique designs and new materials we feel we are putting the ‘Bling into Scrapbooking’. We have a beautiful range of flourishes, vines, pearls, gems and more. And just recently, Flourish with a Bling have introduced their own range of gorgeous flowers.”

 They also sell fabulous themed packs at amazing prices. They have flat rate postage within Australia and also post internationally (half price shipping for large orders). You can contact them or find all their products on their easy-to-use website www.flourishwithabling.com.au.

 Don’t forget to check out their facebook page for random giveaways and visit the blog to win monthly challenges or visit their gallery for inspiration and ideas too.

New techniques - using the inkadinkadoo gear system

I've been aware of the Inkadinkadoo gear system for some time, but always thought it was a bit expensive for the amount of times I would use it.

But then while watching Create and Craft I noticed they had it in their sale... with flexipay and I succumbed!!

It arrived really quickly and I was so looking forward to trying it out but unfortunately, the day after delivery was a work day and that was followed by New Years Day and annoyingly I had other plans that couldn't be changed.   I know, how inconsiderate!!

So I finally got down to playing with it this morning.

Firstly, if anyone does buy the system, I must tell you that the packaging it comes in is beautiful - but you have to totally destroy it to get the equipment out!!  This meant I couldn't use the packaging to store it, which was disappointing.  I got round it by using a toiletry bag set I had in my gift cupboard - the big bag for the gears, and the small bags for the stamps and cogs.  First time I've given myself a gift from that cupboard, I must say!!!

It is really very easy to make lovely background papers using the system - a bit like the old children's toy spirograph -although as I mainly make cards I think I will use the cogs a lot more than I will use the wheels. The stamps were also really good value - and I have already sourced and ordered some more (on sale from Oyster stamps).  Now I just need to get the square and rectangular cogs and wheels...

For this card I used just one colour to make the background and distressing the topper card (Memento Olive Grove).  The two tone effect was achieved by stamping twice without re-inking - you get a surprisingly effective shadow...

It's easy to line it all up because the cogs have alternative openings marked with a little hole, and you never lose your place because you know which openings to put your paddle in.  The stamps are super clingy, and you can vary the effect just by lining the stamp up slightly differently on the paddle. Cool!

I used the same ink pad to distress around the edges and corner of the paper.  I also used my sakura gellyroll pen to highlight some of the dotty areas when it was done (although that doesn't show up in the photograph, which is a shame!)  The only other materials I used was some lace from my stash - a wide organza edged with gold to go across the centre, and some very narrow edged lace to go round the edge of the topper.

This monochrome effect was very easy and I used the colour tones as inspiration to colour in my fairy topper, which was a digital image I had in my stash.

I'm not sure whose digi image it was, so my sincere apologies for not crediting!

I used promarkers to colour in the image - again, sorry I didn't note the colours this time, but they were mainly the olive greens selection for the leaf skirt and shoes and yellows/light brown/orange for the hair.  I used pale pink and skin tones for the wings, and made them shimmer using a wink of stella clear brush.  Again, you can't see this in the picture as you can in real life, sadly...

I am entering this card into the following challenge(s):

Through the Craftroom Door - anything goes

Inky Impressions challenge blog - anything goes

The Crafting Cafe - anything goes

Christmas card challenge

I have been a very bad christmas crafter this year - most of the cards I sent were bought (shock, horror) and I have been so very disorganised that I still have near neighbour cards to deliver!!!  On Christmas Eve.  *sigh*

So.  I have resolved that in 2014 I am going to make one christmas card each week that can be put away for next year.  This should mean that I have  at least 52, right?  That should be ample.  And I will have no excuses....  I've set myself up a ticker *points up to just under the header* to track progress.

Let's see how long I can keep it up - my thinking is that even if I don't do it for the whole year it has got to be better than this!!

Winter Fun - Challenge 106 at Crafty Cardmakers

Welcome to our latest challenge, hosted by Marie who has chosen the theme 'Winter Fun'

Marie would like you to create something that portrays winter fun, but is neither Christmas nor New Year Related. In other words no Christmas cards/projects or New Year cards/projects, but some form of fun you might have during the Winter, skiing, skating, sledding.

For my card I have used a fun image supplied by one of our sponsors, The Paper Shelter, called Snow Angel.  My card is for a winter birthday - so hard to find a suitable card when Christmas has taken over!

I used a Kraft card base, and layered onto the top of the front some blue paper from my stash which had some small random white dots on it that looked a bit like snow.  To complement the theme, I stamped some additional proper snowflakes using some brilliance white ink.  

I coloured my image using promarkers and a spectrum noir and a Graph'it pen 

(Hair: SpecNoir FS1, Pro Henna, Burnt Sienna, Terracotta, Raw Sienna, Gold;   Hat, scarf and gloves: Pro Moss, Pear Green, Lime Zest, Lime twist, apple cider; Coat: Pro Tan, Cinnamon, Tawny Owl, Warm grey 3 and Skirt: Pro Mango and Graph'it 4175)

I cut the image topper to be square and then distressed the edges of it using distress inks and stamped a small motto in the bottom left hand corner.  I stuck the topper image onto my base layer at "a jaunty angle" and finished it off by doing some faux stitching around the edge using a thin nib on a promarker.  I added some glitter to the snowy lines using a quicky glue pen and some of the fine glitter I recently won in a blog hop run by creative expressions.

I did some more faux stitching around the edge of the card base using a black fine line pen, and finished the card by adding a round sentiment.  This was made using a circle punch, and a stamped image which was embossed with silver embossing powder.  Finally, I used the same distress inks as previously used to make sure it matched in colour.

This time we are sponsored byTHE PAPER SHELTERwith a $20 gift certificate for their fabulous store 

If you are looking for fun, cute and lovely digi stamps for your paper-crafting or web design projects, The Paper Shelter is your one-stop boutique! This growing catalog of high-quality digi stamps with many different kind of options offers a multitude of themes such as everyday items, holidays, special occasions, children, adorable characters and creatures. Stamps are available in standard black and white line art, as well as in pre-colored format. Images are wonderful for coloring and make perfect additions to greeting cards and scrapbook albums. In "The Paper Shelter" you'll also find great other resources for all crafts (or digital) projects, like Paper Packs, Printables, Accessory sheet, etc.

and  SIR STAMPALOT with this fabulous prize:-

In the Snow Ski Tilda 

  

Sir Stampalot is a retail shop and online website that specialises in stamps, die cutting and paper-crafting goodies.  We try to offer exceptional delivery times on your orders as well as keeping our stock fresh, new and exciting!  Our dedicated team of card makers means we have a wonderful, inspirational online card gallery with many more cards still to upload!  Sir Stampalot ships internationally as well as domestic so why not check us out if you haven’t already – www.sirstampalot.co.uk.

Haberdashery corner

So over the past couple of months I have been trying to sort out my stash.  One of the problems I had was that everything was scattered all over the place - a box here, a bag there - and one of the worst things was my ribbons and lace.  I kept finding I had bought more of some ribbon I already had because I didn't know I had it.

I decided that the best thing was to find it all and get it in one place, and I came up with this storage solution:

I bought a baby bookcase from Argos for £12.99 - it measures 25" wide, by 32" high and 6" deep.

When I made it up I left the backboard off - I needed to put it on my windowsill and wanted to get light through it where possible.  There is a risk that the sun will discolour the ribbon in places but I decided that was a risk I was prepared to take.

It came with two shelves, and I put those at the top and bottom of the unit.  This left quite a big gap in the middle...

I bought some 9mm dowelling from Homebase and cut 4 pieces to fit the opening. I tried to get some wardrobe rail fixings, but they were too big (and expensive!) and ended up with some plastic pipe clips that I hot glued to the inside of the unit equidistantly.

Then I slotted my ribbons reels onto the dowelling and clipped them in place.

Some extra reels are stored under the bottom shelf, and on the bottom shelf are some stick on lace borders.

On the upper shelf I stored some boxes of very narrow upholstery trimmings.

Lastly, the small rolls and loose lace in my collection were stored in some (amazing value!) jars I bought from Ikea for just £1 each.

I was really pleased with my storage solution - all I have to do now is keep it tidy!!!

The next task is to find what the heck I have done with my hotfoil manual and foils....

Crafty Cardmakers challenge 105 - clean and simple

The latest challenge at Crafty Cardmakers is hosted by Viv who has chosen the theme  of CAS or Clean and Simple. 

Clean and Simple is defined as 

A design of card with clean lines, minimal elements, areas of white space and few or no embellishments, most often single layered or minimal layers.

I chose a sympathy card for this challenge - I think the nature of the card really suits clean and simple, because it is not the time for fussy and embellished.

My card base was a 6 x 6 square plain smooth white card.

I particularly liked this clear stamp called humming bird garden, from Inkylicious, which was stamped with black versafine ink onto the offcut from my A4 sheet!  I trimmed this topper to size, and then edged it with the black.

A simple sentiment was stamped in the bottom right hand corner, and I used a fineliner pen to make my own "frame", using a method often used by Barbara Gray, but which I haven't really tried before.  I quite liked the outcome, so will probably use it again.

For this challenge: 

We are sponsored by
DI'S DIGISTAMPS 
with a $10 GIFT VOUCHER

I have been drawing since a child and studied graphics at College many years ago, I now work as a Medical photographer part time but my love was always drawing. I started cardmaking about 4yrs ago when I bought my daughter a cardmaking kit which we did together, but I’m afraid I got the bug! My daughter preferred scrapbooking. I then started looking online at other blogs and this then became my passion and I loved sharing my cards with likeminded people.
I love stamping and loved finding images, but sometimes I could not find what I wanted so I started to draw myself.
This then has become my second addiction and I have never looked back, I love thinking of new images, and its just fabulous to see others take them and make them into beautiful works of art. 
Long may it continue! 

and
 THE STAMPMAN

 We are kindly sponsored for this challenge by The Stampman (and Lady of course!) who are ofering the winner a £10 voucher for their store, you can spend this online, or if you're lucky enough to see them at a show!  They have a ton of items in store, enough to tickle any crafty taste bud. 

Candle holder - present?

Credit for this project must go to Elena F's blog originally - and then a tutorial provided by Lasatas Crafty Hideout blog.  The basis of the project was a "wavy crisps" tin - I used the Aldis version of Pringles (because it was cheaper) for this one, but beware, it IS shorter than the Pringles version, and some long candles may not fit.  (The ones I had from IKEA didn't, sadly).

The papers used came from a Docrafts Christmas paper stack and the ribbon, lace and silk flowers were all from my stash.  I was really pleased with this as a first attempt!  The idea is that the long candles are tied together with ribbon and stored inside.  My tin still smelt a bit of cheese and onion, even thought I washed it out first, but I would imagine scented candles would remove that.  If plain candles were used, I would include a tumble drier sheet in the bottom of the tin to give some scent.

Autumnal card for a man

Recently I went to a class run by Michelle at In2Crafting, and one of the cards we made was perfect for a man's card.

This card is my take on that design - it is pretty much (well exactly) the same layout, but I used a 7 x 5 card base, chose different papers from my stash, and coloured the trees accordingly.

The background papers come from a pad from Trimcraft called Noel, and while there were some very christmassy papers in there, I think you will agree that the sheets I used really don't look like it.

The joy of having the middle strip is that you can actually use leftover bits of paper! I used some of the leftover parts of my backing paper to make some home made card candi - just punch out some circles using a regular hole punch and emboss them from the back using a largish embossing tool (not the glitter girls big one - a bit smaller).  I attached them to my card using pinflair gel.

The stamps are from Woodware (Kim's Coppice) and included the lovely sentiment.  I stamped the more solid set of trees with a combination of adirondack inkpads (sorry - didn't note which ones) on a plain piece of card and left them to dry.  Then, I stamped the more open set of trees slightly offset with versamark, and heat embossed with bronze embossing powder.  Before layering my image onto the layer card, I cut out the edges with a reverse circle corner punch.

I stamped the sentiment with versamark and embossed that too - layering it with  the same backing paper as the image.

I am entering this card into the following challenge(s)

My Sheri Crafts - Fall/Thanksgiving
So Artful - Trees
Ladybug Crafts - autumn colours

Crafty Cardmakers Challenge 104 - Paper Piecing

The latest challenge at Crafty Cardmakers is hosted by Viv, who has chosen the theme 'Paper Piecing'
  

Viv would like to see something paper pieced on your project. You could, for example, paper piece a flower, part of your image such as a character's clothing, you could even paper piece an animal image for a funky look.. I am sure you can think of other ideas! 

I chose this time a card I made at a recent workshop at In2Crafting, led by the very talented Alexandra Kamann which somewhat fortuitously, featured paper piecing!

This is a technique I haven't used much in the past as my attempts have not been very successful.  However, the trick, I have learnt is to have a good stamp....

The base card was a kraft card base, that was 6" square.  Onto this, I layered  a textured turquoise paper.  The sentiment was stamped first, and then  snowflakes were stamped  all over with versamark ink and embossed with white powder.   At the bottom of the sheet, I stuck some double sided adhesive that had been cut into a wavy shape.  Ultra fine glitter was then rubbed into it.

The reindeer from Woodware was stamped firstly onto Kraft card and the antlers and hoofs were coloured using a white sakura glaze pen.  Then, I stamped the body of the reindeer on a selection of Christmas paper and cut and pieced the body area.  Finally (you can't really see it in the photo) I used a silver nail head coloured with red promarker for the nose.

This week, we are sponsored by 

SATURATED CANARY
with two of their fabulous digis

 Hello!  My name is Krista Smith.  I draw characters and do a lot of crafting:).  I gather a lot of inspiration from my two kiddos...they are sweet and goofy.  I love to see how other people color my images...It is always exciting to watch the colors bring them to life!  You can check out my artwork and family tidbits on my blog,Saturated Canary.  
Thanks for having me this challenge! Good luck everyone!

and also by

WOODWARE
 with this fabulous prize - 

'With a prize of £12.00 to spend at your favourite Woodware Stockist, either in store or on line'

 

Blog Candy!

CuteCottageCrafts have a couple of places left on their all day colouring class - why not go and have a look?  If you leave a comment and link to their page, you could win this gorgeous Blog Candy.  What are you waiting for????

Challenge 102 at Crafty Cardmakers - Shabby Chic

Welcome to our latest challenge at Crafty Cardmakers, hosted by BettyC, who has chosen the theme 'Shabby Chic'.

I'm never sure if my cards are shabby chic or not when I make them, so hopefully this one does fit the bill!  For my base card I used a plain white heavyweight cardstock cut to be 5.75 inches square.

I cut a burgundy diecut "base" for my image from some scrap card.  I cut the next size down out of some white scrap for the image, which I stamped twice.  The top image was cut round before colouring and the edges of both were coloured with aged mahogany distress ink.  The top image was coloured using spectrum noir alcohol pens.  I normally use my promarkers, but have been conscious that I have the speccies and never use them!

Before layering with some floral papers from my stash, I distressed the edges of the card and the lighter paper with aged mahogany distress ink.  Before sticking the backing papers to the card base, I wrapped some burgundy ribbon around it (I know it looks scarlet or bright red in the picture, but it was really the same colour as the diecut base!) and tied a second piece in a knot.   Once the papers were in place, I attached a punch cut butterfly - base was scrap card coloured with the distress ink, and the top layer was cut from an offcut of the bottom paper layer.  I stuck three pearls along the body line.

In the bottom right hand corner I built up a group of paper flowers that was already made in my stash pot (colouring some of the white ones with the distress ink).  I used a diecut from my scrap box to go in the top left hand corner.  Finally, I added some more pearls to "hold the image down" onto the burgundy card cut to shape with a spellbinders die.

I haven't put a sentiment on this yet, but think it could be used for a birthday, anniversary or get well.

We are sponsored by

 MILK COFFEE DIGITAL STAMPS

WITH A PRIZE OF 5 DIGIS FROM THEIR STORE

Milk Coffee Stamps is a digital image shop specialising in cute and girly images. We provide high quality digital images with high resolution so you could resize at a big enough size for your project. We have many different image styles; sophisticated lady, cute girl, whimsical image, cute stuff, fairytale creature, and many other varied themes so they can fit many different crafting styles.

And also by

SIR STAMPALOT

with this fabulous prize:-

Sir Stampalot is a retail shop and online website that specialises in stamps, die cutting and paper-crafting goodies.  We try to offer exceptional delivery times on your orders as well as keeping our stock fresh, new and exciting!  Our dedicated team of card makers means we have a wonderful, inspirational online card gallery with many more cards still to upload!  Sir Stampalot ships internationally as well as domestic so why not check us out if you haven’t already – www.sirstampalot.co.uk.
 Happy Crafting!

Here's a heads up...

Clearly besotted stamps have a birthday promotion on at the moment.  Use their code before 8th October and you get 10% off.  Their stamp and die combo's look brilliant - I have ordered the snowglobe stamps and die and will be back for more when I have more funds.

Edited to add:   How cool...when the goods are delivered, they are wrapped like a present - look!!

Anniversary card

My friend C has a really bad habit of asking me to make cards at the very last minute... This time she needed an anniversary card for her husband - in 2 days time!

I find it hard to come up with cards for men at the best of times, and with a shortened timescale decided to keep it clean and simple.

I used a plain white card base, which I layered with red card.  Then I used one of my new Die D-lites from Spellbinders to cut out the filligree heart in the centre of a white square.  This showed through the red from underneath.  The top heart was cut using both elements from the die set in the same red as the base layer.

I stamped the banner and cut it out from the white card, but had no sentiments that would easily fit.  So I turned to my trusty peel offs.  They were in silver though, and I wanted them to be red... Thank goodness for Promarkers!  I used Poppy to colour the sentiments, and the three small hearts in the top right hand corner.

And because it still looked a bit unfinished, I used the thin nib on the promarker to make some faux stitching around the edge.

I am entering this card into the following challenge:

papercreatorscrafts Challenge 15 - Dies or Punches

Bertie the Snowman

Back at Crafty Cardmakers Challenge 99, one of the prizes was a rubberstamp called Bertie the Snowman.  I recently did a class at In2crafting where we used it - here is the result!

The stamp was stamped onto plain white cardstock using a memento ink pad.  He (and the penguin hats) was coloured in using coloured pencils.  I used glossy accents on the nose and feet, and some black accent to make the eyes and buttons stand out.

The image was mounted onto red card and then layered onto plain white card base.  The "ribbon" frame was done by hand using a fineline marker pen.

Quick and simple...

Crafty Cardmakers challenge 101 - Cute and Furry

Welcome to our latest challenge, hosted by me this time and I have chosen the theme 'Cute and Furry'

I would like to see the main focal point of your creation be something that is cute and furry. It can be a digi stamp, stamp, photographic image, but must have fur and be cute.

For my card I have chosen to use a topper and some background papers from the Crafters Companion Moreheads CD.  I love this little pup - and he is ideal for this birthday card which I needed to make quite quickly because all the main elements of the card are on the sheet you print out.

The base card was cut to be square (it's about 5 3/4 inches) and was a nice thick cardstock.  Onto that I layered a docrafts backing sheet in a mauve, which matched the iris in the picture perfectly.

Next was the components from the printed off sheet - the base layer was printed onto matte paper, and the topper part onto semi gloss photo paper.  I added some gems and paper flowers from my stash to finish it off.  The hardest part was cutting the small scallop around the topper edge - but even so this was a really quick card to make and sometimes, that is what you need!

Good luck with your cards - I look forward to seeing your creations.

We are sponsored by 
DI'S DIGISTAMPS
with a $10 GIFT VOUCHER

I have been drawing since a child and studied graphics at College many years ago, I now work as a Medical photographer part time but my love was always drawing. I started cardmaking about 4yrs ago when I bought my daughter a cardmaking kit which we did together, but I’m afraid I got the bug! My daughter preferred scrapbooking. I then started looking online at other blogs and this then became my passion and I loved sharing my cards with likeminded people.
I love stamping and loved finding images, but sometimes I could not find what I wanted so I started to draw myself.
This then has become my second addiction and I have never looked back, I love thinking of new images, and its just fabulous to see others take them and make them into beautiful works of art. 
Long may it continue! 

and
THE STAMPMAN 

 We are kindly sponsored for this challenge by The Stampman (and Lady of course!) who are ofering the winner a £10 voucher for their store, you can spend this online, in the shop or if you're lucky enough to see them at a show!  They have a ton of items in store, enough to tickle any crafty taste bud. 

Winged things - pondery thoughts about our cards

When I was doing my card for the challenge this week at Crafty Cardmakers, the first one I made was this.  But I didn't like it when it was finished.

I am not sure what I don't like - perhaps the green mat? And I think the colouring was off, too.  So what to do with this?

I've put it in my box of made cards anyway.  When the box is full I take it in to work and if anyone asks me if I have any cards, I say I do and they can rummage through.

What's weird, though, is that sometimes they will pick a card like this, that I don't like and they love it.

So what I think I am saying is, don't ever give up on your cards.  Even if you don't like the finished result, someone else may.  And even if it didn't come out the way you wanted, you have learned something to bear in mind for the future.  In my case, acid green is not my thing...

Challenge 100 - Winged things

Welcome to our latest challenge at Crafty Cardmakers where we would like to see Winged Things.  Your project must have something with wings as a major focal point. Not a tiny butterly charm, or a small bee in the corner of an image, the wings need to be obviously part of the focal point. Fairies, angels, LARGE butterflies, birds etc. would qualify. 

My card came about when I needed a "quick win" and utilised quite a lot of things I had already got in my stash box (backing mat, butterflies and sentiment). 

The base card was brown DL size, and the backing mat was embossed with a cuttlebug embossing folder (script) and distressed with vintage photo distress inks. I used oval nesties for the photograph and the mat and layers in the centre. The two butterflies  were spellbinders dies, also distressed with vintage photo. The sentiment was a bought one. 

 I was really pleased with the way this came out.

We are sponsored by 

CRAFTS AND ME

with three digis of the winner's choice from their great range

AND ALSO BY

WOODWARE CRAFT COLLECTION

With a prize of £12.00 to spend at your favourite Woodware Stockist, either in store or on line.

 

Woodware are a Yorkshire based family owned business, as well as distributing Dreamweaver Stencils and Stampendous Stamps we have a wonderful range of stamps designed for us by Francoise Read and Jane Gill. We also scour the world for new and innovative products for the crafty card maker, and have a great range of punches and tools of the trade, to find stockists in your area or to see the range visit the website www.woodware.co.uk.

Our design team are playing along with the challenge so check out our blog, which is there for inspiration at www.woodware.co.uk/blog.

Crafty Cardmakers Challenge 99 - Christmas Snow and Ice

Welcome to Crafty Cardmakers latest challenge, hosted by Josephine, who has chosen the theme of 'Christmas Snow and Ice'. 

As the hot weather draws to a close, she would like to see us preparing for Winter with some Christmas Snow and Ice.

Your creation must include either a representation of snow or ice, plus a Christmas theme in order to qualify for the Winner or Top 5 slots

Christmas is probably the time of year when we send the most cards, at least in one go! For my card this time, I decided to continue my quest to use up some of the stash I already had from previous years and so went on a treasure hunt through my "bits" box.

I used a 6 x 6 inch square card base with a texture, which I ran through my cuttlebug in an old Docrafts embossing folder.  This gave me icy snowflakes around a centre framed area. To make the snowflakes pop, I used my trusty distress ink (tumbled glass), but only around the edge.  It hasn't come out particularly well in the photograph, but I used a quickie glue pen and some glamour dust to add an icy sparkle both to the snowflakes and the frame.

Next, I used a small small topper from a hunkydory kit of (I think) 2 years ago, which went into the centre of the frame, after I had added some "falling snow" with the quickie glue pen and some glitter. Lastly, I added a sentiment  embellishment from the same kit.

One card down- about 40 or so to go!!!

This time...

We are sponsored by
DI'S DIGISTAMPS
 with a $10 GIFT VOUCHER

I have been drawing since a child and studied graphics at College many years ago, I now work as a Medical photographer part time but my love was always drawing. I started cardmaking about 4yrs ago when I bought my daughter a cardmaking kit which we did together, but I’m afraid I got the bug! My daughter preferred scrapbooking. I then started looking online at other blogs and this then became my passion and I loved sharing my cards with likeminded people.
I love stamping and loved finding images, but sometimes I could not find what I wanted so I started to draw myself.
This then has become my second addiction and I have never looked back, I love thinking of new images, and its just fabulous to see others take them and make them into beautiful works of art. 
Long may it continue! 

and 

HOBBY ART

with these two gorgeous stamps:-

Archie and Pals

Bertie The Snowman 

As a family business we're a friendly, helpful, bunch at Hobby Art.  All our stamps are designed by us and manufactured in Britain.
Look at the gallery on my blog - jennymayes.com - for lots of card ideas using the Hobby Art range.
We're pleased to sponsor the Crafty Cardmakers Challenge and look forward to seeing the entries.   
Good luck everyone.  Jenny and all. X