Creative Stamping Magazine Review

 

Good Saturday Morning Ladies, 

Oh my goodness I cannot be coping with this level of Cold 🥶.  Paul must have thought that I had lost the plot on Thursday night in bed, I was so cold (full on shivering) that after about an hour of shivering I was so cold down to my bones I was in tears,  I was virtually welded to Paul physically,  my feet were entwined in his legs and he was full on hugging me to share his lovely toasty body heat, but it seemed to make no difference, now whether its because of my long term blood loss or just the extra body ache that the cold brings to anyone with constant bone pain I have no idea,  but last night I went to bed in layers, with the heated blanket on before bed and the hot water bottle, I will let you know later. 

Maria I know the scenery in Zell am See is stunning, I mean I would love to see Austria,  but I would want to go in the sunshine and warm weather.  I know that you & Rick love the snow abd your photos have been stunning in the past,  I would definitely say its your 'Happy Place ' !!  I hope that you both have an amazing time, I can't wait to see this year's photos and hear all about your holiday.  I hoped you remembered your thermal drawers!! 🤣😂

It's never a good idea to be left alone in the magazine aisle,  did I need a magazine?  No i didn't but as with all craft stash,  we never need it, but its nice to have,  so I thought I'd share it with my lovely friends.....

Creative Stamping issue 143

This first issue of 2025 has some lovely floral stamps, some Spring flowers, plus a lovely Magnolia (I think) from Stamps by Me.  

The first feature has Sarah Phelan sharing ideas for Lattice cards,  we did these asca tutorial last year, they look really effective,  especially with the flowers and leaves woven through the lattice.

I mentioned that metallic/foiling would be a trend this year and here it is featured, Laura Murcott shares different ways of adding foiling to your cards,  there are lots of options from double sided tape, the heat up bonding powder that get tacky when you heat them, even glue pens will work. You just need to make sure you have the right kind of foil.  Some are heat activated, some need images printed with toner,  you could just use gilding flakes too. 

Some fab fun folds made using the free downloadable papers.  

Some lovely gifting ideas, using the free stamps and papers.  I like the chocolate bar box and  the Pocket Gift tag, which would be great for gifting seeds 

Now Mark Making is something I haven't really heard of.  Its apparently the oldest form of art and something that people have been doing for many years!  You can use anything from Bubblewrap to Vegetables. Things that inspire you in nature,  you have to go right back to basics and leave any idea of perfect stamping at the door!!  It's all about having fun and enjoying the creativity.

Glenda Hall shares different ways of getting the watercolour effect.  For istance get those watercolour markers out and use them to colour your stamped images, then spritz with water, the harder you press down the more the ink will spread.  Now if you use a stamp platform and replace the watercolour background back in place (after drying) you can then ink the stamp with black ink and add the detail back over the watercolouring.  

Stamping on vellum and then adding colour on the reverse gives a much softer effect, just go careful when heat embossing on vellum it sets very quickly

Julia Dawson shares different ways to add highlights and spotlight to your cards, each card has a different effect, all lovely 😍 

All in all there are some great techniques,  great inspiration at a time of year when we all need a bit of a boost.  The stamps are all very usable too. 

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I hope that you all have a super Saturday,  

Love and hugs to all of you,

Sandra xxx 

Perfectly Lovely Day card

 

Good Friday Morning Ladies,  

My goodness what a cold end to the week,  it started off chilly with the snow on Sunday but it seems that it's gotten colder as week has gone on. The 'actual' feel has been -3, -4, even colder where we are in the real rural areas.  We look over a huge valley which I think makes it much colder,  bitter in fact.  Today is the coldest so far !  

By stark contrast, my heart goes out to all of those poor families that have lost everything in the wild fires in California, the news showed aerial films of huge densely populated/suburban areas that have been burnt to the ground. You just can't imagine, it must be terrifying, I saw one man on news saying that he had found photos of his Grandfather when he was in World War two, he had them pn his desk ready to get framed but they were destroyed along with his whole house in minutes,   it makes you sit and think about all the things you have that would be irreplaceable,  our wedding photos,  photos of all children as babies, etc, back then they weren't digital,  we had negatives!  So if they were destroyed it would be devastating,  I have all mums photos here too.   I do hope that they get these fires under control soon.

Today's card I made particularly because I wanted to use that sentiment, I die cut Bold Blooms flowers in Orchid Oasis card,  I thought it worked with the soft green card thatI used for foliage, frame etc.  I arranged the flowers around the frame.  I placed it on a embossed background on a 4 1/4 X 5 1/2 inch card base. 

I hope that you all manage to stay safe & warm,

Love & hugs to all of you,

Sandra xxx 

Simple Wildflower

 Good Morning Ladies, 

I hope today finds you well, are you all back in the usual weekly routine,  I think we are getting there, although we are out of routine with organising meals,  mostly because we are still using bits up from Christmas food shopping,  so this week we are getting back to planning meals for the week ahead, which is boring 😴,  choosing meals is one of my pet , the other thing we have found is that the dates on food in supermarkets are so short these days, its impossible to buy for the 'week' ahead, you can get to Tuesday or Wednesday,  without having to freeze stuff, which wouldn't be a problem if I didn't forget to take things out of freezer!  

Today's card is really simple, I used a stencil to add Twisted Citron ink to the background,  I added a little Shabby Shutters too, I used a brush to add some splatters to finish the background.  I die cut a Wildflower from Tim Holtz Wildflower die set,  I used Mustard Seed & Squeezed Lemonade for the flower and Twisted Citron & Shabby Shutters for the stem.  I stamped the sentiment in Twisted Citron and then added the die cut flower to the background.  I added some resin dots to finish the look, I also used a distress tool to rough up the edges.

I hope that you all have a great Thursday, 

Love & hugs to all of you ,

Sandra xxx 

Adding Fabric to Simple floral card

 

Good Wednesday Morning Ladies, 

We woke to a covering of snow yesterday morning with glorious sunshine 🌞 too, so the best of both worlds.  I bought myself some 'half calf' wellies so that I can get out in the garden, although I have been banned until all signs of ice have gone,  I am hoping to start doing a circuit of the garden every morning with my wheeled walker to try and increase my fitness, baby steps though,  I'm not sure if it will be my heart or legs that give out first 🤣😂   I will say that the wellies are a little heavier than I thought so I'm hoping that won't be a problem. 

I have been wanting to add fabric and stitching to my cards for ages now,  yesterday while looking for jewellery tools for the girls (they were making bracelets) I came across some Taperlogy rub ons that I bought for junk journalling a couple years ago, they come with some calico material, so I created 3 little rectangles using the rub ons and then tearing the calico and then pulling the threads at the edges to give that lovely frayed look.  Now I wasn't sure how to add them to a card, I decided to pick a dark green 'Mossy Meadow' as it was a colour that was in each rub on and went with the Kraft card base too.  I used my Deckle Edged dies to continue the rough/frayed look and then added the 3 pieces to my Kraft card base along with a Tim Holtz Sentiment that I stamped in Mossy Meadow and used Deckle Edged trimmer to cut down to size.

It's very simple,  I'm not sure I love it, I may stick to adding them to tags.  One think I like to be is honest, I think its important to show the things we make that we aren't so keen on as well as the ones we love.  

I hope that you all have a happy Wednesday,  

Love & hugs to all, 

Sandra xxx 

Another Simple Floral card

 

Good Morning Ladies, 

We started yesterday off with a light covering of snow and frost and ended up with blue sky and sunshine, which was lovely,  surprising how much having sun pouring through the window makes,  a down side is that highlights the dust, our lounge was terrible from taking the tree down and having the log burner on all weekend. 

Today's card is another simple floral card, I was inspired by a card by a lady called Patti on Pinterest,  using the Delightfully Eclectic papers for the background and Timeless Charm dies for the flower.  The colours used are Lemonlime Twist and Bubble Bath.  Finished off with matching ribbon and pearls. 

I hope that you all have a good Tuesday,  

Love & hugs to you all,

Sandra xxx 

Pretty Spring Florals

 

Good Monday Morning Ladies, 

Here we are at the first 'fully back to normal ' week of the New Year,  it's going to feel like a long one for me with everyone back to normal schedules, having said that the girls work (Wildlife park) closes during the week throughout January, for essential maintenance,  I think it's also because its the quietest month of the year for visitors and its not so cost effective for them to fully staff and heat the restaurant & kiosks.  The thing about it that frustrates me is that because the park is closed for the week days, the girls do have courses to go on during that period but to cover other days the girls have to use Annual Leave or take it unpaid.  Now most people with monthly bills etc can't afford to take it unpaid.  Who wants to take annual leave in January?  Its cold and miserable and term time so most can't take advantage of time for family holidays.  I am hoping that this is the year that the girls find jobs that they love.  

Did any off you get snow, ours started at around 10pm and continued for a few hours, there was still a good couple inches yesterday morning when the girls left for work but by early afternoon the rain came and turned it to awful sludge, let's hope it doesn't freeze.  It now looks like its not getting above 3 ° all week for us.  🥶

Today's card is a simple floral card using a pretty paper collection that I got in SU sale its called 'Delightfully Eclectic '  I layered a piece if the pretty paper onto a die cut, scalloped rectangle and then onto a bit of 'Bubble Bath ' pink card that I embossed, then into a white card base, I didn't have matching ribbon so I coloured a piece of seam binding ribbon with Bubble Bath ink and dried it.  I added it to the front panel and tucked the sentiment tag behind it. 

I hope you like it my lovelies,  

Love and hugs to all of you,

Sandra xxx 

Our Crafts from this week

 

Good Sunday Morning Ladies, 

Well we didn't get the snow that was forecast,  at the time of writing today's post anyway!    We got our food shop done on Friday afternoon just in case it did, which left the day free, we put it to good use though, we got Christmas all packed away,  everything all boxed up ready for Paul to put back in the loft today.  I do love how much more spacious the house looks after the decorations go away.    Have you all taken yours down?  

Lilian & Maria have both shared a card with us for today....

Lilian 

Lilian has shared the last of her 'Trio of Script Christmas ' cards,  I love that these stamps are ones that you have had for years,  yet they look like could have been bought last week.  Here are the other two for reference.....

Aren't they a lovely trio?? 

All coloured perfectly just as we have come to expect from our Lilian ! 

Thank you so much for sharing the last of your trio with us today my lovely XXX 

Maria

Oh Maria, what an absolutely stunning card, the crystal beads give the card a touch of luxury,  elevating it from a card to a Beautiful gift,  any recipient of your work would feel so blessed to have something that you have taken so long to create.  

Thank you so much my lovely for sharing your lovely Crystal Art card with us XXX

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Karen, I hope that you are having an amazing time, we are looking forward to some photos,  missing you xxx

Enjoy the warmer weather today ladies, it's back to being chilly tomorrow, 

Sending my love & hugs to all of you, 

Sandra xxx