52 Cards Challenge Week 15

Hello! I hope you are all continuing to enjoy the challenges. Remember, this is to help you create more, don't worry if you 'fall behind' you don't need to catch up, pick and choose the challenges as they suit you and your busy schedule. I must admit I have so many projects on at the moment, I have missed a couple of birthday's/anniversaries and I need to make some belated cards to apologise, I have my DT cards to finish and I have a few other projects on the go so I really had to use the prompts for this week to get it done!

The prompts this week are

Brights/Bling/Ribbon

Here is mine

I added some gems and sequins to the paper and a little bit of ribbon and it was finished, a nice quick easy card that looks nice qand sparkly in real life :)

Have a great week!

Supplies used: Cosmo Cricket Delovely Paper and Sentiment and Doodlebug Ribbon

Craft Stash Shopping in New York

I have been lucky enough to visit New York on a number of occasions and always find myself looking for good crafty places to visit before I go and I thought I would share some tips here.

Michaels
The good news is that you no longer have to travel to Staten Island to visit Michaels as there is now a location in the city which opened in 2009. Located at 808 Columbus Avenue, take the 1 subway to 103rd street, walk 2 blocks towards downtown and 2 blocks left and you will find yourself on Columbus. Alternatively you can take the 11 or 7 uptown bus. It looks small from the outside but the actual store is located in the basement and carries a good range of crafting materials. Don't forget to sign up and print the discount coupons before you go!

The Ink Pad
37 Seventh Avenue on the corner of 13th street. Take the 1, 2 or 3 Subway exiting at 14th street. The Ink Pad is one block south. What the store lacks in size more than makes up for in the number of stamps that they carry. Lots of wood mounted and acrylic stamps from over 100 different companies including Hero Arts, Unity and Ranger Industries. They also have a great range of ink pads (obviously!) crafting tools and magazines. The staff are very friendly and helpful and I would definitely recommend a visit.

Kate's Paperie
The website has excellent instructions on how to get to their 2 locations. It has the feel of an upmarket stationers but it does carry some cratfing materials such as stamps, embossing powders and ink pads.

The Garment District
You can take up many hours wandering around the garment district located roughly (to me) around 36th and 40th streets between 5th and 7th Avenue. There are so many bargains to be had but be careful to shop around, there are some stores that are priced much higher than others and the difference in price between 2 stores that are ocated next to each other can be surprising. Here are some of the places that I have been to:

M&J Trimmings
1008 6th Avenue West 38th Street. The store has a stunning array of ribbons and findings, however this was the priciest store I visited, I really wanted seam binding ribbon but decided to leave it at $1.98 a yard (I found it at $0.50 a yard a couple of streets over) Also be wary when buying white or cream ribbons as all of the ribbons I purchased had dirty marks and smudges on the outside, however I did pick up some beautiful teal velvet ribbon.

Joyce Trimmings
109 West 38th Street. Located just across the road from M&J Trimmings this happened to be my favourite trimmings store in the area. Beautiful ribbons, trims, cameos, flowers and cabochons all at great pocket friendly prices. I also loved the $3.95 mixed button bags containing approximately 300 buttons, whilst not all are suitable for crafting the ones that are were well worth the cost of the entire bag. They also have mixed packs with various off-cuts for bargain prices. I strongly recommend a visit.

Tinsel Trading
1 West 37th Street. A gorgeous looking store inside with a vast array of vintage ribbons, trims, flowers and home decor items. Expect to pay higher prices in here as a lot of items are stated as being vintage, an inspiring shop to visit, however I saved my pennies and looked at other stores for cheaper alternatives.

There are also lots and lots of bead shops in Garment District and it is hard to choose one specific store. They all seem to carry pretty much the same base selection of stock and as before the prices of particular items can vary from store to store. I went specifically looking for flower cabochons, and most of the bead stores sold them but they were $1.00 a piece, whereas you can buy a whole pack of prima brand ones for £2.99. I like to buy mine from eBay where there is a great selection for really good prices.

If you have any questions or any shops to add please do let me know! Happy shopping :)

100th Post Prize Giveaway and 52 Cards Challenge Week 14

Hello! When I started this blog I did wonder if it would be a passing fad and I would lose interest but I love sharing what I make with family, friends and visitors and it has really helped me boost my creativity!

I am happy to celebrate my 100th post! and to celebrate I am pleased to have a blog candy giveaway filled with some of my favourite things and there are 3 prizes :)

Prize number one

Fiskars Threading Water Punch
Hero Arts Clear Design Everyday Sayings CL342
Hero Arts Clings Hearts Trio CG160
5 packs of Studio G clear stamps and stamping block
1 Studio G wooden stamp
6 bottles of Tim Holtz Distress Stickles
2 packs of American Crafts Gem set brads
4 Promarkers
1 Sizzix Sizzlet Flourish Die
1 pack of flat back multicoloured pearls
1 bottle of turquoise glitter glue
1 set of flower earrings (just remove the backs!)
1 peach cabochon bracelet (easily separated)

Prize number two

Martha Stewart Classic Butterfly trio punch

Prize number three

Inkadinkado Paperwork Greetings Clear Stamps 97614

All you need to do to enter is:

1 - Be signed up to follow my blog if you aren't already;
2 - Leave a comment on this post :)

Entries are open until 23:59pm GMT on Monday 25th April and I will draw the winner using a random number generator on my birthday Tuesday 26th of April.
Now, on to this week's card challenge. This week's prompts are:

Blue, Stamping, Circles

I needed to make my Mother's Day card and decided to use the prompts for this week. I wouldn't normally have gone with a blue colourway but I was really happy with how it turned out. I decided to use 2 out of the 3 prompts.

On a recent trip to the US I bought some Faber Castell Gelatos and they are just fab to work with. Solid sticks of colour in a lipstick style tube, you just lightly mist your stamp with water and run the gelatos over the stamp and stamp. They give a lovely watercolour look and you can stretch the colour out further using a water pen brush or add more colour by taking a damp brush directly to the gelato and painting on the stamp. I just love them!

I had bought my mum a necklace for Mother's Day but wasn't keen on the box so I made a matching gift box and tag to put it all in and finished off with stamping on the envelope. If you would like to make a gift box take a look at my easy tutorial here.

Supplies used: Hero Arts Botanical Etchings Hydrangea stamp, Papertrey Ink Sentiment, Faber-Castell Gelatos, Bo Bunny Double Dot cardstock, American Crafts Cardstock

Have a happy week and thank you so much for reading :)

PS - All of the challenges so far can now be found under the 52 Cards Challenge page under the header.

52 Cards Challenge Week 13 - Guest Post

Hi everybody - it's Trish from Doodles and Swirls. Ang is living it up in the Big Apple this week and she asked me if I could host the challenge which I was more than happy to do!

The prompts for this week are pink, diecuts and flowers.

Green and pink is one of my favourite colour combos at the moment so I thought I would use it for this card, along with a couple of different Nestabilities for my die cuts (Lacey Circles, Standard Circles and Labels 14). I also used my Craft Robo to cut out the leaves for the flower. The lovely pink flower is from Prima and I added some stickles to the leaves to give it a bit of shine, and finished off with a bit of stripey twine....

Can't wait to see what you all do with this weeks challenge - make sure you leave a link in the comments so I can come and visit you!

Supplies used - Basic Grey Phoebe papers, Nestabilities Lacey Circles, Standard Circles, Labels 14. Waltzingmouse Vintage Labels 14 stamps, Hero Arts sentiment stamps, Prima flower, Bakers Twine.

Crafty Templates - Granny's House

Hello! Just popping in to post a couple of the cards I made with this month's Crafty Templates Granny's House card kit and templates. The templates had a very vintage feel to them this month coupled with the cute doily papers I was in heaven!

I just loved the vintage style sewing machine and I was so pleased with the little details that I added, the 'sewn' love tag and threading a tiny little bobbin, so cute!

I could not decide on the right sentiment for this one, but then Mr Paper suggested 'Just 2 Chair You Up' and I loved it. He is my go-to-guy when I get stuck with sentiments, we sit and throw different ones back and forth until we find one that fits. I should really write them all down in a book so when I get stuck again I can flick through it and find the right one.

I loved the fabric Leo provided this month, so colourful, I had to create a rolled flower with the excess (now I know how to do them!) and the great little sentiment from a Hero Arts mini set.

Hope you are having a good week!

52 Cards Challenge Week 12

Have you ever had one of those days where nothing you make turns out how you envisioned? That's just what happened to me today. After pulling the prompts out of the bag I sat and just stared at my clip it up, filled with visions of this and that and got quite excited, until I started pulling it all together and it just didn't 'fit' right. I was almost at a point earlier where I wasn't going to post what I made, but I think I should share the good with the bad ;)

I also didn't photograph the prompts because I clean forgot! They are:

Brights/Stickers/Unisex

I pulled out a pack of American Crafts stickers and went from there. I was happy that Unisex was featured this week as I have a number of male birthdays coming up and find it hard going to make suitable cards so I hoped this would push me to get some ready.

Here is the first. The circles were going to be polka dots on a white background, but it just looked so plain, I added the lime card and the word 'happy' but it still looked too simple, I popped on the candles and decided to leave it, I have a habit of adding stuff when I should stop and I knew if I kept going I would hate the finished product, so far this is tolerable.

I then decided to use the excess circles, mounting them on foam pads to give them some dimension, and adding the number stickers from the pack as I knew I wouldn't use them on another project. Once I was finished it didn't convey 'birthday' so I added a sentiment on some acetate. Still, pretty blah.

The brown 'best ever' used to have the word birthday in it but I cut it out so I could position it next to the cake. I had initially stamped birthday candles, cakes and hats on a blue card blank but, as my day was going I hated that too. I added some Making Memories paper and highlighted the blue dots with stickles, mounted the stickers on some gingham card and left it at that.

*sigh* I hate days like today and I hope that you have a better one, anyway I am off to the Big Apple this week so that gives me something to smile about :)

Have a great week!

97/100

52 Cards Challenge Week 11

Hello there! I hope you are all enjoying the challenges? It is lovely to see so many beautiful cards being made each week, it really does make me happy that so many of you are taking part. Don't worry if you have only just found the challenges, you can start mid way through or catch up from the very beginning, it's all about helping you create!

Here are the prompts for this week

Red, Folding, Journalling Spot

and here is mine

I scored lines at intervals on a strip of paper and then folded to create a pleated strip, to keep it's shape I then sewed across the middle.
Supplies used: Hero Arts notecard, Cosmo Cricket Early Bird paper, Making Memories Noteworthy paper, Nestabilities dies, Papertrey Ink stamp, ribbon (etsy)

Until next week x

96/100

52 Cards Challenge Week 10

Happy Monday to you! I have recovered after my crafting escapades at the weekend. See here for a refresher! I am so excited, I am off to New York in a couple of weeks and I am looking forward to picking up some crafty items, some of which will go towards my giveaway on my 100th post which should be on Monday the 4th of April, and I am excited about that too!

Sorry, I digress. Here is the challenge for this week!

Vintage, Layers and Decorative Pins.

I would have normally gone at this in my usual way, using pastel colours and lots of flowers and lace etc, but this time I decided to attempt a more grungy vintage style which is not really in my comfort zone, but I really like how it turned out!

I went with the vintage style, used lots of layers and a decorative pin.
Supplies used: Crate Paper Restoration papers, K&Co Die Cuts, TH Ticket, Brushed Corduroy Distress Ink, Prima Flowers, Vintage Looking Lace, Crystal Topped Pin, Vintage Button, MS and Fiskars punches, Vintage book page.

Looking forward to seeing your creations. Have a great week!

95/100

A productive but painful friday night!

I have been on a handmade embellishment kick of late and last night I decided to make a batch of rolled flowers and 'singed edge' flowers. Having never made them before it took me a couple of tries to perfect the process and in doing so I had a number of little accidents, I will share them with you so you don't make the same mistakes!

1. Never hold a cable with your teeth to get 'better precision', it may end in a blob of very hot glue getting stuck to the end of your nose.
2. Ensure that you don't get glue on your scissors and rest them on your leg, you may find that you have a new 'embellishment' on your brand new pair of trousers.
3. Always wear a good bra. Bosoms that roam free on the desk top may find they are adorned with rolled flowers, on the other hand, if you are a burlesque dancer by night you'll have some pretty cute pasties.
4. Whilst fingers are essential for crafting, be aware of the effect of hot glue when holding something down to get 'good adhesion'. Surgically removing a layer of skin to remove an errant piece of fabric can be painful.
5. TIE YOUR HAIR BACK, I cannot stress this enough. I do however have a lovely new asymetric hairstyle that wouldn't look out of place in the 80's.
6. Pearls covered in hot glue stick really, really well to the skin. Unless you are channelling Lady Gaga, be careful where you put them.
7. Waft the fabric above the flame, don't get too close and make sure you have a cup of water nearby. A damp baby wipe is not the same as a fire retardent blanket.
8. Move the candle if you need to reach for something, don't reach over the candle, burnt arm hair is not a nice smell.

After all that, and if you persevere, you may end up with a batch of pretty little flowers like these

Only 1 human was harmed during the making of these flowers ;p

94/100

52 Cards Challenge Week 9

Hello, I hope you had a great weekend and are ready for this week's challenge!

Here are the prompts

Grey, Lime and Handmade Embellishment.

Here is mine

I love bright green so I was happy to be able to work with it this week. I created the embellishment from small circles of felt which I pinched and stitched onto a small strip of felt, I sewed gathering stitches on some ribbon to make the flower and added some buttons. The swirl was cut using my Slice machine and I went around the edge with a sakura stardust pen to make it pop (which it's not doing in the picture!) and finished off with thickers and some gems.

Until next week, have a good one :)

93/100

52 Cards Challenge Week 8

Hola amigos! Hmm, don't know why I came over all spanish then! I know I say this every week but boy does monday come around fast! Ok, so here are the prompts for this week..

Raspberry/Plastic/Just Because



Well, this week I interpreted the prompts on how I saw them (and also what I had in my collection!) I took the Raspberry prompt as an accent colour (although it looks a little more burgandy) I then found an Anna Grfiin transparency (the plastic element) and I recently got a new MME die cut that doesn't really have a clear sentiment so I created this card 'Just Because' i liked all the elements together! That's what is the fun part of these prompts, feel free to interpret them how you want to, it's all about getting you to be more creative!

Here is mine

Looking forward, as usual, to see your creations, post you links in the comments section and I'll pop on over! Have a great week!

92/100

Crafty Templates - Nursery Rhymes

Just popping in quickly to share my cards made with the Crafty Templates Nursery Rhymes card making kit and templates. Based around classic children's nursery thymes like Hickory, Dickory Dock, Polly Put the Kettle On and Hey Diddle Diddle there are plenty of cute templates to choose from and of course the delicious card making kit which is available here.

Hey Diddle Diddle

Polly Put the Kettle On

Hickory Dickory Dock

Why don't you pop over to Kathy's Blog to see her take on this month's kit! Have a great day!

91/100

52 Cards Challenge Week 7

Hello again :) I hope this week finds you well? I find myself looking forward to the weekend when I get to pick the catagories for the challenge, and I enjoy sitting down and creating even more. I didn't think when I started that I would manage to get so many cards made, it just makes me happy!

Here are the prompts for this week:

Purple/Monochromatic/Thanks. As usual you can choose just one of the prompts or use a combination of the three. I managed 2 for this week, only because the original butterfly on the first card was destined for the second card, however the tone just wasn't quite right!

I used a Hero Arts notecard, Inkadinkadoo stamps set for the background, Hero Arts butterfly and sentiment, gemstones and Fiskars punch. I stamped 2 butterflies to give an nice depth to the card, unfortunately you can't see it in this picture but I also detailed the butterly with perfect pearls, it looks so pretty when it catches the light.

Here is the second

I hope you all have a wonderful Valentine's day (and the prompts from last week helped you with a card for that special someone!)

I am also excited as this is my 90th post, 10 more and I am going to have a little giveaway of some of my favourite things so I hope you'll visit again soon :)

Have fun creating!

52 Cards Challenge Week 6

Welcome to another week's challenge!

This week I have forgone the paper bags and little strips of paper and chosen to acknowledge Valentine's Day.

The prompt for this week is Valentines/No use of red or pink/Hearts. You can choose to use all the valentine's prompts or just one, the aim is to have fun creating!

Here is mine.

I stamped the heart doily using my lovely new Hero Arts stamp and used white embossing powder, I then used TH Distress Ink in Tumbled Glass all over and wiped off the excess, mounted and stitched it on some blue gingham paper and added a doily at the bottom (kind of hidden by the sentiment) some ribbon and a sentiment. I really had fun creating this although it turned out far 'girlier' than I planned so I will go back to the drawing board to make a more manly card for Mr Paper!

Have a great week :)

52 Cards Challenge Week 5

Goodness me, how did week 5 get here so fast? It seems like just last week that I started the challenge!

Here are this week's prompts:

and here is my take on it:

I love the combination of orange and aqua together. Looking forward to seeing your take on it!

52 Cards Challenge Week 4

How are you this week? Hope that the prompts have been helping to give you a little creative 'push' I know that it has for me. I have managed to make a record number of cards this week, I decided to pull out a paper pad and all the matching embellishments and stickers and went to it, it was very cathartic and on the plus side using it up means I can buy more stash!

Here are the prompts for this week

Buttons, Pink, Congratulations.

Here is my card

Of course I went with the obvious and made a baby congratulations card, although looking at it now it doesn't have anything that screams baby, it just seems 'babyish' if you know what I mean. I'd love to see what you have come up with, please leave a link to your card in the comments so I can pop on by!

Have a great week :)

Crafty Templates - Retro Honey

It's Crafty Templates time again and this month I have been working with the delicious Retro Honey kit, featuring all kinds of yummy papers and embellishments, couple this with the cute templates and you have a match made in heaven!

First up is my favourite, featuring the retro dress template and some goregous papers

I simply added a little lace, some of the packaging tape the kit came with and some pearls. So sweet!

Love this one, I have always wanted a Kitchen Aid mixer and this was so much fun to make!

How to use a Hoover template?? It had to be for a domestic goddess! featuring one of the yummy rolled flowers.

Love these darling birds...This card will definitely be going to my honey for Valentines day.

Perfect for Valentines Day or Easter, I see this bunny being used as a tag for the kiddies easter bags.

I just loved the paper for this one and could not bring myself to cut it up so I mounted it onto some card, added ribbon and a sentiment and it's finished!

I hope you enjoyed these and if you haven't checked out Crafty Templates, I urge you to do so! Please also pop over to fellow teamie Kathy's blog for her take on this month's templates!

Just as a reminder, the 52 Cards Challenge is up for this week, I hope you will take time to join in :)

52 Cards Challenge Week 3

Hello, thank you for those that entered last week, there were some beautiful cards made!

Here are the prompts for this week: Blue, Flourishes, Hello

I had fun making this card as I got to use some of my lovely Making Memories Noteworthy papers!

Remember you can use just one of the prompts or all three and it's up to you how you interpret them :)

Look forward to seeing you next week and I hope this is helping you create some stunning cards!

52 Cards Challenge Week 2

Wow, I am so pleased that so many people intend to take part in the 52 Card Challenge. If you aren't sure what it is please take a look at the post below for full details, however to recap the challenge is to create a card using the 3 prompts given.

You can choose to use just one of the prompts or all three it's completely up to you! I have developed a very hi-tech and complex system for picking the prompts. I take 3 paper bags, each filled with prompts that cover a colour, a technique and a theme/style and pick one from each bag - tee hee, i told you it was technical!

Without further ado, here are the prompts for week 2

You can choose to create a card that features purple, or one that has die cuts or one with stripes, you can choose to have a combination of two, or, you can be like me and use all 3! Remember, it is completely up to you how you interpret the prompts, they are there to be a little kick start to the whole creative process :)

It was nice to be able to dig into some newish stash of MME Penny Lane, I also used my beloved Nesties and a cute stamp I picked up in the US whilst on holiday last year. For some reason the ribbon looks very dark in the photo, it's much more the colour of the lighter purple in the stripes.

Please feel free to add your link below, or within the comments section or in the challenge thread on UKS

I look forward to seeing all your creations!

Happy New Year and a new 2011 card challenge!

Happy New Year to all my lovely readers I hope 2011 finds you happy and healthy! I have decided to make 2 new years resolutions:

1. Create more.
2. Update my blog more often.

and I have found a way to do both.

Introducing Paper and Ribbons 52 Cards Challenge.
I am in awe of those crafters that can make a card a day, unfortunately I can't keep up and one a month is too few, so every week I will set myself a challenge to create a card a week based on three simple prompts. It could vary from:

Cosmo Cricket/Ribbon/Male Card
Stamping/Die Cuts/Buttons

See? pretty simple! and to upload the picture to my blog. This week's challenge started on Monday uses the following prompt:

Embossing/Lilac/Yellow

I'd love it if any of you wanted to join in and posted links to your cards (tags or other projects using the challenge theme) in the comments, if enough people join I'll add Mr Linky to make it easier.

I am also nearing my 100th post so hope to offer up some blog candy or a prize at random to someone who has entered the challenge!

Here is my card for this week

I hope to see you next week :)