Craft a Scene - Let Your Light Shine - No 1

This month's challenge over on Craft A Scene is "Let Your Light Shine", which translates to a scene with a lighthouse.  When I joined the Design Team, I decided I wanted to vary my techniques, partly to keep myself from stagnating, but also it might encourage others who don't have much in the way of stamps.

The challenge criteria on Craft A Scene does not insist on stamping as the technique, so it is up to you how you interpret the theme.  You must have a background and foreground scene to fulfil the main need.  You can use your cute characters, but you must have that scene for them to sit in.

This card features decoupage, which seems to have gone a little out of fashion just lately.  The original image is a topper from Greeting Card Factory, which I have had for ages, just a flat picture.  All that was needed was to print the image out four times and decide where they could be cut to give realistic-ish depth to the picture.  You could take a photo of a lighthouse and do the same thing with it.

Layer 1 - the complete image
Layer 2 - just cutting off the sky and clouds
Layer 3 - cutting at the base of the jetty
Layer 4 - the lighthouse, and the three sailing boats.

I used my bone folder to curve each layer slightly before glueing with Pinflair Gel, to give a bit more

movement to the pieces, then I sprayed the topper with Spray and Shine from Crafters Companion.  Then it was all matted and layered on dark blue card and holographic card.

So come on, all of you, join us in this challenge, and see what you can do.  Stamps, digi stamps, decoupage or any other technique you can think of as long as it features a SCENE with a lighthouse in it.  I can't wait to see them.  Then wander round and have a look at all the other offerings from the Design Team and the other entries.

Problems leaving comments for Google+ accounts

Am I the only one having trouble leaving comments for people who have a Google+  account. If you are reading this, Gill Edwards, I have tried to answer you but it just will not let me do it anywhere. Please contact me and tell me what I need  to do.  I feel bad, when you have left me such nice comments. xx Maggie

Annie's Friday Smile - 3

This may not be the best photo ever, but it does bring a smile every time I see it so it fits very well into the Friday Smile.

Our daughter had a mediaeval wedding celebration, with all the guests dressed in costume.  Her dress was the one she had always drawn from a child, and her husband was dressed in full armour.  Our grandson was totally confused - he was looked after by strangers during the ceremonies and his Dad clanked whenever he moved (that armour was incredibly heavy).

In between the two parts of the reception, things calmed down a little and he found a lovely flower for his Mum (a dandelion - a weed is only a flower in the wrong place and they look wonderful up the central reservations and grass verges. 

The guests all entered into the action by dressing up.  In fact, it was very strange when we all left as we had all got used to the costumes and got very strange looks from people at the petrol station.

Why don't you join in now and post your own Friday Smile over at Annie's Stitch in Time, and give the rest of us a smile.

Pixie's Snippets challenge - 57

This is my entry for Pixie's Snippets Challenge for this week.  If you saw my WOYWW desk this week, you would have seen some of this card in its component bits.  So now you can see the finished card - please excuse the rather twisted image but due to the decoupage it will not go on the scanner successfully either.  I wasn't drunk, honest, and have only had water so far today.

This started off way back when I first started paper crafting.  I went down to Hayley West's shop (Hayley is more often seen on Create and Craft TV these days, demonstrating anything from the Silhouette Cameo to teaching knitting) in Redditch to find some more bits to add to my meagre collection.  She had some lovely samples scattered round the shop, including one featuring these peel off decoupage sheets.  The base sheet has all five butterflies joined together, and the other layers lose butterflies as you go down the four layers.  

The picture on the right shows the first two layers in place, with the next two waiting on the desk.  To get to that position, I peeled all the separate layers and stuck them to acetate, shiny side up (the acetate, that is).  Then I coloured each layer in turn, matching the colours on each layer which gives the intensity of colour.  The best pens that I have found are the Sakura glitter pens, and I usually do two layers at least of colour, allowing about a day in between to dry properly.  You may find other pens work well too, but I would test them on a spare bit of the acetate first.  Once everything is dry, then each layer needs to be cut out as close to the peel off as possible, and then mounted using Pinflair Glue Gel in tiny spots. I mounted them on a piece of Clarity Silk Art Card, which is a very pure white.

I found it needed something else to finish the card

so I had a ferret amongst my border peel offs, and chose the chain design.  I had thought of colouring in the space between the links, but after I had stuck it on, I decided that extra colour was not necessary.  

I did think these peel offs would be discontinued by now, but I have had a trawl on the internet today and found them at Monoco Direct in the UK at the price of 50p, in three colours - gold, silver and multi.  I might even get some for myself even though I said I was getting rid of peel offs. 

I hope you can understand this lengthy explanation.  It is not hard to do, just a little time consuming, and they look better than the photos show.  I am going to start doing mini videos to show sparkly and shiny things.  I am off now to link up and book my place on the swings this week in Pixie's playground. 

WOYWW - 191

In case you are wondering why I am showing you a small section of my desk, It is all down to Julia, the Queen of Blogland, who is in charge of us all, and linking us up each Wednesday.

You should have seen this desk this morning.  There was literally not a quarter of an inch clear, certainly no chance of doing any crafting of any kind.  I really did not want to show anyone that total disaster area.  Having got rid of a couple of boxes and files full of paper etc, things were still just as bad.

I was talking to Shaz (Silverwolf) yesterday (Tuesday) morning and we both seem to be doing the same thing, throwing out all the things we have not used for ages, and the bits, minuscule scraps of paper we all know will never get used, not even for Pixie's Snippets.

The odds and ends you can see on the desk at the moment are all from one box of bits I had forgotten about completely.  There are a set of decoupage peel of butterflies, which I had started colouring in.  I mounted them on acetate, and once they are coloured I shall cut them out, and find a suitable background.  I must be determined and finish it off before they get thrown back in the "not sure what to do box".  There is also a little sunset scene, which was printed on to acetate and then mounted onto the identical image (reversed so that they would match perfectly).  It is just waiting to be mounted - I might use Barbara Gray's technique with brayer, ink and cling film to get the background I want.

The two little cottages are an attempt to rescue something from a project that went wrong.  I had drawn a scene with two little cottages in the snow but I did the very thing that always put me off art at school.  I loved drawing, and was not too bad at it (though I says it myself) but always ruined my painstaking work when I had to paint it.   In this case, the drawing was ok, not too bad for  something I have not done for years, but it went completely wrong at the very end.  I have now chopped the worst off, cutting it into two small scenes, but it may yet all end up in the recycling bin.  

I must stop waffling now and let you get on and visit all the other wonderful friends and crafters you will find linked in over on Julia's blog (Stamping Ground).  Have a good week, and I hope those of you in the UK are not flooded out,and everyone else is having good crafting weather.  Take care of yourselves.  xx

Friday Smiles

First of all I have to say that these are not my photographs, but were taken by my daughter..  Last week, I showed you one half of the family, who live quite a distance away, too far in this icy weather.  This week, I am showing you our oldest granddaughter - her brother is missing from the photos, but I am sure he helped with the snow dragon. I just love the expression on her face.

If you are wondering why I am showing these photos, it is all the idea of Annie (Wipso), so if you want a smile at the end of each week, just pop over to A Stitch in Time for more smiley pictures of things that make us all smile.  Why don't you link up and join in.  Let's see what makes you smile.  See you all later.  xx

WOYWW -190

Good morning to all of you out there in snowy or sunny blogland, depending on where you live.  Anyone who is wondering why I should be shaming myself by showing you these awful mess, then where have you been for the last couple of years .  You have been missing a real crafting treat.  WOYWW (What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday) is a weekly meeting hosted by the very hospitable Julia over at Stamping Ground.   If you go over there you will find the links to nearly 200 other desks around the world, some messy like mine, others (a few) pristine and tidy, and lots in between.  Personally, I like the less tidy desks to wander round, more to see and study.

My room is still a total wreck, with work going on in the middle of it.  Even the printer is covered, which creates a major problem if I need to change an ink cartridge.  On the shelves (made by my very clever husband) above the printer you can see a number of cardboard boxes,  full of gorgeous Clarity Stamps, mainly labelled to say what is in each box.  I need to follow Shaz Silverwolf's example and catalogue them to avoid the possibility of buying ones I already have.  Behind the printer are most of my ink pads, not a huge selection but enough to work with.  Some of the ones I bought right at the beginning of my card making will be donated to someone else to make use of.

As you can see, my floor is also a wreck this week, and even sports the camera tripod so I can train the camera on one place to try for some good shots.  I actually put the camcorder on it yesterday for half an hour to see what came in, and was amazed at what I missed.

This is one of the photos I got yesterday of a siskin, a really pretty little bird.  There are quite a range of species coming in during this very cold spell, but it is worrying to think of the birds that no longer come.  No sparrows, no dunnocks, no sign of the wren, no thrushes - all birds that used to be very common all year round.  It will be interesting to see the results of the RSPB Big Garden Watch this next weekend to find out if it is the same all round the country. 

If you have got all this way through my post, I apologise for it being so long this week.  I shall probably get my fingers smacked by Julia, who does ask that we are brief.  Come and join us, leave a comment as you go, and link up pictures of your desk, and have fun. 

Why do I keep leaving things to the last minute?

I did promise myself that I would not leave things to the last minute this year.  Failure already.  The images on these cards are both from the Crafters Companion Flower Fairies series of CDs.  I did not want to use the rather fussy backing paper, nor did I want them on a plain white background.  So my solution was to make a wrap for the card, and brayer and sponge a background, using Adirondacks.  

The first one is the Almond Fairy - both cards are decoupage, shaped and then glued with Pinflair Glue Gel.  I added a little extra green under her feet to"ground" her in the very plain landscape.  The sentiment is a Clarity stamp, deliberately faded and uneven.

Card number 2 is the Lavender Fairy, done in much the same way.  However, whereas the first card almost put itself together, this one was a right pain.  The fairy herself was fine, but the background just did not work.  On the second attempt, I managed to get a big splodge of dark blue in just the wrong place.  By then, I was in a hurry to get to the post, so it was out with the tree stamp (Clarity again) and the leaves to go on it. I managed to stamp it in just the right place to disguise the smudge.  I don't think it is too bad.  I used the same sentiment from Clarity.

It was good to combine techniques and ranges of media, and I think they work together.  Certainly, the Splodge Away mat makes brayering so much easier and effective.  I just need now to be more organised and allow myself enough time to get things right and without panicking over mistakes.  What chance do I have, do you reckon?

Pixie's Snippets - Week 55 or 56 (I am not sure which)

My Snippet was quite a rush as I had lost track of days again this week.  The base card is one of those precut, pre-folded cheap hammered ones that we all have. 

All the embellishments come from a kit I bought when I first started doing the cards.  Nothing goes with the cards that came with them, so I have been struggling to use them up.  I also have a problem with them as it is just not a style of card that sits well with me several years on. 

I have a feeling that I might admit defeat and pass them on to others to use up.  As Shaz (Silverwolf) has been having a clearout and getting things together for my daughter (her daughter-in-law), she suggested that I create a box of things for the other grandchildren instead.  So most of my bits and pieces look like heading up to Derby for them to store for the future.  They don't know this yet.

The flowers are quite good as the petals fold up away from the paper to create some dimension.  they will lie flat to go through the post, and then bounce back when the card is taken out of the envelope.

If you have read this far, then you might like to go over to Pixie's Snippets Playground to see what all the other classmates have done this week.  Can I have a go on the slide, please, Di?   It looks a lot of fun.  And we need to build a snowman.  See you on Sunday.  xx

PS Take care of yourselves in the snow and ice.

Friday Smile

I have just seen Annie's Friday smile photos over on Stitch in Time, and decided to show you some of what makes me smile.  The first one is a real "Aaahhh" one for me.  Our two youngest granddaughters, Charlotte and Rosie, having a totally spontaneous cuddle.  Children and animals are the best for cheering us up, they are never anything but natural, and that is how it should be.

Another happy smile from Charlotte, when she was a bit younger.  Just try not smiling back at this one, I defy you.

Hope these two make you smile too.  Thank you, Annie, for starting this blog.  We all need to take a moment and look for the joy in life, rather than letting it knock us down.  If you are reading this and want some more smiles, just go over to see Annie (Wipso) and join in. 

PS do take great care out there today.  Our roads are lethal and full of people who have never tried to drive in snow before.  If you must go out, take plenty of warm clothing, space blankets, hot drinks and emergency food, and your mobile phone - make sure it is fully charged.  Be safe.

Much better today, thank you.

Thank you to all those who visited and commiserated with me after my bad day.  After a frustrating day yesterday, things finally went much better today.  In view of the weather forecast, DH decided that he would do the shopping today rather than wait for the snow tomorrow morning.  that meant a length trip round the town, to the butcher, Pet City (or whatever it is called these days), the cornstores for bird food (they are eating us out of house and home), then the supermarket for our food.

Then we decided to re-arrange the proposed vet visit from tomorrow morning to this afternoon.  He was very pleased with the way the wound is now healing, and basically told us to carry on with what we have been doing, so that was good news.

In between all that, I did manage to have a very satisfying craft session, completing one card, and half finishing the second.  I had the chance to really have fun, especially with my beautiful new Tonic guillotine.  I cannot believe how thin a piece I can cut off the paper, just tiny slivers.  I have never been able to do that with any of my previous rotary cutters.  This makes it so much easier to get very thin borders on my matting and layering.

To thosse of you who commented that I was very organised in getting my stamping masks done so soon.  You can take comfort from the fact that I still had to cut another four today to do the small project for the second card, doing them as I needed them.  Back to normal, except I should be able to keep them all together with the stamps in a plastic bag, ready for next time.

Hope you can all settle down and snuggle in front of a warm fire while the snow falls around us.  If not, take great care.  If you have to travel, take warm clothes, blankets, spades, a warm drink and some emergency food.  Oh yes, and make sure your phones are fully charged.

What a day!

This is my second post today.  If you would like to read my WOYWW post from earlier please look below or click on this link.http://silvercrafter.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/woyww-189.html

Life can be very tricky at times.  I did manage about half an hour of crafting this morning before breakfast, then everything fell apart.  One good thing was the arrival of my new guillotine so perhaps I can cut paper in a straight line without tags on the edges.

DH should have been going out at lunchtime to meet the folks he used to work with but some of them were ill so that was called off.

We had an appointment at the bank this afternoon, so I knew there was no chance of any crafting. Got ready, coats, gloves, scarf, etc on, only to find that the Freelander refused point blank to start.  Even worse, we had moved it down the drive yesterday to allow our visitors to park so now it was blocking in the other car.

Tried to ring the lady at the bank on her mobile only to be told she was busy somewhere else.  Rang the bank who wanted details that we cannot remember or find before they would even speak to us.  Finally got through to a human being who spoke English, who said he would cancel the appointment for us and get the lady to call us back to make another appointment.  To make absolutely sure that the message woudl get through, I texted her as well to explain.

Half an hour later, we got a call from her asking why we had not turned up or cancelled.  More explanations and apologies, but what else could we have done - carrier pigeon perhaps.

The AA turned up very quickly and got the motor started so then DH had to take it over to our usual garage to get the battery changed.  Tracker should have called us when the battery was off but they didn't so that was another call to find out why.

Big dog cannot be left on his own as he is having to wear a collar to stop him scratching a wound so still no chance of crafting.

Definitely FED UP!!  Don't like this year already.

WOYWW - 189

Our visitors left early tonight due to the icy roads, so, without realising it, so my post is showing Tuesday, but it is not likely to change till perhaps Wednesday afternoon, so I hope I will be forgiven.

My desk has deteriorated since last week - entirely my fault.  You can see some of the things that have contributed to the mess.  There is a brown box from Clarity Stamps, full to the brim with unmounted stamps from the half price sale.  I have gathered a lot that fit with sets I already own, and one or two more that I wanted first time round, and some that I just NEEDED.  You know how it is when you need these things.  I think there are still a couple to come of the tiny stamps ready for ATC making.  My phone needs putting back on charge before it dies.

This second photo is just to the left as you can see, and the rest of the desk is just as bad.  In case you are wondering why I am showing you all how bad my housekeeping is, then just go across to Julia's Stamping Ground, where you will find links to lots of other desk, some tidy, some even worse than mine from all over the world.  Do take a look and leave us comments to read, and we will try to visit your desks too.

I have tried to keep it fairly short this week to get a bit more time to find my desk and do some crafting.  I managed to get round quite a lot of desks last week, and hope to visit those I missed on this week's journey.  Have a good week, all of you, and I hope the weather and illnesses are all kind to you.  xx

Snowy Cottage No 2

This is my second card for Craft A Scene's January Challenge - Snowy Cottage.  I used one of the images we were donated by  our sponsor for this month,  Delicious Doodles.

It is all done with Twinkling H2O's and mica paints, with some crystal heat embossing., and sparkles beautifully.  However,as usual, the sparkle does not show up on the photo, but it is there, honestly.

I  mixed the colours, and media to get the colours I wanted, as my colour palette is very limited, and my bank manager will not allow me to get any more colours (actually, I did weaken and bought some more cheap, with a damaged package).  Still, it is good to use what you have and alter them to fit.

Hope you all like this one and it might inspire you to join in with our challenge this month.  Even the weather is joining in at the moment with a sprinkle of snow.  I just hope that is all we get as we are supposed to be travelling up to Derby on Monday to have our delayed Christmas with our son and his family.  It was delayed due to the two littlies going down with Norovirus all over Christmas.  Fingers firmly crossed tonight.

WOYWW - 188

It really can't be Wednesday again ...... can it?  This year is promising to gallop even faster than last year, and I have still not completed anything in the crafting line.  The only thing I have done is to make the masks for a new set of stamps, which you can see attached to the remains of the post it note in the box.  Today will be the first real card making session .... I think and hope.

Mind you, I think a good tidy up is in order yet again as you can see from the general mess on show.  My room has descended into a dumping ground again.  We needed some more copy paper for the printers so where has the large box been dumped?  You've got it - my room because it is paper and I use paper in crafting. 

I am not showing you any more this week, I am too ashamed of how messy the whole room is.  In the meantime, why don't you slip over to see our wonderful Wednesday hostess, Julia and join up with all the other international jet set there.  See you all soon.  xx

Craft A Scene - Snowy cottages week 1

Happy New Year to you all.

This is my first offering for the year for the Craft A Scene challenge - Snowy Cottages.  Hope you are all going to join us here this year. Our sponsor for the month of January are Delicious Doodles, who generously gave us some beautiful images to play with.

I decided to combine two images by changing the postbox.  The original scene had a US mailbox.  I  liked the background, but I really wanted the British postbox (I did debate making it a golden one in celebration of all those gold medals, but I thought the traditional red one was better).  One of our other donated images had this beautiful GR box, so I cut it out digitally (using My Craft Studio) and superimposed it on top of the US mailbox.   I did not want to go over the top with colour as the shading on the original is so good, so went with my Daler-Rowney watercolours and paint brush (I use a waterfilled brush rather than risk a pot of water on my table - it works for me).  I have not used those for a while, so it was almost lie starting at the beginning.

I heat embossed the snowy branches first with kaleidoscopic embossing powder to protect them from the paint (and the snowy bits on the conifers), and finished off with some speckles of glitter (which, as usual, does not show up on the photo).  I also added a little Polar White Flower Soft on the top of the postbox. 

I was not at all sure about the result after I had finished, but I took it down to show my wonderful husband, who is my most trusted critic, and he liked it, so I left it alone and just mounted it up on the card. 

I had another go with oil and pencil pastels afterwards to see how they would work.  As you can see from the smudges, I need a lot more practice to get that right.  Pastels are a totally new medium for me - only just arrived in the post today (an early Christmas pressie).  

Please come and join us this month with your interpretations of the challenge.  All you have to do is to create a scene, with a background and a foreground in whatever medium you choose.  Try something you have never had the courage to do before.  You will be amazed what you learn and find you really love.  I am hoping to really come to terms with drawing my own scenes this year.  I know what I want, but you will be able to judge as the year goes on whether I am succeeding.  

My resolution for this year is - Don't be scared, Have a go.  Come and join me with that.

Pixie's Snippets - Week 54

It seems ages since I joined everyone in the playfround for a go on the swings.  I think I might need to stay in at playtime though this week, as someone has been generous to give me another present - the coldy fluey bug.  Hot soup, hot lemon and honey are the order of the day.  Bagsy the spot nearest the tortoise stove in the classroom (showing my age here).

This is a very tiny card (about 3 inches by 2 inches), so I think it might qualify as a snippet.  It is a left over piece of hammered white card, on which I have used the Clarity mini village set.  The figures were sketched in afterwards to see how they would work.  I used my favourite Derwent watercolour pencils to colour everything in.

I am hoping to get round as many of you as possible this week, in between sneezing and cutting out stamping masks.  Happy New Year to all of you.  xx

WOYWW - 187 - Happy New Year

Happy New Year to you all, to those who have been around for ages and to anyone who has come across this WOYWW  (What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday) phenomenon by mistake.  If you are new visitors, please feel free to join in, by going to Julia's hospitable home and posting a picture of where you work at your crafting of any kind.  Then follow the links there to visit lots more like-minded people.

Just one photo from me this week.  I had meant to schedule this post last night, but the Borrowers have been at it again.  Not sure why they need the cable to attach my camera to the computer, but it has vanished.  It ALWAYS lives in the camera case, but has gone walkabout.  Fortunately, this morning we found another cable which will do until the Borrowers return the original.

 

No work going on yet, just a lot of tidying, so I thought I would show you some of the goodies I was lucky enough to receive from Santa and my lovely family.   You can see two sets of Hobby Art Scenic stamps, ready to join the other sets I already have - they are so good at creating small scenes on a card as hey mix and match among the various sets.  I also was lucky enough to get several of my favourite stamps from Clarity, which are actually in their boxes on my shelf - I will show you that lot another time.  There is one set of Clarity stamps there, which is the set of mini lesson stamps, which will be so useful to mix with the full size versions and to create smaller cards (helps to use the offcuts of card in my box).

 

Other goodies on show, are my tin of Derwent Pastels,, a set of Derwent Watersoluble sketching  pencils, and a DVD of Maddy Prior and the Carnival Band on their Christmas tour - that is a brilliant show for anyone who has not yet seen them.  Oh yes, and in the background you can see two sets of luscious Daler-Rowney acrylic inks.  when you thin you saw those before Christmas, you are quite right, but they were for a present to my crafty daughter.  I was lucky enough to get a set too.  I can't wiat to get playing, but I do have to have a tidy up first in all the areas I have not shown you.

 

I am off now to have breakfast, but then I will be back to do some visiting with the rest of you.  See you soon.

WOYWW - 185

For anyone who is wondering why I should possibly want to show you a random heap of stuff on a work surface, where have you been?  It is for a wonderful weekly blog where we all show everyone else what we are working on, what we are not working on and what has been left behind by the aforesaid activity.  We are hosted by the wonderful Julia at Stamping Ground, where you will find links to others who have been far more creative that me this week.

You may notice that a lot of the things from last week are still here, because the focus of work has moved downstairs for the writing of the cards and the wrapping of the presents - no time to create masterpieces (what masterpieces do you create, I hear you say).  There are a number of things underneath the piles which I cannot show you until they "go live" or until they are delivered to the recipients.  My previous post does show a collage of some of the cards done for this Christmas, if you have time to look back.  For those who are short of time (aren't we all?), then have a wonderful Christmas and I will see you all afterwards.  Now it is time to visit Julia to follow those links, but I hope you will find time to leave a comment before you go. 

Done it - well, nearly!

I have finally finished writing the Christmas cards.  Well almost!  There are about five that I need to make, two inserts to do and a few ecards to send.  The worst is over, however. 

I could not show you all the cards I had made, and I showed most of them throughout the year as I made them anyway,  This is the next best thing, a collage of some of the better ones.  They are all in their envelopes with their address labels on and stamped, ready to go (we bought all our stamps last year (just after Christmas).. 

We still have three small presents to buy and then we can wrap everything and label them - must make some labels tomorrow.   There are a few things still to arrive to make up some mixed parcels.   They are all promised in time for Christmas, so I am not panicking yet. 

The best thing is I can now allow myself to do a little of what I want to do.  I have new stamps to try out, and paints and inks to get messy with.  Yippee!  Watch this space for the fun I intend to have.

How are you all doing with your preparations?  I must sit down now and make out my menu and shopping list for feeding the family.  I intend to make it as easy as possible, doing as much beforehand as I can, to allow us to enjoy having the family together.  I fancy that sleep might be in short supply.  Our youngest granddaughter wakes at around 5 am, and I am certain that the dogs will wake up too to tell us, so sleep will be finished.  We have thought about decamping to the caravan on the front drive for the night but it depends on how cold it is.

Card of the Week

I was so chuffed today to see the write up for the Card of the Week on the Robyn's Fetish Challenge Blog this week, featuring this card using their images.  This was a card I did as a member of the Craft A Scene Design Team for this month's challenge

I was contacted on Sunday by Susan Paulson of Robyn's Fetish asking if she could feature my card on their Challenge Blog as the Card of the Week.  I had to give my permission, send a copy of the card, and details of how I made it, and the write up is now "live" on their blog.  As a thank you, I was also given any image of my choice from their online shop.

It is good to know that the sponsors are really interested in what we are doing with their images. good. The other DT members have done some awesome cards, as have all those who have entered the challenge this month.  Do take time to go over to Craft A Scene to see them all. 

WOYWW - 184

As you can see, my desk is a total wreck at the moment, due to trying to write Christmas cards and do the inserts at the same time, and a few other jobs too.  I won't list all that is there and just let you wander and wonder.

I am sure most of you have finished all your preparation by now and can sit back and pity me..........  did I hear hysterical laughter there?  Oh well, I was hoping that others might have been better off than me.  Anyone got any ideas on how to wrap a huge ride on tractor and trailer for our littlest granddaughter - that could be fun.

If you want to see loads of other desks, some in the same state as mine, some much tidier and interesting, just follow the link  and call in on Julia, our esteemed leader.  She will be delighted to see you.

To anyone I don't contact before the great day, have a wonderful Christmas and see you in the New Year with lots of resolutions (to write the wretched cards in March in 2013, for one).  I hope to get round as many of you as possible this week, panic permitting.  Have a great day.

Craft A Scene - DT - Winter No 2

This is my second offering as a member of the Craft A Scene DT for the Winter challenge for December.  Our sponsors for this month are Robyn's Fetish, who very kindly gave us a number of their designs to play with.    This card is a combination of two of them (Christmas Cottage and In The Cold), after a fair bit of computer playing.

I used My Craft Studio to cut out the first cottage, and then duplicate it twice to produce the row of cottages of graduated size.  I did the same with the In The Cold image, placing it digitally in front of the cottages.  Then I printed it out twice, once on cheap copy paper and once on the good card for the finished design.  The image on the copy paper was cut out and used as a mask so that I could brayer the sky behind it.  I started with Adirondack Cloudy Blue, then Denim, and then finally part of the Sunset Big and Juicy ink pad.  With the mask still in place, I stamped the trees behind the cottages, using a new Clarity stamp.

The colouring in was done with Promarkers.  I started with the windows,with two shades of yellow to give some shading, and then embossed them with clear embossing powder to give them the shine of glass.  I had also embossed the chimneys and the smoke in the same way to make the sky easier to brayer - too idle to cut the mask for those.  The wellies were embossed with iridescent powder to make them a little sparkly.  It also protected them while I was adding the blue shades to the snow.  I love using Promarkers.  It is so easy to achieve good shading with them with a little patience.  The only other thing I added was some Polar White Flower Soft round the bottom of the cottages, and dots of gold for the door knobs, and silver for the sled.

This is, I think, a better picture, having scanned it this time.  Hope you like this effort and it may give you ideas for cards that are much better than mine.  Have fun and let us see what you can do over a Craft A Scene.  Come on, you know you want to have a go.

WOYWW - 183

This is the parlous state of my desk this morning (well, last night, and it hasn't changed since).  Binoculars to watch the birds on the feeders outside, keyboard to write this post, paintbox used for the last project (cannot be shown yet) and to be used on the next one, and sundry other bits and pieces that need putting away.  Still cannot find that foiling kit, drat it!

If you are wondering why I am showing you this dull mess on my desk, then you had better go over to Julia's desk to see loads of others showing you their desk on Whats on Your Workdesk Wednesday.

It is now official, there are not enough days this month to get everything done, presents still to buy, cards to write and to send, life to live .......   HELP!!!!!  I need more time.  Hope to see you all later around the blogs.  Love and hugs to you all.

Craft A Scene DT Card 1 for Winter

This is the first of my two scheduled DT cards for December for the Craft A Scene Winter Challenge.    The original image was one of four donated by the sponsor for this month, Robyn's Fetish.  As soon as I saw the images, I knew what I wanted to do with this one.  It positively cried out to have the doors opened and the windows cut out to reveal a scene inside.  Fortunately, I had just replaced the blade n my Fiskars finger blade so it went through the card like a knife through butter (probably better as our butter is rock hard in the fridge).

The scene for the inside came from a My Craft Studio CD Rom (Craft' E' Christmas Crystal Sparkles), and the digi stamps of Santa and his elves were from the same source.  The Christmas tree you can see was part of the background sheet, and just needed a bit of glittering.  Can anyone tell me how to get glitter to show up on a photo?  I have failed miserably with that task again.  All the colouring in was done with various Promarkers, some of which needed the extra thin nibs added.  In fact, some while ago, I treated myself to a bumper order for those nibs as I was fed up with having to swap them around and get rid of one colour before I could use them.  On more than one occasion, I forgot to cleanse them before trying to add a different colour to a nearly completed image - not a good look.

Santa's beard and the fur on his clothes and on one of the elves was added with a Quickie glue pen and some Polar White Flower Soft.  I kept the colours very simple, more in keeping with what we think of as a child's colouring.  I also added some glitter (Martha Stewart fine red glitter)  for the tree stars and the decorations, and, of course, the holly berries on the fir branch.

I had intended to put all the elves inside, but then the doors looked so bare and dull that I decided to put two of them at the front, ready to go in.  The background and the digi stamps were all printed separately, cut out and added by using extra sticky tape, shaker tape and Pinflair glue, according to the effect I wanted, and whether I needed the extra moveability of the silicone.  I did want to add dimension to the background scene, by raising the figures above the background, and the shaker tape and the Pinflair do that job brilliantly.

I hope you like what I have done with this card and that it show you that you can mix and match different media, and do not have to stick to one set of stamps to produce a reasonable card.  The original image gives you chance to really work your imagination, and I look forward to seeing lots of you joining in with this month's challenge over at Craft A Scene, and seeing how you interpret "Winter".  Come on, join in, and have some fun with us.

What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday - WOYWW 180

One hundred and eighty!

That is quite an achievement.  Congratulations to everyone and a very big thank you to Julia, who started it all. 

I have just had a horrible shock.  It is not Monday, as I had thought, but Tuesday (this post will be a scheduled one as I may not be around tomorrow).  Where has this week vanished to and I have done nothing on my desk at all.   In fact, the only craft thing I have done this week is to make the Christmas cake, which is now sitting in the kitchen waiting for its daily dose of brandy.  then two weeks before Christmas, it will get marzipaned, with home made marzipan, and then royal iced.

This first picture is not, strictly speaking, on my desk, although the camera that took it is.  However, I reckon that a project using it will soon be here.  These leaves taken on telephoto will make a brilliant Autumn background, and I love the way the sun just glows through them.

Now we get to the nitty gritty mess that is my desk this week.  I am not sure what has happened but I have done nothing in here for a whole week, not through lack of mojo or from lack of things that need to be done, but other things just seem to have got in the way.  so all I have to show you is my babywipe box, two bottles of nail varnish remover (for craft purposes), some papers hurled in the general direction of a spare bit of space, my heat resist mat rolled back out of harm's way, and whatever is on the shelves behind.  Not exactly inspiring.

Now we come to the unit on the other side of the room, very cluttered - files of peel offs, reference books and things, that have no other home, just shoved in the middle.  The filing boxes underneath now actually contain what their labels say they do, which is a novelty.  I still cannot find my foil or the large roll of bin bags, but never mind - they will turn up some day.

This last unit, a Really Useful drawer unit, has now been moved to within reach of my desk, and contains things like my Promarkers, Aquamarker, and Sakura pens among other things - the stuff that I use almost daily.  The cupboard underneath which is mostly out of sight has the rest of my colouring stuff, apart from the boxes of Derwent Pencils which won't fit there.  Also peeping out here is a roll of cling film, a roll of baking parchment and a roll of kitchen foil.  If you look hard enough, you will also see my old red Sissix, and the green Cuttlebug on top of that.

Apart from the shock of finding out I had lost a day completely already this week, it has been a bad day on the technology front.  My computer flatly refused to talk to the network or to the internet, no matter what I did.  Then I realised it was the 13th of the month.  Perhaps, I should not have bothered at all, and just stayed in bed.  A lot of work later and sorting out the network, I am back on line. Normally, I work up here in the afternoon, but I think I am going to have to change and do it in the morning to get everything done this weeek - two DT projects needed, homework for Clarity Classroom, and this month's Clarity Clallenge.  then I just have to persuade my printer that it can work with the refillable inks so that I can do the inserts for the Christmas cards.  Not a lot to do then!

I am off now to schedule this post and get ready for our visitors who I thought would be here tomorrow..  If you have read this far, sorry for going on a bit, but I am sure you will thoroughly enjoy all the other desks on show over at Stamping Ground with Julia.  Please leave me a comment, I love reading them, and I will come to visit you in return.

Craft A Scene - Troubled Skies card 2

This card took me back to my childhood straight away, to my favourite little shop (which does not exist any more).  That was where I first bought charcoal pencils - charcoal covered in nice clean wood to keep your fingers cleaner.  In those days, I only remember just the plain black to use for shading.  Now I have a nice little set from Derwent of tinted charcoal pencils.  Same thing but with added tints to vary things.

When I was lucky enough to be taken on to the Design Team for Craft A Scene, I decided that I needed to really come out of my comfort zone and stretch my brain.  So I have tried to use different styles and different media for each project.  I have never been comfortable with charcoal, so it was always going to be a steep learning curve.  In fact, as a result of this card, I treated myself to a book on the subject, step by step.

I used watercolour card for this one, and stamped the images of the church, tree and clouds with Adirondack Pitch Black. and pulled some of the ink out with a water brush to soften the hard lines..  Then I started on the sky with the dark blue, with some highlights with a slightly paler blue.  Dark green took care of the tree by the church and some of the foliage around the church, while the dark brown shaded the tree in the foreground.    Although the pencils do make it a less messy medium, I still ended up with a mucky finger after smoothing across to break up the harder shading lines.

I used several different colours on the ground, two different shades of green, brown and sandstone, trying to give the impression of grass blowing in the wind.  

I only decided to put in lightning towards the end (see, I don't really plan - things develop).  Having just got hold of a battery eraser from Derwent, I thought this was the time to bring it into use.  It took a bit of time and care to sharpen the point of the eraser to give as narrow and line as possible.  A bit more practice would give a much better result, I am sure.  

The main aim of this card was to produce a sky I saw once up at Haworth outside the Bronte Parsonage Museum there, what I would call a real "Wuthering Heights" sky, which made me understand why the Brontes wrote in the way they did, especially Emily.   I think it does have some of that feel, although I did not put in any of the tombstones you can see at Haworth.   More practice needed, though.

Nuisance calls update

While trawling the web for solutions to these nuisance calls, I came across a site - www.192.com

I would urge you all to go and have a look, and you will be horrified at the amount of data held on you on that site - who lives there, telephone number, how long you have been there, amongst other things. It even has your previous addresses and who lived there with you. As far as I can gather, it is information from Electoral Rolls from before 2002.  That is when a box appeared on the Electoral Roll form, allowing you to opt out of appearing on sites of this kind or allowing your details to be sold.

To get this information removed from public viewing, you need to go to http://www.192.com/downloads/C01.pdf and download this form, fill it in and send it off.   Mine is already in the post.

Worcester Black Pear and Clarity - Birthday card

The main stamp on this card is one of those that comes as part of the Clarity club membership and is a sprig of pears and leaves.  It arrived at just the right time for the birthday of one of our friends.  They are involved and have been for years with the scouting movement locally, and the Black Pear is one of the badges used in the Worcestershire area.  It also appears on the badges of Worcester city, and the trees are grown in local traditional orchards.  The fruit itself is not truly black but at one stage is a deep mahogany.

Its importance to Worcestershire is due to Queen Elizabeth I, who saw a black pear tree with fruit on when she visited the area, and gave the emblem to Worcester for their coat of arms. 

The Worcester Black Pear was known as the "Warden Pear" and was first recorded in the 13th Century at Warden Abbey in Bedfordshire.

I used Clarity silk card and stamped the pear twig with Adirondack Pitch Black. I also used the naked tree stamp, also from Clarity to extend the twig into a branch.  When the ink was dry, I used the Quickie glue pen to cover the pear fruits themselves, let the glue dry off and applied gilding flakes (without breathing).  One that was cleaned off and dry, I filled in the tiny specks of white with a similar colour Promarker (I need more practice with the glue pen and the flakes).  The leaves and branches were also coloured with Promarkers.  The bottom corner border was done with another twiggy Clarity stamp, and  the same glue and gilding technique used to highlight that part too.   

I brayered the sky and covered over a couple of black marks with a flock of birds - very useful, they are.  I polished the finished card with a tissue, before mounting it on black card and copper coloured mirri card.  The background of the main card was following another of Barbara Gray's techniques.brayering the colour on to a sheet of Clarity silk paper, and then applying scrunched up wet cling film, and leaving it to dry.  That was also polished and then glued to a white card as a wrap.  I stamped the pears again randomly over the paper with flitter glue and fine glitter, before attaching the main image.

I was pleased to be able to do a card that could be personalised to the interests of the recipient.  That is what I do try to do as a norm, but this one was special to us all.  I did a similar card afterwards for the Clarity Challenge.  I don't often repeat cards but this one was not the same, just using some of the same stamps and techniques.  I really, really like this pear stamp, and I suspect it will appear a lot in the future.

WOYWW - 179

Good morning, it is Wednesday again (or it will be by the time this post goes live) - doesn't time go fast.  Anyway, it is time to join with all the other (now famous - it was on the radio) members of Julia's club over at Stamping Ground where we all get together to see what has gone on since last week, and show what we have on our desks.

This is not actually my desk today.  That comes later.   I thought you might like to see the fascinating occupation I gave myself on Monday.  During my hunt for my (still) missing foils, I came across  a couple of sheets of mirri card with embossed sentiments and embellishments on.  I have had them from the very beginning of my paper crafting and forgot they even existed.  I thought that if I chopped them up properly and put them in a small box on my desk, I might actually use them and get rid of them.  In this first shot, you can see all the tiny bits of left overs, ready to be swept into the rubbish bag.  I started by cutting them with my Fiskars finger knife, but rapidly descended into the scissors mode.

Monday Part 1

The second shot shows other things that have surfaced from the dross of years, mainly freebies from magazine fronts - things I have not thought about and will probably never use.  So they go into a separate pile to be passed to our eldest granddaughter to experiment with.  There is also another sheet of gold sentiments waiting to be chopped up. 

Monday Part 2

Now we come to my desk as I left it on Tuesday evening - it is still untouched today.  A little more exciting. I think.  No actual crafting yet, but a delivery that arrived today from Create and Craft, containing two sets of gorgeous stamps from Clarity and a box of spare mounts for the remountable stamps.  I also use those for stamps from other companies as they are so much easier to use, light and easy to handle.

 

Tuesday/Wednesday

I need to get going with those sets of stamps this week.  One set is for the December Classroom lesson with Barbara Gray on Create and Craft and I want to really experiment with it and see how I can adapt it to what I fancy doing, maybe adding other stamps to the mix.  The second set blew me away when I saw them demonstrated at the weekend - fab!

The little picture in the silvery frame is actually not my work, but was done by my DH's aunt, who was very clever with her fingers.  She was also a talented watercolour artist, although she never passed her creations on, thinking they were not good enough.  This little embroidery is one of three embroideries we were given after her death and we do treasure them.

Now I am going to finish with a rant for the week - hope you will forgive me, Julia.  If you don't want to read on, then nip over to Julia to see what she has on offer this week.  However, I bet you will know what I am talking about and probably have suffered too.

Does anyone know how we can stop all these nuisance calls that come from abroad. We bought our present phone system because it shows the telephone number of any caller. We now let our answer phone take all calls where the number is not displayed or whenever it says "International. Out of Area" The caller never gets as far as the answer machine and always hangs up. However, we are now getting these calls at 7.30am or earlier. At this sort of time of day, we immediately think there is an emergency with one or other of our family and get worried. We are told there is nothing that can be done to stop these calls. Isn't it time that the government or the Telecoms people actually sorted this nuisance out and put a stop to this intrusion?  Is it just in the UK that we have to suffer this intrusion and disturbance?   I, for one, have NOT had an accident that I want to claim for, I do NOT need to claim back mis-sold PPI's, I do NOT want a free holiday that will cost me a small fortune, and I do NOT want any of the other things they are trying to sell me. 

I would love to know how all of you around the world deal with these things and if you have an answer for us over here.  (We are registered with the Telephone Preference Service, but that does not stop these international calls, which are mainly random number generated - we are told there is nothing that can be done to stop the international ones)

Have a wonderful week, all of you, filled with good crafting and good company.  xx