Birthday Gnome

Afternoon Everyone,
Another lovely sunny Sunday. I do hope that you are enjoying the weather from the confines of your own home and are not out and about like some of the idiots that I saw this morning when I went for my walk.

I seem to have finally found some crafty mojo, which is just as well since I have had several commissions to complete in the last week or so.

One of them is this card for a friends husband.

She calls him her garden gnome so asked for one on the card. This beauty was found at Laurie Furnell Designs,

 and comes with 19 different Spring Images.

Although it has been designed with Spring and particularly Easter in mind it worked perfectly for this card.

There are lots of images that I was able to utilize with a bit of fussy cutting. 

I used a piece of embossed card for the background and a sentiment designed by Phill Martin at Sentimentally Yours.
I delivered the card to my friends place of work, where I was promptly asked to make another one for one of her colleagues to give her Dad.

They have bought him a garden gnome for his birthday so she felt that this card would be perfect for him.
I do love to make special cards for people. There is something so satisfying when you see the results of your labours light up another persons face, especially at the moment.
Enjoy the sunshine today, my Mum informs me that we can expect rain for the rest of the week. Part of me does hope that she is wrong, although if we don't get any soon I expect we will soon be faced with a hosepipe ban after all the extra water that we are having to use during lockdown, what with handwashing and clothing etc.
Stay safe, and have a great evening
Hugs Kimx

Something from the Archives.

Afternoon Everyone,
I don't know about you, but I have a list of jobs that I have been trying to get through during the lockdown. Not cleaning tasks you understand, that would be going too far lol.
One of them is to sort through all the photographs that I have taken over the years. To this end I purchased one of those Photostick things that is supposed to make it easy to do. It certainly means that they are all in one place, but this one seems to have saved multiple copies of the same thing, and nothing is sorted into folders so guess what I am going to be doing for the next several years!!
I suppose I have to start somewhere, so I thought that the best place would be with all the cards that I have made, and those that I have blogged.
Going through them has been quite fun, it's amazing to see just how many cards I have made over the years given that I have been doing this for rather a long time. Some of them will stay in a 'never to be shared' folder, but there are lots that I am still rather pleased with, so I thought that you might like to see them.
Of course there are far too many for one post, so I will throw a few into the mix every now and then.

They were all made in 2010, would you believe, using stamps made by Clarity. At least I think they are.

I don't think that they are even available any more,

 but as you can see my taste in stamps hasn't changed very much over the years.

I'm not sure that my style has changed very much either.

I liked my white embossing and handmade backgrounds even then.

Not sure about the stamps on this one, but it seemed to fit in with the others quite nicely.
Now that I've had a quick trip down memory lane, I need to get right back up to date with a commission for a friend.
Stay safe, and have a great weekend.
Hugs Kimx

What a Strange World

What a strange World we are living in at the moment.
What with social distancing and queuing to get into shops, being allowed out to get exercise once a day, and no haircuts and coffee shops.
I am one of the lucky ones, if you can look at it like that, because at least I still have a job, and one that is considered important no less.
I have gone from being one of the lowest of the low, to someone who is actually needed to help keep the country running. I am of course nowhere near as important as all the fantastic people that work for the NHS, that are helping to keep people alive.
Most of my family are furloughed (that's a new one for the vocabulary), and the children no longer attend school. It is going to be very hard for everyone to get 'back to normal', whatever, and whenever that is going to be.
The worse part, for me at least, is not being able to see the littlest Grandchildren. I'm lucky enough to live with the 4 oldest ones, but it seems ages since I had a sleepover, and had my 'bestie' follow me around. Every time I see them on facetime, or whatever it is called, they seem to have grown so big. I do get daily pictures, but it's not quite the same. It is difficult to phone too often as Mum tells me that they get very upset afterwards. It is hard for a 1, 2 and 4 year old to understand why 'Mamma can't come to stay', they must feel like they are being punished, I certainly do.
One of the many amazing things that has come out of all of this, is the friendliness of our wonderful crafty community.
Amongst lots of other things the fabulous people over at Creative Expressions decided to start a 30 day Crafty Challenge, just for fun.
I have several boxes of cards that I have made over the years, so I decided that I would try and use some of them, rather that make anything new. Amazingly I managed to find something that worked for every challenge but one, and shared a total of 107 cards with you all.
I wish I could say that it has made a dent in those boxes, but there are still plenty more to come.
Another thing that has remained a constant has been Mother Nature, who has continued her seasonal marvels regardless of what has been going on in the world.

So no card tonight, just a not very good photo of some bluebells that I saw on my walk yesterday. Stay safe everyone, and thanks for letting me ramble on.

Hugs Kimx

Creative Expressions 30 Day Challenge - Day 30 Apeture

Morning All,
I can't believe that we are on the last day of the 30 Day challenge over at Creative Expressions, where did that month go to?

For the last challenge, they are looking for an aperture, so this is my take on it.

The background is created with a fabulous floral stamp, designed by my friend Jane Gill, and white embossing powder.

I sponged the images with bright colour Distress Inks, and then cut the aperture using a Sue Wilson rectangular die. I mounted the outer part of the panel onto craft foam to elevate it above the central panel.

As usual when I was designing my card I had to have a play, so I created a Masterboard using the same stamp and the Mop Up Technique.

I chopped up the Masterboard and created a couple of extra cards for my stash.

I'm afraid I'm very sad, and even the little bits get used up.
Have a great day, and thanks for stopping by.
Stay Safe and Happy Crafting
Hugs Kimx

Creative Expressions 30 Day Challenge - Day 29 Friendship

Afternoon,
Todays penultimate challenge over at Creative Expressions 30 Day Challenge is Friendship.

Now I'm not much for what I call 'flowery' words, as my friends will tell you. I tend to stick to basics like Happy Birthday and Best Wishes lol.

And as I told you I am also trying to share cards that I already have made in my stash as I have had a few commissions that I have been working on that have taken up all of my crafting time.

So I hope that I will be forgiven for sharing a card with stamps not available through Creative Expressions.

I added my sentiment over the top of a piece of grosgrain ribbon that I found in my stash.

With a few gems for a bit of bling.

 Thanks for stopping by, stay safe, and have a lovely crafty afternoon.
Hugs Kimx

Creative Expressions 30 Day Challenge - Day 28 3D (Edited)

Evening everyone,
Another late one, and I really should be in bed as I start work at five tomorrow morning!!!
It's 3D today over at Creative Expressions 30 Day challenge and I'm afraid that I am going to have to post my cards for it tomorrow as the ruddy internet is not playing the game.
I have managed to write this on my phone, but I cant import any pictures so I will have to update this tomorrow.
The wonders of modern technology and all that.
(Edited to include photos)

Goodmorning, I've done my 4 hour shift at work, and my walk around the park, and I have finally managed to get the Internet to behave, even if only briefly, so here are the cards that I tried to post yesterday.

I'm afraid that my 3D is limited to a couple of fussy cut flowers,

 and some Pinflair Glue Gel.

Both cards were created from a Masterboard of stamped and white embossed images, coloured with the Summer Garden Watercolour Palette.

It is a fabulously sparkly paint palette.
Big hugs
Kimx

Creative Expressions 30 Day Challenge - Day 27 Recycled

Evening Everyone,
A late one for me today, some how the day seems to have got away with me.
Todays the challenge over at Creative Expressions 30 Day challenge, is to recycle. Now we are very good with recycling as a whole in this house, but I am not so good in my card making.

The one exception to that is the acetate packaging that dies come in. I do reuse that, and believe me I have a rather large pile of it.

The central panel on this card is made using a piece of acetate from said packaging along with alcohol inks, a stencil and Alcohol Lift Ink.

I added plenty of die cuts and some extra stamping on the base card.

This card also uses a piece of packaging acetate, alcohol inks, and the wonderful Alcohol Lift Inkpad.

This was probably one of my favourite new techniques that I picked up last year......or was it the year before that. Everything seems to be blurring in to one lol. We really will have to play with it again in a class...…..as soon as we can have one that is.
Off to bed now.
Stay Safe.
Hugs Kimx

Creative Expressions 30 Day Challenge - Day 26 Fabric

Morning Everyone,
I can't believe that it's Sunday already, where did Saturday go?

I've definitely had to think outside the box for todays challenge over at Creative Expressions 30 Day Challenge where they are looking for you to use Fabric.

I don't often use fabric, so how about some patchwork made using bits of Bleedin' Art Tissue.

It does make great background to stamp and emboss on.

Or as a background to some die cuts.

I added the hexagonal pieces of tissue to some DSSSheet to give them some stability.
Thanks for stopping by. Stay safe.
Hugs Kimx

Creative Expressions 30 Day Challenge - Day 25 Distress

Morning Everyone,
It's another Saturday morning, and another day in the Creative Expressions 30 Day challenge.

Today they are asking for Distress, so I had to think outside the box a little bit.

I have been trying very hard to find cards that I have already made to share with you for the challenges,

so I chose this one with a fairly distressed mop up background. Plenty of stamped and embossed images using Jane's JGB003 - Rushes and Grasses

I also blended plenty of ink around the edges,

and a torn strip of vellum and some brads, along with some faux stitching.

I hope that you have a good weekend, although I think we are finally in for some rain after all the beautiful sunshine of the last couple of weeks. 

It has definitely got colder I must say.

Stay inside and stay safe.

Big Hugs 

Kimx

Crea\tive Expressions 30 Day Challenge - Day 24 Gilded

Morning Everyone
I hope that you have had a reasonable week and are looking forward to the weekend, even if all the days seem to blur into one another at the moment.
One thing I have noticed about being back at work...……...nail polish only lasts about 3 days lol.
I always paint my nails with glitter polish for Christmas and the New Year, and then don't really bother the rest of the time because they chip too easily when working at the till.
So as I have been at home for best part of 3 months I thought that I would continue with my manicures (performed by me I hasten to add)
At home they seemed to last for at least a fortnight, back to work and they have lasted about 3 days. Oh well I guess it is another way to fill my time during lockdown.

Todays challenge at Creative Expressions 30 Day challenge is Gilded.

I've chosen something slightly different for my take on it. For this card I stamped and embossed Jane's lovely sentiment on to black card stock and then used several diferent sizes of circle die to create a stencil out of acetate.

I then used gold, silver and copper metallic ink to sponge through the stencil to create this lovely Bokeh background.
I used a small snowflake from another of Jane's stamps released at the same time to finish things off.
Not gilding in the true sense of the word, but hopefully good enough for todays challenge.
Have a great weekend, but don't forget to stay home, and stay safe.
Happy Crafting and Hugs
Kimx