'Just saying Hello' notelets

It's raining outside and I just grabbed a little time slot to rustle up some notelets....beats housework hands down!

The cards are 4" x 4"white linen, topped with scalloped circles cut from fairly big scraps of pearlised card (and I kept the leftovers too!) . The 'Just saying Hello' was stamped in Stayzon Black using an Elzybells sentiment (thank goodness I managed to buy a few stamps before Elizabeth closed her store) and the beautiful little sparkly toppers were in my stash. I don't think anything else was needed so I left it at that.

One of my best finds lately came from Hobbycraft - a pack of two tiny wooden easels which are just great for propping cards up on to take photos. They weren't expensive and I was delighted as I've been searching for them for a while now!

Di

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Good luck to two young ladies

A friend's two daughters are taking ballet exams on 4th November. They are such well behaved young ladies that I thought she might like a card for each of them from their Mum and Dad to wish them luck on the big day. This is what I came up with:

Lucy is the youngest and her favourite colour is pink, hence the pink dress. Holly is almost a teenager and I thought white was suitable.

First I embossed the flowers down the border of the white linen cards and then added clear gems to the centres of the flowers - Kan Ban Bling.

The backgrounds are diecut and embossed using oval scallop Nestabilities and the feathery toppers were bought from The Range a little while back. They might not be true ballet dresses but they're near enough and the feathery effect is lovely! I added peel offs spelling out Good Luck and their names. Hope the cards work for them - they've been practising so hard.


Di
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Mia's 3rd birthday

Today is my OH's grand daughter's 3rd birthday. Life has had a few downs this past week or so and I only hope our presents and card reach her in Germany in time :( She is such a sweetie and we love her, and her baby sister Olivia, so much. This is one of my favourite pictues of Mia, and little Livi (Olivia) is in the background:


I think this little lady might break some hearts when she grows up?!

Peppa Pig is a great favourite at the moment but I went more traditional when making her birthday card. Cinderella!!

The images are thick cardboard ones from QVC and the sentiment 'Thank heavens for little princesses', also in the same set, is so appropriate. The card also came from QVC in a set of really pretty delicately patterned cards for 'special ocasions'. It was really just a case of 'position and stick' once I'd selected what to use - certainly much quicker and easier than the 90th card in my previous post!! I then stuck a 3 on the little bush and spelt out Mia's name using really pretty glittery letter and number stickers from Hobbycraft. In my haste I didn't keep a note of the manufacturer but it was either Anitas or Papermania. I love these and as it's Olivia's 1st birthday in a couple of weeks time I'll be using them again no doubt! The insert has a Cinderella image printed on it - from the internet of course :)

Happy Birthday Mia!!! Love from Grandad and GranDi xxx

Di
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90th birthday card

Recently a friend asked me to make a 90th birthday card for her Grandmother. As I always do, I asked what her interests are. Apparently she is Austrian by birth and loves Viennese waltzes. So far so good - ideas were beginning to formulate already! Then, my heart sank when my friend added that she loves playing Scrabble and doing crosswords. Oh boy, how could I combine those without it just looking like a 'jumble'?!

My crafty friends know I agonised over how to tackle this card - and I ended up a bit out of my comfort zone. Sketches, test layouts and goodness knows what! This is what I came up with:

I abandoned the crossword idea - even using it on the insert I felt would have been too much of a muddle. The card is from The Range - a large square one with embossed dots which I brushed over with a Brilliance Inkpad - Pearlescent Beige as the white was just too stark. The music (Strauss - Blue Danube Waltz) was from the internet and I adjusted the colour to made it look more sepia before printing onto plain 130gsm paper. I also found the violin and the Scrabble tiles images on the internet - both printed onto photo card to give them a glossy finish. The 'ninety' (A Hero Arts stamp from a set with all ages in - so useful!) was stamped onto the back of an oval sentiment from Craftwork Cards. The oval shape was brushed over with the same Pearlescent Beige as the card itself and the 'ninety' was stamped using Cosmic Copper, with a small gold sparkly gem on the dot above the letter 'i'. I spelt out Nanny using the snipped-to-size Scrabble tiles (Nanny is the family's pet name for this very special lady).

The final touches were leaves from Hobbycraft, cream and peach roses (glittered with Stickles gold) and cherry blossom flowers (all flowers came from Wild Orchid Crafts). Then finished off with a double layered bow of organza ribbon (cream and peach). The insert also has a peach rose printed on it.

It's now safely packed in a box from Craft Creations, ready for delivery tonight to my friend. I hope she likes it and I hope you do too.I've lost count of the hours I spent on this but, as I said, it's for a very special lady celebrating a very special birthday!

Later edit:
It went down really well with my friend - apparently Nanny's favourite colour is peach so that was also a lucky 'extra' :) It isn't the big day until Tuesday so I might have more feedback after then. For now, I'm just happy it's been made and has initial approval!

Di
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Chilli eatin' House Meece

Today is my OH's birthday! A friend gave me a House Mouse decoupage sheet from the Food and Drink set - just perfect! He loves hot food and would eat chilli con carne anytime! You can buy the House Mouse decoupage sets here - and postage is free!

I wrote my 'slushy' message before I remembered to take a photo - oops! Here's a close-up of the main part of the card. I just love the little mouse gulping water :)

I made an easel card using cream linen cardstock topped with Core'dinations reddish coloured card, embellished with cream Card Candy. The button was from my stash and I tied a little piece of raffia through the button rather than the usual girlie organza ribbon. From a covering sheet, which comes with all the House Mouse designs, I cut out a little mouse to go alongside the sentiment - thanks for the idea Pauline...........and thanks for the chilli eatin' decoupage sheet!

I tend to sit in bed with my morning cup of tea, tray on lap, snipping out decoupage (I know, how sad is that!) whilst OH watches the early morning news. I actually cut this little lot of decoupage out with him sitting right next to me and he didn't even notice! Hmm, I wonder what THAT says?! :)

BTW, he loved the card! I wonder what will be on the menu for dinner this evening :)

Di
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Dancing in the rain

After the weather recently this card seems quite appropriate. I found the words in my little pink craft notebook (I try to write down sayings etc. in there that might be handy for future use....and of course there's my wish list of all things crafty in there too!!).

The image is a Sugar Nellie stamp called 'Splashing Maggie' and she's so cute :) Of course I coloured her with Aquamarkers, am loving those, and added some Anitas glaze to the puddle splashes and her coat buttons. I used plain white linen cardstock and then ran some acetate through the Cuttlebug using a random dots embossing folder which I think is really for snowy efffects but in real life it works very well giving the efect of rain when it's folded over the front of the card. The photo doesn't do it justice but I suspected that would be the case :(


Di
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Finding your Frog Prince

I bought these 'Frog Prince' stickers in Germany whilst over there in May. I had the inkling of an idea of what I wanted to do with them but it wasn't until this Monday when browsing round a local garden centre that I found the small 'unprincely' froggy stickers :)

The card background is a white linen A6 card, the little 'unprincelies' are surrounding the Prince himself on a background of green Coredinations card from my stash, cut into a flower shape with my trusty Woodware flower punch. Some little green sparkly jewels from my stash (KanBan) brightened it up a bit. The sentiment 'You have to kiss a lot of toads to find your Frog Prince' was printed and then stuck onto a background of the same green card as the flower. I keep a note of little sayings and this was one I wrote down some time ago :) The ribbon is sticky backed and came from my stash - I think it was originally from QVC.

How about this for spooky - late yesterday evening I went into the garden to check that I'd closed the greenhouse properly and felt something light land on my foot (I was wearing flipflops at the time). It moved off PDQ as I squeaked in alarm.....then, when I looked closer it was the tiniest and cutest little frog I've ever seen! I tucked him into a safe place away from prowling cats but there was no sign of a crown I'm afraid :))

Di
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My Fairy name!

Your fairy is called Oak Iceshimmer

She is a bone chilling bringer of justice for the vulnerable.

She lives in forests of oak and lime trees.

She is only seen when the first flowers begin to blossom.

She decorates herself with leaves and berries. She has icy blue butterfly wings.

Get your free fairy name here!

This is true in that I will defend the vulnerable as I hate injustice. But, I draw the line at trolling round wearing leaves and berries :)

Di
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Butterflies and flowers birthday card

Weeks ago I coloured in a couple of Sugar Nellie images using my watercolour pencils and a little bit of jel pen to add some sparkle - Country Garden was one of them. I finally got round to making a card with the so cute image.

It's another easel card - covered with the butterflies wrapping paper I love. I mounted the image onto embosssed white card topped off with a frame cut using my (few!) Nesties and then popped through the Cuttlebug and embossed with little dots. I ran it through twice but in truth the card would have been just as good without the dots :)

I did similar with the stamped sentiment which even has cute little butterflies on (from Elzybells......there are still stamps to be had in the closing down sale) - then all that was needed was a big perfectly matching lilac 'ribbbon brad' from my stash and some pink organza ribbon threaded through and tied in a bow - to 'prop' the card up on. A few silver corner peel offs and just a couple of Anitas gorgeous silver 3-D butterflies.

I had difficulty taking a piccie though without some of the junk on my desk in the background!

I think this card will be saved for a friend's birthday next month - she's always appreciative of my efforts which does make such a difference doesn't it :)


Di
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Hey, hey, we're the monkeys!

This card is for a little chap who is five years old tomorrow. It's very simple, once I mastered the flipping folding! The background paper is from my stash - I've had it for donkeys years and sadly only got the one sheet although I'm pretty sure it came from Craft Creations. Then I just used silver peel offs for Joe's name and his age - coloured with peel off pens and some googly eyes added to the number 5. These peel off numbers are great for kids as they have little feet as well as big eyes - which just beg to have googly ones added :)) I can't remember where I got them from :( 

I should have put the monkey with the penny whistle a bit lower down but trust me, once they're stuck that's it....no chance of them coming loose....and Joe is only small so perhaps Mummy will put it on a mantelpiece so he can look up and see all of the 'band'!!

Di

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Get well card

This card is for a lady currently in hospital after major surgery. She's on a club committee which my OH chairs and we thought a card from all the club members would be a nice gesture. A funny/jokey card didn't really seem appropriate - so I went for feminine and pretty.

The card itself is quite large (8" x 8") and came ready embossed, with a nice flat patch in the centre, from The Range a few weeks ago on my one and only visit. The pyramage is a Dufex one, I keep a few of these ready made up on standby. Then I mounted the image onto a scalloped square cut from silver linen effect card - which came from Craft Creations ages ago. Then just Pauline's name using peel offs layered onto the same silver linen card and some card with little wisps of silver on....finished off with small aurora borealis gems in each corner - and added to the card using thin adhesive pads.

The finishing touch is an organza bow using ribbon from my stash, but doubtless bought from Hobbycraft**.

Making the insert to go inside was a tad tricky but it worked out in the end - I printed the club logo above a printed message and left lots of room for people to sign at their regular committee meeting on Tuesday evening. The challenge was how to make a double folded insert which was much bigger than A4 folded in half. But, endless careful measuring and some careful joining at the spine of the card worked really well - you wouldn't know what a struggle it had been :)

Di
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** To my absolute delight, Hobbycraft are opening a branch within just a couple of miles of here in October! I'm as happy as a pig in 'you know what'!! Sudden thought, I wonder if a part time job in the new store would be a good, or totally bankrupting, idea!!? :))

Crossword card

This was just a bit of a fiddle around yesterday when there was a brief lull between builders coming and going. A few weeks back I found a box of 're-usable crossword cards' in our local Hospice shop. The kind that come with a non-permanent marker... and a little idea formed in my head as I'm sure we all know a crossword addict!

Making this card was so 'simples', and this just shows the idea as it would be better to have more of a mix of down and across words - and better spaced and different little gems, puffy flowers/hearts or whatever. Apart from all that, which is pretty much everything, here it is for what it's worth as a prototype :)

The crossword grids are on beermat sized, rounded corner, wipeable card. I just matted one onto slightly larger silver mirri card also with rounded off corners, then added it to a glossy black card (from The Works and a snip of a bargain, but the shop is no longer there!). The lettering, my writing is grim but then who does a crossword all neat and tidy anyhow, was done with a permanent pen - which does dry indelible given enough time, providing you resist the urge to keep checking it :)). Then I added a few KanBan gems from my stash....as I said, simples!! :)

Di
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Birthday card for a Pearly Queen!

The other weekend I had a great time with a couple of school friends - we go back more years than I dare to admit :)

This card is for one of my favourite girlies - Moira - whose birthday is today. We're only a week apart in age so her birthday is easy to remember.

I used one of the House Mouse Bathtime decoupage sets to make this card - appropriate as Moira was wearing some gorgeous freshwater pearls last weekend. I used a pretty mauve patterned card which came in a pack from QVC - not a bad match huh?! Then, after assembling the little fellas onto the image I tickled here and there with a bit of Anita's glaze - the drawer knob centres, some of the perfume bottle and bits of the lipstick. Then, tongue firmly clamped between teeth, I added teeny little individual pearl embellies to the strand of pearls - not as glamourous as Moira's freshwater ones but the thought is there! Final touch was a double layer of organza ribbon - blue and mauve - tied into a bow and stuck through with a couple of pearl hatpin thingies. I know they must have a proper name but that's my name for them! All pearls and the ribbon were from my stash. Aren't they cute little meece - I esp. love the one on the right pulling faces!!

Happy Birthday Mo, I'll be catching you up in a weeks time :))........as if you ever let me forget that!

Di
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Stamping Bellas

The SD card on my camera let me down badly this week and I lost quite a few photos - boo, hoo!! Undeterred, I resorted to a free file recovery facility called 'Pirifrom Recuva'. I've had to use it in the past (we never learn do we!) and although I def. have lost some recent photos, all sorts of previously deleted ones popped up! Tee, hee!! Amongst them I found these, taken a couple of years ago just after I discovered 'Stamping Bella'.

The stamps are very simple, I love loads of the images and there are some cute sentiment stamps too, so I duly sent off to the States for some goodies - err, and Mr Import Duty in the UK also loved stung me! Can't remember the duty I paid now but it hurt a bit at the time :( I haven't found a place in the UK that stocks the whole range so had to place my fate in the hands of our nice chaps in UK Customs!

I'm sure I sent the Retail Therapy card to my sort of daughter-in-law - Kai is a lady who loves to shop!

I know for sure that I sent my friend Joy the 'Spa' card as we'd been for a half day's indulgence at Nirvana Spa - we came out so totally chilled out we were almost unconscious! The flotation pool was literally out of this world - once you got the hang of gently floating on your back rather than floundering face down as I did at first :( Anyone ever tasted the 'soothing' minerals they put into those pools?? Yeuch!

To make the cards I used white square card stock with sticky ribbon behind the coloured layer of card (being mean I usually just add little strips to each side taken a little way underneath the coloured card, rather than take it right across the card...just make sure they line up OK!). The images were stamped onto white card and coloured using Whispers pens, the sentiments were stamped in co-ordinating colours onto white card and layered onto the same colour card as the image then added at an angle. Then just a few little touches of co-ordinating Bellas Baubles in the top left hand corner - if you go to the Bella website, take a look at the delicious names all the different colours are given! My favourite image is the Bella in the bath (BubbleBella) - love the bubbles made using lots of baubles, which conveniently come in a packet of mixed shades of aqua. Bit of a labour of love though, sticking all the baubles on :)

Thanks for calling by!

Di
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2nd birthday card for a little chap!

I made this, in difficult conditions, for a friend's little boy who was two years old a little while back. The difficult conditions were having to work on a picnic table surrounded by boxes and bits and pieces whilst patiently waiting for my craft room to be decorated, carpetted and kitted out. It's now all done and I love it - but I also know how fortunate I am, so hopefully I don't take it for granted...after almost 16 years wait it's worth it:) That's all I have to say about that!

Again, it's an easel card (did I hear a yawn?) and really a bit of choosing, positioning and sticking down so not a masterpiece by any means. Mandy, Harvey's Mum, and I share a love of all things Disney so I thought Pooh Bear would go down well as I just bet Harvey is being brought up on AA Milne stories.

The cardboard Pooh Bear Disney images were from QVC, the background papers from my stash (Making Memories Cosmopolitan Collection - which is great as one side is patterned and the other is plain in toning colours so you can mix and match without rootling through tons of card and paper). I used the 'Little bit of rubber missing Happy, Happy Birthday stamp' (I wonder if you can see where I have to do a little bit of touching up?!). Harvey's name was spelt out using gold letters in clear dome squares which don't show up well in the photo - from my stash and the button and ribbon also came from my stash.

Thanks for calling by! :)

Di
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Simple 60th for a man - using peeloffs!

What a rush, I realised my friend's husband's 60th was the next day and was under pressure to make a card from us in time to catch the post :( This is despite having a 'birthday book' of all the dates I need to make cards for - perhaps it would help if I checked it regularly!

I know that Ash likes all things to do with transport so I kept things very simple with a square white card, pearlised gold card and maroon Core'dinations card squares, topped off with white again. The car, clouds and lettering were all courtesy of gold peeloffs and then KanBan sparkly gems to brighten up the headlights and a few black ones to take away the bareness a bit. Then just a sprint to post it :))

Di
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A card for Edward

Edward is a very special young man - and he adores his Westie, called Izzy. So, Izzy it had to be when I made his latest birthday card.

The decoupaged Westie image, doggie dish and ball were all from a decoupage sheet by Jolly Nation - of course the bowl didn't come with Izzy's name already on it....that would have been just tooooo much of a coincidence:)

The background (err, easel card again!) of grass and sky used card from my stash, the ribbon and button were also from my stash. The 'Happy, Happy Birthday' stamp is an Anita stamp. I got it ages ago from a rummage box in Hobbycraft - reduced. It has a little bit of rubber missing from one of the letters - probably why it was reduced - but it's a great stamp to use on lots of cards, especially for youngsters, and it's easy to fill in the missing bit with a teensy brush and some ink from the inkpad.

For Edward's name I stamped different coloured letters onto little squares of white card using a See-D's alphabet by Do Crafts - bought from Mad about Cards. These unmounted sets come in all shapes and sizes and cost about £1 a set. I just love Mad About Cards - they have ever-changing offers in their 'Pound Shop'....some bargains to be had here, and we all love a bargain!!! On hindsight perhaps I should have drawn a line joining the letters to make it look like bunting - but Edward was happy and that's good enough for me :)

Di
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Same old, same old.........

This is a style I've used quite a bit, so apologies for putting these onto the blog but it does show how using different colours can totally change a card. Err, if you ignore poor quality of the first photo :(

The 80th birthday card was for one of my old school Matrons - from all of us in The Wilhelmshaven Association. Liselotte (or Lilo as she's fondly known) lives in Wilhelmshaven and does a lot of work for the Association. A little plug for the Association won't come amiss as we're always searching for ex-pupils. It was a British Forces boarding school in Germany and we have reunions, a website and regular newsletters - so if you know anyone who may have gone to Prince Rupert School in Wilhelmshaven, thousands of us did as there was a high turnover of pupils due to the nomadic life we led, please pass the message on! :) Link to our website is here


Back to the cards - Matron's was all sugar pink flowers and the 60th birthday card for Liz was in our old school colours of blue, white and silver (most of the teeny bouquets used flowers from Wild Orchid crafts). Liz is also one very special lady as she started the Association off in the first place - about 18 years ago now - and we all owe her a great deal. So many friendships have been rekindled thanks to Liz.

I hope you have happy memories of your schooldays :))

Di
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Birthday card for a friend with a sense of humour :)

Last weekend I had a great time with two dear friends from my days at boarding school. Living away from home you do forge friendships that survive - for more years than I'm gonna admit!

One of the 'girlies' is fond of cats and this is the card I made for her birthday last year. She was sporting the chain and charms, carefully detached from the card, dangling from her telephone this weekend!

I used a scalloped card with a Core'dinations background. The image is Penny Black coloured with Twinkling H2Os - the sentiment is also Penny Black. The card candy, flowers, brad and charms were all from my stash.

Thanks for calling by :)

Di
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Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer do!

These cards all started when I got the little corrugated flower pots - I think from Mad About Cards in their wonderful website bargains section...and there are loads in the packet! These will appear on some Christmas cards I think!

I used paper daisies from the wedding section in Hobbbycraft - I like the fact that they aren't 'perfect' - much more realistic. The backing papers are from a Daisy and Dandelion Picnic Patch A5 paper collection, matted onto Coredinations cardstock... as ever. After sticking it all together I just added some pearly yellowy bits of muted 'bling' to some of the printed background daisies to 'lift' them a bit.

The wavy sentiment 'Hope you have a perfect day' is from Elzybells. Their closing down sale is still on and I've bought quite a few of their unbacked rubber sentiments at about £1 each. Brilliant value and excellent quality. The sentiment was stamped using Brilliance 'Sunflower Yellow' then embossed. I did all the sentiments in one go before tackling the other areas of the cards BTW. It does save the heartache of spoiling a finished card if you don't get the stamping just right :)

Di
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Gorjuss 18th Birthday card

I made this at about 4am the other morning as a) I couldn't sleep and b) it was needed in a hurry for a friend's baby sister's 18th birthday.

I used a Gorjuss decoupage and, when assembled, layered it onto light brown background card (Core'dinations, again!). I cut this using a deckle blade in my Woodware trimmer. I love the trimmer and it's especially useful for scoring card using a different blade. The A5 deckle edged parchment effect card was a lucky find in my cardstock and the flowers and brads were from my stash as well - mostly Prima with some Papermania flowers mixed in.

The bow was tied with cream ribbon (it looks more cream in real life) edged with gold which came from Hobbycraft. I have quite a selection of ribbons in different colours and textures - it might be a throwback to when I went mad for pigtails and ribbons as a little girl I think :)

The lettering was done using gold peeloffs. For those rare creatures who still use peeloffs - one way to get the lettering absolutely straight and level is to use low tack sticky tape with a faint pencil line drawn just inside one edge. I find it easier to do this than to try to gently rub off pencil lines on the card itself. You can then mark the centre point for your lettering on the tape too. I find it easiest to write out the message on a spare slip of paper and then count the letters, find the middle and work outwards from there. Is this Granny sucking eggs stuff though?!

The insert was printed out, with a little Goruss image on the facing side opposite to the message - to tone with the front of the card of course - downloaded from the Internet. The edges of the insert were trimmed, again using the Woodware trimmer deckle blade.

Di
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Baptism card for a little boy

Our neighbours have a lovely little boy, aged almost two. Sunday was his Baptism day and, as he's a toddler rather than a babe in arms, I didn't want to make too babyish a card. So I kept it very simple with pale blue DCWV paper - layered onto silver mirri card with a sort of watermark pattern on it. I then used peeloffs and some bling for the rest, with the cross embellishment on the front all toned in. The colours haven't come out at all well in this rather blurred photo of the card but I spotted it too late and couldn't really go and ask for it back to photograph again! The box was just tickled up with peeloffs again and tied with some ribbon from my stash (Hobbycraft). Sorry, I've tried all ways to post the photo of the box right way up but it insists on flipping itself sideways...even tried fooling it by rotatating it so it looked wrong in the first place to see if it would right itself.....no luck so I think it sussed what I was up too!!

On the subject of peeloffs, I've read a few 'sniffy' remarks on people's blogs lately about them. Many people are proclaiming they've ditched them and 'moved on'...presumably to 'better' things. I know there are so many ways of doing lettering and wording out there, a lot of which I do use - but peeloffs do have their place....and until someone comes up with silver or gold ink refills for my printer I shall continue to use them where I see fit! Rant over!! :)

Di
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First try at 'distressing'....

....and Tim Holtz needn't worry about competition! :(

Having been a bit sceptical about distressing techniques I finally decided to have a little dip of a toe into the water. Hmmmm, this is the result!

For the background I just dabbed three distress ink pads (Dried Marigold, Peeled Paint and Walnut Stain.....aren't the names mouthwateringly great) onto my hot stuff mat and misted it with water. I then picked up the 'mess' with a piece of satin silk artcard from Inkylicious. This card is just great, it's at least 300gsm and I think anything less would have just freaked out at the amount of water I'd liberally sprayed! Then I dried it with my heat gun and stared at the resulting 'mess'. OK, so then I stamped a swirl (using a clear Inkadinkado stamp) in Walnut Stain...and this is where perhaps I should have left well alone. But, I misted again and lost the clear definition....boo,hoo!!

But, I'd gotten this far, so I carried out with my sows ear. I had to trim off the edges where the ink had 'pooled' a bit and then layered it onto a cream linen card. The little Gorjuss picture is from one of Gorjuss's sets of toppers and tags, the 'Dream' tag is a Tim Holtz Adage with a little bit of brown edging and the organza ribbon is from my stash (bound to be from Hobbycraft!).

Tentatively I asked the opinion of my 'in-house critic' and was told it looks a 'bit Goth-like'. Yay, just what I'd been trying to achieve - bemused look when I punched the air and hollered 'YESS!!'.

I think this distressing lark is great fun and doubt if you get the same result twice....hopefully the next try WON'T be the same...I want it to be an improvement!!

Learning all zee time though :)

Di
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A taste of the Orient

I spotted these 'cheongsam dress' peeloffs, by Anita, in The Range. Each sheet has four different designs with complimenting fans and a few flowers/embellies - they come in silver or gold. It was my first visit to one of their stores and it was like an Aladdin's Cave, so much so that I bought very little, there was too much to take in!

My mind was taken back to three fabulous years I spent in Singapore as an Army Brat a child, from the ages of 10 to 13, many years ago. What magical days those were! I always yearned to be the owner of a cheongsam, I had the slim figure then too :( Obviously I was too young to be wearing such exotic dresses but my Mum did relent and buy me some beautiful pink brocade PJ's with the top in cheongsam style! Much too hot to sleep in, no air. con in those days, just swishing ceiling fans...but great for dressing up in!


The dresses, fans and some embellies were made by sticking the peeloffs to pearlised paper from my stash and then trimming round the shapes. I've had the paper for ages and wish I could find the same pad again :( The paper down the left hand side of the card is from the Papermania Capsule Collection, silver self adhesive flowers strip from my stash (QVC), the sentiment is from Craftwork Cards and I just added a few clear diamantes (KanBan)to add a bit of 'bling'.

Di
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