Another walk in Ploughman's wood

Warning, Photo heavy post! Are you sitting comfortably? Ploughman's Wood is a Wildlife Trusts nature reserve a couple of miles from our house. We sometimes go there just for an hour and a short walk. I know there are Bluebells there, so we made our way with my camera. Here are a few of my photos

 The blackthorn was beautiful on the walk from the road...

 There was a carpet of bluebells as soon as we entered the wood.

 There were also wood anemones in both white...

 and various shades of pink

 We were accompanied by the song of robins, great tits and chiffchaffs.

 We also heard green and spotted woodpeckers

 In some places the wood anemones looked like snow!

 We also saw cowslips,

 primroses...

 and lots of Greater Stitchwort

 I hope you enjoyed joining us on our little walk.
Thanks for looking!

Inky backgrounds

 As I said in my last post, I decided to take a trip to PDA Cards and Craft to escape the quiet house...several pounds later I emerged clutching a stack of card, some stamps and a couple of ink pads. I didn't find all the Woodware stamps I was looking for, but I did find Large Fennel, which I used on the first two cards. I now need small fennel too, having seen the samples the ladies there had made.

When I got home I thought I'd better clear a bit of the mess on my table and found some lovely bits of card coloured with Distress ink re-inkers and a water spray. If I remember rightly I used squeezed lemonade, seedless preserves and either ripe persimmon or spiced marmalade. I lay the card onto the inky wash and keep alternately spraying with water and laying on snippets of card.  The first card on this post was probably the last spray of the inks before it got too pale for me. I found one last bit  which was an almost perfect fit for this inkylicious picture perfect stamp

I'd mounted this one on the card before I decided it needed a hill in the background, so masked the rest of the card and added a hill with ink dusters. Unfortunately I managed to get a smudge on the white base card, but a well places die cut leaf soon covered it up. All stamping was done with Versafine black and then embossed with clear embossing powder.
Do you want to see what else I have been doing for the past couple of days?


These are Rhubarb and Ginger Muffins, and finally...
Soda Bread!
The Chocolate cakes raised £28 for Karate class trophies and medals this week. I was very happy with my soda bread and have decided to venture further into making bread not using a bread machine.
Thanks for looking and feel free  to help yourself to a cake  - all calorie free, lol!

A Squirrel Card

Whilst photographing the Squirrels last week (see previous post), I remembered that Dora had borrowed my photos from a previous visit to draw some digis. She very kindly let me have them, so I had a lovely half hour colouring and making this card. If you fancy it, you can purchase the digi from Dora's digi shop.

I coloured it using Be creative markers. For the squirrel I used natural oak, light orange and yellow ochre. Mixing the light orange and yellow ochre produced the lighter shade. I used some Be Creative paper too. The little die cut leaves are a Joy crafts die that I absolutely love. The brown card and the gold paper are oth snippets so I am off to Miss Di's snippet playground with this. 
The house is feeling rather empty as Meg returned to uni on Sunday and I still have a week of holiday. I am thinking I will take a trip to a craft shop to take my mind off it, lol! I particularly need some of the lovely whimsical flower stamps from the woodware range. One of them has my name on it, quite literally! Thanks for looking! 

Red Squirrels in Scotland

Meg and I had a lovely time visiting Lynne last week. On our last day we visited Eskrigg Nature reserve, a red squirrel hot spot...

 We had a chuckle at this one...

 who finally emerged from the peanut store.

 Some were a little more refined in their dining habits!

 Some liked to make the other squirrels jump with Jack-in-a-box type moves!

 Some tried to blend in with the trees, keeping a close eye on us humans...

 I think this is my favourite shot of all the ones I took (96!) 

 And finally, this little fellow was eager to pick up the food that others had dropped on the floor. 

 It was so lovely to spend a very quiet couple of hours in the company of these delightful creatures (Meg and Lynne included!)
Thanks for looking! 

April at Stamping Sensations

Good Morning! It is the first Sunday of the month, so time for our April challenge at Stamping Sensations, where this month we have a great theme of........

********One for the Girls********

Now I decided to veer away from the predictable and create a couple of cards that are feminine, but not pink or cute! My first card features that Woodware Clear Magic single flower, coloured with alcohol markers and added glitter glue. The base card (Colourplan White) was stamped in citrus shades of Distress Ink using an Inkylicious leaf and the flower was mounted on a strip of stardream card, embossed with a stencil for Inky Doodles.

  The stamp on my second card is another Woodware Clear Magic one, and I have paper pieced it to imitate some of the wide range of converse style footwear available. I added white gel pen to the laces and eyelets.
  we are being sponsored by PDA Cards and Craft this month. I am a very lucky crafter as I live only a 25 minute drive away from PDA at Langley Mill, and visit (and spend lots!!!) often. Their paper and card selection are wonderful and they also stock a wide range of other crafting products, including some Woodware stamps, promarkers and stickles!
Here is the prize:                                                                            
                                        
 I'd be very happy to help you with the spending of that if you want, lol!  Be sure to pop over to the challenge blog and take a look at the stunning feminine creations that my talented team mates have created.
Thanks for looking and for all your lovely comments too.

Spring in the garden

Spring appears to have arrived, and whilst there was a sunny spell on Saturday I took a few photos around the garden.

The snowbells came with the house. I had never seen any before that. They are like oversized snowdrops with missing petals, and I find them fascinating, lol!

The tête a tête Daffodils are very tasty to something in the garden, but I managed to get a photo of these before they were eaten!

I couldn't get a photo of the robin without the reflection in the glass today - not my best photo

I love unusual primulas - I bought some of these for my Dad's garden too

The colour of this Japonica is so cheerful - shades of abandoned coral

As well as colour we have some lovely scent from the Viburnum.

The Flowering currant is a great source of food for early bees

And this Narcissus had a perfect bloom!

Hope you enjoyed a little peak around my garden!
Thanks for looking!

Rudolf day for March

Here I am with a couple of cards for Rudolf Day. The first is an inkylicious tree in a snowy landscape. The embossing folder is from Sheena Douglass, which I picked up in the sales last year.

My second card has a Digi from Teri Sherman's Delicious Doodles, coloured with Be Creative alcohol markers.

I used the same embossing folder. Now you may notice there are no sentiments on these. I want to use quite a small stamp and I have temporarily mislaid it, so rather than searching for it, I'll add the sentiment later!
Do pop over to Scrappy Mo's blog and take a look at the DT cards. There is lots of inspiration! I am going to try and make several cards for April's Rudolf day as I haven't made as many as I had made this time last year.
We have a ridiculous arrangement for our Easter holidays from school, in that I have good Friday and Easter Monday off, back to school for 4 days then two weeks off. The down side of this is we will have two extra days to do before the summer holiday, so don't finish until 26th July, and on top of that I am only off for one week when Meg is here.
Thanks for looking and for all your lovely comments

More Aurora Wings Colouring

 Back in February I entered this card into an Aurora Wings Challenge on Facebook. Amazingly, I was lucky enough to be a winner! As a part of my prize I chose this image called Calla Lily Sprite.
The first one I coloured with be Creative markers and used papers on my card from the Artylicious cd Butterfly Bliss and Filigree fusion (I think - it is a while since I printed them out!) The pale gold card is pearlescent, and I used a  gold gelly roll stardust pen for the centres of the lilies.

My second card is one that I did as a sample for Be Creative's Hochanda shows last Friday. I used paper from their Nature's portrait paper pad. The bottletop and glitter glue are also from Be Creative.
Hi there to my new followers, Teri, Kate, Jo and Trudi. Great to have you here! I aim to have some Follower candy soon, as I head back to 300 followers (I got there just before Google had the clear out and wiped 14 off my total (Grrrr!)
Today I have enjoyed my belated Mother's day, with Meg being home for her Easter Holiday. I was treated to breakfast in bed, a beautiful bunch of flowers...

and some amazing home baked biscuits called Gypsy Creams (I think these might be a Dumfries and Galloway delicacy, taken from the cookbook we bought from New Abbey tea Rooms last summer)


I consider myself a very fortunate Mum!
Thanks for looking!

Ink duster playtime

 I had an urge to get some inks and ink dusters out and had a little play. All of the cards have the main image stamped and dusted onto silk art card. Inks are either Distress inks or memento inks. All stamps on the silk art card for this one are from Inkylicious. I stamped the base cards with crafty individuals CI-430.

 This second card uses hedgerow1 and a sentiment from Hero Arts. Ink colours here are Distress inks in seedless preserves, picked raspberry and broken china. A white gel pen was used to add the highlights.

 I used a bit of water on my dusters on this one. The stamps are from the windswept set

For this last one I used all inkylicious stamps.
Thanks for looking!

March Challenge at Stamping Sensations

Good Morning! It is the first Sunday of the month, so time for our March challenge at Stamping Sensations, where this month we have a great theme of........

********Flower Power********

Perfect for Mother's day, and spring! For my first card I used a stamp by Honey Doo Crafts, coloured with Be Creative markers and decoupaged  over an ink dusted oval. I used the same pens to make a coordinating layer before mounting on a base card covered in paper from the pastel inspirations pad. I added a stamped sentiment framed using a Be Creative  bottle cap. 

 For my second card I used a digi (girl) from Digistamp boutique and a flower woodware singles stamp. All images were coloured with Be Creative alcohol markers. The paper on this card is from the Vintage Collage pad, and I also used be creative glitter glue.
The Usual rules apply, you can enter up to three times, combine with other challenges, use any make of stamp......but can I please remind you we are a stamping challenge and stamping must be the focal/predominant element of your work. Conventional rubber/acrylic stamps and digital images are acceptable, but pre-coloured digital images and toppers are not. It so upsets us to see names come out in the draw who are not eligible for the prize because they have not read the rules. 
Now onto the sponsor and prize this month 
We are being sponsored by Be Creative who have put together a great prize! Feast your eyes on these goodies!  

 Paper pads, pearls and gems galore! You can see loads of ideas of how to use Be Creative products on the design team blog. Do pop over and become a follower!
Also don't forget to pop over to the challenge blog and take a look at all the fabulous inspiration from my multi-talented teamies too! 
It will be a very strange Mother's day for me as Meg is not able to come home this weekend and I'm the only Mum left in the immediate family. We are postponing Mother's day here until 20th March, when Meg will be home for her Easter holidays.
Thanks for looking, and if you are celebrating Mother's day today, I hope you have a great day!