Dino-Decoupage

Regular visitors here will know that decoupage is not ... and probably never will be ... my "thing" but I really admire and appreciate other people's beautiful results.
I have a couple of Decoupage Sheets that were sent to me when I took part in a 'Tried and Tested' item for Crafts Beautiful magazine a while ago. So I thought I would just use them up and make a couple of cards for the Grab'n'Go box.
This one is Die Cut Decoupage so is easy peasy to make up ... just press out the pieces, add foam pads and layer it up.
Even I can't go wrong with that!

The characters are kind've cute and if you look carefully you can just about see the sparkle highlights which catch the light.
Just need to add a Dinosaur related greeting to the inside and it's good to go.

I think I may just about be in time to enter this into Creative Card Crew's Challenge #13 as the theme this week is 'Child's Play.'

There's A Moose Loose Aboot This House!

I took some time off from card orders to have a little play on Saturday afternoon.

After doing over 100 cards and boxes for work I reckon I deserved a wee break.

My good friend Maggie50, from CB forum, recently stamped me a couple of wee Crafter's Companion 'meeces' and also kindly gave me some of the matching backing papers that she had already decoupaged ... ('cos she knows I haven't the patience for it) ... cheers Maggie!

So I coloured them with Whispers Brush Markers and popped them where I thought they should go on the papers.

Naomi's colouring skills are evident on the handsome chappie in green.

Went a bit mad with the Glistening Snow Writer at first, but hey ... we all love a bit of winter sparkle, (and in fairness it wasn't properly dry in the first photo, so the white glue looks quite obvious).

The 2nd photograph shows much better how wonderful it looks when it is fully dry ... all twinkly and sparkly.

Anyway, I think I have perfected the technique now so future efforts should be much less "splodgy".

The day after I got these wee 'meeces' I received the same ones as a freebie from a magazine offer, so now I can stamp and colour these cuties to my hearts content.

Quick MaxMakes

I've been really busy getting a Xmas Card order completed and, because I haven't been too well recently it seems to have taken forever. Sadly I can't show them to you without permission, but I can show a couple of other cards I've made in between.

The first is a birthday card for my younger sister whose special day was 15th September.
The gold foiled card is actually pink, but the camera didn't pick this up very well.

This black and white card was a wee 'Thank You' card made for the surprise send to CB Towers organised by PinkPuppy (aka Louise) on the Crafts Beautiful forum.

By all accounts I think CB Towers Staff had a fabulous start to the week when a deluge of Thank You cards, created by forum members, were all delivered at the same time. Fantastic!

Congratulations BookATrix

I mentioned in a previous post that Jenny Hall from Crafts Beautiful magazine is moving on to pastures new.
I decided to get out one of my BookATrix boards to make a 'Congratulations' card to send along with the Keepsake Box made for the CB challenge.

The pretty paper used is more of Brenda Walton's designer paper but unfortunately the pattern is too subtle to show in the photograph.
The string of beads were adhered with Diamond Glaze adhesive and once again my trusty scallop punch proved useful.
Hope she likes it.

Challenge At CB

One of this month's challenges over at Craft's Beautiful is to make something for Jenny Hall, the Production Editor, who is leaving to take up a new position as Deputy Editor of an interiors magazine. We are all really sad that she is leaving the CB team, but want to wish her every success wih her new adventure ~ I'm sure she will prove to be an invaluable asset to her new team.

I wanted to make her something that was practical, so decided on a keepsake box for keeping together a few of her little CB treasures.

I have popped a few little postcards and envelopes inside which she can use to send short messages to her pals if they need cheering up. Sadly there are not enough to send to all the CB members who will miss her so much LOL!

The papers are by Brenda Walton from a K. & Co. Kit.

Better get it posted before she leaves in 2 weeks.

RAK ... Random Act of Kindness

Some super surprises dropped through my letterbox this morning in the form of RAKs from my friends at Crafts Beautiful forum.

The first was all the way from down under ... sent by Lollies at Cards and Other Crafty Stuff. She is one of our youngest members and an absolute sweetheart.
Please pop over to her blog and say 'Hi' and check out her creations ... they are amazing for one so young.

She'll really appreciate the visit and would love to hear your comments.

The envelope was filled to bursting with loads of lovely papers, stick ons, buttons and .... well just look what she sent!

The second envelope contained the most beautiful tag made for me by Susie at White Ribbon Cards and, coincidently, I had been admiring this tag on her blog just the other day.

She is one very talented lady and if you get a chance then pop over to see some of the other stunning projects she has made.

Thank You both very much for your kindness.

'Doodles' of Daisy and Cupcakes

'Tiggertastic' ... aka Sarah ... is a fellow member (and extremely generous RAK sender) from CB forum who just happens to be a multi talented crafter too.
Just check out her blog HERE and you'll see what I mean.

She recently did some 'Doodling' ... personally I prefer to call it art, but it's all down to perception isn't it? ... and she invited the CB members to have a play with her images.

Here are a couple of cards I made using 2 of them. Thanks Sarah xxx They were very easy to play with.

Black versamark ink was used on a scroll stamp and then stamped randomly on the textured orange base card.
I then added some white 'doodle swirls' with my gel pen, in an attempt to match with the swirls on the orange background paper, onto which I'd printed Sarah's doodle daisy. I also decided that white was all the colour needed for the 'Daisy Doodle.' This was then matted and layered onto black and yellow cardstock.

The cupcakes were printed onto green floral paper, and then red glitter glue was used to colour the cherries, silver for the icing, (which overran a bit because I hadn't allowed enough drying time ... whoops!), and the yellow sponge was paper pieced from another printed sheet.
A vertical strip was cut from the card face and a semi~circle was cut away using decorative edged scissors.
*Note To Self: I really will need to invest in a circle punch for better results.*
Rub on words from my stash and paper flowers in pink and green were layered, cut in half and glued top and bottom of the front, with a couple of gems for the finishing touch.
The background papers used were courtesy of the free Crafts Beautiful pattern pack downloads.

A Max Make ... or maybe 2 !

I've managed to fit in some crafting this week.
Not as much as I would've liked but let's be honest ... that's never going to happen and it's better than nothing.
If only I was more organised it would be so much easier.

The first offering is a quick and easy baby girl card where I was playing with my new Dovecraft Footprints border punch. and the cute paper was a free download from Crafts Beautiful. The BABY block letters were stamped onto pink card and silver embossed, then cut out and mounted on foam pads.

The second card is an A4 piece of plain white card scored to form a gatefold, with coloured textured paper on the front panels.

The pretty image of pansies and background paper were free downloads that Wendy at Ooh~La~La Creations offered for her recent Spring Challenge.


The chipboard letters were from the Lets Make Cards Words Kit and the embellishments are real dried flowers.

Inside silver mirri card forms the backdrop to which was added background paper, sheer ribbon and another of the pretty dried pansies.

Thanks for popping by to see what I've been up to.

Thank You Card

I was gutted the other day to discover that the Thank You card I'd made for The Crafts Beautiful team after being selected for MOTM never arrived ... especially as it was one of my better efforts and was an improved version of the 'Floral Flap Over' card I made HERE.

Thanks for nothing Royal Mail!

However, I decided to just make another one and hopefully it will arrive on Jenny and Kate's desk safe and sound.


This time I used fabric squares for the back and front and made a concertina type pop up for inside, which I covered in some scrummy floral papers from HOTP ... all held together with some bright, shiny turquoise ribbon.

More RAKs!

Hmmmmm ... I wonder what our postman is thinking about the sudden surge of mail being delivered to me over recent weeks. Yep you guessed it ... I have had more surprises dropping through my door from my Crafts Beautiful friends.

Yesterday afternoon, I had a lovely selection of goodies arrive from Copse.
A pretty little Thank You card was included with several lovely papers, embossed 'Happy Birthday' paper and some really pretty feathers, as well as funky foam animals which are so cute.

This morning ... I received a lovely little ATC from Taavjax which made me smile. It is #1 of 3 so no doubt 2 other CB friends will have one dropping through their letterbox too.

There was a larger envelope too and that had travelled many miles across the water.
It contained the Pay It Forward blog candy I won on SewDelish's blog on 17th March. The rules were that I was in turn to offer PIF blog candy to 3 visitors to my blog, hence continuing the Pay It Forward process, and those winners should have received their blog candy by now. So I hope I'm up to date with everything and can relax for a while LOL.

Here is what I received from SewDelish this morning ... some fabby flowers, several embellishments & toppers, some stamped file tabs, ribbed card and some scrummy funky fibres.


I once again have to say a huge Thank You to everyone for their generosity ... you are all so very kind and I consider myself to be a very lucky lady.

MOTM Prize

A rather battered and sorry looking parcel arrived this morning ... poor thing looked like it had done 10 rounds with Frank Bruno. But if ever there was an example of the saying "Don't judge a book by it's cover" ... then this was it!
Because when I opened it ... what a wealth of crafty treasure it contained !

It was my MOTM price from Crafts Beautiful. Ooodles and oodles of luvverly stash ... some of which I have never seen before and will need to investigate what it is and what to do with it LOL!

Just looky here at the stamps ...
which one shall I play with first ??

Then there were the embellishments ...

ribbons and sequins ... brads and flowers ... punches and mini papers ... stickers and pens ... and so much more.

Finally ... at the bottom were the paper pads and a CD rom of Fairies, wizards and fantasy characters, cards and matching envelopes and fabric stickers.

So a huge 'Thank You' to the CB team .... I am very grateful and can't wait to start playing with it all.

Now Jimi will definitely need to build some more storage LOL!

Exciting Week!

Regular visitors and my friends at the Crafts Beautiful forum will already know that I have had the most amazingly exciting week with lots of luvverly goodies falling through my door. Just look for my RAK posts to see what I mean.

So you can imagine how delighted I was to discover that I have been awarded the MOTM (Member of the Month) at Crafts Beautiful too! What a week this has been!! There are so many wonderful members over there who are all equally worthy of being selected so I don't need to tell you how good I feel right now. Thanks to everyone at CB for your lovely messages of congratulations ... you are all such treasures and I'm so lucky to have found you.

So more gorgeous stash is heading my way and I'll post piccies as soon as it arrives ... can't wait LOL!

RAK ... Random Act of Kindness

Several members of the Crafts Beautiful forum have got together and exchanged names and addresses for a variety of different reasons. There are ATC swaps, a Birthday Club, A scrapbook Journal Circle and others too ... I'm sure you get the picture.

Anyway, one of the lists is compiled of members who wanted to join a RAK list and for those who don't know, I shall explain how it works.

The objective is purely and simply to bring a smile to someone else's face, by sending them something through the post. There doesn't have to be a reason (other than you simply want to), there are no deadlines to stick to and no pressure because you just send whatever you like ... to whomever you like ... whenever you feel like doing so ... by it's very definition it is a Random Act of Kindness.

There has been a bit of RAK fever over the last few weeks ... especially as it is a newish thing ... so we are all sending goodies to each other like mad LOL. There have been some lovely gifts being sent and this week I have received more than my fair share in the post. It's a fabby idea and it really does get your day off to a good start. Try it ... you'll enjoy the feeling I promise.

So here are the RAK's I have received this week ... thanks Maggie50, Zheena, Silvercustard and Emily13 ... you have brightened my week already and it's only halfway.