Botanical Thrinchie today!

 

🎉🎈 Happy Birthday Janet 🎈🎉

Good Morning Ladies, 

Let's start by wishing our Lovely Janet a VERY Happy Birthday,  I hope that you have an amazing day celebrating my lovely friend XXX 

I had a lovely afternoon in the craft room, I am really enjoying making these Thrinchies,  they are like mini card, actually very much like the ATC's we made once. 

Todays Thrinchie has a background made on the Gelli plate, I added some Distress Oxide to it too, to give a little more colour,  I added some white embossing,  then added a flower and leaf stamped onto watercolour card and coloured with Ecoline pens, I then fussy cut them and added to my background with a bit of white cotton underneath for a bit of texture. I did make a huge boo boo though, I love the texture that adding splats gives but vowed not to bother any more, I took quite some time adding layers of colour to my flower, I stuck it in place, then shook my posca pen to give some splats and a huge splat of white landed on the centre of the flower, obscuring half of it!!! I could have cried,  instead I stamped another and coloured it and layered it over the original, ssshhh don't tell anyone!! 

I hope that you all have a lovely day, 

Janet I look forward to a slice of your Birthday cake, which flavour did you go for??

Love and hugs to all of you, 

Sandra                                                                                  xxxxxx

My 'Sewing' themed Thrinchie

 

Good Monday Morning Ladies,

I hope that you are all rested after the weekend, oh it was certainly a chilly one!  We had a lazy day yesterday,  a few jobs round house, Paul went into garden,  I went into my craft room.  I was exhausted after the excitement of Saturday.

Today I am sharing my 'Sewing' themed Thrinchie that I made yesterday afternoon, I really enjoyed making this one,  although all those splatters made a fair mess of my desk I can tell you!  I used Tracy Evans Sewing Forever #396 to create this one, I enjoyed the colouring, I will say that the Bristol Smooth card makes such a difference to blending the Ecoline pens, so it's worth investing in some if you have Ecoline pens.  I like how bright and vibrant this one is. 

I hope that you all have a marvelous Monday, 

Love & Hugs to all of you,

Sandra                                                                                  xxxxxx 

Your Challenge cards

 

Proudest Mum Moment ! 

Good Sunday Morning Ladies, 

From a very cold Wiltshire,  my goodness I need to under a heat lamp I think.  

We had the most amazing Saturday,  we took Sophie to deliver her painting to the Wildlife Park, she asked Lucy to meet her in the carpark to help her carry it in, I think she just wanted lucy with her, although she was paranoid that she was going to damage or drop it!  As soon as we got to the restaurant where the painting will be displayed people slowly started to gather, the friends and colleagues,  were all amazed the best reaction came from the park owner, you could see that he was visibly shocked and initially speechless he then pointed out every bit of detail, he was amazed that this was Sophie's first attempt at oil painting, it was so lovely to sit back and watch her talking everyone through it, at the same time I could tell that both of them were struggling mentally being the centre of attention, Lucy soon made her excuses and disappeared back to her kiosk!  We eventually left the restaurant and had a walk around the park, I wanted to see all of the animals that featured in the painting, the Giraffes were busy eating, the Rhinos were having a lazy morning, just laying around their paddock, something was bothering the Lion though as he was roaring like crazy, which was amazing to witness, we then stopped by Lucy's kiosk and had the most delicious hot waffle topped with whippy ice ream, biscoff crumb and caramel sauce with a little whipped cream, very naughty but VERY nice, Paul had sliced banana and caramel sauce with ice cream!  We wandered back to the car as we had been there a good four hours and I was so cold, I had to get under the duvet with a hot water bottle when we got home.  I wouldn't have missed that experience for the world though. 

Now lets see what you have been creating.....

Your Challenge Projects 

Lilian 

Lilian has used the StampinUp! Elements of Style stamp set to create this gorgeous card.

Such a beautiful card Lilian,  the silver gilding in the background gives a touch of luxury, the focal piece is beautifully coloured in a way that lets the beauty of the stamp stand out. That blue is so lovely, with the little touch of green for the leaves, it stands out perfectly on the white card. Thank you so much for a very inspirational card XXX 

Karen

Karen's Description:

Here’s 2 cards I used Daisy B stamps which I hadn’t tried yet

Card 1:  Very simply stamped onto Kraft card The poinsettia is coloured red and his antlers are highlighted with gold glitter

card 2:  Stamped onto white card and coloured in with chalk pencils and ordinary pencils First time I’ve tried to “shadow” with pencil and smudge with a paper stump.

Karen I absolutely love this Daisy B stamp, you really need nothing more than the stag simply stamped and coloured,  it is such a beautiful design, both cards look amazing but I think you see more detail on the white card, that corner stamp is so pretty too.

Thank you so much for two lovely cards for this weeks challenge XXX 

Sonia

Sonia's Description:

I’ve chosen Tracey Hey as my brand this week and have used various stamps from different collections 😊

Sonia your cards are amazing,  I love the modern style, slightly quirky with so many interesting elements with the cute hearts, faix stitching,  lovely script background, I love the font too!  She is an incredible designer, I can see why you like her stamps, I am very tempted to go over to her website!!!  Thank you so much my lovely for supporting the challenge XXX

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Thank you so very much ladies for your inspiration,  I really appreciate your support.

I hope that you all manage to stay warm and cozy and enjoy your Sunday, 

Love and warm hugs to all of you,

Sandra                                                                                  xxxxxx 

Mixed Up Saturday

 

Good Saturday Morning Ladies, 

Today is forecast to be cloudy, yesterday we had torrential rain and lights on one minute, bright sunshine, lights off the next!!  At times the rain was virtually horizontal!!  The river has once again burst its banks and flooded the fields beside it. 

We have a ridiculously early start to the day today as we are taking Becca & Adam to Gatwick for their very long flight to Bali, I do hope they have an amazing time, I have advised Becca to be careful what she eats as she is prone to tummy upsets!  I'm sure it will be tha amazing experience they are hoping for. 

Lucy 's Welcome Home sign for Flynn 

Lucy is more confident using my Scan & Cut than I am, I think they don't have the fear of messing up that we have, she had it all done in about half hour that included deciding on the size and finding the Anchor symbol to cut out too. We then stapled it to a piece of lace  *it was only thing I had to hand that was wide enough to staple letters too*.  Flynn had a huge smile on his face when he saw it, so it was worth the effort.

Diecutting Essentials Issue 101

Issue 101 comes with a Moonstone (Hunkydory)Die Set, I has a striplet style die with a separate cutting edge, it also has shaped border die.  There is some great inspiration too. 

Some lovely card ideas using the free dies, some lovely shaped/fancy folds.  

This months Technique Showcase focuses on die cutting flowers out of white card and then colouring them with Distress ink.

Back to Basics: Different ways of using circle dies to create some fun designs.

Amy shares some colourful ideas for using up the waste from your die cutting or uour 'bit box' . The ideas look quite effective,  I would never thought of Embossing them.

Some pretty cards & Gift bags made with the free dies, including a different idea using the die cut inked up piece to create a distressed image for a card.

This feature shares ideas for shaker cards using different dies you may have in your stash. 

Sharon has created some lovely shaped cards featuring the free dies, one idea uses the strip die as a stencil.  

This issue has some great ideas and inspiration, if I'm honest I doubt I will use the free die set, mainly because I have SW striplet dies in my stash that I don't use, but you never know the inspiration might encourage me to pick it up.   Trouble is I have so many simple background ideas buzzing round my mind I can't think of anything else. 

I hope that you all have a lovely Saturday,  

Love and hugs to all of you,

Sandra

xxxxxx 

Mixed Up Saturday

 

Good Saturday Morning Ladies,

We have a fun outing this morning as Sophie has asked us to take her into work with her huge Oil Painting, it won't fit in her clio, plus I think she wants us to see it hung up in the restaurant, we get to spend a few hours in the park too which will be lovely,  although its very cold around here today! 

I have donevq review on the 100th Edition of Diecutting Essentials below so lets have a look at what this month has in store.....

Diecutting Essentials 

Issue 100

Magazine Review 

Issue 100 has a lovely free gift courtesy of Chloe Endean of Chloe’s Creative Crafts, you get a lovely butterfly die and three word dies that are a decent size.  The magazine has lots of inspiration too.

Chloe herself takes you through how to make sone of the cards made with the free gifts. As always Chloe’s cards are really pretty and have lots of sparkle.

Technique Showcase: Stepped Back Technique 

This technique shows how to highlight a focal point by creating a 'tunnel effect, by raising the things around it.  So if you have a die cut flower,  you would cut the flower out of the background and raise the background up with foam pads, then drop the coloured flower die cut into the aperture. I have zoomed in on the tutorial to help you.  Its a fun idea and another way to get more use out of your dies.

Back To Basics: sentiment dies

This technique requires sentiment dies with separate background dies ( the double layer ones)

It looks like you are using the background part of the die to cut an aperture and then adding the die cut word into the aperture. Its nice to see a different way to use those dies.

Sandra Rayner has made some lovely projects with the free dies, that Birthday Hanger is a lovely idea.

Nicky has made some lovely projects using both the free dies and the downloadable papers, the cards really do Showcase the free gifts perfectly. 

Skills Booster: Faux Foiling 

Basically this technique gets you using a metallic marker to add gold detailing around your die cuts etc.   A simple idea thats quick and quite effective.

This magazine has some lovely content, as long as you aren't sick of Butterflies!  

I hope you ladies have a lovely Saturday,  

Love and hugs to all of you,

Sandra xxx

Hello Friday......

 

Good Friday Morning Ladies, 

It's been a really long week, I am literally buzzing that it's Friday, I feel like I've hardly seen Paul this week, then yesterday I was home alone,  Paul didn't get in until after 6pm, he left at 6.30am!   So he was exhausted,  it didn't help that I was awake until around 4.45am, my tinnitus was so loud Wednesday night it drove me crazy, combined with Mr walrus snoring next to me, even Milo snore, when you can't sleep yourself hearing snoring is like torture because you wish you were joining them. I really have to find away to get Paul to go to GP as he definitely has sleep apnea!   Despite my long night I was up and organised by around 10.30am, Paul had emptied dishwasher etc so i only had a few jobs to manage.  Sadly though Sue couldn't make it over, 😪.  So I decided to get in my craft room and get busy to keep those demons from my mind!! 

I decided I was going to sit and get busy making backgrounds for my Thrinchies, so I set up my laptop watched some YouTube videos and dug out my Gelli plate, I followed a Tracy Evans tutorial for ideas for background using Gelli plate, I made about 30 using that,  then I got my oxide sprays out and made a few more, finishing with some 'smooshed' backgrounds and some Distress oxide on gelli plate.  I was still going when Paul came in!

Here are a few of them...

I think there were 60 in total, so not a bad afternoon crafting!  It's not until you stop that you fulky appreciate the mess you have created! 😲😳🤣

Challenge 

Just a reminder that we are carrying last weeks challenge over to next week, I hope that you have all decided what stamp set / Brand eyc you are using ?? I would still like some for this Sunday if you have them ready . 

I hope that you all have a fantastic Friday, 

Love and hugs to all of you, 

Sandra                                                                      xxxxxx

My First Thrinchie

Good Morning Ladies,

Well ladies my Antibiotics are finished,  so now I am going to start taking my Alternative treatment,  I have started some of the supplements already, Cranberry Supplements I have taken for a while, I have started a Probiotic and Garlic & Parsley seed capsules,  I did research into them all including L-argininne and Magnesium and they are all fine with my AF/Flutter infact some of them are helpful to heart conditions.  The only one that had a negative was Evening Primrose oil, which can cause palpitations,  so I will watch out for that,  I get them anyway so we'll see if they increase. 

The Dream Team! 🤞🙏

This is what I am hoping will prevent me from having anymore antibiotics,  the research papers that I read said that this combination worked in preventing Uti's it also reversed the Resistance to antibiotics that all participants had. So fingers crossed, there are lots of other benefits to these too, I am trying to stay positive.  

Now the "alternate Treatment " the GP was talking about was a combination of a drug called 'Hiprex'  which basically changes to formaldehyde & Ammonia in your bladder turning your urine acidic, so that Ecoli bacteria cannot thrive/grow in acidic environment, combined with D-Mannose which is an over the counter supplement that I could add into my combination above.  The Hiprex has some pretty nasty side effects that don't excite me so I'm not keen on taking it, this combination smooth the lining of your bladder and create an environment that's hostile to bacteria which is exactly what the natural combination above do, so I am going to try that first.  I had to buy a new medication dispenser to fit all of these new medications in, otherwise I'd be in a right muddle! 

Now onto my Thrinchie, my first realisation.... working on a small 3x3 inch piece is as daunting as working on an A3 piece!!  You have to scale everything down, finding that balance between not enough and overkill is not as easy as you think when you start out. 

I started by making some backgrounds on Tuesday afternoon using Pixie Powders and Brushos,  this particular piece was a Brusho background. I added a bit of stencilling and some stamping, the main wings feature I created by stamping the wings from Aall&Create #45 onto vellum and embossing with white powder, then fussy cutting 2 times layering together, I added extra detail by stamping butterflies and adding clear embossing powder and another butterfly I stamped and fussy cut, the little dots of Nuvo sparkly are hard to pick up on camera.  I really enjoyed creating it, I need to stop overthinking now and enjoy the process! 

I hope that you all have a lovely day, 

Love and hugs to all,

Sandra

xxxxxx