Halloween at Crafts and Me

Hello!!!  I'm back again with a new creation for Crafts & Me Halloween Challenge.  For this I went with monochrome and chose Elainia by Hannah Lynn who is a cute little Vampire.  I thought I had some black flowers but a rummage through my stash and I have everything but black!  I did find these Cala Lilies though which I thought went well with the theme (I think it could also be used as a gothy birthday card)
I've coloured with promarkers in cool greys.  For the hair which you might find a bit scary from the stamp I just flicked lines ending in black (use a fine nib or a tria marker for the extra fine lines)
The face and skin I used the blender, cool grey 1, 2 and 3.

The background papers are Crafts and Me Floral Fantasy Monotone.  I mounted on a shimmer white card and some black/violet core'denations card which is a black card stock you scratch the top layer off to reveal the colour "core" in this case a violet.  I've added some white pearls and mirror squares.

I'd like to enter into...

Creatalicious - Halloween
Crafts Galore Encore - Halloween
Noor! Designs UK - Halloween
Crafting with dragonflies - Anything goes
Hiding in my craft room - Monochromatic
Crafty Calender - Halloween
CraftyCatz - Fantasy/Fairy
Really Reasonable Ribbon - Halloween
Simply Papercraft - Anything goes
Stempelsonne Challenge - Anything goes
Clear it out - Anything goes (cala lilies must be 10 years old!)

Pink & Sparkly at Crafts and Me

Well we're over to Karen to host her first challenge at Crafts and Me this week and she has chosen the favourite theme of lots of us - Pink & Sparkly :D :D :D

For this I used the digi stamp by Hannah Lynn called Moonglow which I think will become a firm favourite with me as she has lovely lines to colour.  I went for just a few strands of a darker pink using mulberry and lighter pinks using baby pink and the pink lavender flexmarker on her hair.  Her skin is coloured with ivory, blush, coral, cinnamon, soft peach and cocoa and I think I used some rose pink on her cheeks!
All the white bits (on her top, flower and spine of wings) are glittered with glamour dust and the flowers are all glittered with stickles crystal.  The boingy things in the flowers already came glittered :)
Thats not green card on there BTW its holographic silver.  Isnt it funy how your tastes change, 3 years ago I used to despise holographic card now I love it!

Flowers are from wild orchid, the cute butterfly is by papermania and I've used a butterfly embossing folder which brand escapes me!

Hope you can come and join in Karens first pink and sparkly challenge over at Crafts & Me this week :)

I'd like to also enter my card into...

Deep Ocean Challenge - Sparkling

Flutterby Wednesday - Embossing

Birthday Sundaes - Birthday sentiment on front

2 sisters - embossing

Hotshot crafts - flowers

Midway reminder Crafts & Me anything goes

Evening all! Bet you thought I'd forgot my resolution hehe!  Fear not I'm here lol!  Not here for much longer mind as I've had some Ovaltine so I'll be hitting the sack soon enough.

Kids went back to school today, they were NOT impressed being woken up at 7.30 am after all the long lie ins we've had over christmas break.  Ethan was particularly miffed saying But its still dark!!
After school I took them to the local dog shelter as we're considering getting a puppy but I wanted to see how they reacted around dogs first.  Ethan took it in his stride, Mols was a tad scared particularly of a huge rottie, so was I lol!  It just didnt seem to like people in general :/
No rush yet and we're still considering breeds, having some good suggestions on facebook, border terrier is my fav but I think Mols would love a spaniel with floppy ears.

Right-O onto my creation today and its a mid-way reminder for Crafts & Me Challenge which is running for 4 weeks and is an ANYTHING GOES.  For this I wanted to make a "Sound & Light Thingy" :D

Its a windchime but also has hanging stars with AB coating that really sparkle in the light.  I used the Crafts & Me digi MAY and coloured with promarkers and added versacolor ink in pale purple and a darker purple around the edge.  I did play around with some flowers and whatnot but decided to leave it as is.  The wires are secured on a strip of mounting board in the middle so its very secure although they do get tangled up and took me about 15 minutes to untangle them and hang it up lol!  The hanger is made of AB coated crystals too.

I'd like to enter this into...

Anything goes challenge - blue+1 other
Partytime Tuesday - Anything goes
Top Tip Tuesday - Anything goes
Magical Mondays - Anything goes
Ooh la la - Anything but a card
Truly Madly Crafty - Anything goes
Flutterby Wednesday - Open

Swirls at Crafts & Me

Its all swirlys over at Crafts & Me Challenge this week hosted by Karina and for this I used Jasmine Becket-Griffiths' Pearl Swirl Mermaid - seemed apt!  Papers are a swirly one from Bearly Mine which I think the blue one is a freebie one and the white is cuttlebug embossed with divine swirls so lots of swirly whirleys!  Flowers all wild orchid with added stickles glitter except the bunchy ones at the bottom which are from the works and theres tons of pearls and diamonds.  The ribbon I coloured with promarker duck egg blue to match in with everything (Tip: Buy white satin in bulk and colour!)

Mermaid is coloured with promarkers and I used quite a lot of pencil on this one.  Hope you can come and join in our swirly whirly challenge!  Thanks for stopping by :)

Would also like to enter into...

Sketch n Stash - Used sketch 10
Corrosive - Turquoise & Pink
By the cute & girly - Anything goes
Dream Valley Challenges - Flowers
Wags n Whiskers - Punches
Papertake - Anything goes
Top Tip Tuesday - Anything goes
Paper Shelter - Bling

Pink & Sweet at Crafts and Me

Its Mona's turn to host our challenge this week over at Crafts and Me challenges and also the turn of the dynamite digi team to host.  Mona has chosen a fabulous theme which is a favourite of many (except Judie who I can see cringing from here ha!)  Letraset are sponsoring the challenge with a pack of 5 promarkers.

I'm having such a busy time lately.  We're having an extreme spring clean and so much stuff has been recycled, binned, freegled, cleaned.  We've gone through so many cleaning products and polishes and now I ache badlyyyyyy!  Having fibro when you're on a good day you tend to push yourself too much because youre on a good day but then pay for it the next with some lovely flares, the point at the back of my neck has been really bothersome so I'm hoping to just take some time out over easter to recover lol!

Onto my card and I've used a digi image by Sara Burrier called Poppy coloured with promarkers and glittered with glamour dust.  I added loads of layers for Cupcake challenge using the sketch from The Sweet Stop.  I even got my sewng machine back out and sewed all the layers too, wasn't too brave but I'm getting a bit more confident, only gnarled the needle once!  I added some buttons on but played safe with a glue dot!

I'd like to enter into...

Cupcake - Lots of layers
The sweet stop - Sketch & wings
Flutterby wednesday - open week
Paper Cutz - Buttons n Bows
Scrapbook sisters - Buttons
I love promarkers - anything goes
Freshly brewed - sparkle and shine
Ambers crafts - ribbons
Cooking it up with Katie - Flowers, pink, for a lady
Sew many cards - at least 1 flower, 1 button, 2dp
Papertake - spots and stripes
House of gilli - stripes and bling

Wings coloured with glue and glamour dust.

 Here's the promarkers I've used - Ivory, blush, vanlla, soft peach, sandstone, burnt sienna, umber, cocktail pink, salmon pink, cool grey 2 & 3, blender

BTW have you seen my promarker storage?  I got told about this storage solution which are these cd cases in tesco (£14.97) with slings and they fit an entire set!  Had to go out and buy one, isnt it a fab idea!  It also has a handle and locks!

 Before I say night night just wanted to show you these.  These are my 2 monkeys Ethan & Molly.  Mols has got her 1st black eye!  She dives off things and is always jumping and bouncing, a real live wire but other day she was in my room and was pretending to be a bunny saying hop hop hop and tripped and hit right between her eyes on my sideboard - ouchhhhhh!  It didnt half swell up quick and fortunately I keep cool gel packs in the fridge so managed to get the swelling down.  She's been let with a black eye off it - ahhhhh!

In this pic they're fighting over who's turn it is to say Cheese!  She was shouting MY CHEESE at Eefie here lol!

 And here's our blackbirds nest with 3 diddy chicks taken on Sunday whilst mum and dad were out.  Will post update pics as and when its appropriate without disturbing them, arent they adorable!

And finally our resident hedgehog is back!  Heard him snuffling about last night and left some cat food out for him and waited.  He didnt come but the cat food had gone in the morning.  We've just been put again and caught a glimpse so left him a little more and he came over within 5 mins and filled his face!  No pics yet as he's still a bit timid.

So I'm off to bed in a clean house and a happy smile! x

Anything Goes at Crafts & Me

Over at Crafts and Me Challenges we have a big change!  We are now going to run the challenges weekly and we also have a brand new digital team too!  My team; the Dynamite Digis have 5 new teamies so please pop over and welcome the awesome talent!  We are hosting this week and the Rockin Rubbah team will be hosting next week. 
We are running an Anything Goes just so you know we're now weekly and remember to come visit us!

For this challenge I tore my hair out, seriously ha!  I started my design as pink and yellow as there are a few spring colour themes around this week and made a lovely base then coloured in my image which is Forever Rose digital by Hannah Lynn and you know what I'm like for my dark bolds, she kinda changed from a pale pink and yellow to violet and gold lol!  So time ticking on and I am so busy this week I had no time to recolour and stick to the pink and yellow so I decided it would be easier making another base for her so I pulled some papers together and then decided to make a twisted easel which I haven't made before!  Why do I do it to myself!!  I can make easels no problem but the twisted ones the flowers sit a different way etc and it takes a little adjustment to get used to them.  The clock was screaming at me by now and I know I'd said I'd do Lexi's Challenge which is ribbon with no bows or knots.  Sounded interesting but its a thinking challenge and prob not one when I've spent 3 hours making a card and I'm short of time but hey I'm ME so I met that challenge lol!  I secured a length of gold sparkly ribbon, you know the type that doesn't stick, under neath the flowers only it wouldnt stick so I then had to hunt my silicone glue out **again** 
I seem to be on a perpetual hunt for my silicone glue.  I ALWAYS find it in the back of my box of glue dots as thats a logical place to keep it yes?  Only my memory is that chronic I forget I've put it in this logical place! DOH!

Now because I have some pretty chunky flowers there I decided I didn't want more flowers on
the top of the card so opted for some die cut lettering.  So I used one of the Tim Holtz alterations alphabets, you know the ones that the cutting boards turn into bananas - actually I saw that happen on C&C and had a good chuckle as they tried to hide it lol!  I secured the lettering which is a mother of pearl colour with my now found silicone glue and added a 6m iridescent gem to dot the i!

So here's my humble offering for Crafts and Me anything goes challenge!  Please do come and play and make me feel better haha!

BTW The text around the image I did myself in PSP x

Would also like to enter into the following!

Lexi's - Ribbon with no bows or knots (gosh that was hard!)

Creative Inspirations - Easel Cards

Gingerloft - Die Cuts (Alphabet)

Fab N Funky - More than one fold

Papertake - Girly

Crafts & Me challenge #8 - Pink, black & white

Wow an exciting day over at Crafts & Me! Teresa has launched her own range of stamps today with the release of two artists work in rubba! They are Molly Harrison and Hannah Lynn. There are four from each artist currently available and more will be comng at a later date so in the meantime pop over to Crafts & Me to see these exclusive designs HERE!

The DT have had some of these stamps for a week now and boy have we been itching to let them loose lol!! So here's my first which is Hiding by Molly Harrison.


The challenge at Crafts and Me this fortnight is Pink, Black and White. The DT girls have all used their new stamps so hope you can join us on the challenge blog and have a peek too!

I coloured the image with promarkers, the background was made with graduating pale blue out to black with a blender pen then I've painted over with stickles to make it starry. The moon I coloured over the wings (as they're transparent!) then blended the yellow out before adding glamour dust with a glue pen.

Papers are papermania (I think!) and flowers are wild orchid, the lttle rosebuds I coloured black with a promarker and gave the whole card a blast or several of pearl glimmer mist.

I'd like to enter this into...

Pile it On - Favourite things (Fairies & sparkly fings, need I say more!)

Flutterby Wednesday - Open week

Pocket Full of posies - One for the girls

One stitch at a time - Lace, ribbons & bows (black bow on top right flowers)

Totally Papercrafts - One for the girlies

Magical Crafts - Flower Power

If the shoe fits - Wings

Thought I'd also give you a peek of the fab new stamp by Hannah Lynn called Krista. I'm sooo lookng forward to working with these images, dont they just say "COLOUR ME!!" Have a peek at Hannahs awesome artwork site too and see how beautiful her colours are :D

Crafts & Me Challenge #6 - For friends or family

Challenge time again over at Crafts & Me and this time Amy has set the challenge "For friends or family" which should drop in nicely for fathers day cards too!
We're sponsored by Digistamp Boutique and I chose "Single Flower" image - honest it is lol!

For the background I used the flowerhead and enlarged, overlapped and greyed out then I've used larger and smaller versions of the flower to make a posy overlapping them and erasing the lines, I also erased the leaves as it was easier to see what I was doing then added them in at the end.

Its coloured with promarkers in purples and pinks although it doesnt look it, its all then coloured with sakura stardust pen in clear so its very sparkly. Ive stamped a sentiment stamp which I won on stampin for the weekend blog ages ago and I've added white ribbon, distressed the edges with worn lipstick and victorian velvet distress inks and added some flowers to the centres for more dimension and the edges to frame which I coloured with alcohol inks and iridescent gold glimmer mist.

Entering into...

Tuesday Taggers - All that blooms
A spoonful of sugar - Floral Delights
Charisma Cardz - Flowers (entry 2)
Paperplay - Flowers & Sparkle
Stamp Something - Digi day
Crazy challenge - Distress it


Hope you can come join us at Crafts & Me challenge! Thanks for looking :)

BTW there is a tutorial HERE that I wrote on merging digital images if you want to have a play. Works in PSP and other programs :)

Crafts and Me challenge #5 - Distressing

Its challenge time again at Crafts and Me blog and we're looking for distressing on your projects. There is a fab prize up for grabs from Clevercut too!

For this challenge I chose Black Rose Fairy which you will find at Crafts and Me here. She's coloured with promarkers with highlights using sakura stardust pens on the wings and roses. The background is, well its either moonshadow burnished brass or starburst stains cocoa bean coffee lol! I make batches and store them and forget what I've used so I suspect its the starburst stains which you can find here. I glued a sheet to a piece of card and distressed the edges with scissors. The pinky paper is core-dinations which I've cuttlebugged with the jules jewells folder and distressed with sandpaper. The centre panel is labels 4 and I've used gold mirri card and core-dinations which I've inked with vintage photo and scratched bits off.
The cute little tag stamp is from here
I've also added lots of iridescent sticky gems and on the belt I've used gold leafing foil - well even with vintage I've gotta have a bit of bling bling!

I hope you can come and join us at Crafts and Me for our distressed challenge which runs for two weeks.

Entering this into...

Passion for Promarkers - Anything goes
Totally Gorjuss - Bling it on
C.R.A.F.T - Birthdays
Stamp Something - 2 of something (Images, nesties, its an easel so 2 faces etc)

Crafts and Me challenge #3 - Sparkle

Crafts and Me challenges want to see SPARKLE for this challenge oooh I can hear you shouting YAY from here!

For this challenge I have used a sweet pea stamp - Rising Flame which you can find at Crafts and Me here. I have coloured her in promarkers using yellows, oranges and reds and blending together and added lots of shimmer with orange, red and yellow sakura stardust pens then finally the clear sakura stardust which I rubbed in with my finger to blend any obvious lines. The beads on her are fired brick distress stickles and the added sparkle to the paper roses are stardust stickles. The sky background is distress inks in spun sugar, mustard seed and spiced marmalade.

For the background I have used starburst stains in autumn maple leaf and california poppy gold and the leaves are punched from starburst stains in lucky shamrock green. I also used DCWV pocket full of posies paper and stampin up (one of the pastels) which I cuttlebugged using divine swirls folder to look like waves.

Have to confess to a bit of an accident with this one! Having spent 2 hours colouring her as I wanted a real depth of colour so I do a bit, leave it and come back then do a bit more I then put in the distress ink sky and my last bit was to add the spiced marmalade around the edge of the sun - then I dropped the inkpad across the image aaaargh! Very quickly wiped off but I left a line across the left eye. Not to be deterred I thought what I could do to cover it a bit so decided on my new toy I got at the weekend stampman workshop - a bottle of mica magic reinker which I've mixed with water to make a gorgeous spray. I kinda sprayed this into the air and wafted the image through the mist so its got a sparkly gold shimmer over it.

Hope you can join us at Crafts and Me challenge - sparkle!

Also entering into...

Sweet Pea Stampers - Under the Sea

My Time to Craft - Ruby ruby ruby ruby (that was No1 when my son was born lol!)