Wow I can't believe how long it's been since the last time I posted something. Got to admit times haven't been great I'm just hoping 2015 will be better. Anyway what has prompted me to post is I found a blog competition and well thinking I can't always be unlucky I thought I'd have a go lol. It is Imagination Crafts blog where I found the comp, I was looking for ideas using one of their stamps, I have quite a few stencils so when browsing the Christmas clearance section of a website I found some stamps reduced, well it would have been rude to ignore them now, wouldn't it. So part of the requirements for the entry is to add your name to inLinkz, I haven't a clue so my usual is to forget it, but this time I got brave clicked the button to see what happened and to start with managed to link it to Google lol. well after checking everyone else's links and actually reading properly what you supposed to do ie add your post URL, I got brave and here I am. And this is what all this post is about, and what you have to do to take part.

To be in with a chance of winning you need to do the following:

1. Be a follower of our blog

2. Leave a comment

3. Like our Facebook Page

4. Add your name to the inLinkz

I shall leave you now and start putting together so photos for a new post in a few days, I have a day out planned shopping in Truro on Tuesday with my daughter Lyndsey, so fingers crossed the weather will be good to us. 

Take Care

Kath x

I have just emerged from under a HUGE pile of damp smoke smelling washing, I acquired from my son who came back from camping on Thursday. Normally this would have been something gradually sorted throughout the day, but sadly what I now realise was one of my best mates has gone or should I say is going to the great washing machine scrapyard in the sky. I have been hand washing for a week now and I can honestly say this is one make do and mend I do not wish to continue with, fortunately my new machine arrives on Tuesday and I shall be so pleased to see him lol.

 I accidentally came across this card when searching through my photos for the one below. This card always makes me smile as you can see from the picture (not the best one, but I choose it as it shows how vibrant the paints are) it's bright and the glimmer from the Twinkling H20's is fantastic. I have to say that the background ended up in the bin twice as I wasn't happy with it, but it was there on my desk as I was embossing some card and thought it was worth a try, it's final chance before it went in the bin never to return. I used a Couture Creations embossing folder.I couldn't believe the difference it made, I stamped then heat embossed a Clarity stamp with Wow pearl embossing powder and finished it off with a Memory Box butterfly die cut.

 This was the photo I had been looking for. It was my Father Outlaws birthday card and present. Starting with the card, the background was inked using Faded Jeans and Brushed Corduroy Distress ink  the stamped with Sheena Douglass's Crackle stamp from the Ageing Beautifully stamp set. The next layer was a sheet from the Prima pad Engraver which I again inked with the same distress inks and over stamped with Sheena's crackle stamp. I cut a border to the width of the card inked it and stamped with an Inkylicious Striped stamp. I then embossed a Special Touch mask and cut it out, stamped journey from an Inkylicious stamp set and placed it on the top of the border card. I then wrapped twine around the bottom of the card and tied on an anchor charm. I placed border over the bottom of the main card the stamped and coloured a ship from Sheena Douglass's Destination set, I tucked the base of the ship just under the border. I added a sentiment and some tags from a Kaisercraft stamp set. Finishing off with a starfish at the top.

The box was a teabag box i decoupaged with free download from Debbie Moore's website. This was the first time i had decoupaged a box and have since stuck to stamped tissue paper or ready printed papers, as I found the colour ran with the finished box looking rather green instead of vintage brown. I stamped the full ship image and added it to the top of the box. I filled the box with cookies and chocolates.








I also made a label for a bag of chocolates using the
striped stamp and the ship.









I didn't even know I had this photo last week, my son must have taken more photos than I thought, I would have used this one as part of my entry for Sheena Douglass's Design Team.







I'll end this time with a card I made as part of a pack to send to my sister. A simple card to make but such an effective look. I masked off the area and inked it using distress inks, then using Sheena Douglass's A Little Bit Sketchy, Silhouette Wildflowers stamp set, I stamped the flowers and butterfly and added a Inkylicious sentiment.

                                                                   Until next time x

Hi there, it's been one of those weeks, one of those ones that you wish you could go back and start again. But i shouldn't be looking back i should be looking forward, and with that comment i have been rather good this week and started the Christmas cards. I've even made the dogs advent calendar how organised is that. ( Brownie points i think lol). But this is just the start, i dread to think how many i have to make, i think i've made the card that will be massed produced. But i set myself a challenge to try to keep as many of the cards as flat as possible. This is due to postage cost. I sent a letter recorded delivery it cost £1.50, at the same time i posted a Birthday card 90p, if you times that by how ever many cards it is i have to post at Christmas it's going to cost a small fortune. So here are the first of  this years Christmas cards.

                                                                              This is the card i think i will mass produce, i've already done a few more background layers with different stamps. I'm finding the Katy Sue sentiments stamps really useful, they fill up a large space.

 

 
This year there are going to be alot of cards with these dear little elephants, this one with the plant pots is my favorite image out of the range by Wild Rose Studios.

Heres another example, i like this as it's not the usual colour i would go for but it seems to suit the image.

 

This isn't the best photo in the world it doesn't show the detail of the card well, but i had to use it as i love the way the flash has shown the glitter embossing and the shine of the silver embossing on the words. Another of my flat cards, and i've taken to using 7" x 5" card blanks as i been caught out at the post office with some of the envelopes being slightly bigger than A5.

I finally got round to playing with the Hunkydory pearl glittery powder stuff, i can't remember exactly what it's called but it's great for using on to tape round the edge of a layer and it not quite so in your face as glitter. Although it still gets everywhere like glitter. The strangest place i've found glitter was on my guinea pigs back the sun caught as he came to the front of the cage lol.

And finally here is a couple of photos of the advent calendar. Quite proud of myself for this as i worked out how to do it all by myself, i even had to measure lol. But i made a template of it so i have it to use each year. Now i thought it would be nice if i got the dog to model along side of it, so i sat her down and placed a biscuit in one of the doors it was looking good. That was until i took my eye of her a you guessed it the biscuit was nowhere to be seen.

 

 

Heres introducing Keira, you never know there might be a modelling career for her, but not modelling anything edible that you want to take a photo of.

Yes that was the door the biscuit was in.

Well until next time Take Care.

 

Hi, it's Sunday and i had nothing to do, i have been waiting all week for my David Bailey aka my son to take some photos of my latest cards. He dissappeared this morning to go and see Helen Glover's parade for winning a Gold medal in the Olympics. Sooo i tried myself as you will no doubt notice i take a skewiff photo, which is made all the more noticable after i cropped them lol.
         
       Anyway this is going to be a bit of a challenge for me, the second in a week. As i shall be entering the Polka Doodles August challenge. To blog 3 cards one of which is a digital image designed by the talented Emma Canning, the scarry bit is the lady herself seeing how i've used her artwork. My first challenge was earlier this week when i entered one of my cards for a competition, something i've never had the confidence to do before, i've had some lovely comments about it :)

So heres goes, i've never used a digital image before and i can certainly say it has opened my to this way of crafting. I'll definitely be looking into more images.

This has got to be one of my all time favorite stamps, House Mouse. The butterfly die was one of those purchases that i don't seem to get round to using, and the ribbon has been in my box for about 5 years to pretty to use, the rest of the metre has been stashed away. My daughter has informed me that she wants this one for her Birthday, i'm just hoping when November comes i'll remember.

And finally another version of the Whimsy stamp used on one of my previous blogs. I used distress inks to create the background, i love the way it looks as though theres a light shining behind her.

Hi its been along time since my last post, i had good intentions to start with but sometimes life changes your plans. But here i am again. I thought i'd just share a couple of photos of what i've been up to.  But first i must mention the giveaway on the studio12 blog, you are asked to follow their blog, leave a comment and finally make reference to their giveaway on your own blog. Their blog address is studio12creative.blogspot.co.uk if you'd like to take part.

I have to apologise about the quality of the pictures but i had saved them to the pc and the cards have been sent out. Thats a lesson learnt.

The next 2 cards are made using distress inks, i love them but i do find the shabby style out of my comfort zone.

 This was good practice after watching Debbie from Inkylicious demonstrate this. I love pink and brown together.

Tweety birds and feathers you can't go wrong with that combination. 

And finally my sons birthday cake. He's a jaffa cake lover, so i made a chocolate orange sponge covered it with cointreau chocolate ganache, Terry's chocolate orange and jaffa cakes to finish. Its definately a cake i shall make again.

Well it's the weekend again i don't know where the time goes. As i said in my last post i had been asked to make two Birthday cakes, but as it turned out my Son decided that he would have a go himself. So i supervised and he made the cake and decorated, he did a really good job so good that i'm hoping for a surprise for my Birthday at the end of the month. Well i can hope.
            I was due to make a 50th Birthday cake for Tuesday but i received a phone call last night and due to a change of plan i was asked if i could do it for today. So it hasn't turned out quite how i had planned but i'm pleased with it. And i had made some of the roses on Friday so that helped. It's a chocolate fudge cake which is one of my favourites, so i think i'm going to have to make myself one this week.

This is my first attempt at making roses. They were easy to make, i used one of those plastic wallets that you put in a ring folder. Cut the wallet up the sides, then rolled 6 balls of icing placing them on the open wallet. Covered them with the other side and gently flattened the balls with the side of my thumb. Which leaves a petal which is thinner on one side. The first petal you roll to a tight bud then following round with the other petals getting looser as you go. Carefully lay the rose on your hand and use a knife to cut the bottom off.

This is my Sons creation. I think he did a fantastic job for his first go. This was a chocolate fudge cake as well.

I thought to finish off this week i add some of the cards i had made.

This one seemed appropriate going with the rose cake. I used the Creative Expressions Rose stamp plate. And stamped the image 3 times so i could decoupage the rose, the background was made using mimento dye ink with a piece of cut n dry foam. Then stamped over using a script stamp.The card below was made using the same technique.

And finally for this week is a card i made using Joanna Sheen's Jane Shasky CD. I have told myself that i have got to start using the Cd's i have purchased in the past, i have a few which only ever sit on the shelf and collect dust. I have had to start asking myself before i buy anything now do i really want it, am i going to use it and where am i going to put it. The later usually being the hardest decision.

The backing paper is one of the inserts on the CD, i printed the A4 size. I cut the paper nearly in half and used the other half as the insert. The topper i lay on top of the yellow card a cut round it to leave a border. Then cut the 2 flowers on the topper sheet and layered them.

Happy Easter, doesn't time fly next thing you know Christmas will be upon us again. I'm sat here with the smell of turkey wafting around the house and a Christmas pudding waiting to be cooked. We do this every year it's the only two days i insist my family are home together, not a lot to ask.
  I thought this week i would share a couple of my cards with you, as i have been quite productive in the last couple of weeks. I'm yet to take photos of the others.

I love this stamp image, it's been a good one to help me practice the hair and skin with pro markers. I used a backing paper from Joanna Sheen's Jane Shasky cd, then i embossed a strip of core'dinations card through the cuttlebug. I made a rosette to mount my stamped image. The butterfly is a Memorybox die and finally i made a bouquet of flowers to finish the card off.

This image is another from the same range of Whimsy Stamps i love the simplicity of the image. I've used a some core'dinations card and a pack of Papermania papers to layer the card and make the rosette and a Cheery Lyn die for the flowers.








Over the coming weeks i have been asked to make two Birthday cakes so if everything goes well i'll have some photos to share. I'm off to see if dinner is ready before everyone is completely stuffed with Easter eggs.