My D.I.Y man!!

Happy Monday,

I am happy today as I have a new crafting desk that my hubby spent all weekend building. Well, I say building........it was a flat pack! But he is no D.I.Y man and I was amazed and super pleased he did it for me, and it is perfect. As a thank you I mixed a Manhattan cocktail and made him a 'builder's tea' of pie and mash! And if you know me I hate to cook, so this was an effort for me (not so much mixing the cocktail, this I don't mind doing!!).

Naturally his hard work deserved a card and I had a lot of fun making this with quite a few Paper Smooches stamps. I have had the 'my guy' set for a while and am so pleased I got to use it and for this week Paper Smooches Sparks challenge. I saw their inspiration picture and the whole idea for the card popped into my head and I just got inky. I think I must have smiled the whole time I made it.....I so love it when a plan comes together and just at the right time. Here is the photo:



The chevrons, colours of the cushions and flowers plus the 'love' sentiment were all inspirations that led to my card. One of the hammers I stamped in a different colour and cut IT out and used foam pads so it pops off the page.

I have also, over the last week, discovered a few new fab challenge sites and I am going to enter this card into one of these called Addicted to Stamps and More. They have a CAS challenge this week. I think this card is pretty CAS and is all stamping-no ribbon, gems, twine etc, just good old funky stamps and inky ink!!

I have some exciting news to share with you later in the week so please keep checking back!

Thanks for stopping by x

Snowflakes!

Yes, we are still on Christmas card week! And today I am moving from scripture cards to 'snowflakes. I came across a new CAS site and wanted to join in the fun. The site is Addicted to CAS-if you are a fan of CAS go and have a peek. Their cue word this week is 'snow'.
My card today is perhaps not as CAS as I had started out but although it was quite fiddly I still looks CAS to me! Over on another newish site, Eclectic Ellapau, the challenge is layering, openable or interactive. Well my card really needed to have extra layers to make it look just right to my eye so I thought I would enter it into this challenge. Then the DT team at Ladybug Crafts challenged us to snowflakes, so enter this I must!
And here is my CAS layered snowflake card-I stamped the background then used my linen impression plate. Die cut the 2 snowflakes then embossed then with a swirly embossing plate (can't remember its name!_

And a close up of the layers

Have a fun Friday Eve my friends x

My First Mojo Monday!

I have for a long time admired the sketches on Mojo Monday but to be honest have kept away from them as they have scared me a bit because they appear quite fancy for my CAS brain! However when I saw the sketch this week a CAS version just popped into my head and finally I get to play along!

I think this week is officially my Christmas card week especially as I have just a few more to make and I am done.Then I need to move onto to some Xmas gift creations and 'thank you for your gift' notelets. Then finally I get to a stash of Birthday cards I need to make.

This card is another scripture card and therefore I will enter again into the 'scripture verse' 52 Christmas Card Throwdown challenge. Plus enter the the weekly 'uplifting' challenge at Word Art Wednesday

So enough chatting and onto my card-notice the sparkle!!

Glory to God.

Happy Tuesday crafting buddies,

My card today is another religious Christmas card. I have a few of these to make so have been getting down to it the last few days. I am super chuffed that my last one here was in the top three at A Twist of Faith. It always nice to be recognised and I did love this card.

Today's Xmas card is again using a Verve scripture stamp and is therefore perfect for the 'scripture verse' challenge at 52 Christmas Card Challenge blog. I knew this was the verse I wanted to use but was stuck for colours. I was hunting through different colour challenges when I saw the combo of pumpkin, olive, brown and ivory on Just Us Girls. Now, I know, this shouts an Autumn card but I decided to use it for my Christmas card. A challenge this was! But I kept it simple and used my orange, olive green and brown inks plus some brown twine (check out the bow.....improving don't you think???). I decided to dust off my wood grain impression plate and think it really matched the 'earthy' feel to the card.The hardest thing about this was getting a good photo and I am afraid I failed-the light is so bad at the moment, I left it until this morning as I thought I might get better light than last night but it is so dull and miserable here I think I should have done it last night. Still I hope you get the general idea. I also decided to decorate the inside.

And the inside:

I am also going to enter this into the 'plain and simple' challenge at Totally Gorguss-I love this funky name!

Have a fun Tuesday x

Anyone for Christmas Pudding?

I know a touch early for Christmas pudding but perhaps not!

My card today is for the challenge at Polka Doodles. They have challenged us this week to make a square card with a round element. I was keen to give this a go as I like to use different shaped cards just for a change. Plus crafting friend Asha has just joined their DT. It was actually this card from Asha that inspired my creation.

This is just 2 circle punches-one in pudding brown and one punched in sparkle paper. I just cut the sparkle circle to make it look like cream. That left me with another half of cream so I made 2 of these cards!
You can just see that I have embossed the background paper.

This was such fun to make and super quick and easy but I love how it turned out.

I am also going to enter this into the 'lets have sparkle' challenge at Crafty Catz and the 'I'm Hungry' challenge at Jellypark.

Hope your week has started well x

Winter Blues!

Happy Saturday,

You could easily have the Winter Blues today. It is rainy, cold and miserable. However we can not let this get us down. I am off into town for a bit of retail therapy, do lunch and watch 007 save the world!

But first my 'Winter Blues' card for this week challenges at Cas-ual Fridays, the 'keep it cool' challenge at Charisma Cardz and the 'Winter Wonderland' challenge at QKR Stampede.

Again when I saw Karen's card here I was inspired and got down and inky!

And here is what I came up with and my in much loved CAS style!

Now, off to brave the rain but will seek comfort in viewing Mr Bond!!

Bow Tying!!

I haven't felt very crafty the last few days but today decided to try to improve my bow tying! Why do I find it so tricky?? I watched this tutorial a few times but I think a few more times will be needed. As my  mojo is being a bit snail like at the moment I decided to make a card similar to one I made last week, one that I really liked. I made some alterations-different colours, words and fonts. This bow is a slight improvement but I need a little more work!

I am going to enter this into the new challenge site Eclectic Ellapu. The challenge this week is 'pink and brown'. The cards on this site are stunning with lots of detail, so my CAS card is a bit different but I love this colour combo so wanted to join in the fun. My blogging chum Asha is on the design team so pop over to Eclectic Ellapu and check out her gorgeous inspiration for this challenge.

I am also going to enter this into the 'thanks' challenge at CASology.

Have a good day and thanks for popping by x