Adventures with Brushos - the blue/orange ones

Unintentionally this week turned into a Brusho themed week on the blog so I might as well finish up the week with more cards made with Brushos.

I wanted to get away from the butterflies and make some more masculine ones so used this lovely lighthouse stamp from Kanban.  The sentiments are by Personal Impressions.

But then the overwhelming urge to use butterflies overtook me again.  I made this card for the Fiskarettes UK Facebook May challenge which was to use the colours ice grey, slate grey, light blue and orange.  The die cut and stamped butterflies are all from Stampin' Up, the sentiment is by Hero Arts.

I was left with two small pieces - enough to make two mini cards and when I turned them over I thought the patterns/colours on the back were more interesting.  The butterfly is a Hero Arts stamp and the sentiment is by Penny Black.

I am now kind of addicted to making backgrounds with Brushos so expect to see them used on plenty more cards in the future, especially as there is a techniques article on using them in this month's Craft Stamper which is giving me lots more ideas on how to use them

Adventures with Brusho - the Beat The Christmas Rush ones

After having such good fun playing with Brushos on our crafty weekend away in March, I bought my own so that I could play further at home.  I decided to turn my first batch of backgrounds into Christmas cards.  Warning this post is photo heavy!!

Freebie Hot off the Press Deer and Snowflake stamps with a Penny Black sentiment.  Bling from Majorcrafts.

Kanban Decorations stamp with Penny Black sentiment and bling from Majorcrafts.

A big thank you to Sue for being the creator/organiser of Beat the Christmas Rush.  Sue has now handed over the reins to me to run, so I do hope that you will still all join in.  It is very simple, just make a few Christmas cards each month so that come December you will have a lovely pile of handmade cards ready to use.  I've added a linky below so please add your cards there and each month I will pick a favourite to feature the following month.

An InLinkz Link-up

Adventures with Brushos - the purple/blue ones

As promised here are the cards that I made with the purple/blue background sheets -

 Kaisercraft image stamp and Penny Black sentiment

 Penny Black butterflies and fluttering sentiment and Stampin' Up birthday sentiment

 Kaisercraft butterflies and Stampin Up sentiments

 Kaisercraft sentiment and gemstones from Majorcrafts

Adventures with Brushos - the green/yellow ones

Following on from yesterday's post, here are the cards that I made with the green/yellow background sheets.

Penny Black sentiment and Kaisercraft image -

Stampin' Up sentiment and Penny Black butterfly stamp -

Kaisercraft image and Stampin' Up sentiment -

Tomorrow I will share the purple/blue ones

Adventures with Brushos - the pink cards

Whilst away at Meadow Barn and with the help of Sy I made lots of different Brusho backgrounds.  I have now chopped them up and made a large pile of cards with them.

These are the ones with the pink/orange card

Kaisercraft stamp and Stampin' Up sentiment

 Penny Black butterfly stamp and Stampin' Up sentiment

Penny Black stamp 'Wistful' and sentiment from T for transparent set 'Heartfelt Thanks'

All the bling used is from Majorcrafts.  I will be back soon with the purple and green/yellow cards

At The Pannenkoekenhuis

I am still completing challenges that were set in various Facebook groups for National Scrapbooking Day.  In the Sketchy Scrappers group I combined two challenges, the first one was to use this colour chart for inspiration

And I combined that challenge with this sketch -

As soon as I saw the colour chart I knew which papers would be perfect for the challenge - Basic Grey Euphoria.

I used stamps from the Gorgeous Grunge stamp set (Stampin Up) to make the ink/mist splatters on the background paper.  The title was cut with Sizzlet die 'Naturally Serif' from pink funky foam.

The butterflies were die cut with a Stampin Up Sizzlet die and some smaller Cheery Lynn dies.  I did have to tweak the sketch slightly as I used two photos of similar size.

Me on Monday

It's Monday so time to give a big wave to Sian over at From High in the Sky and give a little round up on all the weekend goings on.

We are still not up to full fitness yet at Parkhurst Towers so it was a fairly quiet one recovering from a late night out for a 21st Birthday on the Friday.  It was a weekend of finishing off a layout that had been started a week ago.  In fact loads of craftiness happened - Brushos that were ordered weeks ago were dug out from their safe hiding place and backgrounds were created ready for some cardmaking.  A pile of green card scraps were punched to within an inch of their life to produce a lovely pile of useful leaves for cardmaking and scrapbooking.

It was also a weekend of running round all the neighbours' houses trying to find out who had parked across our garage (again) so that we couldn't get the car out - four hours later and after a phonecall to the Police the owner finally showed up .  Yet again someone who didn't think they were causing any harm by parking there, who didn't think the large No Parking sign applied to them.  

So onto Monday, the weather started off really dire but has improved, at least it has stopped raining now and the sun has come out.  Monday has been about taking the parents to Lidl's for their shopping and then a run out to Firle to Middle Farm to stock up on a few essentials treats.  We had a lovely lunch there too, well it would have been rude not to have a little sit down in the restaurant.

If you want to join in with Me on Monday then pop on over to say hello to Sian

Happy Birthday to Moo

Belated Happy 21st Birthday to my nephew Harry, it was yesterday but I couldn't show his card till later until I had given it to him.

The theme this month at Penny Black Saturday Challenge is Trees or Nature.  I used this lovely farm animal stamp from Penny Black called 'From the Folks'

 The sentiment is also by Penny Black and the 21 is AC Thickers.  I cut the image out with a Stampin Up Thinlet die and coloured with Promarkers.

Jan and Mia

Another Facebook challenge for National Scrapbooking Day was to use your newest stash and three or more photos.  I haven't bought any patterned paper for ages as I am trying to use up my existing stash especially lots of half finished kits and collection packs.  But when a friend sent me a link to a new paper range from Kaisercraft (Shine Bright) knowing that my favourite colour combo at the moment is yellow and grey - well I just couldn't resist LOL!!

These photos were taken back in 2012 on a long weekend spent in The Netherlands when we took my parents over to visit our family friends The Jansens.  Mum and Dad hadn't seen Jan and Mia for over 30 years so it was a lovely reunion.  I was a little sad whilst scrapping these photos as both Jan and Mia have both passed away since then, but I was also glad that we persuaded my parents to take the trip.  We spent a lovely day with them and other members of the family.

The butterflies were diecut with Cheery Lynn dies and embellished with gemstones from Majorcrafts.

One Photo & Twenty Words

It's the 9th of the month so time to join in with Abi from Creating Paper Dreams for one photo & twenty words.

Three nights of Marillion, the most amazing friends, confetti

Loads of tears knowing it's two years till the next convention

Photo courtesy of Alan Jones

Marillion Eve

Another Facebook challenge on National Scrapbooking Day was a scraplift challenge on Amanda's blog.

This is my layout based on hers -

I used a mixture of papers from WRMK 'Maple Grove' and Jillibean Soup 'Apple Cheddar Soup'.  The title was cut using Tim Holtz Sizzlet alphabet 'Wanted'.  The border stickers are Crate Paper 'Farmhouse' and the butterflies are a mixture of Martha Stewart and EK Success punches.

The photographs are from last December and a meet up with friends the night before seeing Marillion in Leamington.  Big thank you to Sy who came up with the title for me and loaned me her Sizzlet flower card edge die.

Thanks Amanda for setting a great scraplift challenge!

The Little Chapel

For National Scrapbooking Day, the Facebook Group 'For the Love of Pretty Paper' had a cybercrop and set various challenges.

One of the challenges was this sketch set by Jennifer Grace

 I used Basic Grey Serenade 'Half Penny' for the main background and overstamped it with Stampin' Up 'Swallowtail'  in Certainly Celery. 

The patterned paper for the bunting is Pebbles 'Family Ties', the butterflies are an EKSuccess punch.  The heart (SU) is punched from Bazill cardstock and covered in Seafoam Stickles.  The title is done with AC foam thickers.  The photographs are from a lovely holiday on Guernsey, there is a beautiful chapel that is decorated in glass, shells and broken china.

Thanks for the great sketch Jennifer, I am sure I will use it again.

Me on Monday

Whoo hoo I'm back in the land of the living (well virtually, still cough cough coughing and struggling to talk) but at least I feel like crafting again and going out.

It's Monday so it is time to go and give Sian a wave at From High in the Sky.

The weekend saw me going out for the first time in over two weeks - a lovely evening spent with my parents on Saturday watching the third part of The Hobbit and then an all day crop on Sunday with lovely friends at Cardinal Colours.  Saturday was National Scrapbooking Day so I had plenty of layouts to do as there have been lots of online challenges to take part in.

Today has been a bank holiday here, so I have continued working on layouts that I started yesterday

And we've also done our civic duty and filled in our postal voting papers.

If you want to join in, then drop by Sian's blog and give her a wave.