Simon Says Just Magnolia and Hanglar and Stanglar challenges

I had time to play yesterday and make a challenge card :)
I wanted to join in with the challenge at Simon Says Stamp where the challenge is coffee and cream, and as I decided to use a hAnglar and sTanglar image, I checked out the Just Magnolia and hAnglar and sTanglar challenge where there is a fab sketch, so I followed the sketch and used the coffee and cream colours.

 Of course the sweet image is a hAnglar one and is coloured with Promarkers and then sponged around the image with antique linen distress ink.
Not sure where the flowery paper came from, I found it is my scrap box, so no idea about that one. The sheet music is from an old Viola music book which I spotted one day in a charity shop window lol. It was white so I inked it with sime antique linen distress ink, and the brown strips are from Papermania.
The ribbon was a light gold colour and didn't quite go with the colours and I couldn't find another ribbon to match, so I inked that with the antique linen ink as well...... that ink pad really got a good work out on this card lol.
The flowers are a mix from my stash. Some were white, so they got inked as well and then I added some stickles to them al for a bit of sparkle and some pearl sprays which I pulled from some other flowers that I have had in my stash for months.

A little close up of the cute image.... I am really loving these hanglars just now :)

You can't really see the sparkle on the flowers but in real life, they are very sparkly.
Oh and the haf pearls round the image were an after thought. I had a bag of them sitting on my desk and was going to do a swirly flourish type thing with them, but thought that might be a bit much, so just added them around the image instead.

Sorry I didn't get round to announcing my followers candy yesterday, I totally forgot about it! So will do that today at some point. Got to go find something to give away for my next candy and take a pic first.
Not sure what it's going to be yet.....hmmmm, how about a set of stamps???
I will see what I come across that I can part with lol.

Thanks for stopping by

Candy Time again!!

This post is a sticky, please scroll down for more recent posts.

You know one day I might, just might post something on the correct day!! The kids were off school Friday, Monday and are off today for holidays and in-service days so my days have been totally messed up!! lol
Better late than never though, so here's my new candy :)

 Not a very clear pic I'm afraid, so I will list what is in this pile.

Pack of assorted pink paper feet (good for baby cards)
Pack of metal flower embellishments
Some lengths of assorted ribbon and lace
Pile of  Prima flowers in different sizes and colours (it doesn't look as much here as irl, but trust me there is quite a lot of flowers there)
Some bunches of assorted stemed flowers (think there is about 6 or 7 bunches there)
10 pearl ribbon sliders

So what have you got to do to win this little lot???
You must be a follower of my blog (I will check as my fortnightly candies are for followers only).
Leave a comment on this post and at least 1 other comment before the candy draw ends. You have until midnight (GMT) on Friday 25th Feb. Each comment will get you another entry.
And finally please add my candy badge to your blog sidebar (which you can grab from the top of my sidebar). If you do this now you can leave it on your sidebar and will only have to comment for a chance to win any of my other followers candies.

I said last time that is was not nesessary for you to add the badge to your sidebar, but I would appreciate it if you could add it and spread the word so others can find out about my regular giveaways.

So that's it, basically just be an active follower/commenter. And as well as a chance at winning my candy, you will make me a happy girlie in the process :)

I hate having to add this bit, but please don't enter if you don't intend on being a follower and actually visiting and commenting on my blog. I don't expect any of my followers to comment on every post I make, we all have busy lives and it wouldn't be reasonable for me to expect people to comment on every post...... but I think I am being fair in asking you to please comment at least twice (including this post) during the fortnight that my candy is running. Obviously the more you comment, the more entries you will get and I will know that you are a genuine active follower :)

Thanks for stopping by and good luck!! :)

A little Hanglar cutie for Charisma

The new challenge today at Charisma Cardz is black, white and 1 other colour.
I went for blue/aqua and followed the sketch at Sketch Saturday.

 I used a sweet Hanglar and coloured as usual with Promarkers. The black paper is Doodlebug and the other is Magnolia from the "Yummy In My Tummy" collection.
I used some lace from my stash, think the white one was from Hobbycraft but not sure about the black one. The pretty roses are from Janlynn.com and some pearl hearts and half pearls from my stash.

The lighting in this pic is a bit funny, but you can see the flowers and pearl hearts better here.

Hope to see some of you joining in over at Charisma this week!

Thanks for stopping by.

Lora xx

By The Cute and Girly- Red and 1

Thanks for all the birthday wishes yeserday for Liam, he had a great day :)
He just wanted money for his Birthday this year, so we went in own shopping and he bought himself a new pair of trainers and a pile of new clothes, so he's a happy boy, but we both have sore legs today after all the walking we did yesterday. Honestly he is worse than a woman when he is shopping for himself. If it's for anyone else, he hates shopping, but if  it's shopping for himself, he drags you into every shop! lol. We had fun though which is the main thing :)

As I said yesterday, I still have a card to show that I done for the By The Cute and Girly challenge which is a colour combo of red and 1 other colour of your choice.
I posted the other card and the wooden heart I made at the start of the month, but thought I would leave this card till the end of the month as a little reminder that there is still a few days to go to get your entries in.
The new challenge starts on the 1st of March, so get those entries in now if you haven't done so already, and remember you can enter with any craft and as much times as you like as long as you enter with a different craft each time.

 The cute teddy bear image I have used is a digi  from Stamp Fairy who is also one of our sponsors for February over at BTC&G, and I coloured it with Promarkers and also added some glossy accents to the middle of the flower.
The paper I am not sure where it came from, but I think it might of actually been a freebie in a magazine a while ago, it's nice thinck paper though, not that thin stuf that you can see right through lol.
The brown is coredinations and I distressed the edges with my scissors again.... I really must get one of those distressing tools,
The flowers were punched using the SU! 5 petal flower punch and a pearl added in the middle.
The ribbons are from my stash and the red one started it's life as white ribbon but I used a Promarker to colour it to match my image, although it looks a totally different colour here, but irl it's the same colour as the teddys flower.
Oh and I handstitched around the patterned paper with some embroidery thread.

This pic is a bit blured, but isn't this bear sweet? Stamp Fairy has so many cute bears and other little characters. If you haven't had a look at their images before, you really should have a peek. I know I will be buying some :)

That's it from me today, I will be back tomorrow with my card for Charisma Cardz.

Thanks for stopping by

Digital Tuesday- Punches

Today is my Son's birthday. HAPPY BIRTHDAY LIAM!!!
He is 13 today and I feel sooo old lol. Can't believe my baby is a teenager already!

The new challenge over at Digital Tuesday is PUNCHES and our sponsor this week is Stithcy Bear Stamps, who also offered the design team some of their images to use for this weeks challenge.

I used an image from Stitchy Stamps called Sparkles and I kind of took her name literaly and gave her lots of sparkle! lol

I am not sure who makes the paper I used.....possibly Bo Bunny? but I used both sides of a 12x12 paper. Love the colour in this one.

I distressed all the edges of  the dp with the edge of my scissors, no fancy tools here! lol

I ran out of paper to print and colour on because I haven't been able to get my normal paper locally for a while, so I had a look through my stash and all I could find was heavy cardstock that wouldn't go through my printer or coredinations cardstock, so I gave the coredinations a try...... and it worked!! :)

It was a little hard to blend and you can't add a lot of layers of colour because it will bleed, so I didn't do much shading, but I think it looks ok, and it gives a fab texture too.

I also coloured up a cute bear on the coredinations and it looks fab, so think I might use it again....well until I can get some decent paper to colour on anyway.

 

As you can see, I gave the image loads of sparkle :) I used dazzling diamonds glitter on the image and then after distressing the edges of the image and the pink mat, I went round the edges with glue and then dipped them in the glitter too, so I really did take the sparkle thing a bit too far lol.

The ribbon is some from my stash, and I threaded it through a pearl ribbon slider which was originaly bought for wedding invitations but I have loads left so I thought I would start using them up.
The pink little roses are by Papermania and the bigger one is from Janlynn.com. Love the roses from Janlynn, they are great quality and have so much detail, right down to the little leaves. Unfortunately Janlynn are no longer stocking these, but I made sure I had a stash of them because I knew they were going to be disscontinued..... just a pity that stash is nearly done :(


Oh and while I remember that the challenge was actualy to use punches, I'd better mention that I used a Fiskars border punch, which is now retired to my chuck it in the box of things that don't work but might be fixable box lol, because after I punched the paper for a card I made after this one, it stuck and I can't get it working :( I must admit though, I have had it for about a year and in that time, it has had a good workout, but I'm still dissapointed because I only have 1 other border punch which is the Stampin Up scalloped one and I'm not very keen on it.
See do you feel sorry for me now, because I'm deprived of all the gorgeous Martha Stewart punches that I want so much???........... no, didn't think so! lol

And finally a different angle, just because I took an extra pic and couldn't leave it out lol.

 That's the card done. Now just a few reminders for you. The Digital Tuesday Blog Hop starts on the 1st of March (next Tuesday), we will have a challenge as normal and a blog hop with lots of prizes to be won, so remember to stop by for that.
The challenge over at By The Cute and Girly still has a week left. The theme this month is red + 1 other colour and as always you can enter with any craft.
I still have a card to show that I made for the challenge, but since this is quite a long post, I will leave it for tomorrow.
And finally if you haven't entered my followers candy this fortnight, they post is at the top of my blog. Anyone can enter, as long as you are an active follower. Doesn't matter where you live
or if you don't have your own blog, as long as you visit regularly (and comment to let me know that you visit) then you can enter, and the more times you comment, the more chance you have of winning.
I might even throw in an extra few bits and bobs if the winner this time has commented a lot over the next week! :)

Thanks for stopping by

Lora x

Digital Tuesday- Use a Die Cut

 It's time for another Digital Tuesday challenge and this week the challenge is to use die cuts.
Our sponsor this week is My Grafico who are offering the winner a digi stamp set of their choice and 20% off an order in store. My Grafico also gave the design team one of their digi stamp sets to use for the challenge. It's a really cute set called Alice's Tea Party by Zenware Designs and I used 2 images from the set on my card.

Sorry about the photo, I took it last night so there was no natural light.
As I said the images I have used ar both from the Alice's Tea Party set .This is a really sweet set and just perfect for kids cards. There is also the cheshire cat, queen of hearts and some other bits in the set, but I chose to just use Alice and the rabbit and coloured them with Promarkers. It doesn't show very well in these pics but I did use some light greys on the rabbit for shading and some light pink picked up with my blender pen for the pink in his ears.
The base paper is My Mind's Eye Quite Contrary and the other one is Bo Bunny Persuasion. I really like the Bo Bunny paper but only have half a 12x12 sheet left, so must see if I can get some more.

 I don't have much dies, in fact I only actually own scalloped circle nesties and a little die that I got with my cuttlebug, so I bought these scalloped oval die cuts from Die Cut Dreams, very handy if like me you don't own a lot of dies.
I had already printed Alice before I decided to use the scalloped ovals, so I just cut her out and stuck her on.

The flowers are Primas and an American Crafts jewel brad, and ribbon is some from my stash. Oh and the glittery swirl above the flower that you can't see very well in the photo is a We R Memory Keepers adhesive rub on.
I bought some of these foil, glitter and flock adhesive rub on kits in the sale at Hobbycraft, they were reduced from £7.49 to 49p!!
You get 2 sheets of rub ons which when you rub on have an adhesive top that you can then stick either the foil, gliiter or flock onto. You get 3 small sheets of the flock, gliiter and foil in different colours and you just rub on whichever one you want.
I am not a big fan of rub ons and to be honest I only bought them because they were such a great price and thought I could maybe give them away in one of my followers candies but after having them sitting for a week or so, I couldn't help myself, just had to see if they really worked and they worked a treat..... so sorry I won't be giving them away now lol.

I have one of those hot foil pens... do any of you have one of those?, and no mater how hard I try, I can never get writing or swirls etc to look like it does in the little booklet you get with it. Instead I end up with dotted lines of ugly foil, and normaly a burnt finger because I forget that the "pen nib" is not a pen and it is actually very very hot!! lol
If anyone knows how to actually work them properly, please share with me!!

Anyway I got a bit off track there. Here's a close up of the cute images

I'm sure lots of you will join in this week because you all have dies right? It's just me who seriously needs a crafty shop and stock up on dies and punches!! lol

Thanks for stopping by

Followers candy winner

Sorry I am late with my followers candy winner and new candy, but I had a lot on yesterday and I had to go through all the comments I have had since I posted the candy.

Now there was a bit of a problem with choosing someone this time, because most people who commented on the candy post never commented on any post after that, so clearly they are not an active follower, and a lot of my active followers didn't comment on the candy post to let me know they wanted to be in the draw.............so I have just picked someone from my followers who has commented on 2 or more of my recent posts which were posted after the candy.

And that is.....................Stacie (craft-princess)

Thank you Stacie for being a follower and leaving me sweet comments :) and of course to all my other followers who take the time to come see what I have been up to.

I do have another prize to giveaway, and I will be back with that later on today, but to be honest I am a bit dissheartened with this last candy giveaway :(
Never mind, I will see how the next one goes and decide after that if I a going to carry on with the fortnightly giveaways..... I was planning on posting a big candy next month after a few mini candies but I will wait and see what happens with the mini candy first.

Stacie please email me at lorascards@aol.com with your snail mail address and I will get the making memories embelishments in the mail for you :)

I will choose another winner on Saturday if Stacie has not claimed her prize by then.

Thanks for stopping by

Lora x

Dewdrop Craftz meets Charisma

The challenge over at Charisma Cardz this week is mythical/fantasy so I just had to use one of my images from Dewdrop Craftz .
I think I went a bit too purple with this card lol, but it's on the challenge blog now so might as well show it here too!

The image is called Sorcerer and is by designer CupuDOTexe and I knew she would be just perfect for this weeks challenge.
I coloured her with the usual Promarkers and cut her out then stuck her on some paper by Bo Bunny which is actualy a Christmas paper but you wouldn't think it, would you? I wrapped some funky fibres around the paper before sticking the image on, just to give it some texture. It looks much better in real life though.
I got the fibres from Janlynn.com.
The other paper I am  not sure of as I have had it for ages and there was only a little bit left from a 12x12 sheet..
Ribbon was from my stash, and the flower and pearl sprays are from Hobbycraft. They were originaly white but I coloured them with a Promarker to match my image.

Here's a better look at that fab image.

That's it from me today, I will be back tomorrow to announce the winner of  my followers candy, so if you haven't entered yet then this is your last chance! and I will have some mor cnady to post tomorrow too, so remember to stop by and see what I am giving away this fortnight! :)

Thanks for stopping by

Digital Tuesday - Valentines

The challenge over at Digital Tuesday is "From The Heart" (Valentines Theme) and we have a new sponsor this week- Paper Pretties who was also kind enough to let the design team have an image each to use for the challenge.

 I chose this little sweetie from paper Pretties and it's called "Cuddle Me". Of course I coloured her with Promakers then cut her out and stuck her onto a scalloped oval which I bought from Die Cut Dreams a good few months ago. I only have the scalloped circle nesties and really need to get more shapes but being able to buy these die cut shapes from Die Cut Dreams is very handy.
The paper is Bo Bunny and the scalloped strip which was done with my fiskars border punch is the other side of the paper.
The ribbon is some I picked up in my local craft shop ages ago (Holburn Crafts in Aberdeen), flowers are Primas and some roses from Wild Orchid Crafts, and the little hearts are digis from The Cutting Cafe which I coloured with Promakers to match her dress.

Thanks for stopping by today and remember if you haven't entered my followers mini candy this fortnight, you can find it here.
If you are not a follower already, you will ahve to become a follower for a chance to win any of my mini candies. Please remember to leave a comment on the actual candy post so I know that you want to be in the draw, and you will have to comment on at least 1 other post before the candy ends (which is this Saturday) so I know you are an active follower and not just here for the freebies :)

A DT card I forgot about!

 I can't believe I forgot to post my DT card for Charisma on Thursday! See that long post on Tuesday was just too much for me lol.
The challenge at Charisma Cardz is to use no embellishments, just papers, image and sentiment.
I had a tough time with this one, I tell ya!! I mean come on a card of mine without any embellishments, that's just unheard of lol, but I did give it a go and here's what my card turned out like.

 One of our sponsors this week is Make It Crafty and I have used two of their images on my card, "Hidden Forest Seat" and "Magical Sapphire Fairy". I coloured both with Promarkers then cut out the fairy and stuck her on the seat.
In hindsight it would of been easier to just merge the two images in a graphics program because the fairy was really fiddly to cut out, especially her tiny wand, but I already had them both printed so I just done it the old fashioned way lol.
The sentiment is also a digi and I still can't remember where I got these ticket sentiments from! I inked it with distress ink again.
I kept the background simple and just used one sheet of dp by Basic Grey.

Here's a close up of the image.

 I am not sure about this card, it just looks too plain for my liking, but I do like the images and I had fun colouring them :)


That's it from me for today, I will be back tomorrow with my dt card for Digital Tuesday.

Thanks for stopping by

Lots of DT stuff and something a bit different for me.

It's the start of a new month and that means lots of challenges :)
I have a lot to show today, so I will warn you now that this will be a looooong post, so you might want to go get a cuppa and get yourself comfy first before you read on :)

First of all, the new challenge is up over at By The Cute and Girly, and this months challenge is to use red and one other colour of your choice.
As always we have some fab sponsors, Simon Says Stamp,  Joanna Sheen,  Little Snippets and also a new digi sponsor, Stamp Fairy, who also gave the design team some images to use for the challenge.
We also have 2 guest designers join us this month, and they are no other than the fabulous Bev and Rach!!
I was so happy when they both said they would guest design for me because I love their work and I know you all do too :)

I actually made 2 cards for the challenge but I will show one another day, and I also decorated/altered a wooden heart.

For my card, I used red and brown. I really struggled with this challenge, because I don't have much red papers that only have one other colour on them, but in the end, I went looking through my digi papers and found this stripey one, so that's where the brown came from. Although I would of never used brown and red together, after seeing this paper, it kinda grew on me and I even used red and brown for my other dt card.

The cute image is from The Stamp Fairy and I coloured her with Promarkers. I had never actually saw any of the Stamp Fairy's images before this but she has some really nice images.

I am not actualy sure who made the paper, but I think it could be Summer Driggs as it was a freebie and I have a lot of her stuff.

I used my fiskars border punch, some ribbon from Hobbycraft, a little rose from Janlynn.com and some punched swirls which were done with an All Night Media punch that I have had forever.

 

Here's a close up of the image. I am still not confident at colouring with red, but everyone has to learn right?


 Next here is the heart I decorated. This is something really different for  me and not at all like the normal cutsie style I do, and I must admit that I wasn't sure about this, but my teamies at BTC&G said that they liked it, so I decided I would be brave and show it to you all lol.

 \The heart is a wooden one that I got at Hobbycraft. I inked the whole heart with distress inks because the red was a bit too bright for my liking, then stamped a little flourish on the bottom with white ink and embossed with clear embossing powder. The stamp came as a freebie with a magazine and it had christmas baubles on it, but I just cut the baubles off and used the flourish on it's own.
The piece of paper I used was from a wedding kit that I got from my BTC&G teamie and friend Lisa a while back, I just ripped a bit and stuck it on lol.
Flowers are from Janlynn.com, lace from my stash and the little pearl heart ribbon sliders are from Ebay.
Oh and the "LOVE" letters were off a sheet of vellum quotes and I had the bright idea to just cut the letters out by hand...... I have to say that wasn't one of my best ideas because it was really fiddly lol, but I managed to cut them all out without cutting bits of them by mistake (which I normaly do!) and just stuck them on wit some glue.

I also have a dt card to show for Digital Tuesday, and the challenge there is also a colour combo..... shades of grey and one other accent colour.
I haven't used a digital image again this week, but I did use a digital sentiment, just incase I get any more emails shouting at me for not using a digi (honestly I got a really nasty email last week saying that I cheated).
So just to confirm the new challenge rules are that you don't have to use a digi image, as long as you use a digital element somewhere on your creation.

I had to make a card for the kids Papa who's birthday is today, so I took the plunge and made a male card.
The image of course is from the Greetings Farm and coloured again with Promarkers.
Papers are Basic Grey and some grey coredinations cardstock.
The sentiment is a digi freebie which I inked with distress inks, but I can't for the life of me remember where I got it. I do know that I got it as a set though and there is loads of fab ticket sentiments in it. If I remember where I got them, I wlll edit the post and add a link.
The stars are hand cut from some digi papers (this one I am 99% sure are by Summer Driggs) and covered them with glossy accents, waited for them to dry, then cracked the glossy accents by gently bending the stars.

And finally I have a little pizza box that my 7 year old Daughter Rhianna made for her DT work at Messy's Mini Missions. If you have never heard of this blog before, it's a monthly challenge blog for under 16's.

I found a tutorial for this mini pizza box on Splitcoast stampers and I did have to help with the measuring and scoring as I don't have a scorpal or any of those scooreboards so I knew she wouldn't be able to do that bit herself,  but after it was all scored out, she cut, stuck and decorated it all by herself :)
The flowers are mostly Prima's except the blue and white one which she apparently found in my flower box, so no idea where that came from , pearls from my stash,  ribbon from Hobbycraft and the sentiment, I have no idea because she just stamped it with one of my stamps and she had no idea which one she had used lol.

Sorry if I have bored you to death, but I did warn you that this would be a long post! lol
Remember to comment for another chance at my mini candy for this fortnight which is in this post here. Oh and please commet on the actual candy post too so I know that you want to be included :)

Thanks for stopping by