I'VE HAD BAGS OF FUN!!

Hi Everyone

I fancied having a go at a handbag shaped card today .. .. and I must admit I am really pleased with the result.

Of course it doesn't want to fit into any standard sized envelope but now I have my scor-pal that won't be a problem. 

I did a quick envelope out of copy paper before I embellished my little card just to make sure I wasn't going to be stuck with a card that didn't fit an envelope LOL!!!

This used:


Papers: DCWV Latte Stack
Nestabilities: Standard Circles Large, Classic Scalloped Circles Large (with a bit chopped off!!)
Sentiment: Elzybells
X-Cut Punches: Flowers
Button, Gems and Cord from the stash box

The template I used came from here.

I really love the finished look and think I am going to make a few more in different colours.

Can't wait for my lovely Sis to see it.  She isn't the only one that can make handbags!!  Tee hee!!

So it is a short and sweet post from me today as I am a bit of a busy bee and have a lot to do .. .. .. but I must just report that I had a lovely snuggly sleep last night with the extra duvet width!!

Catch you again tomorrow

Love

ANYONE FOR CAKE?

Hi Everyone

I hope your Monday was good.

Weather wise it has been a bit of a mixed bag here .. .. but I have managed to dry the washing which was nice.

I stripped our bed and made a very strange discovery.  I have been complaining about the quilt disappearing in the duvet and often ending up with only the material of the cover covering me with no quilt in my part .. .. today I know why!!  I have only been using a double duvet inside a King Size quilt!! Doh!!!

But I did find the  King Size quilt squashed into a drawer under the spare bed!!  Yippee .. .. I feel a snuggly sleep coming on tonight LOL!!!

OK round to today's share

This used:

Image:  Lili of the Valley

Backing Papers Pink Petticoat

Flowers:  Cuttlebug Die and X-Cut Punch

Josy Rose:  Nail Heads

ProMarkers

Glamour Dust
Ribbon from the stash box

That is one massive cake that young girl is carrying.  Nearly as bad as the one we had on Saturday night .. .. ..  and sadly we forgot to put the remains of it into the car with the birthday girl when she went home yesterday .. .. .. so we have cake overload on our hands .. .. even though we have given lots away!!.

There is only so much chocolate fudge cake you can eat  .. .. even when it does have a bit of cream poured over it!! 

Does anyone fancy helping me out and eating a piece or two?  LOL!!

Next I have an award to share

It came from a lovely lady who I have only recently met in blogland called Stella. Please make time to pop over and see Stella .. .. her blog is a real treat to see and so inspirational.  I just love the way she presents her work so artistically.  When posting a creation she shows you a little bit at a time, step by step until you finally see the whole beautiful creation .. .. and every creation is beautiful.  You need to look back over past posts too as there are some real beauties there.   Thank you very much Stella, I really appreciate you thinking of me .. .. but I am very naughty with awards and can never choose who to pass them on to .. .. so I give it to everyone who visits my blog today to say thank you for calling by.

Have a great evening everyone.

Love

JULES' CRAFTY SNIPPET CHALLENGE - WEEK 19

Hi Everyone

Here at last.

All recovered from the party and a very late night .. ..  all the party guests, including the birthday girl, have now gone home :-( 

Oh well, all good things must come to an end .. .. the same as all the bad ones.

Just our youngest Son here now for his Sunday dinner.  The calm after the storm!!  LOL!!!

Only time for a couple of snippet makes today . . but they did use up quite a few of those snippets that have been lurking around for a while.

 

For those who are new to my blog Sunday is the day that I use up all the lovely card and paper from around my workspace that I just cannot bear to throw away.  A case of waste not, want not.

I don't list all of the things I have used but if anyone would like to know what a particular element is then just ask away and I will come back to you.

The first one is my favourite this week. 

So who kept me company last week and played with their snippets too:

Well first up was my lovely playmate Sandra .. .. who is becoming quite a regular here.  Sandra is really putting me to shame and is using up lots of magazine freebies.  We all have these hanging about and I really must make an effort to drag some of mine out sometime.

Next to play along was Maarit who made a brilliant "do not disturb" sign with her snippets.  I love all the different elements on this.  So much to look at.  Maarit even does her own crochet flowers!!!  Aren't they gorgeous?

Then Mervi came to play with a gorgeous card that used a scrummy Penny Black image and so many gorgeous layers.  I loved it.  The sad thing is that I remember commenting on it .. .. but Mr Blogger managed to lose my comment amongst all the hassle he was having this week.  I have made amends and commenting again today .. .. just sorry it is late Mervi xx

Then last, but not least, came Kaz.   What a gorgeous creation Kaz came up with.  I love the colours and layout on this one very much and such beautiful colouring too.

Thank you so much ladies for all your inspiration and for keeping me company.  I hope you enjoyed playing along. 

I certainly enjoyed seeing what you created and I hope others will pop along for a look at your lovely makes too.

If anyone wants to play along this week then please link to Mr Linky below so we can all come and gain some inspiration from you.

By the way Stella, I haven't forgotten your lovely award.  I promise to post it tomorrow and thank you very much for thinking of me xx

I will catch you all again tomorrow and will hopefully get chance for a good old blog hop tonight once our evening meal is sorted.

Take care everyone.

Love

JUST A QUICK POST BEFORE THE PARTY BEGINS

Hi Everyone

Just a very quick post from me tonight .. .. as the party starts in about an hour!!!  Woo hoo!!!

The party peeps will be arriving soon.

Today hasn't involved any crafting .. . other than taking my DIL to see our one and only craft shop in the area.  We both had a little spend .. .. but my DIL had some birthday pennies to spend so her purchases were much more exciting than mine.

Mine were essentials like new B plates for my cuttlebug, a new blush Promarker pen (last of the big spenders) and some more transparent sprink plastic.

My DIL had some Tim Holtz Sizzit dies (which I have ran through my cuttlebug a few times in exchange for her running some of mine through LOL!!) and she had some other lovely goodies too.  That's the beauty of having a birthday.  Guilt free birthday stash.

Anyway a quick share of another make that I did for Anice to launch her new Funky Hand Download "Rainbow Stripey Stripes".

This used: 

Backing Papers:  Funky Hand "Rainbow Stripey Stripes" and "Rainbow Polkadots"
Sentiment and images:  Funky Hand Paper Factory CD "Craft the Year Away"
Brads from the Stash Box

So a very quick post from me.  Sorry I haven't been able to visit to see what you have all been up to .. .. but tomorrow I should be able to catch up.

I hope everyone has had a good Saturday and I am so pleased that Mr Blogger is feeling so much better.  He even returned my tutorial post.  That was kind of him.  Thank you Mr Blogger!!

Catch you tomorrow with my Snippet makes but for now I am off to party!!!!

Love

DEDICATED TO MR BLOGGER

Hi Everyone

Poor Mr Blogger .. .. .. what a stressful time he must be having trying to get all our blogs back in order again.

I do hope he manages to recover all of the missing posts we have all done .. .. especially the tutorial I did yesterday.  I don't want to have to do all of that again!!!

So here is my share of the day .. .. dedicated to Mr Blogger

This used:

Image:  LOTV
Backing Paper:  Sorry I don't know.  It is some paper I bought years ago when I didn't need to know who made things LOL!!
Sentiment:  Elzybells
Martha Stewart Punch:  Daisy
ProMarkers
Crystal Stickles

and that is me!!!

Hope everyone has a good weekend.  Mine is going to be super special as my big baby boy and his wife are coming home from London for the weekend so we can celebrate my lovely DIL's birthday (I have spent a good bit of today trying to find the spare bedroom for them .. .. it has become a bit of a craft pod overflow room of late LOL!!).

So tomorrow may or may not see me making an appearance .. .. we shall have to see how the day goes.

Have a good time whatever you are doing and "Get Well Soon" Mr Blogger.

Love

FRENCH KNOT TUTORIAL

Hi Everyone

Hope you are all well .. .. and if you aren't then I wish you better soon!!!

It has been a busy day today in the House of Hearts but I have a card to share and a little tutorial.

I received quite a lot of emails asking about the french knots I put on my card yesterday and how I did them.  So I have tried to put a few photographs together for you to explain the process I used.

But first here is my share of the day

This used:

Image:  Hero Arts"G5311" Sillhouette Spray
Background Image:  Elusive Images "32531" Script Background
Sentiment:  Elzybells (sadly no longer trading)
Background made with brayer and Big and Juicy "Spice" Ink Pad
Heat it Up!:  Silver Pearl Embossing Powder
Josy Rose:  Nail Heads
Ribbon and Button from the stash box

Very different colours for me .. .. but I love them!!


Now tutorial time.

I am hoping this glut of photographs help to explain how I make my french knots.  Here we go ....

I started by laying the vellum over my base card and folding
the ends to the back

This is the back and I have sellotaped the loose ends down

Working from the front again I made two holes where I
wanted the french knot to be

Thread a needle with embroidery silk
(I didn't split the silk and used all 6 strands).
Working from the back push your needle through one of the
holes and sellotape the end down. 
(You don't want to put a knot in it or your work
won't lie flat against your card when you stick it down)

Working from the front again place your needle
behind your thread

Now wrap your thread over and over the needle.
I do this 4 times .. .. but don't do this too tight.

Next push your needle through the second hole you made

Gently pull the needle and thread through to the back of
your work and all of the thread you wrapped over and over your
needle will bunch up into a knot. 
Don't pull it too tight .. .. you want it a bit bulky.

Oops!!!  I can see distress ink on my thumb!! 
Mucky madam!!!!

On the back simply cut your thread,
pull it tight and sellotape that end down too. 
Keep quite a bit of length otherwise the thread might
work its way through and spoil your work. 

Here is a close up of one of the knots from yesterday
(because I forgot to take one of my finished knot today).

I think they add bit of texture and are a bit more artistic
than the ever faithful brads that I normally end up using.

So hopefully that has been useful for you.

I used embroidery silk here but you can also do them with ribbon, wool, thick cotton .. .. all kind of threads really.

They take a little practice.  Just don't pull the thread too tight around your needle whilst wrapping it round and you should be OK.  In fact it might be easier to practice on a piece of material to begin with.  Once you get the hang of them you can experiment with wrapping the thread round the needle more times or even less .. .. just to see what result you get.  Good luck if you decide to give it a go.

So back to the important issue of The Apprentice.  LOL!!!

Both Keryn and I still have our three candidates in the running for The Apprentice.  Neither of us lost any of our acts this week (sounds like we are on the X-Factor).  Keryn has Jim who seems to be one very lucky chappie .. .. I have never seen anyone be nominated to be taken back to the boardroom and then turn it around so that they aren't .. .. and what was that little wink he did when they were back at the house.  Mmmm... might be more to him than meets the eye!!! LOL!!!

Shame it isn't on again tonight!!  I have to wait a whole week now!!  Tee hee!!

Have a good evening everyone whatever you are doing.

Love

PENNY BLACK SATURDAY CHALLENGE

Hi Everyone

Hope you are all well.

I am beginning to think hubby chose the right week to have off.  We had beautiful sunshine whilst he was on holiday last week .. .. but this week we have had rain every day!!  Not continuous rain but very heavy downpours in short spells .. .. must be late April showers!!!

A quick share of a card I am entering for the Penny Black Saturday challenge where the theme this week is "distressing".

This is something I am getting into more and more .. .. after being quite frightened by it at one stage.

Here is my creation

This used:

Image:  Penny Black "4037K" Mixed Media
Backing Paper:  Memory Stor
Woodware Punches:  Flowers
Leone Em Pty Punch:  Ash Branch
Distress Ink:  Frayed Burlap
Pearlescent chalks
Vellum, brads, seam binding and embroidery silk from the stash box

I do love vellum but find it hard to attach sometimes.   But because this creation had a nice "old" feel to it I decided to attach my patterned vellum with a few embroidered "french knots" .. .. .. how many years since I last did some of those?  Phew ... too many .. .. must do more as these three whet my appetite.  Makes a change from attaching it with brads I thought.

So that is it for my share of the day.

Another helping of The Apprentice tonight!!  Woo hoo!!  Two in one week!! 

So now having seen my three chosen candidates in action I may have chosen a bit differently given the option again tee hee!!  I have a sneeky feeling my candidate Tom isn't going to go too far .. .. I think he needs a good shave to start with!!!!

Anyway we will see how they do tonight .. .. but the right one went last night.  I think we are going to see a few "strong and strange" personalities making an appearance over the next few weeks.  LOL!!!

Love

THE STAMP FAIRY CHALLENGE

Hi Everyone

Well after reporting to you about the thunder storm yesterday .. .. we had so much rain it was unbelievable. The water was running down the road like a river!! I bet all the little plants were well happy!!

My water butt is certainly filling up nicely.

Anyway, round to my share of the day and this one is for the Stamp Fairy Challenge where this week there is a sketch to follow.

and a mega close up because he is so darn cute!!!

This used:

Image: The Stamp Fairy - Lenny Notes
Sentiment:  Woodware Clear Stamps "FRCL022" Girl Talk
Backing Papers: DCWV - Latte Stack
Nestabilities: Standard Circles Large, Classic Scalloped Circles Large
Sizzix Die: 654995 Stars #2
Cuttlebug Embossing Folder:  Swiss Dots
Josy Rose:  Nail Heads
ProMarkers
Buttons and Cord from the stash box

I was lucky enough to win the challenge again last week over at the Stamp Fairy and my image today was one of my prizes .. .. I think I lurve Lenny!!!

I need to make a few male cards and so today's card is one of them.  However the same sketch and image could easily be used for a female card, or a childs card.  Very versatile!!

If you fancy playing along here is the sketch.

So tonight sees the start of one of my favourite TV programmes .. .. The Apprentice .. .. yay!!!

My blog buddy Keryn and I have chosen three candidates each to see who goes the furthest in the competition.

My three are:

Susan Ma

Natasha Scribbins

Tom Pellereau

Remember those names .. .. one will go this week, the other next week (or later this week?  there might be two shows this week) and the other the week after that.  Get down the bookies quick  LOL!!!!

Have a lovely evening whatever you are doing.

Love

Rainbow Stripey Stripes

Hi Everyone

I hope you are having a lovely Monday  .. ..  mine has been a bit quiet without hubby about .. .. so I have had to make do with the radio to compensate.

Today is just a quick share from me featuring a new download that Anice has brought out over at Funky Hand.  The download is called "Rainbow Stripey Stripes" and it matches the Rainbow Polkadot download that was recently released.

Here you can see one of the samples I made using the stripey stripes:

This used:

Backing Papers:  Funky Hand "Rainbow Stripey Stripes"

Marianne Designs:  Butterfly Die

Martha Stewart Punch:  Traditional Scallop and Frond

Woodware Punch:  Circle (for making the roses)

Distress Ink:  Tea Dye .. .. for distressing the edge of the roses

Ribbons and Gems from the stash box

Well it must be my lucky day.  We are just starting a thunder and lightening storm with mega rain and hailstones .. .. thank goodness I did my token offer of gardening first thing this morning and got my mail into the post box about 30 minutes ago otherwise the phrase "drowned rat" would be coming to mind!!  LOL!!!

Just the greenhouse door to close but hopefully the storm will have passed before I need worry about that!!

Have a lovely evening everyone.

See you again tomorrow.

Love

 

JULES' CRAFTY SNIPPET CHALLENGE ~ WEEK 18

Hi Everyone

Here at last with my snippet makes of the day .. .. but sadly only two this week :-(   (Slacker!!  LOL!!)

The day has just disappeared!!  It is the last day of hubby's holiday and we have been trying to cram more and more into it!!

Lots of lovely rain last night that has started to fill our empty water butt .. .. but it did make the ground rather heavy to dig this morning.  But not to worry as every bit of work done out there is another step in the right direction.

So enough of the excuses woman and show your snippet makes .... ...  tee hee!!!

There might only be two but at least they are two I like .. .. which always helps LOL!!!

One little tip that you might find useful is that when making the little curled roses I have found using my old quilling tool really useful in helping to curl the paper round and hold everything in place whilst the glue sets. 

So who kept me company in my snippet mission last week .. ...

First up was Amanda who made two lovely snippet makes this week.  Both were lovely and completely different to each other.  You can find Amanda's fabby makes here.

Then Kaz came along to play.  Kaz followed a sketch to use up some of her snippets and the finished result was great.  Just goes to show you don't need much paper to make a special something.  You can find Kaz's creation here.

Next came Lisa with her great make. Lisa keeps waving this fabulous stamp under my nose .. .. I just know I am going to have to succumb sooner or later LOL!!!. I love the neat clean look of this make .. .. plus quite a few snippets were lovingly used in the making of this project. You can see it here.

Then last, but not least cam my regular playmate Mags.  Mags really came up with a brilliant make this week as not only did she use up some of her paper snippets she also used and recycled lots of other interesting things too.  I was well iimpressed with the finished look.  Take a little peep here to see waht Mags created.     

Thank you very much ladies for keeping me company this week and for sharing all your inspiration for using up some of these snippets that are just too gorgeous to not use. 

I hope you get chance to visit their lovely blogs.

So hubby is back to work tomorrow.  I feel a "down in the dumps" day coming on tomorrow as I know I am going to miss him lots.  We are already on a bit of a sulk as we have had such a lovely week.  Not bad for saying we have worked for most of it.

Right, off to see if those roast spuds are done enough to turn the veg on for dinner.

I will catch you again tomorrow and in the meantime if you decide to have a snippet attack then please share below so others can take some inspiration from you.

Love

RANUNCULUS FIELD

Hi Everyone

I hope your Saturday has been good.

We have had some much needed rain so most jobs have been indoors today.  I know all jobs count but we were hoping for just another couple of days in the garden.

Hubby goes back to work on Monday :-( and we still have lots of things on our list that are incomplete .. but not to worry .. .. it was a very ambitious list LOL!!!

So here is today's share

This used:

Image:  Stampendous Cling "CRR112" Ranunculus Field 
Sentiment:  Penny Black "Critter Party"
Backing Paper:  Dovecraft Back to Basics
Distress Ink:  Tattered Rose
ProMarkers
Glamour Dust
Seam Binding and Charm from the stash box

Just the one picture today but it does have a posh background so hopefully that compensates. 

I have been photographing wedding stationery again and didn't want to dismantle my display because I have more pictures to take.  (Lazy madam).

So that is me for today.  I am now off for a good old blog hop and will be back tomorrow with a snippet or two.

Love

FANCY MAKING A CORNER BOOKMARK?

Hi Everyone

Here I am .. .. bright and early(ish) with my creation for the Get Funky! Challenge.

This month the theme was set by my lovely teamie Debs and she asked for us all to use "spots and stripes" on our creations.

I decided I didn't want to make a card this time as I am a bit predictable with what I post .. . so came up with this:

A bookmark for attaching to the corner of your page.

If you would like to see how I made it then I have put a little tutorial on the Get Funky Challenge blog here.  They are really easy to make and great little fund raisers at fayres or great for popping alongside birthday cards or into party bags.

If you fancy playing along with the Get Funky! challenge this time round it would be great to see you but rember you need to use at least one Funky Hand paper or extra on your project.  If you pop over to the challenge blog you will see that there is a fab free paper available .. .. and you could end up winning a free download of your choice!!  Woo hoo!!

Have a lovely day everyone .. .. not too sure exactly what hubby has planned for today yet .. .. but we do need a journey into town as part of it.

Our garden will get a little bit more attention too but at the moment the noise out there is so loud.  Lots and lots of little birds calling to each other and tweeting and busily flying around the place.  Popping in and out of the hedges and trees.  Some clearly building nests and others just chasing each other!!!  They wear you out just watching them don't they?  Tee hee!!! 

Plus something else I want to know .. .. how come when we had all that wind at the beginning of the week were the birds still able to fly properly and bob along the ground without being blown over?

Anyway that is me for now and I hope I see you over at Get Funky!.

See you again tomorrow.

Love

NO LAND DUTIES TODAY

Hi Everyone

Well guess what? 

We didn't do any gardening today!!

After all the hard labour of the last few days we both had a break and did what we enjoy doing best.  I made cards "all day" and scheduled my Funky Hand post for tomorrow.  Hubby went off to buy his football season ticket for next year (before the prices go up), then he did the supermarket shopping .. .. bless .. .. and then he started to paint the swingy sofa thing we have in the garden!!

I think my day was bestest!!  LOL!!!

So here is my share for today, which is based on an old Mojo Monday sketch that I enjoyed using a while back

This used:

Sentiment:  Penny Black "3849E" Birthday Dreams
Backing Papers:  Aimee Asher (4 different papers here pieced together)
Woodware Punches:  Scalloped Oval and Dasies
Josy Rose:  Nail Heads
Distress Ink:  Frayed Burlap
Brad and ribbon from the stash box

I am around nice and early tomorrow as it is my turn to post my creation over at Get Funky!

See you soon

Love