Flowers Galore!

It's Saturday!  I've had a whole week off and I now have loads of washing to do!  I am also very fed up with the cold weather and can't wait for Spring so that I can get out into my garden and pretty it up a bit!  I have been looking at photo's this week and sighing over the once-beautiful garden I had before I neglected it and have now set myself the task of turning it around this year.  I need to equip myself with a new 'greenhouse' first though.  I used to own one of those pop-up greenhouses but after many years, it finally caved in to the rust and I had to skip it.  That's where it all started going awry, I think!

So, in the absence of the real thing, I have decided to throw my efforts into creating floral projects for the home.  Over at Marvellous Magnolia this week, the them is Floral Bonanza, and the Inky Chicks want you to create something for Mother's Day, so I combined the two and concentrated my efforts into creating this sign:

(Click on picture to enlarge)

I have one of those wooden sign's that pretty much every house has and I used that as a template to draw around - neat huh?  I then spent a painstaking half hour cutting it out and distressing the edges, before diving into my box of 'unused coloured images' to finish it off!  Here's the girls close up:

This was a stamped image that my lovely friend Suzi sent to me which I had great fun colouring in.

Tilda normally has a broom on this image, but I decided to relieve her of it!

...and the colouring technique on this one I unashamedly 'stole' from the lovely, and remarkably talented Alby.  This was one of the images I made while I was learning how to use my pencils and I remember sitting in front of my pooter for about 2 hours till I almost went blind just trying to copy his colouring and shading technique!  I was pleased with the result but I had to develop my own way of using them if I was to keep using them, and Alby gave me some great tips!

So there you have it.  Thank you for stopping by my blog and I hope you leave with a smile on your face.  Have a great weekend! :o) xx





Time for Change

Things around here have not been the same since we lost our darling Rosie.  It's not something I want to dwell on too much but it's hard not to when she is on my mind every waking hour.  I don't seem capable of doing anything at home without imagining her there by my side as she always was (except when it was sunny outside, because she loved to sunbathe!!).  My mojo has been completely missing but I really want to get back into the crafting habit.  Rosie always made me uncomfortable while I was colouring because she used to lie across my feet - something which I would curse while she was here - what I wouldn't give to have her do it again!

I have been a bad DT member as I have been MIA for some time, but now I need to change that and get right back in the saddle.  I haven't had any new stash for some time due to a serious lack of funds so I decided to have a clearout of some of the stuff I don't use and sell them on ebay.   One or two things staked a claim on my new income, but I did manage to salvage a little to buy myself a couple of new Magnolias and some dies.  This frame and image are part of my new stash and you can rest assured that you will see this Marianne frame used MANY more times because it is now officially my most favourite die cut ever, and I can't stop cutting it out!  I used it here on my card for this week's Midweek Magnolias theme which challenges you to use Kraft Card on your project.  See:

I coloured Tilda with Copics, but having not used them for such a long time, I know that I desperately need a refresher course!  The BG paper is one that I made myself and the vintage label is Kaiserkraft.

Well that's my lot for today.  I'm busy planning how I'm going to redecorate my living and dining room at Easter and I want to get my nose back into my mags!  Please pop over to see what my lovely teamies have created over at Midweek Magnolias - they are an amazing bunch of girls which so much talent and they have been really busy!

Thanks so much for stopping by.  Have a great week! :o) xx

Sad Week

 

Rosie

1.8.97 - 30.1.13

Possibly the hardest post I've ever had to make on my blog, but I can't let the passing of my darling little girl go unmarked.  This is purely for my benefit because I am grieving so much after having to say goodbye to my beautiful Rosie on Wednesday this week.  Her suffering was thankfully short-lived and is now over and she is totally at peace but the memories are still raw and painful, even the happy ones.  I miss her sweet face, her barking at every animal on the telly, her getting excited and whizzing around in circles when I call names to come and collect their food, her darting up and down the living room at 100mph when she wanted to play, her wrapping her paws round my neck giving me her "please don't make me" look when her lead was produced at night because she hated being dragged out of the warmth into the cold air, her sitting beside me in the kitchen, Her sneaking up to nick the cushions off the sofa the minute our backs were turned, and her lying on my feet while I play with my pencils and stamps.  She's left a gaping big hole in my heart that I don't know how to deal with.  Her nephew, my gorgeous little man, keeps getting up to look for her.  He goes over to where she made her bed but he can't understand where she's gone. 

 

My lovely friend Elaine sent me this which I will treasure:

 

it is so poignant because I can still see my Rosie peeping round the corner at me with that quizzical look on her face.

 

My friends have been wonderful and I am so thankful for all of their kind words and support.

 

RIP Little Girl

xxxxx







Bit of a late start



OK, Joke's over now! I LOVE snow but I've had my fill of it for the time being, thank you very much!  When it first arrived last Friday, I leapt for joy when I learned that school was closed for the day.  Snow does something magical to the whole world and I find myself coming over all poetic like!! I took my camera out and snapped away at everything that didn't move, and lots of things that did move, and with every snap I found myself saying "That's my Christmas Cards for this year sorted!!" LOL!  However, when I woke up this morning to find we'd had another coating, I was less than amused.   Even more so when I reached school to find that one of our teacher's has had an awful accident trying to get to school!  That's the reality of snow - most of the children are in catchment, i.e. walking distance, but many, if not most of the teachers at my school are at least 20 minutes drive away. 

And so, as it's still looking like a Christmas Card out there, I decided to use the wintry theme on my Midweek Magnolias project this week for our Anything Goes theme.  And I have made my very first ever Spinner Card!! Woohoo!  See:

While I was planning my card, I decided that I wanted to use Blues so that I could also show this in the brand new Stamp and Create with Magnolia challenge blog and I decided to use my 'Vintaged' Tilda and my 'retro' paper's once more:

I've often wanted to make a spinner card but wasn't sure how to go about it, but with the help of a CD and a slightly smaller roll of sticky tape, I managed to come up with this and it was actually relatively simple.  However, I couldn't find any stamps small enough to fit inside my window so I had to get creative with a fine point liner!  My card will also spin to say:

and Season's Greetings, as in the header picture.

Well that's it for today - I should have posted this this morning but unfortunately all this snow is taking me away from my normal duties - having to brush snow off my car at 7am is absolutely no fun at all and takes up too much valuable time that would be better spent in front of the fire! LOL!

Thanks for stopping by here, and please pay a visit to my gorgeous teamies at Midweek Magnolias who have been creating THE most amazingly stunning samples you ever saw!

Have a good week! :o) xx

Pink, Flowers, Ribbons and Pearls

Good Morning blogland.  Having a very girly week this week with my offering.  Over at Midweek Magnolias our theme is "In the Pink" and we stipulated using ribbons and pearls on your project also.  Well I had great fun making this shadow box card:

Somewhere in the depths of my paper stash I had hidden away half a pad and lots of scraps of Graphic 45's A Ladies Diary paper so I decided to use up some of the scraps to create this.  It's very bold for me as I really struggle to use papers with random images all over, but I liked how this came out.  I also braved my Copics again, seeing as I haven't used them in such a long time.  I was afraid of them drying out, but they seem to have managed to hold their own!

Inside the card looks a bit like this:

Oh I cannot tell you how much I have struggled to get a decent photo of the inside, for some reason.  I took over 20 photo's but this, believe it or not, was the best of a bad bunch!  However with time running out I had to just swallow my pride and go with it.

I'm also going to show this off in Magnolia Down Under Challenges too as their theme this week is Flowers.

Very brief from me this week because I now have to dash off to work.  Please find a moment in your day to visit my fab teamies over at Midweek Magnolias - they have created some absolutely stunning projects for you to feast your eyes upon.  

Hope you have a great week and thanks for stopping by!  :o) xxx

Some Blog Candy

Just want to let you know that my lovely buddies Tina and Jenny have some gorgeous blog candy on their blogs.  If you would like the chance to win these gorgeous goodies, go pay them a visit!  They both have lots of other yummies for you to feast your eyes on too!  Good Luck (keeping my own fingers cross too!) xx

We're Back!

Hurrah!  Midweek Magnolias are back from our Christmas break, and what a fab theme we have for you.   Tilda on a Tag!  Perfect to start the new year!  And the lovely girls over there have creates some absolutely stunning tags.  Please pop over there and take a look at them, they are just amazing!!

I hope 2013 has begun great for everyone.  I went back to work on Monday for a few hours to sort some of my classroom displays out and catch up on any photocopying that needed to be done.  It was fab without the children in - I got so much done! LOL!!  But they all came back on Tuesday and I have to say it's been lovely!

Anyhow, onto my tag.  Well, it's self-explanatory really.  The bg paper is my own design and is available in lots of colours, so expect to see more of it in the coming weeks!! LOL!

And here it is again!  Yellow and blue have been my new favourite colours so far this year but I want to try out lots of new colours - I tend to be a bit stuck in my ways, colour-wise!

This is a card that I made for last week's themes in blogland but because I had so many blogger problems, I never got around to posting it.  Here is the card:

I'm showing these also in Tilda's Town's theme this week which is Anything Goes, Magnolia-licious Highlights, which is also Anything Goes and finally Magnolia Down Under Challenges who also have an Anything Goes theme.

I want to share this also with the lovely new Inky Chicks who's brand new blog started yesterday, and I just KNOW it is going to be sooooooo popular and I want to wish them all the luck in the world!

Right, true to my word and New Years Resolution, I am now going to go and get my pencils out and get started on my next lot of projects so that I'm not last minute dot com any more!

Thanks for stopping by!  Have a great week. :o) xx