Prima Dolls

OK, anyone who knows me knows that I am always the last to discover stuff in the craft world.  However, I can say with my hand on my heart that I actually discovered Prima Dolls quite some time ago, but in truth I really didn't like them at all.  However, I saw them in my local(ish!) shop, Pink Tulip and I thought "My God, they're HUGE!" and I changed my mind about them, so I got a couple.  However, they've been sitting gathering dust waiting for me to find inspiration, and at last I've got them out and made something - with this one at least.

 

Now I know they don't have faces, but honestly the temptation was too great - I didn't want to go mad and put all the fine detail in, so with my Watercolour Teacher's words ringing in my ears, I put a 'suggestion' of a face in.  She is coloured using pencils and the bg papers are 5th Avenue.  The die cut roses are just vintage clipart images that I printed onto Bazzil and fussy-cut (I love that expression! LOL!).

 

Thanks for stopping by my blog, Have a great week! :o) xx

Fancy Folds and New Lawns

 

My word, the Wednesday's seem to be coming around rather quickly right now.  It was my intention to use some of my holiday time just creating with card and papers, but already a week has passed by and I've only made one thing - this card!  I have however been busying myself around the home and I have singlehandedly ripped up, dug over and am about to turf my entire front garden!  This is one of my rare smug moments and Oh Boy, am I enjoying it, and I feel I completely deserve it!  It was no mean feat let me tell you and I thought my back was going to break at one point, but I have managed to fill 10 - yes 10 garden refuse bags with the old grass, weeds, plants, clay balls and natural debris that was no longer required, making my front garden look beautiful again.  Hubs in the meantime decided to dismantle his man-shed to replace the floor and roof, dumping the entire contents under my gazebo and has turned my back garden upside down!  I've been to neater looking tips than this!

 

It was so depressing!  However, the shed is now repaired and rebuilt, most of the rubbish is sitting in council skips, but I think it will be some time before my lawn is completely over the shock of this gross disruption.  Particularly the part which he scorched with the incinerator while getting rid of the old roof and floor!!!  Boo Hoo!!  He's gone back to work today and I was looking forward to having breakfast in my gazebo again, but I woke up to rain today so it's breakfast with Daybreak for me today!

 



 

So here is my card.  Over at Midweek Magnolias our theme for the next fortnight is Fancy Folds.  This is only the second Z-Card I've ever made but I am really pleased with how it turned out.  My amazing teamies have created some stunning projects which I would urge you to take a look at, if you haven't been there already.

 

I've not been out and about in blogland for a while so I am going to share this card with a couple of other Magnolia challenges to show that I am still alive!  I'm sharing it with Magnolia-licious challenge blog who's theme is Anything Goes and Lovely Hanglar and Sweet Magnolia challenge blog who have a Bingo Board currently running, and I fitted in the bottom line Sparkle, Ribbon and Flowers.

 

Well that's my lot for today.  I have to brace myself for a couple of hours of turfing now so I figure I deserve a cup of tea before I get going.  Thank you for dropping in.  Have a great week! :o) xx

Buttons and Bows

 

 

Well hasn't it been a long time since I was last here?  Just dusting a few cobwebs away whilst I reflect over the last couple of months.  Oh boy, it's been busy!  Having two growing boys takes up a lot of energy and time, but I wouldn't have it any other way.  At last summer is here though and we now have a few glorious weeks to fill with domestic chores and hopefully a few fun days away.  My main objectives this summer is to have a huge craft clearout.  Having done my job for a year now I can safely say that I have too much stash, and too little time to use it so it's a good time to downsize.  My kitchen and utility are in dire need of a makeover, and my garden is desperate for a little TLC!  I am busy filling in the gaps with my pencils, prepping images for future Midweek Magnolia challenges while I have the time.  Here is my offering for the challenge which is currently running until Tuesday.  The theme is Buttons and Bows and this is my card:

 



 

My gorgeous teamies have created some amazing samples for your inspiration also, and it would be fab if you would visit them and send a little love their way.

Whilst I have been typing this, the glue on next week's card has been drying beautifully so I am going to head on back to my next project while the house is quiet and nobody notices that I am not outside with my spade!!

Have a great weekend and thanks for stopping by! xxx

Summer at last!

 

Happy Wednesday, and thank goodness it's a hot one!  Long may it last, I hear you cry?

 

Over at Midweek Magnolia's this week we are celebrating Summer, whether that be BBQ's, Seaside Trips or just what summer means to you.  Well, we're fast approaching the end of the academic year and it's time that I started making my cards to give out to friends and children at school, so this week I began that process with this card.

This card was borne our of the desire to try out colouring on Kraft card, and I was surprised at how different it is, and how 'forgiving' Kraft card is!  I could quite easily become an addict!  This is one of my most favourite images to colour and I loved watching her come to life on the Kraft.  I decided to go for a clean and simple look because I wanted to see as much of the Kraft card as possible.  Tilda was coloured with my pencils and the bg sun was shaded with Copics.

 

Please pop over to the blog to see what my amazing teamies have created also, you won't be disappointed, I promise!

 

Thanks for stopping by, and have a great week! :o) xx

A touch of Frantage

 

A very brief post from me today as there is a queue for the computer!  I just wanted to show my DT piece for this week's Midweek Magnolias theme which is Anything Goes, but with the option of adding a Vintage look or Frantage - I went for the Frantage because I'm enjoying a great romance with it at the moment - you could call it a Fr-omance......grooooooaaaan!

 

Anyway, the girls have come up with yet more amazing inspirational samples so please do go check them out.  Here is my offering for this week's theme:

 

I've only ever done one criss-cross card before, but our lovely Teresa makes them a lot and seeing her recent beautiful pieces has inspired me to have another go.  Here's the insert:

 

It's really difficult to see on the photograph but I tried something new this week.  Tilda has been embossed to give her some shape and dimension - you have to trust me when I say this looks more effective in real life.

 

 

I also want to show this off at Magnolia-licious Challenges too as they have a Butterflies theme this week, and this gave me the opportunity to use my newly acquired butterfly edge, a die that I have uuuummed and aaaahhed over for such a long time, then I took the plunge last weekend - expect to see it some more! LOL!

 

Well that's my lot for today.  Thank you so much for stopping by.  If you have time, please pay my lovely teamies a visit too as they have worked their socks off once more!

 

Have a great week and see you soon! :o) xxx

Butterflies

Happy Saturday blogland!  I was meant to post this yesterday but unfortunately life got in the way again making me late again.  I've had an interesting week learning how to colour digitally and I used my newfound skills to colour in this gorgeous butterfly from Teri's Delicious Doodles for my DT offering this week.  Now, simple as it may look, this little fella learned a lot of new, colourful language from me during the creative process.  The theme this week is Anything but a card, and I had this brainwave, as you do when you're sitting outside in glorious sunshine!  This year I have been making a lot of my own garden decorations and I was thinking "wouldn't it be lovely to have a nice suncatcher-style mobile with lots of butterflies on" and that's how this week's project began.  Having mastered the colouring process, I then copied my butterfly and pasted it a number of times, changing the sizes from quite small to huge.  I printed my first batch out onto overheads but unfortunately the colours just bled and looked a mess.  So I ended up taking a printout into work and photocopying them instead.  This time they looked great - so great that I cut a number of them out and stuck them onto my classroom window to brighten up my Spring Display!

I digress - having now successfully printed out my acetate sheets, I set about cutting them out.  I did put glitter glue on a few wings, which instantly fell off the moment it dried!  So then I began threading them onto invisible thread. This wasn't as painless as it might sound either as I ended up with a very sore finger and a lot of blood dripping!  First string of my mobile finished I proudly held it up to the light.......... Uh oh!  I completely misunderstood the rules of mobiles!  My butterflies just pointed straight up to the skies - I didn't take into account the balance.  D'oh.  So I tried again using TWO strings of invisible thread - still no success.  By this time, I had spent so much of my week with my batch of butterflies, one way or another, I threw the towel in and as time was running out I set about thinking of what else I could do with them.  Then I had another brainwave (I've actually had quite a few this week!!) and I dug out this old basket which I rescued from going onto a skip many years ago.  I loved it for it's rustic-ness and every Christmas it gets an airing when I fill it with aroma-soaked pine cones and tartan bows.  But I decided to give it a facelift.

I gave it a coat of white paint, wrapped some pale pink satin ribbon around the handle and decorated it with flowers and the butterflies.  It is now a home for my pretty fat quarters which so far have been sitting in a cardboard box somewhere, and my lovely old rustic basket now has a beautiful shabby-chic  look and I have fallen in love with it all over again!

At the moment is is sitting pretty on my window-sill, but by the end of the weekend, it is going to be the centrepiece on my beautiful painted dresser.  It will look perfect there!

Well that's my lot for now.  Thank you for stopping by and I hope you like what you see.  I'm going to go and try and find a place for the other 16 butterflies that I have cut out now!  If I find a suitable home, I'll be sure to show you where they've adorned!  Have a great week. :o) xx

Late again!

Phew!  At least I made it before Wednesday was over, because I wanted to get DT offering for this week's Midweek Magnolias theme posted on the day the theme was published!  Our theme this week was Die Cuts and/or Punches.  Well I used both!   Our fabulous DT have been hard at it again creating yet more spectacular entries to entice you to play along.  This was my creation:

Once again I used one of my own bg papers topped with some embossed velum which I thought gave a pretty lacy effect.  The flowers are my own again too, made using my 'ancient' punch.  I made them using white cardstock and tinting the edges with distress inks, like so:

I made the bunting by punching out a tiny bird punch and rough-cutting the pennants around it by hand.

The whole thing, including the metal corners, is finished off with a sprinkling of shabby blue frantage!

I'd like to say a huge Thank You for stopping by my blog, and send out a huge plea to you to go and visit my fab teamies at Midweek Magnolias, if you haven't already done so.

Have a great week, see you Friday! :o) xx