Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Just a short post to wish you all a very merry Christmas and health, wealth and happiness for the New Year.  Here is a little festive video from The King!

Hope you all have a great time over the festive season and that all your wishes come true in 2012.

Take care
Rachel x

Have a Fab'n'Funky Christmas!

As you know I participated in my first Fab'n'Funky Challenge as a DT member last week.  Well, the winners are now up on the Fab'n'Funky Challenge Blog.  What a response - you are all so talented.  It was far too hard to choose just three winners so you can view a selection of our favourites.  We are also giving five lucky crafters the chance to win some fab candy. 

As we are starting our Christmas holidays early there will be no challenges until next year.  The first one for the New Year will start on 4 January 2012.

Hope to see you all there.

Happy crafting.

Rachel x

Gran's Christmas Cards

Hope you are all well.  There is certainly a chill in the air now and a layer of snow on the cars when I left work tonight.  Brrrr!

Tonight's post shows the collection of cards that I made for my Gran to send out this Christmas.  Mam had the great idea that I could use photos of Gran's garden from last November when we visited for her 90th birthday.  It was quite a mission with all that snow!

I used the My Craft Studio program to design the layouts.  Normally I would have printed out the layers separately and mounted them with foam pads etc for dimension but I thought it would be best to keep them flat so that Gran doesn't need to worry about postage. 

This photo was taken on the path that runs past the bottom of Gran's garden.  I love how it has a natural blue tinge to it with the snow and cold in the air.  It's my favourite snowflakes again - Spellbinders Create-A-Flake Three!  The background paper is actually from the Fab Glam Fifties CD-ROM.  The colour was such a good match that I didn't need to keep looking.  I input the sentiment using the Text feature and then turned the brightness slider up to 100 so that the lettering became white.

The tree in this photo is in my Gran's garden and I used a black and white version (using the saturation slider) against the green background to make it stand out.  The greeting is from the Winter Whimseys CD-ROM.  I added the three red gems once it was printed and they really stand out.

I think this is my favourite of the bunch.  I love that photo.  It was taken by my Dad on Boxing Day last year.  We were on our way to see my Granny for her 80th birthday and just couldn't resist stopping to capture this beautiful view.  I used a digital punch for the lace on the left  hand side.  I couldn't believe my luck when I came across the peachy-coloured paper on the Fab Glam Fifties CD-ROM as it compliments the image so beautifully.

This is a seeing double selection!  I actually changed the red version to green first as this is how the background paper is stored in the program but I liked it too much not to make the red one too!  This picture is looking back into the garden and towards Gran's house.  I hope she likes them.

Happy crafting. x

Exciting News!

I can finally tell you all my exciting news!  I applied to join the Design Team at Fab 'n' Funky Challenges back in October and I got in!  I could not believe my eyes when the email came through!  Delighted and honoured to be picked.  I hope I can live up to the challenge. 

The current challenge on the Fab 'n' Funky Challenge blog is "Anything Goes", sponsored by the The Stamping Boutique.  I chose this cute image of a carousel horse and instantly knew I wanted to use bright colours with it.  It reminds me of a My Little Pony that I had as a child.  I made the gatefold card blank using my Ultimate Pro (not sure how I managed before without one!) and used purple Core'dinations and orange pearlescent card to match my image colourings. 

The photo doesn't show it up very well but I added My Craft Studio glitter around the horse and onto the saddle.  The image was cut using one of the X-Cut dies that I won back in July through the DoCrafts Creativity Club Prize Draw.  The dies are good quality but the scalloped and straight edged squares don't nest like the Spellbinders.  I am chuffed with the cutting and embossing results though.

I'm having my kitchen redone so my toaster and kettle are sitting on my glass cutting matt at the moment!  Not the best way to craft but I'm sure it won't stop me!  Hoping that I'll have my sitting room back in a couple of weeks and a new kitchen to boot.
Happy crafting. x

I'm fairly cracking out the Christmas cards now!  Just a pity I ddin't get going about two months ago.  This one was started in the Digital Designer software from DoCrafts Papermania, using the Christmas Past CD-ROM.  I picked the Naughty and Nice collection, mainly because I love pink.  The snowflake was cut using the Spellbinders Create-a-Flake Three.  It's becoming a firm favourite this year. 

Happy Crafting!

Tweety Pie on Ice

A completely different Christmas card tonight.  Tweety Pie was always a favourite of mine and this image is super cute.  I teamed it with a blue background paper from the Looney Tunes CD-ROM, silver textured paper and a green paper from the SWALK Winter Cheer CD-ROM.  I love the skates paper and used the colouriser to match Tweety Pie's earmuffs.  I mounted the image onto a Spellbinders Labels Sixteen die-cut using foam pads.  The snowflakes were cut using Spellbinders Create-A-Flake Three.  I'm rediscovering my love of Spellbinders (not that I was ever out of love with them!) since buying my Grand Calibur.  Oh the possibilities!  The rick-rack ribbon was from the DoCrafts online shop. 

Happy Crafting!

Celebrate the Season...

Hope this post finds you all well and feeling that festive spirit.  Not long now!  For today's card, I embossed the holly Mica Mask using my new Grand Calibur and I'm really impressed with the results it has given me so far.  I dabbed all over with green ink using a make-up sponge. The baubles are from the Spellbinders 2011 Heirloom Ornaments set and the holly flourishes are from Spellbinders Holly Accents collection. These were also cut and embossed with the Grand Calibur. 

The image is a digi from Pink Petticoat and I fell in love with it as soon as I saw it.  There are several handbag and shoe designs and just right up my street.  I daren't think how many of each I own!  Well they do say, if the shoe fits, buy one in every colour!  I used a Promarker in Forest Green and an Aquamarker in Raspberry to colour the holly and berries.  I mounted the baubles with mounting foam to give dimension and attached the flourishes with Cosmic Shimmer Glue. 

The insert gives the finishing touch.

Happy Crafting!



Christmas Greetings

It's that time of year again and with only six weeks until the big day, it was time to start Christmas card making!  I had my old pals Jim and Elvis blasting out with their Christmas tunes to get the creative juices flowing and this is the result! 

This is a new embossing folder (well, new to me anyway!) that I saw on eBay and just had to have.  I used it with silver mirri-paper and ran it through my Cuttlebug.  I stamped the greeting with a black dye-based inkpad and die cut that using Spellbinders Labels Four.  The stamp is from Claritystamp.  I just love their designs and Barbara is so kind and inspiring.  I bought the ribbon a while ago from the DoCrafts online shop for 68p for 5 different metres.  Bargain!  I got one is just about every colour! 

Another picture from a slightly different angle which shows up the colours a little better.

Happy Crafting!

Fab 'n' Funky Challenge #96 - Hubble, Bubble, Toil and Trouble

When I was catching up on blog posts last week I came across the chance to be considered to join the Fab 'n' Funky Challenges DT and couldn't resist.  This is my offering for Challenge #96 Hubble, Bubble, Toil and Trouble and also to be considered for the DT position. 

My inspiration started with the Twilight Queen CD-ROM from Debbi Moore.  I was looking through the designs and came across the spiders web background paper and my brain went into overdrive with ideas for the card!  I used a rubber stamp from the Tickled Pink range of Pinkettes and coloured her using Promarkers.  The skull card was made by welding two skull images on my Gypsy and cutting them out using my Cricut Expression 2.  The original image came from the Rock Princess cartridge.  I used some cotton wool for added effect on the front.  The lettering came from Tim Holtz's Upon a Time alphabet die, run through my Cuttlebug. 

Thank you for taking the time to look at my blog.

Special Thanks

I just want to say a big hello and thank you to all my new followers.  Special thanks to those who have taken the time to comment on my posts.  It is gratefully appreciated and keeps me going when the inspiration is severly lacking! 

This is one of my favourite photos, taken outside my Granny's house earlier this year.  Hope you all have a great week and happy crafting! x

Distressed Butterfly Tag

To be honest, this tag was a bit of a happy accident.  I was playing around with my new Cuttlebug embossing folders and found a scrap bit of Black Magic Coredinations cardstock.  Next thing I knew the sanding block was out and I was distressing away to my heart's content!  I managed to make the entire tag out of the waste card and funnily enough didn't use the embossing folders in the end.  The base for the tag is a cropped Spellbinders Labels die and I inked the edges in Tim Holtz distress ink - Fired Brick, which hasn't show up very well in the photo.  I ran the blade of my craft knife along the edge of the tag base. 

The black layer is a piece of the crumpled up Black Magic Coredinations cardstock which has been sanded.  I die cut the butterflies twice from the same coredinations cardstock using a Sizzix die (bought from the Stampin' Up catalogue).  It works like a dream through the cuttlebug and is my favourite butterfly die.  I sanded the butterflies to show up the embossing and then finished it off by gluing together with Pinflair Glue Gel.

Tatty Button Rescue

I just love the Tatty Button stamps from Creative Expressions.  Even better that they are already mounted.  This was a work in progress card as when I started I didn't really have a vision in mind.  I coloured in the stamp one night when I was feeling a bit fed up and needed something to cheer me up. 

When I looked through my Spellbinders I came across the Labels Twenty which was the perfect size.  Unfortunately I managed to slip one of my distress ink pads right on top of Tatty!  D'oh!  Luckily she managed to avoid the cheeky ink and I managed to save her by cutting around her and mounting her onto an orange and white tartan card.  This is the first time I used the button mask and was quite pleased with the result using Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Broken China.  I made the border using an EK Success punch and just alternated the colours.  The flowers were stamped and then cut out by hand.  I finished off the card with a small sentiment stamped onto another of the Spellbinders shapes.

Reflection

The image on this card comes from a selection of Hunkdory toppers in the His n Hers collection.  I love the colours and the peacefulness of it.

I covered my card blank with silver mirri-paper and then tied the bow, using the same metallic ribbon from previous cards, around the foiled and embossed Hunkydory cardstock before adding it to the base.  The topper was also mounted onto silver mirr-paper.  I used a pair of compasses to draw the circle and then cut it out by hand.  I think it might be time to invest in some circular Spellbinder dies!

Art Nouveau in the 21st Century

This is the one and only challenge card that I have made, so far.  It was for the weekly sketch challenge on the DoCrafts site that is set by Katy Goodbeer.  I took the topper and decopage from the Nouveau Style CD-ROM by Sharon Duncan and teamed it with Create and Craft textured card.  The black card was embossed with the same dotty folder from the previous post and then I added a strip of turquoise glitter card to bring out the colour in the wings of the butterfly.  The ribbon was from DoCrafts and was as cheap as chips for 68p for 5m!

The Look of Love

This card actually came about because I had been playing with my new Fiskars punch and didn't want to waste the pretty pattern I had done!  You know what they say - crafters never throw away anything that can be used in a project!


I covered the base card with silver mirri-paper and then added three layers of the punched paper, alternating between blue and silver.  The image is from Hunkydory.  I'm a huge Hunkydory fan and have just sorted all my toppers into a neat folder.  I love looking through it and just imagining all the creations that will follow!  I got the ribbon from DoCrafts and have used it on several cards. 

Flutterby Thanks

This was a quick thank you card for my jewellery making tutor, Anita.  I did a 10 week course in jewellery making earlier this year and Anita was so lovely that I thought it would be a nice thing to do for her to say thanks. 

I cut the butterflies out using Spellbinder dies and then inked through with Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Broken China.  The purple dotty butterflies were a little trickier!  I had to draw round the die and then cut them out by hand as they only come in one size.  I embossed them with a dotty embossing folder run through the Cuttlebug and then added some more of the Distress Ink to make the dots stand out.  The sentiment was stamped using the peg alphabet letters from Stamping with Dimension. 

Love at Christmas

Confession time - my name is Rachel and I'm addicted to glitter!  The images on the Debbi Moore Art Deco Magical Christmas just call out for glitter and to make Debbi proud I added two different types to this card!  I put down ultra sticky tape (the red one) and then rubbed in ultra fine gold glitter.  I think I would probably use a narrower tape next time though.  The image was printed from the CD-ROM onto Super Smooth Decopage paper and then glittered using Diamond Sparkles and a quickie glue pen.  I mounted it onto a piece of gold paper to tie in the glittery frame.  Very simple card but with glittery impact!

First Christmas Card of 2011

As there seems to be a lot of Christmas crafting going on just now I thought I had better make a start on mine.  I'm hoping to have a stall at a small craft fair in November this year so there are plenty to make!  I matt and layered some teal holographic card with silver mirri-paper and a plain black card topper.  Then I added three Spellbinder Baubles, using my trusty foam pads and then some gems.  The sparkly dotty background was made using a Quickie Glue Pen and some Diamond Sparkles.

What's Behind the Wrapping?!

This is my first Tatty Teddy card and I made it for my friend's birthday.  I love all the TT background papers and that was what I used to start my inspiration.  I noticed that a few cardmaking bloggers had used this layout so I thought it would be a fun one to try for myself.  I think it might become a favourite!  The TT decopage was mounted onto silver mirri-board to make it stand out and I also mounted the sentiment tag onto foam pads for some dimension.

A Hint of the Orient

I'd had this idea with the trail of flowers along a shaped card for a while but hadn't really known what else to put with it.  As soon as I saw the Geisha stamps in my stash I knew it was the perfect match.  I covered the shaped card with red paper and purple textured card and then placed flowers from my 3 Birds set around the edge, alternating the colours. I stamped the figure and masked her and then stamped the trees around.  The image was coloured using Promarkers and then cut out using Spellbinders Labels 4.  Next I drew around the biggest die and cut that out to form the mount and then inked the edge of the stamped image with Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Red Brick. Finally I stamped the sentiment onto another piece of the red paper and mounted both that and the image onto foam pads.

Knock on Wood!

This will be my brother's birthday card when he turns 26 at the end of June.  He is a joiner so I knew that I wanted to incorporate some toppers in this theme.  I made the base card using the Ultimate Pro by scoring the sections before cutting.  I used a brown textured card for the base to give the effect of wood.  The blue toppers were made using white card and a Mica Mask.  I dabbed blue ink through the mask using a make-up sponge and then cut them to size. 

The Woodware tool stamps were stamped in black ink and then run through the Cuttlebug with Spellbinders Labels 8.  I ran the same blue ink over the edges of the toppers to tie-in with the masked toppers.  The paintbrush stoppers were also stamped in black and raised up with foam pads.  The Happy Birthday stamp was from a greetings selection from the Hobbycraft Store.  This card could easily be adapted for Father's Day.

Shooting Star

This Little Star stamp from the third set of stamps designed by Suzanne Woolcott for Sugar Nellie is just so cute.  The embossed purple shape was actually originally printed from the computer for another project and ended up being put to better use on this one.  I ran Spellbinders through my Cuttlebug to make the nesting shapes and also the bases for the letters which were stamped using an acrylic peg.  The stamped image was coloured using Promarkers and this was my first proper attempt at using them.  More practice needed there, I think!  I actually the Promarkers to colour the purple base shape.  Luckily I had a colour that matched the printed shape on top perfectly. 

Purple Blooms

This is the first card I've made from my new Stamping Up stamps.  The card is made using the Pretty Petals range.  I just love this stamp.  I stamped the flowers all over the purple textured background card and then mounted it on lilac silk art card which I punched on either side with an EK Success punch. This was all mounted on silver mirri paper. The ribbon is from a selection from DoCrafts. To tie-in the sentiment I stamped it on the same purple textured card and then mounted it on the lilac silk art card.  The sentiment is from the Daisy and Dandelion range.  I rounded the corners with an X-Cut corner rounder punch.

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

I just love the Tatty Button images and when they became available on Create and Craft as an interactive CD-ROM and stamp sheets, I bought them straight away!  This is the first card I have made using the pre-loaded pyrimage on the CD.  To make this card I used the Cricut to cut the card blank and covered with spring themed paper. The Tatty Button pyrimage was printed on supersmooth decoupage paper and layered using foam pads. I added ribbon from a selection of green ribbons by DoCrafts and stamped Happy Birthday in green to finish the card off.

Happy Mothers Day

This is the mothers day card that I gave to my Mam last Sunday.  Dad even thought I had bought it!  Surely he knows I don't buy cards anymore!

The design came from the My Craft Studio Encyclopedia of Card and Papercraft Templates and Folds (Picture Window card).  Once I had printed out the elements it was just a case of cutting and sticking whilst following the instructions.  Very easy to follow and I used a wooden stamp for the greeting to finish it off.

Give It Some Welly!

I was asked to help out at a local Brownies meeting with a card for Mothers Day so this was my first idea to see what would work.  The Wellington boot template was bought from http://www.annamariedesigns.com/ (only 99p) and used with free papers from Quick Cards Made Easy issue 84.  Diamond sparkles added to give definition to the top and bottom of the boot.  Sentiment stamped onto white card and cut out using Spellbinder Labels 4, chalked around the outer edge using ColourBox fluid chalk inkpad in Pink Pastel and added using foam pads. 

This was a very quick card to make.  I used silver mirri-paper for the first layer and then covered this with a printed background paper that I designed using My Craft Studio.  I cut out two butterflies for the topper and shaped the top one to add dimension.  This was attached using Pinflair Foto-Glue.  The sentiment was taken from a peel-off set.  All corners were rounded using the X-Cut corner rounder punch which I can thoroughly recommend.

90 Best Wishes

This is the card I made for my Gran's 90th birthday last December.  I ran a daisy embossing folder through the Cuttlebug for the pattern on the left-hand side.  The image was achieved by using the nail varnish remover technique.  I photocopied the photo in black and white and then used nail remover to transfer it onto lemon coloured paper.  The flowers have been glittered in the centres and at the edges.  I used a gold peel-off sentiment to finish the card.  I also added a gold border peel-off to the side of embossed paper which was done after the photograph was taken.

Not quite a Royal engagement...

My best friend got engaged on Valentine's Day this year and I wanted to make the happy couple a really pretty card to say congratulations.  I had recently purchased the Craft Artist Platinum multibuy and couldn't wait to try it out.  I was really impressed with the quality and variety of the images.  The front of the card is based on the "We're Engaged" card template.  I changed the colours and added my own text.  Once it was printed I heat embossed the main butterfly with Cosmic Shimmer Embossing Powder using a heat gun.  The inside of the template was left plain so I added a photo and used the brush technique to give a bit more interest.  I hope the sentiment sums up how happy I am for them both.  Here's to a lifetime of happiness!

In the beginning...

As this is my first blog post it would only be polite to introduce my crafting to you.  This is one of the first computer crafted cards that I have made.  I used the My Craft Studio Fab Glam Fifties CD-ROM for the images and mounted the main image and sentiment onto mirri-paper.  The main image has been highlighted using Cosmic Shimmer Embossing Powder and a heat gun.