Together is the best place to be...

 

Hey!

I am starting to wonder if I am ever going to be able to show 2021 makes here, as I made SO much in 2020 LOL.

This cute card was for my Goddaughter Amy's first wedding anniversary. She is a big fan of Dogs and I thought she would like this.

Also, her plans for her future had to shuffle a considerable amount in 2020 because of Covid and I wanted the card to be a reminder to them, so early in their married life, that together is all that matters, the what and where is irrelevant.

I used my fave MFT cloud edger stencil to create the background, the dog and bird are Gus and Gertie by Taylored Expressions, the together sentiment is by Unity Stamp Co.

I love creating these cloud background it is addictive!

Cx

Happy 10th Anniversary JT...

 

Happy New Year!

Welcome to 2021.

My girl JT and her Hubby had a difficult 2020 for various reasons, but I saw that they decided to end the year on a high. They recreated their Wedding meal and I thought that was such a lovely thing to do.

I had been planning on sharing the card I made them for the 10th Anniversary last September, but never got round to it. So it seemed fitting today to share it.

JT and her Hubby share my love of all things bacon, so my first use of the AALL & Create 'Bacon' set had to be for them.

Sadly, you can't see in my slightly blurry photo the teeny tiny little handwritten gold 10's in the hearts. 

Wishing them and all my family and friends a very Happy New Year and I hope that if 2020 was a hard one for you, I sincerely hope that 2021 will be better for you.

Love

Claire x

16/11 - Happy Anniversary..

Hey,

If you have been visiting my blog for a while you know a) my wedding anniversary is Halloween and b) I always celebrate the anniversary of our first date - 30th October.

This year it's 16 years together and 11 years married!! 

The photo is from our anniversary early morning boat ride through the water park/conservation area last year in Cancun.

Being a cardmaker, I use these x2 anniversaries as an excuse to make Hubby elaborate cards. 

First up the 16 year card.

I love the 'Bacon' set by AALL & Create - a brand that I discovered earlier this year, whilst I was at home in London and they have been such a great find. I blended Worn Lipstick and Picked Raspberry distress oxides to create my background and then stamped the awesome bacon stamp from 'Bacon Break' by Sweet Stamp Shop. I added a few hearts for fun.

I mean how can he not love a card with a bacon background?! AND not a pun in sight (he very much dislikes a pun card, and I give them to him to wind him up - hee hee).

And here is the 11th Wedding Anniversary card! It's not strictly a pun, but it is kind of because it's Halloween...

I love all the amazing cloud blending I am seeing and I need MUCH more practice at it. But I am SO happy with how this came out and now I need a black blender brush..

I used an MFT Cloud stencil, Crate Paper 'After Dark' stamps and Papertrey Ink 'Keep It Simple: Anniversary' stamps. The inks are distress oxides in Black Soot, Carved Pumpkin and Wilted Violet.

We would normally be in Mexico right now celebrating, but you know global pandemic.. So we are going to our fave restaurant in NYC instead (hoping we don't freeze to death outside). 

I would just like to say that even though the last 7 months have been very strange, there isn't anyone else I could have been trapped in a small apartment with. Hubby and I have had so much fun at home, watching random crap, eating our body weight in cake, perfecting our fave recipes, and hanging with Clint Catwood. 

If you choose your life partner carefully, all storms can be weathered with humor.

I love you Mr G, you are my man, love, thing for life and beyond.

Cx

4 from 1: Flora & Fauna Critter Valentine..

Hey,

So I have been a bit blog absent the past few weeks. BUT I am not going to get upset about it like I used to. I vowed in 2019 and beyond that my blog would go back to being a thing that made me happy and not a chore!

Now I post when I want and not based on the silly objectives I created for myself (sometimes it is hard being a project manager IRL).

Anyway today I am back with a fun set of x4 cards using the Flora & Fauna 'Critter Valentine' set.

I really wanted this set for a while and it was on sale, including the dies for a super bargain price at F&F, so I had to have it.

I have been planning on using it to create wedding and/or anniversary cards.

I think the first x4 came out really well.

The main photo shows the anniversary cards I made - LOVE the little critters in the VW-esque van.

I masked off a circle (I create my own masks using the card backing that comes with stamp sets and I cut them to A6 and then die-cut shapes out, so I can lay them over the paper I am using and I don't get ink where it shouldn't be) and then I stenciled hearts in the circle, using my fave Dutchdoobadoo heart stencil.

The rest of the card was pretty easy, stamp, colour and die-cut the van and x2 critters for each van.

The next x2 cards used backgrounds that I already had in my stash and when I made these I only had a die-cutter big enough to cut this mini size (my big shot died after x8 years). They are both made using different texture medium. The one on the left uses Nuvo Mousse in Indian Gold and the one on the right uses blue glitter paste (not sure where from, can't find it now).

I decided to make these ones 'Hello Friend' and I really like how backgrounds can just change the feel of a card.

Have a great weekend.

Cx

Happy 15/10...

Hey,

Hubby and I are currently in Mexico to celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary, but if you have read my blog before then you know that yesterday was the anniversary of our first date - making this 15 years that we have been together!

I have written SO many posts about Hubby and our relationship over the last 10 years that I have had my blog.

My fave post is this one I wrote to celebrate our 10/5 year anniversary and I can't top that. I also decided not to use one of our Wedding photos for this post. The one I have used is from a friend's wedding last year and I love it, as it's SO us.

So today, I'm just going to show you the two cards I made Hubby for both anniversaries - I am a cardmaker, after all, so he always gets two cards!

I bought this amazing set by Ellen Hutson when it was on sale, especially for this occasion, as I refer to Hubby as Otter Boy - too personal for this blog ;) AND Hubby really hates all my punny cards, so I love to wind him up by giving them to him..

But also Otters mate for life and when they are in the Ocean or the River, they hold hands/paws at night, so that when they sleep they don't drift apart.. We have always thought that this is the sweetest thing ever and the set had two Otters holding hands/paws making this set perfect.

The first card is the one for our 15th Anniversary -

Gorgeous right! I started by stamping the Otters and masking them off before stenciling over them using a fave heart stencil by Dutchdoobadoo. The bottom half is a Clearly besotted stencil and I added the sentiment from the Otter set along with some Tim Holtz stickers to complete it. To hide the join, I added a glittery blue strip.

Here is a close-up of the sentiment - 

Here is the card for our 10th Wedding Anniversary.

This card is SO sparkly IRL, as I added Wink of Stella everywhere!!
I started by stenciling in the waves using a MFT stencil, then I added the sunburst, using a Clear Scraps stencil.
I stamped, coloured and die-cut the Otters and added a sentiment from the set.

Really happy with both cards - especially the mad puns!

Happy Anniversary Hubby, so glad that we are 15/10 in and continuing to have fun together, here's to the next 15/10 of fun, laughter, love and adventure. You will always be my Otter boy.

Cx

Mr & Mr...

Hey, 

So around the middle of August my work colleague, Emma asked me to make her a Mr & Mr card.

I immediately knew what I wanted to do as I had just bought the awesome 'Furry Friends' set by Concord & 9th and had seen this idea -

So with a few modifications I CASE'd it - LOVE how mine came out, it was so fun to make and the stamp set is so versatile.

I was so happy with it all that I made JT and her Hubby their anniversary card using the same premise.

The background papers that I used for both of the cards are by Pink Petticoat (no longer open) and are digital, so I just had to print off a sheet of each colourway - it comes in 48 colours - amazing!

Cx

Mini Love...

Hey,

Happy Monday to you!

I like to get creative with anniversary cards, especially as I send them to the same people every year!

I love the Love Heart Frame Die by Simon Says Stamp (sadly no longer for sale), it is SO versatile and I use it a lot.

This time, I thought it would be fun to use the 'Love' die and keep the negative part and make cards using that too.

The main heart frame die-cut I affixed to the awesome notecard card blanks from Target ($1 for 6) and added the Love word over the top of it.

A while ago I bought a random pack of mini 3x3 red papers and the mini square cards use two of these.

I love how cute these cards are and how easy they were to make.

Cx

Peacock Anniversary...

Hey,

Happy Thursday!

There has been a bit of a post gap from me, I was on vacation for 6 days with my Hubby in Tampa and when we got back, we collected our new cat Clint!

Isn't he gorgeous! We are in love already and he has settled in really well.

I made today's card a while ago. I bought the awesome Peacock set by Avery Elle over Black Friday..

It actually comes with a 'Happy Valentine's Day' sentiment, but for my first use of it, I wanted to make an Anniversary card.

I stamped the Peacock repeatedly onto a piece of white card to create the background and because I wanted my bright and colourful Peacock to pop, I left them all uncoloured.

I added two different kinds of hearts and the sentiment to complete the card.

I love it, it was a good decision to leave the background uncoloured.

Cx

Hip Hippo Anniversary..

Hey,

Only 5 more days of work for me before the Christmas break - I literally cannot wait.

December is the hardest month in my job, it's so intense getting everything delivered pre-Christmas and then planning for January, but it also feels pretty satisfying too, getting that much work done in such a short space of time.

I have good friends who celebrate their wedding anniversary in December, they got married the same year as Hubby and I and their wedding was one of my all time faves..

I bought this great Waffle Flower set 'Hip Hip Hooray' a while back and I hadn't used it, so I thought it would make a fun anniversary card for my friends - in part because they do a lot of things together and I thought these cute Hippos working out together summed them up.

I stamped, coloured and die-cut the hippos. I stamped hearts all over a mini kraft tag (I buy these from eBay 2x3.5inch and you get 100 for $2) using embossing ink and then dusted perfect pearls over them to create a fun background.

I stuck with the purple theme and mounted the tag onto a purple card blank, add the hippos and stamped the sentiment in a deep violet.

A slightly different anniversary card, but I love making things that are a bit personal for the recipients.

Cx

Love and a Cat...

Hey,

I have friends who are cat people and some who are dog people..

So generally when I am making cards for these people I try and think about what they might prefer, as I tend to use critters / animals / monsters a lot.

I wanted to make a fun anniversary card for my friends who have been married for like a bejillion years! And remembered I have this fun cat stamp by Unity Stamp Co, that I have hardly used.

This was another super simple make, I stamped the cat and the sentiment (I added the Happy Anniversary part), coloured the cat with Promarkers and added a bit of sparkle pen to his bow tie and the heart.

Die-cut it out and voila! Anniversary card.

I love the sentiment, it's pretty true in my house.

Cx

Happy 14/9 Hubby...

Hey,

Happy Halloween! AND Happy Anniversary to my Hubby.

Today is our 9th wedding anniversary and yesterday was the 14th anniversary of our first date. This is my fave post that I have written about Hubby and I and it's hard to top.

So I am not going to try, I am just going to say Happy Anniversary Hubby, you are awesome in so many ways and I'm super lucky to have found you ;)

Today's card is actually for Hubby, we are both massively geeky/nerdy and this set by Technique Tuesday (Favorite Human, no longer for sale), made me laugh, especially the little robot with a bow tie. I also LOVE that it came with 'beep' in a speech bubble, for some reason the word 'beep' makes me crazy happy!

Also Hubby always eye rolls me when I show him punny cards, which always makes me laugh, so I am looking forward to an eye roll later on when I give this to him.

I thought I'd share some photos from our wedding day, I was looking through them the other day and these ones made me smile ;)

Top left - Me with my Parents (why is my Dad so grumpy!), Daddy and our Dog Oscar, Bottom right, Me with my bridesmaids laughing, Me + Hubby laughing at my Dad's speech, Me + MIL laughing at the Best Woman's speech

We are heading to a new place for dinner tonight, which is fun (or foolish), we don't normally deviate from our 'spots' on Anniversary night.

Cx

PFS Background Anniversary...

Hey,

Happy Monday!

As I said yesterday this week my blog will be taken over by Anniversary cards.

Today's card was made quite a while ago.

I created the background waaay back in June as part of the Daily Marker 30 days of colouring (which starts again on Thursday!). The stamps I used are by Pink Fresh Studio from the 'Itty Bitty Elements' set - I am a big fan of Pink Fresh Studio, their stuff is a little bit different.

Despite my multiple stamp platforms, I always use blocks when I am creating backgrounds like this.

It actually took a seriously long time to colour and I was a bit over it towards the end! So with that in mind, when I came to make a card using it I kept it simple.

I die-cut a stitched rectangle panel in a colour that coordinated with the birdie, because I knew I wanted a red sentiment. I used arrow sentiment dies by MFT for the sentiment and cut off the arrow tips, as they were too fussy here.

I love this card, so rich and a bit of a mix of traditional and modern.

Cx

Anniversary Week...

Hey,

Happy Sunday to you.

Hope you have had a good weekend so far. I had a seriously hard session in the gym yesterday, it was my first trip up to the secret weight floor and it was hard, but rewarding.

Today I have made Sausage and Cheese & Onion rolls and Hubby and I are drinking mimosas and watching NFL Sunday.

It's our wedding anniversary on Wednesday and Tuesday is the anniversary of our first date :) This year we are celebrating 14 years together and 9 years married..pretty big, I don't know where 14 years have gone.

I have had lots of anniversaries recently, so this week feels like my blog is going to be full of anniversary cards!

Starting with this little Monster cutie I made for friends using a new set from Unity Stamp Co. 'Nicest Place to Be'.

I kept this card super simple and just coloured the stamps and added some hearts. I mounted the panel onto a Lawn Fawn card blank to make it pop.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend, I am going to eat more rolls..

Cx

Floral Anniversary...

Hey,

I am still in London and SUPER excited today.

I am off to watch the NFL at Wembley with my Dad and it's going to be great, we always used to try and get to the London games when I lived in London.

It will make up for not being able to watch a ton of games from my usual NFL Sunday sofa position.

I thought my card today was topical, as I made it specifically for my Parents wedding anniversary on 8th October. Top fact, my folks have only been married for 14 years..but together for approx 47 years!!

It was a great excuse to play with a piece of NBUS. The stamp is 'Heart Bouquet' by Laurel Burch for Stampendous.

I stamped it onto watercolour paper and used liquid watercolours to colour it and added a ton of Nuvo drops in a few colours. I added a simple sentiment, as the stamp is very fussy.

I'm pretty pleased with how it came out and my parents liked it too.

I am heading home to NYC tomorrow - Yay! It's been a fun week of parties, work, catch-ups and even a crafty playdate with JT, but I will be happy to get home to Hubby, Boscat and my desk.

Cx

Bouquet Anniversary...

Hey,

Happy Thursday from London!!

I had a great day out with my parents yesterday celebrating my Mum's birthday. We went to Runnymede and had a picnic by the river, did some plane spotting, listened to the cricket and fed the ducks, it was a very English day out.

I made today's card a while ago - literally the minute after the amazing Bouquet of Hearts stamp by Pink Fresh Studio turned up.

I watercoloured the stamp and had it sitting on my desk for a while, until I decided to use it as an Anniversary card.

The sentiment banner stamp is by Mama Elephant.

I love stamps like this that you can use for a variety of occasions.

Cx

Love birds..

Hey,

With my birthday money from my Parents, I bought a ton of Zini's and Jofy's by Paper Artsy - Cara enabled me totally not my fault!

I decided to use the Lovebirds stamp to make a fun anniversary card for my friends.

So cute right?

I kept it all really simple by just adding more hearts and I even coloured it very similar to the image on the stamp packet.

I love these mini stamps by Paper Artsy, there is so much you can do with them, I have a few more cards to show you with these later on this week.

Cx

More than Coffee..

Hey,

Happy Friday..coming to the end of my 2 day work week - gotta love a short week.

I think that my anniversary card for Hubby was possibly a bit of a stretch, even he didn't believe that I love him more than coffee LOL.

But I liked the idea...

The stamp set is by Gerda Steiner - Coffeesaurus - I love the cute Dino and he reminded me of Hubby (I'm sure that he will love that..)

Have a great weekend, I'll be hanging with my friends, Hubby and watching NFL, I mean did you see the Seahawks game last week?!

Cx

13 years later...

Hey,

So today is the anniversary of my first date with Hubby and tomorrow is our 8th Wedding Anniversary!

I can't actually believe that we have been together for 13 years!

2017 has seriously tested us, complications from my surgery and losing our beloved baby Archibald, it's not been an easy year.

But this is when you know you have the right person, because no matter what we have experienced this year, we have still managed to find the happy side of life.

When I think of Sam I think of the word crazy! Because together we have so much crazy fun, infact we have so much fun that if you go out with us and survive our friends call it 'Being Granthamed'.

I genuinely love our life together, we always manage to weather storms in our life together with humor and booze, that's a great way to live life.

The photo today was taken just after we were declared married and we are walking back up the aisle, the couple we are laughing with are my Aunt and Uncle - which pretty much sums up our wedding day. Laughter.

Happy Anniversary baby, you are my Lobster (but I'd still trip you if Zombies were chasing us).

Cx

Christmas Card 2017: Unity Stamp Co Christmas Bicycle..

Hey,

Happy Friday.

I am very excited today, as Hubby and I are off to Tampa tomorrow morning to celebrate our 8th wedding anniversary and 13 years together!! I need some sunshine!

I am also excited as I have officially finished all my Christmas cards - whoop whoop, under 3 months for 130 cards..not bad going.

I actually find it way easier to create cards in little batches and this year with the MISTI on my team it's been a dream.

The cards today are one of my faves, I fell in love with the stamp by Unity Stamp Co last year, but it was too late to use it for my 2016 makes.

The stamp is quite a lot of work to colour, but SO worth it.

I still have a few more cards that I made for Christmas that I am going to continue to share with you.

Have a great weekend, everything will be scheduled until I get back on Thursday..

Cx

Retro Rubber Challenge #73.. Boo!

Hey,

Welcome to another fantastic Retro Rubber challenge.

This is a popular theme here in the US - Halloween..

I celebrate my Wedding Anniversary on 31st of October, so Halloween means something completely different, but it does mean that Hubby knows when he sees Pumpkins..time to start thinking about our Anniversary LOL.

I chose to use a fave stamp set by Simon Says Stamp - Trick or Treat.. I've had it for just over a year, I bought it with my birthday money last year, because I wanted to make a card for my Nephew and Niece.

I thought using a red background would suit the Cat-ula stamp and heat embossed the sentiment onto the red background. I decided to use a wobbler sticker for my Cat-ula, but he didn't pop that well, so I added a background behind it. If you look closely you will realise that it's mini bats - by Your Next Stamp (Batty Background Splatter).

I love how the gold edge of the card blank makes the whole thing pop, a great addition to my slowly growing Halloween card pile.

Check out what my awesome teammates have made over at Retro Rubber and show us your interpretation of the sketch.

Don't forget to use a stamp older than a year on your project and tell us all about it, that is a big part of the Retro Rubber fun. Also please feel free to combine our challenge with others, but keep it to a maximum of 10 challenges including ours.

Challenge ends on October 20th.

Cx