Christmas Countdown Day 8 - Rustic Snowman

Rustic Snowman

Another pretty, rustic card today using a Molly Blooms stamp I have had for a few years now and it's still one of my favourites.

The card has been stamped with potting soil archival ink, and water coloured with inktense pencils.  I've added some distressing and some Heidi Swapp color shine spray, glitter and a touch of glossy accents for some sparkle.

Happy Crafting

Anna x

Christmas Countdown Day 6 - Rustic Stag

Rustic Stag

Just a quick card today.

Stamped with a freebie stamp from the Creative Stamping magazine in potting shed archival ink.  Water coloured with Inktense pencils and distress ink in gathered twig.

I added some splashes with Heidi Swapp gold Color Shine spray.

The papers are from an old collection of Papermania Christmas papers and the banner stamp is from a Hero Arts set.

 

Happy Crafting

Anna x

Christmas Countdown Day 3 - Angel Wings

Christmas Countdown Day Three

Angel Wings

The gorgeous Tattered Lace angel wings die inspired me to make this card.

The stamp is a Lili of the Valley stamp and I painted it with Twinkling H2O's and Inktense pencils.  The layers are distressed with faded chipped sapphire distress in and there is a splattering of distress spray in brushed pewter.  The snow flakes and wooden shapes where covered with the distress sprat and glittered with stickles for a touch of extra sparkle.

Supplies
Tattered Lace Dies Angel Wings (D1037)
Lili of the Valley Stamp Peace on Earth
First Edition Silent Night Paper Pad
Papermania Capsule Collection Bexley Black Doily
Wooden Stars and snowflakes HobbyCraft
Die Cut Snow Flake cut on Silhouette
White berry sprig from The Range
Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Chipped Sapphire
Tim Holtz Distress Spray Stain in Brushed Pewter
Inktense pencils
Twinkling H2O's
Silver and white bakers twine HobbyCraft
White lace from stash
White cobweb fabric HobbyCraft
Stardust Stickles
White Sequins

Hope you liked today's instalment.

Happy Crafting
Anna x

Christmas Countdown Day 2 - Silver Antlers

Christmas Countdown Day Two

Silver Antlers

I just adore this free stag stamp from Creative Stamping magazine, I've used it on several cards and I plan to use it on some mixed media layouts too.  I love how simple and clean this card looks,  the silver, white and grey just work perfectly :)

Supplies

Creative Stamping magazine issue 56 free stamps
Penny Black Slapstick Cling Stamp Set Christmas Banners
First Edition Silent Night 6 x 6 paper pad
Black Stazon
Stampin' Up Smoky Slate ink pad
Stickles Candy Cane
Metal snow flake charm
Silver and white twine
White card
Holographic silver glitter

This was so easy to put together, you could easily knock up a batch of these in no time.

I matted and layered the Silent Night papers onto a 6 x 6 card blank, inking the edges with the grey ink.  I then stamped the stag in Stazon onto white card and the banner in grey ink and fussy cut them out, not bothering with the antlers ans I also stamped the stag onto the patterned paper.

I popped up the banner with foam pads and added a bow and charm.

The stag was glued flat to the card and the antlers glittered using the silver glitter.

And that's it, so quick!

Don't forget to check out my new Facebook Page

Happy Crafting
Anna x

Christmas Countdown Day 1 - Snow Ride

Life seems to have gotten in the way of blogging one again and here we are in December.

I have been a busy bee creating my December Daily album and getting the few cards I am making this year done.  I now only make cards for close family members as I don't have time to make 50 plus cards lol!   I've also been working on some fun mixed media projects which I'll be sharing soon.

I have planned to update with a new blog post every couple of days through out December, so fingers crossed my plans work out.

I'm also planning to get a couple of videos up, to share my December Daily progress and maybe some handmade ornaments I've made for our tree.

I also have a new Facebook Page, go check it out here

So, onto the first instalment of Christmas Countdown!

Snow Ride

This card nearly went in to the trash can lol!  I originally coloured the image just with Inktense pencils, however, I had done it at night in the living room and the lighting is dismal in there and it wasn't looking that great.  I decided to fiddle with it the next morning and added some distress markers and was much happier with the result, not perfect but heyho it's for my Mum so I'm sure she won't mind lol!

Supplies

Lily of the Valley Stamp Toboggan For Two
Ranger Black Archival ink pad
First Edition 6 x 6 paper pad Silent Night
American Crafts white textured cardstock
Papermania Capsule collection grey doily
American Crafts white glitter paper
White iridescent sequins
Small pinecones
White berry sprig
Red Berries
White Eyelash yarn
White lace
Distress Markers
Inktense Pencils
Stickles Stardust
Sakura Gelly Roll glitter pens in red and green

I just love Lily of the Valley stamps, they are so whimsical and sweet!  I stamped the image in archival ink and then water coloured it with Inktense pencils and distress markers.  I added a few touches of sparkle with the gelly roll pens and Stickles.

The large snow flake was cut on my Silhouette from the AC glitter paper, I inked all the paper edges with distress ink and then distressed the edges with my scissors.

To add some dimension and a extra bit of colour and texture I added the cluster of pine cones and berries.

I really love how the card came together and I hope my Mum will love it too.

Happy Crafting
Anna x

Christmas Countdown Series

Christmas Countdown Series

Hi, I'm excited to announce I'm doing a series of posts to countdown Christmas, with lots of lovely projects to share.

I've been busy with my Christmas crafting, there will be posts about cards, ornaments, mixed media projects and scrapbooking my December Daily album.

The first post will be up on the 1st of December so please stop by and say hi :)  I'll be adding a post every other day throughout December and there may be some blog candy involved somewhere so be sure to keep popping by.

Happy Crafting

Anna x

Happy House

Well here we are, at the beginning of Autumn and this is the first post since the beginning of the year.  How bad is that.  But in my defence I have been super busy making lots of fabulous stuff for work.

Yesterday, I got to have some well deserved 'me' time with my friend and co-worker Kathleen and we had a day out at Art From The Heart.  We attended a Stampotique class with Karen Hayselden and made and adorable wooden house.  I loved the door stamp, my NEED TO HAVE list is getting longer by the minute lol!

Here's what we made

I added my own touches to make it mine, such as shading around everything with a Faber-Castell Pitt artist pen and blending it with my finger and adding the little wooden butterfly and heart which I coloured with a orange Gelato and glittered with Tropical Tangerine Stickles, I added a Tim Holtz game spinner and a little key to finish it off.  I just love it, it now has pride of place in my craft studio.

This was the first class or workshop I have ever attended and I have been bitten by the bug, I had a fab time and Karen was great, it was so much fun.

Hopefully I will be a bit more prolific with my posts in the next few months, it's been crazy since Christmas and will probably get busier but I am learning to be more organised with my time lol!

Happy crafting
Anna x

Steampunk Stuff

Morning ladies and gentles:)

My Brother-in-Law is Steampunk mad and I, also love me some Steampunk too, so as it was his birthday yesterday, I thought I would indulge in a bit of card making (lol!  as if I don't do enough) and made him a Steampunk style card.

Here's the results, quite pleased with it.

I love all the texture and dimension especially the clock face which I created in Silhouette studio and cut on my Cameo, then sprinkled with copper, gold and Tim Holtz distress powder in walnut stain and heat embossed.  The numbers were created using a really old Helix plastic stencil, it's probably twenty years old lol!  Just goes to show I never throw anything away.  I mixed some modelling paste with some mica powders and some early espresso ink refill to colour it, however in retrospect I really didn't need the mica powder as you can't see it.  I spread the paste through the stencil and then covered with distress embossing powder.  Because the stencil is so thick it gave loads of dimension to the paste.  However I got impatient waiting for it to dry and blasted it with the heat gun, even though it had felt dry, it still puffed up.  It did give it a very cool appearance though and the embossing powder worked really well.

For the tag I splodged some walnut stain, gathered twigs and scattered straw on to my mat and spritz with water, then dragged a manilla tag through the inky mess and then dried with a heat gun.  I then spritzed with Mr Huey's dark calico spray and Dilusions white spray and spritzs with some water, dried and then stamped with Ranger archival ink in potting soil and inked with the same three inks I used to distress the tag.

So lots of messy, inky fun, it made a change from the girly stuff I normally do.

Supplies
Inks
Tim Holtz Distress ink pads Scattered Straw/Walnut Stain/Gathered Twigs/Brushed Corduroy
Rangers Archival Ink Pads Black/Potting Soil
Brilliance Cosmic Copper Pigment Ink Pad
Spray inks
Dylusions Picket Fence
Mr Huey's Dark Calico
Stamps
Creative Stamping Magazine free set Timeless Opulence
Craft Stamper magazine free stamp moustache and Glasses
Prima  Tempus Fugit Cling Stamps
Other
SteamPunk Antique Brass Elements from Hobby Craft
Tim Holtz Ideology Memo Pins/spinners
Papermania Chronology Collection Gears/Clock Faces and Label Plates
Manilla Tag
Tim Holtz Cor'dinations Kraft cardstock
Windsor and Newton Galeria Acrylic Modelling Paste
Embossing Powder Gold/copper/Tim Holtz distress powder walnut stain
Distress Crackle Paint Rock Candy
Tin Holtz Gears Embossing Texture Fade Folder

Thanks for dropping by, leave some love in the shape of a comment to let me know what you think.

TTFN
Anna x

Tattered Lace Design Team Cards

Hi all, well this month is already getting away from me, I wanted to post thes cards several days ago but haven't had time to update my blog.  Busy working and sleeping :)

Today's post consists of the cards I made for the Tattered Lace dies released at CHA on Jan 11th.  What can I say, totally beautiful dies, I was sent the padlock & key, the lattice bow, the English rose and the lacy rose dies.  Here's a link to the Florentine Collection

Padlock & Key

Treasure chest card

21st Birthday

Valentines Hearts

English Rose

Climbing rose

Ink dusted rose & lacy rosebuds

Double rose

Lattice Bow

Citrus Wedding Cake

Birthday Boy

Peaches & Green

Well that's all from me, just sorted all my scraps out, I may never need to cut a whole piece of card ever again lol!  I hope you get some inspiration from these.

Happy crafting
Anna x

Busy, Busy

Hi all, slacking again with the blogging but real life keeps getting in the way unfortunately.  Quite a few things to share, I'm having a stall at a local Christmas fair this year so getting some cards together to sell.  This will be the first time I've done anything like this so I'm a bit nervous.

I'm also toying with the idea of becoming a Stampin Up demonstrator, I've been mulling it over for a while and I'm not getting anywhere at work so need to focus my attentions elsewhere because I feel like I'm not achieving anything at the moment.

PS. I Love You
So onto the crafty stuff, first up is a scrapbook layout, I can't take full credit for the layout as I loosely followed a layout I'd seen on Cricut.com The papers are Stampin Up from the holiday catalogue winter frost collection, a very versatile collection as it isn't all Christmasy so can be used on other projects and I just loved the colours. The cardstock is all American crafts in lagoon, stone, robin egg and black. I just loved this photo of my hubby and really wanted to do something with it and love how the page looks :) The arrows are cut from the Cricut Southwest cart in AC slate and the words from Wall decor and more in black and white. I just added a bit of faux stitching in black copic fine liner and uniball broad gel pen and added a few accents to the arrows and flags.

Hey Cupcake
This card was a quicky card to send off to my niece in Canada.  The cupcake was cut from the Sweet Treats cart, paper is from DCWV Sweet stack which is totally adorable.   Plus I got it for a fraction of what it should have cost from The Range, along with a few other sale goodies :)  Lots of stickles in baby blue and glam pink, I used seed beads for the sprinkles and the sentiment is from a Fiskars stamp set called The Sweet Life and is stamped in SU early espresso, card stock is also SU early espresso and American Crafts lagoon I think.

Outer Space
These next two I had so much fun with, inspired by Mary from cardcrazy09 on YT.  She makes the most adorable cards.  Both of these monster were cut from the mini monsters cart, I used scraps for the majority.  The rockets are cut from the just because card cart and the stars were punched out from various punches.  The faces were stamped using the adorable Peachy Keen monster mash face stamps and I did a little extra doodling lol!  Sentiments were from SU birthday sentiments.  the black sky was embossed using the cuttlebug devine swirls folder and the orange planet was embossed with a Tim Holtz texture fade on DCWV glitter card and then I coloured over the top with an orange promarker.  To finish them off I just added a some stickles and googley eyes :)

Adorable Ducks
I have had these stamps since June I think and this is the first time I have got around to using them.  I just think they are adorable, they are from Crafty Individuals and come with a lovely sentiment too.  I stamped the background on SU crumb cake cardstock with crumb cake ink, using the Creative Expressions chicken wire background stamp, the matts were cut from SU early espresso and SU DSP Beau Chateau.  I added some SU linen thread, buttons and a tiny tag I cut on the cricut and stamp a sentiment in early espresso.  I stamped the ducks in Ranger archival on water colour paper and coloured them with distress markers.

Colours of Autumn
This card really started off with me experimenting with some Mr Huey sprays I had bought from Create and Craft when they were selling them off.  I was just messing about getting inky and sprayed some colour, then though I'd stamp some leaves and add some perfect pearls, it turned out very pretty and autumnal and so that set the theme for the next lot of cards I made.  Using the background I had made I just added a simple sentiment as a topper and stamped a leaf, added more perfect pearls and cut it out, added a few buttons and some linen thread and called it a card.  The sentiment is from SU. Cardstock is SU crumb cake and early espresso.  As this ended up being and odd size I made and envelope to match. 

Shimmering Dragonfly
Really the same as the other card except I stamped the dragonfly from Papermania dragonflies urban stamp set, once on the background and once on a piece of cream paper, I embossed the dragonfly with Stampendous fine detail black embossing powder and then painted it with perfect pearls mixed with a little water.  I used a Tim Holtz texture fade embossing folder to emboss the early espresso strip and the cuttlebug mesh folder to emboss the card blank.  The sentiment is from Papermania Vintage notes urban stamps set.

Autumn Thanks
This little set of thank you cards was made using the scraps on my desk, I challenged myself to not use anything that wasn't already out as I keep ending up with a mountain of stuff which all ends up in the scrap pile and never used lol!  All made from SU crumb cake cardstock, SU early espresso ink, SU french foliage and SeeD's leaves stamps set and the squares where stamped by inking an acrylic block with distress ink in vintage photo, spritzing with water and the stamping onto the card stock.  The sentiment is also SU.

Winter Frost
This set of cards were all made using the SU winter frost collection, the sentiment is SU from the holiday catalogue, stamped in SU smoky slate and island indigo.  The shapes were cut on the cricut, as were the snowflakes and the ribbon is from Papermania.  After I had stamped the sentiments I gently sponged some SU illuminate ink all over to give it a subtle shimmer, they came out very pretty and I made half a dozen of these to sell ;)

Gift Card Holders
All these gift card holders were made following Dawn5377's directions on YT.  These were so easy and simple to make and I can see me making plenty more as the possibilities are endless really.

This last item was inspired by Joy of Obsessed with scrapbooking on YT , I don't have the Close To My Heart cricut carts as they are ridiculously expensive to by from the States, with shipping and customs it works out around £100, money I'm not willing to pay, especially as half of that is actually for shipping and customs!!  So I decided I would give it a go using one of my other cricut cuts.  I purchased the Cricut craftroom Exclusive quilted ornaments last year and never used them so thought it was high time I did lol!  I basically followed Joy's instructions but as I didn't have any tulle, I added some roses from Wild Orchid crafts instead and think it came out very pretty.  It's cut from American Crafts, crimson, vanilla, and pomegranate cardstock, ribbon is from Papermania.  It looks really beautiful on the living room door and I think I may make a couple more for my other doors.  Very happy with this :)

That's all for now folks, I do have more to post but need to get the camera out first lol.

Happy crafting

Anna xx

Hiya, quicky update today.  Well I started Weight Watchers again lol!  So far I've lost 6.5 lbs, so pleased about that.  Had a bit of a shock when I last went to get my bloods done, I seriously need to get my sugar levels down and get some weight off!  So it has stengthen my resolve to be healthier. 

On a happier note, we are off to the Lake District again soon, so I am looking forward to getting up into the hills.  It just makes your heart sing :)

Anyhoo, enough of my waffling today's post is really about a couple of cards with totally different themes, the first is a bright and colourful under the sea theme and the other an outdoors theme with earthy tones.

This card started with me messing about with my distress inks, stamps and my gelli plate.  The background peice was made by swiping sapphire blue, salty ocean and peacock feathers distress inks onto my gelli plate and then spritzing with some shimmer spray.  I know that some people say not to use your inks on the gelli plate because it stains, but to be honest that doesn't really bother me as it's just stuck in it's packaging and I haven't used it really.  I may as well use it for something!  The colours seemed much brighter using this method.  I then flicked water and picket fence distress stain on to the inked card stock.  I recently bought Creative Stamping issue 10 and it had loads of lovely seaside themed stamps with it, I stamped the starfish and scallop shells in a random pattern onto the card and then embossed with stampendous white embossing powder.  I wanted the stamped images to pop so  I outlined them with a inktense pencil and just blended it out with a water brush. The white splatters weren't bright enough so I did some more with picket fence distress paint.  

The lovely mermaid image is by Wee Stamps and I coloured her with promarkers and then glittered her with a stardust pen and waterfall and eucalytus stickles. I mounted her onto American crafts cardstock and added some liquid pearls.

The scallop and starfish were cut from the mermaids and pirates cricut card and as luck happened this cart was the free cut for this week on the cricut website :) I then gave them a bit of a sand, added some shimmer spray and then covered them with rock candy crackle paint.  I like how vibrant this is.  It really made a change from the usual pinks and lilacs I usually use for girly cards :)

This second card I made in Mat for my OH's birthday, I've only just got around to photographing it lol!

All the peices were cut from the outdoor man cart, I combined 2 of the scenes on the cart to give me a forest scene with a mountain in the background, we are walking fans and love to get out into the Peak District and the Lake District and as we'd just got back from a fabulous week in the Lake District, this was perfect, he loved it!  All card stock is American crafts and cor'dinations, sanded and inked.  I used some See'Ds texture stamps to add some texture to the path and the area under the trees.

Well that's all for today, I'm off to drink my tea and make some cute gift card holders Tami White just posted on her YouTube. 

Happy crafting
Anna x

A Few More Odds & Ends I Forgot To Post

Ok, so I said I hadn't done much crafting lol!  When I've gone through my photographs I realised I had more than I thought!

My first attempt at an art journal page, this was so much fun!  Lots of stamping, sketching, and colouring with my promarkers.  I drew the poppies on marker paper and then coloured with promarker and cut them out.  Really would like to do more of this!

A cute card for one of my lovely colleagues at work, image from  All That Scraps
coloured with promarkers

 

Red Nose Day charity bake sale poster, I had so much fun making these silly red noses!

Adorable Bunny Bears!!

Spring is in the air, at least in my imagination, it's freezing here and snowy.  Although the sun was out for a few minutes earlier, which I enjoyed while making a cup of tea :) 

How adorable are these, I've gone bear crazy the last few days and cut a ton of teddies from the Teddy Bear Parade cartridge.  I couldn't help making a series of cards with these bunny bears :) The other carts used were mother's day bouquet for the flowers and just because cards for the flower stem. The little butterfly, ladybird (stamped inside, which I forgot to photograph lol!) and sentiment are from Studio G designer clear stamps by Alison Wong and coloured with promarkers.  Card stock is American crafts from the spring and pastels collections.

Happy Crafting and I hope it's warmer and sunnier where you are!

BTW!  The dynamic blog was driving me crazy, it was too slow and clunky on my puter so I changed it again lol!

Anna xx

Cuteness Overload :)

 Three cards, two birthday cards and my first Christmas card of the year :)

This is a tiny 3 x 3 card, the tiny kitty is a Stampendous stamp and is totally adorable.  Stamped with Memento black ink and coloured with promarkers, the flower was made using some freebies won in some blog candy from Ladybug Crafts, coloured with distress stains.
Cardstock is SU crumb cake and AC caramel.

A cute cow cut from Create a critter, the fencing cut from wall deco and more and the tree was stamped from some Nitwit stamps freebies off a magazine and paper pieced.

My first Christmas card of the year, not only did I make a resolution to do more scrapbooking, I also made a resolution to make at least one Christams card a month.  :)

The stamp is a Penny Black stamp, coloured with promarkers, mats cut from Elegant Edges cart and the Tree and bauble cut from Joys of the Season.

Hope you've enjoyed this update.

Happy crafting
Anna x

Scrapbook Pages and Valentines

Forgot to post these last month.

Firstly a double scrap book page, I kind of made a resolution this year to do at least one scrapbook page a month, so this was last months.  We went for a walk in the Peak District, it was freezing cold and the ground was frozen solid, the wind was blowing the rain horizontal and we were walking in the clouds!  But!  We had a fantastic time, the Peak National Park is one of my favourite places.  I used the Cricut cart Camp Out, SU and AC cardstock and SU skeleton Leaf stamps.  I used distress inks to add texture and some See D's texture stamps.  I did a little journalling on the computer and printed it out.

Here's the gift and card I made for my OH for valentines.  The mug was made using Tags, Bags, Boxes and More 2.  The cute little monkey was cut from Create a Critter.  The Card was made in Cricut Craft Room from the Love You A Latte  cart, I weld 2 shapes together to make the card, added the sentiment and stamped with coffee beans from a Fiskars stamp set.

Happy Crafting
Anna x

Mothers Day Cards and Clearly for Art Modelling Film

Quick post today, three cards made for Mother's day.  

All three were made using background papers printed on my new Gelli plate.  Stampin Up Tea Shoppe stamps, See D's Alpha stamps, Kaiser Crafts Sentiment stamps and American Crafts cardstock. 

This is my finished brooch made using Clearly for Art modelling film, coloured with alcohol inks and finished with a layer of Distress Rock Candy crackle.  The seam binding and lace were coloured with promarker and the button and metal piece from my stash.

Happy crafting
Anna x