Halloween ILWS Challenge....

The second challenge on ILWS (Just click on the bar on the left hand side of the blog and it will take you to their forum where you can join in the challenges and upload to their gallery), is to make something Halloween....

I made these type of boxes last year but I loved them so much I thought I would make them again this year.... they are full of halloween style sweets, like eyeballs etc.

And this second little bag is from Papertrey Ink, its one of their new dies, and so is the big label which I stuck to the front. The stamp set is Tiny Treats - Halloween.... am definitely loving this set... Couldn't get away with using no Stampin Up product though, so I used Pumpkin Pie and Elegant Eggplant Cardstock..... and Pumpkin Pie Grosgrain Ribbon too, dont these colours go well together.

So here we are, the start to another week, need to get on and make my Mum a birthday card for tomorrow, you would have thought that by now I would have managed to be more organised.... no chance, we seem to have so many birthdays in October.... have a good day all, hope you are more productive than I have been lately... xx

Wedding Card Season....

So the season of Weddings is now starting and a lady I met last week asked if I could make her a Wedding Card as she was fed up with the cards she saw in the shops.... the lady just asked what I did and I said I make cards and teach at Card Workshops.... she was thrilled. I made a card for her took it to her house and she was over the moon, so that makes me happy if she is happy.

I used Elegant Eggplant and Whisper White Cardstock from Stampin' Up! and some matte silver card that I had in my stash. I used the Mr & Mrs Stamp Set also from Stampin' Up! and the wheel that matches it for the bottom part of the card. I finished it off with a little pearl from the Pretties Kit.

But then I always decorate the insides of my card too, for this I used the Forever Flowers Wheel again, the sentiment was computer generated and I used a Martha Stewart punch for the lacey hearts... and a few more little pearls from the Pretties Kit....

Off to Ally Pally tomorrow to increase my stash mountain... lol

Have a great weekend, take care xx

Sneak Peak

Stampin' Up! have a new mini catalogue coming out on 1st April and I thought I would show you a sneak peak of what is in there.....

The Patterned Paper I have used is the new Sweet Pea Paper Stack, you get 48 double sided sheets of thick paper, and they will all co-ordinate.... but most of all I love the Bird Punch.... don't you think this is just wonderful.... you get to punch out the branch, the bird and the wing... here I have made a card...

and here is the inside... I have used Chocolate Chip, Tempting Turquoise, Elegant Eggplant, So Saffron and Pale Plum Cardstock...

and I made some little co-ordinating bags which I am giving away to my customers who have recently placed an order with me... they are filled with lengths of ribbon....

And here is the whole set, so each customer gets a little thank you card and thank you gift..... If you would like to get your hands on a new Mini Catalogue just ask, and if you place an order who knows what lush little gift you may get enclosed with your order..... there will be another Mini Catalogue Sneak Peak tomorrow and on Sunday there will be a Mini Catalogue Blog Hop for you to go browse all the lush new stash.

Have a great afternoon all xxx and thanks to you all who left such kind comments yesterday or who emailed me, they are really appreciated.

Card Class.....

I thought I would show you what we did at my Card Class this month... the ladies all decided last month that they would like to make a masculine card set this month after seeing my card...

But I thought that maybe the flowers were a bit feminine, so I designed a whole new set to make, and I think they all went down really well, everyone seemed pleased and no one found them too difficult.... Here is a photo of the whole set together....

We even made a little Treat Box, I learnt to do this at a day Monica held in Peterborough, I changed the colour etc, but it was not my template.

The colours I used for this was Elegant Eggplant, More Mustard and Always Artichoke... and a small circle of Really Rust.... the Feather image is from the Nature's Nest Stamp Set and the little leaf is from the Autumn Days Stamp Set... the patterned paper is To The Nine's Speciality Paper... the chocolate bar is now all mine.... he he he

This card used Spiced Cider Patterned Paper, Elegant Eggplant and More Mustard Cardstock and the ribbon is Always Artichoke 1/4" Grosgrain. Stamp Set as above... I used the pricking mat and template to make the holes in the cardstock...

Again for this card I used More Mustard and Elegant Eggplant, the patterned paper is To The Nines and the ribbon is 1/4" Elegant Eggplant Grosgrain.

This last card is an easel card, the patterned paper is from the Perfect Plum Patterned Paper set and everything else is as above....

My little grandson who is 23 weeks old was admitted to hospital again last night, this time the doctor seemed positive that he wouldn't be going home until they found out what was wrong, this included having a gastric team on standby at the Royal London Hospital... they observed him last night, did even more blood tests and today decided that maybe he is allergic to dairy products.... er hello, we said this to them 3 months ago.... anyway this meant that I got to have my 22 month old grandson yesterday evening.... what a shame!! ha ha So small grandson is now home, he has kept his last 3 bottles down apart from the normal baby sick and we have our fingers crossed that this is the problem and finally he will start to put on weight.... the doctors have said he will never be able to have dairy products and the baby milk they have given him is only available on prescription, but hopefully for now everything will be fine... thank you everyone who has asked about him.

Hope you all have a great weekend, and Mums that you have a really great Mother's Day.... (ooops still need to make my mum a card...) Take care all xx

Anniversary Card......

This morning I had a Card Class and I think everyone enjoyed themselves, at least they said they did and they all managed to complete some wonderful cards... thank you very much ladies for coming... next months class is going to be made using the Greenhouse Garden Stamp Set, so cannot wait to get experimenting with that set. In the meantime it is my daughters 2nd Wedding Anniversary on Sunday (and it is also Mother's Day, I really need to do something about that too...). So have finally managed to make her and her hubby an Anniversary Card.

I used Perfect Plum, Rose Red and Pale Plum Cardstock with Whisper White for stamping on. The Heart and the Love image is from Love You Much Stamp Set. The heart was punched out using the new Big Heart Punch, it was smaller than the image so gave a really nice pattern on the heart. The Happy Anniversary sentiment is from the Cheers and Wishes Stamp Set, the ribbon is Elegant Eggplant Grosgrain. Oh yeah, the patterned paper is the To The Nines Speciality Patterned Paper. Think that is all....

I decorated the inside to match the front but this time used the Heart to Heart Punch to get the smaller heart shapes..... I hope they like it.

I will be back tomorrow, hopefully with a Mother's Day Card, and I am also going to put some more packs together to give away, but haven't yet managed to do that....

Have a great evening all, take care xx

Tutorial at Last.....

So finally I got my Why Not Make It Wednesday Tutorial edited and uploaded.... have had parents evenings, meetings etc this week and so have been really busy with family... hope you think the wait is worth it. I decided to show you how easy it is to make Embellishments out of Drink Cans, I did get DH to cut the top and bottom off for me as I am a liability when it comes to cans and sharp edges.... I also played around with the images on the video afterwards to get colours I liked more, but I was very conscious of how boring it would be watching me mess around on screen. I also think I got a better angle, although at one point you do see one of my cats walk along underneath my arms, luckily when it walked across my desk the camera did not pick it up.... ha ha...

And I have been dying to make a Tim Holtz type rose for ages and thought it would be ideal for using on the card I made using a tin embellishment... I did make a much grungier one using grungepaper, but it didn't really fit with the card, so it is sitting on my desk at the moment with all the children trying to nab it for various projects.... maybe I will need to show them how to make their own.

I did bling up the rose and the butterfly with Stickles Star Dust, you can just about see it on the rose but not on the butterfly, it really does sparkle in real life...

For the Card I used Basic Grey Wisteria papers and Elegant Eggplant, Sage Shadow, Almost Amethyst and Very Vanilla Stampin' Up! Cardstock, along with Very Vanilla Grosgrain Ribbon, also from Stampin' Up!. I have all the Stampin' Up! colours of cardstock and find that normally they will match with all the papers I have whether they are Stampin' Up! or not, so really pleased about that as it is good quality cardstock. Anyway, guess you are here coz you want to see the video, so here it is...

Hope you enjoyed it.... have a great weekend... xx

What Would Jesus Do?

Yet another card made for my monthly order, this time I have used some of the Faux Buttons that I made and showed you in my video tutorial....

For this card I used Elegant Eggplant Ribbon, Taken With Teal, Elegant Eggplant, Real Read, Sage Shadow and Whisper White Cardstock. The Lace Border Punch was used to make the scallop edge and the Patterned Paper is from the Spiced Cider set...

Hope you like it... dont forget to enter my colour challenge #3, the link is in the left hand side Column, under Tackle it Tuesday.... have a great day all xx

StampyCarol's Sketch Challenge...

I told you I would be back.... lol

Here is a card I made for StampyCarols Sketch Challenge, I promised her I would try and make it this fortnight and I have.... you can find the sketch here

I used Elegant Eggplant, Whisper White and Basic Black Cardstock... the image are the Stampin' Up! Rub Ons and the patterned paper is Nouveau Chic... the sentiment is computer generated and the Ribbon is the Whisper White Satin Ribbon from Stampin' Up! The dots around the edge are also SU rub-ons....

Hope you like it... thanks for the challenge Carol

MoJo Monday Challenge....

It must be that time of the week again when I enter the Mojo Monday Challenge.... This time my image is not Stampin' Up!.... Shock horror!!! But everything else is... lol

So above is the challenge you can find it here....

And here is my interpretation of it....

I have used Greetings Farm Stamp, Perfect Plum and Pumpkin Pie Patterned Paper from Stampin' Up!, Pumpkin Pie, Perfect Plum and Elegant Eggplant Cardstock and the sentiment and decoration are both from the Saleabration Set Vintage Tags, dont they look good... dont forget you can get this stamp set FREE if you spend £45 on Stampin' Up! before the end of February, after that it is gone.... and no chance of getting hold of one then. The ribbon is Elegant Eggplant Grosgrain Ribbon and the little button is also Stampin' Up!...

So you are honoured to have had 2 posts from me in one day, dont forget to scroll down and take part in my fortnightly colour challenge, there is a small prize for the winner...

Take Care all xx

A Little Bag....

Whilst at training last Saturday we made a little bag which would hold love notes or something small like that. Well I finished my little bag off at home but decided to add a little notebook to it.

The notebook has quite a few pages and was made using normal white paper and making a cover to match the little bag.

It ties up nicely using the Linen Thread. The Cardstock used is Sage Shadow, Elegant Eggplant and Pale Plum. the stamp set that I used to stamp on the bag is the Saleabration Set Vintage Tags. The little clip used to attach the label is from the Clips Set from Stampin' Up! and the ribbon is the new Whisper White Satin Ribbon and you get tons on a roll.

Below shows you just how well it fits into the little bag, The perfect little gift for a friend or just to show someone you care.

Off to weightwatchers this evening, just need to shift the extra weight I put on at Christmas... dont want to put the 5 stone back on that I lost last year, so have to keep myself in check. Not sure I have lost anything this week, but we shall see....

Have a great evening all xx

A Halloween Card....

My 2 little boys are going to a Halloween Party on Saturday, we don't celebrate Halloween but I don't feel I can stop them going to the party as the rest of their classes will be there, so I have made a card for the little boy whose party it is... not really sure if I should get a pressie too as it was his birthday a couple of months ago, so the only occasion is Halloween. Any ideas or suggestions?

I don't have any Halloween stamps other than the Papertrey Halloween Tags, no images or anything and I have left it to late to buy online as I am unlikely to get anything because of the threatened postal strikes again this week. So had to use what I had here. I find the Stampin Up Cardstock in Pumpkin Pie and Elegant Eggplant the perfect colours for halloween things and so used these colours, and they matched the Patterned Paper I had beautifully (not sure who the paper is from, I had it left over from last year)... I used a Quickutz die to cut out the pumpkin and bats, and I used the Stampin Up Pastels (chalks to us plebs) to colour the edge of the pumpkin in slightly so it gave it a bit of dimension. Again the inside is decorated to match the front....

Can you see the little googly eyes on the top bat? How cute are they and finish the card off perfectly methinks.

And this is the inside of the card, and even the little ghost has googly eyes.

I have been trying to make myself a watermark today to put on my cards but since I upgraded to elements 6 I cannot get any watermarks to work. I used to have PSP and my watermark worked brilliantly, then I changed to elements when I got my graphics tablet and my watermarks have never worked again. They are transparent until put onto the cards and then they are no longer transparent. Can anyone help me out here please... I would be very grateful.
I have wasted all afternoon on this, and I have used 2 different tutorials and ended up with the same result. Transparent until added to my picture.... grrrrrr!!!

Anyway, need to get dinner started, we are having Chilli Con Carne and Rice tonight, not sure I have any rice, so will check before I start and send one of the children to the shop if I haven't... why do I always forget the most important part (well apart from the mince of course.. lol).

Have a good evening all xx

A Little Something For The Halloween Trick or Treaters....

I thought I had better make a little something for the Halloween trick or treaters, even though we dont really celebrate Halloween ourselves, we have quite a few small children living in our cul de sac so I expect they will be calling. Last year I made the jubbly boxes so this year whilst at the Ally Pally a few weeks ago, I bought this shaker box die specifically for using with the Halloween treats... so here they are..


I made 16 in all, 8 of each design and stuck some cute googly eyes on the cat and the spider. The stamp set is Papetrey Halloween Tags... I love this set, I am not sure why Stampin Up dont make Halloween Sets for the UK as I am sure they would sell well, celebrating Halloween is on the increase in the UK... But I did use Stampin Up Cardstock in Pumpkin Pie and Elegant Eggplant and also the matching Pumpkin Pie and Elegant Eggplant thin Grosgrain Ribbon. I think the Patterned Paper is My Minds Eye.

Off out in a minute to get a girly birthday present for a party my 8 year old is going to today, he says she has long hair, so I am thinking some pretty girly hair stuff which I may just put into a small takeaway box and decorate with ribbon and gems... we shall see how much time we have left once they finish tidying their room.. (ha ha ha).

Have a great weekend guys xx

A Couple of Things For You Today.....

Yep, thought I would treat you with a couple of things today, first a card I made which I adapted so would be suitable for 2 challenges at once, and the little image folder that I made for my downline.



So firstly the image folder, I used the new stamp set Good Friend, and the new Perfect Plum Patterned Paper, also Elegant Eggplant Cardstock and the new Pumpkin Pie Striped Grosgrain Ribbon, I also used Stampin Up Brads, and Stamp Set for the For You.

I used DL sized Vellum envelopes for the pockets, cut them in half and then punched the tops with the new eyelet border punch. I then punched more Perfect Plum PP with the tab punch to make little tabs for the tops of the pockets. I then finished off by stamping some images to put in the pockets and posted them out to my 5 downline. But the creating didn't stop there, I made some little folders to post out the image folders in, but I thought that as everyone would rip them over I would use some of my retired Stampin Up Patterned Paper along with Sage Shadow Cardstock and here are the finished projects waiting to be posted.

The above photo was the front and I just stuck an address label on the patterned paper, again I used the eyelet border Stampin Up Punch.

And the above photo is the back of the CD folder, I used the scallop border Punch and Grey Taffeta Ribbon.

My next project was a Get Well Soon Card, for this I used my Whiff of Joy Stamp as I thought it was really cute with the angel blowing kisses, I thought these could be get well kisses....


I used Glorious Green and Pumpkin Pie Cardstock and Pumpkin Pie Grosgrain Ribbon, I also used the Sincere Salutations Stamp Set for the Get Well Soon sentiment, although I did use the Stamp a ma jig to shuffle the writing around a bit so it would fit into a circle punch. And as with all my cards I decorated the inside to match....

If you would like details of any of the items I have used or would like to purchase any Stampin Up items, then just drop us a line at LindaLloyd@gmx.net and I will do my best to help you out.

Take care everyone, have a great weekend.