First Prize at the Village Show

 My Owl birthday card got first prize in the local village show this weekend - first response from family was - was it the only entry! No, it beat off 6 other cards, one of which had some lovely beadwork on it.

My cross stitch picture of the Lion also got first prize. And my husband won an enormous Teddy by guessing its name, not sure what we are going to do with him. At the moment he is sat in the bay window watching the passersby.

Cards Squared

 

I realised that this set of graduated stitched square dies had been sadly neglected for a while, so decided to make some cards using them. 

it was also a good way of using up some scraps of paper and toppers that had been hanging around waiting for inspiration to strike!

Bits & Pieces

I really have far too many little embellishment bits and pieces left over from other projects, so this weeks challenge was to try and use some up that have been hanging around for TOO LONG.

A small sense of achievement after I made a few cards! I've also been selling off some of the stamps that I never use on eBay to make a bit of space.

Costic Shimmer Metallic Gilding Polish

I must confess I have had these pots of Metallic Gilding polish  by Cosmic Shimmer for some time, but never really got on with them - I found the paste sticky and difficult to apply.

But them I spotted them being demonstrated on Hochanda the other day and realized what I had been doing wrong - apparently you need to create a 'ski slope' of the paste with the applicator at the side of the pot to get it out! And give a spritz with water before you close the lid.

A quick whiz over embossed  card gave a great effect with a lovely shimmer - so now I must get them out more often!

A Little Bit Fed Up With Making Christmas Cards!

You can have too much of a good thing, so I decided to pack away all the red, green, glitter, gold, reindeers and snowmen and make a few men's cards for a change.

Hopefully I will get back into the Christmas card production mood soon, as I still have loads and loads of Xmas stash to use up!

More stash gone!

A quiet weekend has allowed more time for crafting - so a few more cards for the Charity box! 

I'm also up to date on all my ATC swaps for this month too. For anyone who wants to join in with my January Travel ATC swap , the details are here.

Book Folding - An Owl

When I heard about book folding art - I just had to have a go!

I bought and downloaded the cute owl pattern from an Etsy Seller who specialises in folded book designs and purchased an old book from a table top sale for 20p

It took about 3 or 4 evenings to complete it and I found it quite relaxing!

Day 3 - March Challenge - How Now Brown Owl

This little owl is a Tando chipboard that I painted with brown nail varnish! I tried colouring him with promarkers but he just looked a little washed out. He has a drop of gold perfect pearls for eyes and is sitting on a hand cut tree branch.

New Stamps - New Cards!

I can never wait to use any new crafty items, so when I picked up Creative Stamping Magazine, I just had to try out some of their fab 'New Beginnings' stamps!

They have lots of great ideas how to use the stamps in the magazine and I quickly sat down and made these cards - going to use the tall house stamp for a 'New Home' card next!

A Parliament of Owl Cards!

Not sure why, but I've just realised that I have been making several owl themed cards recently! 



Why not hop over to the Creative Friday Link party and see what others have been up to?

Owls & Bears

The snowy weather was a great excuse for staying indoors and taking over the dining table for a crafting session.

 I made these cards using the freebie papers from Papercraft Essentials magazine ( see post below), this time teaming them up with some cute Teddy bears as well as the owl stamps.

Hoping today will give time for more card making!

I really shouldn't have but ....

I gave into temptation and bought the Papercraft Essentials magazine because of the cute woodware freebie Owl stamps! I thought I had stuck to my new years resolution to stop buying crafting stuff and use up more of my growing pile of stash but couldn't resist these stamps.


I had even managed to visit The Range last weekend and come out empty handed ( a first!) but knew these owls and papers would make some great looking cards.

Christmas Cards for Pagans

I have a couple of friends who are Pagans and who don't really want to celebrate Christmas, but I don't want them to miss out on cards, so I have made these "Winter Wishes" cards which I hope they would like instead.

I now have a blog where I sell cards suitable for Pagans to send or receive over Christmas time at pagancards.blogspot.co.uk

Another Small Dent in My Stash!

I have just made these 3 cute cards  - but have only used up 2 sheets from my ever growing pile of papers. But the purple paper I have had for years, so there is a small feeling of satisfaction over that! 

Really I cannot justify buying any more papers for at least 10 years, but they keep producing yummy designs that I just cannot resist, is there any treatment for this addiction???

Neglected Stamps

We've all got a few of those, haven't we! You know, the stamps we fell in love with, just had to have but then only used a couple of times before another set of yummy stamps came along.




Anyway, I dug out these lovely Inkadinkado bird stamps and decided to give them another go, so here are 2 fairly simple cards using Brilliance Cosmic Copper ink, which gives them a lovely sheen!

Yet More Owls!

I picked up another bargain on eBay this week, a set of colour-me ovals from Craftwork Cards. I've coloured them with promarkers and teamed them up with card candi and sentiments, also from Craftwork cards.

As you can see, I'm a bit of a Craftwork Cards fan, mainly because they use great quality card with a bit of a satin sheen that gives it a luxury feel!

Yet another Owl Card!

I don't know why, but everytime I try to make a male birthday card it ends up with an owl on it!

Owls Rock!

Yesterday hubby kindly took the kids swimming so I had the whole afternoon for a bit of 'me time,' which just has to be spent making cards! I managed to make 8, including these 3 blokes cards above. I had bought a copy of Creative Cardmaking Magazine in the morning so I had lots of new papers to play with.

Kanban Birds

I took a trip to Bury St Edmunds today and just had to pop into the 2 very good craft shops there! I picked up some great sentiments and colour-me ovals from Craftwork cards and this set of bird toppers from Kanban. My mother loves wrens and so the orange card will be for her birthday later this month. I am taking her on a weekend trip to London to see the Titanic artifacts exhibition at the O2!

Woodland Folk Bargain

I popped into The Range today to take back some unused paint and just had to take a peak at their crafting section. I was very good and only picked up some glue dots and a pack of Woodland Folk chipboard shapes that had been reduced to 99p - well, I couldn't resist a bargain!So these are the first cards that I made with them, the owl card has some rough textured card as background that I have had hanging around for ages.