New Stamps at Crafty Individuals!

 

Hi There! Did you know that Crafty Individuals released some new stamps recently? There are two absolutely stunning Mandala stamps in amongst them, designed by my very lovely friend Lynne of Creative Lynks

The top 2 use the Summer mandala stamp with the gorgeous butterfly in the centre.

This third one features the spring mandala. they are wonderful to colour and layer up but equally good to simply stamp over an inky background. I absolutely love them! 

If you want to get your hands on these beauties, you can find them on the Crafty individuals website at an introductory price! 

Check them out here.

Thanks for looking! 

Inspired by Sunsets

 Our lovely friend Lynne has taken some stunning photos of sunsets recently. Several of them feature a very beautiful old Beech tree, which Deby at Inkylicious made into a stamp a few years ago. This prompted talk of ink colours and bending brushes, followed by Lynne challenging us to recreate the scene. We had a choice of photos, but this was the one that I chose, and here is my card:

Nowhere near as beautiful as the real thing, but I'm happy. The base card was stamped with Crafty Individuals stamps in dried marigold and versafine black. The sky behind the tree was done with Distress inks and ink dusters, using mustard seed, fossilized amber, spiced marmalade, ripe persimmon, rusty hinge and fired brick. I stamped the tree in Archival black and extended the ground and fence to fill the width of the card with a black pen.

Please do take a look at everyone's beautiful art work, inspired by Lynne's gorgeous photos.

I am sure Lynne, Sandma, Viv and Joan would love to have you visit them. These lovely friends are so wonderfully supportive and their creations on their blogs and on facebook are a real feast to the eyes. 

Whilst I am here, I've got a quick reminder for you that Jean Hardy is on Hochanda tomorrow with some stunningly beautiful new stamps designed by Sandma. The programmes are at on10am and 2pm, straight after the lovely Lesley Wharton of Chocolate Baroque (9am and 1pm) I will leave you with a sneaky peek at one of the cards I made for the show 😁

Thanks for looking!

A wonderful weekend and other news

Half term started well with Lynne arriving from Scotland on Friday night. On Saturday we went up to the Be Creative Launch and did make and take sessions throughout the day. It was lovely to meet everyone who came along and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. Here are just a few of the creations made by people who visited.
Here is Janet with her wonderful creation...

 

Helen and her sister made the next two...

I am only sorry I didn't get the chance to snap a few more as we went along. I thoroughly enjoyed myself and look forward to doing some more workshops soon. One of the popular products that we were trying out was the Be Creative Alcohol Markers. As a member of their design team, I was lucky enough to get to play with these beauties...

There are 100 different colours in the range and I am very impressed by the quality of the ink. Here is a colour chart that I made whilst I get used to them.

 

The day I recieved them I just couldn't do anything but colour, and here is what I did!

Digi image is from Teri at Arti Doodles.
On Sunday, which was Lynne's Birthday, we went to Stamp Magic at Doncaster Dome. We bumped into lots of people we knew and had a great time. It was lovely to see some new things being demoed too. We had so much fun, especially when my purchases were put through a till and they came out as this!!!

 Seriously, I didn't spend that much!!! I can't wait to get playing with my goodies, but Steve is off work this week so we are going to have some time together. I am also looking forward to seeing what Lynne does with her goodies too!

I will leave you with a card made with more Be creative papers. The poinsettia was coloured with Be creative markers and the Die is from Frantic Stamper, also available from Once Upon a Stamp.
Thanks so much for looking and for all your lovely comments. I hope to catch up with all you lovely people who leave me comments soon!

A little pink creation and some photos

Hi there! I have just returned from a few days away visiting my dear friend Lynne. I needed to make a card for a work colleague who loves anything French, and as I used quite a lot of pink I thought it would be a good time to remind you that Pink is our current theme this month at Stamping Sensations.

I used Inkylicious ink dusters and stamps for all the backgrounds and used Distress inks in Victorian velvet and tea dye. The Eiffel tower (Dovecraft) was stamped on a snippet of card in starlight black brilliance ink and heat embossed with clear powder. I cut the ferns, a rather wonderful little die from Frantic Stamper (available from Once upon a Stamp) from two snippets of burgundy card. I cannot recommend Frantic stamper dies enough. They took one run through the cuttlebug and popped straight out of the die so easily! The sentiment (Little Claire) was stamped on another snippet of card, cut with a spellbinder die, and even the ribbon was a snippet! With so many snippets used I am nipping over to Di's snippet playground with this card.
Before I leave you I will share some photos from my trip to Scotland.

 Mute and whooper swans.

 Whooper swan

 Wild primrose

There is nothing quite like fresh air, sunshine, blue sky, good company and exercise to put a spring in my step! Oh yes, and seeing 47 species of bird in just one day!
Thanks for looking and for your lovely comments. Do bring your pink creations over to Stamping Sensations this month as there is a whopping prize of £40 worth of goodies from PDA to win!

A Wonderful Weekend!

Last weekend it was Lynne's Birthday, which was the day before Stamp Magic, so she came to stay for a few days, so we could go to Doncaster together.
I can now share the card and a small gift I made for her.

 The card was made using ink dusters, Memento inks in dandelion, rosebud and elderberry and Inkylicious stamps, including the old beech tree, that was made from a photo of a tree near Lynne's house.

I made a stampboard pendant, using spring distress inks and grape jelly memento ink. Whilst the fern was still wet I applied clear embossing powder and set with a heat gun. As the challenge at Allsorts this week is embossing I am entering the pendant there.
We met up with some friends whilst we were at Stamp Magic. It was lovely to see you, Jane, Brenda and Lesley! Hope you enjoy playing with your new crafting goodies!
We bought quite a few new goodies too, and I am looking forward to sharing what I make over the next few weeks. It is half term, so I am enjoying a bit of playtime!
Thanks for looking!

Summer Crafting, Inkylicious style

Meg and I took a quick visit to Summer crafting at Doncaster today. If you are going tomorrow, do make a bee-line for Inkylicious on B02, not far from the main entrance. Deby has some fabulous new stamps on show, and one is particularly important to my dear friend, Lynne, as she sees this tree from her garden every day!
Here is the card I have made with it this afternoon.

I used my ink dusters to dust the sky with memento inks in dandelion, rose bud, lilac posies and elderberry. You will see quite a few using this ink combination over the next few weeks! The set of stamps is called old beech tree and includes two buzzards, the tree and two sentiments. I added a bit of cow parsley in the corner and extended the ground a bit with a distress marker.
My second card features more new stamps, a gorgeous set called fern leaves.

For this one I used Adirondack inks in peach Bellini and Mountain Rose, Distress inks in crushed olive and shabby shutters, and Memento inks in lilac posies, olive grove and espresso truffle. This is a card for another wonderful friend who is going overseas for a couple of years. I will miss her very much.
My final card is made using some older Inkylicious stamps called Summer Morn, and the same ink combo as the top card.

The little flower in the corner is made using the Blooming Marvellous set. The background was made by running a stencil (inky doodles) through the cuttlebug with an embossing mat and then sanding it.
Well, I'd better go. I have 5 birthday cards to make this weekend!
If you go to Summer crafting, I hope you have a lovely time, and that it isn't as packed as it was this morning. If I were you I'd also take a bottle of water with you if the weather is as hot as it was today!
Thanks for looking!

A couple of evening scenes and some photos

I needed a few cards in a hurry at the end of term, so I reached for my snippets of silk art card and made two quick evening scenes with ink dusters and Inkylicious stamps. I used Memento Grape Jelly and Lilac Posies and a water spray. After it was dry I added the stamped images and white gel pen. Here is a close up of the panel.

The second panel was much the same, but this time I put it onto a square card. As these were both made with snippets I will take them to Di's snippet playground. Hope the sun is out!

We have just returned from a few lovely days in Scotland with Lynne. (If you pop over to her blog you will see the gorgeous guest DT card she has made for Mrs A's butterfly challenge.) We had a wonderful time - just what was needed at the end of a long term. Here is a photo taken at Grey Mare's Tail nature reserve.

I don't know why, but I am still surprised at how much taller than me Megan is now! The view from the hillside on the right was wonderful!

I will finish with a photo of a red squirrel taken at Eskrigg Nature reserve near Lockerbie.

 Thanks for looking, and for your lovely comments.

Exciting news!

It is the school holidays and I haven't posted for days, in fact I have been quiet all fortnight. I will tell you why... as well as visiting Dad regularly and having a couple of days away at Lynne's in Scotland, I am working on some cards for Inkylicious!!!! Deby asked a while ago if I would be interested in making some samples for her when she next had a TV show, and I jumped at the chance! I just know lots of you will love the stamps that I have been playing with, and I can't wait to show you. There are going to be two Create and Craft shows coming up quite soon, so I will let you know the details in the next week or so, as well as giving you some sneaky peaks of the things I have made. I might just keep saying 'My cards are going to be on telly!!!'  - please forgive me, as I am very excited about it!
What I will show you today are some photos of our visit to Scotland.

 We had a lovely walk along the river,

 taking in views of the Moffat Hills. It was bracing, but the fresh air and exercise were just what was needed!

The following day we went to Caerlaverock WWT centre, followed by a visit to Caerlaverock Castle.

 The castle's curtain wall forms a triangle, and there is a substantial mansion within it's walls.

We saw lots of wildlife too - a Peregrine falcon, lots of Buzzards, deer, teal and widgeon, to name but a few. We also saw the footprints and spraint of an otter, but he wasn't going to show himself this visit. A big thanks to Lynne for letting us visit again, and showing us some of the lovely places around her home. 
Hopefully I will be back soon with something crafty to show you. Thanks for looking!