The Paper Players: Toucan of Friendship...

Hey,

Sad day today, as my Momma leaves after being here for 2 weeks. It has been SO much fun hanging out with her and I'm super sad to see her go.

Momma and I in Philadelphia

So I love bird stamps, so when I saw the challenge over at The Paper Players this week, I knew I had to enter!

I wanted to use the great 'Toucan of Friendship' set by Reverse Confetti. I stamped and coloured one of the Toucan's from the set using Zigs.

I was a bit indecisive about the background and then came across some tags that I had forgotten about (from Paper Source) and I thought it would make a great backdrop for the Toucan. So I cut off the 'tag' part as it is a super long tag!

I stamped my sentiment also from the set in the top right corner and added the Toucan using foam tape..

I love him, he's so cheerful and is going to accompany a gift for a friend.

Cx

MAWTT: Adding Red...

Hey,

I really liked JT's choice of theme over at MAWTT this time and so I thought I'd play along.

Also her card is AMAZING!!

Her theme is black, white + another colour.

I went with red for my other colour.

I kept this card pretty simple and used a new to me (second-hand from Cheiron) Waffle Flower 'Circle Flower' set.

I stamped the stems and flowers and messily coloured the flowers, using Zigs and a paintbrush. I added a few red dots here and there for an added bit of colour and the sentiment is from the same set.

Super simple, but the red makes it all pop and works really well with the set.

Cx

Bullet Journal: January 2018..

Hey,

So as I love notes, journals, pens and all things stationery related, I have been considering trying out bullet journaling for a while.

I finally bit the bullet (sorry..) and spent some of the Christmas break doing extensive research about how my journal would work and what I wanted it to look like.

I started using a Traveller's Notebook last year and I love the format. I also got this new Webster's Pages TN in the Black Friday Studio Calico sale ($9) So I bought a mixed media TN insert and utilised this for my new bullet journal.

I do not have the tidiest handwriting so this was part of my concern about bullet journaling, but so far it doesn't look too bad.

One of the things I learnt during my research phase is that every Month doesn't have to look the same. I like this, variety is the spice of life.

I started by drawing a rough sketch and figuring out what I really wanted, I decided that sections for a monthly calendar, goals of the month (self-shaming..) and highlights of the month, were a must have.

I also thought it would be fun to add Monster of the Month. Partly because I love Monsters and have a huge Monster/Alien stamp collection and also because I am a crafter, there had to be a stamp and colour element for me. Underneath my January Monster is 'Monster Facts' LOL. For January its a little blurb about the stamp, he's an Alien and he is from my first ever Alien/Monster stamp set from 2012.

As you can see I have x3 'spare' boxes - I am using one for 'To Do List' and the other two I have no plans for right now..

I added colour to my page with Zigs and a paintbrush, I like how it came out, feels like a frosty January and it sure is that here in NYC right now!!

I might add something to the top right hand corner, but we'll see...

Cx

Resting Beach Face...

Hey,

Happy Friday.

So it's been a busy week and I am still a bit unsure about where I am exactly!

NYC>London>Belgium>London>NYC will do that to you!

Anyway one of the great things about this week was coming home to all the awesome Black Friday goodies (so many bargains I went a bit nuts)..

I opted for not putting anything away immediately and instead went straight into playing mode..

This year I have discovered a few new to me Stamp companies, generally smaller independent ones that I like to support. One of these is Sweet Stamp Shop - I love Nicole's sense of humor and her cute images.

I bought Beach Face and the dies in the BF sale

I have been madly in love with the dog Nicole draws and was very happy to finally own him.

I decided to play wth the girl first, because I have a friend who NEEDS this card in her life.

I roughly blended a piece of cardstock using Broken China Distress Oxide ink and spritzed it with water to create the slightly mottled background. I used a new stitched, scalloped frame die by Avery Elle. I need to get better at putting these frames back together..

I stamped the waves from the set, so the girl looks like she is floating in water and added the awesome sentiment.

Love it!

I have a birthday card idea in my head for the Dog, so I'll be giving that a go over the weekend.

Hope you have a nice weekend, I have a lunch with the Craftgang, the gym and a ton of NFL to watch with Hubby AND I want to squeeze in some desk time, so it's going to be a fun and busy one for me.

Cx

Happy Snappy Crocodile Birthday..

Hey,

Before I left for London I showed you a card I made for a colleague using my new Heffy Doodle Snappy Crocs set.

I had also stamped and coloured a couple more of the Crocs, but they were not made into cards.

So today you can see them all finished and ready for new homes.

I love this set, it is super versatile.

I am in love with the fact that I can give the Croc a bow-tie!!

I coloured both Crocs using Zigs and I kept everything pretty simple and just added some of the pretty Lawn Fawn papers to create a nice border.

I suspect that there is going to be a mad amount of over-using of this set..

Cx

A rude farewell...

Hey,

Happy Monday!

I am in London this week, as we head out to our Christmas party in Ghent on Friday.

One of my colleagues is leaving in January and I won't see him again before he leaves so I wanted to make him a card to deliver in person. He has been an amazing colleague and I am super sad to see him go, but it can't all be about me ;)

I have been trying to get my hands on the Heffy Doodle Snappy Crocs set since I saw it several months ago..I finally managed to snag it over Black Friday and it arrived last week..

I am 'famed' for my potty mouth, especially when working and so I thought a slightly rude card would be very appropriate.  The sentiments are a mix by Snarky Stamps and Paper Smooches.

I coloured the Crocodile using Zigs and a paintbrush.

I feel that this stamp set is about to become a fave..I love how versatile the set it, it comes with all these cool mini stamps. I went with the glass and bottle here as this is a 'good luck' card after all!

Cx

Unicorns, Balloons and Clouds...

Hey,

Happy Black Friday!

I have been 'crafty' shopping all week, so today I am off to the gym (working of Hubby's delicious Thanksgiving dinner) and then going to do some Christmas gift shopping.

We had a really nice relaxed Thanksgiving and dinner was amazing, actually a dual effort by Hubby and I. We had a friend join us for dinner and it was just really nice and simple.

Today's card is for a friend's Daughter who turns one next week.

I created the background first using a cloud stencil by DutchDoobaDoo and Broken China Distress Oxide ink.

The Unicorn and Balloons are from different Mama Elephant and Hampton Arts sets I got at Michael's on my recent jaunts around America (Tampa/Doylestown).

I used the sentiment from the Unicorn set..not sure I love 'eternal happiness' but it is what it is now.

I added a tiny number one, I like to make number card for the toddler years..

Pretty pleased with the end result, the balloons actually look like they are lifting the Unicorn.

Cx

Retro Rubber Challenge #76..Anything Goes..

Hey,

Yes! It is that time again for a shiny new Retro Rubber challenge.

This time we have everyone's fave for you...Anything Goes..

I decided to have a manual rummage through my stamps to find something that hadn't been used in ages for this challenge. Embarrassingly I came across this beautiful stamp by Gorjuss that I had a) forgotten I had and b) have never used!!

I bought it as part of a post-Christmas sale haul in January 2016.

I coloured the stamp using Zigs and a paintbrush, then I fussy cut it out and mounted it onto a wobbler. I thought it would be a fun random card for a friend who recently became a cat owner, hence the sentiment!

I kept the whole card pretty simple and chose a co-ordinating card blank and an ancient scrap of Chevron paper. I like the simplicity of it, as the stamp is HUGE and a bit fussy.

My friend already has the card and I have actually seen it in her kitchen on her 'Cards from Claire' pinboard..I am a Happy Mail Spammer!

Check out what my awesome teammates have made over at Retro Rubber and show us your fun anything goes makes.

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 December 1st.

Cx

Welcome Sunny Rae...

Hey,

So I have been destashing a bit and selling on the monthly Hero Arts kits, as they haven't really been my style, sad as they are great VFM.

I met a lady on the group I use on FB and she recently had a baby girl - Sunny Rae - such a gorgeous name and the baby is gorgeous too!! As I was sending her a batch of stuff she had bought off of me, I thought I'd make her a card too.

Any excuse for me to make a baby card...

I thought the main focus of the card should be some sort of sunray / sunburst, given the baby's name.

I used an old faithful Crafters Workshop stencil with Fossilized Amber Distress Ink.

I really wanted a cute critter on the card and remembered that I had some of the MFT birthday bears die-cut and ready to go, so I coloured the x2 bears and the balloon using Zigs - yes that is a pink bear..creative license..

I love the giant welcome stamp by Lil' Inker Designs, sadly I don't get to use it as often as I would like.

Finally I added stamped Sunny Rae's name on the card - using Studio G alpha stamps from 2011 that I have hardly used, but I keep hold of them for moments like this!

I am so pleased that my card looks like the vision I had in my head, so rare that the final card looks how it was 'supposed' to.

Cx

Retro Rubber Challenge #71..Anything Goes..

Hey,

First post for today and I am back with another great challenge from the Retro Rubber team.

This time we have everyone's fave...

I decided to break out a stamp from 2015 by Stamping Bella 'Nice to See You Petunia' I love these Petunia Pig stamps and I have a couple of them. This one is my fave because all the chicks have glasses too!

I used Zigs and a paintbrush to colour the image, I added a Simon Says Stamp sentiment from 2015 and die-cut my panel using a wonky stitched die by MFT.

I covered my card blank in the cute star paper, as I thought my card needed a little lift.

Check out what my awesome teammates have made over at Retro Rubber and show us your fun Anything Goes makes.

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 Sept 22nd.

Cx

CASology: Wish..

Hey,

I didn't play along with CASology last week, as I don't have any pizza related stamps, the winning card shamed me a bit, as they made their own slice of pizza - clever!

The current cue card immediately sparked an idea for me -

I thought it would be cool to stamp the amazing Unity Stamp Co flower off of the edge of my white panel. I watercoloured the flower using Zigs and an aquabrush.

Obviously I didn't think it through and once the flower was stamped and coloured, the sentiment wouldn't work over the top! So I heat embossed it onto Vellum and overlaid it. Yay!

The sentiment stamp is from a beautiful freebie set came with a magazine JT sent me when I was off sick. All the stamps in the set are gorgeous.

Once it was done it all looked a bit bland, so I added some black paint splatter and I like it much better now.

I like sending cards with this sentiment, covers so many occasions.

Cx

Monster Thanks...

Hey,

So you might remember that I stamped the Monster above when I was at Jamey's on a craftgang playdate a couple of months ago.

I fell in love with the stamp set and really wanted it. Sadly the company don't make it anymore.

So I put out a social media appeal, begging someone to sell it me!

My wonderful friend Jen left me a 'don't buy it' message and then about a week later this arrived -

Yay! How lovely are my friends and how lucky am I that they all indulge my Monster fetish,

Even better is that the card Jen sent with the stamps was made using a stamp set I sent her ;)

So I made her a thank you - not a surprise as I previewed him on Instagram.. I used Simon Says Stamp sentiment and heart stamps to help my Monster show his gratitude. He is so versatile..

Love my little craft world, makes me all warm and fuzzy.

Cx

Addicted to CAS: Pink..

Hey,

Hope you are having a good weekend so far.

I had a lazy one yesterday, I engaged beastmode at the gym on Friday and then went out with Hubby, so felt like taking it easy!

I decided to play along with the latest challenge over at Addicted to CAS -

I had the Hogs & Kisses stamp set by Avery Elle out on my desk already and I thought it would be fun to use the Pig for my card.

I die-cut a piece of Tim Holtz Woodgrain cardstock and stenciled on the hearts using Picked Raspberry distress ink and a Dutchdoobadoo stencil.

The Pig was coloured using Zigs and I stamped one of the sentiments from the set into the heart.

Super simple card, but so pretty!

I'm having a playdate with JT today and I am most excited, it's been a while!

Cx

I just want to say Hello!...

Hey,

I decided I wanted this card to have it's own post and not be part of the April craftgang bulk post.

I love it SO much. I found this great stamp set in Jamey's stash last month -

Eek! A Monster by My Cute Stamp

Isn't it cute!

I love monster stamps.

I stamped the monster with the flame coming out of his mouth.

When I got him home I coloured it with Zigs and die-cut it out using an ancient recently rediscovered scalloped rectangle die (bought in Amsterdam in 2012).

I thought it would be fun to stamp a cityscape around the monster, only problem was that I couldn't mask him off as I don't have the stamp.. cue the amazing lightbox, I traced around the image and cut it out to create a mask. BOOM. Gotta love that lightbox.

I used New York Tim Holtz cityscape stamp -

I love these stamps and I got them in a super bargain Black Friday sale..

The final touch was the sentiment from Your Next Stamp Silly Monsters set.

After I stamped the sentiment, I realised that perhaps the monster didn't mean to rampage across the city, he was just trying to say Hello! Yes. I am slightly bonkers.

Cx

April Craftgang Playdate...

Hey,

Happy Friday.

Tonight will be my second Personal Training session - I have been going to the gym without my trainer too, so I am pretty tired this week! But it seems to be working, I feel stronger and can see results already.

As Sunday is the May Craftgang playdate, I thought I would FINALLY show you my April playdate makes!

All the image stamps (except the Waffle Flower Bear) came from Jamey's stash. The main card and the WF Bear card, I actually finished on the day at Jamey's - along with something I can't show you yet.

The rest of the cards I finished last weekend - I spent last Saturday finishing all the half done projects on my desk!!

I love the variety of the cards. The main card is obvs my fave, because I LOVE background stamps and Jamey's collection makes me so happy. The stamp I used is by Simon Says Stamp and I roughly coloured the 'flowers' with Zigs and then used an aquabrush to get the smudgy watercolour feel.

The card below makes me smile - I finally got my hands on the Waffle Flower Bird and Bear stamp set..I should have bought it when it came out, I procrastinated and had to wait 2 months!

I used one of Jamey's background stamps and I like that the bear looks like he is passing a wall on his travels.

The next 3 cards are the ones I finished last weekend.

Loved the dog and heart stamp. I used Lil Inkers wonky dies and Hero Arts sentiment, coloured with Distress Inks and an aquabrush  

I love Pigs!! My Hubby is from the home of Pigs LOL. I kept this one simple and close-up you can see the glittery bubbles.

Same dog set as above, but I used the sentiments from something else. Die I bought in London. Kraft blank from JT. Added clear Pretty Pink Posh droplets (of course)

Fun makes, I love the Craftgang playdates, they make me so happy.

The gym does not. But that is where I will be tonight and tomorrow morning - I swear I better look like Naomi freaking Campbell in my bikini this year!

Cx

HLS and a Red Lady...

Hey,

I can't believe it is May already!! So much has happened this year and I guess being out of action for 6-8 weeks explains why this year is whipping by!

I made a card at the weekend, that totally fits this month's Happy Little Stampers watercolour challenge -

The April Hero Arts Card Kit arrived whilst I was in London, so last weekend was my first chance to break it out and have a play.

I really wanted to stamp one of the ladies over a watercoloured background..so I mixed up some distress inks, applied water and smooshed my background and added a few extra streaks and splodges with a brush.

I was careful to only add colour to part of the card, as I didn't want her head to be in the background and I die-cut my panel (MFT Stitched Wonky die) before I started applying the colour - makes it easier to understand the space I am working with.

I stamped the skirt, legs, body and head before I stamped and die-cut the skirt in RED!! How lucky was that ;)

As the body was stamped over the watercolour background, I used Zigs and a white gel pen to colour in the top, so that the background wasn't peeking through.

I left her legs alone, as I like the idea of the colour swirling around her legs and feet?!

Super simple card and I had a lot of fun playing with the various elements from the card kit.

The card is actually for a work colleague that is leaving, I am so sad to see her go and she is most certainly one of a kind!

Cx

Little Cat Birthday...

Hey,

I had a very successful flea market yesterday - $38 not bad considering I was selling for 25cents or 50cents.

It was fun to have Lisette hanging with me and being the mistress of stall display! Where was she back in the day when I used to do craft fairs?!

Today I am playing along with The Paper Players, they have a Tic-Tac-Toe challenge one of my faves..

I opted for the diagonal left to right line - Circle, Die-cut and Flower.

First I stamped and coloured (with Zigs) one of the Cats from my new Mama Elephant, Little Cat Agenda stamp set. I love these teeny tiny little kitties.

I die-cut it using a stitched circle die by Simon Says Stamp.

I am hoping my flower 'interpretation' will count! I used a Spellbinders scalloped circle die and a SSS stitched circle die to create the petals of my flower - the Cat circle is the centre of the flower.

The sentiment is made up of a Technique Tuesday stamp and a Tim Holtz die-cut.

I think it will make a great birthday card for my Niece Florence.

Cx

Hello There Kitty...

Hey,

Happy Friday.

I hope you have all had a better week than me :( I have had a rotten cold, just coming out through the other side of it.

When I was in London I could not resist a little trip to one of my fave stores Paperchase... I try not to buy anything full price when I am there, as I really do not need any more stationery..

But when I saw this set of stamps on sale, I could not resist -

They are so simple and elegant.

I wanted to make a little card for my parents and I thought this set would be great for them.

I coloured the image using Zigs and then die-cut it out using an MFT stitched oval die. The sentiment is by Simon Says Stamp and is from the Sketchy Banner Greetings set - which has two sketchy banner dies - I don't think they do the stamps anymore.

I love these mini kraft card blanks and JT buys them for me, as I can't get them in the US.

Cute card to say thanks for fun times.

Have a great weekend, I am doing the Stuytown flea market tomorrow - I'm at pitch 271, if you want to come and say hi ;)

Cx

Sketch Saturday #460...Relaxing...

Hey, 

So it's time for another great Sketch Saturday...

Our sponsor this week is Digital Stamp Boutique and they are offering a £10 gift certificate for their store.

Here is the sketch.

I really liked the Alyssa relaxing stamp and felt like a perfect fit for the sketch.

I decided to go with a muted lilac / purple colour palette and that informed all my paper / colouring choices. I embossed the deep purple background using a Sizzix spot folder, the floral strip is from my scrap box and by Pink Petticoat.

I printed Alyssa a couple of times in different sizes, as I wasn't sure which dies I wanted to use. I settled for ancient Spellbinders Labels 4 dies and die-cut the two panels.

My final touches were the fun sentiment by Hero Arts, some stickles and a blingy purple heart.

This has already left my desk and is on its way to a friend.

What will you do with the sketch? Check out what the rest of the DT have made over at Sketch Saturday.

Challenge ends 28 April 7pm GMT / 2pm EST

Cx

Too early?

Hey,

Happy Friday!

It has been a short week for me, so it's a bit cheeky to be glad that it is Friday, but I am.

Last month I bought a few new things from Lil Inkers, I coloured most of them including today's card as part of the 30 days of colouring.

I fell in love with the 'Oh Deer' stamp set and had to have it, it seemed a tad early for a Christmas card make, but I really wanted to colour it.

Isn't it gorgeous?

I used Zigs and an aquabrush - I have to keep reminding myself that Zigs work as watercolours.

I thought it was so beautiful that it should be made into a super simple card, so I die-cut it using a circle die and affixed it to a square craft blank.

I think I'll be making a lot of these come ACTUAL Christmas card making time.

Have a great weekend, I am hanging with the Craftgang on Sunday and tomorrow Lisette is coming to help me tackle the closet beast (ugh).

Cx