CHRISTMAS LOVE

Hi Everyone

Just popping by to wish everyone a really lovely Christmas.

I hope it is a special time for you all, and one you can collect special memories from to look back on in years to come.

Our big family day is Saturday .. .. so I am going to enjoy a few days of  "calm before the storm" .. .. starting in around six hours time when hopefully everything I want to get done will be done.

Santa won't be bringing me anything craft related at all .. .. in fact I am hoping for a manual that will teach me how to switch off, stop thinking, chill and be lazy!!  Something I find very hard to do.  My brain always seems to be on overdrive.

I can never sit and do nothing .. .. but I will try .. .. very, very hard  LOL!!

My crafty share to wish you all a really happy Christmas, filled with love, is something I have created using Serif Craft Artist Professional (something I treated myself to a little while ago but haven't had time to play with properly yet).  I know it leaves a lot to be desired but it isn't bad for a first attempt.  I was quite proud of being able to add my curtains behind the windows .. .. but sadly I couldn't make it look like I had a decent front door LOL!!!  Mr Heart said I will just have to pretend it is open !!

It has all been super busy here on the wedding front recently .. .. hence the lack of posts and blog visiting .. .. but hopefully I will catch up soon.  

In the meantime I would just like to thank everyone for all your support, comments, cards, emails and friendship.  All very, very much appreciated.

Have a wonderful special few days everyone.

Love and Christmas hugs

SUNDAY SNIPPETS

Hi Everyone

Happy Sunday!

I hope your day has gone well.

A quick share from me today which used up a few of those pesky snippets that seem to keep multiplying in my little craft pod. 

As always on a Sunday I am very lazy and do not list my ingredients .. .. but I will be taking my creation over to share with the playmates over at Pixie's Snippets Playground.  

So poor Luke Friend got booted off the X-Factor last night.  Shame :-(  

Enjoy what is left of the weekend.  I hope you have made some "in-roads" into those Christmas preparations.

Not sure whether I will manage to post anything for a few days as I have a mountain of work to get through before next weekend hits.  So I will just say that I will "catch you when I do".

Love

MY LAST CHRISTMAS MAKE FOR 2013

Hi Everyone

Happy Saturday!

Well here it is .. .. my last Christmas make for 2013!!

All Christmas orders now complete and the craft pod has had a clearing away of all things glittery and seasonal.  Quite a sad feeling really because I do love making Christmas cards.

But the clearing away of Christmas stash now makes way for a mountain of general orders and wedding work which needs to be done.  

Today has been the preparation part for some of that work.  The drafting out of wording for invitations, table plans,  place names, menus etc (not my favourite part .. .. I much prefer the "putting together" of everything) .. .. but you can't do the latter without doing the former can you LOL!!.

So here is my last Christmas card for 2013 which I actually made yesterday .. ..

This used:

Image:  Penny Black "3057K" Leaping Deer

Sentiment:  Pink Petticoat "Tiny (Christmas) Sentiments"

Backing Papers:  Pink Petticoat "Twas the Night .. .. Script" and Snow Flurry from "Christmas Selection"

My Trusty Sewing Machine

Josy Rose:  Nail Heads

Distress Ink:  Tumbled Glass

Ribbons and Charm from my stash box

Time now to get my glad rags on as we are meeting friends for a pre-Christmas celebration and an exchange of presents.  We always set ourselves a price limit and a theme.  We enjoyed last year's theme so much that we did the same again this .. .. £5 worth of serviettes .. .. and the more obscure the better. You wouldn't believe how many you can buy for £5 LOL!!!

Have a lovely evening everyone .. .. and don't tell me who gets booted off X-Factor please.  I won't see that until tomorrow.  But please don't let it be Luke Friend.  I want to see him in the final!

Love

TAIL END OF THE CHRISTMAS MAKES

Hi Everyone

Happy Friday!!!

I am on the tail end of the Christmas makes so this is probably the last time you will see this fabby die I invested in during 2013.. .. but it will definitely be here again next year that's for sure.

So here is my share for today

This used:

Memory Box Die:  Grand Merry Christmas
Backing Paper:  Nitwits "FQB Woodland Wishes"  (Random snippet behind the die cut)
Cuttlebug:  Snowflake die and Embossing Folder  .. .. I don't think this is still available though :-( sorry
Ribbon, embossing powder, charm and a brad (with its legs cut off) from my stash box

Short and sweet and very late so I will fly in an out.

Catch you over the weekend.  Have a good one!

Love and hugs

PENNY BLACK SATURDAY CHALLENGE

Hi Everyone

Happy Wednesday.

I hope your day is going well.

Another busy one here in the House of Hearts .. .. and one where I have today taken a huge weight off my shoulders and resigned myself to the fact that no-one will be getting handmade cards from me this year .. .. I just don't have time to make them amongst the wedding work and orders I need to complete before Christmas .. .. so it will be charity cards supporting our local Hospice from me this year. Phew!!!  Pleased that decision is made and strangely enough I don't feel guilty!

But I am still making Christmas cards for my lovely customers and here is one of my favourites from today:

This used:

Image:  Penny Black "3741K" Filigree Tree

Sentiment:  Lili of the Valley "Christmas Sentiment Tags"

Backing Papers:  Pink Petticoat "Twas the Night .. ..  Script" overprinted with "Scandi Chic Snowflake" and "Pinstripes"

Distress Ink:  Old Paper

My Trusty Sewing Machine

Josy Rose:  Gems and Nail Head

Eyelet and ribbons from my stash box

I am going to take this over to the Penny Black Saturday Challenge where the theme is "Christmas" .. .. that was handy!!!  LOL!!!

So that is me for today.

A mammoth cutting out session is planned for tonight and tomorrow .. .. so my snippets are going to increase still further with all those offcuts that I simply can't put into the bin!!!!  LOL!!!

Have a good evening everyone.

I'll catch you when I do.

Love

WOW! EMBOSSING POWDERS

Hi Everyone

I hope your week is going well and that the Christmas plans are coming along smoothly for you.

Things are progressing nicely here  .. ..  at the moment!!  Of course I am putting that down to my efficient "do lists".  LOL!!  At least if something makes its way onto the list I can stop thinking about it as my memory just isn't good enough to remember everything any more!

So with all the things on my list you would have thought I would be doing wedding work or Christmas makes .. .. but no.  I wanted to play with my prize that came on Saturday from the WOW! Embossing Powder Challenge and this is what I made.  After all a craft pod isn't just for Christmas and my list contains general card makes too!!  LOL!!

This used:

Image:  Hero Arts "S5316" Silhouette Grass (bet you thought I had lost this stamp as you haven't seen it for a while LOL!!)

Sentiment:  Pink Petticoat "Tiny Everyday Sentiments"

Crafter's Companion "Die'sire Dies "Scalloped Tags"

WOW! Embossing Powder, Earthtone Pepper, Earthtone Honey, Earthtone Olive  (plus I embossed some Neutral Ultra Shimmer Embossing Glitter onto the distressed butterfly wings)

Distress Ink:  Tumbled Glass, Spiced Marmalade and Wild Honey
X-Cut Punch:  Butterfly

Twine and pearls from the Stash Box

I couldn't believe how quickly my lovely prize arrived.  I only chose my six colours very late Thursday evening and my goodies were with me Saturday morning!!  No chance to use them until now .. but I am well chuffed .. .. and they all came in this fabby little storage case.  Thank you Tania!!

There is a fabby blog full of wonderful ideas if you fancy a nosey .. . you can find it here.

OK time to get into that there kitchen .. .. the breadmaking machine smells like it has worked its magic so I had better go and check it out!

Catch you again soon (I hope) .. .. have a lovely evening.

Love

SUNDAY SNIPPETS

Hi Everyone

I hope you have all had a good Sunday.

I have had a lovely day and managed a little play with my snippets for taking over to Pixie's Snippet Playground .. .. .. with "little" being the operative word:

This little creation measures a whole 3 inches by 3 inches .. .. and I faffed about for blinkin' ages with it LOL!!!!!

It has been a lovely day here with Christmas starting to come together.  The tree is out of the roof and already half decorated and the Christmas cards are out ready to start writing.

Plus the Christmas glass is out .. .. woo hoo!

No heart on the glass .. .. but all the ice cubes inside will be heart shaped .. .. Tee hee!!

I am trying to get ahead of the game Christmas wise as there is rather a lot of wedding work to get through on the run up Christmas .. .. .. and today feels like a good start.  Though I am nothing like as organised as the folk on Coronation Street .. .. all of the houses are full to bursting with Christmas cards and decorations and have been for weeks!! LOL!!

Enjoy the rest of this evening and have a good week

Love

TWEET BIRTHDAY WISHES

Hi Everyone

How goes it?

I hope your weekend is going well.

I have been dabbling in lots of things today, dreading washing, weddings, birthdays, .. .. but for some reason nothing related to Christmas!!! Something wrong there!!  But never mind there are still lots of sleeps to go yet .. .. aren't there ?!?!?!? 

Quite a few birthday cards needed here so I made the first port of call the Sketch Saturday Challenge Blog .. .. .. to take some of the thinking out of things for me, and this is what I came up with:

This used:

Image:  Digistamp Boutique "Cute Singing Bird"

Sentiment:  Computer Generated using font Candy Buzz

Backing Papers:  First Edition Papers "J'adore

Spellbinder Nestabilities:  Classic Ovals and Scallop Ovals

Papermania Punch:  Daisy

X-Cut Punch:  Corner Rounder

Josy Rose:  Nail Heads

ProMarkers

Ribbon from the Stash Box

I am also sharing this with the Digistamp Boutique Challenge for December.

and here is the sketch I used .. .. in case you fancy playing along:

Time now for our Saturday supper .. .. hopefully catch you tomorrow with some snippet usage .. .. I didn't manage it last week :-(  

Serves me right for shooting off and entering three times the week before.   LOL!!

Enjoy your weekend!

Love

HAPPY COUPLE SHARE

Hi Everyone

I hope your week is going well.

Mine is flying by in the blink of an eye .. .. .. again!!!

Still no makes to share as it has been wedding work and commissions all week .. .. but I thought you might like to see the sort of thing I am making when I am absent from blogland for these long spells.

One of my lovely happy couples who got married in October sent me some lovely wedding pictures to look at this week .. and they kindly said they would be happy for me to share a picture of the table plan I made for them with you.

The frame was actually from a mirror but worked really well for the effect this lovely couple wanted to achieve.

I never find table plans easy to take pictures off :-(

Catch you again when I do .. .. sorry I'm not getting any blog visiting in at the moment.

Love

SUNDAY SNIPPETS

Hi Everyone

I hope you have had a good weekend .. .. mine has flown by.

We were determined to get more of the Christmas shopping out of the way and some of it took place in a local craft store where I spent ages talking with the lovely lady who was serving there.  So if you are the kind lady who helped me and you have come to my blog to see if there is a project on view along the lines of our discussion .. .. then I apologise for it not being here yet.  Hopefully I will get around to it soon .. .. and hopefully it will be worth looking at when it does appear.

But for now .. a quick card that uses snippets .. .. but I can't take it over to the Snippet Playground because the gates aren't open yet.  So I will have to use more snippets another day.  I should think that Miss Di is in shock at the moment because not only did she reach the elusive 60 entries last week .. .. but a huge 101!! Yay!!!  Well done Di.

As always on a Sunday I am lazy and don't list my ingredients .. but a nice lot of snippets got used up.

The spider is still "on the loose" and hasn't been seen again .. .. but it has been named "Pimpernel".  I still keep looking for it .. .. although the bride who was with me the night we saw it did email the following day to say that it could even have dropped to the floor and climbed into her handbag which she had put on the floor!!!  That would be a nasty surprise if it did!

Have a good week everyone.  

I'll catch you when I do.  Not sure when it will be .. .. lots to be done and lots of people to meet before this time next week!

Love

MISSION COMPLETE

Hi Everyone

Happy, happy Friday .. .. the weekend is in touching distance!

Nice and early today with my final snippet make for this week.  My mission is complete .. I managed the three I promised on Sunday!

Good news in itself .. .. but even better news is that Di has managed to reach (and surpass) her elusive 60 entries!!  Well done Di!!  In fact, as I write, this entry will go into Pixie's Snippet Playground at number 70 and there is still time to enter if you get chance! 

It has certainly been a very busy playground this week and I do hope some of the new playmates have had fun and decide to come and play again.  (I think Miss Di needs lots of folk for the "crowd scene" in the Christmas Play LOL!!).

So here is my last snippet share for Challenge 100:

This used:

Image:  Penny Black "4268K" Crystal Drops

Sentiment:  Lili of the Valley "Christmas Sentiment Tags" (20% off sale starts midday on Monday!!)

Backing Paper:  Pink Petticoat "Christmas Scripts"

WOW! Embossing Powder:  Opaque White

Glamour Dust

X-Cut Punch:  Small Snowflake

Josy Rose:  Gems

My Trusty Sewing Machine

Twine, ribbons and thread from my stash box

As will all things blog related this is much more sparkly in real life!!!

I was hoping to have posted this creation late last night but when a bride called by in the evening to pick up her invitations we sat chatting and talking about what she still needs to do ahead of her wedding when she said "Do spiders bother you .. .. because you have a very big one over there" and she nodded towards the corner of my dining room.  

I turned around and what a shock.  There was, what I can only describe as the biggest spider I have ever seen just hanging high up the wall.  Big and black!!!  We both looked at it, looked at each other with our mouths open, looked back at the spider and at that very split second it dropped itself .. .. but to where I don't know!!  Eeeekk!!!

I don't mind spiders but he was rather large and I wouldn't like to think of it crawling on me.  

We don't kill spiders .. .. we catch them in a bug catcher thing my hubby bought a couple of years ago .. .. but the span of its legs was so large I am hoping it will fit inside .. .. otherwise it will be back to the old glass and paper technique (oh .. another use for snippets).

I told hubby about the spider later and he said "I know".  

"What do you mean?  You know?" I asked .. .. and it transpires that this little critter has been living in our midst for quite a while now and hubby has sometimes seen it run across the carpet .. .. but so fast he hasn't been able to catch it.

So last night I started on the spider hunt as I couldn't stop thinking about it.  I hope it can't climb stairs!! LOL!!  

Anyway time to get cracking on my day.

Have a great Friday everyone and a lovely weekend.  Hope you find some craft time.

Love

MIGHTY WISHES!

Hi Everyone

Super late in the old House of Hearts today!

It has been another busy old day .. .. and I have a feeling I am going to have a busy old few weeks ahead of me judging by all the boxes I have filled today with supplies for making wedding invitations, favour boxes, table plans and table stationery.

I felt quite sorry for the delivery man as he struggled up the drive with a huge box.  He carefully placed it on the floor inside the front door whilst I signed for it and then off he went leaving me the lovely job of splitting it all into the various storage boxes for the relevant couples.

I get tricked every time when I open the box and see samples on the top and my heart always skips a beat when for a nano second I panic that I have ordered the wrong colour LOL!!  Every time it happens LOL!!!

Anyway, time for a quick share that for a change doesn't involve a Christmas card .. .. 

This used:

Image:  Penny Black "2074J" Mighty Wishes!

Sentiment:  Pink Petticoat (no longer available I'm afraid .. .. I have had them years and years)

Backing Papers:  Docrafts "Best of British"

Josy Rose:  Nail Heads

X-Cut Punch:  Corner Rounder

ProMarkers and Chalk

Diamond Stickles

White Gel Pen

Metallic Cord

and that is me for today.

Not sure I will get chance to share anything tomorrow as I have a full "seeing customers" day ahead of me  .. .. but I will try my best.

I hope everyone's week is going OK and my apologies for not getting much commenting in at the moment.

Love

MORE SNIPPETS BITE THE DUST

Hi Everyone

I hope your week is going well.

Sorry for the "no show" yesterday. 

I experienced one of those magical days that don't come along too often where you seem to fly through lots and lots.  Then just as I was expecting my lovely hubby to come home he sent me a text to say he was staying at work to do some overtime as they were busy .. .. so I carried on with my wedding work .. .. but then completely ran out of time to make anything to share on my blog.

Never mind .. .. I can't expect to win in all directions .. .. but I would like a whole week of days like yesterday.  It was "fandabidozi"!! 

Anyway, as I promised on Sunday I am going to try and enter Di's Snippet Challenge a whole three times this week in an attempt to get Di to reach 60 entries.  My entry today will log in at number 36 (if no-one else jumps in first) .. .. so things look to be on track!

I am also going to scurry along to the last Rudolph Day Challenge for 2013. 

So here is my share:

This used:

Backing Papers:  Nitwits "Still Joyful Hearts Too" (you know when you haven't got too many downloads if you can still recognise which paper collection a snippet comes from).

Sentiment:  Digistamp Boutique "Simply Christmas Greetings Mixed" (fabby new download that is going to be super useful)

Marianne Design "Bell and Bauble" Die Set

Glamour Dust

Josy Rose:  Nail Heads

My Trusty Sewing Machine

Diamond Stickles

and that is me for today.

Time to link up and then crack on.

Have a lovely day everyone.

Love