Another new Inkylicious stamp

I needed a birthday card for a very dear friend, so I decided to ink up a new Inkylicious stamp. This one is called Jasmin Garden. I ink dusted the background with Adirondack Peach Bellini, mountain rose, Memento lilac posies and grape Jelly. I then decoupaged the butterflies/ moths and coloured those with gelly roll sparkle pens. This panel was layered on a dark purple panel. The base card was dusted with the same inks and stamped with some similar flower silhouettes from the Summer Morn stamp set. I had intended mounting the panel in the centre, but it didn't look right, so I moved it until the horizons met and decided to stick it there! Off centre, but better than in the middle! What do you think? I went round the jasmin garden stamp frame with a lilac promarker and added faux stitching to the dark purple layer with the gelly roll pen.
Thanks for looking and don't forget to sign up for my follower candy here.

New stamps!

When I was at Doncaster I was handed a voucher for 10% discount from Inky Doodles. I ordered from them and received my stamps very quickly. Excellent service, thank you! Two lots have gone away for Christmas, but I couldn't resist breaking out 'Backgrounds two' and having a play! After randomly filling 3 sheets of scrap paper with a multitude of different patterns I decided I'd better get on with the card I needed to make!

That patterned panel was easy to stamp and although it isn't perfect, I don't think I will ever need to buy papers again! The owl stamp is from Chocolate Baroque. I used a mixture of adirondack (pool, peri) and memento inks(teal zeal, grape jelly). The border and nestie (timeless rectangles) are both from Spellbinders.
Please forgive me if I don't visit and comment very much for a couple of weeks. I am busy at work and bringing lots home too. A few makes here and there plus DT comments are all I am managing at the moment. Don't forget to pop your name on my blog candy above if you are a follower. I am only counting followers on Google friends connect (the default one on my blogger dashboard) as that has been around since I first came to blogland five years ago, and so have some of my followers on here! If you join now, I might even break the 250 mark, and if you leave a comment you will be eligible for the draw, however long you have been following. 
Thanks for looking and for all your lovely comments

And the Winner is...plus new candy

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In celebration of five years in blog land the winner of my first lot of candy is............

Tracy Harris

Congratulations! Hope you haven't made all your Christmas cards already! Please email me Tracy, with your snail mail address so I can post your goodies off to you. Thanks for all your fab comments. I wish I could send all of you something. Still there are more chances to come!
 Now on to the second lot of candy. Again this is follower candy for you lovely people who leave a comment on this post and are followers of my blog. If you want to be in with a chance make sure you leave a comment and follow this blog via google friends connect on the right there.

Onto the next card and candy then.

 A simple card using three stamps, two of which are up for grabs, the script  and the trees. I dusted and stamped with Kaleidacolor Cappuccino Delight. The two die cut panels are matte card and the base panel is silk art card. One of those 'any occasion' cards I think. Hope you like it.

Here are the stamps on offer this week.

I will draw the winner next Saturday, and with any luck there will be another lot of candy too! I am back at work on Monday though, so the card may be a bit later than today. Thanks for looking!

November Challenge for Stamping Sensations

Well, it is time for our November Challenge at Stamping Sensations and this month our theme is Christmas. We are being sponsored this month by Stamp Addicts and I have used one of their fabulous scenic stamps in my landscape.

I stamped in Chipped Sapphire distress ink onto watercolour paper and then dragged a little colour out using a water brush. I also dusted the sky and some snow drifts using my ink dusters. The trees in the foreground and the sentiment are both Inkylicious stamps. This is a 7 x 7 card using some lovely navy blue cards I picked up from Doncaster at a bargain price.

For my second card I used one of Nicecrane Designs winter scenes and used a combination of inkylicious, Waltzing Mouse and Woodware stamps, trying to pick out the colours in the picture with memento and distress inks.
As I said before, we are sponsored this month by Stamp Addicts and they are offering the lucky winner a fabulous £35 voucher. Think of all the great stash you could buy with that!
Do pop over to the Challenge blog to look at the fabulous creations by my talented teamies. They are such a talented bunch.
Oh yes, before you do here is a quick reminder that I have follower candy here, if you haven't popped a comment on already, and this is new - not the same as last week!
Thanks for looking!

5 years in blog land! who'd have thought it!

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Would you believe it?! I have just realised it is my fifth anniversary of being a blogger! 745 posts and 245 followers later, I don't regret a second of it. First I think I need to say a huge thank you to all my followers and especially to those of you who comment and give me encouragement. Without you I would have given up long ago! Second I need to say thank you to Guzzie Sue and Lynne, without whom I wouldn't have dipped my toes in the water in the first place! Sue explained the process of setting up and Lynne and I took the plunge together, bouncing ideas off each other all the way.
To mark this occasion I decided to have some blog candy for my lovely followers. I am going to give away some stamps along with a card featuring said stamps, and there will be more than one lot. So, here is the first:

And here is the card:

For anyone who is stuck for ideas for Christmas cards, this could be right up your street. The possibilities for this set are endless! There are more cards made with the winter spruce set on this post. The only stamp I haven't included is the sentiment, and hopefully you will have some of those of your own.
I will draw a winner next Saturday 2nd November, by which time I should have sorted a new lot of candy. Just leave a comment below if you are interested and a follower. 
Thanks for looking!

More trees!

I have been using my new trees and one or two other stamps to make more Christmas cards and gifts. This first card features the black forest stamp and also Musical Melody. I used Adirondack inks in Pool and Cool Peri - I love this colour combination. The central panel is on silk art card using my mountain and valley stencil. All of the pieces of card on this one are snippets, so I am rushing off to the snippet playground with it. Miss Di says they will let me play on whatever I like now I am a brown belt, lol!

I've also made another easel calendar using the timeless rectangle spellbinders. 

I made the scene using memento inks and ink dusters in much the same way as the tree scene on my second video tutorial. I used the inkylicious twiggy trees, birds from the windswept set and a quote from a set of hobby art landscape quotes.

I picked out a bit of detail on the tree and reflection with a white gel pen.
If  you are going to the NEC then look out for all these stamps on the Inkylicious stall. Thanks so much for your lovely comments. There is just one day left on the follower candy which I will draw on Saturday. Thanks for looking!

Nicecrane Christmas Birds and a Baby

With so many bird lovers amongst friends and family, I saw these Christmas bird images at Nicecrane designs and had to have them! The Bullfinches are some of my favourites, and it is especially nice to have birds other than robins on there too! I've printed the images onto matte photo paper, then mounted on scraps of card. The base card has been dusted and stamped with Distress inks in Festive berries, Chipped sapphire and tumbled glass, using Inkylicious background stamps (worn paint and Damask).

This second card is much the same, but this time I used the Inkylicious holly panel, and Memento inks in Cottage ivy and Ladybug. I dusted the background with Shabby shutters Distress ink and used distress markers to colour the Holly. I am entering these into Sarn's Rudolf  Day challenge, which I am going to try and follow more religiously next year so I am not behind on my Christmas cards! I am also entering them into the anything goes challenge at Penny Black and More
After the success with the Easel calendar I made yesterday, I thought I would try it with Spellbinders and another of Ignacio's gorgeous images, this time from the colourful nature sheet. 

I love the colours on this one, and the bluebells and daisies are so pretty. Weasels always remind me of some of the fabulous descriptions of the 'wild wood' from 'Wind in the willows'.
I am also going to show you the baby card I have made for my new Great Nephew (crikey that makes me feel old!) Elliot was 8lb 14oz and arrived a little later than expected!

I love the vintage feel of Ignacio's gorgeous images by Bessie Gutmann, and used antique linen and tea dye distress inks to age my papers to match the image.
I hope you are all okay out there. Did you have a dreadful stormy night? If we did, I am afraid I slept through it, and there is not a lot of evidence to say we did either! It was fairly wet and windy yesterday afternoon, but nothing noteworthy. Hope you are keeping warm and dry. Thanks for looking!
P.S. If you haven't done it yet, I have blog candy for followers here

Tree-mendous!

Is it my lucky week or what?! Tree challenges galore! There is Tree-mendous at Allsorts and Wood, trees or Leaves at Sweet Stampin'. These come straight after a trip to Doncaster where I bought a whole load of new tree stamps! I know, I am a bit of a tree stamp addict. Won't be giving up anytime soon though!

 First up is a Christmas card made with an Inkylicious new stamp called black forest. I stamped it in Stormy sky Distress ink and ink dusted the background in the same colours using one of their reusable mountain/valley stencils, a quickie glue pen and some glitter.
Next I made an easel calendar using some more new Inkylicious trees, this time called twiggy trees. Look out for these beauties at the NEC, along with the sentiment too.

I saw this idea on Pinterest and thought it would be a great gift. I used impress inks in lemon yellow and cherry pink for the sky, along with Adirondack slate grey for the hills. Here is a close up of the scene. I am also entering this into the challenge at the male room where the theme is Nature

Finally, I spotted there is a one layer challenge at Addicted to CAS, and I have been making a few more Christmas cards this week that fit the bill perfectly, and guess what? They have trees, lol!

 These were made using memento teal zeal and grape jelly. All stamps are by Inkylicious.

 I hope you like them! Well, thanks for popping by and don't forget to leave a comment for my follower blog candy here. Thanks for looking!

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!