A very, very...

...busy week.

Lots of cards made.

The week started with me making a card for my sister's birthday - she isn't overly into papercrafting so I tried to keep it fairly simple but I wanted to play with my Martha Stewart Heart border punch. This I did on the edge of some handmade paper that I used as a wrap.








Wednesday was Dawn's card workshop "Christmas in July". The cards we created were lovely and very enjoyable to make. The first one here was a cute little Angel card in its own box - everything was made as part of the workshop including the box. To help show off the Angel a little more clearly I took a pic with some white paper behind it. The Angel was printed onto acetate and then decorated with glitter and some netting.
This one was an outside-looking-in card and again the box was made to fit the card to make it more of a gift.





I'm going through a phase of making Quad cards at the moment - they look so complicated but are really very easy. I just loved the way we decorated this one.





More printing on acetate and a bit of rubber stamping...Santa & Sleigh are actually stamped on the card behind the printed scene on the acetate.




I have loads of ideas for more Christmas cards but it is getting the chance to sit down and put them into practice. Still, at least I've made a start - how many days to Christmas?................................

Yuck, yuck, yuck...

...if there is one thing that I hate more than ants it's FLYING ants. They make me feel all itchy.

The walk home from the station this evening was horrid.

The platforms at the station were swarming with ants (flying & non-flying varieties) and the walk from there home was truly YUCK - forever being bombarded by the nasty flying things. Gosh I'm glad to be indoors, but I still feel itchy.............

Well I said I'd been...

...busy. Here is the proof.

A wonderful 3D LO inspired by Carole Janson (see link to the right - under blogs).

This was what I did today at the monthly Artbase Sunday crop.

Margaret came up with this fabulous idea after seeing some of the lovely 3D work that Carole does and shows on her blog.

One of the things behind todays project was to use lots of punches (you know, the ones you just had to have but have never seen the light of day since you got them home LOL) and some die cutting.

There were little circles, BIG circles, tiny & large flowers, hearts, squares, leaves and grass.

Most of the elements are attached to the LO on acetate hinges.

A bit of inking, some blinging-up with Stickles and some pretty little flowers cut from Core-dinations card and then sanded.

I've taken loads of pics of sections of the LO so you can see some of the detail.

Making up the various elements of this LO was what took the time but once they were done it was quick and easy to put everything together. Although you might not realise it, this LO will lay flat and slip into an album but for the moment I am enjoying having it sat on the mantlepiece.

Kristy came along to this and this was her first 'All-day' crop. She was very pleased with herself as she managed to get everything completed before the end of the crop - and a fab job she did too......................

No Internet didn't mean...

...no crafting. In fact, it has been a busy week.

On Tursday, I took Kristy to her first scrapbooking craft class. Margaret & Emma at Artbase decided to start some daytime classes and the first was this super mini house shaped book.

Although there was a slight mishap with a craft knife to start with, resulting in Kristy wearing a very fetching plaster LOL she was soon up and running and completing pages at a rate of knots.

These are pics of my book.






The base house was designed and cut by Artbase and the papers were from one of the Fancy Pants ranges. We had a fab time with this book - it's amazing what can be achieved in a couple of hours. Kristy loved using the Fiskars border punches and despite this being her first class of this type she had everything finished but the front cover (this was completed as soon as she got home and I'm sure there will be pics over on her blog very soon).

A fab class - thank you Margaret & Emma. What's the next one going to be...........???

I'm back...

...on-line, that is.

Gosh how I've come to rely on Internet access and really don't know how I managed before I had it cos I don't cope too well when it goes missing LOL

Spent a fab Saturday with my niece at Barleylands - farmers market, lots of scrummy stuff to nosh and then Christmas in July at Pinnacle Crafts. Some super bargains amongst the vellums and mirri card...20p a sheet, YES!!! I did say 20p!!!!!

Well, off to an Artbase crop today where we will be making a 3D LO.



In the meantime, let me wish you all a Happy Christmas (in July) and point out that there are just 166 days until the real event **runs to hide before someone throws something at me** LOL........................

Off-line for a while...

...hope to be back soon.

My PC at home is playing up at the moment so I've lost email & internet access. Whilst I can access most of my internet forums from my work PC I can't leave comments on many of my favourite blogs - sorry. Please do not think I'm ignoring you.

I hope it won't be too long before the PC gets sorted. Hope to be back soon...........

Cut & Fold...

...or Quad cards are easy - honest.

There are some very good basic instructions on the Pinnacle Blog

The cards are really only a sheet of A4 with four folds and two cuts - the decorating can be as simple or as complicated as you wish to make it but is very easy to do cos you are working on a more or less flat surface.

Thank you for the comments received about my card - why not have a try yourself, they really are very easy.................

Playtime...

...and another card.

The other morning I was channel-hopping whilst drinking my morning coffee. On Create & Craft they were selling a pack of card blanks that looked really strange - didn't have time to stop and see what they did with them. Then yesterday on the Pinnacle Crafts blog they had the same design with a few samples - so I thought I'd have a go.

Here is my first play at making one of these cut and fold cards.


You can see from the top view that they look a bit funny, but I love the effect.

I used a sheet of A4 embossed silver mirriboard for the base card, some foiled black & silver card as matting and some foiled decoupage on the centre panel.

I rather like this type of card so I think I will be having a further play..................

One of these days...

...I will learn how to copy blinkies.

I follow the blog "Cuttlebug Challenges" and they have made available a blinkie link to the Provocraft site. Unfortunately, my success with installing blinkies is still more MISS than HIT but at least I managed to install a linked piccie over on the righthand side LOL

I will keep trying (yes I know...I'm very trying) **rollseyes**..............

EDT: As you can see - I've managed to add the Cuttlebug Challenges blinkie, and it blinks...YEAH!!! Unfortunately the link doesn't work - back to the drawing board LOL..................

EDT2: Rebooted and the blinkie link is working...well at least for the moment................

Soooooooo...

...hot this week.

They say we Brits are obsessed with the weather (LOL) but it is true...for weeks we have moaned about wind, rain and temperatures that haven't met our expectations for the time of year and then this week arrived...

It has been sooooooo hot this week, but not a nice hot (IYKWIM).

Now I can do hot, honest, I really can...but this has been yucky hot - can't sleep at night hot - outside like open oven door hot - can't breath hot.

Over previous months I've 'commented' (okay, moaned about) the Air-con at work. I've told you all how noisy it is and how it is like sitting in a force 10 gale - this week, couldn't care less (LOL), our floor/wing has been the only cool area of the whole building...we have never had so many visitors (hehehe), any excuse and folk have been wandering in - ain't it nice to be popular LOL

The Air-con hasn't been fixed so when this hot spell is over I'll be 'commenting' again, I'm sure. In the meantime........................