P is for Professor.

Hello crafty peeps and welcome to my crafty nook! A special welcome to my new follower Natalie "Hallo Natalie, ich danke Ihnen für immer ein Anhänger." I hope that is correct - I used Google Translate! As promised I have another card to share with you, this time it's my entry for the Passion for ProMarkers Blog Challenge week 285 - Letters of the Alphabet. I bought some Morehead stamp sets from Crafter's Companion from the sales section and I've been dying to try them out. For this card I used the set called 'Professor' and teamed it with papers taken from the DCWV paper stack called 'Homeroom'. I am very lucky to have quite a few of the older DCWV 12" x 12" paper and card packs because I won them about two years ago from QCME magazine. I've been subscribing to Quick Cards Made Easy magazine for years and one of the best things about it used to be a monthly card making competition which unfortunately they stopped over a year ago to have giveaways instead. I loved the challenge of coming up with a card to fit the theme (rather like I do with the PFP challenge) and over the years I've won around half a dozen times though I only had a card featured once (they only showed 3 cards but had prizes for 10), funny enough the one card they featured was my least favourite, it had to be based on a Christmas carol or song and I chose "Santa Baby"  - it was far too cluttered for my taste.

P is for Professor

I cut the papers to size and rounded the corners of the black patterned paper and stuck them down with glue in the above arrangement then I stamped the image using Memento Tuxedo Black ink and coloured it with ProMarkers. I fussy cut around the image and adhered it to the card using foam tape. I die cut an apple using a die from Clearly Besotted Stamps and covered the main part of it with Versamark ink and covered that with Claret embossing powder which I heat set using a heat tool. Once it had cooled down I covered the leaf and stem section with Versamark ink and green embossing powder which I also heat set. When I was using the heat tool I held the apple using a pair of tweezers and heated it from the back to get a smooth finish. Once it was cool I added a clear gem and attached it to the card using Dovecraft Clear 3D Pearl Effects. I added 3 stars in different colours and sizes to the top left hand side as shown.

Close up of the Professor

I'm afraid this picture doesn't show how shiny this apple really is :(

I'm trying something new for taking photos and although they're not as crisp as I'd like, I do think the quality is slightly better than normal. I hope you've enjoyed sharing my latest card - I don't have any plans for it at the moment but I think it would make a great card for a boy finishing Primary school and starting high school. I'm sure my beloved hubby would say it's too cutesy for a boy *rolls eyes*.

As always if you have any comments or questions, please leave them in the section below or use the comments form in the sidebar. I love reading all your comments and try to leave a reply promptly on the post it's addressing. I'm in the process of making a first anniversary card for one of my favourite friends but I won't be sharing it until the actual day. I've got three mother's day cards to make too so hopefully I'll have something to share with you all very soon, until then - keep crafting!

Love and crafty hugs,

Sarah xxx

Card Share - Then I really "mustache" lol

Hello crafty peeps and welcome to my crafty nook! I hope you all enjoyed your weekend as much as I did. I think having the girls to stay has worn Chris out, that and staying up until 4.30 am listening to the cricket because he's gone back to bed, bless him. Gives me a chance to add a post about the card I made for my sister's partner Simon though so I'm not going to complain.

I always find men's cards challenging, even more now since my beloved told me "Men don't like cards featuring rabbits going fishing!" - cheers for that little nugget dear husband, now what I'm I supposed to put on male relatives cards??? After seeing this card Chris wants a mustache card too and he'll be getting a rabbit fishing card WEARING A FALSE MUSTACHE card and like it lol.

For screen villains everywhere....

I made this card using a Darice Mustache embossing folder which I covered with white pigment ink on the negative side so the kraft card that I put inside got swiped with colour on the background but the embossed mustaches remained mostly kraft colour, I rather like the chalky effect you get using this method. I diecut the mustaches out of plain white card using a Cat's Pajamas die set and I coloured in the diecuts using ProMarkers. The sentiment came from the coordinating stamp set and both are available from My Mum's Craft Shop for £10 for both in the sale clearance section. Just a little word of warning though, I've ordered twice from this site and both times I've been contacted by the owner to say that one of  stamps I've ordered was no longer available and as they were from the clearance they wouldn't be getting any more in. As much as I appreciate getting the option to have a refund or a replacement item (one site I went to just refunded me when an item was out of stock!) it's a bit disappointing to have to change my order twice in a row, so although I'd recommend this site don't have your heart set on the clearance items as you may be disappointed. Of course they may have sorted out their computer glitches by now. Anyway back to the card - I stamped a speech bubble around the Curses! Foiled again sentiment using a stamp taken from Clearly Besotted Stamps set called "You Said It!" which I fussy cut round as I don't have the coordinating dies. The largest mustache and the speech bubble were both stuck to the embossed panel using double sided adhesive foam tape. The three smaller mustaches were glued down using Dovecraft's clear 3D Pearl Effects as I wanted to use a quick drying strong adhesive on the uneven surface. I rounded the bottom two corners using scissors then layered it onto black card and finally onto a pre-scored card blank.

Inside of the card

I used a sentiment taken from another Mustache themed stamp set but this one is by Hunkydory, the mustaches above and below are from the Cat's Pajamas stamp set and I left them uncoloured.

I stamped this fun sentiment onto the flap of the envelope as a bit of a teaser to the contents.

Tomorrow is Tuesday which means another challenge over at the Passion For ProMarkers blog so hopefully I'll have a new card to share with you all in the next few days. I find some challenges easier than others which is why I sometimes post the day after but if I find the challenge difficult it takes longer for it to be posted as I need more thinking time - sometimes of course I'm overwhelmed by choice which takes me even longer still! I'm not sure how the other bloggers do it but I make a new card for each new challenge, I don't just adapt what I've already got made. My reason for taking part in the challenges is to stretch myself creatively and practice my ProMarker colouring techniques so if I just added a few pearls to a previously made card so it fulfils the challenge criteria, I wouldn't be staying true to my own objectives. This is in no way a criticism of anyone who does do that by the way. Crafters tend to be busy people and might not have the time to make a new card for every blog challenge. *steps down from soapbox and stashes it away in a corner of the crafty nook* As always if you have any questions or comments then please leave them below or use the comments form in the sidebar. I hope to have a card or two to share with you in the next few days but until then - keep crafting!

Love and crafty hugs,

Sarah xxx

Life Update, Teeny tiny Crafter's Companion Haul and a Card Share

Hello crafty peeps, welcome to my crafty nook! I hope you've had a brilliant weekend. We had Millie and Bethany stay overnight and it was fantastic - I've really missed having them over so we're planning on making it a regular event again. Bea - bless her - started crying when she realised she was being left with us (you'd think we were child torturers or something!) and sobbed like her heart was going to break. Sue decided to go outside and stay there for 10 minutes in case Bea didn't settle down but by the time Sue had got to the stairs Bea had already stopped crying and was happily playing with Millie. I'm afraid I had to giggle, she does this every time she comes to stay and poor Sue gets racked with guilt, my little niece is a master manipulator - I'm worried it's going to end in minions and world domination! lol.

One of the best things about having the girls was doing a bit of crafting with them. Bea is still at the scribble over everything stage which means that if you give her a stack of  scrap paper and some crayons she'll as happy as Larry but Millie is old enough to actively take part and is always keen to make a card or two for her mum and friends. I've just realised that apart from watching "Frozen" on DVD with them last night, the TV wasn't on the entire time they were here!! Part of that was down to the fact that our Freeview remote has broken and I have to press the channel changer button on the top set box to change the channel and since they switched the kids channels round, they're channel 120ish I think instead of in the 70s. I love my nieces but not enough to develop callouses from pressing a button 100+ lol. The second reason is the girls were just enjoying playing with the few toys we have here for them and with each other oh and their DS players lol, I honestly don't think they noticed the TV wasn't on. Anyway back to Millie's crafting. I don't actually have a card to show you of hers because we started crafting around 2pm and Sue was coming to pick them up at four so we made a little card kit for her to take home and finish. Mother's Day is next month so Millie had a look at some of my stamp sets and chose a fairy image and a bear holding a present then she had a go at stamping. She also chose a backing paper which I cut to size for the 5" square card blank and we die cut a stamped sentiment out. She also wanted to make a wedding card for her mum's friend and decided to use the same image as I've chosen for an anniversary card (please excuse me not going into detail but the recipient reads this blog and I don't want to spoil his surprise) so she's taken that home to colour too. I'm really looking forward to seeing what she comes up with.

As to my own crafty adventures, I got a small haul from CC last week - Gelatos! I ordered the Steampunk selection because I like the colours included and love Steampunk plus it was the cheapest set they had at only £8.99 plus £1 p&p. I've had a bit of a play and I do like them as a watercolour medium especially using a wink of stella clear brush pen instead of plain water but I'm not keen on using them as a crayon.

I'd also like to share a card I made the other day. It's a diamond accordion fold card featuring A crafter's Companion Scruffy Little Cat image called "Lola", it's very similar to the one featured on this blog in a previous post but I've used a bubbles embossing folder (also from Scruffy Little Cat) and my new favourite product Dovecraft 3D pearl effects in cream and clear.

Her name was Lola....

I should have put feathers in her hair...

She likes to wear her underwear... ok I admit I don't know the lyrics!

I'm really chuffed to find out today that someone has repinned the other Lola card I made onto a Scruffy Little Cats Board on Pintrest and I showed the girls the board while they were here, Bethany fell in love with one of the images Ashleigh but at 5 and a half there is no way she'll be getting a card with it on any time soon. I think the images are too old for little girls plus I have loads of cute images that I'd rather use on her cards. I've actually started making Bea's card already even though her birthday isn't until August, unfortunately the craft gremlins have stolen the stamped image I was planning on using. I can't believe it's gone missing - I'dfinally managed to do the hair with highlights too!!! I'm hoping it'll turn up when I go to tidy it up later *shudders* I'm not looking forward to tackling the mess that's in there at the moment.

If anyone's interested in details of how this card was made, please leave a comment below. I have another birthday card to share with you tomorrow but I want the person it's for to see it first. You may have noticed the new Facebook badge in the sidebar. I'll explain the reasons for joining another time but please feel free to go check out my page, I share cards etc on there but a lot of the stuff is blogged anyway. Until next time - keep crafting!

Love and crafty hugs,

Sarah xxx

Masquerade Ball card Entry for week 284 - Perfect Pearls

Hello crafty peeps and welcome to my crafty nook. I hope you are all having a brilliant week. I'd like to share my entry for this week's blog challenge over at Passion for ProMarkers blog, the theme this time is "Perfect Pearls" and can be any sort of pearl product including half backed pearls, pearl strands and liquid pearls.

Kanban - Magical image with pearls

Unfortunately I haven't had time or the resources to make my white box yet and the main photo of this card is pretty bad so I thought I'd start with a close up of the main image which is taken from an old Kanban stamp set from 2010 called "Magical" which features this main image, masquerade masks, sprinkles and a sentiment. This image is huge so i had to lay it flat on my desk, ink it up then lay my card over it and rub it all over to transfer the ink. I inked the feathers on the headdress using Distress Ink in Peacock feathers then carefully inked the rest using Memento Tuxedo Black ink. I coloured the image using ProMarkers (see list below) I went over the star tinsel with Sakura Gelly Roll Clear Star pen using a dotting action. I added silver Dovecraft 3D Pearl effects at various points and a half backed pearl on her headdress.

Mask embellishment and sentiment

I stamped the large mask from the same stamp set, coloured with ProMarkers and fussy cut it out. I stamped a Feather from a Hot Off The Press stamp set using Peacock feathers ink and cut it out using the coordinating die, I the cut out two other feathers using the same die which embosses the feathers as shown. I coloured these feathers using Salty Ocean distress ink and Peacock Feathers ink as shown. I highlighted the veins of  all the feathers using the clear star pen. I shaped the mask and added a pearl from Dovecraft Modern Back to Basics Christmas to the left hand side of the mask. I took a scallop 8" x 8" card blank and covered it with the feather paper taken from Craftwork Cards Venetian 8" x8" paper pack and cut down a topper from the same set which I added to the mask using Siesta Refillable tape runner.

Sorry this is a bit blurry

I arranged the elements as shown and stuck them with a combination of foam tape and tape runner. I added 3 large half pearls on the right hand bottom corner.

Close up of top half of main image with liquid pearl embellishments

Close up of lower part of main image

Close up of feathered mask

ProMarkers used

Skin - Tan

Lips - Putty and Sunkissed Pink

Moon - Primrose

All purple areas coloured using a combination of  Lilac, Lavender, Orchid and Amethyst

Other areas on costume coloured using Cool Grey 3,4 and 5

I'm not sure who this card will end up being for my mum for Mother's Day perhaps but I like it and for once I'm pleased with how the colouring turned out. The colour combination may be a bit unusual but I really like it and I love how the 3D liquid pearls turned out! 

If you want to join in with the challenge click on the link promarkerchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/week-284perfect-pearls.html I hope you like my entry as always if you have any questions please leave them below or find me on Facebook and friend me! (just click on the FB badge on the sidebar!)

Until next time - keep crafting!

Love and crafty hugs,

Sarah xxx

Some words of thanks and welcome..

Hello crafty peeps and welcome to my crafty nook! I hope you've all had/are having a brilliant Valentine's weekend.

Thank you Lindsay.

I just wanted to do a quick blog post to say a big thank you to Lindsay Weirich aka The Frugal Crafter for taking the time to visit this blog and reply to the message I left on her blog. Anyone who follows Lindsay knows what an incredibly talented and productive crafter she is which makes the fact that she did reply etc even more appreciated. I've taken on board what she said and hopefully once I've made a white box the photo quality should improve though I'm still planning on getting a new camera at some point which should improve them even more - my current camera doesn't have a flash, zoom or any fancy features, it's basically point, click and hope for the best lol.

And Welcome...

My other reason for writing today is to welcome a few people who are new followers. So a big hello to Mynn Kitchen who joined this blog via google+ and another big hello to Cindy Z Stewart who joined via google+ and google friend connect. Foolishly I assumed they were the same thing and I did have the google friend connect button on my blog but way down at the bottom of the posts and who looks there? Once I realised they were two different things I jiggled my layout a bit and moved it to right at the top of my sidebar so hopefully a few more of you lovely blog readers will follow me that way. This brings me to the other people who I'd like to welcome - my sweet email subscribers! I'm actually guessing that I have some because I can't seem to work out how to find out how many people subscribe that way as none of the Blogger stats mention email subbies. So I'd like to welcome you however you follow or read this blog. Although I set up this blog for fun and to have somewhere to display my cards and projects, knowing other people apart from those who know me in the real world read it gives me a huge amount of pleasure.

Last but not least I'd like to share a quick card I made yesterday.

The monkeys were punched out of thin card stock using a Dovecraft punch and then coloured using my ProMarkers and the thanks sentiment was diecut out of black card stock using a Clearly Besotted Stamps words die and the paws paper was from a 6" x 6" paper stack called Bazoo by Dovecraft. The googly eyes were from my stash.

I'm hoping to do a bit of crafting this evening so hopefully (if I can get some inspiration) I'll have a card or two to share tomorrow but if not Passion for ProMarkers will be setting a new challenge on Tuesday. As always if you have any comments or questions please leave them in the section below or use the comments form in the sidebar. Until next time thanks for stopping by and keep crafting!

Love and crafty hugs,

Sarah xxx

Happy Valentine's Day

Hello crafty peeps and welcome to my crafty nook! I hope you've all had a good Valentine's Day, Chris wasn't feeling well today so I left him in bed while I went into town to meet my in-laws so we could celebrate my dad-in-law's birthday. I don't have anything "crafty" to share with you this time but I thought I'd post a new photo of Isobel (she's grown so much!) and also a photo of dad with his lookalike birthday card - which amused him greatly lol.

Awwwww!!!!

Dad and card

As always apologies for photo quality - it's very hit and miss at the moment. I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a peaceful half term if you have children, we'll be having Millie and Bethany on Friday which I'm really looking forward to. As always if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below and until next time - keep crafting!

Love and crafty hugs,

Sarah xxx

Steampunk Silhouette Fairy

Hello crafty peeps and welcome to my crafty nook! Uh oh it's Friday the 13th today so I'll be touching wood and encouraging my fur baby Jinx to run in front of me (but not trip me up like he usually does!) as he's a black cat and considered lucky in the UK. With a bit of luck and avoidance of going ANYWHERE I should be ok lol. In all honesty I'm not that superstitious and the only reason I'll be staying indoors is because we're expecting a parcel today. I've had a sleepless night - it was just one of those times when my brain wouldn't switch off long enough for me to fall asleep - so I pulled an all nighter and did a bit of crafting. I coloured in a Kaisercraft stamped image from the "Suga Pop" range which features a couple of cutesy owls (I love owls) but I haven't bothered to take a photo as it was just ProMarker practice. However I have taken a few pics of a steampunk fairy picture I've made for my sister. 

Steampunk silhouette fairy with metal/card gears and butterfly

 Regular readers of this blog will notice that this is an old favourite of mine in fact I made my sister a card using this image for her birthday last December and she liked it so much that when I offered to make her one in the colours of her choice, she jumped at it. Teresa asked me to make her a picture (for framing) using lilacs and purples so I hope she likes what I've made for her. I started off with a 5.5" square piece of cream card (I used cream because I have loads but prefer to use white card stock for toppers and card bases and for this project the original colour is covered with distress inks) and I covered it with Seedless Preserve Distress ink using a blending tool then I went round the edges towards the centre but leaving a space with Dusty Concorde. I blended both inks together until I got a smooth finish as desired. I stamped the fairy image using Memento Tuxedo Black ink but carefully wiped away the central parts (the veins) of the wings so that I could stamp them with cogs and gears. I also stamped the star dust and mushrooms at this point. My Wink of Stella brush pen is nearly out of ink so after swiping it over the steampunked wings I got a new WOS pen out and prepped it, unfortunately I squeezed a little too vigorously and too much ink came out. Although it's called clear the fluid which the shimmer is suspended in actually has a silver tint to it and as too much liquid came out of the brush tip, my wings ended up silvery instead of it having a bleaching effect on the Distress inks as it usually does. I don't mind too much though because although it almost obscures the cogs and gears etc that I stamped if you move the panel to a different angle you can see them through the shimmer which gives them an ethereal appearance - I imagine a steampunk fairy's wings to be half clockwork and half magic. The solid fairy image didn't stamp as dark as I would have liked so I went over it with a black WOS brush marker. I covered the mushroom caps with a layer of clear WOS and added splodges of it to the star dust sprinkles. I added some silhouetted flowers and leaves from a Lindsay Mason stamp set as shown. Once I was happy with this image I layered it onto black card stock then onto purple/lilac holographic card. I cut a sheet of lilac shimmer card that came from Crafter's Companion (I won it a few years ago in a card making competition with some stamps, rock-a-blocks and spray and stick) to 7 1/4" square and layered this underneath the holographic card. Finally I cut a sheet of dark purple ribbed card to 8" square and added the fairy layered topper to the centre. 

Close up of "Steampunked" wings

Slightly different angle showing steampunk fairy

The pictures above show the ethereal cogs and gears in the fairy's wings. To highlight the steampunk elements of the fairy I decided to add some metal embellishments to the finished piece. I usually add a butterfly rub-on to this image but instead added a metal butterfly using a Dovecrafts 'Metallics' mini brad (I punched a small hole through all the layers first using a WRMK crop-a-dile hole punch) I bent the wings up slightly to add interest to the butterfly. I got a cogs and gears die set from ECAP a while back and used them to cut out card shapes which I either painted with copper Cosmic Shimmer paints (absolutely love these paints!) or I covered them with Versamark ink and double embossed them using silver and copper embossing powders. I'm really pleased with how my homemade cogs and gears turned out because the embossed ones are on par with the metal bought ones. I got a selection of made and bought cogs and gears and added them to the bottom right of the panel using different sized brads - I've even found some Woodware screw top brads which look very steampunky! With the exception of the second from the top cog, the gears and cogs can be moved but unfortunately they don't really move each other - I'm going to frame this eventually so having moving parts isn't exactly a priority.

Guess which gears and cogs are the metal ones?

The clue is the screw brads *grin*

Another angle - the wings are now silver!

I hope you've enjoyed this project, I shall be on the look out for a suitable frame (a box frame would be good) and once it's framed I'll add a finished project photo to this post. I really hope my sister likes it too. As always if you have any questions or comments please leave them in the box below and until next time - keep crafting!

Love and crafty hugs,

Sarah xxxx

SHH! don't tell Chris.

Hello crafty peeps and welcome to my crafty nook! I hope you've all had a good week. Today's card is a Valentine's Day card for Chris. I'd like to enter it in the Passion for ProMarkers Blog challenge 283 - to someone I love. 

Card for my bad bad boy lol

I made this card by folding an A4 sheet of off white card stock in half to make an A5 card blank and then I stamped over the front with A lip print stamp (no idea what brand as I found it in a drawer and it has no info with it - could be Bratz, yes the dolls Bratz at one point it was difficult to buy craft stuff cos I didn't trust internet shopping which is laughable now, so I had to improvise and Bratz had a craft set available) the OX stamp is from a Clearly Besotted stamps set called Just my Type (I think!) both images are stamped in Brilliance Crimson ink and has a slight sparkle to it. I stamped the Acid Drops & Whatnots "Bad Bad Boy" image and text onto a tall scrap of 350 gsm card stock with Memento Tuxedo Black ink and coloured it in with ProMarkers:- Putty Gold metallic Berry Red Warm Grey 1 and 5 plus the blender (I coloured the stocking'd leg with WG5 then removed most of the colour with the blender). I stamped the Wild Rose Studios "Love Circles" sentiment onto a piece of white card, fussy cut it out and coloured over it with the Berry Red ProMarker. I layered it onto a scalloped circle punched out of gold card using a Woodware punch. I embossed a sheet of Colour Connection Red Glitter Card using a Sizzix Textured Impressions folder taken from the Love Set#2. I then cut it to size and layered the topper onto it with a generous amount of wet glue and weighted it down while it dried. I used thin foam tape to stick this layered topper onto the card blank. I added double thickness of foam tape to the circle and added it to the lower right hand side, then added a epoxy circle topper over the sentiment to magnify it slightly.

A slightly better photo?

Love this sentiment lol

For bad boys everywhere...

Close up of Circle sentiment

Naughty, naughty!

Close up of the image coloured with ProMarkers

Because Chris has very little sight, I've tried to introduce texture through the embossed glitter card and I've carried this through to the inside.

Inside of Valentine's card with 3D heart pop up

Closer look at the heart

The stamp set comes with a smaller version of the main image so I stamped this at the bottom left hand side of the card using Memento London Fog ink. The sentiment is a foiled rub on which I've had for nearly 5 years now and unlike other brands still rubs off onto the project perfectly (some brands I've had in the past dry out and stick to the carrier sheet after a few years these ones only cost 50p and are fantastic - wish I'd bought more!) To make the heart pop up I punched out 6 hearts using a Woodware punch and folded them in half vertically. I stuck one half of each heart to another until I had a heart that would lay flat in the card but pop up once opened (with a bit of fluffing). 

I hope you've enjoyed seeing my new creation, if you'd like to join in this week's challenge pop over to the Passion For ProMarkers blog. Until next time - keep crafting!

Love and crafty hugs,

Sarah xxx

Counting Chickens and a card for my Dad-in-law

Hello crafty peeps and welcome to my crafty nook! I hope you have all had a splendid weekend. I'm a bit late posting this because my 'lovely' cat decided to stick his claw into the palm of my hand last week and it's been too painful to craft until yesterday :(. Before I get on with the card I just had to share this with you... Last week I got a letter from my gas supplier e.on to say sorry for the fact they've been overcharging me for nearly 4 years through my card meter and that they would be sending me a cheque in a few days to cover what they've overcharged me in the past, what they are planning on overcharging me in the next two months (you think they'd get their fingers out and sort it ASAP wouldn't you??) and interest on it all. So I got pretty excited thinking that as they'd sent a separate letter in advance of the refund it was going to be a substantial amount because when they got in trouble last time and sent me a compensation payment it just arrived and that was for £37! The next few days were spent daydreaming about what I could buy with this windfall; craft stuff (obviously!), maybe replace my falling to bits camera with a better one - a new bed frame perhaps? (Ours is being held together at Chris's side with string and elephant tape!) On Saturday there was a white envelope in the post (strangely no e.on logo on it though) and excitedly I opened it and glanced at the cheque attached to the bottom of the letter. Now brace yourself..............................................................................

.......£3.92. I shook the envelope out in case a zero had fallen out inside but no such luck! Lol Chris and I howled with laughter, all those pipe dreams for less than 4 quid!!! I'm in two minds to keep it and frame it to remind me not to count my chickens in future, I suppose you could say that e.on sent me a REALITY CHECK!!!! lol

Anyway enough with that nonsense, time to share a card with you. It's my father-in-law's birthday on Saturday (Valentine's Day) and I bought some Crafter's Companion S.W.A.L.k stamps sets from Every Craft's A Pound about 6 months ago. One of the sets I bought was a 'paw'fect pal set called "Prickly" and although the sentiment is a Grandpa one I loved the main image and it reminds me of my dad-in-law so I had to use it.

Close up of "Prickly" Topper

ProMarkers Used

Hair - Ice Grey 1 and blender

Skin - Blush and Dusky Pink

Shirt - Ice Grey 1

Boots - Pear Green and Lime Green

Jeans - Denim Blue, China Blue and blender

Tank Top - Pastel Beige

Gloves - Lime Green

Hedgehogs - Sandstone, Caramel, Terracotta, Cocoa and Henna

Grass - Grass

Tongue and Ears - Salmon Pink

Flower - Lime green, Lime Zest and Red

Birthday Card for Dad

Close up of Topper

Sentiment from Clearly Besotted Stamps mini banners stamps and die

The sky was coloured in using Dovecraft 'Brights' chalks and the sentiment was stamped onto Kraft card using my usual ink. The square brads are Making Memories and the baker's twine wound between them is from Dovecraft. The paper is what I had left over from making Les's birthday card on my last post. I added some Dovecraft 3D effect clear pearls onto the boots and the hedgehogs' noses to make them shine.

I hope you like my latest card - they'll be another Challenge on the Passion for ProMarkers blog tomorrow so once I've made a card I'll post it here on this blog.

Until next time - keep crafting!

Love and crafty hugs,

Sarah xxx

Acid Drops and Whatnots "Does my bum look big?"

Hello crafty peeps, welcome to my crafty nook! Nearly the weekend again, not sure where this week's gone. It's my hubby's best friend's birthday on the 10th and Chris asked me to make a card for him. The timing was perfect because this week's challenge on Passion for ProMarkers is "One For The Boys" (male themed makes). There isn't a lot of ProMarker colouring but it is there on the stamped image so I'm entering it in the challenge but plan on submitting a second entry once it's made.

Acid Drops and Whatnots card

For this card I used a stamp set from one of my favourite company's - Acid Drops and Whatnots, I don't have a huge collection of the stamp sets but I try to purchase a couple or three sets every time they have a sale. The featured stamp is from their last sale (aciddropsandwhatnots.co.uk click on this link and then on the Sale Stamps and Topper Sets to purchase this stamp set for the reduced price of £6.99) and is one of my favourites as it's one of the few stamp sets I own which are suitable for men's cards. Because it's a vintage image I wanted to keep the colours muted (ProMarkers used are Caramel, Putty, Almond, Sandstone, Cool Grey 1 and Vanilla) and just added a splash of colour to the lady's hat by adding a small red gem. The papers are cut down from a Dovecraft 12" x 12" paper pack and I'm afraid I can't remember the name of it as I bought it 6 years ago and the front cover's gone walkabout - those pesky craft gremlins probably stole it! The card base and card layer are both Kraft card purchased from my local craft shop and I used a sentiment taken from a Kirstie Allsopp stamp set that came free with one of my craft magazines, probably Simply Homemade or Crafts Beautiful. I stamped it on a piece of scrap kraft card using my usual ink. The inside of the card is stamped using a sentiment taken from a Docrafts Papermania stamp set from the Heritage Press range. Here are a couple of additional photos.

Nice Aim Madam!

Inside of card.

I had a lot of fun making this card and I really hope Les (Chris's friend) likes it. If you'd like to follow along with this week's challenge click on the link promarkerchallenge.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/week-282one-for-boys.html. As always if you have any questions or comments please leave in the box below or use the comments form in the side bar. Until next time - keep crafting!

Love and crafty hugs,

Sarah xxx

Haul from Sizzix

Hello crafty peeps, welcome to my crafty nook! I hope you all enjoyed the weekend. We're experiencing some wintry weather here and even with the central heating on the flat is freezing! As a result I haven't done a lot of crafting this weekend but I did get my order from Sizzix today (Monday). I ordered some dies and embossing folders on the 16th January during the sale as my lovely husband gave me some Christmas money for craft stuff (always the best present) and it's certainly taken it's time to be processed - though I noticed they took the money out of the account pretty darn smartish!

I did my usual trick of not reading the small print in the description (I get too excited about potential new craft stuff) and I ended up getting three sets of Movers and Shapers dies which technically speaking actually need a special metal base tray or Movers and Shapers base dies to work neither of which I've actually got. However I discovered that if you put the card on the bottom cutting plate and lay the die on top of it face down, you can cut out the shapes as long as you add loads of card shims to it depending on your machine - I ended up using 3 mountboard shims and 3 card shims underneath the bottom cutting plate to make it cut all the way through, using a couple of the dies in one go helped too as they are rather small and it helps keep the cutting plates balanced if you use more than one die.

Eileen Hull Heart & Label Die set £2.75

Tim Holtz Mini Bird & Cage and Mini Crown & Fleur  £2.75 ea

Here are the photos of the rest of my purchases.

Originals Bird Cage (£2.24) and Peacock (£2.75) Dies by Rachael Bright 

Thinlits Leaves, Garden Dies by Susan Tierney-Cockburn (£3.74)

Sizzlits Die sets Decorative Vintage and Butterfly #2 @ £3.74 ea

Mason Jar Bigz Die with....

...Bonus Mason Jar Textured Impressions! £4.50

Echo Park Framelits Die and stamps For The Record#2 £4.99

Hero Arts Framelits Dies and Stamp set Chandeliers £4.99

Ferns & Seed Packet Embossing Folders £1.99

Texture Fades Embossing Folders Bingo & Patchwork by Tim Holtz £1.99

Close up of Patchwork Embossing Folder

Close up of Bingo Card Embossing Folder

Some of the things that I would have liked (some angel wings and a flying heart for example) had already sold out by the time I got to order but I'm really pleased with what I got and I'm so blessed to have a lovely husband whose so indulgent of my crafting obsession. I'm especially pleased to have the Tim Holtz embossing folders and the Mason Jar Die w/bonus Textured Impressions folder as I've wanted both for ages. Once my crudy's warmed up a bit I'll be playing with my new goodies and I'll share with you what I make with them. If you have any questions or comments, then please feel free to leave them below and until next time - keep crafting!

Love and crafty hugs,

Sarah xxx

P.S. OMG it's sleeting at the moment and there's just been 3 bursts of thunder - I nearly fell off my chair!! It's about 3.45am btw and as I couldn't sleep I thought I'd surf YouTube. Think I'd better log off in case we have lightning next!! - Just had to share xxx