JUST BECAUSE.......

Do you ever have a day, when you want to do something for someone just because?

I work for a local Cancer Charity, and although we are a small team, we are all incredibly busy.  My lovely boss Lisa, is snowed under at the moment with work, and with things going on in her personal life, at the moment, that yesterday was my just because day.

She has been travelling a lot with work, so when she does I go and feed her cat for her, which I did yesterday.  Whilst there in her kitchen, I left her a bunch of flowers, a 2 ltr bottle of diet pepsi, and box of mint matchmakers (all of which are some of her favourite things), and this card that I'd made the day before:

Lisa came back last night, and shortly after I got a lovely text from her to say "thank you so much for the pressies and very kind card.  Made me cry!  Very, very lovely to come home too.  You are so thoughtful and it is appreciated.  Thanks for looking after Lulu".

It made my day to do something for someone else that didn't cost much, but was really appreciated.  I then found out that yesterday was world kindness day(!) which I didn't know when I planned my surprise for Lisa.

I'd like to enter this card into the:

Crafty Creations Challenge - Dies and Punches
Creative Moments Challenge - Anything Goes/CAS

NEWSPAPER CARDS

Lately, I have been doing some newspaper cards as lots of people I know have had special birthdays:

This one was for my 'desk buddy' at work and good friend Tash, whose favourite thing in the world is shopping for new clothes, bags, shoes and perfume.  She loves pink, so this was a perfect card for her.

Next up was a special 21st one for my lovely niece Jennifer.  Since graduating in the summer, she is making a new life with her boyfriend out in Australia.  She has managed to get a couple of jobs out in Perth, one of which is to help disabled kids learn to ride horses, and since she graduated in Equine Management, I think that this will be the perfect job for her to use her knowledge and skills with the kids.  I tried to theme it to incorporate Australia and horse, and finally found the balance:

 

The final 2 are older ones, that were made for a work colleague, who likes Manchester United, and his all time favourite player was George Best:

 

With this one I made a ManU badge to go on the card, that I was quite impressed with :), and this one is for a friends husband who is a keen golfer:

Finally one for my cousin Carl's 40th birthday - he is a huge Arsenal fan, so this one was easy:

A CHALLENGE AT CATCH THE BUG

I made a card yesterday for my friends little boy who is 4 today - Happy Birthday Lewis - and it fits perfectly into the current challenge at Catch the Bug - Western Round Up.

I love bugaboo stamps, and find them so easy to work with and colour, that I have used the Howdy image to make Lewis' card:

I just love how this card has come out.  The blue is glittered card, the stars from a DCWV paper stack, and a piece of kraft card.  The star is cut from kraft card, and I added a '4' peel off.  A bit of fake stitching finished the card of.

I'd like to enter this card into the Catch the Bug Challenge - Western Round Up

WHERE HAS THIS YEAR GONE......

I can't believe that it is 10 months since I have posted on my blog - how bad is that!

Life as always has been hectic this year, taking on a new role at work, running around after the kids, there is just not enough hours in a day.  My youngest son has been picked to play football for our borough, so 4 nights a week he is doing some kind of football training, and now plays matches on a Saturday and Sunday.  So any spare time for me is severely lacking!

I've been crafting/card making still since I last blogged, although not as often as I like, but have also got into gardening, and growing my own veg, so that has kept me busy.  I successfully managed to grow potatoes, onions, radishes, carrots and a ton of strawberries and blackberries.  The tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers didn't do well, but you live and learn, and veg growing is something that I will be doing again next year, everything tastes so much better than shop bought:

I've also had a little helper helping me in the garden - our cat May, and she loves to dig up what I plant!

I'm back into card making for Christmas - 35 down; another 20 to go.  I've challenged myself to get them all made by the end of this month, so that I can concentrate on other Christmas preps from December.  Going 'up north' Christmas shopping in 2 weeks, so looking forward to that - staying over night on my own, but it is worth the costs of the hotel, cos everything is some much cheaper than where we live.  I love wondering around home bargains shops to grab a bargain, its a shop that we don't have here, so have about 7 planned out on my trip to Stoke, and Cheshire Oaks.   My husband thinks I'm mad, but a night away on my own is pure bliss!

I made a card yesterday, and have found a challenge to enter it into, so am hoping to do some more posts before the end of the year.

CLEAN AND SIMPLE CHRISTMAS CARDS - 2012

Since I've just spent some time sorting out photos from my camera, and thought that I would enter the Christmas Cards that I made for Christmas 2012 into the Clean and Simple on the Allsorts Challenge Blog.

As I had to make of 70 of my main card (50 of which were posted, and because of the jingle bell I put on the cards, then were classed as large letter, and cost me loads to post - grrrr).  Next year's Christmas cards will be flat!

Anyway onto my cards:  the text is a digi stamp from Pink Petticoat, that were part of the 'Handwritten Christmas Sentiments' pack, and all I have done is print them out, cut them into squares with the cuttlebug, and hand tied some organza ribbon and thin thread and added a jingle bell to the middle, and voila, a plain and simple christmas card.

I chose 2 different lots of text to use from the whole sentiment pack, and then used various different colours of the organza ribbon, because I underestimated how much I needed, and everytime I went back to get some more from the shop they had run out of the colours I was using!  So some cards were baby pink; pale blue; white or red with gold or silver thread.  I reckon I got through 50m of ribbon and thread, to make the 70 cards!!  Pricewise, it wasn't to expensive, as I use a local old fashioned haberdashery shop and the ribbon was about 20p a meter and the thread 10p a meter.

The jingle bells were bought from a local art shop, and I thought they were a bargain at 99p for 30.

I was really pleased with the way they turned out and how effective they looked, but have to admit I found it very fiddly to tie all the thin ribbon bows, and make them look good!  I've had some great feedback from lots of people that I gave the card to, so all the effort was definitely worth it.

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:
clean and simple challenge - Allsorts Challenge Blog
without design papers  - The Crazy Challenge
white + one other - Sweet Stampin' Challenge
ribbons and bows - Crazy 4 Challenge

IT'S NEARLY THE END OF THE YEAR....

so thought that I should blog the last card that I have made for 2012.

Been really busy this year, and blogging and crafting have sort of fallen by the wayside over the last few months.  I did however manage to make 75 Christmas cards to send, plus 9 individual cards for the really special people in my life, but started doing them really late, and almost ran out of time.

This is the card I made for my oldest son Harry, and it sort of just came together. 

I love this card so much that it has to be one of the favourite individual ones I have made this year.
The image is Snowman Bells, from Bugaloo Stamps, and was a doddle to colour.

I've used blue snowball paper and coloured the image with promarkers, and used a metalic pen on the bells. I used a new snowflake cuttlebug folder for the backing piece to the image, and the sentiment is from Cardworks Cards.

I'd like to enter this card into the current challenge at Bugaloo - Holiday/Seasonal Theme (Holiday Winter).

BACK INTO CARD MAKING AND CRAFTING

Oh my goodness I can't believe how long it has been since I added anything to my blog.

Work has been so busy for the past few months - you know what it is like there are never enough hours in the day, so you end up catching up and doing work in the evenings and weekends, and therefore it doesn't leave much time for anything else.

I am determined to now create some 'me time' over the coming months, and get back into crafting in time for Christmas.  I have so many ideas going around in my head, that I want to do, that I need to get my butt into gear and make a start on some of them.

I have been making a few cards, over the last few months but nothing major and only making them as and when I need them, and making them as simple as possible.

I want to get back into card making as I find it so theraputic to do, so thought I would make a start on reviving my blog, and entering a challenge that I have just spotted over at Charisma Cardz - plain and simple, so here are my entries, which ended up being a set as a present for my Mum's birthday in September.

First we have the card:



 

Then came a box, that I put some ES mints in:

 

 

And finally a gift card wallet, that I put some money into, as she is saving up for a new TV:

 

I was really pleased with the way that the 3 things came out, and love the simplicity of the designs.

 

Last year in the States I bought a paper pack by DCWV called the Luxury Stack, because I fell in love with the designs of the papers.

 

I've put off using them really, as I needed an idea that showed off the papers to the full, so came up with this design, of just adding a co-ordinating piece of ribbon, a bow, and a few pearls.

Having mastered tying bows, I have since used the same design on a few more of the papers  The added bonus is that they are fairly quick to make and every time I make one they all look gorgeous!

A CUTE LAZY CAT CARD

I'm still making the cards that I need for the next few weeks, and found this gorgeous image in my stash that was waiting to be coloured, and made into a card.

I'm not sure why but I sometimes completely uncontiously seem to produce cards with this type of layout.  It isn't until I finish the card, and sit and look at it that I realise it is similar to cards I have done before.  Still it works for me, and I bet in future there will be others!

I've coloured the image with promarkers, and added glossy accents to the heart on the flower pot.  The circle and scalloped cirle were cut with nesties on my cuttle bug and the boarder at the bottom is a MS punch.  The sparkly organiser ribbon was from my stash, and the packing paper is yet another of the DCWV paper stacks I bought in the States last summer called 'Nanna's Kitchen Stack'.

I'm not sure that you can see but the backing paper is not only bright and colourful, but also sparkly to go with the ribbon.
 

I'd like to enter this card into the following Challenges:

Creative Belli Blog - animals
Celebrate the Occasion - happy birthday (must use a ribbon)
Creative Craft Challenge - animal antics
Deep Ocean Challenge - use punches and dies
Oldie But A Goodie Challenge - on the farm/in the garden
Promarker Challenge - cut it out

A PRETTY BIRTHDAY CARD

One of the girls I work with has a birthday in a few weeks, and she is a shopaholic, so I think that the image on this card is perfect for her, because most lunchtimes she comes back from town with a armful of bags!  I'm not sure of the designer of the image, as it is one that I have saved to my PC a while ago.

I have gone with a plain and simple design for this card, as the backing paper is gorgeous.  The photo really doesn't do the backing paper justice.  The paper came from a DCWV stack that I bought in the States last year called 'The Luxury Stack', and all the designs are.

I have teamed the backing paper with some plum coloured card to match the paper I have used, and some wide plum ribbon.  I love ribbons and bows and am always so disappointed with my bows but have been a follower of this blog for a while, her cards are amazing, and I have finally mastered tying bows thanks to using Bev's tutorial, and am really happy with the result.

With the bow tied I have added a glue dot to the back of it, and attached it to the ribbon.  The image was coloured with promarkers, and a few pearls and sentiment finish the card off.

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Marg's Challenge on MSE - inspired by a film or book (Confessions of a Shopaholic)
Papermakeup Stamps Challenge - birthdays
Love to Create Challenge - anything goes
Crazy Challenge - feminine/girly
Secret Crafty Saturday Challenge - inspired by a film title (Confessions of a Shopaholic)

A LITTLE BOYS CARD

A little while ago it was my friends little boys birthday, and he is mad about trains, so it made this card from him.

As usual the image was a colouring page that I found on the internet, and I have coloured the image with promarkers using the colours of the backing paper.  Before I printed the image, I added 'Lewis is 2' to the smoke coming out of the funnel of the train, using Paintshop Pro.

The backing paper is from the DCWV that I have had for ages, and the little blue punch train boarder, was made with a MS train punch.  It was one of the punches that I bought in the States last summer because my youngest son Jack wanted it.  Needless to say this is the first time it has been used!

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:

Totally Gorjuss Challenge - boys toys
Crafty Ann's Challenge - its a man thing
Crafty Catz Weekly Challenge - stripes or checks