Christmas in August again...

Well here comes my favourite rabbit! Messy is just so adorable and I think this particular stamp has to be my all time favourite.

This card was just so eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeasy as I used a backing paper from one of the new paper pads produced by Joanna Sheen. This pad is number 5 in the series and is called White Christmas. Every page in the pad is just so useful - not just for using with Messy Rabbit, but for other characters too. Must try it with Tilda!

I was playing around yesterday with various bits of card stock and decided to try out some card I have called Iced Gold. It's white card, but has a coating on that gives it a sort of gold lustre - very nice and wonderful to use with Promarkers. You can't really tell in the photo, but Messy has a wonderful sheen to him that makes him a bit more Christmassy.

Feeling quite guilty after using the backing paper and having such an easy job I decoupaged Messy to both give dimension and a bit more oomph to the card. I also added a touch of glitter to make the scene frosty.

My card is for the following challenges...

Fab's Big Christmas Card Challenge - this one's not from a kit, but I think it still counts and Fab wants to see as many cards as possible.

Simon says - Christmas in August

Papertake Weekly - are celebrating 100 challenges - wow! They are asking members to choose a challenge from last year - I chose 'Let it snow, Let it Snow, Let is Snow'. I'm sure I joined in that one last year but I can't find my entry! Maybe it was a 'gonna do it but didn't one'!

Have a fantastic weekened everyone and see you on Monday for the latest Pink Elephant challenge.

Flying in...

with a very quick card made using the sketch 129 at CPS. The stamp is one from a clear set by Inkadinkado and after stamping onto white I cut the image into 3 sections and mounted on black. There are gems on the bird and the flower, but they are not showing up too well in the photo.

I like the sketch, but my card is not blowing me away - it's not even rustle my feathers so I think I'm going to have another go. Watch this space!

My card is also for the challenge at One Stop Craft where this week's theme is to use the colours pink and black.

Blog award...

I am delighted to be given this award from the lovely Elaine at My Creative Corner. Thanks Elaine, I really appreciate it!

In doing so, these are the rules which come with it!

1. Thank the person who nominated you for this award
2. Copy the logo and place it on your blog
3. Link the person who nominated you for this award
4. Name seven things about yourself that people might find interesting
5. Nominate seven Kreative Bloggers
6. Post links to the seven blogs you nominate
7. Leave comments on all seven blogs letting them know you nominated them

Right so now I must tell you 7 things that people might find interesting- Elaine's 7 things were fascinating - goodness knows what I am going to put!

1. I've just taken a year off work and called it my 'gap' year - well I didn't have one before or after college. I haven't done any hitch hiking though as I didn't fancy the idea of staying in hostels, etc. Unfortunately my year is up and I do need to think about returning to the work force, but not in a rush.

2. My mum has alzheimers and needs me nearby most of the time.

3. I have some amazing card making/blogging buddies that help to keep my sanity on a daily basis. I'm not going to mention names, but you know who you are and I love you all.

4. My favourite alchoholic drink is red wine and I suppose the favourite place to drink it is in the place where the grape is grown - hmmmmm line from one of favourite films sneaked in there. Love the film 'Shirley Valentine'.

5. If you happen to be the one person that I haven't told yet I was recently asked to make samples for Joanna Sheen and I'm still floating on air about it.

6. I have a multitude of kidneys - 3 at one side and 2 at the other. I'm not sure whether that makes me a good kidney donor or not, but I'd prefer to stay alive rather than find out.

7. My favourite treat is ginger - ginger anything - wine, icecream, chocolates, biscuits - love them all.

So there you go lol! Now on to my Nominees for this award :)

Max at Max's Craft Creations
Irene at All Occasions Cards and Papercrafts
Lorraine at Lorraine's Loft
Chrissie at Chrissie's Card Creations
Wendy at Pixie Days
Rita at RMG Design
Lorraine at Crafty Coo

Now just got to pop to their blogs and tell them the good news.

Christmas in August...

Just a very quick card using Kanban Christmas paper and images. The penguin, sentiment and snowflake design were already packed onto one sheet of card so all I really needed to do was find some matching green card and decide on a layout. A nice easy task which was what I needed as I have so much to do after being away.

I'm entering the card for the following challenges:

Fab's Big Christmas Card Project - make a Christmas card using one of the kits you have stashed away.

The Creative Card Crew - Christmas in August

Dutch Dare Christmas in August

Our Creative Corner - Christmas in August

Favourite Flowers...

At last Joanna Sheen's new stamp range called 'Favourite Flowers' is available on her website. I made this card using the primula stamp from the Wild Flowers collection. It is one of a set of six cards I made as samples for her and I will be showing the other cards after the live show on Create and Craft on Sunday.

The stamps are just beautiful to work with and were inspired by the beautiful work in The Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady. On this card I used a sketch that I particularly like that originally came from The Next Level challenge blog (oh I so miss that blog). I used Promarkers to colour the primulas and dragonfly with a touch of Sakura Stardust on the dragonfly's wings.

Of course the cuttlebug Swiss Dots folder and my favourite DCWV papers had to get in on the act too alongside nesties, peel offs and organza ribbon. I know other people have said this on their blogs, but seriously how did we make cards before cuttlebug folders and nesties?!

As I love to enter challenges I'm adding my card to these challenges:

Creative Inspirations - Tags

Pollycraft - Favourite Things (mine has got to be DCWV papers and the Swiss Dots folder)

Tanda Stamps - Tag it!

No time to Stamp - Birthdays

Allsorts - English Country Garden (Primula's are a favourite cottage garden plant)

Oh and before I forget if you loved the images in the book The Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady dash over to Joanna Sheen's website and check out her latest CD. Just gorgeous - can't wait to see the show on Sunday to see the cards made using it and the images on the CD. It looks as if it's going to be absolutely wonderful.

A little playing around...

So proud of myself - I've changed my blog! Okay the background was just an easy copy and paste from the Cutest Blog on the Block site, but for the header I had to a fair bit of playing around with colours and all sorts of gadgets in a photo editing suite that I haven't done before.

Really pleased with myself, especially as I did it all without loosing my blog completely!

If you too fancy a change check out The Cutest Blog on the Block - they have some really funky designs and really are easy to do. The link is on their motive in the top left corner of my blog.

Pink Elephant Summer Challenge

Yes this week at The Pink Elephant we are celebrating 'Summer' ! I know we don't seem to have really had one yet properly in England this year, but we can always pretend and in any case I have loads of happy memories of being on the beach at Great Yarmouth in the rain making sandcastles. No offence to Great Yarmouth it was probably raining everywhere else in England too.

My Summer card has a cute Cuddly Buddly stamped image for the focal point. I coloured the image with Promarkers and then realised that none of my pinks matched the paper I had chosen to take to Irene's with me. Yes this was made at Irene's and she encouraged me to use her pearls, which I really like as an addition.

Due to the non matching colours I decided to do some paper piecing - hmmmmmmm make mental note at this point to never ever paper piece images that have loads of detail. It took many layers to get the right finish on this card, but I do like the end result.

The shells are from a stamp set by Pink Cat Studio.