Starting the week with a Beautiful Gift

Good Monday Morning Ladies,

Here we are at the start of another week and as of tomorrow the start of another month, crazy isn't it?
I am hoping to start the new month off in a nice organised Craft Room, it is coming together at last, I know it's dragged on but I wanted to do it properly!

Today's card is absolutely stunning, it's the beautiful gift that I received from Our Brenda for my Birthday, as always Brenda's card came beautifully wrapped in pretty pink glittery organza that was tied with pretty Seam Binding Ribbon and finishes with two of Brenda's gorgeous Hand Rolled Roses. that match the card colours perfectly, I am going to use those Roses as inspiration and sit and practise making those darling roses if I can remember Brenda's tutorial from when we met up in July.

Now onto that stunning card, firstly the background, which looks like Brenda has handmade it, it's such lovely shades of pinks and greens.  Brenda has then taken a Cream coloured panel and die cut a gorgeous floral corner out of the panel, so that that gorgeous background can be seen.  Brenda has also die cut a floral corner out of the background and used it to embellish the corner, to finish the card Brenda has printed off the greeting and layered it up and added across the centre of the card, the embellishments used to finish the card are some pretty crystal gems in the centres of some of the flowers, that catch the light and twinkle beautifully and the gorgeous spray of Hand rolled Roses.
Brenda, I will treasure this beautiful gift forever, thank you so very much XXX

Oh I forgot to mention on Friday that I won a die on Sue Wilson's Blog, there were some lovely dies in this latest collection and I won the 'Priscilla's Border' Die set, I will share it with all of you when it arrives.

I hope that you all enjoy this last day of September my lovelies, I also would like to wish all of you well, particularly those of you that haven't been around for a few days, I pray that you are all well.

Love and huge squidgy hugs to all of you,

Sandra
xxxxxx

Your Challenge Cards

Good Morning Ladies, 

I can hardly believe that this is the last Sunday in September,  how can we be almost in October?! 

I really am going to have to get into 'Christmas Card Making ' mode!  I think I have two, maybe three Christmas cards already made!! 😲

No panicking today though, I am going to sit and quietly browse through your very calming 'White On White' Cards......

Maria 

Maria has stamped and embossed a pretty Garden Scene onto the Die cut circle in the centre of her card, she has the beautifully embossed a background piece,  mounted that onto a base card, then added that pretty stamped centre piece. Such a pretty card Maria, thank you so much for taking part XXX 

 Janet

Three beautiful White on White projects, I gave you a sneak peek of the first one yesterday,  the other two cards are just beautiful,  so elegant,  I do love 'White on White!

Janet's Description:

"My first  offering are three Hearts bought from The Range; painted with white acrylic dried which gives a bubble effect and decorated with lace etc from my lace box.

My second offering is made using Phil Martin's latest dies and decorated with Little Birdie white flowers. The ribbon is from my ribbon box and the sentiment is a Crafter's Companion die.

For my third offering I ran out of time so this is a card I made some time ago using  a Sue Wilson efolder and dies."

Thank you so much Janet,  I can see that you enjoyed this Challenge, thank you so much for taking part XXX 

 Cheryl 

Cheryl has made a stunning Wedding card for our 'White on White' Challenge. 

Cheryl has used a pretty Embossing folder for the background of her card, it's such a beautiful design that it is perfect as the main focus of the card.  Cheryl has used a selection of pretty circle dies to frame her sentiment. 

A beautiful card Cheryl,  thank you so much for taking part XXX 

Karen

Karen's Challenge card has been designed to perfection,  I absolutely love how you have arranged your foliage Karen, it frames your sentiment beautifully!

Karen's Description:

"I have embossed the top half with a SW folder and hidden join with ribbon The Poinsettia are JL’s cut in vellum and topped with his new Swirly Poinsettia and the foliage is his “old” ivy dies

The sentiment is SW’s which I’ve stacked-3 layers I used a quickie glue pen Made it a lot easier to stick together"

Thank you so much for taking part Karen xxx

Michele 

Two Beautiful 'White on White ' Christmas cards from Michele for this weeks Challenge. 

Michele's Description:

"Two challenge cards for this week! I used white pearl card on silver mirri card plus mini gemstones. Both Embossing folders are All occasions Christmas ones."

Absolutely stunning Christmas cards Michele XXX 

Lynda

Our Lynda has made an amazing Christmas for this weeks White on White  Challenge.

Lynda's Description:

"The star die is a wish die embossing folder from stash. Hope you like it"

Thanks so much Lynda, I love your Christmas card, your embossing folder is lovely, it gives a really deep, clear impression XXX

Margaret 

Margaret has also made a Christmas card for this weeks Challenge.   I love your clean and simple  design Margaret, your embossing folder is really pretty too.

It's so lovely having a 'Margaret card' on our display.  I can't wait until your back making cards again my lovely,  Thank you so much for taking part XXX 

Thank you all so much for supporting the Challenge this and every week my lovelies,  you know how  much I appreciate it.

I actually cleared some floor space and got some things loaded into my trolleys!  

I made some progress in between doing other jobd around the house, one of those jobs was the Cooker Hood/Extractor,  i think it's a fairly old fashioned design, our last one had little metal plates thst you slid out and could pop them in a pan of boiling water with vinegar & Bicarb and they instantly became clean and shiny! 

The one in this house looked like it was an original feature! We started by 'googling' how to remove an old design AEG Cooker hood filter,  nothing similar came up, so Paul took a screwdriver and turned a few screws, with a little persuasion we got it out!  OMG 😲🤢🤮 never in my life have I seen anything as old and disgusting,  it has been a dark honey kind of colour since we moved in, we though that was just it's natural colour, oh no, this sheet of, well i don't know what, just oozed grease and grime, we managed with a bit of brute force and wretching we managed to get the sticky sheet off, i just looked at this large greasy bit of metal znd thought 'what am i going to do to get you clean' I then had a lightbulb moment and laid it on the draining board and sprayed the whole thing with a generous amount of KOH cleaner, you could see it start working straight away, emulsifying the grease, it started turning white and with a nice hot cloth it just wiped clean, it was a miracle and in about 10 minutes the whole thing was shining like new, we have ordered some more filter sheets, to collect today, I can't wait to see it all clean and back in place.  Since we first discovered the cooker hood (thanks to Sue), it has had a honey coloured drip seeping from the light/fan switch,  I have taken that part to bits and washed it countless times, so I'm guessing it's been years since it's been taken apart.  We very rarely 'Fry' food, when we do it's not in oil, it will he interesting to see how long these new filter pads last!  That was a job well done and, quite a satisfying job too. Sorry for the long explanation! 

Have a lovely Sunday Lovely Friends 

Love and hugs to all,

Sandra

xxxxxx

Mixed Up Saturday with Michele's Magazine Review

Good Saturday morning Ladies,

We are starting today's post with a bit of a 'Naughty Sneak Peek ' of one of Our Janet's 'White on White' Challenge projects, this particular project works perfectly for 'Mixed Crafts ' Saturday, so I thought I would share it today and tomorrow! 

I will add Janet's Description below:

"My first  offering are three Hearts bought from The Range; painted with white acrylic dried which gives a bubble effect and decorated with lace etc from my lace box."

I love your gorgeous home decor piece Janet, this would make a lovely Wedding Keepsake or even Pearl Anniversary gift, thank you so much for taking part my lovely XXX 

 Danielle 

Danielle has been busy making lots of different gift bags and creating YouTube Tutorials so that everyone can have a go at her Designs, I love the rolled handle attachments on these bags, it just adds something different to the look of the bag, very modern too.
I will add the link to Danielle's YouTube Channel below, she has a great Gift Box and Gift Card Wallet Tutorials going up this weekend too.

Danielle's Bag Tutorials

Michele's Magazine Review 

Hi Ladies

Next magazine for a review is Diecutting Essentials which has a great set of Festive Foliage Dies free this month as shown below.

This photo show just a few ideas you can make using the free gift.

Great article on Bokeh effect Diecutting.

An interesting article on Fancy fold cards-perfect for the special people you know at Christmas.


That’s all this week-Happy Crafting.

Love Michele

Thank you so much Michele for another fantastic Magazine review, I love those Free Dies, so useful! 

There are some great features too, like the Bokeh Effect done with Die Cutting and those great Fancy Fold 'Surprise' cards. I am very tempted to order this one! XXX

As I progress with my Craft Room Organisation I felt  I just needed a bit more drawer storage, Danielle sent me a photo of this storage trolley that they have in Hobbycraft, I looked at it and immediately thought that the top would be perfect for my Scan and Cut and there is loads of drawersfor storage too. It costs £43 But they had VIP shopping for Card Members so I got 20% off, which took it down to £34.40 !! Absolute bargain, it is really well made, sturdy too and easy to put together! 

I will share a photo of it filled and in my craft room later.

I will be continuing with my organising today, I hope thst you all have a lovely weekend, 

Love and hugs to all of you,

Sandra 

xxxxxxx

Next Weeks Challenge

💛❤Happy Birthday Cheryl❤💛

Good Morning Ladies,

I want to start today by apologising for getting confused on the date of our lovely Chery's Birthday, I made the mistake of going by Facebook this time, which has your Birthday as the 27th.
I know that all of your lovely friends here on the blog will join me in wishing Cheryl a Very Happy Birthday, followed by a year of Good Health and Happiness XXX

Your Next Challenge

I thought that we would go for 'Things With Wings' for next week's challenge, I always try to think of topics that will work for most occasions.  This one works well for any card from Angels, Robins and Doves for Christmas cards to Butterflies, Dragonflies and Birds for everyday cards.
I  hope that you will enjoy this challenge my lovelies, I look forward to seeing your cards XXX

Earlier this year I bought the 'Chloe's Creative Cards' 'Butterfly Trails' collection. which included a 3D embossing folder, a set of stamps and a lovely die collection.  This is what I used to make today#s card, I embossed a piece of white card with the embossing folder and added some glue with a fine tip glue pen and added some of Chloe's Razzle Dazzle Glitter,  I then stamped butterflies onto white card and vellum and die cut them and added them over the butterflies on the Embossing folder, I finished the butterflies with some crystal gem stones.

The craft room reorganisation continues, I wish I could have captured the look on Paul's face when he walked into the chaos yesterday, it was pure shock I think, hahaha!  I invited him to help but he said he wouldn't know where to start, I just smiled and carried on!


I hope that you all have a lovely day, especially Michele, have an amazing time!

Love and hugs to all you,

Sandra
xxxxxx

Sue's beautiful Groovi card

Good Morning Ladies,

Did you ever start something and wish you hadn't bothered?? Well that's just how I am feeling about deciding to 'reorganise ' my craft room, it's absolute chaos, I got everything put back together, then couldn't decide whether to keep the side table that is attached to my craft unit or put something wider in it's place.
After a whole day of procrastinating I kept it attached and got Paul to get me a wider piece of wood to go on top, extending my work space, it doesn't matter how much space we have, we always  want more!

Luckily I had some company that helped me decide on what to do with my work space, it was lovely to chat whilst I re-organised, it made the job much less tedious. 
Sue bought her own reorganizing with her,  she had lots of dies that needed to be put back in sets, Sue was saying exactly the same as me with regard to wishing we were much more organised when it comes to putting dies back in their sets/packaging.
We both made some good progress though!

Today's card is a Gorgeous Groovi card, i believe that this is sue's second Groovi card which amazes me, its just fantastic.
I love all the detail around the wreath and the die cut butterfly is so delicate.
I really love the font of those letters too.
Thank you so much Sue  for such a lovely Birthday card and for coming to visit yesterday xxx

I bet you can all guess where i will be today!

I hope that you all have a lovely day,

Love and hugs to all,

Sandra
xxxxxxx

My Beautiful Birthday card from Lilian

Good Morning Ladies, 

Good news to start us off today, Mum is now home, she has a bed downstairs for the next couple of weeks, she is having carers in 3 times a day, to get her organised in the morning, to make her lunch and again at tea time, they sent her home with a hole box of anticoagulant injections but with no instructions on who was going to give them, After a few frantic phone calls to her GP the District Nurse is going to call in daily to give it.   Mum was delighted to be home, I am hoping that she does as she is told for once, particularly with the things the Physio /OT were strict about, not going to toilet in the night was one rule, she has a commode for night time, mainly because she has to negotiate a slight step at the back door. I think we may be in for a bit of an adventurous few weeks!🤣🤣😉😘

Now just look at this gorgeous, sparkly, Green card, oh I love it, I am excited to discover how you did that amazing background Lilian. The three dark green Fronds are the most sparkly sparkle paste ever, they sparkle like they are studded with diamonds, oh you have really inspired me my lovely. I also really like the unusual shape of the mat of green card, it adds real interest to the overall look.

Lilian thank you for such a gorgeous, individual piece of artwork XXX

Well there was drama in government and drama in my craft room yesterday, I believe I told you I was planning re-organisation, well, I decided that the magnetic wall on my craft unit was a waste of space, the magnetic board is so thick that you can't put any of the shelves on that side with it in place, I thought the magnetic board would be great for die storage but in reality it wasn't that great, the dies lie flat against the mag wall that has deep edges so you can't easily lift the dies off, I had to resort to using a magnet to lift them, if a die was slightly warped as some of them are it wouldnt stick, so, it was coming off, or so I thought, I struggled so much that I was perspiring, bloody thing wasn't budging, I ended up deconstructing the door unit and using a huge carving knife to break the seal of the tape, just as I finished Paul arrived home and just gave me 'that' look! My craft room was a disaster, I did it though, now hopefully I can get on with the organising!

I hope you all have a lovely day,

Love and hugs to all,

Sandra 

xxxxxxx

My White on White Challenge card

Good morning Ladies,

 I actually managed to sit and make a card yesterday,  which apart from Paul's Anniversary card is the first time I have sat and crafted since the 14th of August   it was a combination of having to clear out my craft room for the workmen, lack of inspiration down to being tired from journey home etc.

I know intend to get it all sorted properly before I put everything back, I want everything organised properly so that I have stamps with matching dies stored together, i ordered some storage bits from amazon yesterday with some more magnetic sheets, I will try and do some before and after photos too.

I have got one of the Hobbycraft trolleys that are still on offer at £25, I am planning to have one for my stamping and one for dies/diecutting, fingers crossed that it works.

We were in IKEA on Sunday and I noticed that they do a mini version of their 'Raskog' trolley, it was so cute, but at £29 I decided to pay less and get the bigger one from Hobbycraft.

I honestly think that if your work space is organized you  want to sit and craft, unlike my big ole mess, where the thought of tidying everything before I started was really off putting!

Today's card is my 'White on White ' Christmas card for this weeks Challenge.   I think it works well for Christmas cards.

 My card is very simple, i used one of the Apple Blossom (from Craftstash) to emboss my background, I then used a Quickie Glue pen to add glue to the snowflakes and the falling snow, I then added white iridescent glitter.  I finished my card with white ribbon with a silver snowflake to adorn the bow.

I am really looking forward to seeing yours! 

Have a lovely day ladies,

Love and hugs to all of you, 

Sandra 

xxxxxx

Janet's Beautiful Birthday card

Good Monday Morning Ladies,

Here we are at the start of another week, I hope to film some video's this week, we now have our internet installed and the other equipment needed for whizzing the internet coverage all over the house, the service we had before barely made it to the lounge! So hopefully any video tutorials that I do will not take a week to upload !

We had a relatively quiet weekend, which we both needed, Saturday was mostly spent in the garden as it was such a glorious day. I was laid awake listening to thunder in the early hours of Sunday morning which bought some fairly heavy rain with it, that rain stayed with us all through Sunday, so we decided to pop to Ikea as we needed some stools for the kitchen table, little did we know that the rain had encouraged what seemed like the entire population of Reading to 'pop to  Ikea' too, it would seem that most of them had gone just to let their children run riot! I have never seen anything like it, bearing in mind that it was raining outside so most peoples shoes would be wet and dirty, the amount of children clambering over sofas and beds, one child that I would estimate at about 8/9 years old was in the centre of a large island full of glasses, wine glasses, champagne glasses etc, she had climbed up through the bottom, her parents were oblivious! Absolutely shocking! Rant over, Soap Box, stowed.

Todays beautiful card was my Birthday card from our Janet, I was overjoyed when I opened the envelope, the background paper is absolutely stunning, so detailed with a script detail in the background and those beautiful roses as the main focus.  Janet has allowed the beautiful paper shine, enhancing it with a gorgeous applique with some pretty roses, a matching tag with the greeting and some pretty applique Butterflies to finish the card.

I absolutely adore this gift Janet, thank you so very much for designing this card for me XXX

I hope you all have a lovely day, 

Love and hugs to all of you,

Sandra

xxxxxx

Your TicTacToe Challenge Cards

Good Sunday Morning Ladies,

Wow this week has absolutely flown by, so much has happened with Sophie starting University and having a car accident, then Mum got a Bionic leg (well it has metal in it), the proper name for her break was Neck of Femur Fracture. She seems to be recovering well and enjoying the attention.

You have made some stunning cards for this weeks challenge, so I will get straight on with sharing them......

Janet

Janet has made some absolutely amazing projects for the this weeks TicTacToe Challenge, showing that you can make lots of different projects other the cards for the challenges.

Janet's Description......

''My first is a traditional birthday card. I used Vellum which has Gold embossed swirls on it. I then used stamps from this ,month's Creative Stamping mag for the leaves and the sentiment. I coloured the leaves etc using spectrum noir pens.

This meets the needs of this week's TicTacToe- Vellum/ribbon/thanks/leaves/gold..

My second offering this week is a small envelope containing a little pocket book which I covered in Vellum which has gold roses printed on it. I embellished the front of the book with silver leaves and finished this off with a ribbon bow and a small paperflower. The envelope has leaf flourishes and a sentiment of 'Thanks.

This meets this week's TicTacToe- vellum/ribbon/thanks/gold/leaves/

To finish I covered a box using the same gold rose vellum.I used gold ribbon around the edges of the lid.The box lid has a silver glitter flower to finish off.

This meets this week's Tictactoe - vellum/ribbon/glitter.''

Thank you so much Janet for such a stunning range of projects XXX

Lilian

Lilian has made an absolutely stunning card for this week's TicTacToe Challenge. 

Your colouring has bought those die cut flowers to life Lilian, they look so realistic.  The shading on your background really draws your eye into the focal point of your card.  Sometimes using Glitter card as a mat/layer can draw the eye away but not with this card.

I would love to sit and watch your creative process. 

Thank you so very much Lilian, you must have been both physically and mentally drained after a full day in hospital, so I really do appreciate the effort you have made to make your Challenge card. XXX 

Michele

Michele has made two gorgeous. Autumnal cards, I love that embossing folder and the die!

Michele's Description....

''2 very quick/simple challenge cards from me. Gold/thanks/dry Embossing and dry Embossing/glitter/leaves. The rich gold card is glittery. The 3rd picture is the magazine freebie I used to make the cards. It was from the August issue of Papercraft Essentials.''

Thank you so much Michele for 2 gorgeous Challenge cards XXX

Karen

Oh WOW Karen, I absolutely love your challenge cards for this week's TicTacToe, you have shown how easily this particular grid could be used for both Christmas and other occasion cards.

I love how detailed and sparkly your cards are, I might just have to but that Christmas die, purely because I love those deer and I love that card you have made, the photo just doesn't do it justice, so zoom in ladies and check out the sparkle!

I will add Karen's descriptions below.....

Card 1 :  Here’s a cc for you

Glitter-Leaves-Die cut This is the first time ever I have used black glitter (Nuvo) The coppery gold was given to me Don’t know name. I quite liked it before I put JL butterfly on too!

Card 2:  I’ve just finished this cc Gold-Glitter-Die cut

I am really thrilled with the background It was a technique shown by Jenny McGuire where you “trap” glitter etc in a laminating pouch! Dead easy (I could do it!) The stars are leftovers from Milestone confetti and the glitter is CS Holographic Sea Spray  Glitterbitz backed onto navy card Frame cut on ScanNCut.

Thank you so much karen for two stunning, inspirational cards XXX

Lynda

Two fantastic cards by Lynda that work perfectly for this Challenge...

Card  1:  Gold/Die Cut/Embossing.  Using 'Lovely as a Tree Stamp set and Star Of Light,  (Both SU) the stamps are used to create a lovely scene, a die cut gold frame finishes the card.

Card 2: This is a card that Lynda made for lovely CU's Birthday,  using Categories: Heat Emboss/Die Cut/Gold . I love how you have used the brick effect background and stamped the train on a die cut circle to create the look of the train coming out of the tunnel.  Brilliant card Lynda !!

Thanks so much for 2 amazing cardsXXX

Some absolutely stunning card on this weeks display, we have had some really different projects this week, they have all been amazing!

Thank you all so much xxxx

We were pottering around in the garden most of the day, the weather was beautiful all day, you would never have guessed it was mid September!

I hope that you all have a lovely Sunday,

Love and hugs to all of you,

Sandra

xxxxxxx

Mixed Up Saturday

Good  Saturday Morning Ladies,

I hope that you are all well and enjoying the weekend, thankfully we have a quiet weekend as we did our long distance visiting in the week.

Now let's get on with today's lovely projects, oh and of course we have Michele's magazine review, I would like to add an 'Extra Special' thanks as Michele has sent through Magazine reviews to cover the weekends that she is away too xxx

First project today is a gorgeous one, I think you could all guess who made this lovely work of art but for all those new people looking in it has been designed and created by our very own Janet.

It is a gorgeous card for a friend of Janet's but I have to say that I would pop this in a frame and have it as wall art, it's gorgeous with so much incredible detail. Look at all of those little sewing themed elements, the measuring tape ribbon, the cotton thread would around a bobbin with little dressmaking pins in the top. the scissors and the dressforms.  I love that image you have used too Janet, the vintage ladies on dressmaking pattern paper. Your friend will love it.

I will add Janet's description below....

The is a card I have just finished for a friend's bday.I used one of the prints I pulled off Pinterest last week and didn't use. The scissors/dress maker's models are Tonic Media Dies. I used a piece of straw and wound cotton around it and glued two pins down the middle.The piece of tape measure came from a little sewing kit from Pound Land ages ago just for times like this.

Thanks so much Janet, great idea using the cheap sewing kit as embellishments. XXX

Lynda

This amazing card and matching gift box was Lynda's engagement card for her son Darren and his lovely girlfriend Sam.
Such a gorgeous card Lynda, that heart die you have used is stunning, I love the colours and how you have embellished it with those gorgeous roses.
I bet they were both over the moon with their card, I would have loved to have seen Harry's face when he found out bless him.  I hope that you and Terry have a lovely time at the engagement party tonight, no partying till 3am mind!!
Thank you so much for sharing your amazing card my lovely XXX

Michele's Magazine Review

Hi Ladies,

The latest magazine for an in depth review is Simply Cards & Papercraft which comes with a great set of Stamps & a festive Die.

The photo above show a ideas using the free gifts.

Here’s more ideas using the stamps.

The next 2 photos show some ideas for gift wrapping using the free gifts.

Below is a photo showing a great feature on Autumnal ideas.

That’s all for this week -Happy Crafting.

Michele


Thanks so much Michele, what a fantastic issue, I love the die that you get and those lovely Christmas stamps, you really get a lot with this issue.
A great review Michele,  thank you so much  XXX


That's all for today my lovelies,

Enjoy the rest of your weekend,

Love and hugs to all of you,

Sandra
xxxxxx