Our Next Challenge...

 

Good Saturday Morning Ladies, 

So excited to be meeting up with some of you today,  I wish it was ALL of you though. 🥰

Today's quote is so true and mostly the reason that we all do it. 

Our Next Challenge 

Lilian helped me by suggesting a Spring themed TicTacToe,  I couldn't find one that would work for us so I created one, I hope I have included something for everyone!  

It's a great idea for a challenge and I can't wait to see what you all create.  Thank you Lilian XXX

Maria

Maria has had her beautiful Crystal Art picture framed and she has kindly shared it hung over the fireplace.  Its such a stunning scene with the reflections on the water.  It must have taken you ages to finish my lovely, it was worth every minute it took you though. 

Thank you so much for sharing it with us my lovely XXX 

I hope you all have a great Saturday,  

Love & hugs to all, 

Sandra xxx 

Distress Spray Background card

 

Good Friday Morning Ladies, 

Well this week has absolutely flown, I was making cards yesterday thinking it was Thursday today, not Friday!   I haven't given the new challenge a thought,  is there any techniques or style that you'd like us all to focus on???

Today's card started simply with a plain piece of mixed media card that was 'spritzed' with Distress Spray Stain in Milled Lavender & Seedless Preserves,  after spritzing I placed another piece of mixed media card on top of the original spritzed one,  there is a lot of ink on the surface, so why not get a two for one?!  It also helps to even the ink out across the whole card.  I set it on the Aga to dry and made another couple of blends.                                   Once it was dry I stamped the SU French Script background, I partially inked it with Seedless Preserves Distress ink so that it matched, I didn't want a perfectly stamped background,  I wanted it to be just here and there, which us luckily what I acheived. 

When all inking was dry I stamped the Tim Holtz 'Floral Outline' Floral spray onto my background,  now I'm not sure if it's the mixed media card or the inks but my goodness did I have a job getting the Clear Embossing ink to sit on the card long enough to hold the white embossing powder, it seemed to keep getting absorbed by the card, I eventually got some embossing powder to stick and heat set.  I distressed the edges of the stamped piece and mounted it onto a piece of white card and then matted it onto a card base the worked with the Shaded Lilac.  To finish the card I added a butterfly stamped on vellum and die cut and popped another die cut butterfly in white to make it stand out, I propped the upper part of butterfly with a foam pad and added a sentiment below it. 

The white areas around the bottom of the card are just areas that the Distress Stain missed  

The speckly bits from the spritzing are my favourite 😍 

I hope that you all have a great day,  I am so looking forward to seeing some of you tomorrow,  

Love and hugs to all of you,

Sandra xxx 

Karen's colour blend card

 

Good Morning Ladies, 

We had quite a busy day today,  hampered by the fact that I woke with a UTI !  It's made me feel rubbish this time,  luckily part of the days appointments was a blood test so I took a sample in with me and asked the nurse if she minded dipping it for me,  she said "of course"  so she dipped, drew my blood and then said "my goodness you have a good urine infection, the strip has lit up like a Christmas tree"!  I kind if knew anyway, but like to have them check it, the gp called me later and has prescribed antibiotics,  luckily I have a couple so that I can get started as the Chemist was closed when the gp called.  Fingers cross they kick in fast. 

The girls wanted to pop to the garden centre before Dr's and hairdressers,  so we did that, Soph got herself so plants for her Terrarium.   I get that not everyone would like the plant I shared yesterday,  it was its quirkiness is what appealed to me and the fascination at how mother nature could create something so intricate,  tiny little saucers threaded on a very fine stem, that looks like a thread.  

Karen has very kindly allowed me to share a lovely card that she created yesterday.

Karen had the genius idea of using her Colour Box cards to create a background on Serif,  the resulting background is perfect.  

Karen's Description:

It’s a piece of Serif coloured to match the card The flower die is John Lockwood and is cut with a one die smaller Do gives 1/8” border The sentiment die is from Temu - my new favourite die. 

I really like that border die too,  cutting it slightly smaller is a brilliant idea as having the background showing all around the die cut is like another frame.  

Thank you so much for allowing me to share your lovely card Karen ❤️ 

I hope that you all have a lovely day,  mine will be much quieter than yesterday! 

Love and hugs to all of you,

Sandra xxx 

A smooshed Ink card

 

Good Wednesday Morning Ladies, 

Lucy and I had a fun filled afternoon out yesterday,  if course she wanted to go to a garden centre!  Now I don't always believe in 'fate' but I can be convinced.. On Sunday I spotted a really unusual House plant that I really likes, when Paul handed it to me to look at a bit fell off in my hand, so I kept it, 😯.  Anyway they were £20 plus so I made do with my 'offcut', we visited a different garden centre this time (the one where Paul and I get the bargains)!  We wandered round, I let her pick a couple Osteospernems and a Geranium,  for our Patio pots,  we then went inside to the house plants,  we were a little underwhelmed and so went to pay, right by the tills was a 'Bargain Corner ', can you believe they had two of the quirky plants that I spotted in the expensive garden centre, reduced to £5 !!!  

We did get the giggles though because the plants are quite fragile,  Lucy pulled out of the parking space and one of them fell over, a little bits rolled everywhere, I squealed 'Eeyah your killing the poor thing, the bits are rolling all over" she glanced over and got hysterics, we had to re-park and sort the situation out and then composed ourselves!  I ended up holding them both all the way home.  

 

Its called ... Crassula Marianier Hottentot, it looks like beads threaded in a string, I love it,  even more for £5 !!  Lucy was buzzing,  she loved it's quirkiness too. 

Today's card I wasn't sure of, I got the inspiration from Pinterest,  I smooshed Kitsch Flamingo & Fossilised Amber Distress inks (one at a time) onto a place of acetate, spritzed it with water, then smooshed it onto the card,  I dried each layer before adding a new layer.  After it was dry I stamped the floral spray in black ink.  It's very abstract!  Now it's finished I do quite like it.  What do you think?? 

I hope that you all have a good day, 

Love and hugs to you all,  

Sandra xxx 

Distress Spray Stain Blend card

 

Good Tuesday Morning Ladies, 

I hope that you all got to see a glimpse of the sun yesterday,  I wonder if we'll see it today??   The forecast says cloudy and windy so we'll keep our fingers crossed. 

Not sure what Lucy & I will do today,  tomorrow we are finally getting our haircut,  I have never gone this long without a haircut (since lock down).  The last haircut I had was last August,  the stress of the diagnosis of my Bile duct/pancreas had my mind of many things that seemed more important than haircuts!  So I will be glad to get it chopped off tomorrow!  The girls wouldn't go without me either so they are both looking forward to get a trim, although they have really long hair so it's not as obvious.  Shayne stays open late so that we can all go together,  he's a funny chap but quite old fashioned in his ways, he calls us all Madam, I love watching the girls try not to grin when he says it. 

Today's card is another blend, (I expect you are getting bored of this challenge, I will change it this week,  although I am quite enjoying it) this blend is Distress Spray Stains Spun Sugar,  Picked Raspberry & Seedless Preserves, now I did spray onto a watercolour card that was more cream than white, which slightly makes the spun sugar look more peachy.  I absolutely love the blend too, I did nothing to it other than spray the stains onto the card, no blending or anything,  they settle and blend together beautifully. 

I left it to dry for a couple days and then I inked up and stamped one of the Tim Holtz 'Floral Outlines' stamps onto my background, added Gold Embossing powder and heat set it.  I wanted the background to be the main focus of the card so I did nothing more.  I simply added a sentiment,  stamped in gold on the same cream card that I used for the card base.  

I hope that you all have a good day, 

Love & hugs to all, 

Sandra xxx 

Some Throwback colour blend cards

Good Monday Morning Ladies, 

Welcome to the start of a new week,  I hope that you all had a lovely weekend, it's so lovely having this bonus day off with Paul, we may go out for a while today as we haven't left the house since food shopping Friday,  mind you we are slap bang in between Burford & Bourton on Water which are two mega busy Cotswold tourist attractions,  so going anywhere will mean sitting in lots of traffic, living somewhere so beautiful has its drawbacks!  

I really struggled to get around yesterday,  my hips and knees were so incredibly painful, all I could do was shuffle as I physically couldn't lift my legs to walk, I really didn't want to let it stop me though, we sat outside on the deck for an hour or two, Paul bought me some herbs that needed potting on, which I could do sitting down,  so I did that, I had to go in to use the bathroom and that was me done, I just couldn't get outside any more.  I did my best to help Paul do the roast lamb dinner, I prepared and cooked the lamb and made cheese sauce for the cauliflower, Paul is the roast king though so he managed the rest.  

He also did a treasure hunt for the girls Easter Chocolate, he used to do it every year when they were little, he draws a the clues, leading all over the house to where the Chocolate is waiting, I haven't heard them laugh and giggle so much in ages, there was a couple of dodgy drawings that had them confused but they worked it out in the end. 

I couldn't summon the energy to create a card for today, I am sorry, I always feel like I am letting you down when this happens.  Anyway I searched through my archives to 2021 I think and found some colour blended cards that might inspire you, the first two are Alcohol inks, the second two are oxides. 

I hope that you all have a great start to the week,

Love and hugs to all of you 

Sandra xxx 

Let's look at your colour combinations

 

Happy Easter Ladies 

Good Sunday Morning Ladies, 

I hope you all have a lovely Easter Sunday 🐣 🐰

We had a busy day in the garden yesterday,  our Bamboo plants were all looking like they were dying, so we split them and repotted them, fingers crossed they will pick up and thrive.  Other than that and baking a perfect loaf of Sourdough bread we didn't much else. 

Let's look at what Karen & Lilian made this week...

Karen

Karen's Description:

Card 1 & 2 : 

A colour combo I rarely use with my all time favourite A&C stamp set #449 Through the Meadows and sentiment from #718 Tagged Alphabet

Fussy cut a second butterfly coloured with yellow orange and pink Inktense pencils and finished with Glossy Accents

Card 2: 

First try using my Colour Box, Using DO:

My colours

Picked Raspberry 

Fired Brick

Mustard Seed

Frayed Burlap 

Evergreen Bough

Daisy B Butterfly 

Karen love the new colour way you used for your Butterfly card, it's so vibrant and the butterfly looks very realistic.  

Your first card using your colour box is lovely,  the faux bleaching adds so much extra interest to the background.  The colours work so well together too. 

Thank you so much for supporting the challenge XXX 

Lilian 

Lilian's Description:

Hi, here is my card for this week, 

Very simple blended background using pastel chalks.

Primrose stamp is from stamping up, sorry I can’t remember the name.

Such a lovely Easter card Lilian,  a beautiful blended background too. 

Thank you so much for taking part in this challenge xxx

Gina

Gina's Description:

My offering for tomorrow using my Sue Wilson die that I bought a few months ago.  Two baskets with Easter eggs for my friends son. 

Love your baskets Gina, what a lovely gift, the baskets look very versatile.  

Thank you so much for taking part in this weeks challenge XXX 

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Ladies I hope that you all enjoy what's left of the Easter weekend, 

Love & hugs to all of you, 

Sandra xxx 

Ps:  I hope that you all get to eat a little chocolate today xxx

Mixed Up Saturday

 

Good Saturday Morning Ladies,  

I hope that your weekend has gotten off to a great start,  we had a bit of a boring start, just getting the shopping done so that we have the rest of the weekend  to enjoy,   I got a loaf of Sourdough started, so it will be ready for baking this morning, Soph and I used up some of the Sourdough 'discard' in the afternoon,  Soph made some of her amazing bagels, I made a cake that had a sponge with a cinnamon sugar layer in the middle and was topped with a crunchy cinnamon pecan crumble,  as I am writing this I am waiting for it to finish cooking, it smells deliscious.  

Karen's Colour Box

Karen bought herself the Aall&Create Colour Cube, I have had one of these on my wishlist for sometime,  I didn't realise Aall&Create did one though, having one made by someone that does Papercrafting makes a difference,  its been designed with colouring with inks etc in mind. 

This is a lovely colour combination,  Karen matched Distress Oxides for all the colours, here is here Description:

First try! Using DO

My colours

Picked Raspberry 

Fired Brick

Mustard Seed

Frayed Burlap 

Evergreen Bough

I love the card that you created Karen,  I can pick out the different colours and they blend beautifully. 

Karen wasn't sure about the blend between  Frayed Burlap and Mustard seed,  this is the way that she rescued it, which is a useful tip for all of us....

I think I have rescued it

I blended the Frayed Burlap over the Mustard Seed

I have since watched a video by a lady named Jenny (lovely colourist) who talked about using the predominant colour in lighter shades for background and when colouring image shading with the light/medium/dark colours 

I didn’t intend to emulate the card

Heat embossed the Daisy B butterfly and did faux bleaching- managed to get water onto background so did some splatters! 

This was well out of my comfort zone

It may have been out of your comfort zone but you absolutely aced it my lovely. 

Thank you so much for sharing your colour box and first project with us, I am  sure there are a few of us that will be wanting one!  XXX

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I just had to share these with you today,  they are in a trough just by where we park the car, They really make me smile every time I get in the car, they move on the breeze,  to me they look like bearded little men, I love them 🤣😂

I hope that you all have a lovely Saturday,  

Love and hugs to all of you,  

Sandra xxx 

Happy Good Friday

 

Good Friday Morning Ladies, 

I hope that you are all ready for a lovely long weekend,  what have you all got planned?                  I think our weekend will be mostly be spent sowing and in the garden.  Our lot are all working sadly 😔, when I think back to when the children were small, they loved Easter,  Paul always did an Easter Egg hunt for them, which they still remember now, we always had a huge Easter Lunch,  we are still having a lovely lamb roast but there will only be 4 of us sat around the table, it will be an evening roast too as the girls won't get home until almost 6pm.  

Karen & Lilian I hope you got your Prescriptions sorted, I feel really lucky at the moment as our current pharmacy is really good, he really goes above and beyond to make sure you get what you need, the last time I had a uti he rang the GP surgery for me to explain that he didn't feel comfortable treating me (as gp suggested), he explained to them that my history was far too complicated for him to diagnose for, he made sure they saw me the same day too.  He also must remember your prescription as I went to buy Cymalon sachets and he said that I couldn't take them with the medication I am on.   It's quite reassuring to know.  

We had a very long day out yesterday,  Becca had arranged to collect some bud vases and candle holders from a ladyin Hungerford, so to make the journey worthwhile she said, "lets go charity shopping in Newbury ",  we set off, she was confident that she had got the Salvation army charity shop in her sat nav as our first venue,  we drove past a big trading estate that had a Salvation army building,  but she was sure we were on the right route, turns out she forgot the charity shop part in the search, it took us straight to The Salvation Army church hall ! 🤣😂 Soph and I were in stitches.  We parked nearby and had a look down the Newbury shopping centre,  it was quite nice,  not much in the way of charity shops though.  We visited a few shops, found a branch of Sostrene Green, its a lovely little shop that sells home decor, they had lovely little bud vases that were 88p and £1.20, their candles were cheap too, so Becca bought most of what they had, she was really pleased. We had lunch and then went to find the actual Salvation army charity shop,  which didn't disappoint,  we got tealight holders for 25p each so pretty crystal candle holders for.£1. We were all exhausted by this point, so we headed to the address that lady had arranged to get the wedding bits from, she was really lovely,  she got married in late March,  she had the exact table number holders that Becca wanted, some lovely bud vases and candle holders too, so all in all a really successful wedding shopping day, Becca had a huge smile on her face which made it all worthwhile.  Needless to say today will be a rest day for me! 

I hope that you all have a great start to the weekend,  

Love and hugs to all of you,  

Sandra xxx

Another Blended Background with Faux Bleaching

 

Good Morning Ladies,  

Today feels a bit like a Friday with it being Good Friday, I do love a bank holiday weekend,   extra nice when its a double.  The weather doesn't look that great though.  Isn't that always the case with Bank Holiday.  

Today's card is another Blended Oxide Background,  Salvaged Patina, Salty Ocean and Blueprint Sketch.  I then used my 'bargain' Tim Holtz Floral Outline stamp, I stamped in Versamark and added white Embossing powder and heat set,  I then took a small paintbrush and a piece of kitchen towel and 'painted' each flower and leaf with wYer and used kitchen roll to dab each piece to lift the ink.  It looks really effective.  I finished with a sime sentiment for a simple look. 

I hope that you all have a good Thursday, 

Love & hugs to all of you, 

Sandra xxx

Using a three colour Oxide Blend

 

Good Wednesday Morning Ladies, 

We had a very dark & dreary day yesterday, we didn't actually really see any of the rain that was promised, it tried once or twice but thankfully it didn't come to anything although the garden could do with a good soaking.  

Lucy fancied trying a different garden centre yesterday,  we went to Dobbies in Cirencester, it's a huge garden centre that has a Lakeland shop ( which I really like) it also has a big childrens play centre so it was really busy,   they aren't daft are they, these garden centre chains, the restaurants are all usually quite overpriced, they attract parents with children by having the play centres so that the parents can still shop while the children are occupied,  customers that would otherwise be elsewhere entertaining their children in the school holidays.  It works too,  the car park barely had a space.  Lucy's eyes lit up when she saw the huge indoor plant area,  it was far bigger than any other one we've been to,  we must have been in there for about an hour and a half!!  Lucy picked two plants, one of which she has been looking for for a while.  I got another terracotta pot for my succulents and another small succulent so that I had an odd number in my new pot.  (Thats my excuse and I'm sticking to it) 🤣😂

Today's card was a result of my playing with one colour blends,  while I was looking for some inspiration I saw a card that caught my eye,  I didn't have the materials the original card featured so I did my own version,  I used Wilted Violet, Villainous Potion and Black Soot Oxide inks to create a blend from light at the bottom to dark at the top,  after drying I tore two pieces of paper to give a narrow, irregular  section from bottom to top, at an angle,  I laid the torn paper on my piece and then used my splatter brush to spritz white paint across the piece to look like a 'Milky way/galaxy', (not the chocolate) 🤣, after drying I stamped some trees (Inkylicious) to the foreground, making sure the trees were in that lighter section of inking.  I stamped some little mounds at the base of the trees to ground them. 

Now... confession time, I originally stamped the sentiment straight on the card, however,  it didn't stamp perfectly,  no matter how i tried I couldn't rectify it, white embossing on a dark background is recipe for disaster at the best of times,  I was gutted as the blending had taken my ages and a lot of ink, so feeling frustrated I tossed it in the bin!   When I got back from garden centre yesterday I sat at my desk and the piece was glaring at me from the top of my card & paper bin,  I picked it up and thought I refuse to waste it, so I cleaned and dried the sentiment stamp that I originally used, I tested it with black ink,  it was ok  so I inked another piece of card with same inks and dried it, I inked the stamp in Versafine and stamped it, added white embossing powder and heat set.  I die cut it and added a black mat and placed it over the original sentiment.  I mounted the card onto a narrow white mat and then onto a black card base.  It's by no means perfect,  I do like how the lighter ink makes it look like the trees are illuminated by the stars.  

It just seemed a shame to bin it. ! 

I hope that you all have a good day, 

Love & hugs to all, 

Sandra xxx

The second card using colour wheel papers

 

Good Morning Ladies,  

I think I felt cold all day yesterday,  mind you we did have the door to the garden open for Milo & Bella to go out,  I had to go find some socks, ( I think that my circulation is off) as my feet were almost purple, it reminded me of my Mum's feet, although I think hers may have been down to smoking.  Some fluffy socks served two purposes, 1 warmed my feet, 2 stopped Paul & Girls from worrying about my purple feet!!  Although I will get it checked next time I have Gp appointment.  This time last week I was in t shirt, yesterday,  cardi & thick socks,  what confused weather we have!  

Karen & Maria, I have the die Gina used on her card, I will bring it to Watford if you like. 

Today's card is one I made as I didn't want to waste the leftover piece of patterned paper that I used for this card last week   

It's a good feeling when you use the whole piece of paper, no waste!! 

I die cut a black decorative circle with a white mat to cover the hole that I die cut for the card above and to have a place for a sentiment.  It's a simple card but it's colourful and fun. 

Today Lucy is at home so not sure what we will do, she wants me to help her re pot some of her plants, I need to do a couple too, apart from that no plans set yet,  we need to book hair appointment,  as we haven't had a hair cut since last August, apart from lockdown i have never gone that long!  I didn’t want to get any more colour as I want it to look perfect for the wedding in September.  

I hope that whatever you are doing you have a great day, 

Love & hugs to all of you,  

Sandra xxx 

Gina's Thank You card

 

Good Monday Morning Ladies,  

Well a bit of a change in the weather for the start of the week,  the difference in temperature was really evident yesterday,  I needed my cardi on in the garden🤣😂

We managed to get all of the Alpines in that we got last weekend,  they look just like the ones we bought last year, a little small and pathetic looking but 1 year on....

So hopefully this time next year we will have lots of ground cover and pretty flowers.  Paul had quite a job as the bank is made up of tons of cotswold stones, you have to move it aside to get to the heavy clay soil, so Paul added lots of compost too. 

Today I am sharing the lovely Thank you card that Our Gina made for Karen.  

Gina used the Waffle Flower Postage die to create the card, adding both stamped images, die cuts and pretty papers to embellish the card. It's a lovely card Gina, thank you so much for allowing me to share it, thank you to Karen for taking the photo too XXX

I hope that you all have a good start to the week, 

Love and hugs to all of you, 

Sandra xxx

Your Colour Cards

 

Good Sunday Morning Ladies, 

It's my favourite day of the week,  I absolutely love sharing your cards.😍

We had a fun day yesterday, we were up and out early,  we went to the local  Cricket club to look at their monthly market.   It felt a bit like Castle Eaton at first where it feels like everyone is looking at you as you are the only stranger in the room,  we were asked if we were tourists,  so we explained that we have lived in the village for almost two years. We soon got talking to the lady on the 'Bric a Brac' table,  as I was looking for bud vases for Becca's wedding reception, we then noticed the plant table, where we picked up some Chinese Money plants and some alpines for the garden, only £1 each, luckily the plant table was next the Cake table, there was a lovely Coffee walnut cake that just happened to land in our box!! 😍 I am so dubious about buying handmade cakes at these kind of events, I hope whoever made it had a clean kitchen 🙄🤭

Let's look at your cards....

Karen 

Karen's Description:

Here’s my challenge card for this week

Totally out of my comfort zone with colours- similar to one of those blends on that sheet Was inspired by a photo I took of a card that was on Create & Craft by Janet or Abs.

What an amazing card Karen, I love the colours you have used, that hint of purple in the background really enhances the purple in the butterfly.  

Thank you so much for supporting the challenge Karen XXX 

Lilian 

Lilian's Description:

Here is my card for this week.

Background: blend of three colours.

Tattered Rose

Old Paper.  Both oxide distress ink.

Powder pink.   Stamping up.

Next stamped in ground espresso permanent ink, 

Embossed in clear.

Punch three spots to show the colours used.

Oh I love this card Lilian,  the colours you have chosen are so delicate,  you have blended them perfectly too.  That stamp is so versatile isn't it. 

Thank you so much for taking part in the Challenge XXX 

Maria 

Maria's Description:

Hi, it's that time of the week again 😊. Wasn't sure if I made it right but here are two I got together.

I already had this piece of card with green and yellow together. Used an embossing folder to make a frame and then found this little duckling or is it a 🐥 ? Anyway I stamped it on and the sentiment that was with it.

The next one I used more orange and brown hues together. Tim's Dried Marigold, Vintage Photo and a bit of Marmalade 🤭 

Two lovely cards Maria, both have lovely colour ways. I also love the dies you used on your first card.  How adorable is that little duck/chick 😍 

Thank you so much for two beautiful cards my lovely XXX 

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I hope that you all have a lovely Sunday, 

Love & Hugs to all of you, 

Sandra xxx