Good Luck...

Hey,

Hope you are all well?

I had a fun weekend in Florida with my girlfriends, a few makes from that trip will be posted soon.

Today's card I made for a work colleague that was leaving.

He is a copywriter, so it made sense to use the awesome pen stamp that I have - it's from a Technique Tuesday set 'Man Day' and the pen has never actually been used before this card!

I kept it super simple and used glittery Thickers for my sentiment.

Love it when a card in my mind comes to life so well.

Cx

Happy 50th Disco DJ Diva...

Hey,

Welcome to April!!

Today I am heading to Lille with my Momma for a 2 day break, we will arrive just in time for lunch, so we are super excited about that.

I can finally share the card I made for my friend Marie's 50th Birthday. She is a dj and loves disco, so I really wanted her card to capture that and her fabulousness. She is so fabulous that Hubby and I asked her to sing the song (Disco Inferno) for our first dance at our wedding and she was amazing.

So I found a great digital image and retouched it a bit to get the look I wanted. Once I printed it out, I added bling, sequins and sparkly gold Thickers numbers.

It came out even better than the vision I had in my head.

Marie posted a photo of the card saying how much she loved it and that made me really happy and pleased that I nailed it.

Cx

FMS: OMG! How Old?...

Hey,

Happy Monday.

I had an early start this morning..6am PT session - UGH.

Over the weekend, I didn't really get to spend that much time at my desk, but I did find the time to make a card for the current Freshly Made Sketches challenge -

Love this sketch, super versatile.

I found a Monster already stamped on my desk, so decided he should be coloured and go on the card.

I started with a black card base and used a coverplate die (Lil Inker) on a piece of white cardstock. I stuck this piece to the card base and then added my red piece of paper.

I wanted the sentiment to kind of look like it was coming out of my Monsters mouth. But I kind of mis-judged it a bit, so it looks like he is swallowing the stickers LOL.

I heat-embossed the fun sentiment onto a piece of black card... I love this sentiment, it is by Create A Smile stamps and was a set I bought with a prize I won.

I'm pretty pleased with the ONE card I managed to make this weekend.

Cx

Belated Happy Birthday Momma Bear...

Hey,

Happy Friday.

This is the 2nd Friday in a row that I have been to the gym at stupid o' clock!! I think it was easier to do that when I was on vacay last week!!

Last Friday I showed you Lucy's birthday card that I made using parts of a Stampin' Up cardkit, I used the same kit to make my Ma's birthday card.

Here is what the card looks like when it is in the kraft sleeve -

Ma has been busy losing weight (super proud of her) so to keep her motivated I gave her one of my older fitbit's and made this bag to put the card and the fitbit in.

This is something I do a lot - basic plain muslin bags and then stamp onto them. The recipients are ALWAYS impressed.

Have a great weekend.

Cx

Monsters, Microbes and Aliens

Hey,

Happy Monday!!

Today is a quick post - just wanted to share the card I made using the awesome Monster set that my naughty friend Lisette sent me in the post.

In fact there are two sets, I haven't had a play with the other one yet.

This one is by Flonzcraft and called Monsters, Microbes and Aliens - LOL, right up my street!

I used the MISTI to help me stamp the Monsters, etc and then I die-cut them using a Lawn Fawn square stitched die.

I didn't want to cover the pretty image, so affixed a piece of vellum using staples to my card and added the sparkly RAWR!

Ha ha ha love it, love the stamps, love Lisette for being so thoughtful and for the amazing card -

Cx

Mini Canvases....

Hey,

Recently I started working out of an actual office (not my craftdesk) with two colleagues.

It's nice, but I miss being at home..

I thought on the first day that we were all together it would be nice to give them a gift, but as I don't Nicole that well, I didn't want to be too personal.

So I settled for 'initial canvases'.

I started with Blick 2x4 canvases and added texture paste to them through different Tim Holtz mini stencils.

Once the paste was dry, I chose 3 colours of acrylic paint and roughly painted over the paste - roughly because I wanted some of the white to show through.

Pretty right? That white 'palette' is a laminated piece of scrap paper, I have these in all different sizes and use them for ink, paint, messy mediums and when they wear out I just recycle them.

Final step once the paint dried was to add the initials, I had originally planned to spell out our names, but I thought just an initial was more impactful. I have these ancient black sparkly Thickers that worked really well here. I affixed them with Glossy Accents, because of the paste I wanted to be sure they held.

I love working with small canvases, it's a little slice of art.

My colleagues loved them BTW.

Cx

CASology: Landmarks...Space Needle..

Hey,

Yesterday was a fun day, hanging out with Lisette and Hubby. Today will be mainly me at my desk and also our new bed arrives - yay!

I liked this week's CASology cue card -

I am from London and live in NYC, so landmark's aplenty in both places, but I decided not to be obvious and go to my other 'home' Seattle. It has a special place in my heart, you can read why here.

I decided to use the Kelly Purkey for Hero Arts 'Seattle' stamp set, I love it and I also have the NYC version (there isn't a London one..)

First I die-cut the white panel - love the MFT wonky stitched dies, then I added a teeny bit of blue distress ink to make the Space Needle pop a bit.

The hardest part of this card was fussy cutting the Space Needle - it is SO tiny!!

I stamped the sentiment - 'rocks' I built using these great stamps by Prima. Seattle is from the same set as the Space Needle, but I messed up the 'S' instead of starting again, I added a blue sparkly Thickers 'S'..I think it works..

For my final touch I added some sparkly Nuvo drops.

I think this card will be winging it's way to my friend Michelley, who is responsible for my Seattle love affair.

And just incase you don't know this, the Space Needle was built for the 1962 World's Fair, you can get to the top in just 41 seconds with the super speedy elevators and it is worth it. Even if like me you are terrified of heights!

Cx

Happy 21st Birthday Josh..

Hey,

So I have no doubt that I am nursing a hangover today after attending the HAC Summer ball with Lemons...

I am also leaving for home today. It has been a most excellent week in London and its only 3 weeks until my Ma arrives for her first visit of the year.

Today is also my Goddaughter's boyfriends 21st birthday. I actually don't know him that well (due to living in NYC), so I couldn't make the card too personalised.

I love the paper you can see on the card, I stole it from JT, when I was staying at her house last Summer - ha ha ha - only a teeny bit you understand..it has been greatly rationed.

I thought it would make a fun boy type card.

I settled on pale blue as my accompanying colour and die-cut a panel for the sentiment (By Simon Says Stamp) and die-cut a small stitched circle for the sparkly Thickers numbers.

Super simple and perfect for a 21st birthday.

See you in NYC tomorrow.

Cx

Happy 30th Birthday...

Hey,

So my wonderful work colleague is turning 30..I adore her, she is awesome.

I wanted to make her something fun, because she is fun and keeps me sane.

I broke out two distress inks - Wilted Violet and Picked Raspberry - and dabbed them onto my craft mat, spritzed with water and smooshed my paper into the inky mess.

I find the first time you do this, you get a pretty standard watercolour effect. I like to go back in and pick up some of the colours in certain areas - you can see where I have done this, because you can see little speckles of colour and some fatter more defined splodges.

I like the colours I ended up with. I stamped the sentiment and used co-ordinating pink Thickers Stickers for the number..

I wanted to keep it kind of edgy, so affixed the whole panel to the cardblank using hot pink staples..love to co-ordinate.

Cx

Happy 1st Birthday...

Hey,

So the Son of good friends will be turning One this week and I wanted to make a fun card for him.

I decided to look through my stash of 'special' makes and see if there was anything there.

I came across this -

From my first ever Loft Art Retreat in 2015..

I thought he would be great to modify and turn into a 1st birthday card.

As you can see from the main photo today it totally worked with two simple changes - 1) add a new sentiment, over the existing one. 2) add a Thickers number sticker to a balloon.

I love it when I can slightly tweak something I've already made to use for a slightly different purpose, it feels very 'clever' LOL.

Cx

WOYWW #350...Birthdays and Holibobs..

Hey,

Happy WOYWW.

For those of you that don't know what WOYWW is..it is that magical time of the week where we join Julia over at her blog Stamping Ground and share our desk space.

This is my last WOYWW for the next three weeks, as I will be on Holibobs and working in London for the next two weeks.

It is going to be hectic, but fun and it's nice to get to travel with Hubby, as so much of the traveling I do now is solo :(

I took my photo whilst I was colouring on Tuesday night for the current The Daily Marker colouring challenge. JT's Mom bought me a colour a day calendar and it's been a lot of fun. You can see my Promarker colour chart, a couple of Promarkers and the sheets I am colouring.

I also wanted to share two very different cards with you this week..

One is the finished 'hunk' from last week - you all seemed to like him :) He is winging his way to a friend already.

Second card is for our Nephew Otis, he was 5 yesterday!! I can't believe how quickly the time has flown.

He loves Football, his Dad like me is a lifelong Spurs fan, so I coloured the image to match their current kit. I believe he is having a football party on Saturday..complete with 29 friends - the horror of 29 kids under 5..I do not envy my SIL.

Fun cards that both use digital stamps.

Have a great day everyone, see you for a nosy later.

Cx

Simons Says..Add a little texture..

Hey,

Hope you all had a good weekend.

I had a great one, skype playdate with JT, plenty of time at my desk and Hubby and I watch the Lord of the Rings trilogy!!

I saw the Simon Says Weds challenge this week was Add a little texture and I am totally loving texture this week. The DT also used SSS products.

I decided to make a tag instead of a card, I am sending something to a friend to say thank you and I thought wrapping the gift in a nice tag would be a great idea.

She's creative and so she loves it when I send her things that use different techniques.

I used a Tim Holtz tag die and stencil. I placed the stencil over my tag and used Wendy Vecchi textured embossing paste. I love this stuff, you get such lovely texture.

I wanted to use sparkly Thickers for the sentiment, so I mounted them on a sparkly vellum strip of paper. It's a bit wider than the tag, to give it a bit of dimension.

I die cut the circle, star and heart from a SSS stitched die bundle set that I love. I used all scraps for this. The ribbon is a scrap too, left over from wrapping JT's bday gofts :)

Here is a close-up so you get a closer look at some of the details.

I'm super pleased with my tag, I love all the little details and different textures.

Cx

Happy 4th Birthday Otis!

Hey,

Today is President's Day here in NYC and it is also my Nephew's 4th birthday.

Sadly I have not seen him in person since last March, but we skype often and he is growing up so fast..

I based his card around the boy in the alien costume digital stamp by Jellypark.

I coloured the stamp using Promarkers and then fussy cut it out, I added googly eyes to the alien for a bit of fun.

The paper is from a Recollections Monsters and Robots stack that I have.

I could fit Happy Birthday in the sparkly Thickers on the card, so I used a giant Woodware stamp instead.

Here is a photo of Otis and I - it's a couple of years old, but it's a fave of mine..

I hope Otis loves his card as much as we love him :)

Cx

WOYWW #281...Counting the days...

Hey,

I missed you WOYWWer's last week and I was too tired in the evening to visit you all.

I am looking forward to some desk nosying this week.

Get yourself over to Julia's blog Stamping Ground if you want to find out what I am talking about and join in!

So I have 7 more working days until Hubby and I head to Mexico!! Yay!! On Friday my MIL and SIL - awesome! Fun times ahead.

The angle of my desk is most weird, but I wanted you to see everything! It's been Christmas a go go at my desk recently, which has been lots of fun since I decided to make a 'selection' box of cards to use as our personal cards. I am using lots of my Christmas stash and its fun. I've been playing with alcohol inks, so you can see offcuts from that.

Generally my desk is pretty tidy - I always seem to accumulate piles of 'stuff'. Honestly I have no idea how it happens..am I alone here? Does this happen on your desk?

Here is a little card for you and JT (she's in Kansas, so no peeking) -

JT and I have this crab/moose/lobster thing - can't explain it. So when I made a oops with the bottom square (watercolour through a stencil) I covered it with a crab, added Dude in blingy letters and BOOM a card for JT...ha ha.

I'll see you all later - after work.

Cx

WOYWW #271...Leaving on a jet plane..

..well not quite, but tomorrow I am heading home - Whoop Whoop!

Today I am joining WOYWW..the infamous time of the week, where we join Julia over at her blog Stamping Ground and nose at each other's desks.

Hope everyone is safe after the serious storm that hit a lot of people last night. The wind here was amazing - never heard anything so loud!

My desk is a bit tidy and a bit messy - just on the left side..I have been playing with some ideas, hence the pile to the left, I was going to use the Silhouette cat eye mask on the purple card - hence the t-rule, but I changed my mind. The papers are out, because I sorted my scraps. The Dymo label maker is also out because I sorted my scraps.

I saw a great idea for scrap organising on a WOYWW blog (sorry can't remember who for the life of me...getting old), but I thought it was a bit small for my silly season scrap "collection". So I hunted for something and decided that I would buy a photo organiser, that was handily on sale at The Container Store and meant I could also use a voucher I had.

This is the end result -

Photo organiser transformed into a scrap manager!

I labelled the cases by colour - to match my large paper drawers and then spent nearly all day on Sunday sorting out my scraps. I ended up with 2 carrier bags of paper for recycling..I finally managed to get rid of all the teeny tiny piece of paper that I have been hanging on to and some crumpled damaged pieces.

Here is one of the cases open -

Green scrap case

Most pleased with myself and everything I have made since has used a scrap or bigger offcut - no new pieces of paper have been harmed this week :) I have vowed to try and use as many scraps and bigger offcuts as I can before chopping up anything else!

As always there is a card for you lovely WOYWWers - it used x3 scraps and x1 bigger offcut. Its for a work colleague, who is a bit quirky, so she got a quirky card  - 

Cat Mask 30th Birthday Card

Sorry for the long post. Happy WOYWW.

I'll be visiting late tonight, as I have to stay up!

Cx

WOYWW #270...Indulgence..

Hi,

Happy WOYWW..as a crafter I know all about Indulgence (why do we have such large stashes?!)

Anyway, before we get into it..if you don't know what WOYWW is by now you need to hop on over to Julia's blog Stamping Ground and find out.

I've been a bit indulgent this week..I bought some stamps from ByLori Designs, some from Hambo, some from Cuddly Buddly and then had to stop myself!!

However as you can see from my desk some other new items arrived too (oops).. misting bottles..I love mini misters, but they are way too pricey. Saw these mini travel bottles with a fine spray nozzle for 99c, so bought them and they work really well. My glasses - the correct craft desk pair, my gym headphones, new bling and chalk tags - 99c each pack and some left overs from die cutting, I am going to use them as masks. Then there is the new dog stamp - $1.50 and a coloured version of it.
Also my approx.18yr old beloved Pentel automatic pencil..I love this pencil. After changing industry after nearly 20 years earlier this year, my pencil holds special meaning to me. He was given to me on my first day of work at my first ever ad agency and I have had him ever since..refilling him time and time again. And yes my pencil is a he!

Here is a little card for you WOYWWer's as usual..using a ByLori stamp :)

Ella stamp by Lori Boyd

Cute right?!

Sorry for the lengthy post :) See you all later.

Cx

Moving Along With The Times - Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

Hi,

Well wasn't that Birthday Blog hop fun last week!!

Congratulations to all the winners over on the MAWTT blog.

Thanks for all your lovely comments, I put all the people that commented on my blog in a hat and got Hubby to pull the winners..drum roll please...

The winners are Carmen M and Becky - congratulations ladies. Email me at hamnmulenyc@gmxDOTcom and I will get your prizes out to you.

Ok, so now it is time for Team B again over at MAWTT..

The theme is Girls Just Wanna Have Fun..hosted by the lovely Janice.

This is the perfect theme for one of my favourite Stamping Bella stamps..Victoria and Juliette's Night out.

I coloured the stamp using Promarkers and added touches of glitter glue, the backing paper is Pink Petticoat's tiny leopard paper, the black sparkly paper is by DCWV and the letters are foam glitter Thickers. Tammy used a great photo corner die on a Team B challenge and so I hunted down a photo corner punch - for a bargain $4 and I think it is a great accent detail here.

To join in the fun and see all the other great Team B makes..go to MAWTT.

Have a great 4th of July if you are in the US and celebrating..I am heading to a boat party tonight with Hubby and friends, to get the weekend started right!

Cx

Cards for men...

Hi,

YAY!! It's Friday...this week has been HARD!!

I am most excited as JT and I are doing another Skype playdate tomorrow - whoop whoop..it's gonna be epic!

I am also pleased to see that this is my 96th post of the year!! I am on target for my goal of 200 posts this year..there is no reason for that number, other than I want to achieve it. It will mean that for the 2nd year running I have taken this blogging thing seriously and that makes me super proud.

I often struggle to make cards for men, however when making for my work colleagues it all just seems to flow..

I am the 'resident' card maker at work. We are a small company that are growing, so it is nice for people to receive a handmade card with their name on, it retains our family feel. I love making these cards, as I get to experiment a bit.

The main card is for one of the AM's - his birthday is Monday and as you can see he is going to be 30 - hence the retro tech paper - from Graphic Stock. Unfortunately when I stamped the sentiment originally, it smudged, so you can see a bit of a crafty repair!

This card is for one of our board members who is a numbers guy..I made a different card for him originally, but I didn't love it, so cut the sentiment and his name off of the original and started again. Much happier with this one - the number washi tape felt like a nice touch.

As you can see I have been obsessed with blue bling whilst making these :)

Happy Friday everyone and have a great weekend.

Cx

Online Card Class - Stretch Your Stamps - Day 1

Hi there,

Hope you had a good weekend. I've had a fun and varied one!

I wanted to buy JT a bit of a different craft related present for her birthday this year. So I chose a class from the Online Card Class site.

I thought Stretch Your Stamps would be great for both of us, as we have a fair amount of stamps that we probably under utilise! And yes I did by the class for myself...

Be warned this is an EPIC post!

So Day 1 is about using background stamps..I chose to use a Heidi Swapp giant Chevron stamp (5.5x5.5 inches)

My main card was made during the first part of the class, we had to make an ink pad and double stamp. I didn't have some of the things used to do exactly the same rainbow technique (cut n dry felt and reinkers) so I improvised.
I inked my background stamp twice in a different colour each time and spritzed with water for a smudgey effect. I managed to achieve the double stamped / rainbow effect..without the additional tools - SWEET! I also don't have a heat it tool (yet...) and so I had to stamp my sentiment (by American Crafts) in white ink.

I feel like this card is a total win!

The next card is totally and utterly for JT!!

Paper Pieced background..wobbly owl!

I bought the wobbly owl (by Studio G) on Saturday at Michael's with her in mind and it felt like a natural fit for this card. We had to paper piece our background stamp. It's a great technique using similar coloured papers and co-ordinating inks. I used a hexagon punch and not a die for my shapes, I decided that foam Thickers were more appropriate than a stamped sentiment and I love the corrugated card texture against the hexagon pattern.
Another win for me :)

Card number 3 is all about kissing :)

Kiss technique - on the hearts

You take your background stamp and ink it up and then take another stamp and ink it up and then 'kiss' them together. Love this technique. I used a soft green chalk ink and a gingerbread ink for my 'kiss', then I punched hearts out of it and made my card.
I will totally be doing this again and once again I feel like a winner, as I love the end result.

Final card for Day 1..

Featured element..out of this world!

This is a great way to use your background stamps. Basically stamp into a 'featured' element on your card. I chose to stamp onto a piece of paper first and then die-cut my shape. I went with a 'monster / alien' theme because as JT pointed out earlier in the week..I love a monster! I used an xCut star die to cut my paper in 2 sizes, some washi tape (the blue stripey stuff) that I got from Amazon in a tin, it is awesome and has random die-cuts in it - hence the spot. The alien I bought when I was home last month and the sentiment is from a set I have..can't remember who by :( As I am so pleased with my card, I thought I'd use it as my submission for the latest Northridge Publishing blog challenge - Cards with Stars.

Day 1 of the course was great fun, I have learnt some fun new tricks and feel like I really did stretch my background stamp..

I won't be doing the next day until later in the week and I will be jumping to Day 3, as you need a heat tool for Day 2 and my new toy hasn't arrived yet...

Cx

Love..

Hey there,

Well only 3 more days before I am back at work!

So I am trying to make the most of the time. I had a fun weekend with Hubby, both here in NYC and in Atlantic City.

Before I left, I stayed up late on Saturday evening making stuff :) Among the things I made was my entry for
Pals Paper Arts - I love their challenges and the entire DT make me swoon...this week's challenge (#187) just screamed love at me!!

My card went through many, many changes..right at the last minute I decided to chop the doily in half and I am feeling pretty pleased with that decision!

I love the Thickers foam glitter stickers..I need more, but I bought them on offer and I am now being mean about paying full price...it's my 2014 strategy for not adding things to my ever expanding stash!

The textured sky blue paper is very old and bought when I first started crafting and it is rationed, as Kaiserkraft have never made it in this colour again :(

I punched the hearts using Woodware punches..I love heart punches I have one that is even teenier than the smallest heart on this card..

I'm thinking that I will use this card as an Anniversary card..what do you think?

Cx