Good morning!  Well, this is the last day of my summer holiday, so regular postings will now go out of the window!  Here are three more cards to share with you, all for birthdays in September.

 Ingredients

Card, embossed frame and sentiment : Craftwork Cards

Ink : Versamagic Spring Pansy

Ribbon : Craft Fairy

Glitter Glue : Stardust

Ingredients

Card blank, sentiment, Candi : Craftwork Cards

Flowers : Prima

Paper : Sugar and Spice by Dovecraft

Ingredients

Card blank, Candi, Digi Smooth cardstock : Craftwork Cards

Cardstock : From stash

Stamp : Time for Tea by Beth Gunnell (free with Quick Cards Made Easy)

Nestabilites : Large Classic Oval and Large Scalloped Oval

Promarkers : Duck Egg, Walnut, Lime Zest, Sky Blue, Meadow Green, Canary, Peach, Rose Pink

Sakura Glitter Gel Pen

I think it will be unlikely that I will get any more cards made today which is a pity.  My day will be spent getting myself and the children ready for tomorrow - checking bags, pencil cases, PE kits etc.  Making sure shoes are polished and phones are charged and locker keys are found.  I'm trying to eliminate the panic tomorrow - would like the morning to be calm, particularly for Emily - so no dramas would be good!  I'm off to chivvy Edward to get dressed (how is he going to get ready on time tomorrow??!!) so that we can walk the dog.

Have a fun day.

M x

Cheers!

Just enjoying a glass or two of champagne to celebrate my 17th Wedding Anniversary.  Mark is cooking a sumptious meal (his choice, I suggested a takeaway) of scallops to start and posh sausages and puy lentils for the main course.  I've had quite a chilled day.  Haven't done anything special but it has been lovely all the same.

I've been trying to break the back of all the birthday cards I need for September.  They pretty much all have to be different as most of them are for people I work with.  I also have an order for three special cards to complete in the next week (typically I have left this until the last minute).  I have really enjoyed my card making today as I don't feel under any pressure.  I'll be showing you these over the next week - they are awaiting scanning.

I've also started to organise my crafting area too, little by little.  I've got an A5 Notebook and I have written down all the colours of my inks, ink pads, Glimmer Mists, Promarkers etc to avoid duplication when I go to stamp shows (in readiness for Ally Pally at the end of September!).  I've also noted down my Nestabilities, Cuttlebug embossing folders, clear stamp sets etc.  It's jolly useful and reminds you what you have.

Here are a few Christmas cards that I made recently.  They are all the same design, just different colour combinations.  As usual - all products are Craftwork Cards.  (Sorry the cards are a bit wonky - you just can't get the staff these days!!).

Hope you are all enjoying the weekend.  I have to say, we had better weather 17 years ago!

M x

New Cards 2

I'm on a roll now! More cards to show you.

These are very simple too and didn't take very long to make. I cut a panel of coloured card and embossed the bottom half with a Swiss Dots embossing folder through the Cuttlebug. Then I cut various circles/scallops with my Nestabilities and stamped some images and words from Paula Pascual's range of stamps with Stazon ink.

I really loved the embossed bit of the card. I mainly use my Cuttlebug for cutting shapes, but I think that there will be more embossing on my cards from now on.

Hope you are all having a fab weekend. We are off to take the dog for a long walk. See you soon.

M x

New Cards 1

Here are a couple of cards that I have made recently. I used Paula Pascual stamps called Simple Flowers and my trusty Cuttlebug and Nestabilities to cut the circles. The beauty of these cards is that they took minutes to make, and that they are very inexpensive. I finished the centre of the large flowers with foiled Candi from Craftwork Cards, and added a little bit of glitter glue to the centres of the smaller flowers.

I'm feeling very happy today as I have a new toy to play with - an early birthday present. It's a new laptop. My old one was a cast off from Mark's job and was painfully slow, sometimes it wouldn't boot up at all, other times it would just switch off with no warning - totally unreliable. Not helped by the fact that Chloe had bitten off one of the keys! Anyway, all my family are clubbing together and I am feeling very lucky indeed.

Take care everyone.

M x

Freebies

Here is a card I made using paper that was a free gift with a scrapbooking magazine, and the stamp was also free with a card making magazine. Normally I'm not that keen on the free gifts that magazines tempt us with, but both these caught my eye. Of course, the magazines themselves are ones that I always buy, so I wasn't lured by the free gift alone!

The stamped image is coloured in with my trusty Promarkers. The little green circles are Candi by Craftwork Cards - really like their new range of printed Candi - these have little flowers on them. I cut the circles using my Cuttlebug and Nestabilities, and the scalloped border was done with a Fiskars border punch. Oh, and a little bit of glitter glue here and there! A very quick and simple card to make. Hope you like it.

Hope you are having a restful day.

M x

New Cards

Here are a couple of cards that I made recently. The base cards are cream although they look white in the photo. They are from Craftwork Cards - Back to Basics range, good quality, good value.

The paper is old stock, had it for ages and am trying to use it up. Its the Birdie Collection from Crate Paper. I love the soft colours and they really suit a little bit of sparkle, either with some Stardust glitter glue or a sparkle Sakura Gelly Roll pen - my two favourites.


The circle messages are also from Craftwork Cards and I used my Cuttlebug to cut the coloured circles and the scalloped circles.


I still have enough paper to make a few more cards which I hope to finish and post soon.


Can't believe we have had our little Chloe for over a week. She's a real sweetie, but can be quite naughty. It's really hard being cross with her when she looks at you in a sad way. Night times are still a challenge, but we'll get there in the end (I hope!). I'm really looking forward to the time when we can take her for a walk - four weeks to go!



Hope you all had a brilliant weekend.



M x

Birthday Presents

After a hectic weekend celebrating Emily's birthday, I celebrated mine on Monday. I had a lovely day despite having to go to work. I had lots of lovely presents from Mark, the children and family and friends - I felt very spoiled. I made over 70 cupcakes over the weekend to take into work - some for the children in my class and the rest for the staff (I never want to see a cupcake again!!!). But at least they disappeared quickly! The children in my class made a big fuss of me and I really felt the love!

Here are some of the presents I received. My Mum and Dad bought me the Promarkers which I have been keen to try out for some time.

Mark bought me three of these Nestabilities and my parents bought the other. I'm getting quite a collection now and I've even got my Mum interested and she's just bought herself a Cuttlebug.

A couple of new Momiji dolls to add to my collection (from the children).

And some new books. The first two (fromthe children too) are by authors I love, so I'm quite keen to start reading them. The second group are from a friend who knows I love to read and we discussed these books recently. She highly recommends them so I hope I like them. Has anyone else read them? I'd be interested to know your opinion.

I was also lucky enough to get some money, so I've ordered some more Promarkers and will probably get some more wool for my new Granny Squares blanket that has ground to a halt at the moment.

I'm hugely excited about the weekend because I have tickets to see Eclipse - the third in the Twilight Saga. It's not officially released until the 9th, but I managed to get tickets for the preview weekend - I can't wait!

Enjoy the rest of the week and the lovely weather - hope it lasts til the weekend.

M x

For my sister

Today is my sister Maria's birthday and wedding anniversary. These are the cards I made for her last weekend.

This first one is the anniversary card. The papers are from a DCWV stack (sorry, can't remember which - I have quite a few!!). The heart design oval is from Craftwork Cards and the scalloped oval is cut with my trusty Cuttlebug and Nestabilities.

The birthday card is all Craftwork Cards products. I love the red and grey combination and the butterflies are so cute. I am such a fan of their products, the quality is first rate.

I hope my sister has had a lovely day, she is suffering from a throat infection at the moment, so I wish her well.

Have fun!

M x

Regular posting

Apologies - a quick moan! I've been finding it very difficult to post regularly at the moment. I haven't felt that I have had anything that interesting to share. I don't mean to sound all doom and gloom, but you know what it is like when everyday life just gets in the way. I am in awe of those who are able to post everyday, but during term time, whilst I'm working, I just can't keep it going. So please dear followers, bear with me!

That said, I did manage to get some cards made on BH Monday. The fist one is for a friend's daughter. I have used my Cuttlebug to emboss the pink panel (Swiss Dots) and the oval scallop is one of the Nestabilities (I am so in love with these - beats craft punches any day!!). Oh and my lovely Martha Stewart glitters on the numbers.

This second card is for another friend's daughter - the papers are Tiffany by We R Memory Keepers, Nestabilities oval scallop again and Papermania rub-ons.

I hope everyone had a lovely BH weekend, despite the lovely weather! Ours, whilst not very interesting, was very productive. We had a lovely time with my nephew for his 16th birthday, even if he didn't like the fuss. Did have a little detour on the journey up - simply couldn't resist a little visit to Paperchase - we don't have one close by.

We spent Sunday and Monday turfing out the under stairs cupboard - my goodness what a lot of rubbish was in there - I filled two black sacks. My lovely husband laid the leftover flooring in it, painted the walls with the Duck Egg paint of our living room, then put up some shelves - he is so clever. And the shelves, well most of them are for my crafting stash that had been stacked in the dining room - what a result!!

On that happy note, I'll say cheerio. Have a good day. Until the next time.

M x