Gathering Holly

1. White pearlescent white card

2. DP from Artylicious Seasons Greetings CD (colour changed to suit)

3. Main image mounted on to white pearlescent card that was double edged with thin silver border peel offs.

4. Corners made with Cuttlebug die from white glitter paper and rhinestones added.

5. Blue organza ribbon with a Dress It Up crystal snowflake.

6.The sentiment is a rubber stamp from Kodomo Inc, stamped using Brilliance Mediterranean Blue ink pad.

Kept it simple as the picture is so delicate I didn't want to overwhelm it. Thanks for looking and enjoy your weekend.

TK & KS

PS. I've got another card scheduled for later (17:00 GMT)

Triple Snowflake

Hello again,

Here's another card I made while I was ill. I got the inspiraton for this card from a lady named Unni, to see the original card click here. Isn't it lovely, well I just had to do a version of it. so here it is...

1. Base card is Stardream white pearlescent card

2. Dp with text is a freebie I found on the web sometime last year, originally it is red and gold but of course I changed it to blue. The snowflake DP is from Artylicious Seasons Greetings CD rom again changed to suit.

3. The silver strip down the middle is a wide silver border peel off that is normally just flat, but here we go again, I changed it by putting it in my Swiss Dots Cuttlebug embossing folder to give it a bit more interest.

4. The snowflakes were made with a Wizard snowflake shapeabilies die and the middle snowflake is made with a QuicKutz singleKutz die. they have been coloured in with Sakura clear Stardust gelly roll pen. Then the first is secured with a pearl brad, the second with a plastic flower and star brad and lastly a silver star gem.

5. The sentiment is computer generated, mounted onto silver silk mirri card and the whole lot edged with thin silver border peel offs.

I think if I did this again I might put some of the snowflake layers through an embossing folder or maybe stamp with a background stamp and heat emboss. But I must confess I'm not that impressed with either die. The Wizard one because I had so much trouble trying to get the pieces out I bent the die, not to bad that I cant use it, but I shouldn't have had that problem. And the QuicKutz, well all you get is two arms of the snowflake and you have to build it up,

so you end up with a middle thats about 3mm thick! I cut the middles of mine and diguised them with the flower. Had the dies been more user friendly this would have been a quick card, but hey ho it's done now. Oooo I just thought I could have done a gate fold card. See, typical I get all these ideas now it's finished DOH!

Toodle pip, take care & keep smiling

Cupcake Challenge 16 - Chocolate Christmas

Hello people,
that cold I thought I was coming down with on Sunday hit with a vengeance Monday. I've ached in places I didn't know you could ache, I've been hot, I've been so tired it was untrue and now I've got a sore throat and am losing my voice, but apart from that I feel great! When I haven't been asleep I have made some cards the first of which I decided to enter into the Cupcake Challenge, which calls for a vintage card. You will notice that the main image, the DP and the sentiment stamp are ones I've used recently on other cards, my excuse is my brain has been too tired to come up with anything original, plus I like them...

OK from the base up...
1. Stardream bronze pearlescent card
2. DP is from Artylicous Seasons Greetings CD Rom, again I change the colour and coloured the berries in with Sakura gold stardust gelly roll pen, then sponged the edges with Versafine Vintage Sepia and Brilliance Galaxy Gold ink pads.
3. The label/tag was just plain but I found a picture of some Christmas sheet music and printed it on to the tag, again went round the edges the same as I did with the DP and added a gold organza bow and loop.
4. The main image is from Joanna Sheen's Victorian Christmas CD Rom, mounted onto a gold silk Mirri card die cut Nestabilites.
5. Prima flowers that were sponged with Brilliance gold galaxy ink pad. The red stamens came from my Blooms to Go set, they were yellow, but I rolled them around a Brilliance Rocket Red ink pad (as you do) and then added the sentiment to the largest flower. The sentiment seal is from Magnolia Rubber Stamps. Last but not least some little leaves that I actually left alone.
Not sure about the flowers, I could do with some holly leaves, but I haven't found any I like...yet.
Thank you for popping by and I'll be seeing you again real soon.
Take care & keep smiling

Little Victorian Snowball Fun

Howdy doody y'all,

Sorry about that appalling American accent, but today when I went into work one of the girls there showed me a "review" of a show I went to see last week at our theatre. It was an amatuer production of "The littlest whorehouse in Texas". IT WAS FABULOUS, it was funny, the singing was superb and the acting was excellent, well it was that good I went to see it twice. But this so called critic did nothing but moan about the scantily clad women and the excess use of swear words when children could have been in the audience!!! Excuse me, but what parent would take their child to see a show with a title like that, and anyway on both the nights I went the youngest people there were probably at least 16-17 and they probably swear a whole lot worse. And as for scantily clad, you see more flesh on the TV. Hmmmph, I think that "critic" should stick to reviewing children's programmes. So all day now I've been singing songs from the show, with the Texan accent, not out loud though, everyone thinks I'm mad enough without proving them right :) But now I've had my moan I'll show you my card...

So here's the list of ingredients from the base up:

1 Mars red Stardream pearlescent card

2 Hessian textured gold paper

3 DP from Artylicious Seasons Greetings CD Rom. This is the first one I printed off for my red Christmas card yesterday, but it wasn't red enough so I saved it and used it for this card. It was printed onto hessian card. I went round the edges with a Krylon Red Shimmer leafing pen, and the berries where coloured in with my Sakura Gellyroll Stardust clear pen

4 The Christmas wishes paper was a free paper I found on the web last year, but this is the first time I've used it. This was mounted onto the same gold hessian paper.

5 The little girl image is from Joanna Sheen's Victorian Christmas CD Rom. Cut with my nestabilities and mounted onto, yes you guessed it gold hessian paper again cut with my petite oval nestabilities.

6 Then to finish off I used - Prima flowers, some leaves I found in my stash (YEAH LEAVES), gold rhinestones, red ribbon and finally the corners where cut from a Cuttlebug die from the same gold hessian paper.

I wasn't quite sure about the little girl image when I first printed it out, I think because of the white background, but now it's all put together it looks quite nice. Right I'm off to go blog hopping.

Take care & keep smiling

Two more for Christmas :)

Three posts in one day, well I've had the last two days off so I'm making the most of it. So here's two more for my Dads collection, hopefully I'll get to have a go at the new HM challenge, don't know if I'll get to post it in time, but I'll try...




































The blue card was made (from the base up) with Stardream white pearlescent card, silver Silk Mirri card and the DP is from Doodlebug. I cut a circle out the middle of the DP so the silver card would show through and also I cut the DP a mm smaller so as to get a border. I used a Cuttlebug die to cut the snowflake and added some rhinestones. The outer and inner of the circle has had silver peel offs added ( I had to cut it by hand as the paper was to wide to go through the Cuttlebug, DOH) to hide any flaws. Then using a snow stamp I got from eBay I stamped round the edges of the DP with Encore metallic Silver ink pad, added some blue flat back pearls and some ribbon.

The red card was made using Mars red Stardream pearlescent card. The DP is from Artylicious Seasons Greetings CD ROM, that I altered on my computer as I wanted it to be more red. I coloured the berries on the DP with Sakura Gellyroll Stardust clear pen. The bookplate was made with a spellbinder die and the sentiment is computer generated and the metallic red brads are from Dovecraft.

The poinsettia is actually from a Christmas garland I found in a shop, the poinsettias were strung together with red wool, so they were easy to pull apart. I added some Stardust pen to the poinsettia as well. Then last but not least some 3mm red ribbon. Nice easy cards to make, but tomorrow I'll show you a Victorian Christmas card I made today and I actually used some embellishments (swoon), nothing on the scale of Emilie's masterpieces, but I did take the bull by the horns and went for it. I've even put some little leaves on ! See I'm getting braver LOL. Any way no more posts today (unless I find something REALLY interesting)So until tomorrow..

Take care & keep smiling

PS. Why does my signature keep disappearing? Very strange.

Santas' Work Shop - WHAT, another Christmas Card!

Good Morning,

Yes I'm afraid it's another Christmas card. Well it is that time of year :) ...

This was a quick card for me, but only because I'd done the decoupage topper earlier in the week. I do like these decoupage images, they're from Joanna Sheens' Craft site, and she does post/ship internationally apart from her card stock (to expensive). The green holly card was made with my Artylicious Season's Greetings CD Rom, printed onto some hessian card.

Card Ingredients:

Base Card - Green Linen - from stash

Poinsettia DP - Carolee's Creations, Christmas Poinsettias

Gold hessian paper (topper mounted onto) - from eBay

Poinsettia flower - Blooms to go... Christmas - from Poppicrafts

Gold border peel offs ( edged the gold hessian paper)

Sakura Gell Roll Stardust pens (on the poinsettia flower)

Gold ribbon - from stash

Brilliance Galaxy Gold ink pad (sponged edges of card and paper)

Thank you for looking and take care & keep smiling

Cupcake Craft Challenge 8

Hello again, it's been a gorgeous day, not that I've been out, too busy getting this card finished in time for the Cupcake Challenge dead line. But I did get it finished and I got some decent light to take some photo's of my card, so here it is...

I took two photo's one with the flash one without as certain elements, colours show up better under different lights. The card was made up from one designer company called Elusive Images.

The backing paper was from their Artylicious Season's Greetings CD-ROM . It wasn't quite dark enough for me, so I put it through my trusty graphics program and made it darker, then printed it onto hessian card and then sponged with Brilliance Galaxy Gold ink pad. The oval and circles were made using Nestabilities classics and scallops. The holly design on them is from Elusive Images Christmas Flourish rubber stamp themeplate set, which was stamped using Versfine Olympic Green ink pad. The swirls were highlighted with a gold gel pen and the berries have Stickles Xmas red splodged on. They were then all mounted onto gold silk mirri card scallops. The green panel is just some dark green linen card with another stamp from Christmas Flourish stamp set using Brilliance Galaxy Gold ink pad and again sponged round the edges. The sentiment is from the same stamp set and the same gold ink pad. The ribbon is just from my stash. I like this card, but the photo's are a bit yuk. The gold sponging round the edge of the backing paper isn't that bold in real life, but hey ho I can only apologise for my bad photography :(

Anyway thank you for dropping by hope you like my version of the challenge.

Take care & keep smiling

Calendar - May & June

Morning! Well it's not so cold today but it is raining (now there's a surprise). Today I'll show you the third installment of my calendar...

May - The image is by Alphose Mucha from Joanna Sheens Card Makers Year CD Rom and has been decoupaged and mounted onto gold silk mirri card, and a couple of pink rhinestones. It was then layered onto a pink floral paper that was from Artylicious Fantasy Floral CD-ROM, and then some gold corner and border peel offs added. Then that was put onto a silk effect backing paper from Joanna Sheen's Fashion Boutique CD Rom and "aged with Brilliance Gold Galaxy ink pad. The hardware was made using a wizard die and gold silk mirri card and "aged with Stazon Timber Brown inkpad and a couple of pink rhinestones. Then last but not least the ribbon was from Raspberry Ribbons June kit.

June - The main image is one I found on the internet (sorry can't remember which page) printed onto Ilford Galerie smooth pearl paper and mounted onto silver silk mirri card. The backing paper is from Dover William Morris Designs CD Rom, aged with a green inkpad (can't remember which one). The sentiment is a rubber stamp from Stampland Chicago (yes they do ship outside the US), mounted on silver silk mirri card cut using Nestabilies. The corner swirls are a Cuttlebug die cut from dark green linen card. Lastly the daisies where from ebay, and the ribbon from a craft show.
Right with that done I'm off the continue with my card for the Tilda & Co Challenge 39.
Take care and keep smiling

Raspberry Ribbons Sketch 5 (but I missed it!)

Good Morning, well it would be if it wasn't persisting down with rain, not that I'm going anywhere. Anyway, above is the Raspberry Ribbons Challenge Sketch 5, and as you can tell by the title I missed the deadline :/ (I must be the slowest card maker in the world and the most indecisive) but I thought I'd show my effort anyway. So here it is

The backing paper is one I sort of made myself. Sort of being the blue part comes from Artylicious "Seasons Greetings" CD and then through my VERY old graphics program I added the snowflakes using some free snowflake images I found on the web, and then printed it on some white hessian card. The Cuttlebug snowflake embossing folder wasn't quite long enough for my A5 size card so I did two taped them together then trimmed them down and mounted them onto silver silk Mirri card, and the ribbon hid the join. The little snowflakes were made using white pearlescent paper and punch I found in Wilkinsons (they have a small craft department). This was a simple looking sketch but I found it quite difficult (still a novice) as the main panel is so long and narrow. BUT I have had another idea so I'll have a go at that some other time and if it's any good I'll post it. Thank you for looking, keep smiling, and stay dry!