Having a play......

I've just returned from a rainy few days in our caravan in North Devon.  This time I just packed a few crafty things to have a play with - stencils, inks, pens and a few stamps.

For the first card I used a Creative Expressions 'Raindrops' stencil with an Adirondack 'Denim' ink pad.  The stamps are from Inkylicious. 

The next card is one of several I made this week using Lavinia Stamps. I think this one needs a bit of glitter or liquid pearls, so I may add that tomorrow, as I'll have somewhere to leave it to dry overnight.  

Finally, this isn't a card, but my first attempt at Zentangle, using a Dreamweaver stencil.  I'm not sure I'll make it into a card as I was just playing around and I'm not sure about it.  I need to find a good book to teach myself how to do it properly, or see if there are any local Zentangle workshops.  

Well that's it for today.  I've missed having a decent signal for the Internet while we've been away, so I need to catch up on the blogs I'm following.

Sunflower

On a recent day out with my crafty friend, Ruth, I bought this Prima Circle Lattice stencil.  Having discovered that they are not as scary to use as I thought, I used the stencil with an Adirondack 'Meadow' ink pad to make the background.

The sunflower is a Cheery Lynn die.  I made the yellow frame using Nestability dies and attached it with foam pads to make it stand out. As my blog name suggests, Sunflowers are my favourite flowers!

I would like to enter this card for the following challenges:

Lisa B. Designs Monthly Challenge ~ Butterflies and Flowers

Pixie's Snippets Playground - Week 136  ~ Use Your Snippets
Allsorts Challenge Blog ~ Favourite Things

Up, Up and Away!

There seems to be a lot of cards I need to make for men at this time of year, so here is the card I made today. I started off making the hot air balloons from plain card oddments, but decided patterned paper looked better.  I cut out the bottom of each balloon from snippets of brown card and attached to the bottom of each balloon, cutting off the patterned basket.  All the balloons are embossed, although this doesn't show up very well in the photograph.

The background was done with an Embossalicious 'Clouds' embossing folder. The balloon dies are Lin and Lene dies and I also used Memory Box cloud dies.

I would like to enter my card for the following challenge:

Pixie's Snippets Playground - Week 136 ~ Use Your Snippets

It's a Boy!

We heard this weekend that friends of ours were made grandparents for the first time.  Little Archie arrived three weeks early, so I got to work on making cards for the happy parents and grandparents.

Every time I use this Marianne die, it reminds me of the first time I got into cardmaking.  Many years ago I went to a craft show in Shepton Mallet and saw a demonstration using Lacé templates, which you cut through with a craft knife.  It looked really easy, so a bought a couple, went home and made my first ever card.  Thankfully, similar Marianne Lacé dies came on the market, which do all the hard work for you!  

I used snippets of blue pearlised card for this one, layering the pram using foam pads. I love this cute embossing folder for baby cards to give the backgrounds a bit of texture. I used a Memory Box die - 'Baby Carriage'.

I would like to enter this card for the following challenges:

Pixie's Snippets Playground - Week 136 ~ Use Your Snippets
My Mum's Craft Shop ~ Clean and Simple
Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge ~ Anything Goes