Ribbon & Lace

First of all, thanks to everyone who entered our challenges the last four weeks - we had over 30 in the last one and it was lovely to see so many terrific entries.

Sam's choice this time and I must admit I did like the thoughts of Ribbons and Lace - kind of Vintage or Shabby Chic.  What did I do? Well I made an atc because at Vicky Stampers we are doing Vintage for our next swap and so I can actually use this one (hope nobody from Vicky Stampers sees it before next week but don't think any of them come on here except Jo and Ann and they are not going to the club that week).  But then there is Paul - he won't tell.  I hope!

Here it is

I used a new stamp (think it is a Whimsy) from Oyster Stamps and stamped it in Black Archival Ink on a piece of white cardstock.  Then I cut another piece of card to ATC size and using an oval from my Nestabilities (Spellbinders) cut out a frame. I then put some lace on the bottom and re-cut the length of the atc as I wanted the lace to hang over the edge.  A tiny strip of lilac ribbon, some flowers pushed through pin holes in the top left corner and it was almost done.  The final thing was to pop dot the frame on top of the picture and then mount the whole on a piece of lilac card so that it showed through the lace.

Hope whoever gets it in the swap likes it.

Now what will you make for our challenge at Artful Times?  Remember it is ribbons and lace but does not have to be Vintage - do what you will and enter our challenge, we love to see what you create and each and every one of you will get visits from the Design Team.

The Blue Mallard

As I said yesterday, here are some photographs of our day out with Jo and Dave at Burscough.  I posted pictures of the "deelish" food we had (real good stuff check out the website here) yesterday so hopefully whetted your appetites for a trip there if you live within striking distance.

When Chas and I arrived, there was Jo in the old fashioned sweetshop buying her favourite Cinammon balls and some Cherry Lips (I used to buy those when I was in white ankle socks) and Midget Gems.  The shop also stocks the cordials from Fitzpatricks in Rawtenstall where I used to live. That reminded me of the time my son was still in his pram and I used to go there for a "hot stingo" with my friend Lillian on the way back from shopping with the toddlers.  He's all grown up now and 6'5" tall so you can see it is a long while ago.  In fact Micah, the man who owned the store, passed away quite a long time ago, he was such a lovely gentleman, a proper one too.

After the meal we went for a walk along the canal banking - what about these for retirement flats - wouldn't it be idyllic living? Without the hassle of the locks you are on the canal banking -  my imagination would run riot as I sat in those gardens.

Look at this lovely Mallard - I got up quite close and he didn't jump in, guess they must be so used to people with living here.

Look at his lovely colouring.

This poor white thing must have been trapped or savaged as there were no wing feathers.  Just broken quills left in their place, but he was an adorable thing with a little white tuft on his head - leading to much debate as to whether he was young or old.

Could not resist showing you this picture, what a way to spend a Tuesday afternoon cruising down the canal.

Once we left the canal we went in search of the charity shops having been talking to Jane in the Gallery who was sporting the most gorgeous necklace she had bought from there.  It looked quite expensive but was a charity shop buy.  Needless to say I got nothing, Jo got a Rag Doll for one of the grandees and a necklace she might pull to bits for her crafting.

Then we went to the little square and Jo got side tracked running around the circular monument reading what was written on the ground.  Here she is in deep contemplation

and here on her way round reading

It was here I spotted a white owl

not real of course

and then all too soon it was time to wave goodbye again

A lovely day out with Jo and Dave

and great views on the way home

as James Cagney once famously said "Look Ma, Top of the World"

Parbold Hill looking across the Douglas Valley

WOYWW

Well, I had hoped to show you lots of things on my desk today but to be honest I went out yesterday and came back too tired (it's the glass of wine I had) to do any more crafting and so all that you see is what I left yesterday morning before I went out.  Before we go there all you WOYWW'ers I must show you some photos of a table yesterday.

Occasionally we have a day out together with our 'respecteds' and so yesterday Jo and I  met up in Burscough. I thought we were having lunch on a canal barge but NO, we were having lunch in the canalside restaurant The Blue Mallard (can recommend).

Here is Jo with her starter (look at her fabulous nails)

Then the three of us with our main courses (Chas did not get a photograph taken as he had the same to eat as Jo and he was sat at the side of me so I would have had to get up)

The food was delish!  (Jo had the pork belly, Dave the duck and I had the pan fried hake with mussels)

Afterwards only the men had sweets but I will leave it for Jo to show you what Dave had - yum yum!

Then we went for a stroll along the canal before making our way home but I won't show you those photos as it really should be about my workdesk.

Here it is as it resides this morning

I am going to make some napkin rings with my CTF dies in red, white and blue and maybe some decorations as well for a barbecue we hope to have to celebrate the Jubilee weekend (weather permitting).  You will have to wait and see what the finished results are going to be like but you can always go back a few posts to http://hickydorums.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/oyster-stamps-blog-hop-starts-today.html when I did something similar in black, white and gold for the blog hop I was involved with.  There is still time for you to enter if you want as the final unfold is today and there are a couple of days left to go to all six blogs to see what we did - but you need to start with me.

Now I think it is time to shut up shop so that you have time to visit other blogs as well so I will leave it there for now but show you some more piccies from Tuesday tomorrow.

Less Is More Challenge

Almost made a card incorporating yellow this morning - doh!  Still have that Worzel Gummidge head on at times.

Decided it was about time I joined in again with Less is More - a Big Challenge with lots of followers and entries but I do like the idea of less being more.  Clean and crisp is how I describe them.

Well, today it was "Baby or Child" on the challenge, not yellow, so I decided to do a baby card as I (naughty, naughty) owed a card from way way back to a friend of mine who had become a grandma again.  The little boy was ever so tiny so I thought this particular rubber stamp (sorry, cannot remember who it is by but I do know where I bought it) was appropriate and would also fit in with the challenge.

Coloured in with my Promarkers to try to get different shades of greens - that's lime for the pea pod -  and then cut into an oval shape with a Spellbinders oval die and that was it.  Inside on the left cover I have included the word "Sweetpea" which comes with the set - cute or what?

If I Had't Posted Yesterday ...

... I would have shown you the box lid I made for my Promarkers but I had to schedule it for today instead..

Do you remember me making a box - 9th May I blogged it - from two Felix boxes?  You can see it here.

Well, yesterday I made a lid for it.  Here is is with it's lid on - so now I can store it on its side.

You can just see the "cheat sheet" I typed up with some notes from Vix's class at Vicky Stampers, which I found invaluable, stuck on the front.  After that I wanted to play with my Promarkers, but didn't have much time with the blog hop prep  (click on the link to go directly to the beginning if you haven't already - you have until and including the 23rd to enter by going around all six blogs starting here) but now I am ready to rumble.  Watch out for some "cute" cards!

I didn't show you in any detail the inside of the box so here goes

Pens all out so you can see the dividers and just how simple they are. I varied the widths according to the number of Promarkers I had in each colour family.  Don't envisage me buying a lot more of these as I am now into Pan Pastels (have you seen the great price of them at Oyster Stamps - five, yes, five for £20 and postage only £1)

Pens in

On the other side I have a compartment for "skintones" and one for "hair" so I can easily access them.

The only trouble is, I bought a dozen of those "fine" nibs for them and now they reside in a plastic box at the side - got to get my 'paper engineer hat' on now and think of a way to incorporate a pouch of some kind on the side.  Watch this space!

Hope this inspires you to make one of these yourself - a good morning of crafting and some cat food boxes, paper, sticky tape and you are good to go.  Of course, it would be quicker if you just put some old emulsion paint on, or gesso and then used up those old acrylics. Enjoy!

BINGO

Over on Out of a Hat Creations Florence suggested that they do a BINGO card this week.  I love this idea and so I set to and made this card following one of the recipes - 3rd row reading down

Flower - Cheery Lynn die
Diecut - Spellbinders fancy tag
Bling - centre of flowers
Image (and text in this case) - Chapel Road

Now this looks to be a very grey card when in fact it is green.  I chose these three lovely murky shades of green for this and look how it has turned out on the scan.  No amount of bending and twisting my laptop lid will get it to go green.  At least the orange of the flowers and the butterfly have turned out orange, if a little duller than in real life.

The words on the left hand side seem a bit blurry too but I guess that is because of the depth of the flowers that prevented the scanner lid from closing fully.

Oh blimey, why isn't it a lovely May day outside and then I could have taken a photo out of doors?  Oh for some sunshine!

Oyster Stamps Blog Hop Starts Today

Well, here we are at last, Oyster Stamps is launching its very first Blog Hop, in fact the first time the Design Members (Barbara, Linda, Martine, Pam, Paul and myself, Neet) have got together as a team.  I do hope you join in and visit each one of us as we upload our creations using our Grand Calibur and the Spellbinders Cut, Fold and Tuck Dies starting here today.

It all began with a bit of fun with our ‘boss lady’, Tracey, handing me four sets of Dies at Aintree show.  Four “Cut, Fold and Tuck” dies to do something with.  She then said she was going to challenge the team to come up with something using them.  Barbara and I chipped in and then the words “blog” and ”hop” came out into the conversation and before I knew what was happening it was taking off.

Here’s a short video to show you how these incredible dies work and a little snapshot of what I made with some of the ones I had been given to work with.  (This video went live yesterday to make sure it was working in time for the Blog Hop so it does talk about "tomorrow" which is "today".  Sorry.  Also the sound is fairly low but that is my itty bitty camera.  Please bear with me.)

Now you have marvelled at my finger nails (don’t often get them all to that length – wonder how long they will stay?) here is what I did with my dies.  It’s fun to buy more than one set of these dies as you can mix and match them - I threw mine in the air and let them land on my desk and then proceeded to make a card with a couple of them.  Now to puzzle as to which set they all belong to LOL.

It had to be a large card from me as I am always dem'ing the Grand Dies from Spellbinders so here I have used Grand Labels One and Four, CFT Angle Approach (Lg), Carnival Dream (Md) and Parisian Accents (thanks *Cindy - see link at end) for the corner pieces.

There are so many things you can do with these dies, not just restrict yourself to making cards, what about a candlestick (Spectacular Spin (L) drip tray ?  (NB please do not leave unattended when burning the candle – always take care with a naked flame or better still remove the tray when burning the candle)

A napkin ring (Floral Burst (M) to use on that table setting with the candlestick?  You could even make a placemat and put one in the corner – imagine them all in red, white and blue for a Jubilee celebration!

I used a sheet of A4 card, the Fleur de Lis border and made a place mat for my Party Setting

I even went and made a badge/rosette (Floral Burst (L) for George, one of the twins (sorry Tom, could not find your photo on my computer) which is what you could do for the kids who are having a party.  Either the child’s name or a number showing their age would be good fun and would fit in those party bags just fine.

There were so many things I wanted to make with these versatile dies – I thought a headband with one, two or three of them on the side would be rather cute, two or three brightly coloured ones on sticks to make some fun flowers.  The ideas are endless.  What can you come up with?

Once I see what the others have made I think I will get back to making more things.  Hope you do too – they are on sale here at Oyster Stamps so get them quickly as the orders will be flying off the shelves in no time.  In the meantime though, you need to follow all the wonderful talented Design Team to see what incredible makes they have all done.  Just leave a comment on every blog and at the end, 6pm Friday, 25th May, all the names of those who have commented (on ALL SIX Blogs) will go into a hat and a winner will be chosen who will receive two of the dies we have been using!

Be sure to peek in at the other DT Members  - tomorrow we are with Linda and then going on to

Sunday - Pam

Monday - Paul

Tuesday - Barbara

And ending with Martine on Wednesday.

Have fun!  And please leave us a comment to tell us what you think of our creations and our first ever blog hop!  Remember, there's going to be a lucky winner.

Links as promised:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vSpPO7o61U&feature=channel&list=UL – * Cindy Etchinaw’s You Tube video

http://www.amazingpapergrace.com/warmed-with-joy/ - Becca’s Amazing Paper Grace Blog