Yay, she's going for the hat trick!

Yep folks, that's 3 days in a row now and I've actually managed to bring you a card & today that includes sitting for 3 hours through the 2nd instalment of The Hobbit, brilliant film but does not stick very closely to the book (apparently, I haven't read the book for years so they could have put anything in it!).

This latest card has had the topper made for ages - it was actually all cut on my Cameo as a little experiment but never got made into a card, so as I'm trying to get more organised I decided to finally make the effort.  The sentiment is an Elzybells one I got many years ago (shame the store is no more, but she at least has gone on to design for Penny Black).

Not alot to say about this really - I kind of followed this weeks Saturday Sketch challenge, just moving the sentiment to fit with what I had done.  Hope you like & see you back here in the New Year for some more craftiness (no sore heads now!)

Yay! Go Me!!!!

Two days in a row, not only that I've actually made two cards today - well, one and a half really as the bebunni one I started yesterday.

Now, before you view this first one, I would like you to get up and go find your sunglasses, I apologise it is a bit bright!  I've had this image coloured and ready to go for a while now, it was even cut out and mounted ready to use one of the Saturday Sketch challenges (think it was no. 271) but I'd never got around to doing anything with it (story of my life!).  Anyway, as I was having a bit of a tidy up and realised that I have millions of images all coloured and ready to turn into cards, I thought I'd better make a start somewhere, and this was it - with such a brightly coloured image, it kind of needed to have something a bit more psychedelic in the background, so here is what I came up with. The stamp for anyone who's interested is from Susanna Loves Stamps from the Oddly Sweet Curiosities range, which you can buy from Quixotic Paperie (hope the link works, she's closed until 7th Jan).

My second card is the one started yesterday, just had to put the finishing touches to it today, it is one of the Bebunni stamps from Crafters C. coloured with my new spectrum noirs, I've even used one of the new dies to do the frame and cut out the image, these images are really big - I did consider doing this as an 8x8 card but thought if I kept the card fairly simple it would work.

Boy am I having a good day, done some sorting out, tidying up AND made two cards!!!, right I'm off for a lie down in a darkened room before I make a start on tomorrows stuff - loving having the time off to do all of this!

Belated Merry Christmas & early Happy New Year!

Wow, I'm not very good at this blogging lark am I?  Sorry, it's been ages since my last post - I would blame the festivities, but i could have found 5 minutes if I really wanted to, but family, work, telly, pretty much everything else got in the way.

I had several orders for my candles in boxes for Christmas so that was a huuuugggggeeee boost to the ego, along with orders for the square crackers so that was great & must say a big thanks to Crafters Companion for the wonderful CD's without which I would not have been able to print the wonderful card to make them (or make the milk carton that the candles went in).

I'm already starting to think of ideas that I can put together for next Christmas & hopefully will be brave enough to hawk my wares around some craft fairs next year, well, we'll see....

In the meantime, I thought I should catch up with a couple of cards that were made before Christmas, the first was made some time ago, when I first got the BeBunni stamps, which I believe was during Crafters Companion birthday week, which I think was in October.  I thought I had blogged it before (stupid me, haven't blogged that much - doh!), anyway it uses one of the stamps, from the Bebunni range, together with a sentiment - the frame and the tag are both from the Crafters Companion Diesire range and the balloons are really old Sizzix dies - the papers are from a Wild Rose Studio Christmas collection of 6x6 papers.  Its a lovely simple card to make (even with the outside the die bit with the balloons).

Then next card is a fab Christmas card made with the Santa stamp from Crafters Companion (are you spotting a bit of a theme here?  I use an awful lot of Crafters Companion stuff!!), in fact everything on this card is from Crafters Companion, well except the base card and cardstock used, but all the dies and stamps, and even the embossing folder are all CC.  I'm not a slave to the brand, but boy do they do some great stuff!

Speaking of great stuff, my Christmas pressie was Crafters Companion too - it was a full set of the new version Spectrum Noir pens - have to say they are absolutely gorgeous, I have been using them the past few days to colour in some more of the BeBunni stamps - I really am trying a bit harder to make more use of the things that I have bought, instead of just putting them in boxes and stroking them!

Anyway, enough waffle, off to craft & I hope your Christmas has been as peaceful and relaxed as mine has - long may it continue!

On a roll now

And still not a card in sight.  I shopped in Morrisons yesterday and happened past their cleaning isle, and tucked in a corner they had some lovely big white pillar candles which were only £1.70 each (they had some even bigger ones for £2.50 as well), and I decided there and then to buy one and have a go at printing onto tissue paper, as I've now found my tissue paper!

It was soo much easier than I imagined and the paper did not get stuck in the printer once.  I printed my images onto copier paper first (standard print, nothing fancy) and then used repositionable tape to stick tissue paper over the image (all round) and then sent the paper back through the printer again printing a second time, this then printed the image onto the tissue paper which I then stuck to the candle using greaseproof paper and a heat gun.

Once I'd made the candle, I realised that one of my new Sweet Treats boards from Crafters Companion would allow me to make a milk carton which was just the right size for the candle (I did cut down the height, but this was more so that the candle was easier to get in and out).  I used paper from the Snowman & Snowdog CD for the outside of the carton & printed a different paper from the Barkley Christmas onto the inside.   Once printed, embossed and cut out, I then cut an aperture and used some snowfall acetate behind it so it looks like it's snowing in the box, then some little tiddly bits with my diesire snowflake dies and the snowdog and voila!

Anyway, hope you like - really must sort out a Birthday card for hubby now!

Hugs

Rach

x

Not a card in sight

Well, I was left to my own devices today as Alison has family down for the weekend, so we didn't get to craft, but now my crafting area is permanently in the dining room and not in the corridor, it's so much easier to sit for the entire afternoon & just craft, which is what I did.  First I thought I'd show you a picture of the new crafting cupboard - I'm still deciding the best places for stuff to go & have already added some inserts to the draws to hold my little embellishments.

Gorgeous isn't it?

Anyway, I had some fun making things other than cards, the first is a square cracker, which really would hold quite a decent little present (some chocolates or jewellery - you could even fit a pair of socks in there probably).  It's made from a single piece of A4 card & was a doddle with the instructions from Claire Murphy's blog.  The sentiment is one of the ones that comes with the Tonic cracker die.

And finally (yes on a roll here!) I made a gingerbread house using the Crafters Companion sweet treats board, all jazzed up with the Studio 12 Picknix 2 CD.  I've left one side of the top open so that you can fill it with sweets or cookies for Christmas & although it doesn't show up very well, the roof is all glittery!

Well, hope you like all of these & hopefully this is the start of things to come!

Hugs

Rach

x

I'm in!!!

Well, my craft room (well, space under the stairs) has now been moved into the dining room with my brand new shiny craft unit, I will take pictures of it at some point to show, but it's lovely.  It was however a week of complete disruption as it took 3 evenings to put together and then several more days to fill - oh and then there were the 16 boxes and tons of polystyrene to get rid of - such fun!

Alison and I got to sit down in it on Saturday & have a bit of a play - no cards made but lots of fun had!

On Sunday I did sit down to the serious business of making a card & got out a freebie pack from one of the magazines with Mulberry Wood Christmas - may have to get that CD & stamps (must have stamps, although I have discovered that I do actually have millions of them - and quite a lot of them are Crafters Companion).  Anyway, after several hours, yes even with my crafty organisation it still takes me forever to make one card - still don't know how some people make loads in one day, this is what I came up with.  I made the beads with the triangular strips that came on the decoupage sheet with santa, the little wreath I've had in my stash for probably 10 years, forgot I had and re-discovered when I moved - so some good has come from all of this.

Anyway, here's the card

Hope you like & see you soon.

ooh, nearly forgot - I followed the sketch from Friday Sketch Challenge but used a square in place of the circle.

Love

Rach

x

Booooooo

Well, as it's Saturday, was hoping that my crafty buddy Alison would be over & we could set the world to rights over some glue & paper (no sniffing involved!).  Unfortunately, having managed to look after herself all week to be well enough to come over, she pulled something in her back putting something in her wardrobe - oh the perils of tidying!!! - Ah well, get well soon Alison & stay away from the housework, it's bad for your health.

Speaking of housework, I always try and do some on a Saturday morning just so I can justify having the afternoon for myself.  Today however, I decided to carry the housework onto my craft desk too & did some tidying up there & putting away some stamps that have been sat on my desk just gathering dust (seems to be a lot of that about at the moment!).

I did make time to finish a card I've been working on, it's a Party Paws image (Bamboo) from Crafters Companion, coloured with my Speccies.  Believe it or not the background paper was made with a 6x6 mask and blow pens (I discovered them at the back of a cupboard and decided that as my daughter is all grown up she won't mind me playing with them), the butterfly is an EK Success punch, the sentiment was from the same Crafters Companion set - nice & bright considering the dull and grey weather we are having.

I also had a bit of a play with one of the new Crafters Companion embossing boards released for their birthday week.  This one is the Takeout box, and I think will make a brilliant gift box for small things - you could get some jewellery in there, or some sweets, or even a cupcake.  The base of the box is 2 inches by 2.5 inches, at the top its 3 inches by just over 4 inches and is about 2.5 inches high.  This was just a test piece so I just used plain white card, but I can't wait to have a play with printing off some of the wonderful background papers from my CDs and using them to make boxes - I've yet to make the popcorn box, milk cartons or gable end box, but I will get there.

I used some scrap paper to make the panels - finally trying to use some stuff up rather than just stroking it - I have a mountain of paper that I really need to unbury myself from (but then I think most crafters have - you have to see this video here, it is soooo familiar!!!).

Anyway, it's Saturday night and I have a Terry's Chocolate Orange (it's not Terry's it's MINE!!!) with my name on it.

Take care for now

Rach

x