Silver and Snowflakes

Starting this week there is a month of Christmas themed challenges over at Penny Black Saturday Challenge and it kicks off with silver/snow/snowflake as the theme.

I need to have a count up to see how many more cards I still need to make (despite making some every month since January, I still need quite a few).

I rustled up these two cards on Saturday after a busy morning of shopping round The Range and Dunelm - I was in just the mood for Christmas cards as I got some new decorations, tinsel and some pretty lights whilst out.

I know I need some cards for sending overseas so used an apt sentiment from Hobby Art.

Whilst uploading these photographs I realised that I had failed to add any Stickles to them for snow - so have now added this - don't understand how that happened as I never fail to put Stickles somewhere on a card LOL!!  The patterned paper used on both cards is from Craft Creations and the snowflakes are punched using Martha Stewart punches.  Sorry for the awful photos - the light is so awful, a horrible drab and dreary day here.

Take One - Me & You

For the last couple of weeks I have been meaning to take part in SJ's Take One challenge where you take inspiration from your own favourite layouts.  This layout has always been a fave of mine - I love the big cluster of flowers, so decided to repeat that for this layout.

We went for a photoshoot whilst on our Icelandic cruise as we rarely have our photo taken together as either one of us is usually behind the camera.  I loved the photographs and can see quite a few layouts being done with them.

I used Sarah's Cards May kit - MME Stella & Rose (Mabel) and loads of blossoms from my stash.  The swirls were die cut using a MFT swirl die.  The pearls are all Prima e bling.

Thankyou SJ for a great challenge!!

Take one sketch and make three cards

The challenge this week at Penny Black Saturday Challenge is this great sketch.

I made this card for a November birthday -

 

I used some embossed paper from Creative Memories and cardstock from my scrap stash.  The butterfly border is punched using a Martha Stewart punch.  The sentiment is Personal impressions.

Whilst I had my scraps box out and some other watercoloured images to hand I got on and used the sketch to make two more cards!

The patterned papers are all Creative Memories and the sentiment is Personal Impressions

The papers for the Christmas card are from an old pack from Lakeland back when they use to do quite a bit of craft stuff.  The snowflakes were all punched from Trimcraft glitter cardstock using MS snowflake punches.

Thankyou PBSC for a great sketch!!

One Man and his (adopted) dog - Anita's August Class

I am still a bit behind in getting some of my layouts blogged.  This is the class that Anita taught back in August.

My Dad adores my sister's dog Toby and Toby loves his grandad too.  We used Basic Grey Marjolaine and gold Card Candy for faux brads.  The class featured lots of gutting of the patterned papers to get the most from them and matting all the layers with Bazill cardstock.  I have loads leftover to make cards with.  I added the title once I got home using AC Thickers and My Little Shoebox alphabet stickers.

Thankyou Anita for another fab class xx

Too Cute to Spook

The challenge this week at Penny Black Saturday Challenge is Too Cute too Spook.  Well I am a bit of a party pooper and don't celebrate Halloween but I do have one cute Halloween stamp that is most suitable for making birthday cards for some of my friends who are vamp fans.

I found some scraps of patterned paper that I used on a layout years ago, so I haven't a clue as to what brand they are but the spiderweb paper was perfect for the card -

I glittered the webs with black stickles and the sentiment was computer generated.

The image was watercoloured with Derwent watercolour pencils

I used this stamp a lot last year but this is the first time this year that Feline Count has come out of the drawers.

Sketch challenges at Cardinal Colours retreat

There were various different challenges to take part in over the weekend, including two lovely sketches.  I had packed some spare photographs for the weekend and one of my Sarah's Cards monthly kits and these are the two layouts that I did - sadly I have lost the sheet that had the sketches on it so can't show you what the sketches were like.

For both layouts I used the July kit - Pebbles Inc 'Happy Go Lucky'.   The first layout used some old photographs from 1992, it was my sister's birthday and I had got her a pink piggy cake from M&S but her little girl thought the cake was for her.  The title was punched using Martha Stewart alphabet punches.

The second layout uses a group photo plus individual shots of all the ladies who attended our crafty weekend at Debden in 2009, thankyou Wendy for letting me pinch the title from one of your layouts from that weekend.

I used the same kit for this layout and two different alphas that were leftovers from class kits.

Family Portrait - Anita's October class

As always another lovely class from Anita aka The Inky Blossom.  We used some lovely papers from Echo Park 'For the Record' collection.

Richard and I had a little photoshoot with the ship's photographer whilst on our Icelandic cruise and we managed to persuade my parents to join us for a couple of photographs.

Thankyou Anita for a lovely class xx