"Snow Crafting" part II

...And here's what we did this morning while the snow kept falling outside, from a can of porridge oats:

Before

 

After

He has plans to keep all the little toys from the Xmas crackers in the can. What can I say, he has inherited the hoarding habit from me ;-)

For the afternoon we did Word Search puzzles, which he loves at the moment, as well as a Birthday card for my mum.

We might go to the cinema tomorrow, if the roads have improved and we can get out of the driveway; otherwise- baking as many of you suggested, although baking means eating, and I would prefer avoiding that :-)

"Snow crafting"

Schools were closed today due to snowy conditions and treacherous roads, so I had my son to entertain all day - and by the looks of it, this will continue for the rest of the week! As much as I love spending time with him, sometimes it is hard to find exciting things to do indoors! So we decided to do a bit of "snow crafting".

We cut snowflakes with white paper to make a banner and decorate the house and the Xmas tree (although I refuse to put up the tree until at least 5th or 6th December!)

and

we made 5 small and simple Christmas cards for his friends, inspired by Stephanie's wonderful cards.

What are we going to do tomorrow? Well, tomorrow will be another day, I will think of something ;-)

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow!

Here's my design for the Ooh La la challenge # 68: A Christmas Song.

It is an A5 card; the beautiful papers are all from Ooh La la: Sky Blue Cedar from the Dreams of Tranquility CD; Snowflakes 3 and Snowflakes 5 from the Femme Fatale CD. I distressed all the edges of the different blue cardstocks and used Metallic Rub ons to accent the papers. I can't remember where I got the big snowflake die cut to be honest; the button is a wooden one; the sentiment stamp is Studio G; blue gems and twine from my stash.
Check out the other OLL DT creations here. You have a fortnight to enter the challenge - remember it is not about Christmas but about a Christmas song!

I would like my card to enter the following challenges:
ABC Christmas - X is for Xmas
Crafts and Me - Dreaming of a White Christmas
Crafty Creations - Christmas is coming
Simon Says - Let it Snow
ABC - I is for Ice and Snow
The Pixie Cottage - Let it Snow
Easy Craft Projects - Snow
The Crafty pad - Snowflakes
Our Daily Bread Designs - Snowflakes
Crafty Calendar - Winter snowflakes
Freshed Brewed - Winter/Xmas
Stampin for the Weekend - Winter
Sweet Stamping - Buttons and Bows
Crafty Catz - Christmas
Crafty Sentiments -Christmas
Scrappy Frogs - Merry Xmas
Stampin Bs - Holidays
All sorts - Monochrome
ISB - Monochrome
Bah humbug - Feeling the blues
Fussy and Fancy - Christmas without red or green
Creative Cottage - Untraditional Xmas colours
Totally Papercraft - Untraditional Xmas colours
Craft your Days away - Texture
Die Cut Dreams - Use a die cut
Inktegrity - Anything goes
Fab'n'Funky - Going with the flow
Christmas Stampin - Anything goes
Paper Cutz - Anything goes
A Spoon full of Sugar - Anything goes
Creative Cowgirls - ANything goes

Have a nice week! Thanks for your comments!

Exploding Box

A handmande gift for a very good friend of mine who turned 40 recently.
I decided to make an Exploding Box because this dear friend lives very far away from her family, and knowing how much she misses them, I thought she would like to keep photos of her relatives and most beloved ones in the box. She is a fan of red and this is why I used this colour throughout primarily.
This exploding box has 3 layers, giving her plenty of room to add photos and even journalling. A variety of papers have been used (Damask, spotty, flowers), mostly digi ones; the red and cream cardstock are Core-Dinations and the different embellishments (flowers, gems, buttons, ribbon, swirls, etc.) are all from my own stash. The butterfly die cut is Cuttlebug; the sentiments have been printed in Word; I have also used several stamps from Gstudio and Rhona Ferrer.
Here are several views of the exploding box:

I would like my box to enter:

Paper Cupcakes - Red and cream

Die Cut Dreams - Anything but a card

Stamptacular Sunday - A time for giving

Mami Doodles - Gift item

Saturday Challenge - Handmade gift

Creative Card crew - Not another card

AiFactory - Friendship

Moving along with the times - More than one fold

A Spoon full of Sugar -Anything goes

Have a nice weekend!

Birthday in pink

Good Thursday to you!
My card today (commissioned) is for the elderly mother of a friend. His request was for "something very special" for his mum so, inspired by Lisa Jane's beautiful card, I decided to start with a different size, shape and layout of card, and continue with soft pastel colours and very feminine embellishments. And here's the result, I hope you like it.

The base cardstock is grey, a colour I would not use normally, but I thought it worked very well with the rich backing paper with soft pink tones - from The Luxury Stack, DCWV, distressed and matted in white card; the card is 21x14cm so much bigger than your average card; for the main die cut label in the centre, Nestabilities, I used a pearlized grey card, which I embossed and matted in white card too; the flower, handmade, has several layers of different papers with a mother-of-pearl button in the centre; the circle die cut is matted with grey card; the sentiment was created in Word; the corners are Fiskars punches; pink card candy and pink organza ribbon from my own stash.


My card enters the following challenges:
Lollipop Crafts - Very Girlie
Crafty Emma's Store Challenge - Think Pink 
Stampin' Royalty - Patterned paper
Little Paper Shop- Die cuts
Critter Sketch - Texture
A Spoon Full of Sugar - Distressing
Take Time for you -Pink
Sarah Hurley - Embossing
Simon Says - Sparkle

Ooh La la challenge #67 - Rudolph

Another Monday and another challenge over at OLL.
This fortnight challenge is about Rudolph The Red Nose Reindeer, and my entry is a Christmas chocolate gift box decorated with OLL paper 52 from their Joyeux Noel CD. Isn't the paper super cute?
The box was originally a Lyons Decaff tea box which I decided to alter and fill with Nestle chocolates.
I made an aperture with the Oval Nestabilities and acetate. The reindeer digital image is a free clipart I downloaded from the net, coloured with Letraset Promarkers, mounted on 3D pads and highlighted with embossing fluid; red ribbon, green, blue and red cardstock from my own stash.
This is the final box, altered and ready to be given as a gift.

 A couple of close ups

I would like my project to enter the following challenges:
Bah! Humbug! - Rudolph the Reindeer
Wags'n'Whiskers - Acetate, tissue or vellum
Bunny's Zoe - Christmas but not a card
2 Sisters - Christmas
Bee Crafty - Christmas 2
The Creative Cottage - Someone special at Xmas
ABC - H is for Holidays
The Stamp Man - Christmas
Fab'n'Funky - Going around in circles
The Stampsmith - ovalicious

Another winner!

Good Sunday to you all!

Can  you tell I am in a very good mood? Luck is defenitely on my side this week ;-)

My little Birthday card won 1st prize in the Catch The Bug Challenge from last week and I can now choose 7 of their great Bugaboo images - cool or what??!!  I am thrilled! Now comes the difficult part - which images to pick? They are all so great! Oh, decisions, decisions, decisions....

Wags' n' Whiskers winner!

I am over the moon!! My Friendship/Birthday card for Wendy won the challenge over on Wags'n'Whiskers and I can now choose one of their cool rubber stamps as a prize!! Great or what!??

Have a look at their blog, their new challenge is already on.

Thanks Nichola and team!

Another male card

This week seems to be mainly about male cards. And god knows they are far from my favourite and I usually struggle a lot to come up with ideas :-(
But hey, they needed to be done and here's my latest, for a 14th year old relative. I know he likes rugby but for the last few years I have made rugby related cards for him, so I could just simply not do another one. Plus his parents were recently telling us how his "interests" are shifting slightly, like any teenager I guess... he has started developing an interest for...yes, you got it right... girls... LOL!

I hand cut several stars in different sizes, matt them and mounted them on 3D pads. Some other stars were punched/cut so that the (green or white) cardstock underneath could be seen. I stamped the sentiment HB2U to make it look "cooler" :-) and I finally added a piece of twine for extra texture. Paper and cardstock are leftovers I had in my stash.

My card enters:
AiFactory - Punch/die cut
Dutch Dare - Clean and simple
Pixie Dust Studio - About men/boy
Cute Card Thursday - Antyhing goes

Have a nice weekend!

Friendship card

This card is quite special - it is for my very good friend Wendy, whose birthday is today (yeahh!! Make sure you leave a Happy Birthday message on her blog! ;-)) It is not just a birthday card, but a friendship card too, because for the last year this mad South African lady has been a fabulous friend to me. So I just wanted to say: Thanks for everything, Wends! And Happy Birthday! Love ya! xx :-)
The image and sentiment are (once more) from TLC creations - and I just LOVE them! The minute I saw the cute little girl and her friend the Teddy playing on the see-saw I knew this was the perfect image for my birthday card to Wendy. It didn't even need much colouring. And then the sentiment, which goes so well with it! The card is quite vintage looking and defenitely my kinda colours and style. Hope you like it as much as I do.
This is the outside:

 And the sentiment inside:

Both the image and sentiment are from TLC; the image has been outlined with Pastel Beige Promarker and some beige chalk. The rich damask backing paper is from DCWV, The Luxury Stack; the different cardstock (brown and earthy tones) are Coredinations, embossed with Cuttlebug folders, distreesed and with some of the edges chalked; ribbon and pearls from my own stash; Labels Nestabilities.

I would like my card to enter the following challenges:
Wag'n'Whiskers - Friendship
Daring Cardmakers - Topaz/Friendship
Kaboodle Doodles - Vintage
Scrap it with a Song - You've got a friend
Passion for Promarkers - Colours of Old photographs
Take time for you - Monochrome
Sisterhood of Crafters - Birthday
2 Sisters - Birthday
Lexi's Creations - Anything goes

Thanks for your comments!

A birthday card for a Chef

I cannot take all the credit for this card because my son, nearly 6, coloured the digital image with his own crayons. You see, this birthday card is for my youngest brother, his uncle, who is a chef, so my son wanted to participate in the making of it. And fair play to him, he helped me a lot! I am sure my brother will be very chuffed with such a creative card! ;-)

If I am not mistaken the chef image is from Bits of Cheer, coloured as explained by my son with his own crayons and highlighted with Stickles, mounted with 3D pads for dimension; the yummy ice-cream and cupacakes backing paper is a download, EHI Make a Wish; the sentiment was created in Word; Cuttlebug Happy Birthday embossing folder; Nellie's and Spellbinders die cuts.

Some challenges:
Crafty Cardmakers - Dry embossing
CRAFT - Dry embossing
One stop craft - Embossing
Top Tip Tuesday - Image/Sentiment
Sisterhood of Crafters - Birthday
Party Time Tuesdays - Photo inspiration
2 Sisters - Birthday
Cupcake Inspirations- cupcakes
Crazy 4 challenges - Square card
Fairy Tale - Anything goes
Lexi's Creations - Anything goes

Male card

I remembered only this morning about my friend's birthday on Thursday! Doh!
Because he lives in Amsterdam and the card needed to be on the post by this afternoon the latest, I momentarily got into a bit of a panic - the job could have ended in disaster with all the rush; however, I must admit I am pretty happy with the result. I actually feel it is a double winner: a quick AND a male card that I am satisfied with!? It must be a first ;-)
I think the reason why I feel so comfortable with the result is because of the great TLC image and sentiment I decided to use. Make sure you visit Paulette's wonderful blog, Create with TLC - she has LOTS of beautiful, funny and vintage images and sentiments, many for free!!

It is yet another CAS card, by far my favourite style; the lovely stripe paper, distressed, was a present from my good friend (non-blogger) Christine; the blue and green cardstock are from my own stash, as is the blue ribbon; image coloured with Letraset Promarkers, mounted on 3D pads and highlighted with embossing fluid for a bit of dimension.

There are a couple of challenges I can enter this card onto:
I used the Paper Tree Design sketch for this week; on Crazy 4 Challenges they are looking for Square cards and the ladies on Ladybug Crafts Ink want to see ribbon.

So that's it for me for today! Wrap up well! It's cold and windy out there! :-)
Thanks for your comments!

Autumn in the Park





Quick Bugaboo birthday card

The card I am showing you today features a super cute Bugaboo image. It is for my friend's 2 year old daughter - isn't the turtle a cutie?! The little girl's birthday was last Friday and since I had a couple of appointments and other bits that day, I kept it all fairly simple. 

Bubaboo image, coloured with Letraset Promarkers and highlighted with Embossing fluid; Labels Nestabilities; Cuttlebug polka dot embossing folder; sentiment created in Word; ribbon from my own stash. 

Onto some challenges:
Catch the Bug - Bugaboo image, Anything goes
My Time to Craft - Quick and cute
Stampin'Bees- Animal in a die cut
7 Kids - Birthdays
Stampin'Royalty - Colour challenge
Craft Challenge - Dry Embossing
Dutch Dare - Clean and simple
Fairy Tale - Anything goes

Blog awards

It was a miserable start of the day - rain, wind... but my dear friend Wendy cheered me up with a sweet suprise. She treated me to not 1 but 2 Blog Awards!!

The first one is the Beautiful Blogger award. The rules for this Award are to tell 10 unknown things about yourself and to pass it onto 10 more Beautiful Bloggers. Let' see:

- One of my biggest regrets is not having spent more quality time with my father, listening to his stories, understanding his life.

- I am really really scared of illness and death, not seeing my child/ren grow up.

- I was 11 years old when I had my first hair cut.
- After a dodgy henna tattoo while visiting Morocco I developed an allergy to PPD and will probably never be able to dye my hair as a result :-(
- I am also allergic to peppers (chillies, jalapenos...all sorts!)
- I would have loved to have blue eyes
- I suffer from the "travel bug"; I love travelling and am "itchy" unless I have some sort of trip planned soon.
- I wear my watch on my right wrist and my ring always on the middle finger.
- The first name given to me (i.e. registered) at birth is completely different to the first name I carry (officially) now (political and personal reasons, in case you wonder).
- I do not like reptiles and I am terrified of snakes in particular.

I have chosen the following 10 Beautiful Bloggers, for different reasons:

- Lisa Jane (because she is super talented and has offered me positive comments from day one)

- Faye (because she is super talented, as well as very funny! and always ready to give positive comments)

- Doreen (because she is talented, dedicated and a very supportive team of the OLL DT)

- Snehal (because she is talented and a sweet follower, always ready to learn and leave positive comments)

- Debb (because she is one talented lady)

- Elaine (because she is another very talented lady)

- Heloise (because I wish I could work with beads, felt and fabric like she does)

- Geraldine (because she makes beautiful embroidery embellishments)

- Judy (because although I do not really know her, she's often left kind comments on my blog, and more importantly, I've noticed that she always taks the time to give thanks for any freebies and tutorials available in the blog world, a rare and admirable thing!)

- Chupa (one of those blogs I visit often because of her inspirational creations)

- Melissa (an Australian talented crafter and super mama!)

The second award is the Cherry on Top award; the rules for this one are to share 3 things that you enjoy doing and then to pass it on to 5 more wonderful bloggers.

So what do I really enjoy?

- I love snuggling up in bed with a good book or a good film and a cuppa at the end of a long day.

- I love going out for a lazy lunch/dinner with my partner and son on Sundays somewhere different.

- I love arts and crafts with passion and the first thing I do in any place I visit is to look for a crafts market and/or crafts shops

The 5 bloggers I have selected for this award are:

- Lisa Jane

- Faye

- Snehal

- Karenika (for her inspiration and beautiful creations)

- Paulette (for her beautiful creations that she kindly shares with other bloggers)

If the recipe works...

Isn't that what people say...? :-)
You have probably seen a few cards of mine with this same image, Born to Shop by Docrafts, but the feedback has always been so positive that I think the cool funky lady must really work for this sort of card - another commissioned 40th Birthday card. LOL!

(I apologise for the bad quality of the photo; the weather has been so miserable today that it had to be taken with artificial light; the colours are much more vibrant and bright IRL)
As usual I coloured the image with Letraset Promarkers and highlighted some bits with Diamond Stickles. I matted it with red cardstock; the backing papers are leftovers from other projects, can't remember where they came from, edges all distressed with red ink; the dots stamp is Inkadinkado; the border punch is Fiskars; the red paper flowers from my own stash; the sentiment created in Word.

My card enters the following challenges:
Basic Grey - a sketch by Heather
PaperTake - sparkly and bright
Creative Inspirations - Glitter, Glamour, Girlie
Inky Impressions - Flowers
Simon Says - Punch them
ABC- G is for Glitter
Aly's Sunday -  Distressed
Sentimental Sundays - Birthdays
Clean and Simple - Happy Birthday
Inktegrity - Anything goes
Craft Your passion - Anything goes

Thanks for your comments!

Ooh La La challenge # 66 - Remember Remember

Good Monday morning to you all!
November already!!?? Phew, time flies when you are having fun! :-)

Here's my creation for the OLL challenge # 66, Remember Remember - a corner bookmark.
When given the theme a few weeks ago my thoughts went directly onto a bookmark. Why? you may wonder... Well, simply because most of the evenings I am so tired that I end up falling asleep after a few pages and the following day I can hardly remember where my reading ended! LOL!

 Front:

 Back:

My bookmark was decorated with Pattern Paper 27 and Spot paper 15 from the Ooh La la Silhouette Magic CD, as well as the Ribbon Border 10 from the Fleur d'Imagination CD. I also used a border Fiskars punch, oval and scalloped punches and scalloped scissors. The sentiment ("This is where we left it") and quote ("Some books are undeservedly forgotten; None are undeservedly remembered") were created in Word; purple organza and satin ribbons. I finished the bookmark with a few beads from my own stash.

I would like my corner bookmark to enter the following challenges:
Your next Stamp - Bookmark it!
Mami Doodles - Anything but a card
My Time to craft - Pocket (my corner bookmark has a "pocket")
Crazy challenge - Tones of shapes
A Spoon full of Sugar - Let's get punchy
Simon Says Stamps - Punch them
Fab'n'Funky - Clean and Simple
Ann's Creative Nook - Think Pink
One Stop Crafts - Anything goes
Paper Players - Anything goes

Happy Monday!