Easter and Mami Doodle

A huge number of challenges wanted Easter cards this week and it's not a card I have made since primary school - so here's one using a Phindy's place image and a hand written sentiment (I kept forgetting to print one...)
Raise the bar this week wanted "something you dont usually do" and so both cards kind of qualify, in that I dont do Easter an I also have never used My Mind's Eye papers before. Hard to believe now I've seen them but this is a first (but not the last!)
My second card for the day is MME paper and decoupage flowers using a mami doodles image, I paper pieced her dress using some sassafrass paper samples I had the big pink bow is real cheapskate stuff - it came tie around a pair of pyjamas from Penneys....
So the res q challenge this week is eggs, eggs, eggs
paperplay challenge is Easter
raise the bar - something you don't normally do
I used the sketch at papertake weekly
dare u 2 digistamp is also Easter
daring cardmakers also has eggs as their theme.
and that's it. tfl.

another Mo and a few new challenges

So I'm sneaking in a final entry for Mo's dream team guest design spot here for April. I've simply followed the sketch, I had coloured the image and couldn't decide what to do with her and somewhere along the line what started out as a black and white background transformed itself into something more grown up looking with pearly purples and red but hey ho it's all about experimenting... and the La La Land challenge wants homemade flowers.
Secondly is a card using a Karens Whimsy image - a new one for me and incorporating her weekly sketch challenge . Loved this image as soon as I saw it and had to track it down - there's a boy version as well. I originally tried her in pink but me and pink just don't get along well and she looked drab and flat when I'd finished, so I started again prompted by the Res Q challenge colour palette for this week with just a hint of the pink and I'm much happier with the end result.
The cute card Thursdaychallenge this week is dimension - so it's an easel card (what a suprise!)
crafty creations challenge this week is for babes.
phew.... back to the daily stuff..... tfl

Mo's sketch for the GD spot with a RESQ!

When I saw this week's RESQ challenge, I was just going to pass it up - pastel colours are just not my cup of anything but then I thought, heck, it's a challenge aint it? And so while it's almost the end of another month (eeek! I'll be spring cleaning in Autumn at this rate), that means there's another chance of a guest design spot at Mo's Dream Team - these girls are amazingly talented and I'd love to have a chance to have my work along side theirs for a month and so I've had a bash.
So it's Mo's sketch and a Res Q colour challenge with a few pearls and flowers for good measure (you can hardly see but I glued tiny seed pearls to her dress frill and top) and all the cardstock came from an siopa bui and the end result a fresh and spring feeling card from me.....
tfl.x

digi bug, ladybug, ladybird....

So I'm still in digi bug mode - unfortunately all of our household is under a week long vomiting bug. So rather than the emjoyable, relaxed make a card Sunday I had planned, it was piles of icky sheets and laundry to deal with. So my cards today are super quick mostly digi ones.
First up is a Good Luck card - I used this week's PCP Saturday sketch and the image is my favourite Softpencil image, Michu is a Magician - it reminds me of the Miffy rabbit books we had in nursery school. This week's paperplay is to create a Good Luck card, while this week's Paper Cutz challenge wants one ribbon and three buttons. Yep done that. All I added apart from the challenge requirements was a single gem by the sentiment and a dash of glamour dust - after all it is magic....
Next up is a second one using the PCP sketch - using a set of free brushes I picked up long ago and a ladybird, just because I wanted to make one - he's freehand and then I layered his back with a clear domed sticker (I should have done this bit first as the sticker is smaller than the ladybird but hey ho.
Right enough skiving from me - it's back to the housework for me - have an unbelievable 4 bin bags of rubbish for the morning, plus bags for recycling and 2 for Chernobyl lorry and I'm still in a pig sty! So it's no cards (ok perhaps one or two) and all spring cleaning for me this week - the grub will emerge houseproud and organised...... hmmm, unlikely but the spiders look in need of some exercise.

New Baby Card

Been putting this one on the long finger but finally found time to put it together this evening using the sketch from Friday Sketchers and the colour challenge - lilac and lemon over at Papertake weekly I then used a quote for the current ABC challenge Q is for Quotes and what do you know my card all but made itself.
Not a colour combo I'd ever choose myself (but very much my sister's cup of tea!)- so much so I had no lemon or lilac ribbon in my stash, hence the purple and the only 2 promarkers that vaguely resembled lilac and lemon had to suffice. Pearls as always from ZVA creative (will soon have a reason to order more and there is so much yummy stuff it will have to be a big enough to last order!)
I'd just got the yellow dots card at An Siopa Bui on Saturday and the flowers have been in my stash since I first discovered little flowers and had a buying frenzy from somewhere in the Phillipines years ago.
The shoes I picked up as a digi freebie from the Rusty Pickle digi blog I think.
tfl

Happy St.Patrick's Day!

A bit late with my posts this week - I had a really fun time at An Siopa Bui, Kerry's sister had made cupcakes that were absolutely divine - swirly pink ones and fudgey chocolate ones (I didn't taste these as greedy crafters scoffed them long before my tea break!) but can atest that the lemon cheese ones were truly scrumptious and the kids devoured the two "an bui" ones that came home with me.
Of course I was really there for die cutting not cake - I love the big cupcake hlder die from Sizzix (on my wish list) and not only will it make all your cupcakes look divine, if you turn it upside down and stick a scalloped circle on the bottom with foam pads, it makes a nifty eggcup holder or Easter egg container.... or put a little battery (no flames girls and boys!) operated tealight in the bottom and an artificial flower on top and you have an outdoor table light for the balmy summer evenings we'll be enjoying soon (honest we will).
You can see these ideas in real life at the upcoming Galway Craft event - I'll post the link once I have it. I'll be doing another die cut demo and I'm hoping I'll have my new Tim Holtz dies by then - oh I can't bear the wait!
Not a lot to show this week - I was doing a sample wedding set for someone - small pocket card, evening invitation and ceremony book and then a wedding card for a commission - no patterned paper here, I love just layered dies for a quick and elegant looking card. So this is for the dare U to digi stamp challenge
My cute little piggy card was a just for the heck of it card and it's for the paper play challenges this week - seeing double.
I made the green flowers from an old phone book for the raise the bar challenge "Go Green" - both green and recycled!
And Papercutz has made this weeks challenge super easy with an anything goes challenge.
And that's all folks - the girls have had a vomiting bug and so I hope they wont be literally wearing green today. Yuk. Enjoy parades, guinness and craic .....

Another bunch of cards

I've decided to blog twice a week and incorporate a few cards (hopefully!) into each post rather than keep trying to post as soon as I have something made.
So tonight I played with my new mami doodles image - isn't she cute? Although I'm not too sure about the card, it took me a long time and I still feel it's not quite in balance but I do like the zippy red and green offset by the candy pinks - not a colour combo I could ever have chosen but it just kind of evolved. The rolled up flowers are similar to the ones Elisa highlighted on her other scrapping blog here, the paper is 7 gypsies and there is a cuttlebug panel in the circle aperture (this looks too stark and I should have added touch of peeled paint distress me thinks. I highlighted the girl's top and socks with seed pearls & I put flock on the cat, except you can't see it too well but he feels all velvety!And there's more pearls and a Tim Holtz adage tag to finish - these are so handy when I'm too lazy to print out a sentiment (a lot...).
So my mami doodle card is for friday sketchers used as my base sketch.
It's also for die cuts r us challenge 29 - flowers
And digital tuesday challenge - piercing.
Also dare u to digi stamp pearls challenge (I think a challenge for me would be a no pearls challenge - I love em).

Next up is a Mother's Day card using a Mo Manning image of dancing nuns - I just sdore this and I have been trying to think of other uses for it than the obvious Sisters. I paper pieced the central nun by printing the image onto a piece of Basic Grey Boxer collection paper. I then made my easel card using the same paper collection. I added distress ink to the edge of the image to soften it and die cut some grungeboard to make the large flower with one of my pearl brads in the centre.
I made this for the ABC challenge P is for Paper Piecing - which I like doing as you get 2 weeks to complete the challenge - think this is a perfect idea, especially as there are so many things to do in a week!

Lastly a quick "Love You" card for The Res Q challenge - use text on your card. More 7 gypsies paper bit of ribbon and a flower. Easy as that!
And I must add what was I thinking with the little girl card on my last post - tis a bit ghastly - the card design not the image....

Couple of quick cards based on Susanna's Saturday sketch challenge on Paper Craft Planet and using my new Softpencil images that I WON - yipee, last week. I have whole file of these little cuties, so you'll be seeing more!
I also finished the Papertake weekly challenge which was bows, buttons. brads and bling and the Paperplay Challenges - this week it's just because cards, which these definitely are.
Coloured with Promarkers, rub ons from 3 bugs in a rug and decorated with odds and bobs.
tfl - and enjoy the weekend.....
Oh and I am doing a free demonstration at An Siopa Bui, Spiddal, Co Galway next Saturday 13th March. Kerry has asked me to go along and play with all things die cut for the day - so it's about getting more from your dies and embossing folders - not just for cards but ideas for gifts, fundraisers, boxes and whatever else I imagine up between now and then. So if I'm quite on the blog front this week, it's because I am sample making. So come along if you can - it's free and the views are fabulous and there's a marvellous cafe and crafty goodness, what more could a body want?!?

sassy studio sketch challenge Thursday

I just love the Alice in Wonderland releases from Sassy Design Studio - my fave has to be Miss Hatter. I used their sketch as well to make a quick and easy card.
Papers are my very under used Basic Grey - it's one paper line that I have never been able to use very successfully. I'd buy them as soon as they were released and then shuffle them round for a few weeks and then put them away! But this is the year of the stash reduction and I think it turned out ok given my BG phobia.