Snippet Number 3

 

Good Wednesday Morning Ladies, 

Well I am beginning to wonder in gale force winds are just part of living in this house, it seems that at least once every week I am laid in bed wondering if roof tiles are secure!  Later in day, around 5pm the torrential rain started, it does make you feel cozy and warm being tucked up inside though.  

Poor Soph is absolutely full of flu, she has the full on body aches and shivers and I listened to her coughing most of the night, I felt so sorry for her, I did go in with an extra couple of pillows to see if that helped but it didn't make much difference bless her, I have got the vick out for her for tonight, I have such vivid memories of Mum putting Vick on our chests at night when we were poorly,  O never liked to rub it on their skin so put in on their pj's, I have to say we had more success with Olbas Oil or 'Dab Dab" as it is affectionately known in our house, because we used to say 'dab dab' as we were tapping on their pj's or cot/bed sheets.  In fact Becca had to ask me what 'dab dab' was actually called so she could buy some.   Paul's parents were a bit fancier than mine, we had Vick, they had a plug in thing that created a vapour of vick or something similar, we did buy something similar when the children were small but found it ineffective,  nothing beat a little dab dab! 🤣😂

Today I am sharing another Snippet, the background of this one is a new stamp, as is the flower,  I am really enjoying making them, because you are crafting along you don't have to overthink anything, there is plenty of fussy cutting and colouring which I find so relaxing.  I started the next one yesterday afternoon and that involved getting the Gelli plate out, I haven't used that in a good year I would say, something else I love to play with as the results are a surprise every time. 

I hope that you have a calm & dry day,

Love and hugs to all of you,

Sandra xxx

Sophie's Birthday card

 

Good Morning Ladies, 

We had a wet and very windy day again yesterday,  the wind was biting too.  I did see a forecast that mentioned snow at the weekend,  but I doubt we'll see any,  although snow has been a regular occurence on the girls birthday, so it wouldn't be out of the norm.  

I have a lovely day crafting yesterday,  Paul was working behind me, which makes it even more enjoyable,  just having company fills me with joy.  I was creating some Tracy Evans Snippets, I don't find them as quick to make as Tracy suggests, she said she likes to keep the time down to 15 minutes,  I was on atleast an hour and half to 2 hours. It's things like finding the right size dies or trying colouring on Pink Frog card and finding it didn't work etc, I do get easily distracted too! 🤣

Now onto Sophie's card, firstly she prefers to be called  'Soph',  she says Sophie is her Sunday name,  only to be used if she is in trouble 🤣😂

I used HoneyDoo Paint Splats stamp and Distress Oxide inks, Salty Ocean,  Peacock Feathers, Wild Honey,  Abandoned Coral, Spiced Marmalade & Mowed Lawn.  I used my SU Large Letter dies, I die cut the letters from the panel of white card, then used tape on the back to hold the letters back in place,  I then stamped the splats over the die cut letters.  Looking at the card now I wish I used slightly larger ink splats but the next size up in my set is way too big.  I adhered the white layer to a black mat and then onto the white card base, I placed the 'O' & the 'P' back in their respective apertures so that I could get the fall out pieces in exactly the right place,  I then added foam pads to all of the letters and placed them back in place.  I stamped the Happy Birthday in VersaMark ink onto a piece of black card and added white embossing powder and heat set, I trimmed it down and added it to the top left corner of the card. 

I hope that you all stay warm, dry and safe from this next storm, 

Sending my love and hugs to all of you 

Sandra                                                                    xxxxxx 

Lucy's Birthday card

 

Good Monday Morning Ladies, 

Welcome to the start of a new week, are you all feeling creative?  I ended up crafting most of Saturday which is something I don't generally het to do, however I left making the girls birthday cards rather late, so with a furrowed brow and a head full of no ideas I just started digging out stamp sets and dies and had a play,  I wanted to go with an art theme for Sophie but had no ideas for Lucy so just went for a bright and cheerful design.

Sophie's eclipse card was made using HoneyDoo paint splats stamps and Distress Oxide inks, which I haven't used in ages (apart from those Tracy Snippets last week). I had used Distress Inks more.

Lucy's card used my StampinUp Large Letters and Spellbinders  Bold Blooms dies for the flowers. 

We had a very relaxed day, Matt came over to drop something off for the girls and spent ages testing out his new camera lens taking photos of Milo & Bella.  We finished off the day going out for dinner, It wouldn't have been my choice but it's the girls birthday so their choice, I will let you know how it went.  You had to leave credit card details, they only hold your table for 15 minutes,  you only get your table 1 hour 15 minutes to finish your meal. 

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

Love and hugs to all,

Sandra xxx

Your New/Unused Challenge projects

 

Happy 24th Birthday 

Lucy & Sophie

Good Sunday Morning Ladies, 

It just doesn't seem possible that Lucy & Sophie ate 24 today, there are and always will be my babies, despite the fact that they are beautiful, funny and incredibly talented young ladies.  We are so very proud of both of them.  We hope you have an amazing day girls 🎂🍹🎁🎈🎉

Apart from being the girls birthday  Sunday is the day that we get to see everyone's challenge projects, it's my favourite day of the week. 

Your Challenge Projects 

Sonia

Sonia's Description:

Card 1:  I found a piece of card I’d already spritzed with Lavinia Mystical Mica sprays. I die cut using a heart from Stampin Up Meant To Be collection, the sentiment is also from the set. The straight on photo didn’t show up the colours and mica in the hearts, so added a side ways on photo to show the beauty of the colours ☺️

Card 2:  I inked a piece of watercolour card with Lost Shadow, Mermaid Lagoon and Broken China distress inks. I stamped snowflakes and the sentiment from Stampin Up Snowflake Sentiments collection. The die cut snowflakes are PinkFresh Studio

Oh Sonia I absolutely love your Valentines card, that inked paper is beautiful and the hints of gold give it that luxurious look.  Such a lovely composition too. 

Your second card is a beautiful Christmas card, I love that colour combination you have used.  The stamped background looks great behind those die cut snowflakes.  Thank you for taking part in this weeks challenge, especially as you have had  super busy week XXX

Karen

Karen's Description:

Snippet 1:  My version of Snippet 3 (in the end I think I’ve sort of muddled them up because I started by using a leaf stamp which isn’t showing veins

Snippet 2:  Here’s number 18, But used Viola not Violet. 

Karen thank you so much for inspiring me to start making these Snippets, I am really enjoying them, yours are amazing number 18 is so pretty.  Thank you for supporting the challenge XXX 

Lilian 

Lilian's Description:  

Hi, here is my card for this week.

The same flower stamp as last week

The little grassy stamps are Lavinia stamps 

The stencil is an old one from Aall&Create, not used it before.

Coloured with the distress pencils.

Have a good day.

This is an absolute WOW card Lilian, I love everything about it  I am so impressed with how vibrant those Tim Holtz Watercolour pencils are, your flower looks amazing, perfectly coloured as always.  Thank you so much for supporting the challenge and for tempting me with those new pencils 🤣 XXX

Maria 

Maria's Description:  

Card with flowers from Card Making Magic die and stamps set. I like Christina's stuff. I made a few extra flowers but haven't put them on yet for not sure and a sentiment will be put on later too 😂. A b

Oh Maria what a beautiful fancy fold card,  the paper you have used is so pretty, the flowers you made match the paper so perfectly.  I bet you can't wait to get your craft room finished my lovely, thank you so much for taking part XXX

Sue

Sue's card was made using the free stamps and dies that came with Simply Cards and Papercraft magazine that she did the review on yesterday.  I think its the first time Sue has made a card from a magazine using only the free gift.  I absolutely love the design, it's nice to see you crafting again, I don't think I have ever seen you sit and make a card from start to finish while you were here.   Sue's answer was to not get distracted by searching on Pinterest. 

Thanks Sue for taking part in this challenge XXX

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I hope that you all have a lovely Sunday 

Love & hugs to all of you,

Sandra                                                                    xxxxxx 

Mixed Up Saturday

 

Good Saturday Morning Ladies,

The girls birthday weekend began last night, one thing Sophie & Lucy have wanted to try for a while is a Seafood Boil, like they have in the 'Deep South ' of America,  now ours wasn't going to be on a grand scale, mostly because we couldn't get King Crab legs or a couple other bits of Seafood,  we had a feast though, with Mussels and clams, large raw prawns, giant Black prawns, sweetcorn and baby potatoes.  You started by boiling the corn and potatoes,  when almost cooked you drain, the add melted butter Old Bay seasoning, salt & pepper,  then mix in all of the Seafood and coat everything in spice and butter and divide between 4 tin foil parcels,  seal them tightly and bake in hot oven for 15 - 20 minutes, it was amazing,  fish all cooked perfectly in the foil steam packets, we had some lovely juices left at the bottom of the foil packet that Paul and the girls couldn't resist eating with some fresh crusty bread. We will definitely be having this again on special occasions. 

Sue did us a Magazine Review.....

Simply Cards & Papercraft 

Issue 253

This month the magazine and the free stamps and die set have a bright and colourful spring feel with some pretty florals, three cute birds and several sentiment stamps of different sizes and fonts. The floral die set is from Spellbinders.

There are several cards using different styles and techniques here. They will all be quite quick and simple to make. I like the Make a wish card, love the white embossed floral stamp on the colourful background. 

I was really interested to read about shaped card fronts. The basic idea is to cut 2 rectangles or whatever you want as the back of the card shape. You then cut another rectangle that is nearly half the size of the back. Score a small hinge at one end of this shape and glue it onto the top of the back card base then fix the other large rectangle over the top to hide the tab and make the back tidy. Vanessa Hodgson shows us some pretty cards using flowers built up over the front of the cards. You must remember to use one or two hof the flowers or whatever you are using to sit level with the bottom of the card so that it can stand up on its own. I do want to try this technique, another one in my long list of “must try…..”

Sarah Jackman Read has designed 6 gift ideas using this months freebies. The gift box has a free download if you fancy having a go at it. It’s a nice size for a little thank you gift. I only use baubles at Christmas usually but I love this idea as a gift tag or embellishment. 

The third article using the freebies is designed by Nicky Gilburt and I love her makes. Using strips of card as the front of a card looks great as Nicky has on two of her cards. She also shares a How to: on stamping a mirror image using a gel plate which you need for the birds on the Happy birthday card. 

This article designed by Cathy Andronicou. It’s about adding more dimension with stepped up die-cutting. Basically you die-cut into the card and also layer die-cuts on top of the card giving the impression of more depth. A benefit of this technique is cheaper postage.

As always please ask if you would like any more info. 

Take care. 

Love Sue

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Thank you so much Sue for a fantastic review, this is a great Issue the free Spellbinders free dies are really handy, I like the font of the sentiment too.  Some great techniques to try too. XXX 

** Next Week ** Karen has done us a guide to using the 'Perfect Layers ' tool, I have one but have never been able to work out how to use them so I am very much looking forward to reading it and having a go. 

I hope that you all have a fantastic weekend, 

Love & Hugs to all of you, 

Sandra xxx

New Paper Collection Card

 

Good Friday Morning Ladies, 

Thursday was quite a pleasant day weather wise, it was lovely and sunny, we had to drive on to Cheltenham to collect the replacement wheelchair that was ordered for me, I wasn't excited to be going to that place again as last time it was so frustrating and emotional that it affected my mood for a good 2 days!  The beautiful scenery on the way, which was highlighted by the beautiful sunshine helped to lift my mood on the way in,  we are blessed with beautiful countryside all around is here, making it hard not to smile as you take it all in.  

As it turned out it was kind of a wasted journey,  the wheelchair that they have ordered just didn't work, the leg raise was too low down which put pressure on a very sore area of my thigh, I felt terrible that she had worked hard to make it work but it was pointless having something that I was totally uncomfortable in, added to the fact that it had a steel frame (mine is aluminium) making it extra heavy for the girls to get in and out of their cars.  On fairness the lady was lovely and after trying a variety of things to resolve the issue, Paul pointed out what the problem was, which was the leg raise being too low and not adjustable.  She then said "right we have tried what we can offer here and it clearly isn't suitable, so I will order the exact same wheelchair that you have now" so she took all of the measurements and we now wait for it to come in.  She said that she reffered to me as 'the grey lady' as my needs fall between 2 categories.  We left there feeling frustrated,  I find going over all of my medical history very painful.  Thankfully that journey home improved my mood. 

Todau I am sharing a card I made with a brand new patterned paper from SU called "Irresistible Blooms' the papers have like an emboss resist like pattern on them, it is a pretty collection made up of some lovely colours too.  

The pieces I used have the Pretty Peacock colour which I love, I kept the design tone on tone as I love the colours so much, so basically I started with a Pretty Peacock card base then matted and layered the patterned paper and pretty Peacock card stock, I added a couple of flowers cut from the same paper collection to add some decoration to the card, although I really like that beautiful emboss resist like pattern on the paper. 

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

Love and huge to all of you 

Sandra xxx

Snippet Number 2

 

Good Morning Ladies,

Well January is over, it was full of storms, hopefully February will bring us some calmer weather.  I do look forward to seeing all of the beautiful Spring flowers, we already have snowdrops around us, my bulbs are all just poking through,  teasing us! 

I hope that today finds you all as well as can be expected.  Gentle hugs to those of you that need one. ❤️ 

I had a visitor yesterday..... Sue came over, it was lovely to see her, I worked out that I hadn't seen her since November,  good to see you back to your normal self Sue xxx

Today I am sharing my second Snippet using Aall&Create stamps that were still in their original wrapping,  it does feel good to be using them all, I think I must have bought them for specific cards that I'd seen, some I picked up because they had a great offer at a show.  I used the same colours as yesterday with the addition of Picked Raspberry.

I hope that you all have a lovely day,

Love & hugs to all of you,

Sandra xxx