Merry Christmas everyone.

I'll not be doing any more crafting this year so I thought I would use my blog as many others have done to send my Christmas greeting.

Thank you for all the cards we have received, as usual the hand crafted ones take pride of place second only to our family cards.

This picture was taken last year at the end of November in the airport as we left the Dominican Republic after a much needed holiday in the sun.
The tree was decorated with lots of lights, red baubles, drums, lots of gold bows and 'straw' hats. It really did seem strange to see in such hot weather. To all my forum, blogger and facebook friends I wish you a Merry Christmas and a Peaceful New Year. I hope 2009 sees you Happy and Healthy.

x x

A bit of rough!

Take your minds out of the gutter right now.
I meant a bit of rough icing on my Christmas cake.
I don't go in for smooth edges and fancy piping on my cake just the good old snow effect with a couple of embellies on top.
The poor angel looks as though she's stuck in a snowdrift.
It looked as though it had snowed in our kitchen by the time I had finished, the icing sugar just seems to fly everywhere.
Maybe it will get cut at Christmas this year, it's usually well into the new year before we touch it.

Thank You

I received this lovely unmounted rubber stamp from Annie this morning. It was blog candy from a few weeks ago which I was fortunate enough to win. The stamp is Oakley in the bathtub, a Whiff of Joy stamp.

I got my versafine out straight away to try it on a scrap of paper. It is a lovely stamp and one i've not come across before, it gives a beautiful crisp image even on cheap copier paper. This photo really does not do it justice at all.
Thank You so much Annie i'm sure i'll find lots of uses for it.

An Award

I've been given this award ( well about a week ago) by my good friend Lynn.

Thank you so much Lynn.

The rules are to give it to five others, who shall give it to five others. You must link to the one you got it from, and also to the ones you give it to and let them know. And there is more ... ... You have to write down five things you are addicted to!

This list of addictions is partly why I have not blogged this before now.

1. Rubber stamps although I don't use them as often as I should.

2. Nice papers, I don't like to use them as much as I should as I can't bear to part with them sometimes.

3. Embellishments- beads, buttons, ribbons etc. etc.

4. The internet, be it forums, blogs or facebook.

5. Liquorice! Once I start with the stuff I can't leave it alone.

I've not included my hubby or family as it goes without saying that I am addicted to them in more ways than they will ever know.

I hope i've not hung onto this award for so long that I don't have anyone new to give it too but here goes.

Karen, Gez, Kathy and Hazel my Bubbly Funk friends and Annie who I have known for a couple of years originally from the Stamping Mad forum but whose blog I now follow with much interest.

This is the real reason why I have not blogged it before as I know so many ladies with super blogs. Please don't be offended if you are not on this list, I'm sure someone else will pass it on to you soon.

Thank You

I've got a big Thank You to say today to a lovely lady named Gez. I know her through the Bubbly Funk forum.
Several weeks ago we did a stamped image swap and she remarked how much her daughter liked a couple of the images I had sent. I stamped out a pile of them for her along with some other cuties and sent them off.

This morning the postman rung the doorbell and gave me a jiffy bag containing a super box of chocs. So a very big Thank You goes out to Gez for her kindness and thoughtfullness.

Will it or won't it?

Will it or won't it get iced before Christmas? The cake was made at the end of November in plenty of time to be decorated. since then it has been fed brandy a couple of times but I only got round to putting on the marzipan today.

I hope it can get iced before the big day, i've got everything ready to do it.

Not many left

As you can see there are not many packages left now for me to open. I'm getting a little bit impatient now and having a good feel at each one. I can't imagine what is in the 25th though, it is such a strange shape almost like a tube of handcream or such but it is so light. I can imagine the person who sent my parcel is chuckling away to themselves if they read this.

This is what I unwrapped today - 2 lengths of beautiful shiny ribbon and a piece of lace ribbon. I want to keep them all to myself but know they will look a lot better on cards than shut away in my box.Thank You whoever sent them to me, I will find out on Christmas day.

All Done (I hope)

Well I think I have finally come to the end of my Christmas card making for this year, it seems to have gone on forever.

I have never been so late in finishing them before, in fact for the last 2 years the bulk of them have been completed by November. Last year it was because we went away mid November and the year before because we moved at the beginning of December and I had to get them out with change of address notes included.

I have just gone through my lists and reckon I have made 124 Christmas cards and at least 9 Birthday cards for December and early January dates. Of these 10 Christmas and 2 Birthday have been commisioned and another 20 Christmas ones have been left with my Hairdresser for him to sell. I'll find out in January how many of those are left.

These are 2 that I made for a friend, I made 3 of them altogether. They are based on the ones I made for our parents and I think I prefer them to the originals. I think the piece along the base adds to them being a bit special.

I have received some beautiful handmade cards from Forum friends on both Bubbly Funk and Stamping Mad and would like to say a big 'Thank You' for all of them.

Toppers on cards

This is how I used some of the toppers I showed in an earlier post.




I really enjoyed using them and managed to sell the A4 card shown in the middle. Most of these seem to have lime green in them, I wonder how that happened!

This is one I made for my daughter, it had to be pink because all her tree decorations are that colour.

Forever Friends

These cards are made using my new set of stamps. It is a set of 3 Forever Friends stamps from the DoCrafts range. They have all been sent to friends or neighbours.

This card uses one of the stamps but was made especially for my grandaughter, Faith. It's in pink, her favourite colour but still looks Christmassy.

The image was stamped with grey versafine ink and then I coloured it with watercolour pencils and layered it onto a piece of silver mirror board embossed with the snowflakes folder by Cuttlebug. It has a touch of glitter glue to give it a bit of sparkle.

Christmas minis

I made these mini cards for my nephews and great niece using stamped images from a swap on Bubbly Funk forum.
I'm afraid i've no idea who sent these as I didn't remember to keep them all seperate.

Does anyone recognise them?

They have all been coloured with watercolour pencils and had a spot of glitter glue applied.

More Goodies

It's been a while since I made a post on here so I thought i'd start off by showing a few more of the lovely goodies from my secret advent parcel.

I'm getting lots of super crafting items, i've not used any of them yet and some have been whisked away by my daughter but i'm enjoying very much finding new things each day.

I'm still only guessing who my sender is but almost found out by accident on saturday as I was wrapping gifts.
I realised the box they came in was just right to hold a gift so took most off the sticky tape off and started to cut my address label away when I realised the box had been used before and the senders address was underneath. Quickly I turned the box over before tearing the label off so i'm still non the wiser.

Secret Advent

As I have done no crafting at all today I thought I would share the contents of my first 3 secret Advent packages from the Bubbly Funk forum.


Day 1 a selection of shiny eyelets in different shapes and sizes.

Day 2 a selection of flowers, some are buttons others are flat.

Day 3 six flowers with sparkly gems in the centres.

Thank You Secret Sender but I still have no idea who are as I was very good and tore off the postage sticker without looking for the P.O. postcode.

Christmas toppers

I started making these toppers a couple of nights ago then had to give up as the bulb went on my lightbox. Not to be outdone I got my Cuttlebug out yesterday and embossed a few more but because the bits on the corners are only part of the design had to leave them out of the backer.
I did the stitching in different metallic threads and backed them with co-ordinating card then layered onto white backers and put organza bows on them, some have tiny jingle bells.

Don't you just love the spotty lime green ribbon, it is from Ribbon Oasis and is my absolute favourite at the moment.

I have to decide how to use these toppers now, the ones with bells will have to be for hand delivered cards as I don't think they will go through the post too well.

Another award.

I have been given another award by the lovely Karen. Do have a look at her blog for some super ideas. This award states that:

This blog invests and believes the PROXIMITY- nearness in space, time and relationships. These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in prizes or self-aggrandizement. Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers.

Deliver this award to bloggers who must choose more and include this cleverly-written text into the body of their award.

It is so hard to choose a I only gave out an award such a short time ago and most of the people whose blogs I follow may already have this. If I miss you out this time I am sorry, I love visiting blogs and appreciate all the kind comments left on mine.
This time the awards go to

Jacqui and Jak, who maybe don't know me but I find so many beautiful things on their blogs each time I visit.

Lynn and Billie who always have good ideas on how to do things.

Autumn wildlife.

These cards will have been received by now so I am safe in showing them.

The images on both are once again taken from the Jayne Netley Mayhew Cd.



The squirrel image has been layered onto a rust coloured mat which has in turn been layered onto white cardstock which has been stamped with an oak leaf in brown ink. The same inking was used twice to give a difference in colour.

The little mouse has been layered onto a mat of red card and the white cardstock covered with a backer from the Cd to match the image.

Secret Advent calendar

Over on the Bubbly Funk forum we have done a secret Advent calendar. 18 of us have taken part and wrapped 24 small pressies and 1 larger one and sent them to our recipient to be opened each day during the run up to Christmas.
We were given the name of the person to send our package to but have no idea who ours is from until Christmas day when we open the last gift.

Mine arrived last week and my recipient already has hers. What a lot of lovely packages I have to unwrap.

I just had to have a traditional chocolate one as well of course.

Have you noticed my new signature? It's quite easy to do and if you click on it you will find out where I got it.

Bad blogger?

Oh dear it's over a week since i've blogged and then it was to accept an award not show any work.
I have been making cards and have taken a few pics ready to pop on here but have not spent much time on the computer for some reason. I really will have to get my a**e into gear this weekend and sort something out.
Lots of work going on in our garden as well as we are having a conservatory built. A couple of photos of that to show later. Need to upload them to the computer first.

Kreativ Blogger award

Awe...a big thank you to Karen for this award.






To recieve this award I must pass it on to 5 people whose blog who inspires me. Well there are so many that I have in common with Karen that I may struggle to give this to someone who hasn't already got it.


The rules:
1. The winner may put the logo on their blog.
2. Put a link to the person who sent you the award.
3. Nominate 5 blogs.

4. Put links to their blogs.
5. Leave a message for your nominees.


Ok here goes, I apologise if you already have this award but if you have you must be inspirational!

Santtu - Arctic Stamper - for all the super ideas I get from her blog.
Di - for all the inspiration on the Bubbly Funk forum and hard work for the Think Pink blog.
Lynn - Craft and Waffle - because she has been a good friend as well as a crafting buddy and has a huge collection of stamps which I envy.
Kaz - Slightly Wonky Crafts - because she always makes me smile and does some super crafting.
Tracy - Crafty Me - because she taught herself to crochet and i've not managed it.

Fishy Business

I've just finished this for Sallie's boyfriend for his birthday next month. He goes fishing most weekends so I hope he'll like it.I printed the image and both backing papers from the Jayne Netley Mayhew Cd and layered them up onto a top fold A5 card.
Very simple and easy but I think it's quite effective. As i've said before the images on this Cd are super.
I've done 2 more cards using papers from the Cd today but as they are for 'crafty' friends i'm not showing them yet.
I also printed off a couple which will be good for Christmas cards.

Cute & Cuddly

Look what my neighbour just brought round.
She left me a 'cosmetics' brochure a couple of weeks ago, i'm sure you know the name.
I couldn't resist the picture of this little fellow even though i'm not sure who he will go to live with. He's so soft and cuddly with his own little scarf and can be warmed up on the radiator as he has plastic beads inside to hold the heat.
I think I may need to order another!

Family cards

This is the card that I have made to give to my parents and Mick's mum for Christmas.

It took a long time to make as I had to do the computer wording on scrap paper first then get it positioned to print onto my backing paper. The 'C' & 'W' were traced in gel pen using a light box and then glittered. Done straight from the computer the spacing was all wrong because of the different sizes.
I have only completed one so far but the next will be much quicker now I know what i'm doing and have the wording already done.

The A5 card is in soft cream and has the whole of the front covered in red holographic card. A green mottled card with rounded corners is layered on top of this. The greeting is on pale green paper mounted onto the same red holographic card, both with rounded corners. The words are printed in red with the first letters picked out in gold ultra fine glitter.

The flowers are fabric poinsettias which have been taken apart, glittered and put back together with a gold star brad and green sequin flower. The fern is cut from a much larger spray.
They have been attached using silicon glue.

I will have to make some kind of box to put them in, luckily they don't need to be posted.

Christmas Tree

This is a stamp from Judikins entitled Living Christmas Tree.
I stamped it onto white card with Grey Versafine ink and coloured it with watercolour pencils and shimmery watercolour paints before cutting all round the image. It was layered onto white card, embossed with the Cuttlebug snowflake folder.
The blue and silver one has been layered onto holographic card while the pink and gold one is on vellum.
I'n not sure yet whether or not they need a greeting at the side or to leave it as it is. Any suggestions?

All glittered up!

I've been glueing and glittering for the past few days and here are a few of the results.







The foiled acetate images are Betti Buttons from the Pinflair people.


I've put ultra fine glitter on the back of them. They have been mounted onto either glitter board, holographic card or backing papers from the Christmas Glow set of Forever Friends papers by Docrafts. I've also used a snowflake embossing folder in my Cuttlebug. Some have a simple peel-off greeting.
All are set onto 6inch square white cards.