Blog Awards

Hey there everyone!

I am really pleased to share with you that I have received another two awards! This one is from my friend, Sav.  We've got to know each other through being on the PDCC design team.  She's such a generous and fun person, and makes fab cards too!!   I'm so pleased to have 'met' her virtually, and hope to meet her in real life too! Please stop by her blog and leave her some love!!

I can remember the first award I got, I was SO excited, and they still make me feel really happy! As Sav said on her blog they seem to come at just the right time, don't they?!  Sav introduced me to {ippity} so it's thanks to her that I'm now playing with lots of yummy new stamps! Thanks Sav!!!

My next award is from Wendy over at The Stamp Attic in Wantage, thanks Wendy!

There was a list of instructions so here goes ...

1. Express gratitude to the blogger that bestowed the award unto you... Wow, Wendy, oh great one, I am so honoured that you have given this award to this mere mortal, little ole me!  I truly am not worthy of your kindness!

2. Display this picture proudly on your blog;

3. Be nice and provide a link to the person who gave it to you..................Wendy can be found here!

4. Tell 6 outrageous lies about yourself and one truth, or switch it about and tell 6 truths and one lie............you will have to decide for yourselves what you believe

5. Nominate 7 creative writers who might be into doing this (now that's a tough one!)

6. Post links to the 7 you nominate and let them know..............

Okay, here are my lies/truths...................

1. One of my favourite films is 'Another Stakeout 2'
2. I do not have an addiction to all things paper crafting
3. I usually fall asleep at the cinema, they turn the lights off...what do they expect?!
4. I hate celery with a passion
5. I am not very keen on clothes shopping
6. I used to work in an old people's home

And now I need to pass this award on to some of my blogging friends....here they are in no particular order .. except for the first one of course, she's my baby!

1. Rock Chick Tink
2. Joanna
3. Sarah-Jane Rae
4. Sav
5. Sarah
6. Julie
7. Michelle

Sorry girls, I hope you're still talking to me after this one!! It is just a bit of fun though :o)

I have exciting news to share with you tomorrow, so watch this space!

It's H{ippity} Hop time again!

Happy Monday!

It's a bank holiday Monday over here in the UK, so happy bank holiday to everyone over here and happy Monday to everyone else!

For my H{ippity} Hop today I want to share a card that I have made for the Unscripted Sketches challenge.  I had a few ideas for this, but while mulling them over I decided to watch a bit of TV with my family.  When I came back to make my card this little pack of Jenni Bowlin papers was screaming at me to be used!!

As you can see I flipped the sketch for my card.  I'm not sure I like the black bar down the middle now, my little checked ribbon makes it look more like a zip lol.  It does look better in real life, honest!!

I really do need to stop photographing my cards at night, they just don't come out that well so I hope you can see all the detail.

For this card I used one of the new {ippity} stamp sets, 'Delightful Little Things'.  I love this particular sentiment, it sounds so old fashioned!  This was quite an easy card to put together as I just used all of the Jenni Bowlin co-ordinating papers and cut out a little butterfly to finish off the central tag.

Here is another card that I shared recently using the new 'Now and Always' {ippity} sets, I had entered it for a colour challenge, see here.  I love these colours, they are so cheery!

Be sure to stop by the Ippity blog for a complete list of blogs to hop to--there are some amazing creations posted today! I'm really loving these new stamps from Ippity, and it's fun popping round to all of the blogs to see what people have created!


Have a great day!  Don't forget to join in with the Play Date Cafe Challenge this week, there's still time!

You're sew lovely!

Hi everyone

It's Play Date Cafe Challenge day, and Julie has set a yummy colour challenge for you this week!  When I first saw these colours I really liked them but I had absolutely no idea how to put them together, so I went on a search for some papers.  Over in the UK we have Cadbury's chocolate that has a purple wrapper, so that was obviously the first thing that came to mind lol ;o)

Sarah and I thought it would be a good idea to use the same patterned papers and prima flowers for this week's challenge, to see how different our cards would turn out.  So this is my one, and you have to go over to Sarah's blog to check her one out too!  Thanks too to Wendy at The Stamp Attic for pointing us in the right direction with the papers!  It added an element of excitement wondering what Sarah will come up with too, I can't wait to see her creation!

Here are my card details;

1. Double mat lilac cardstock onto a white card base.  In all honesty this was an accident, but you know what it's like..you come up with much more creative ideas when you have to cover something up!  In this case I had a glue mark on the paper, so I doubled up on the lilac but I really like how the edges turned out.  I will have to do that again some time!
2. Cut dark browny plum patterned paper and adhere at an angle onto the card
3. Stamp tailor's dummy onto ledger paper and the sentiment, add to card as shown
4. Cut a strip of patterned paper, adhere as above
5. Finish off by adding a few prima flowers

Simples!

I'm really pleased with this one.  It's colours I would never have put together, but I definately would now!! Yummy!!!  Thanks Julie!!

Stamps: Lawn Fawn
Papers: So Sophie range - My Mind's Eye, Bazzill Cardstock
Accessories: Prima flowers, Versa colour 'bark' ink

Don't forget to check out the rest of the team's creations, there's some FAB ones there!

Julie Ranae (Senior DT)

Mona Pendleton (Senior DT)

Sarah Anderson (Senior DT)

Lisa Somerville

Savannah O'Gwynn

Stephanie Kraft

Suzanne Czosek

Have fun!

My first H{ippity} Hop

Hey everyone

Hope you had a great weekend. Ours was quite busy, but lovely too. Saturday we did an Art Journalling course with Sarah (Anderson), which was incredibly messy but lots of fun. I've decided that I need to work on that a bit more, lots of practice required I think lol.

So, today is my very first H{ippity} hop. I thought I would join in on the fun. I'm hoping this will post properly for me as there is quite a time difference and it took me a while to figure out what it was! Fingers crossed I got it right!

 For my card I used my little bird and tree from the {ippity} 'Fall for You' set.  Oh HOW cute is he?!!!!  He looks so sweet stamped up in real life!

I usually do a search on different sketch sites at the weekends to see what sketches jump out at me, and I found this one over at the Sweet Sunday sketch blog.  The idea this week was to use the sketch but to incorporate some background stamping.  Now, this all started off very well, but my tree looked a bit flat.  In the end I decided to stamp it and cut it out instead, so it only resembles the sketch a little now!  Does that ever happen to you?!!!  Funny!  I still really enjoyed using the sketch though.  As soon as I saw it I thought it was perfect for my little bird.  What type of bird do you reckon he is?

Hope you enjoy the rest of the H{ippity} hop!   I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone has made.  Don't forget, there's still time to join in with the Play Date Cafe challenge this week!  Pop on over and see what you can come up with!

Doodle Blooms & Get Sketchy

Happy Friday everyone!!!

I hope you have a good weekend planned. We've got fabulous weather here at the moment. Today the sun was shining, it was lovely and warm and we were able to go out in summer clothes, gorgeous! It just makes you feel so much better about life!  Tomorrow is supposed to be more of the same!  I'm off to Oxford to do an art journalling course with Natasha.  It's run by Sarah Anderson from the Play Date Cafe team.  We had such a giggle last week, we just spend the day messing around with paints and rubber stamps, great fun!

So for my card I wanted to try out another digi image and thought I could combine it with this week's Get Sketchy challenge.   I keep seeing them popping up everywhere and I've downloaded a couple that I want to play with. Today I'm using one from Tiffany Doodles, called Doodle Blooms. This bloom is just so elegant, I love it!  I am in a dotty mood today, hence the papers ;o)  I matted some 'Early Bird' papers onto black cardstock and paper pieced the flower onto some Making Memories 'Love Struck' paper and then finished it off by framing it with some of my Nesties.  Using my new favourite ruffled ribbon technique I ruffled some ribbon and tied a bow at the other side.  Finally to finish I stamped my sentiment and inked with Tim Holtz 'tea dye' ink to age it.  I'm quite pleased with how it turned out.  I do love my polka dots.  What patterns do you like?  I'd love to hear what ones work for you.

We have visitors again this weekend so I won't have much time to play, but I will be popping back on Monday with an {ippity} card.  I'm going to try and play along with my first H{ippity} Hop then.

Have a lovely weekend! 

Ciao for now ♥

Butterfly Dream... more like Butterfly Nightmare!

Hey there! How has your day been? Mine has been busy but good :o)

It's challenge day at Play Date Cafe this week and for some reason this REALLY was a challenge. I had been mulling over ideas throughout the week, and had a few different cards that I thought I might make, but when I actually came to sit down and do this card I had nothing! When I say nothing, I mean nothing!  So as my title suggests this card was a nightmare to make!  It may look simple but trust me it took FOREVER to make! 

These are the challenge colours;

 
I managed to dig out a paper that worked for the colours, but that was it. It was too traditional for the ideas that I wanted to play around with. Now, I look at other people that make cards look modern with traditional papers, but that's not really how it works for me. I see traditional paper, I get traditional ideas, modern paper, more modern ideas etc. Hmmm, now what was I going to do because time seriously was running out before I had to submit my card design!  I could think of lots of ideas for other cards, but just not for this one!  I still don't like it very much!

Tell me, what do you do when you have to make a card, but the ideas just don't come up for you? Is there something that helps you get your mojo? I'd love to hear how you get it together!   Anyway, onto the card details....

1. Huff, puff and moan about not knowing where to start while you try out new ideas, hating each one more than the last, and will your mojo to somehow kick in on time!
2. Cut a rectangle of patterned paper, attach to white card base
3. Cut two strips of green cardstock, punch border
4. Cut a strip of yellow paper, another of patterned paper and adhere punched border either side of strips as shown
5. Tie a ribbon around strip before attaching to the centre of the card
6. Stamp label and sentiment, fussy cut and pop dot onto card
7. Die cut butterflies, attach to label with pop dots
8. Add pearls to finish

Stamps: {ippity}, Papertrey Ink 'Damask Designs'
Papers: Basic Grey, Bazzill Cardstock
Accessories: e Pearls,Versacolour 'bark' ink, Martha Stewart punch

I'm hoping to get to play more with my new {ippity} stamps this week.  I haven't had much time so far, and we all know how much fun it is playing with new goodies!  The stamp I used for this card came from this set..

Although it's mostly for Christmas the labels can be used now, and for those amazing cardmakers that have started their Christmas cards already then this would be perfect.  Note to self, must get more organised!

The rest of the DT did a fab job again this week with the colours, they've all made it look so simple.  If only!  I wouldn't mind, but I think the colours that Mona set us are so lovely.  Very strange how sometimes ideas come together, and others just don't!  Pop over to the rest of the DT to see what they've made.

Julie Ranae (Senior DT)

Mona Pendleton (Senior DT)

Sarah Anderson (Senior DT)

Lisa Somerville

Savannah O'Gwynn

Stephanie Kraft

Suzanne Czosek

We have Maile Belles as guest designer this week, how exciting!  I've only recently come across Maile's work via Papertrey Ink and I just love how clean, simple and modern her designs are.  Luverly!   I LOVE her card for our challenge, it's so perfect for our colours.  Why can't I come up with designs like that?!

I would like to say a big thank you to Janet who very kindly gave me this blog award the other day...

What a lovely surprise, it made my day!  Thank you Janet!  (such a pretty cheerful flower too!)  I am supposed to pass it onto twelve people but I wouldn't have a clue where to start.  I get inspiration from so many places, so I would like to give it to each and every one of my followers.  Without you all I wouldn't do half the number of cards that I do, your comments truly inspire me to keep creating.  It takes time to comment, and I really do appreciate you taking that time to say the lovely things you do say about my cards!  You're all fantastic and you inspire me too!  There are always so many new things to learn in this hobby, aren't there?!

So don't forget to pop on over to the Play Date Cafe and join in on this week's challenge, and then leave me a comment to let me know how you got on.  Hopefully you will have done better than me!

My first card with the new {ippity} stamps...

Hi again everyone

As promised I'm back to share another card with you.  This time it is with one of the new sets by {ippity} called 'Now and Always'.  This is my favourite set of all of them.  I just love the way you can paper piece the flowers, FAB!!

This is my card;

For this card I used the Embellish Colour Challenge and the Caardvarks May sketch challenge set by Heidi Van Laar.  Now I've been following Caardvarks for EVER, but I have never quite got around to joining in on their challenges, so I am very pleased to have crossed something else off my list! 

Have you noticed I like my lists?!  According to one of those psychological tests that I took many years ago I am a 'completer' and a 'planner'.  Hmmm, not sure that always works in real life but there is an element of truth in it!!  I tend to just wing it a bit more now that I'm older, which just totally adds to your stress levels lol. 


So.. what do you think of this new YUMMY set then?  You likey??  I lovey!!!!  You wait until you see the rest of them!!!  If you haven't seen them yet then don't worry, I will be making some cards over the next few days that I will share with you.

This was a very simple card to put together.  I used October Afternoon papers, with some Bazill cardstock.  The flower was paper pieced and layered using dimensionals, which was one of the Embellish challenge requirements (not that I had actually read that, so I was quite fortunate that I pretty much always use dimensionals!)  The sentiment was from my new Waltzingmouse Fancy Phrases stamps.  Those stamps are fab, they fit into the Nestie Fancy Tags cutters.  Love them, and they have great phrases too that can be used on all sorts of cards.  To finish my card I simply distressed some of the edges using Tim Holtz tea die.

Hope you like!

I've toned it down a shade... what do you think?!

Hi everyone

Did you all have a good weekend?  I hope you got lots of creating done!   It's been busy for us, so I haven't had a minute to pop round and say hello to my blogging friends, but I will be round as soon as I can.

I hope to be back later on today to post a card I made using the new {ippity} stamps, but until then I just thought I'd share a little card I made for the Limelight Papercrafts challenge. I didn't come across the challenge until too late, but loved it so much I knew I needed to try out the sketch as I have quite a few cards to make for an order.

The colours are a bit more muted than I normally use, but I wanted to play around with my new Basic Grey papers.

This is the sketch from Limelight... Such a cute little sketch, and it could be used in so many different ways.  I'll leave you with the deets.  Have a great day!

Dies: Tim Holtz - Tattered Flowers
Stamps: Papertrey Ink - Signature Greetings
Papers: Basic Grey Kyoshi, Bazzill Cardstock
Accessories: Brilliance Graphite Black inkpad, SU! border punch

PDCC & don't kids say the funniest things!

It's time for another fun challenge over at the Play Date Cafe!  This week we have some nice bright colours for you!  (Lovely!)

Heidi Van Laar is our guest designer this week!    I LOVE Heidi's style, it's so fresh and funky!  I've been a follower of hers for a long time now.  What I really like is how she pops over and leaves a comment on my blog when I've commented.  I'm sure she gets loads of comments, but she still takes the time to pop over.  It's really sweet of her.

This card took a bit longer to make this week.  The idea came together quite quickly, but for some reason it took me ages to put it all together.  I'm going to blame it on my cold, that must be why!

Here are the card details;

1. Cut a piece of lime patterned paper, attach to card base
2. Stamp alphabet set, using green for the letters 'b', 'o' and 'y', red for the heart and the remaining letters in blue, paper pierce corners, distress around all of the edges
3. Stamp the sock monkey in green, or whatever it is you would call him
4. Cut a strip of pale blue paper, attach as shown
5. Cut two rectangles in dark green patterned paper, one large, one small, round right hand corners
6. Attach the larger rectangle to the left of the card, add the stamped square and do some faux stitching around the edges
7. Attach the smaller rectangle to the right of the card, matting a white rectangle on top, and adding the sock monkey using pop dots, add a little red dot to his hat.  Add some faux stitching to the white rectangle
8. Tie stripey ribbon around the card to finish

Stamps: Unity
Papers: Amy Butler, Bazzill Cardstock
Accessories: SU! grosgrain ribbon, Tombo pens, Tim Holtz 'tea dye' distress ink

Pop on over to the rest of the DT's blogs to see what they came up with.  As you will see we all had very different interpretations of the colours this week!

Julie Ranae (Senior DT)

Mona Pendleton (Senior DT)

Sarah Anderson (Senior DT)

Lisa Somerville

Savannah O'Gwynn

Stephanie Kraft

Suzanne Czosek

Re: kids and the funniest things...

Natasha was talking about some illuminous tights she had seen, here's what was said;

Natasha:  'I saw some halluminous tights today'

Me: 'You're funny darling. It's illuminous, not halluminous'

Natasha: Oh, I should be a chameleon (translate that to a comedian!)

I love it!  I hope she never gets too grown up to make me laugh!  She is my little ray of sunshine each day :o)

News.... Ippity

Guess what... I started using {ippity} stamps a little while ago, and seeing the cute designs they do, and now having played with them I know how well they stamp so I have decided to start selling them!! I'm really excited about it all!!! I'm going to be an ippity chick!! Yay!!

I think I've come in on it all at a great time, because I've seen the new release due to come out on 13th May and I have to say it is FAB!!! I LOVE some of the designs and I know you will too!

When I first started this blog I was very anti-rubber stamping. I much preferred my die cuts, but now having made many online friends and gaining so much inspiration, pretty much daily, as I've said in the past, I feel I can now make card designs that are contemporary with rubber stamps and not out-dated as I viewed them a while ago.

They say 'never say never'! I used to hate butterflies on cards too, can you believe that?!! I never thought I would do digital either, but that's another area I'm starting to venture into. What I love about it is that it's great being able to get your 'stamps' immediately, no waiting! Every crafting girl wants to create as soon as they see what they like, right?!

There are just SO many things to learn about cardmaking, and blogging has opened up a whole world of new ideas. I love it! Thank you so much to everyone for their kind comments, you have NO idea how much they mean to me. Even now I still do a happy dance every time I get a new follower, each and every comment and each and every follower makes me smile, so a great big THANK YOU for your support!

It would be a good time to follow my blog now so that you don't miss out on the new releases. I will be setting up a separate blog eventually for my stamps, but in the meantime, until I can get that organised please feel free to e-mail me. Once I can share the new releases with you I will. Lots of fun things to come very soon with {ippity}.  I've only just signed up so I'm waiting for my delivery to arrive, but as soon as I can get my little mitts on them I will be sharing a few designs with you!

From tomorrow if you would like to place a pre-order with me you can e-mail me at rubyrubis@aol.com.

More pink!

Hi again!

My Florence Nightingale duties continue, but I am still managing to make a few cards in between my nursing ;o) My man is now on the mend, home safe and sound, which is the main thing. He just needs to behave, and know that it's ok just to rest! Mind you, I think he has lost the plot actually.  I was typing at my desk earlier and I saw a fairly small (but too big for me to get rid of) spider run up the wall.  I asked if he would remove it for me, and because he couldn't see it he said, 'Are you sure it was a spider?'  Hmmm, now let me think... it was black with lots of legs, it moved.  Umm, yes it was a spider lol.  Funny! 

I've had a bit of time to look at some of the tutorials I'd saved for reading. I've learnt how to make spiral flowers thanks to Rae Barthel's tutorial, ruffled ribbon thanks to Ashley Cannon Newell's tutorial, layered and looped ribbon thanks to Nichole Heady, and many other little bits and bobs. I've had a few of those, 'why didn't I think of that, it's so obvious' moments, which have been quite funny!  I've yet to make a card using Nichole's ribbon technique, but I will :o) Thanks so much for the inspiration ladies!

Ok, so what do you think of this card?  It's not my normal style, but I was asked to make a pink card, with butterflies and bling, very girly and I guess romantic because it was from a partner to his girlfriend.  I can't make my mind up if I like it or not.  Ian and Tink think it's lovely, so does my Mum, but do they count?  They all think I'm amazing (well, why wouldn't they?!! ;o) ) so I'm not sure.  Would love to hear what you think about it!  I've shown you the inside of the card too.  I don't normally do much with the inside, and in actual fact at the beginning of the year I did say I would start doing something, so I just kept it quite plain and simple.  Another thing off my to do list!  I am in LOVE with those yummy spiral flowers though!  They are fun to make and pretty too!

I also made this card for the Clean and Simple FTL #89 sketch this week, where I played with Ashley's ruffled ribbon technique, that was great fun to do too, quite therapeutic actually! 

Have a fun evening!

ps - just in case you were wondering - he did find the spider, and very nicely removed it for me!

Hope your day is fabulous!

Hi everyone

I hope you popped over to see the creations from the PDCC team for the challenge this week!  Join in on the fun while you're there!!

Fingers crossed this post has worked and you should be seeing some more cards that I made for some challenges!

My first card was made for this week's Clean and Simple FTL 88 challenge.  I am really finding their clean and simple sketches inspiring.  I'm so glad I came across this blog!  Here's what I made;

I made my second card for this week's Sweet Sunday Sketch challenge.  I'm quite pleased with it, but I'm not sure about that baby's head, does it look like a lolly stick?!!  Also, the circle I've put the baby's head on, hmmm, not sure.  Anyways, it was fun to make.  I love that patterned paper, it's so colourful. 

When I'm back to normality, and released from my Florence Nightingale duties ;o) I will be back to posting more information about the products I've used.

Have a fab day.  Make sure you get lots of crafting in! ♥

Oh my goodness, I made a pink card!!

Please scroll down for challenge entries....

Hi there everyone.  I hope you're having a good week.  Mine has been quite good so far.  So, today is Play Date Cafe challenge day!  We have some luverly colours for you this week;

For my card I used a cutter that I have had for a while.  (So long in fact I nearly had to blow dust off it!)   It's a Sizzix clear die so you can position the image anywhere that you want it.  I chose to position mine to one side and then cut the same flower out again to use inside.  I wasn't quite sure how to photograph the card for you to see it, so I've done both inside and out for you.  Sarah, you'd  like this one, you could use the offcuts afterwards as a stencil for your art journalling ;o)

This week we have guest designer, Ashley Cannon Newell, joining us! I absolutely LOVE Ashley's work, she has some beautiful ideas, she is very inspiring!  I subscribe to her feeder and look forward to seeing her latest creations pop into my inbox!

This has to be one of my quickest cards to make so far!

Here are the card details;

1. Cover front of card with patterned paper
2. Position daisy on card and run through Big Shot machine
3. Cut out another daisy in a different colour
4. Line up the black daisy through the front flower and stick down
5. Using a pre-cut flower add a polka dot brad and attach to large daisy with a pop dot
6. Cut out a silver and black rectangle, round corners using small corner punch
7. Attach sentiment die cut and add a flower
8. Simples!!

Dies: Sizzix 'Clear' 'Flower'
Paper: Craftwork Cards 5 x 5 papers
Accessories: Craftwork Cards pre-cut flowers and pre-cut labels, Bazzill Basics polka dot brad

I think our design team have come out tops with the cards this week, they are ALL gorgeous, I think it's my favourite week so far actually for all of the DT cards, and as you know pink isn't usually one of my favourites to use on my cards.  It comes up now and then, but always with an addition of lots of other colour!!  Pop on over to their blogs and see their creations....fab!

Julie Ranae (Senior DT)

Mona Pendleton (Senior DT)

Sarah Anderson (Senior DT)

Lisa Somerville

Savannah O'Gwynn

Stephanie Kraft

Suzanne Czosek

Challenge Entries - Card Patterns #62, JUGS #31 & Sketch Saturday #101


Here is a card that I made for the Card Patterns Sketch challenge this week.  I used my Basic Grey pad, my old faithful circle and scallop cutter (as you know I LOVE those!) and my Hero Arts 'Write Your Own' stamp, with 'happy' and 'birthday' from the Papertrey Ink set, Springtime Doodles.  I then stuck on a couple of little embellishments (I think they were from K & Co, but not entirely sure as I emptied them all into a pretty little pot so don't have the labelling!)

My next card is a combined one for two sketches, 'Just Us Girls' Challenge and Sketch Saturday;

 

As you can see for the Sketch Saturday Challenge I inverted the sketch and for the Jugs challenge I added the ribbon, hope that counts!  Again I used Basic Grey papers, some SU! choc chip ribbon and some cupcake stamps.  To finish I used some little legless brads from Craftwork Cards.

My man is going into hospital today for a gallbladder removal so I haven't added a proper 'how to' or 'recipe' list of what I've used for my challenge cards.  If there is something here that you would like to learn more about just drop me a comment/e-mail and I will get back to you with the details.

In the meantime have a great day and don't forget to play along with our challenge at the Play Date Cafe !