What a great day!

We had a great day today, when these lovely ladies came to visit (Thanks for the photo, Lisa!). From the left there is Jules, Lisa, Brenda, me, Meg and Lynn. We spent much of the day chatting, eating and drinking. There was a moment or two where we stamped and die cut too, but the thing we did the most was laugh! I am still smiling now! It was wonderful to chat to Ruth from 'A Passion for Stamps' using skype too. Brenda brought some of Ruth's stamps, manufactured by Tonic, and I stamped some before she left. I have to say how impressed I am by how beautifully they stamp. They are now top of my shopping list! I will make a card with them soon.
Finally, after everyone had gone home I got to see Mo Farrah and Usain Bolt make history, and Tom Daley get a well deserved Bronze Medal. All these Olympics have seriously affected my crafting, and thanks Brenda, for pointing out the attributes of lycra to me!!!

A few wings

As the theme at stampalot this month is 'take flight' I thought I would share a few photos from our holiday on the same theme with you.

A speckled Wood butterfly,

A male Common Darter Dragonfly,

A Reed Warbler,

A comma Butterfly,

 A common blue Damselfly

and an emerald damselfly. Thanks for looking!

Take Flight with Sir Stampalot

It's the first Sunday in the month and time for a new Challenge at Stampalot. This Month our theme is

    Take Flight

In other words we want you to show us any creations that feature things that fly, be it butterflies, birds or dragonflies, or even planes and helicopters!
Here is my creation.

This was my Niece's 30th Birthday card. The stamps are from Indigo Blu, stamped in Memento Black and coloured with promarkers. The die cut leaves around the edge are a Joy Crafts die. The tiny Dragonfly brads were from Lakeland in the days when they sold craft stuff for a while, several moons ago!
The prize for this month looks like this:

- Lots of lovely goodies with a flying theme! I'm really looking forward to visiting everyone's entries this month, so go and get some more inspiration from my amazing teamies on the DT, over on the challenge blog. I do hope you will join in this month.

I didn't get round to visiting as many people as I intended last night as I got all distracted by the Olympics! Wow! Another major haul of medals - Well done, team GB! I'd also like to congratulate everyone who was in the athletics stadium on their superb rendition of the national anthem when Jessica Ennis was awarded her medal. You sang brilliantly!

Thanks for looking!

I'm Back!

We have had a couple of weeks away in Suffolk and the batteries are definitely recharged. There was plenty of fresh air to be had, wildlife to enjoy and, for one week, sunshine to soak up.
I love the Suffolk coast far more than I expected to. The big skies seem to make up for the lack of hills and mountains! ( You were right, Brenda!)

These photos were taken at Orford Ness where we took a boat trip as well as a walk along the river.

 The second week was changeable, but only one day of soaking, constant rain, so we were very lucky. I thought I would share a few nautical photos before I go and reacquaint myself with my craft table. After that I will be round to visit you. I'll post some more nature pics later in the week.
 Many thanks for the lovely comments you left on my last post, and I will be sharing my Stampalot DT piece with you in the morning.

A Birthday card for a friend

I decided to have a play with the Summer distress inks again when I made this card for my friend Sarah's 40th Birthday. I used the Orchid stamps from Dimension Stamps and the Friend definition (Hero arts) to create the background. The main panel was coloured using my Ink Dusters and the summer distress inks. I added stickles and sprayed with glimmer mist to add a bit of sparkle which I think you can see here.

The orchid and the flower buds were coloured with distress ink too, but this time I used 'wild honey' for the orchid centre as well as 'picked raspberry'. I also added a bit of white gel pen. The base card was stamped with the smaller orchid stamp and Brilliance ink in Twilight.  Sorry if I don't get round to visiting you back for a little while. Mr Blogger is sending my comments off into the ether. I have been back to several places I have visited recently and found no comment, and after commenting I got a 503 error message. I'm also having a little break and some fresh air weather permitting. This half term has been very hectic, and I really need to recharge the batteries, and tidy up the mess that has accumulated on my desk over the past few weeks. I will be back by the end of the month. Thanks for looking!

A very quick anniversary card

Just remembered an anniversary that I had forgotten, so I used a freebie stamp from the front of a magazine, coloured it with promarkers, added a few blobs of gold tulip paint and mounted on a scrap of paper from my stash. The sentiment is from Waltzing Mouse. Little random blobs of tulip paint are great for covering up little mistakes or marks on the card. Note to self - check your fingers for ink before pressing the card into place!
Thanks for looking!

Cake with glitter!

 This is what I made this morning. My niece is celebrating her 30th Birthday today, as on the actual day she will be working. She is in the middle of a project on Dragonflies for Cheshire Wildlife Trust, so the green icing and blue edible glitter had to be used!

The cake is a carrot cake topped with cream cheese frosting and the dragonfly's wings are dusted with gold - they looked better in real life!
I am off out to another party this evening - My friend Sarah is 40 tomorrow. I may well be falling asleep by 9.30 - not used to this social life business!!!
Thanks for looking!

Spring Dreamy

I had a request for another card like one I did for this month's Stampalot Challenge, but in the Spring Distress ink colours.

I stamped and clear embossed the 'Dreamy' flower, then dusted the background with Peacock feathers, dusted Lavender and squeezed Lemonade distress inks. I then stamped over the top with the Hero arts Friends definition in Dusted Lavender. The base card was stamped randomly with Dreamy (Penny Black) in the same inks. The central panel was mounted on silver Mirri card and placed over the matching ribbon. When I use this technique I ink up the main image first with versamark and then with distress ink before stamping, to make sure the embossing powder stays put.
I think I like this colour combo the best, although the summer colours come a close second. Perhaps I should keep using the summer colours to prompt an improvement in the weather! We have had some heavy downpours and there is a puddle outside work like a ford, but nothing like they have had a little further north, or in the south west. There have been moments when I have given up trying to teach over the noise of the rain drumming on our flat roof and told the children to watch the hail, rain, lightening etc through the window! We have had an impromptu lesson on what lightening and thunder are, so it hasn't been all bad! Thank you to all the lovely people who keep visiting despite my sporadic visits, and thanks too for your kind words.
Thanks for looking!

Normal service soon, hopefully

After months of being seriously unimpressed by BT, I've changed my broadband and telephone provider to Virgin Media. The good news is it is so much quicker to upload photos to my blog and I no longer get cut off mid post. I am determined to sever all ties with BT, so the bad news is I am having to let everyone know my new email address... which is taking hours! If I am in contact with you by email and you haven't had an email from me yet, please forgive me. You can find my new email address on my profile page. Then there are the craft sites who send me their newsletters, etc... On top of all that I am trying my best not to watch the tennis. It is on and I am glancing over whilst trying to make my niece's birthday card, but if I get engrossed I will get all upset if Andy Murray loses!
Yesterday was our School summer fair, and thankfully it was dry for the three hours it was on. The sun came out too! I did some baking to sell at the fair, so I thought I'd share some photos with you whilst I get round to making something worth showing you card-wise.
Banana cupcakes,

 Lemon Cupcakes

 and Bran Loaf

Thanks for looking and I hope I will return your visit very soon x

In Bloom

When I saw the theme for Allsorts this week I was quite pleased, as I had this card nearly finished. After my trip to Doncaster, where I bought this beautiful Hydrangea stamp from Inkylicious, I have been itching to have a go at a background dusted on linen look card stock with my ink dusters. I got out the Spring distress inks (LOVE these colours!) and made the background, adding a little detail with the text stamp and some sequin waste. I stamped the Hydrangea in black and added a line of white gel pen around the edge. I saw one of Deby's cards where she had done this and loved how it made the image pop. I added an embossed panel, some ribbon, some flowers and leaves cut with a Marianne Designs die, and a few spots of diamond Stickles. All stamps are from Inkylicious. I'd also like to enter this into the challenge at Penny Black and More where the theme is Summer blooms. Thanks for looking!

A lovely weekend

Well, my lovely guest left England and is flying back to Rwanda as this is posted. We had a great weekend and I think he enjoyed himself. I took him to my Dad's church where there was a flower festival followed by cream tea and brass band on the vicarage lawn. I don't think we could've shown him anything more British. We dodged the showers and he loved the scones, jam, strawberries and cream!

We drove through Sherwood forest and talked about the differences in the landscape. He says we have lots and lots of trees in England.
On Sunday we talked about Rwanda and plans for when we go over there. He tells me we will either go to the National park to see Zebra, Elephants, Giraffes, Lions and Hippos or we will visit the Mountain gorillas! How exciting is that! Meg also tried teaching Andre a few chords on the guitar.As well as helping to entertain our guest, Meg has had a weekend free of homework (she is on work experience next week) and has been sketching like mad. You can see her latest portraits here .

What's my Crafty Passion?

Good Morning and welcome to the first Sunday in the month, in other words, time for another Stampalot Challenge. For July we are asking 'What's your Crafty Passion?' Well, where do I start?!

Distress inks, tree stamps, Hero Arts leaf swirl and old French writing to name but a few. Here is a close up of that old French writing that I stamped in versamark and brushed with mica powders...

The tree(Indigo Blu) was stamped with flitterglu and then covered with gilding flakes.

Another crafty passion I have is floral stamps, so I made a second card featuring a Penny Black floral stamp called Dreamy, Hero Arts friend definition, and the gorgeous new summer set of distress inks. I used my ink dusters over the embossed image to blend the three inks together before stamping the friend definition with shaded lilac DI from the spring set. The prize this month is this rather lovely set of goodies.

 Pop over to the Challenge blog and take a look at the fabulous creations of our lovely Design team, and then create something to show us your crafty passion.

Thanks for looking!