Male Birthdays

 Lots of people struggle when it comes to ideas for male birthdays, especially teenagers. In times of need I will often opt for digi images, and Mo Manning has quite a few, especially if you are looking for a computer or gaming theme. With this one I began by stamping a panel of white stamping card with a twinchie stamp from Inkylicious in Kaleidacolor Creole Spice. I dusted over using the same ink pad and my ink dusters. I trimmed this and attached it to the base card, popping a turquoise stick on nail head at each corner.
I sprayed a snippet of card using blue and purple dylusions. When it was dry, I ran it through the cuttlebug inside a birthday themed embossing folder, before rubbing over some treasure brass to highlight the embossing. The sentiment is from Little Claire and was also stamped on a snippet. I made both of these cards a while ago. This first one was made for Meg's godmother's godson (Meg's godbrother?), who is also off to University in Sheffield.

 Here is another male card for you.This time I found some snippets of black card, and paper pieced the Woodware clear singles Sneakers stamp, using a white gelly roll pen on the laces and eyelets. I used ice grey 1 and pastel blue promarkers to shade around the stamp and a little ivory to add some shape to the sneakers. This stamp is great for paper piecing and for girls or boys from about 12 upwards - So versatile!
As I used snippets on both, I am off to Miss Di's snippet playground with them. I will be behind the bike sheds where the chocklit is, hoping the tag game is finished and no one else gets a tail pinned on them. Poor Mrs A! Hope Miss Di is feeling a bit better and her back is behaving itself.  Thanks for looking!

Baby cards

 I needed a new baby card and a first birthday card recently, and, after seeing this baby card by Debby, using a new Mo Manning Baby Digi called Hush, I had to have it! I printed it and coloured it with promarkers. I stamped the base card (not very well - I need to practice with these stamps!) with Inky Doodles Little Patchwork stamps in various shades of pink, before giving a general dusting of Tea dye distress ink to make it look a little bit shabby chic. I added a sentiment and a ribbon to finish it off.

My second card is for my great Nephew's first birthday. This Mo Manning Digi (called 'I Love it!') was particularly apt in that he loves his train, but the little boy in the picture has quite a lot of hair compared to Elliot! The base card was stamped with another inky Doodles stamp from the Country checks set, in two shades of distress ink (tumbled glass and tea dye). The stitched alphabets are from Inky Doodles and the sentiment is from Little Claire.
Thanks for looking and for all the lovely comments. I hope I will manage to visit you soon!

Some photos in my garden, a couple of cards and some follower candy

I hope you have managed to stay cool enough this weekend. I have spent a good part of yesterday and a bit of today at Gedling Book festival. It was brilliant! Meg was volunteering there, so I thought I would pop over and see what was happening. I sat in on four talks/ workshops. They were in Marquees with a through draught, so perfect for the weather! Anyway, this hot weather has brought the flowers out on my pot marjoram and shasta daisies, so I thought I would share a couple of photos.

I also had a couple of cards to make, one for a colleague going on maternity leave...

 I coloured the Mo manning image with promarkers, cut out with a nestie and mounted on some polkadot paper from Pink Petticoat. The sentiment is from Inkylicious.

My second card was one that I really didn't know what to put on it. I eventually settled on this for a chap who has been covering my class each Wednesday whilst I do management stuff (Technical term, that!). I used Kaleidacolor fresh greens and stamps from Inkylicious. It took me all of 10 minutes, tops!
Finally I promised Candy. This is the first of several I think. I am having a clear out and getting rid of things I don't use. First up is a bunch of 7 Molly Blooms stamps that have been used once or never. They are not to my taste at all, but I was asked to make a couple of cards to promote them some time ago.

It seems sensible to let them go to a good home. Leave a message below if you are interested and a follower. There will be some more follower candy soon.
Thanks for looking!

A couple of snippet makes

 Here are a couple of snippet makes I made about 3 weeks ago, but haven't got round to blogging yet. The first was a maternity leave card for my boss. Those of you who are regular visitors will know this is the fourth maternity card I have made recently. I don't know which chair it is Di, so I am playing safe and not sitting down at all! The digi image is from Mo's Digital Pencil coloured with promarkers.

My second card was for a TA who was leaving. Please forgive the simplicity of it and the dodgy stamping on the left, but it was made after a meal out and a few glasses at about midnight! The music stamp is an Inkylicious stamp and the guitar was from Dimension Fourth a while ago. The snippet in this one is the copper mirriboard. I'm entering them both into Di's crafty snippets challenge, where I haven't been for so long I bet she thought I'd been expelled!
Thanks for looking x

Another snippet make

Well, I have managed to get out to play twice in one week! For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, it is Di's crafty snippet challenge, where many of us relive our childhood whilst using up our snippet mountains!  I am here with a card for a friend's daughter. I can't believe she is three already! I found this fabulous stripy paper in my snippet box and thought it was perfect for a little girls card. The rosette was made from another snippet, and the ribbon was a scrap barely long enough to go across the card. The image is a digistamp from Mo Manning and I LOVE it! It reminds me of Meg when she was about five. I coloured it with promarkers and finished it with a sentiment from Waltzing Mouse. The flower is a die cut bought in a pack before I had a cuttlebug (yes, that long ago!)

Right, I've found a spacehopper in the shed. If I can only work out how to blow it up with the bicycle pump I'll bounce my way round the playground!

Christening card

Last week I had a request for a Christening card, so yesterday I got busy and had a go at putting one together. I have only ever made 5 Christening cards, and two of those were for members of this same family, so I had to come up with something different! I had a little visit to Once Upon a Stamp last weekend and bought a Marianne Designables cut and embossing folder, and wanted to try it out, so that was my starting point.

After running the folder and linen look card through the cuttlebug I used Spun sugar distress ink to go around the edge. I then stamped some plain white card with one of the Waltzing Mouse gingham stamps and Memento angel pink. I added some flat backed pearls,some faux stitching and an organza bow...

and then thought about the image!
I went to my usual place for lovely baby and children images - Mo Manning and found this beauty.

I coloured her with promarkers using fine tips (What a wonderful invention those are!) because this circle is less than 2 inches across. The sentiment and name (Irish apparently and pronounced ee-ma) were computer generated and coloured with more spun sugar DI. The tags are spellbinders dies - fancy tags 1 and Grommet tags. It is rather pink for me, but I think it works.
Well, I'm going to take a break for a few days. Meg and I are off to visit a lovely friend, and hopefully get some fresh air and see some Scottish wildlife. Thanks for looking!

A few cards

Well, I've had several requests for cards and had to just get on with them - mojo or no-mojo. I can't say I'm particularly thrilled with any of them, but I'm posting them any way, as I've nothing else at the moment.
The first one is a silver wedding card using Inkylicious stamps and silver embossing.

 

The second card is a Mo Manning Digi called 'I love it!'. I coloured it with promarkers and Used some MME papers behind it.

 

Not sure what happened to his hair - not the colour I wanted it to be!

Next we have a Penny black image, stamped for me by my good friend Jules and coloured with promarkers. I teamed it up with some Pink petticoat papers.

Finally we have some owls (one of my two magnolia stamps). I coloured the owls with promarkers, and did a bit of research on owl eye colour. Did you know that an owl with very dark eyes is normally active at night, an owl with yellow eyes is active during the day, and an owl with orange eyes is active at dawn and dusk? Unfortunately this lot look positively evil now! The papers here are MME also.
Thanks to those of you that wished me well on my course. I have to say I wasn't looking forward to it, but it was surprisingly very good, in that it was focused on the real world and will be useful too!
Well, thanks for looking, and if you see my mojo, please send it back to me pronto!