Dragonflies, Birds and Sunshine!

As it was a better day weather-wise today and Steve had a day off too, we decided to go to Old Moor RSPB reserve for the day. The sun shone for most of the day, and the autumn colours are really beginning to show. I couldn't resist taking a photo of these rosehips by the side of the path. There were loads of berries of all sorts in the hedgerows.

There were lots of common Darters around, and this one was particularly obliging in posing for us to take photos!

It was from the hide at Wath Ings that we saw the most bird-wise, with lapwings and golden plovers by the thousand, dunlins, ruff, common sandpiper and several grey heron too.

 When they all took off it was quite spectacular! We also saw quite a few ducks - teal, shovelers, gadwalls and this one, which is a wigeon.

Finally, I am going to leave you with a photo of the card I made for Lynne's Birthday. I couldn't leave that autumn scene I made on a small card, so I took it off and used an 8"x8", stamping it with the Inkylicious skeleton leaves.

The leaf embellishment is the same stamp, used with versamark and mica powders, then sprayed with water.
I really enjoyed the fresh air on our stroll today, and the sunshine added to the fabulous colours. A real feast for the eyes. Thanks for looking!

Time flies!

I can't believe it is over a week since I posted! What a bad blogger I am! First I'd like to welcome my latest followers. Not sure when you found me but welcome aboard! I have had a wonderful weekend, as my lovely friend Lynne came to stay and we went to Doncaster together for the Stamp Magic show. I think I can safely say that we shopped till we dropped! We saw Lesley there too and it was so lovely to catch up with  good friends. I have to say I enjoyed the company as much as the shopping, if not more. I am looking forward to having a good play with some of my haul, but I haven't had the chance yet, as today I waved Lynne off and then took my dad to the hospital for a pre-op appointment for his other hip. He will have his second hip replacement in December. The weather was dreadful on the drive back from the hospital. I had the wipers going full blast and the water was across the road in lots of places. When I finally got home Meg made me a cup of tea and I stuffed my face with chocolate!

Anyway, what have I got to show you today? I needed a Thank you card the other day, so I got out my ink dusters and a plain white card. Using Memento inks in dandelion yellow, lilac posies, grape Jelly, Danube blue and Tuxedo black, I made the background,masking the moon. I then stamped the owl and tree ( Lavinia stamps).

The sentiment is a Chocolate Baroque stamp. Very quick and simple! Hope you have managed to stay warm and dry. Thanks for looking!

Tired but happy!

I can't remember if I told you, but back in June (the same day as Stamp Magic) Megan graded to 3rd kyu brown belt. Four moths later and I have been doing the same. It was tiring and full on for the two hours we were there, and a little scary. I was the only one grading from red to brown belt, so there was nowhere to hide at times! Even so I did it and now I am the proud owner of a Brown belt!

 These are two of my regular Sensei, Sensei Alex on the left and Sensei Xavier on the right.

This is our area Sensei, Sensei Karl, who is in charge of the region (Notts and Derbyshire), as you can see, at 6 foot 6" he looks like a giant next to me!
I was very proud of Meg too, as she went along to train at grading.

 

Sensei Karl was so impressed with Meg's Karate he invited her to senior class to train with the Sensei and black belts. 

I am hoping to relax with some inkiness this evening and  I will share some more cards very soon. Thanks for looking!

Autumn Colours

When I saw the themes at Allsorts and heck of a challenge I just had to join in. I love this time of year for the richness of colour and quality of light, so the theme called for a scene, and here it is...

The photo isn't the best as I took it after dark, under my daylight lamp on my craft table. All stamps used are from Inkylicious, and I used a combination of Adirondack and Distress inks for stamping and ink dusting. I had plans to make it an 8x8 card and stamp the background, but ran out of time, so it is a simple scene. As I said above, I am entering it into Allsorts and Heck of a Challenge where the theme is Autumn Colours. I've also spotted the challenge at Sweet Stampin' is also Autumn, so I'm entering it there too
I can't tell you how much I am looking forward to half term and having time to not only get inky, but to wander through blog land too! Thanks for your patience and I will visit you soon. Thanks for looking!

All Creatures Great and Small at Stamping Sensations

Good Morning! Here are my cards for the latest Challenge at Stamping Sensations, where our theme for this month is All Creatures Great and Small. Our Sponsors for this month are the wonderful Penny Black, so I chose to use my slapstick paisley swirl all over my base card in memento Danube blue. I then used a lovely set of woodware stamps for the owl, the branch, the flowers and the sentiment and coloured them with promarkers. I added three buttons to finish off.
After this fun card my eye was drawn once more to those lovely images from Nicecrane designs, and the pile of gelli print papers I had made a little while ago. This is what I came up with.

Two tiny creatures on this one! The leaves were cut with a joy crafts die, and the gelli papers were created with Docrafts paint and Inkylicious stamps.
What is the prize this month? Feast your eyes on these wonderful goodies...



I do hope you will find the time to join us this month. Pop over to the challenge blog for lots of fabulous inspiration from my very talented teamies. Thanks for looking!

A Good Day

Well, I have been finding it difficult to get into blog land this week, but I am finally here and I will be back tomorrow too, with the October Stamping Sensations challenge. So what has brought me here today? I have had a wonderful day so far. This morning I made a ginger cake for my lovely friend Megan, who I went to Rwanda with. Here it is:

After a fairly hectic week at home and at school I needed some baking therapy, lol! Whilst it was in the oven, I discovered who has been raiding our peanut bird feeder all week!

He was quite small, so I think he is a young one. After that I went down to the New Writers UK book fayre where I met up with my friend, Megan and daughter Megan who was volunteering there. We listened to talks by Mark Gwynne Jones, a performance poet from Matlock Bath, and Steve Dunne, a crime fiction author and English teacher from Derby. They were both very approachable and we had a good chat with them. After that came the award ceremony for the children and young peoples writing competition, where Meg was a finalist. We were thrilled to find she had won the silver medal in the 14-16 age group.

Her short story will be published in a collection with the rest of the finalists in February. As you can see I enjoyed my proud Mum moment, and came home with a pile of books to read too! Hope you are having a good weekend. I will be back in the morning with my cards. Thanks for looking!

Another card for the playground

After a very hectic week, I am staggering back to blogland with a final entry for Di's snippet playground challenge. 

Is this a bit bright for a Friday night?! I loved the colours in the topper, which is another from Nicecrane designs. You can find this on the colourful nature Collage sheet, which I love! I found a snippet of yellow card that matched the yellow Hammer and the blue snippet was the right shade of stormy sky. To dull down the yellow a little I over stamped it with the worn paint stamp from Inkylicious in Stormy sky DI. Two more snippets to mat and layer and a snippet of ribbon too. This is my third time in the playground in a fortnight - put the flag out Miss Di! Fingers crossed that I am in with a chance of winning that water drops stamp! Thanks for looking!

More Christmas Cards

Inspired by this card by Heather Telford, I decided to have a go at making some similar Christmas Cards using Inkylicious tree stamps from the set Simply trees. I am continuing to try and use up lots of my white snippets too.

I began by dusting the linen card stock snippets with tumbled glass, faded lilac and spun sugar distress inks. A bit of teal zeal memento may have snook in too (my current favourite colour!). After a few attempts at embossing with different embossing powders, I decided I liked the silver sparkle (Top and bottom cards) better than detail white.

I added a few lines of Crystal Stickles and a sentiment. that's three more made! This is my second entry to Di's Crafty snippet challenge this fortnight. Hopefully I will get another one done before the close on Saturday so I can be in with a chance of winning some stamps by Ryn!
Thanks for looking!

Quick one layer Christmas cards and new Inkylicious stamps!

If you are looking for ideas for Christmas cards, then there are some new stamps from Inkylicious that are perfect for quick one layer cards.

 The branches, baubles and pine cones are all on a little plate called 'Winter spruce' and the 'Merry Christmas 08' is a single stamp.

I've stamped with Memento and Distress inks, as well as dusting with them on these cards. The Music Background stamp (also Inkylicious) provided a great vintage look in Antique linen Distress ink, as did the tiny script stamp above.

 Look out for these stamps and loads more at All Pally, Hobbycrafts Exeter, GNPE Harrogate, Stamp Magic Doncaster and Hobbycrafts Glasgow and NEC on the Inkylicious stand.
Bearing in mind the cost of postage I am making a whole load of these, along with some simple tree/ snow scene ones like this:

 Teal Zeal and Grape Jelly Memento inks were used with my ink dusters on this one. If you are off to Ally Pally this weekend have a wonderful time! If not, happy crafting wherever you are. Thanks for looking!

Poppies For Stamping Sensations

Hi there! It's my turn to provide some mid-month inspiration for the Stamping Sensations challenge, where the theme is Poppy -inspired. For this card I have used another Poppy from Chloe's stamps, our sponsor this month. The poppies were coloured with Distress markers and the stamens were accented with a black gel pen. I created a background with my ink dusters, memento and distress inks, along with a bird and a grass stamp from Inkylicious.
Pop over to the challenge blog to find out which crafting items I would take to my desert island!

Three Snippet makes

When I make square scene cards I often end up with lots of strips of silk art card where I have cut them off an A5 piece to make the square. I thought I would have a little play with wetting my ink dusters and see what combinations I could come up with.

On each of them I used just two stamps, Willow twigs and the birds from Windswept, both from Inkylicious. I did use black soot distress ink on this last one, but all the others were from residual ink on the dusters and water. I also added some dots from glitter glue or gel pen on each one.The mats were from my snippet box too, so I think these qualify for Pixie's Crafty Snippet playground this week! Thanks for looking and I hope you managed to stay warm and dry today!

Nicecrane Designs

After seeing Brenda's post here and Lynne's post here, I thought I'd better go and check out Nicecrane Designs...what a lot of gorgeous images there are! I spent a bit, but the lovely Ignacio gave me some freebies too. They are instant downloads, so very quick and great when you want a card in a hurry!

The images on these two cards are from a sheet called 'Colorful Nature'. I just loved the vintage feel and the gorgeously crisp images. I know I love stamping, but using images like this still means you can stamp the background or base card. I used the worn paint stamp and the delicate vine from Inkylicious. The inks were bundled sage, shabby shutters and rusty hinge DI, with memento olive grove to stamp the vine. The various scraps of paper and card used to mat and layer were all from my snippets drawers, which are very full at the moment!
I am entering these into Di's crafty snippet challenge (Sorry I have been away so long!)