The clocks have gone back...

and that spells disaster when photographing my cards. It's dark when I leave for work in the morning and it's dark when I get home so I am reduced to taking pictures with a daylight lamp, angle poise lamp and overhead light. Now, most people can make that combination work, me? I am so technically challenged that I just can't get it right. I have updated my blog hop post here with *marginally* better photos than before, however I need to figure out how to improve the quality of my photographs in winter!

Here are a couple of cards that I made recently for a submission call that didn't make the grade!

Lots of gold glitter (which got everywhere!) and my newest favourite sentiment set, Scrolling Script along with the Mat Stack 7 die. I had some left over pleated crepe ribbon from another project which I added for a bit of dimension, I like to think that this might be suitable for an older person's birthday.

I went simple with this card, adding texture with the polka dot embossing folder. I die cut an aperture in the card with Mat Stack 7 dies and mounted the sentiment on acetate to give it a floating look. I like how it looks like a silver ring with a big diamond, if I swap out the sentiment it might be nice for an engagement card.

On a later shift all this week which wreaks havoc with my crafting time, I hope to get started on some more Christmas projects this week.

Ang.

October 2013 Papertrey Blog Hop - Tag It Challenge

Edited 28th October.
I have replaced the old photos with marginally better quality ones, winter time light is my kryptonite!
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I apologise for the truly horrendous quality photo's, it's 1am and I have only just finished my tags for the Papertrey Ink October Blog Hop. I will take better quality pictures in the morning. In the meantime, here is what I came up with.

This one is my favourite, I just love candy canes, I would love to buy more stamps sets of that theme as I really don't own that many Christmas stamp sets.

I liked how the holiday words look when stamped in this way, I am going to try this in a traditional colour scheme and then make another in pink, aqua and purple. Who doesn't love jingle bells?

I punched these leaves with my Martha Stewart punch ages ago from all my scraps and have been waiting for just the right project. I need to use seed beads on projects more often as I have thousands of them.

I really like the Snowflake Flurries stamp set and dies, they aren't too 'christmassy' and can even be used on birthday cards.

Mr Snowman didn't quite come out how I wanted, there is too much white space for my liking.

At least it means I have 5 pretty tags to use when wrapping gifts and they will add that extra special touch.

Thanks for looking,
Ang.

The First of the Year

I have been putting off the dreaded 'c' word for some time, but I have finally decided to take the plunge and make my first Christmas card of 2013. I have been admiring the new Wplus9 Merry and Bright stamp set, a Christmas companion to Fresh Cut Florals, and decided that I would try and recreate my own festive card using Fresh Cut Florals and here is the result.

The card base is Papertrey Ink ripe avocado, I die cut and embossed a panel of white card and sewed it to the base, stamped some die cut berries and leaves using pure poppy, ripe avocado and simply chartreuse and adhered them in a circle using foam pads. The small doily is by My Favourite Things and the sentiment is from PTI Tag It's #8. I had fun making the wreath hanger and bow from washi tape. I was slow to pick up on the washi tape craze but find myself using it more and more, I'm worried that I will amass a large collection as I have almost 20 rolls already (That's nothing, have you seen this?)

Well, I'm going back to making some holiday tags for the PTI blog hop :)
Ang x

A Note of Thanks

I really do love Fresh Cut Florals stamps and dies from Wplus9, I think it may even be in my top 3 of all time. Unfortunately for you, it means you'll be seeing it more than a few times here over the next few months and for that I am sorry*

I love the starkness of black and grey paired with bright florals, and I already had the background strips cut so it was pretty easy to pull together.

I had enough stamped flowers and strips left over to make a coordinating tag too. I am currently trying to make a dent in my pile of 'scraps' so every time I make a card I have to use up all the remaining leftovers on another card or tag before I allow myself to move on. I think I made 6 in this manner over the weekend but I'll share them in another post.

Anywho, Toodle-oo
Ang x

*I'm sorry i'm not sorry.

A Tale Of Two Mum's

I know, silly title, but it's the best I can come up with this Sunday afternoon! September was a busy month for birthdays, my sweet nephew, my mother-in-law and my lovely, wonderful Mum.

This was a card that I just kept adding to, sometimes I need to learn when to say stop! I had a play with my new fresh cut florals stamp set and dies from Wplus9, they are so beautiful and so much fun to play with.

This is the card that I made for my mother-in-law

Florals again, quite predictable from me, this time I used Cutting Garden stamps and lots of patience cutting them all out :)

Thanks for looking,
Ang x