A few crafty bits for sale...

I have a few items for sale, and have a feeling more will be added as I continue to sort out my stash and uncover more duplicates or things I am never going to use! If you see something you like but aren't so keen on the price make me an offer!!!


1. BRAND NEW Helz Cuppleditch Pepper's Christmas party mini stamps. I have the full sized versions and didn't realise these were exactly the same stamps! £3.50 including p&p 2nd class.






2. Sizzix die (green) - Doll shoes #1... someone bought this for me thinking it was for the bitty bodies but it's not so it's no use to me as I only have bitty body people, not dolls!
Would like £5 for it, including p&p 2nd class









3. Tatty Teddy / Me to You wood mounted stamp - Cupcake Treats - Tatty Teddy with tray of cupcakes. BRAND NEW. Somehow (I can only blame it on post-pregnancy lack of brain cells!!!) in my desperate need to have this stamp I have ended up with 2!!! They both have the price label of £4.50 still on them, so ideally I would like £4.50 for the stamp but that would include p&p 2nd class.

4. BRAND NEW STILL IN CELLOPHANE WRAPPER DCWV 12x12 SPRING GLITTER STACK - 48 sheets of double sided printed paper, 1/2 with glitter. £15 including p&p 2nd class

It's been a while!

As the title says, it's been a while since I was last here!

I have spent most of the year making thank you cards - firstly for Joseph's presents when he was born (and Christmas presents) and then for my birthday presents and Joseph's christening gifts! Now the thank yous have all been sent I have been able to get back to creating rather than mass-producing!!!

We recently held a fundraising bring and buy sale to raise money for our Brownies and Rainbows, at which I sold about £20 worth of my cards... this weekend a friend of mine has had a fundraising funday with her work, raising money for Hope House Children's Hospice on the Wirral. I gave her 87 cards to sell with a percentage of the sales being donated to the fundraising (as other people selling items were also doing) and they sold £40 worth of cards yesterday!

So I now need to collect back the cards she's got left and see what occasions I'm short of so I can get making again! I have got some cards to add on here but since buying my IPad (30th birthday present!) I haven't been on the laptop much but can't figure out how to blog from the IPad (or even if I can!!) so I now have to make myself find time to switch the laptop on, upload my photos and then add my cards to my blog! Fingers crossed I will manage to upload at least one this week (between working, babysitting and entertaining Joseph!)

I don't know why I can post titles but not posts?!?!?

Can you help Alice?

http://www.blogger.com/profile/13027223823260960348

Birthday card (2)

Birthday card for one of my best friends who turned 30 last week (we're all getting old, uni - where we met - seems so long ago now!)...

Image - Papermania Retail Therapy stamp set coloured with Promarker Carmine and Copics Ciaos 100 (Black), C3, 5 and 7 (Cool Greys), E37 (Sepia) and E47 (Dark Brown).

Caption - DoCrafts Born2Shop Bubbles phrase (free on the cover of DC magazine last year) written over with Promarker Carmine.

White oval and DC Born2Shop Nostalgia pink paper cut with Nesties - Petite Ovals Large

PaperMania Classical Handmade flocked paper

30 -EK Success

Happy Birthday - Anita's Glitterations

Pink flower from DC Born2Shop Creative Papercraft Kit

Gem from stash

Another birthday card

This birthday card is for my friend who is a Brown Owl at Brownies (although she doesn't use the title as she didn't want to feel that people were comparing her to the old Brown Owl who ran the Brownies for 30 odd years!). It was made using lots of stash from my black&white and blue bags of papers, flowers, etc. The stamped image is a Honey and Hugs image from Papermania coloured with Pro-markers Gold and Blue Pearl, the small flowers are punched from scraps of the backing paper and the middles are brads from my stash as well. Ovals are petite ovals large and petite scalloped ovals large Nesties and sentiment is a peel-off from Create and Craft (bought at Wilkinsons!)

Birthday Card

This is the birthday card I made for my cousin a few weeks ago. The backing paper is from a very old pack of papermania papers (one of the first cardmaking paper packs I bought, I've learnt my lesson since!) as I had decided

I had to use up my old stash before I am allowed to buy any more (that was the theory anyway!!)

Recipe:

* DL Card covered with Papermania spotty paper from stash

* White leaves cut from white card using Sizzix die 38-0227 Leaf, Stem

* Greeting Farm stamped image coloured using various shades of blue Pro-markers and brown Copics pens (I didn't think to write them down as this was only a month after I had Joseph and it took all my efforts just to get the card made!), edged with Azure Pro-marker and mounted using foam pads.

* Blue marbled card from a stack bought at www.thecraftbug.com also edged with Azure Pro-marker

* Peel off sentiment from stash

* Prima flowers from stash

* Brads from stash

30th Birthday card (1)

I had a few birthday cards to make this week (as well as the christening invitations!) and was bloghopping (or leapblogging) for some inspiration when I came across last week's LOTV Challenge which was using a layout. I wanted to use this Greetings Farm image as it reminds me of the friend the card is for so there was no rush to get it finished and on here by Wednesday night because it wasn't for the challenge!

Ingredients:

* Black&white papers from stash

* prima flowers from stash with silver brads in the centres

* Cardinal Red promarker (and I can't remember which shades for the hair and skin, forgot to write them down!!)

* Black Copic Ciao

* Paper Mill Shop peel off sentiment

* Petite Oval Large nesties

Handbag card

Over on www.madaboutcards.com/forum a group of us take part in a birthday card exchange. This was the first card I made since Joseph was born, which amazingly got to Linda (Tag) on time!

The card is one that was in a pack my brother gave me for Christmas (from Hobbycraft I think?!), the paper is from a stack which was free with Cardmaking and Papercraft magazine a couple of months ago.

Tilda arrived in a stamped image swap (I love this one so may have to purchase her at some point!) and was coloured with Copics - I didn't think to make a note of the colours at the time, was rather pre-occupied with a tiny baby!

The purple flowers are from my stash and the smaller ones were punched from the scraps of the paper used to cover the handbag shape, with gems added from my stash and a peel-off sentiment. I also made a matching ATC as we had been discussing them on the forum, but forgot to photograph it!

60th Birthday / Retirement card

A couple of weeks ago we were invited to a 60th birthday and retirement party. If you look in the shops you probably won't find one card that combines both sentiments, but when you make your own you can! So that's what I did...





Ingredients:



* Ivory pearlescent card base from www.crafterscove.co.uk
* Green marbled card from a stack I bought in a sale at www.thecraftbug.co.uk
* Black paper from my stash
* Die-cut glass from stash
* Silver 'congratulations' tab from stash (originally bought from www.madaboutcards.com) a few years ago
* Peel-off sentiments from stash

Lots of matting and layering and 3D foam pads to add interest as I didn't have a lot of time to make this with an 8 week old baby!

Christening Invitations

Well, as promised, here is one of Joseph's christening invitations:

Recipe:

* Ivory pearlescent card blank

* Blue paper cut with petite scalloped ovals large nesties

* White card cut with petite ovals large nesties

* LOTV Christening baby stamped with Memento Tuxedo Black ink, coloured with a layer of Ivory and a layer of Blush Pro-markers; edge of baby's pillow coloured with Pastel Blue Pro-marker; edge of christening gown - Baby Blue Stickles.

* 'Invitation' gold peel-off sticker

I have had to make a slightly different version as well, using a more turquoise-blue paper and Waterfall Stickles because I didn't have enough of either shade of blue paper to make all 50 invitations (thanks to the Paper Mill shops closing - I used to buy all my plain paper and card there as they had so many different shades of every colour!)

*

Christening Invitations

With a bit of help from my mum I made a start on the christening invitations yesterday! She cut out white ovals using my nesties and I stamped the LOTV baby in a christening gown onto them all. While I then used my nesties to cut out scalloped ovals from blue paper, Mum folded the card blanks (which I had already stuck the inserts into) and when she had gone home I stuck all the white ovals onto the blue scalloped ovals and started adding Stickles to the baby's gown - I need to keep working on that tonight!

Mum is coming back on Wednesday so we can hopefully finish them - colouring in the baby with Copics or Promarkers (any recommendations as to which colours are best would be gratefully received!!), sticking 'invitation' peel-offs on each card and then just writing names, addressing envelopes and typing & printing out directions!

Hopefully by the end of the week I will be able to put a photo of them on here, then it's back to the thank you cards for all the presents he received when he was born!

New year, new design

Thanks to the very kind RedRottie from the Docrafts forum I have found out how to make my blog look much more interesting than just the plain pink background I had before! I am still experimenting to find which one I like best but as everyone who knows me 'in the real world' could tell you I am well known for being a chocoholic so when I saw the quote on this layout I decided this would be the one... for now at least!!

Now I can blame the baby for my lack of crafting!

Well, a lot of crafting DID take place between 14th September and 20th December - mostly Christmas cards with the odd birthday card thrown in. Being pregnant meant I could only sit for so long at a time so everything took much longer than planned and I didn't have the energy or inclination to blog about my crafting as well!

On Monday 20th December I was in the middle of making the last of the family Christmas cards when I had to go to my routine 38 week midwife appointment. Expecting to only be out for 20 minutes or so I left everything where it was so I could finish the cards when we got back, then the plan was to tidy the whole of the downstairs, make a start on clearing my craft desk upstairs so the craft room could be transformed into baby's room and put the Christmas tree up.

Unfortunately things didn't go quite to plan and the midwife decided to send me to hospital, adding 'take your overnight bag as you may need to stay in'... I was in for 3 nights being monitored, was induced for the first time on the Tuesday and the baby - a little boy, Joseph David, eventually arrived on the Thursday, 23rd December at 15:11, weighing 6lb 1 and a half oz. We finally escaped the hospital at 5pm on Christmas Eve and life hasn't been the same since!

I now have a VERY good excuse for not crafting, although I am itching to get back to it - aside from all the thank you cards I need to make, I have lots of ideas floating round in my head about scrapbook pages I want to create about Joseph! I just need him to get into a routine now so that I know when I have got time to do a bit of crafting - hopefully soon!

I have only made a couple of cards this month and haven't got round to adding them on here yet! What I HAVE been doing is stamping... lots and lots of images (mostly unused stamps I have to confess, it's amazing what you buy and put away for another day then forget about!)

I was looking for a specific stamp I knew I had for a specific card.... and came out of the spare room with a stack of pages of stamped images!

Hopefully some of them will make it onto cards very soon!

I didn't get round to making my Christmas cards today as the weather was just too lovely to even be thinking about it1

Instead I have entered a draw for Bev's Blog Candy (along with over 400 other people! lol) - she has lots of fantastic ideas and lots of links to other fab things, why not go and have a look?!

http://bevscrafts.blogspot.com/

I can't believe it...

my 'chocolate and caramel' cake card has won a prize! And even more exciting is that the goodies I have won are going to come all the way from America! I think I need to go and find myself some more challenges to enter now!

The latest card in my collection (which is being given to a friend for her birthday as she has just got married 2 weeks ago) was made for a challenge, following a sketch. More information can be found here ~ http://justmagnolia.blogspot.com/2010/08/week-70-sketch-by-dawny.html on the Just Magnolia blog. I LOVE Tilda stamps and this challenge made me go and get out one of my new stamps that I haven't used yet. I'm really pleased with the result and have used colours I don't often use in my cards. The reason I have used these papers is because they are similar to the colour of bridesmaid dresses they had at the wedding.




Tilda With Flower is stamped with Memento Tuxedo Black ink, her hair and skin are coloured with Copics, the rose and trim on the dress are coloured with Spiced Marmalade Distress Ink, I have added Aqua Stickles to the middle of the flowers on the paper (which is Wild Rose Studios Spring Fling), the flowers are Prima paper flowers, the ribbon is from a piece I bought at Hobbycraft and the sentiment has been placed onto the smallest of my petite ovals dies (I think that's what they're called, without going to check!!)

Oldie But A Goodie Challenge Blog

I have just come across this blog and given that over on the MAC forum we regularly have comments about stamps that have been sitting in drawers/boxes/on shelves unused and unloved I thought this might be a good challenge blog to follow!

http://oldiebutagoodiechallenge.blogspot.com/

Hopefully some of you will join me as followers over there!


And given our recent obsession with Lili of the Valley stamps, I thought this might be useful too:
http://liliofthevalleythursdaychallenge.blogspot.com/

Ooooh, how exciting... I have just received my first ever award and hopefully I've added it here! Thank you SO much to Andria at http://iona-rose.blogspot.com/



There are a few rules to go with this award so here goes...

1) Thank the person who gave you this award ~ THANK YOU Andria, I'm amazed you've given it to me, I know I need to keep my blog up-to-date more often and promise I will try hard!!
2) Place the award on your blog ~ Done.
3) List three things you love about yourself ~ I have a fantastic husband, I have lots of friends and I am going to be a mummy in January (that's the thing I love most!!)
4) Post a picture you love ~ this one is easy, I just have to figure out how to get it on here!

The very first time we saw our baby at our 12 week scan on 14th June 2010. We are now 21 weeks and 3 days - 18 weeks and 4 days to our due date!

5) Pass this award onto 5 other people ~
This is also a bit tricky because I don't have many followers and I don't follow a lot of blogs. One of the ones I do follow is Andria's (where the award came from!) and 2 of the others were given the award BY Andria so I'm a bit stuck with this one!
Anyway, here goes...
1. Gemma at http://makedoandgem.blogspot.com/ - I can't remember how I why I ended up following her blog (as is usually the case with me!!) or she mine but never mind!
2. Sandra at http://stamperontheshore.blogspot.com/ - again not sure how she ended up being a follower of my blog but she is!
3. Lisa http://crafty-moments.blogspot.com/who I recently bought some stash from through the DoCrafts forum (even though I'm not supposed to be spending money any more!!)
4. Emma http://emmalouisecards.blogspot.com/who I also bought goodies from via the DoCrafts forum!
and 5. Sarah and who was one of the regulars at our crop here in Chirk until the shop closed. Fingers crossed we will be restarting at Froncysyllte Community Centre in September or October! http://craftamongthelandrovers.blogspot.com/