Stick with what you know...

Literally I will be 'sticking' with my regular white craft glue and never want to see UHU again! I followed a little tip and bought a tube, thought it might help me getting buttons to stick to cards better. Well it certainly did that, but it also ended up all over me and the craft room.

Basically it comes out too quick and is too runny and it scared me a bit!

Anyway, I wanted to use this weekend to make some non Christmas items, but was feeling a bit short on inspiration. So I popped over to Pinterest and had a rummage through my craft ideas and also at Edie A's cardmaking board, which is amazing.

Today's main photo is of one of the cards I made using the following card as a guide -

I always feel that any cards I am 'copying' should be modified in some way to make it feel like I actually did something...
They were fun to make sp I made them in 3 colours - the UHU was the only sticking point (ha ha). I tried a new technique of running an ink pad around the edges of the paper square, it's really easy, but choose your ink type carefully - the pigment ink does not dry in a timely fashion and I ended up with it all over me and ruined a couple of cards. Chalk inks are much better.

I think the twine threaded buttons look cute, but I felt they were a tad too much effort - here is a detail photo so you can see the inked edges and the buttons

I advise using a 6 x 6 piece of paper and cutting it into 4 equal sizes squares, I found using detailed papers worked really well at this size

The papers are all from a set that I bought earlier in the year, but didn't really know what to do with them.

Here are the red and blue ones

Choosing a contrasting ink colour for the edges, really makes the paper squares stand out on the white cards.

Below is a detail shot of each card.

I opted for no twine on the red cards - don't like it as much.

Once I am back from Amsterdam, I'll post some more photos from my inspiration session.

Cx

Pottering around

Due to a rather large Friday, this weekend has been a nice pottering around the house one.

I've just been doing the easy craft related things this weekend! Like buying some stamps from Bugaboo that I have started colouring in, I am going to use them for my friend's Daughter's birthday - I want to frame them as I think they will look really nice in her bedroom and make her a matching birthday card.

Today I have been taking photos for the blog and my customers - I enjoy taking the photos, but need to catch the light at the right time, I really need a home studio set-up, so I can take the photos more often. I also went through all the recent personal cards I've made and matched them to the birthday / anniversary, etc book - very satisfying.  I have to do this every couple of weeks, as it can get a bit confusing in the craft room! Generally every thing I make fits one of three categories and I kept everything organised in these categories. These categories are -

1) Things for sale
2) Things for my personal use
3) Ideas I am trying out

It may seem a bit OCD, but I realised a while back that the things I am selling need to be relatively quick to make, as they are often required in big batches. The things I make for my personal use, I spend a bit more time and essentially play!

JT and I have been discussing this weeks Mojo Monday sketch challenge 246 and felt that it was a good one to enter. Here's the sketch -

Today's main picture is my entry, I decided I'd rotate the sketch and instead of a bow, I used a sentiment. I think it's a fun card and fits the things for sale category! The star paper is by Pink Petticoat, blue squares were made using DCWV brights adhesive stack - so easy to use. The red foam stars are from Michaels. Sentiment from the batch I cut last weekend. It's nice and simple and I think it's quite a 'man' type card, if you changed the colours it could work for 'girls' too.

Back to the craft room for me :) enjoy the rest of the weekend.

Cx

Making to give..Part 2

Bit of a delay posting this one - thought I had actually posted it!! Anyway, following on from my last post, here is part 2 of making gifts. As you are aware I have a bit of a thing for Crabs and JT kindly bought me the most wonderful Martha Stewart punch for Christmas.

Today's main picture shows my set of monochrome crabs in a row - I adore them, I think they are simple and elegant and fun too!

They are for my friend Emma - who I am going to see in a few weeks - she is quite random (as am I), so I am figuring that she will love these just as much as I do.

The best bit about these cards, is they use scraps from the squares I cut to use for the loopy round the page punch and the black strips are from the epic Christmas card making.

I really like the addition of bling after 'Crab' and the teeny tiny glittery crab eyes - which I have been dying to use for ages, but didn't know what they would be useful for - now I know.

Here are a few more pictures including a close-up of the Crab's glittery eyes -

I do have a part 3 - but that will be posted at some point next week once I have finished the Lavender sachets.

Over the weekend I am aiming to show you some of the children's cards I've made, that I am really pleased with, I had a genius idea and think it has worked out well.

Have a great weekend.

Cx

Crafting with new tools!

Hi, hope you all had a nice weekend.

I lost my voice and so had a very relaxing and quiet weekend - bar the trip to the local dump and the charity shop!

I have recently acquired a few new bits and bobs and decided I'd spend this weekend trying them all out. Today's main picture is of the masses of tags, that I die cut using my new xcut set of tags and nameplates die set. It's great, I think it makes standard printed wording zing to life. I also cut some plain coloured versions for use with peel offs.

They are actually quite straightforward to use, but I had to develop a little technique, so I can see how the wording looks through the aperture! An hour later, several errors and some sticky tape, I now have a technique that works.

This is a cheap and easy way of creating sentiment tags for cards and gifts.

Previously I had purchased a set of Spellbinders Nestibilities Labels Four and had spent a rainy afternoon die cutting a stack of these. Below is a picture of these combined with one of the tags from the main picture.

So, I had this beautifully layered sentiment, that looks wonderfully professional - what to do with it?! Make a card of course (duh!). I am so over the moon with the card that I made (below) - which was all based around the sentiment, it took me quite awhile, as I was being very fussy about the flowers and the buttons, but I think it was worth it - now who do I give it to?

This weekend was great, I made so many things - started the Lavender sachet project - and I managed to take all the photos, that I should have ample material for blogging this week - yay! Nearly everything I did this weekend involved a new tool or something that I'd forgotten about - you know what the new tools for this post were, but the forgotten element is buttons. Mine had been so hidden away in the previous craft room configuration, I generally couldn't be bothered to get them down. Now that I have relocated them to a handy position, they are being used a lot!

My final card for today uses the blank tags I mentioned earlier - die cut before I started making the card and it fits the colour scheme perfectly. I also used the fave Stampin' Up Bird Builder punch and the new Martha Stewart punch around the page flower.
This card is based on an idea that I saw in Cardmaking and Papercraft this month. I modified it, as I wanted it to be easier to make! All the papers used were free with magazines and are from my scrap bin, the flower is a foam one with a pearl in the middle, sentiment is a coloured peel-off and I whipped out the crop-a-dile to add eyelets. I'd gone off eyelets for a while, but as you will see over the course of this week, they came back with a vengeance over the weekend!

Hope you have had good start to your week too.

Fingers crossed I can get another post out tomorrow - whoo hoo!

Cx

Sewing Machine Skills!

Thank You card for JT 

Recently I have been noticing a lot more cards and handmade stationery made using sewing machines - like the main pic in my previous post. I really like these items and have wanted to give it a go, but I love my sewing machine, it was a rather large investment and I have been unsure about using it for paper crafts.  So I bought myself a sew easy tool - quite frankly a lot of effort for not a lot of gain! eBay for that bad boy!!

Then I discovered MoonMum - her blog is AMAZING and totally inspirational and she's been using a Berina (which is not a cheap machine) to make her items. MoonMum is actually a lady called Belinda and she uses her awesome sewing machine skills to make fantastic items that she sells.

I've been thinking that if I can master using my sewing machine for making cards, I'll be able to make some really special things for my friends and family as gifts (ooh and imagine the Thank You sets I could make). I think that as I have a day job it's too much of a time investment to make these items for sale, which is a bit of a shame, but I guess one day Hubby and I will be living by the seaside working part-time and I'll be free to invest more time in Ham'n'Mule.

Anyway, I took the plunge and used my machine to make JT's card - today's picture (note the butterfly punch in the background, JT and I love love love that punch), here are a few more photos.

close-up of the top of the card - I love how the butterlies stick out and add depth to the card

close-up view of the bottom of the card

I used the beloved Martha Stewart Butterfly Punch, free contrasting papers for the butterflies, white scrap paper, blue gingham paper from Michael's. The sentiment is just a silver peel off - I might try stamping a sentiment next time.

I am really pleased at how well it came out, how easy it was to do and it has made me feel really inspired. I have started sewing together some bunting cards and have some other ideas that I want to try, hopefully I can finish and post those over the weekend.

On another happy note, my Owl builder and Bird builder punches by Stampin' Up arrived yesterday and I had a quick play with the Owl one tonight. It's really cool and I am looking forward to making some cards using them.

Cx

Post Superbowl Chilling!

Superbowl 46 invite.

We had a great night last night watching the Superbowl with JT and her Hubby. We ate a lot and drank a lot of beer.

The menu consisted of Chicken cooked by my Ma, jacket potatoes and corn on the cob. JT made crack bread - brilliant idea, a loaf, ranch dressing, butter, cheese and bacon, then grill - yum!

Crack Bread

She also made 7 layer dip which is one of my fave things.

7 Layer Dip

I made a vanilla layer cake (Martha Stewart's Versatile Vanilla Cake), which was lovely, but not moist enough as I got the temperature a bit wrong! Next time, next time.

Picture of the day is of the card I made for our friend Jamie - he insisted that he hadn't had a formal invite!! So I made this for him - when I got home slightly worse for wear at Midnight on Weds evening! I think it came out pretty well considering!

As the Superbowl finished at 2.30am I had today so I mooched about, making some cards and doing the prep for Otis' bunting. I'll show you pics later in the week and I have a tutorial for making really pretty flowers.

It's been a really fun weekend, I had a great day out with Karen and JT at the Range and then lunch. The Superbowl party was fun, looking forward to doing it again next year!

Cx

242

That is the number of Christmas Cards my friend JT and I made yesterday!!

It was hard work, fun and they are gorgeous - only a few more designs to be made now. I have started on one of them and JT will be working on the other one.

Unfortunately I can't show any of them to you, because the website goes live in October and I want to wait until then to showcase all the beautiful cards. Today's pic is of the Christmas Advent calendars from last year.

I'm exhausted so I am off to chill, but as a final note I want to say a massive thank you to JT for all her help.

Cx

I Got Published!!!

Whoo Hoo!!

Yes, you read it right!

I came runner up in a subscriber's competition in Cardmaking and Papercraft!! They asked subscriber's to send in a 'Thank You' card and I was one of the 2 runners-up.

My card is at the bottom, with the blue flowery background and the bird (from Bugaboo Stamps). Here is a better pic of the actual card -

I am really really pleased, it means I am published and I am getting a heap of cardmaking goodies.

I found out on Saturday, what a fantastic start to the weekend, which I spent in the craft room making lots of lovely cards.

Yay!

Cx

Mices!

The reason mice are my topic for today is because my parents have mice and are not pleased about it, however their attempts at pest control make entertaining reading!
They no longer have a cat - which has prompted the cheeky mice to set up home in their kitchen. Their dog (Oscar the Jack Russell) is rather unconcerned by the arrival of the mices and in part this is because he can't see too well!
So my parents have tried traps and poison to no avail and finally settled on glue traps - they caught their first mouse today, but were quite distressed at it not being dead and so released it!!

Now I can understand that it's not nice to have to kill any creature (no matter how repellent) but surely this is the point of the whole exercise for my parents?! Anyway it made me chuckle.

Onto the craft stuff! I've written a list of the challenges I want to enter this week, mainly because I will be at my in-laws from Thursday, thru to Sunday (before I start my new job on Monday) and so need to get organised so I can take all the pics before I leave and then I can combine my photography adventures with my Father-In-Law with my challenge entries!

This means today, I have been crafting up a storm and have managed to make today's pic - for 3 challenges:

Corrosive Challenges #107 (sketch below)

Kaboodle Doodles #58 Happy Birthday


Polka Doodles Week 10 Challenge - Black, White + 1 other

I gave this card quite a lot of thought, as it was going to be the entry for 3 challenges. I decided it would be nice to use some red for a change, as I often work with blues, greens, pinks and purples.

I am pleased with the outcome and I think I am going to give it to a friend for her birthday. I used Martha Stewart loop border punch, free sentiment circle (from a disc on Complete Cardmaking Magazine), cute chipboard button that was part of a Christmas gift I received, red wool and papers and gems from my local Poundland.

Finally even though this card wasn't part of a challenge involving her, I should mention that my inspiration was Mary Fish, she makes such beautiful contemporary cards, I love her work, I think she is very talented.

Til tomorrow.

Cx

Chilling!

So I am very relaxed and a touch hungover - following a lovely day at a spa yesterday, then Hubby came and joined me and we stayed the night at the hotel - which was totally tricked out! We drank a touch too much, hence the hangover.

I have enjoyed my first week of lady of leisuredom and will be sad to see it come to an end, but I am excited about starting my new job and looking forward to getting stuck into work.

Whilst I have been busy tooling around town - I have still managed to enter all of the challenges I wanted to this week - which is great!

Today's pic is for the Mojo Monday #181 challenge - sketch below.

I loved some of the DT ideas for this sketch and seized upon the opportunity to use my new Pink Petticoat Big Dots digital papers (yes again!!) and make a groovy wedding cards for our friends Lora and Dan. I am really pleased with how the card came out, it's another off the wall attempt - which I quite like! It was a good use of some of my new embellishments from my Christmas stash - the joy one in particular will have special meaning for Lora!

Cx

Lady of Leisure

So because I have been 'busy' being a lady of leisure, I haven't devoted as much time as I would have liked to crafting! I have been making things, but on the downside, I have been leaving it til late to take the photos - hence today's pic, which is a touch dark and doesn't do my beautiful card justice!

I made today's challenge entry using Pink Petticoat Big Dots Lavender papers (for both the backing plain and the spotty paper), the digital stamp also came from Pink Petticoat (With Flowers set) and you saw it earlier in the week, I used Promarkers, Stickles glue, peel-off sentiment (which I coloured purple with permanent markers), ribbon from my local Poundland and push pins (not brads!) from my stationery stash!

I really like this card, it's simple and clean - I might actually take another pic and post it again over the weekend, so you can see it in it's full glory!

I made the card for Sketch and Stash #56 - sketch below.

Cx

It's Been Emotional..

My last week at RL was eventful, lunch filled, booze fueled and very emotional. I am sad to leave my posse, but I will see them again and I now have a shiny new job to look forward to.

So I have been trying out the new camera - today's pic was taken by me, using my new beloved Pentax - it's of Archie - our most elusive kitty kat - he was having a stretch on the bed and I caught him in action - cool right?

As I have a 2 week sanity break before starting the new job, I have been keeping my craft hands busy. I have a whole list of challenges I want to enter this week, but let's start with 2 for today!

DYSU - #9 - Just Green it

Polka Doodles - week 9 challenge - Flower power

Here's my card (pic also taken using the new camera) - I love it.

I have been playing around with ideas for Mother's Day cards (3rd April in the UK) and this one won! I used Pink Petticoat's Little Big dots papers and one of the digi stamps from their With Flowers set - I love Pink Petticoat! I also used Promarkers (Gold, Sage, Pumpkin), diamond Stickles and ribbon and gems from Poundland!!

Until tomorrow.

Cx

Let's Eat Cake.

It's Friday, this means I have only 1 week left in my current job and I am starting to get a bit sad about leaving my friends.

It also means that on my 'pod' we will be eating excessive amounts of bad stuff!

The big news in my world is that I bought a new camera, I am sad to be parting with "The Beast" but it is time to move up to a full dslr. The new Beast arrives today, which is very exciting - I don't have any lenses for him yet, so I guess I'll be spending the weekend trawling the internet for good deals!

Today's pic is something I put together for 2 challenges.

Polka Doodles - week 7 Chocolate

Cupcake Crafts - Cupcake 130....Cake 'n' Ice Cream

Making this card gave me the excuse to buy some new cake digital stamps from Pink Petticoat and I have had fun colouring and glittering them. I have no idea where the backing paper came from! The ribbon was on a gift I was given and I used peel offs for the sentiment.

I am pleased with the card and I am looking forward to making more cards using my lovely new cake stamps.

This weekend is going to be a quiet one. Hubby and I are off out tonight for a fancy meal to celebrate all the recent good news and on Sunday his cousin and his girlfriend are coming to stay before heading home to Bulgaria.

Have a good weekend, I'll be back tomorrow - I have another card all lined up for the Mojo Monday challenge.

Cx

Congratulations!

To my Sister-in-Law and her Husband on the arrival of their Son - Otis, first thing this morning!! Yay! I am Auntie Claire now!! Hubby and I are going to visit them later, so more news tomorrow.

I really wanted to enter the Do You Stack Up challenge this week - #6 Ribbons (use it anyway), so I rushed home last night and made this beauty!

I am really happy with this card - I like the subtlety of the ribbon (which is from WHSmith, as is the flower embellishment) the card is by Canford, the sentiment stamp is by Hero Arts and one of my faves at the moment and the corner punch was a Christmas bargain from Hobbycraft.  I only bought the ribbon and the embellishment last week (naughty), I really like them, the ribbon had four other designs on the reel and you get 8 embellishments for 1.49, complete with the blingy brad - amazing!

Anyway, that's it from me this morning, Happy Wednesday everyone!

Cx

Post Film Club Blues....

Film Club happens approx every six weeks and last night was the second meeting of Film Club. It consists of myself, Hubby and our friends JJ and Jon. We watch some obscure stuff and there is always a horror movie in the list of 3 films!

We has so much fun yesterday, which just enhanced the happy feeling of the last few days (reasons why to be shared later in the week).


So when I got home today, I made the card below, for the following challenges -

Get Funky - Funky Hand make really cool papers and stamps - mainly digital, I love their stuff. Their challenge is Going Round in Circles (my papers and central feature of the card fit this)

Sketch n Stash - Challenge #54 (sketch below), here they ask that you use new/neglected items.

I like this card a lot, I think it works well. I used neglected papers from Funky Hand's Salt and Pepper set, coredinations beige textured cardstock, new stamps from Hobbycraft and new brilliance lightning black ink.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Cx

Yum! Sunday Dinner!

Yes, I love Sunday dinner! Hubby and I had roast beef and it was delicious!

Aside from consuming dinner (and working), I put the finishing touches to the Valentine's cards and decided I would post my card for the following 2 challenges -

Do You Stack Up - #4 Patterned Paper
Corrosive Challenges - #100 Reuse, Reduce, Recycle

I like this card because it's really simple and has special meaning as my friend Lianne is moving to Dubai and she gave me some buttons that she had and couldn't take with her, so I re-used her re-cycled buttons, sweet! I think Lianne would be pleased at how I have used the button.
The striped paper is by American Crafts and the blue embossed spotty paper is by coredinations, which I embossed using a Cuttlebug folder (in my Textured Impressions Embosser). The birthday stamp was free and I used Navy Hobbycraft ink. The blue corrugated card flower is by Craft Essentials and they come in 3 colours.

Lianne also gave me some offcuts of fabric and I am going to make a mobile for Lucy & Stu's new baby, using them.

I've also finished the diary cover, so I'll post pics of that later on in the week.

Cx

Having fun...

Today has been a fun day, I've been shopping with my Ma, watched Basketball with Hubby and spent a couple of hours in the craft room.

I've been tidying up, playing with some of my new toys, making Valentine's cards and a couple of cards for challenges.

Today's pic is the card I made to cover 3 challenges -

Polka Doodles - There is no place like home
Kaboodle Doodle - #51 Bling it up
Mojo Monday - #175 (sketch is below)

I'm really pleased with this card, I think it's fun and is a reflection of what a nice day I've had.

I used the following items to make this card -
Gingham Paper - Nikki Sivils 'my sweet cherry pie'
Stripe Circle / Green Paisley rectangle - Heidi Grace
Stamp - no idea who it's by, I got it at Jemcraft Memories
Ribbon - Tesco
Bow / Pins / Gems / Red Circle - Local craft shop

Cx

All work and no play!

Ok, so I am moaning a LOT right now, way too busy at work - can't think straight! Also Hubby is sick and he very rarely gets sick, so I am keeping an eye on him, as he is not very good at just resting!

Fortunately, despite the challenging work / life balance, I am still finding time to craft. It's keeping me sane and stopping me from murdering someone!!  

I've also been indulging in some internet shopping!! I have been hand colouring a lot lately and I am getting ready to finish the Valentine's cards I have been making and I realised that I need more Promarker colours, so I bought 20 new pens! Yay! Can't wait for them to arrive.

I have also bought some beautiful papers and stamps from Pink Petticoat - Liz the lady that runs the company is lovely, very helpful - even when I get myself all confused!! 

I decided to enter this weeks Do You Stack Up Challenge - #3 Think Pink.

My card is pretty simple as you can see, but I love it! I generally make simple cards and I have been trying to be a bit more complexl with my cards when entering challenges, but I haven't been 100% comfortable doing that! So I decided that if I am going to enter challenges, I will stick with my style!

To make the card, I used some papers that my friend Adrian made me as a gift and I glittered the pink spots with Stickles glitter glue, the border strip was made using an X-Cut scallop punch and the bird stamp and happy birthday are by Hero Arts. I have wanted to use the metallic papers I have for ages, but they kept tearing when I cut them! Now I have an X-cut freehand circular cutter, which is fantastic, it cuts through pretty much anything smoothly!

I better go! Work to do.

Cx

Challenging Week!

Seriously this week has been pretty hardcore at work - challenging is an understatement.

I really wanted to enter a couple of challenges, but needed to make my entries straightforward, as I haven't had a great deal of time.

So there were 2 challenges, that I liked the look of -

Mojo Monday  - their sketch challenge 174 inspired me as did Kaboodle Doodles 'black and white + one other colour'

Here is the sketch from Mojo 174 -

And here is my entry.

Not too bad, quite simple really! Not a winner I don't think, but the main thing is I had fun and tried out new stuff - the corrugated kraft card was something I've had for ages and I haven't had any idea how to use it! The ribbon is by Eastern Treasures and I have been saving it to make a wedding card. I hope to use the card for one of the numerous weddings Hubby and I are attending this year!

Happy Sunday - I am off to watch some tv and colour in some bird stamps!

Cx

Too much real work and not enough craft!

This week has been stupid busy at work, so my craft life has been on the back burner.

I did find time to make these lovely birthday cards and they sold rather well at work!

I used a digital stamp and font from Lettering Delights, I designed the spotty frame and the papers were from Creative Cardmaking issue 27, I coloured the ice creams using Promarkers (caramel for the cone and vanilla, pastel pink, buttercup and carnation pick for the ice cream), I then outlined them with stickles glitter glue.

I think they are really sweet!

I hope to see you tomorrow, as I really want to enter a challenge this week!

Cx