WOYWW - Just when you thought you'd seen it all

Hi everyone. Ok so I may have been exaggerating in my last post, teasing you with something amazing coming up.  BUT, this Wednesday finds me with -(DRUMROLL) ... twice the amount of space.... I spent part of Easter Monday (you'd better all sit down somewhere safe...) tidying up my stash. (well, some of it, anyhow)

So now I have maybe DOUBLE the amount of floorspace (i.e. my desk) to work at.... didn't go so mad as to get the hoover out though.... you can only go so far, right?

(sorry about the arm of the sofa, I'd transferred the photos before I stopped to look at them properly..)

I moved a couple of piles of old scraps of part made cards and other things that didn't quite work out - chucked some of them away - managed to find room in a box; moved some craft magazines (2007-10.... yikes) and pulled out this cardboard storage box (a less than perfect QVC buy, though it's ok...the drawers don't open very well) and moved it to just inside the doorway. Thought I'd show you some of the stamps inside - I haven't used many of them for a while as previously it lived behind those blue boxes (the Timmy/glimmer mist one) so there wasn't often room to pull it out.

I also put the contents a collapsing plastic box full of (dusty) stamps into the box under the Timmy box .... which I have to move to the sofa if I want a stamp from this box, but life's not perfect, right?!  Ok, so the first time I need to find a stamp in here it will get totally messed up... but I couldn't get to many of them in the old place...
Some of these stamps were already in this box, but it was being under-utilised!  And now I look at the piccy there is still a huge pile of sweets on show.  Oops (I have a very sweet tooth!!)

This created the spare floor space - I've "pushed back" my pile of distress inks (they don't fit in the drawer where I used to keep them and as I use them all the time, there's no point putting them away - and my melting pot, against these stamp towers that you saw a couple of weeks ago.

The plastic tub on my workspace (in pic one) came from work - my manager brought it in on Thursday before Easter - it's a "Toy Story" tub of eggs which she handed out - and I grabbed the empty tub.  Not sure what I'll fill it with yet, but there'll be something, rofl. (At the moment it still has an uneaten egg inside it!)

So there it is this week.  If you want to see some more - much neater, lots of them - workspaces, check them out here .  I may not be here next week, unless I schedule something as I may be going to spend a couple of days with my Mum, but if I get back in time I'll come visiting.

simply butterflies

I made this tag yesterday evening (after the slide mailer in my previous post) but didn't get time to scan or upload it.

I used some bundled sage (for some reason I keep muddling the name of this with the tumbled glass one and want to call it tumbled sage...) over the tag, just lightly in the middle and wild honey (its so still my favourite!) in the middle and used Tim's numbers and Wendy's leaf border in the same colours.  I stamped some 4 small Wendy butterflies on white card, two in each colour, then cut them out and stuck them back to back and mounted them to the tag.  I stamped (yes, it's wonky, oops!) the message over the top. If I was doing it again, I'd stamp it separately and stick it on... doncha love hindsight!

Hope to play - sorry, make art - again tonight so I could be back.  If not, boy do I have a treat for you tomorrow...

Slide Mailers

Several years ago I bought some slide mailers from Lin but haven't really used them much. So today - after I'd (whisper it) done some tidying up in my living-come-craft room (yes, I know!! check out the results on Wednesday) I came across some in a drawer.

The outside is coloured with chipped sapphire, the inside with tumbled sage.

I stamped Tim's mini flourish front and back in walnut stain and outlined some of the flourishes with a white Inkessentials pen, the "believe in  yourself" is Wendy's.

On the inside I used chipped sapphire for the flower border (Wendy Vecchi) and stamped the penny black Gandhi quote on a scrap of white card and stuck it inside the mailer, edging with glitter glue.

This is the finished piece - the Wendy heart is grungepaper coloured with barn red distress ink, some silver bling and rock candy distress stickles on the top part.

It kept me away from the chocolate for a while!!

Hope you've all had a great Easter.

Sunday Stampers - Lace

This week, Hels has chosen a Sunday Stampers theme of Lace and thanks to her, I've got Agadoo running round my head and I can't get rid of it - thanks, so much Hels!!

I was stumped for a while to make the theme, as I don't have any decent scraps of lace - a couple of small pieces that I couldn't work into anything so I decided to lace some ribbon instead.  (and I have to thank Julie Hickey for reminding me of the idea)

The stamp is by B Line Designs - and although I know I've had it a good two or three years, it was looking suspiciously unstamped....  I stamped it on a piece of white card with black versafine ink, and trimmed it to fit a square card - it's just short of 6 x 6 inches.  I used my Japanese screw punch to punch some holes for the ribbon and then rummaged in my ribbon box (it's now even untidier than when you saw it a couple of Wednesdays ago... if that's possible!) for some narrow ribbon.  As I could only find this baby blue, I decided to colour the lady's dress to match.  Good job I did it that way round...

I stuck the stamped image to my square card and ran some glitter glue round the edges.

Notes on a Postcard

Hels has been co-ordinating the UK end of the yahoo group Gingersnap Art Exchange to celebrate it's first birthday, theme was Party and this is another of the postcards I made for my entry. The exchange closed a short while ago and the cards are being swapped so someone will get this soon!

I posted the first one a while ago, this is the purple one - I used the same basic theme for all 4, just in different colours and with variations on the Wendy flowers - details of how I did it are on the first post.

I didn't have any dusty concord reinker so used a combination of red and blue reinkers/perfect pearl mixers for the metal.

They've just announced a new exchange - so why not join the yahoo group and check it out!  There are details on their website.

Rhapsody in Blue - PDCC 23

This gorgeous picture inspired this week's Play Date Cafe Challenge - shades of blue.  I love blue, it's one of my favourite colours.  I decided to go for flowers, even though you don't get many truly blue flowers.

I took two Stampington stamps, Floral Documents, which I stamped in Adiriondack denim, on some smooth white card, and tore the edges which I then distressed with faded jeans and tumbled glass distress inks and stuck to a white cardstock.

I stamped Poppy Pods in faded jeans, on another scrap of white card, and cut out the two poppy pods and the edges which I stuck to the edge of my card (I had to trim it down to fit).

Then I took Tim's butterfly which I stamped in the dark end of the  Kaleidacolor blue breeze pad (this was about my third attempt at the butterfly - the metal one didn't work properly, the other inks i tried didn't look right either) and I finished it with two prima flowers held together with a blue brad and stuck on with glossy accents.

It's Not an April Fool

Thanks for all your encouragement in response to my first Zentangle Doodle yesterday!  I think it was beginner's luck as the one I started tonight is not going to my liking at all!  Still, I shall persevere. I do know that I need to get some decent pens to use, the one I am using is too thick-nibbed for most of the doodles. Keep you posted!

Instead, I have needed to have something to take my mind off the Liverpool football game which isn't going as well as I would have liked, soI have made this card. 

This started as a square tag on which I clear embossed the flower flourish by Tim (set is called fairytale frenzy) twice - one upside down.  I covered the tag in dusty concord DI and a dab of tumbled glass round the edges.  I wiped off the ink from the stamped images with a damp paper towel and stamped the message.  I rounded the corners of the tag just to help it fit within the scalloped edges of the cream card it's mounted on.

This is my entry for the Gingersnap Blue Moon Challenge - Take on a Tutorial (which is Hels' "resist" tutorial.)

In case you were wondering about the title of the post - well, today would have been my (21st) wedding anniversary - yes, I know, it's April First... April Fool's Day.... it is a very long story and probably not very interesting to anyone so I won't bore you with it.  I don't think the fact that we got married on April 1st had anything to do with the subsequent divorce.....!!!!

And now the football has just got worse so I am going to sign off!