DCM’s Little Extra

The Daring Cardmakers team are getting us to ‘Look Back a Little’ this week.
We want you choose a card from one of the design team’s cards submitted for the 'Foiled' dare and come up with a card using one or two of the same elements. tricky... !

I’ve chosen to use the same Tilda image and a Silver Star, as Lythan used on her foiled card last Friday. It would seem that I’ve also used the same colours as she did too but that was completely unintentional. The colour scheme came about because I wanted to use my Tres Jolie papers from My Mind’s Eye. They are close to being one of my favorites to use because I just love the quality and muted, subtle colours…..they’re so scrummy!

Roberta Robo was pressed into action for this card, as was my large Daisy punch and my water colour pencils.





Plain Card – Aqua Bazzill
Patterned Papers - Tres Jolie - My Mind’s Eye
Tilda Image – courtesy of Lythan (thanks hun)
Blooms – Prima & Sarah’s Cards
Ribbon and Star brad – my stash
Stickles Glitter Glue – Lime Green
Distress Ink – Broken China

I also thought I would have a go with a set of Tanda rubber stamps that I brought a little while back but haven’t used yet. They are the Native American Indian - Set 1 and I was really impressed with the quality of the images.

Here’s one of the cards I made



I coloured the card with distress inks before stamping the image with Black Staz-On.

It was quite a simple card but you should have seen the state of my hands when I’d finished. Lol!

Foiled again!

I’m a little late with the Daring Cardmakers dare this week but did manage to get my card finished last night and photographed this morning.

It was Jo’s turn to set the challenge for us:

My dare this week is 'Foiled!' -I would like you to utilise some plain old aluminium (aluminum for our friends across the pond!) foil from your kitchen :). You can scrunch it, die cut it, emboss it, ink it, coil it, cover chipboard - or anything else that you choose!






I decided to have a little go at Dry Embossing this time but to do this I needed quite thick foil so I started by folding my piece into four.
I used an outline Peel-Off as the stencil and embossed first from the front and then the back before colouring with my trusty Twinkling H2O’s.
The background was embossed using a Cuttlebug embossing folder (small bubbles) but I couldn’t do it through my machine because I didn’t want to go over the vase of flowers. Instead I laid my foil over the top of it and embossed by hand using an embossing tool.

The foil was then wrapped around a panel of card, edged with Gold marker pen and then I added some Pink velvet ric-rak to the corners before attaching it to the card with Gold Mini Brads. A strip of velvet ric-rak and a peel off greeting were added and a spot more Gold marker pen around the edges finished off the card.

SOLAK - Cross Stitching

Once again the week has just flown by in a flash and I haven’t managed to blog since last Friday.

Tuesday’s Little Extra over at Daring Cardmakers
was intended to be a tutorial from Jo but sadly she was ill (hope you’re feeling better by now hun) and they put in a ‘Tempting Template at the last minute.

I came up with this little card that could either be used as an Anniversary card of even may be as a Valentine’s Day card.



The first thing I did was cover the front of cream card blank with Rhapsody-Euphoria paper from Three Bugs in a Rug. I love this set of papers but unfortunately the colour hasn’t come out very well in the picture.
I cut two strips of cream card and two different sized hearts, stamped all over them using Fluid Chalk Cat’s Eye’s ink pads and my Heart Deco tapestry Stamps and then gave the hearts three layers of Clear UTEE. The hearts and the greeting, which incidentally is a Rub-On that matches the Three Bugs paper, were mounted on the card with 3D foam pads and you’ll have noticed my usual inking around the edges.

I’ve been doing some more charity stitching in the evenings this week for SOLAK
Two more squares for Liridon’s quilt,





Two for Callum’s quilt

And one final one for Annalise


If you have a minute pop over and have a look at some of the wonderful quilts that the girls have put together. I admire anyone who can use a sewing machine the way they do, especially as it’s all for such a fantastic cause.

Hide & Seek

It’s my last Friday as Guest Designer on the Daring Cardmakers team, which is a big shame. I can’t believe those two weeks have flown by so fast but I might still be able to sneak in a Mid Week Little Extra before they kick me off. Lol!

I just wanted to say a big thank you to your girlies for asking me to be a part of your little group……it’s been such fun even thought you managed to find me the hardest dares ever to take part in!

I also want to say a big thank you to everyone who's visited my blog and left lovely messages, it's really kind of you and I do appreciate it.


This week it was Kathy’s turn to set the dare .

Okay, for my dare we're heading to the playground for a game of
Hide & Seek
I'd like you to make a card which has a hidden component of some sort - the hidden part could be a tag, a concealed photo, message or something along those lines, maybe a pull-out or pop-up. Anything goes as long as there's something extra for the recipient to find on your card that's not immediately visible when they open the envelope.

Here’s the card that I came up with



And this is what’s hidden inside

I started out with a White linen card and stamped randomly using a Penny Black water colour effect Daisy stamp and a Big and Juicy rainbow ink pad.
Once this was done I attached the torn corner of patterned Vellum over the top before inking the edges of the card.
The mat and paper ribbon were made from glossy card which I’ve daubed with Ranger Alcohol Inks in Stream, Latte, a spot of Gold Mixative and edged with a Sliver Metallic Marker.

Next the Slide Mailer which indecently was hand made.
I brought three of these before Christmas but do you think I could find any of them…..nowhere to be see….grrrrr.
Anyway, once I had bodged one together myself I gave it two or three coats, inside and out with a Ranger Acrylic Dabber in Aqua and then stamped the front with the same daisy as the rest of the card and finished all the edges with the Silver pen.

For the inside of the Slide Mailer I used an Anita’s stamp with Black Staz-On and then painted it with Twinkling H20’s.



The glass slide on the inside was my first attempt at anything like this but I have to say, I was quite pleased with the results.



I used Ranger inks, in the same colours as before to make the background by stamping the applicator randomly over the back of the glass until I was happy with effect and then turned it over and used the Anita stamp again, only this time I just inked the large daisy part of the stamp with Black Staz-On.
I painted this with H2O’s mixed with a little of the solution that allows you to paint onto Acetate or glass before finally popping the slide into the silver frame with a piece of white card behind it to help the colours show up more and topping it off with a little bow of Lavender sheer ribbon.




The front of the card was finished off with Lavender sheer ribbon, flowers, brads and eyelets, all from my stash and the Daisy, Daisy was cut on my Cuttlebug using ‘Ginger’ Quickuts and Sizzix Skittle Dee De Alphabets.

Lookie, Likies

Yep lookie likies, that’s what we’re playing over at the Daring Cardmakers today for the mid week little extra and that Jane has set us another stinker of a dare.

Now, as you are probably aware, both Lynne and Gillian sadly stepped down from the Design team recently, and all though the DCM team's door is always open for them, we thought it would be nice to pay a little tribute to them in appreciation for all their wonderful work during their time on the DCM design team. Lythan came up with an idea that we make a card in the 'style' of either Lynne or Gillian's cards. Or maybe pick your favorite of theirs and use an element from their cards on your own card. Everyone has their own style- we thought it might be a little challenge to try out a different style for a change!

You’d think it was easy trying to emulate someone else’s style of card making wouldn’t you but I found this so hard you wouldn’t believe.

I chose to have a go at Gillian’s style but the first obstacle I had to overcome was the fact that she seems to use a lot of what I term ‘Artsy’ type rubber stamps. Now I have a fair sized collection of rubber stamps but not one single stamp in this style (if you don’t take into account a Christmas set that I didn’t want to use) so I had to find a way of overcoming this little glitch. Eventually I solved the problem with a bit of surfing and found a set of lovely tag in just the right style to download and print out.

There’s a small heart on one of the tags so I decided to go down the romantic route and went searching again for the words to the Shakespeare sonnet ‘Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?’ and printed this out in a script font onto cream parchment paper.

Next came the fun bit……..I went mad with my Tim Holtz Distress Inks in shades of Tattered Rose, Vintage Photo, Antique Linen and Dried Marigold on the card, tags and the parchment and having spritzed the whole lot with water I added a few coffee granules to the parchment to distress it even further. When everything was dry I added a little Diamond Glaze to the heart for added definition.

I then had to blow the dust and cobwebs off my sewing machine.
It’s lucky to see the light of day from one year to the next is my sewing machine but as machine stitching seems to feature in quite a lot of Gillian’s cards it was a must. Two very wobbly rows of stitching later and the parchment is attached to the card.

Next I needed something to tie my tags to and what better than a piece of Maya Road Chip Board which I covered in Brown Staz-On and secured with an antique looking brad from my stash. The sheer ribbon and metal photo were also from my stash.

All that was left for me to do then was print out the first line of the sonnet in a different font, cut them up and add then to the front of the card………and there you have it…a card that looks nothing like the cards that Gillian makes. Lol!

Sometimes it’s the littlest things that make the biggest difference.

As you may know, I just love to cross stitch and just recently, thanks to a very good friend, I was pointed in the direction of a wonderful group of ladies who stitch for charity.

The group is called SOLAK which stands for Stitches Of Love And Kindness.
They are a non-profit making organisation that was launched back in April 2001 with the intention of making lap quilts for people with long-term illnesses. As time has gone on the membership has grown to include stitchers and quilters from all over the world and I’m very pleased to report that I’m one of their newest members.

The way it works is that people make requests for quilts or cushion and tell us what they would like to be incorporated into it, as in flowers, teddies and the like. It’s then posted on the board and we decide which current projects we want to stitch for, stitch the appropriate squares and then send them to the person doing the quilting. Then, when it’s all finished the gift is sent to the recipient.

I’ve just finished my first two squares for a quilt that has a theme of Flags and American cars and they will be winging their way to my good friend Nicki out in Switzerland very soon to be made up.

Off to see what else I can stitch now!





If anyone has an hour or two to spare and is interested in stitching or quilting for this charity, I’m sure they would be grateful for your help. There’s never any pressure about how much or how little you do and after all it’s all for a good cause so why not give it a go.

You’ll find more info here if you’re interested.

Excited or what!

I can’t tell you how excited I am this week, and to say I’m over the moon is in no way an exaggeration.
I was so thrilled last week when I received an email from the lovely Lythan asking me to be a guest on the design team for Daring Cardmakers
for the next two weeks…..how cool is that……..I just hope I can do them justice.

Jane set the dare this week entitled Me and my Shadow.

I want you to create not just one but TWO cards! But wait........there's more! I want both cards to contain the same embellishments and papers, ribbons etc- but arranged in a different way for a different occasion....the only thing being different is the wording....I'll let you have different wording ! (How nice of me eh?) I'm well aware this is a really hard challenge, and that I have thrown everyone into 2008 off the deep end....but go on- give it a go - I DARE YOU !

Now I don’t know about you but usually when I make my cards I have some of idea of what I’m about to make and the papers and embellishments are chosen with that in mind. In this instance I had no idea what I was about to make so I just sorted through my stash, got together a few things that I thought would go together and true to my recent form sat pushing them round the table for quite some time before eventually coming up with something that looked passable.
The real challenge came trying to make the second card look totally different but hey, I guess that’s what Daring Cardmakeres is all about, isn’t it!

Anyway, I eventually managed it and without further ado here they are.





It might look as if I've not used both the papers on the second card but I have, honest. I've just cut out the flowers from the red paper and used them on their own.

Here’s a little list of the components that went into my cards:

Cream Hammered card stock – Craft Creations.
Paper – Daisy D’s Chasing Butterflies collection
Ribbon – Little Silver Hat
Tilda Rubber stamped image – curtsey of Lythan (when she came over to play)
Happy Birthday – Clear Choice Stamps
Also from my stash
Large Brad
Red and Blue Stickles Glitter Glue
Gold Metallic Pen
Water colour pencils
Computer Font – abc kids

Ever had one of those days...............

.........when you push your craft stash round and round the table but never seem to produce anything that looks in the least bit passable.

Will I'm having one of those today and I'd hate to tell you just how many half finished cards have ended up in the recycle pile.

I did eventually finished two cards for the Little Extra over at Daring Cardmakers though.

Carrying on from Fridays dare we had to make a card using some of the new things we had for Christmas.

I've made two Valentine Day cards using my new Heart Deco set of Tapestry stamps, two different Cuttlebug Embossing Folders, Cuttlebug Vintage corner die and the Sizzlits Love with Hearts decorative strip, all of which Santa brought for me.





I'm also pleased to report that my knee is well on the mend.
Thanks to everyone who left messages (and those that just laughed to themselves at the thought of me hobbling around. lol) Your good vibes seem to have done the trick, the swelling has gone down quite a bit and I can bend it now.

Just Call Me Hop-a-Long!

I’m feeling so fed up with myself at the moment because I can’t get about very well.
It all stems back to an op I had on my Right knee over 20 years ago and every now and then it swells up for no apparent reason. It had been feeling a bit odd (numb) since the start of last week and as the week went on it steadily got worse.

I guess I didn’t help matters by limping my round the sales last Thursday looking for new shoes and by Friday I was unable to bend it at all. To add to the the problem I also had constant cramp in my calf because of the way I had been walking and to top off it started the pain in my hip off again, so since Friday I’ve been able to do very little, other than sit with my leg up and pop Ibuprofen tablets to reduce the swelling.

I eventually managed to get to the doctors this morning and he thinks it’s more likely to do with the ligaments rather than my old problem but said I should keep on with the tablets.

The good news is that I can at least bend it a little bit now and have been able to sit at my craft table today and have play.


Lynne has set the first dare of 2008 for the Daring Cardmakers team and she wants us to make a card celebrating ‘New’ so I decided to do a New Baby card.

While I was sitting with my feet up I used the time to stitch a few panels using ‘Form-a-Line' templates from Card Inspirations. I love doing these and have collected quite a few of them over the years. I've used a Teddy Bear for my card.

What I’ve used

Patterned paper and Blue card – DCWV Baby Scrapbook Kit in a Stack
Baby - Cuttlebug Embossing Folder
Ribbons & Ric-Rac
Large & Mini Brads
Stickles Glitter Glue

Last dare this year

It’s hard to believe that it’s New year’s Eve. This year has just flown by in a flash.

I thought I would end the year as I mean to start the new one……..by taking part in this weeks dare set by the team over at Daring Cardmakers

Team dare year end....4 of the best
Hi All. Today we have decided to revisit your most favorite dares of 2007. The four top dares, decided by the number of comments you made on them are (in no particular order): 'buttons', 'ribbons', ...'and cut' and 'frames'. We would like you to use this week as many of those dares as you like to make your card in any theme and any style.
I’ve managed two cards for this one, the first of which uses my Tapestry Stamps.





I started off by chalking the white card in two shades of Blue and then used a Tapestry Border Stamp and flowers from the ‘Garden Veranda’ set (SFL 34052) to make the background.
I cut the aperture, a frame and a tile using the Creative Memories Cutting System and decorated the frame and tile with the same set of stamps.
I then finished off the card by attaching the frame to the outside of the card around the aperture and the tile to the inside of the card using 3D foam and added the ribbon.


The inspiration for the second card came after seeing a project in a recent copy of PaperCraft inspirations.



Their card used one flower and wire but I decided it would look nice using layered blooms and a painted chipboard flourish. I also added a Chipboard initial, buttons and ribbon.



Now, I was going to tell you about the strange experience I had while walking around the Christmas market in Frankfurt, wasn’t I.

My cousin Jane and I were walking round the market when we came across a stall which was selling ceramic cats and there on the table were several Black, White and Ginger ones just like my BoJangles. Bo himself is a pretty special cat because approximately only 1 in 4000 Tortoiseshells are male and because of his Ginger patch that technically makes him a tortoiseshell.



Now comes the spooky bit……..

People who know me will already know that before I got BO I was ‘mum’ to a very sweet little tabby cat called Emily but sadly she developed Diabetes and had to be put to sleep. I was totally devastated and felt I had let her down by making that decision and it was almost a year before I could bring myself to visit the cat sanctuary and give a home to another cat.
Anyway, there I was, standing in the market holding this Black, White and Ginger ceramic cat when I turn it over to see how much it was and I started to cry. There on the bottom was the cats name…..EMILY.



Jane started to lift all the other cats to see if it was the name of the artist but no, it was the name of the cat and every single one was different.
There were several with the same markings, but this was the first and only one that picked up. It makes me shiver just thinking about it but it was as if Emily was trying to tell me she was still with me, watching me and that some how she approved of Bo.

How could I not buy it after that!
It now sits in pride of place on the shelf right under the cross stitch of Emily that I stitched.

Where did December go?

I can’t believe that it’s been over a month since I last blogged and I feel so naughty for not having taken part in any of the dares and things that were going on.
I’ve just not found the time for ‘fun’ crafting.
I had loads of Christmas card orders and also some birthday cards that I needed to make without all the other Christmas preparations and I also had a little short break to Germany for the Christmas markets so there was simply no time to play.

Our trip to Germany was organised by Alex, an old work colleague of mine. He organizes a trip every year but I’ve only been once before and we went to Cologne on that occasion.
This time we were heading for Wiesbaden, so at 6am on a VERY WINDY Friday morning a full coach load of us set off . Unfortunately our journey was made longer because they had to close the Dartford river crossing due to the bad weather. We sat there in a queue of traffic for over half an hour without moving an inch. The ferries were also running late due to the bad weather conditions and we had a rather choppy crossing to say the least. All in all it turned out to be a very long day, but we eventually arrived at the hotel at around 8pm.

Here’s a picci.


It was a really lovely hotel and very old apparently.
In the foyer we were greeted by the largest Gingerbread house I have ever seen. It must have been at least two feet high and was covered with lots of iced cookies but what made it very special was that every morning there would be a little try of cookies or Stollen placed at the front of it for you to help yourself…..how nice was that!

(sorry it's a bit out of focus)

Our first evening was spent exploring Wiesbaden’s own little Christmas market and ice rink and then finding something to eat and a nice warming cup of gluevine to drink.
On Saturday we spent the day at the much larger market in Frankfurt. I had a bit of a strange experience here, something which made me cry but I will tell you more about tomorrow .



Then on Sunday we were taken out to the much prettier town of Rüdesheim.









It seemed that no sooner had we got there, the weekend was over and we had to face the long journey home again. It was still 'very' windy and we were told there were force 8 gales in the English Channel so to take our minds off it we decided to treat ourselves to a meal in the Langham's Brasserie on board the boat........very nice!

All in all it was a fantastic weekend and I really do hope to go back one day because there’s so much to see there.

Anyway, I just thought I would pop in and let you all know that I’m still in the land of the living despite the lack of crafting.

These last couple of pictures are of Bo sporting his Red Christmas Day bow and playing with the toys that were in his Christmas stocking.

Hope you all have a fantastic Christmas.

DCM challenge - Song without words

It’s Lythan’s turn to challenge us this week from the Daring Cardmakers
and boy what a challenge!

I would like you to create a card inspired by a song or a carol - it could be for Christmas or not! (you may have got all your Christmas cards done by now...) BUT there is a twist. the words of the song are NOT to be seen on the front of the card. You could leave it to us to guess! Have fun!

Here’s my very simple card



Both papers are from the BG Fruitcake collection and I’ve used my tapestry stamps to create a border around the edge of the plain Green one and also on the Cream centre mat. The centre image is from a three panel Magenta Christmas stamp that has been embossed with Gold and painted with Twinkling H2O’s. The whole thing is edged with Gold Marker Pen.
Very easy but can you guess the Christmas Carol?

Another card I’ve made today is this one

Roberta Robo has been in action again and I’ve used yet another template by the wonderful ErikaP over on UK Scrappers.

Thanks Erika for still sharing your fantastic creations with us especially in light of what has recently gone on, it’s so very generous of you.

A Friend To Play At My House

I’ve had a wonderful day today despite the grotty weather because my special friend Lythan came over to my house to play. We’ve not actually managed a get together since the crop in the middle of September so there was loads for us to catch up on and there was lots of chatting and crafting going on.
Lythan brought her new Tilda and Sugar Nellie rubber stamps for me to play with and now I can feel a shopping spree coming on because they were so cute………. and I need them all!
Then, while Lythan was piecing together some cards with images she had stamped and coloured earlier I had a go at making a never ending card. It’s not quite finished yet but I hope to have some photos to show you in the not to distant future. I don’t think it turned out too bad for a first attempt but there’s lots of Gold inking going on to hide some of the not so straight edges. It was fun to make thought and I’ll definitely be having another go.

I've also finally managed to complete last week’s digital scrapbooking lesson and have to say I’m feeling pretty pleased with myself if I’m honest.

In this weeks lesson we were introduced to the wonderful world of brushes and were shown how to load and use them.
This meant some more changes to my layout of an 84 year old hoody and this week they are quite subtle. If you look closely you will see some rather fetching Red scrolls have been added to the White band across the centre of the layout.



Next we were shown how to make our own patterned papers.



Then how to make a brush with our signature on and finally how to make a spotty paper, organising the spacing so it remained uniform throughout.



Now the reason I’m feeling pretty please with myself is because I decided to have a go at making my very own Christmas paper and here it is……drum roll please………



Now I’m eagerly awaiting Lesson 5.

Golden Highlights - DCM's

Yet another week has gone by in a flash and I’m still chasing my tail.
Mainly my own fault because I’ve been out and about with my friend Susan looking at all the lovely Christmas decorations in the local nurseries at Van Hage (Ware) and Crews Hill (Enfield) and doing a spot of Christmas shopping at Lakeside. I also had the dreaded dentist check-up on Friday morning before heading off to Romford with Dad to look for a new cooker. I may be 51 but it doesn’t stop me being terrified of going to the dentist, still, it was all ok and he doesn’t want to see me for another nine months…phew!

I still found time to do my Daring Cardmakers Little Extra on Wednesday, this week’s Friday challenge, and a few other cards that needed to be done so here we go but before we start can I just say a great big thank you to everyone who visits my blog and leaves me mesages. It gives me such a boost when I read them and they are all much apreciated, so thank you again.


Now......this weeks Little Extra

Santa's Little Helper is still trying to motivate us into getting those Christmas cards made and this week our subject is
Piles of Parcels
We’d like you to put some gorgeous, tempting, beautifully wrapped Christmas parcels on your cards this time.

I have a rather large Docrafts stamp that was just perfect for this so I dug out my very scummy Basic Grey Fruitcake papers and stamped each parcel onto a different paper and embossed them in Gold.
I then stamped and embossed them again on the reverse side of the sheet for the ribbons, which co ordinates perfectly. Everything was then cut out and layered with some 3D foam.
The ‘Happy Christmas’ is an INKA stamp that’s also been embossed in Gold and I've finished all the edges off with a Gold marker pen.



Actually, thinking about it this card could have doubled for this weeks Friday challenge too because it was Keryn's turn to set the dare and she wanted us to include some Gold somewhere on the card but being the good girl that I am I made another card.



This one is on a Cream hammered card, don't know why but for some reason it looks White in the photo.
Gold stamping and embossing again, using my wonderful new set of Christmas Stamps from Elusive Images that the lovely Sheila, Manic Stamper made me buy. (Oh it’s good having someone to blame!)
The Happy Christmas is the INKA stamp I used on the last card and MUM was done using some clear alphabet stamps from Anna Griffin and more Gold marker around the edges of the card. Now I know this looks a very simple card, which it would have been but it took forever to make because silly me decided it would look lovely if I cut out all those swirls with a craft knife and attached the image to the card with 3D foam.

Um, note to self.....NEVER AGAIN!

I won’t bore you with all the details of these but here are a few more of the cards I’ve made recently.

My 1st Tanda stamps