Moving Along With The Times - Girly, But No Pink!

Hi,

Yes it is indeed that time again, how quickly the weeks are flying by now!

Team B are up this week over at the Moving Along With The Times blog and Sarah has given us a great theme of 'Girly, but no Pink!' this week.

I was feeling a bit stuck with this one..then JT sent me a little care package and in it was the lovely black and white chevron paper and voila! Inspiration :)

The layout was also inspired by a card JT had made for me earlier in the year!

Ingredients are -
Yellow spotty paper is by Pink Petticoat.
The black spotty flower and the yellow button are by Dovecraft.
The stamp is by Kaisercraft.
The Candi's are by craftworkcards.
The sentiment and bakers twine are from  my stash.

I love this card, it feels very girly to me, the splash of yellow and the enormous flower make me smile.

Head over to MAWTT and join in the girly fun. The DT makes are impressive and inspiring as always :)

Finally - Happy Thanksgiving to those of you that are in the US. Today Hubby and I are in DTown with JT and her folks, celebrating Turkey Day!

Cx

WOYWW #234 Gift for Hubby...

Hello!

Today I am off to DTown with Hubby to celebrate Thanksgiving with Family Nixon. JT will be there too, super excited.

But before all the excitement its time for WOYWW...if you don't know what I'm talking about..go and visit our fabulous hostess Julia at Stamping Ground for the weekly global desk nosy.

On my desk today is a little gift for Hubby...I've made him an advent calendar!! You can see some of the bags for the gifts, some of the gifts and some of the leftover peanut butter cups (yums) - I have alternated the gifts and chocolate. A;so on there are my scissors, my glasses, my mouse, promarkers and a sheet of 3D stickers...which I dug out and now I can't remember why!

Here is a close-up of the bags and gifts..the green sequinned bird is mine and not a gift for the Hubby!

Advent calendar bags and gifts

It was really easy to make, I used mini Kraft bags, washi tape on each bag, a punched snowflake, a punched hexagon and adhesive letters.

I bought all the gifts at Party City for 35cents!!

I am planning on staying up late on Saturday night to hang it above his desk! I hope he likes it.

Oh and if anyone has a Cricut and wants 5 dollars/euros/pounds off of a 9.99 digital image purchase, just leave me a comment saying so and I'll put your names in a hat and announce the 'winner' next week. I bought some glitter film, but I have a Silhouette so it is no good to me.

Cx

p.s WOYWW'ers here is the Bow from last week..

Personal Christmas

Hello!

I was going to write a post about our personal Christmas cards and then I saw the Designed to Color challenge #23 Christmas / Winter - it fits my cards perfectly.

Their sponsor this time is Penny Black...which is crazy, because two of my cards are made using Penny Black stamps.

The main photo is my entry. This year I wanted to send cards that reflected where we are and where we are from! When I stumbled across the Penny Black stamps it all came together.

I stamped them onto white card and then scanned them in, so I could remove the New York and London wording and add my own Christmas greeting - it also means I don't have to stamp 70 cards!!

I am using the New York version (my main photo and entry) for our UK based friends / family.

Below is the London version is for the US based friends and family.

Penny Black Stamp - London

I also stenciled a NYC skyline and scanned that in too. I am using it for some of the cards, to alleviate the colouring burden :)

NYC Stencil by Crafters Workshop

I coloured the cards using Promarkers -
NYC card = Sunflower (taxi), Poppy (bag and coat), Icicle (buildings) , Frosted Leaf (trees and bushes).
London card = Poppy (phone box, coat, umbrella, dog's coat, Queen's guard, underground sign), Warm Grey 3 (Houses of Parliament, Tower Bridge), Icicle (buildings, London Eye, lamp posts), Sunflower & Cocktail Pink (flowers), Black Aquamarker (taxi), Royal Blue (underground sign)

It's not really showing up in the photos, but I did add touches of stickles glitter glue on all of the cards.

Even Hubby loves these and you know he doesn't understand Christmas cards! So I hope our friends and family love them too.

Cx

Colourful mistake....

Hey there, hope you had a good weekend..

Hubby and I laid low, as it is COLD here in NYC, but it meant that I got to finish off my Christmas cards and nearly finish the advent calendar I am making our Niece.

In amongst everything else I had enough time to make something for ONE challenge and I love the Color Throwdown (#269) palette this week, I chose CDT as my challenge this weekend.

My main photo is my second attempt at this card..I had made what I felt was the perfect card for the challenge - then I had a stamp malfunction...

I had to cover the stamp mess-up (you can just see it poking out from underneath the label) with a punched label and a peel-off..meh! I am going to use the card, it's too pretty to waste :)

I am very happy with my final card, it was fun to make as I dug out a favourite American Crafts teacup stamp. I coloured it using Promarkers in Pear Green, Warm Grey 3 and Dusty Pink, which I think are a match for Pear Pizzazz, Soft Suede and Dusty Durango. I used peach and vanilla Co're-dinations papers.

The sentiment is by Hero Arts and I think it works really well here, I stamped it using a soft grey Studio G ink. The final touch is a Candi (as usual).

Cx

Happy 18th Birthday Amy-Jo

My gorgeous Goddaughter Amy-Jo turns 18 today, she had a very large birthday party last night, no doubt she is still in bed when I post this :)

I stupidly forgot to take photos of the BEAUTIFUL card I made her - idiot! However I did remember to take photos of the card I made for her Mum to give to her.

I can't explain how happy I am with the card, it came out even better than I could have hoped...I based it on this idea -

As you can see from my main photo, I modified the idea a bit.

I also made the actual card, from individual pieces of card stock (thanks to my friends at Paper Presentation). The die-cut hole for the sentiment was done using the Silhouette.

My ingredients were -
Butterflies = punched by JT for me using her EK Success punch
Camera paper and Pink striped paper = American Crafts
Twine = American Crafts
Button = DCWV
Candi's

Amy is a beautiful, clever girl and I love her to pieces...I want her to achieve lots and lots, I must remember though that whilst this is all possible and will happen, it should happen at her pace not mine or anyone else's....

Happy Birthday!

Cx

Good luck...

I wanted to make a special card for a colleague and a friend that left last week.

I thought she'd quite like a KennyK card, as she is a fan of the stamps. I chose Helga Frost, as it is getting rather cold here in NYC!

The current challenge over at KennyK's Krafty Krew is Anything Goes #160...which is handy, as it meant I could enter the card I made!

I am very, very pleased with this one, simple background with a teeny embossed strip, so the stamp doesn't get overpowered. I added a random pale pink piece of paper and some teeny tiny bling and sequins. I coloured Helga using Promarkers and finished her off with some glitter glue touches.

The good luck message applies to both my friend and myself, as I have entered myself to join the KennyK Krafty Krew Design Team...fingers crossed kittens, fingers crossed.

Cx

A final bow..

..well, for this week at least :)

As you know, this week I have been playing with a Silhouette bow and I decided that one of my ready made bows would work nicely with the FMS Sketch this week..

I seem to be making a lot of Thank You cards at the moment..I think that's because I am working on a big batch of them for OWH.

I used American Crafts washi tape, Kaisercraft textured pink card, a bow cut with the Silhouette portrait, sentiment is by Hero arts..all the other elements are from my stash.

I am very happy with this card - the addition of the button to the bow really makes it a focal point. I am also enjoying this new gem-sequin scattering technique that I am trying out.

Have a great weekend everyone, I am going to see Dr Kevin to help him with the planning for his Christmas Eve party and then I will be packing some craft items for JT and I to play with next week. Can't believe it's less than a week before I see her - AWESOME!!

Cx

Mojo Time..

Hey,

Fun WOYWW yesterday and for all you WOYWWers out there - my main photo today shows you what I did with the bow :)

I love the Mojo Monday #320 sketch this week.

Every now and then I like to get BOLD (aka brave) and mix it up by using papers that have different patterns.

Here I have used 2 patterned papers - the long strip is by American Crafts and the flowery rectangle is by DCWV. The stamp is a Studio G one that I don't use very often, because it fades out in the centre, no matter what I do...
The bow was made using a Silhouette cut file. I have sprinkled gems and sequins around - ala my craft Heroine Liz at Pink Petticoat. The background paper is a mottled grey and also by American Crafts, but I am not sure it's worked as well as I had in mind..

A friend sent me a belated 40th birthday gift, so this will be going to her to say thanks.

Cx

WOYWW #233 - I Heart my Silhouette Portrait

Hello!

Only 2 more WOYWW's until Turkey Day for us US based peeps!!

If you don't know what WOYWW is - then where have you been?! It's the day that we crafty folk get to join Julia over at her fab blog Stamping Ground and have a global desk nose..join in!

So this week is a twofer..in the main photo you can see my Silhouette Portrait on my desk, busy cutting away (on Tues night)..the bright pink things were cut out shortly before..

In the next photo are the bows that are the end result of my cutting frenzy..the sequins are there as I had made my Mojo Monday entry using them (and a bow) but I can't show you that until Thurs!

I love these bows and I have Liz at Pink Petticoat to thank, as she has a Lil Inker bow die (comes in 3 sizes) that she uses and I have been converting... but I decided to go for a Silhouette cut file instead :)

Happy WOYWW...tonight is TACO night here in NYC.

Cx

KennyK Design Team Call!!!!

OMG OMG OMG OMG...

I am super excited as KennyK's Krafty Krew have just announced that they are looking for Design Team members!! To be considered you either have to create a blog post, or a Facebook post about the DT call. I decided I'd do a blog post...

I am a HUGE KennyK fan and have been fortunate to win the Kraft Krew challenge once and get a spotlight mention.

I own a lot of the stamps and they are such fun to work with...when I discovered them earlier this year, I wasn't a big fan of colouring, as I didn't think I was that good at it..I believe the stamps have helped me up my game and learn new techniques. I love colouring in stamps now and I even use watercolour pencils / gelatos now!

So far 2013 has been a very successful craft year for me, I've managed to up maintain a steady blog presence, win some challenges, get shout-outs for my work and be appointed to one design team (MAWTT).

If I made this design team, it would make 2013 totally and utterly complete for me, the team are so good at what they do, being part of that would surely improve my work.

I thought I'd show a few of my fave projects made using a Kenny K Stamp.

The main photo is of the Valentine's card I made for my Hubby and I won challenge #129 over on the Krafty Krew blog. I am really proud of this card, its modern, sexy and fun.

The next photo is of an Anniversary card I made for my friends and it was my first DT make for MAWTT

Using Sexy Cupid

This card is a bit cheeky, it was made for my neighbour Dr Kevin, who is a huge Magic Mike fan and so I added the lyrics to 'Pony' behind the card!

Using Playboy

Final card is one that won Spotlight of the week and is the Anniversary card I made for my Hubby...he loved it and he believes he is some kind of lucky charm as I keep winning with things I make for him!

Using Hella Enchanta

Hope you enjoy looking at my work and that I make the team.

Cx

Being prepared..

In my real life (aka my non-craft world) I am a Project Manager..I often find that my working practices spill over into my personal life...

Such as making things WAY in advance of needing them. Today's card is a perfect example of this.

I wanted to enter Pals Paper Arts #179 challenge this week, as the colours are so gorgeous and fit my stash perfectly.

I decided that I would turn my entry into my Thank You card for JT's parents (they are hosting Hubby and I for Thanksgiving) - bit early, but I wanted the card to be special, as it is very kind of them to invite us along.

I love corrugated card and I just bought a massive pack of it by DCWV on sale at Joann's, so decided to use a piece of it for the backing paper on this card. I happened to have 2 butterflies from the ones that JT sends me, that matched the backing paper and the challenge colour scheme. I used my Martha Stewart butterfly punch for the big butterflies, the Razzleberry die cut is from Paper Presentation (my FAVE store in NYC) and I cut the thank you with my Silhouette.

I am really happy that despite all the different elements and textures on this card, it doesn't feel too busy.

Cx

Winter meets Summer...

Hello there!

Hope you are having a nice weekend..Hubby and I are having a super lazy one and I am attempting to the bulk of my UK bound Christmas cards done (as JT is kindly taking them back with her after Thanksgiving to save postage costs)

In amongst this Christmas frenzy I found time to make a couple of challenge entries..the main photo today is for Color Throwdown #268..when I saw the colours I knew that I had to use the free Beach Girl stamp I have.

Her stripy dress works well with the colours, I used Cerise, Fresh Meadow, Duck Egg and Ginger promarkers for the dress, her glasses and her hair. I stenciled the background using a Crafters Workshop stencil in contrasting Ranger Distress inks. The sentiment stamp is by Hero Arts and I think the colour is a bit of a mix of the rust, rose and melon!

I really wanted to make a summery card, as the weather is so blah, it's making me think about the beach and being warm!

I feel like this card should go to my friend Liz in New Zealand..I owe her a long letter, so this will be a good way to say hi!

Back to Christmas cards for me. enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Cx

Moving Along With The Times....Furry Friends..

Hi,

Yep, it's that time already - where does a fortnight go?

Team B are up over at Moving Along With The Times this week and our host this week is Tammy.
Her chosen theme is Furry Friends.

I decided I wanted to use JT's Little Claire cat stamp and so she kindly sent it to me :)

I really love this stamp, it's so versatile, I have used it before without the butterflies and that worked really well too.

I used the following ingredients -

Stripy background paper - American Crafts
Stripy scalloped circle - DCWV
Scallop Punch - Woodware
Alpha Stickers - Target
Butterfly - EK Success Punch (that I don't own, JT punches these and sends them to me...)
Promarkers to colour the cat, post, flowers and butterflies

This has turned out to be such a pretty card, I am pleased as punch and thought I'd enter the Card Galore November Challenge (Animals) with it.

Your turn now! But first have a look at all the fab creations by Team B.

Cx

WOYWW #232 In the post...

And winging their way to all the lovely ladies that signed up are my 40 for 40 cards.

Before I show you a photo, lets talk about WOYWW - join the lovely Julia and the gang over at Stamping Ground for the weekly desk nose. It's fun, you should get involved!

An overhead shot of my desk this week and it is looking kinda busy this week..a pile of stamped and semi-coloured Valentines' toppers (stamp by Simon Says Stamp!) for OWH, some Thank You's that are either gifts / for me to use / for December craft fair (some complete, some partially done), my new hexagon punch, a card layout I am working on...with hexagons, a box of hexagons and mini stars (no idea why these are together), tweezers, my glasses, Mr Mouse, my pencil, a free disk of goodies and various bits and bobs.

Tonight I will be taking what I need off of the free disk and finishing what is on my desk.

Here is a montage of the 40 for 40 cards-

They were such fun to make, some were challenge entries and some were made specifically for 40 for 40. Big thanks to all my WOYWW friends for making my little dream come true :)

Maybe next year I'll do 41 for 41 - ha ha.

Hope they all arrive safely...email me ladies to confirm arrival. Happy WOYWW, I'll be visiting desks after work today, so that might be the middle of the night for some of you...

Cx

Blingy Christmas..

Hi,

Well it was snowing a bit this morning here in NYC! Which is cool and worrying all at once....

I worked late night, wolfed down a BBQ dinner with the Hubby and raced home to make something...making things relieves the pain of a bad day :)

I love embossing, so the current CAS-ual Friday challenge was perfect for me...

I also wanted to make a fancy card for my Grandma...as I am not convinced that our contemporary ones are right for her..

I think this card has the right CAS balance, I love the Sixxix snowflake embossing folder and the flowers are actually a font (dingbats) that work in my Silhouette Portrait - clever eh?

The glittery sentiment Peel-offs, I have had forever and have been doing that 'saving for best' thing...really got to stop that...soon I won't be able to use anything in the craft room!

I hope Grandma likes her card - the rich burgundy colour of the flowers and the label remind me of her.

Cx

Saying thanks...OWH style...

Today it is Veteran's day in America.

So I thought I would share the OWH Thank You cards that I have been making.

On the OWH site, they mentioned that they were low on Thank You's and I love making them, so have spent the weekend making them...I am at 20, all slightly different.

I found this great set of Thank You sentiment stickers in Michaels and thought they would work well for OWH, as I could do all different things with them.

The main photo is a collage of some of my faves and here are a couple of bigger ones.

Thanks - using spellbinders flower dies and American Crafts papers

All I can say is...Thanks! - using spellbinders label dies and American Crafts papers

These were very easy and fun to make, it also meant I got a serious play with the Big Shot, who might feel a bit neglected with the new fancy Silhouette, but I am trying to spend quality time with him :)

These cards will be going out at the end of the month with my Valentine's cards!

Happy Monday to you all and don't forget OWH always needs generous cardmakers.

Cx

Just in time..

All week, I have wanted to enter the Mojo Monday challenge...but time and lack of inspiration just seemed to get in my way.

Here is the sketch -

Finally at around 6pm (in NYC) my inspiration kicked in :)

The main photo is my card - made using American Crafts papers, for the background and the flag strip. The hexagons and the tag were made using DCWV papers, the button is by DCWV too. The sentiment stamp came free with a magazine.

Not a bad effort I think for a close to the wire entry :)

Hope you have had a good Sunday - I've mainly been on Skype and watching football (NFL)

Cx

p.s Big thanks to Hubby for the awesome photo tent, how awesome is this photo despite it being very, very dark in my Craft Room!!

Multiple challenges with a purpose...

Hey, bit of a late Saturday evening post. Today I have been busy making OWH cards, finishing off Amy's 18th birthday stuff and mooching around a bit!

I had to make an Anniversary card for friends of mine and decided to combine a couple of cool challenges that I liked this week..

First up is Freshly Made Sketches #111

Love this sketch and the design team cards were very inspiring.

I also loved the colours over at Pals Paper Arts #178 (and Mary Fish is on their DT...I love Mary Fish, she is my craft heroine!)

I didn't quite have Summer Starfruit in my stash, so the greeny colour is a bit darker, but I think it still counts..

I was happy to be able to use another one of my precious Range flowers and my new spotty embossing folder (JT has this set and I have always coveted it). The expresso pearl in the top left corner made me very happy, as I had forgotten I had them! The sentiment is a Hero Arts stamp. All the papers are by Kars.

I think my card came out pretty well, simple but effective :)

I managed to sneak in a little Michael's trip after work yesterday - hence the new folders..I was very restrained and bought mainly essentials (card blanks, stuff for my Niece's advent calendar, etc)

Off to eat curry now with Hubby..yums!

Cx

It's been one of those weeks..

Jeez..it's been a really intense week! I am most overjoyed that it is nearly the weekend..

To celebrate I bring you this beautiful Color Throwdown #267 entry..

I love these wintery colours. As we all know I love a thank you card and Turquoise..I think it is no coincidence that I happened to have the wonderful Thank You die cut on my desk...in Turquoise :)

The 'Thank You' was made using my Silhouette Portrait, loving the amount of amazing things I can create with this machine.

The rest of my ingredients are -
Crumb Cake and Vanilla - backing paper by Dear Lizzy
Old Olive - card stock (DCWV) and one pearl by Dovecraft
Always Artichoke - a pearl by Dovecraft

I am totally 100% head over heels in love with this card, it feels really modern and fresh..

Have a great weekend, I am going to be doing NOTHING..

Cx

WOYWW #231...Skipping to the post office

..Well that's a bit of a lie...but I will be going to the post office on Saturday with all the lovely 40 for 40 cards I've made - yay!

So let's have a look at my desk shall we..if you are wondering why we need to look at my desk then pop over to Stamping Ground - the lovely Julia's blog where we all hang out on a Wednesday nosying at desks from all around the world!

This week my desk is VERY tidy, in part that is because my in-laws have been in town, so there hasn't been much craft activity and also because our apartment is a total tip right now :) and so I tidied my desk..made me feel like I've done something!

You can see x2 Valentines cards for OWH, my glasses, my shiny new purple mouse (he is super), a stamp on a block, a heart punch, my phone, a bone creaser (love him) and two piles of random..

Here's a close-up of the one of the Valentines cards...

OWH Valentines / Love card

Cute right?

Happy WOYWW everyone, I'll be nosying at your desks after work today.

Cx

p.s forgive my blurry photos..taken at 23.50 on Tuesday night after a few wines and Pomegranate Mojitos..

p.p.s I am playing with my blog look and feel...so stay tuned as it changes a few times :)

OWH Christmas Makes....

Hey,

As I have been a bit busy with the in-laws this weekend, I haven't made that many things, so thought I would show you some of my fave Christmas cards that I made for OWH.

I used a Bugaboo 12 days of Christmas stamp set, that I purchased using some Bugaboo winnings :)

I really love this set and had originally bought it to use for my own personal Christmas cards, but fast realised that it would be quite a lot of work to colour 40+

Using them for OWH meant that they went to a good home and as you can't have more than 20 'similar' cards in one batch meant that I could just make a set of 12 and be happy.

As you can see from my main photo they are really cute - 3 French Hens is my fave of all the stamps.

I used a 'recipe' for all the cards - a simple background paper (spots, stars, stripes or snowflakes), strip of paper to hold the punched sentiment and a foam star. I also tried to make the colours of each element compliment each other - so tonally they are all similar.

I love the way they turned out and hope the troops do too..

Here are a few more of them..

2 Turtle Doves

6 Geese a Laying

12 Drummers Drumming

5 Golden Rings

11 Pipers Piping

Remember OWH always needs card makers like us to donate cards to them - check out their website and give it a go, you don't have to make 100's of cards like me, 10 or 20 cards will be most welcome.

Have a great Tuesday, we are off to Tommy Lasagna with the in-laws...yums!

Cx