December Scrapbook Layouts - No's. 5&6

Hello Everyone,

Back again sharing and recording the two latest pages for December. 

This is just a better pic of the one that was on my desk post yesterday. The background was made with two Brusho powders, Leaf Green & Orange. I had a moment or two of doubt whilst doing it but, once it dried, decided it would do. I kept the embellishments fairly minimal so the simple shot of rosehips in our frosty garden didn't get lost on the page. 

Page No. 6 features Alan in better times - 2018 in fact. Long before Covid. And he's wearing his favourite Christmas jumper. We'd stopped at the supermarket cafe for tea - our reward to ourselves after doing the Christmas shopping. 

As in the previous pages, I used Lisa Sikorski's sketch of the day in her Facebook Sketch-a-Thon for each page. I will continue to use her sketches for the rest of the month.

Similarly, I'm participating in the Scrap Backwards group challenge. This involves creating a kit from stash based on a sheet of stickers that has been broken into but not finished or, failing that, old embellishments like those ancient wooden stars in No.5. Admittedly, my kit for this month is enormous because I just dragged out ALL my Christmas stash. My aim is to use it all up so I can treat myself to a new collection for December 2022. 

And, because it's fun I'm doing my best to include each of the three items in Dotty About Flair's daily prompts. Day No. 5's prompts are, Texture, Rustic & Green, and No. 6's are, Water, 4 patterned papers & Silver. 

No doubt I could make scrap pages without participating in these challenges but it wouldn't be half as much fun. It also helps to see my daughter's inheritance shrinking some! 

Bye for now.

Elizabeth

What's on Your Workdesk Wednesday - Week 653

Hello Everyone,

The days seem to be flying by now we are in December. I suppose it's because we're on the run up to Christmas and there's so much to do. But, hopefully, there's still time to join Julia over on the Stamping Ground for this week's WOYWW. 

My desk yesterday teatime after finishing the fifth page for this year's winter album. I used the stamp set for the number five, stamped with the green ink pad in the background beside the Brushos used to create the messy background. There's also a few bits and bobs but really it doesn't look too bad. But don't believe it ... there's more.

Yes, this is the hideous mess deliberately avoided when I took the first pic. And they say the camera doesn't lie! I could liken that pile at the back to the Leaning Tower of Pisa. The pic lying on top of the front pile is ready to be scrapped next. First, a tidy up is in order. 

Now it's time for the kitten.

She's having a lazy morning. Could be because it's raining out. 

And now the funnies. 

Have a wonderful WOYWW everyone and a very good week too. 

Sunday Snippet Cards - A Kaleidoscope of Butterflies

Evening Everyone,

It's been a lovely autumnal day here ... perfect for the day out at Portpatrick Harbour to celebrate DH's 79th birthday. For those of you who follow me on Facebook pop over to see photos taken today.

There was, though, a definite nip in the air so I think it's safe to say that summer is over. Not to worry, autumn here in Scotland is glorious and our summer hasn't been all that good ... not good enough to miss, that's for sure. And it does mean that I will be spending less time gardening and more time crafting. Now, that's got to be good because it will mean I can get back to posting more often on this much neglected blog ... starting with sharing this trio of snippets cards.

As you can see the design is similar in all of them and they all feature butterflies. The strips of card are leftovers from an earlier session when I played with the various colours in my Brusho collection. I layered them on to scraps of solid coloured card before adhering them to the face of the card blanks. The butterflies were cut from snippets of card using two of the new die sets bought recently from The Range.

Supplies used:

• card blanks 
• leftover pieces of white card spattered with Brushos in a variety of colours, trimmed to create strips
• scraps of card in green, yellow and pink for the layers under the Brusho strips to create the panels
• snippets of card in green, aqua, yellow, turquoise and pink for the butterflies
• butterfly dies - Xcut Dinky Die - Butterfly and Dovecraft Mini die - Layering Butterfly

I'd like to say that these made a huge dent in my scrap mountain but, sadly, they did not. I've been thinking of taking another approach to this problem, that is apart from tossing them all in the bin - I couldn't do that - and after watching a few YouTube videos on the subject I'm going to have a bash at making up card kits to have ready to work on at any time I have a free moment. I'm hoping the initial time taken to make up the kits will, in the end, be worth it. Grabbing a few kits to work on whilst watching TV of an evening would seem a good plan. And it also occurs to me that the youngsters in the family might like some to be creative with. It's worth a try. I'll let you know if it proves to be a successful approach - or not.

In the meantime, I'm submitting one of these cards to Pixie's Snippets Playground. I'm just not sure which one - decisions, decisions!

Hope you have all had a wonderful weekend and that the coming week is going to be a good one.

WOYWW 428

Morning Everyone,

After the lovely weather we were enjoying last week today it's raining. Never mind! There is always What's On Your Workdesk to console me. That's the fun meme brought to us by Julia our Queen of Desks. over at the Stamping Ground, in which a worthy bunch of crafters reveal all. Here's what was on my desk this morning.

Of course, I had to clear it, using the shove-to-the-side-method, before I could get to the keyboard. Inspired by Shaz's post last week I've dragged out a bunch of UFOs and sorted them out. I've even managed to make one card, resting on the keyboard in the photo. It's not much but it's a start. On the left there's a pile of die-cuts (just visible), Brusho splattered bits and alcohol inked bits. To the right of the guillotine is a pile of card and stamped images, some already coloured, others still waiting to be coloured. The horrible mess to the far right is a couple of boxes of ribbon and lace scraps which I dragged out thinking it could be useful. At the back are the boxes and tubs of essentials that are permanently on show.

I've also set myself a target to clear the backlog of needlecraft projects waiting to be finished. Here are two that were finished this week.

Crocheted pineapple patterned doily. The first one I've made for many decades. I did make a few, still scattered around on tables even now, before my children were born but this kind of crochet takes a lot of concentration - not the sort of thing to do when you have a house full of kids.

Zippered pouch. After the success of the scrappy bag I made for my daughter's birthday - shown in last week's WOYWW post - I've made this similar but smaller and simpler to make pouch. Forward planning for, dare I say it, Christmas. I found the easy to follow  instructions on Anna Graham's blog Noodlehead.

I think the pouch would make a lovely present, filled with goodies of course. And that reminds me that I had a few comments last week asking what the goodies were that I put in my daughter's bag. Well, they were skin products - all fruity perfumed, e.g. body butter, lip salve, hand cream, etc. She was particularly pleased with the hand cream because, as a quilter, her hands get very dry.

So that's what I've been up to this week. DH is taking me out for a spot of lunch now so I'll be over to see what's on everyone's desk later - just as soon as I'm back.

In the meantime, Happy WOYWW and have a wonderfully crafty week ahead.

Rudolph Day Card for June

Hello Everyone,

It's last minute but I just found some time this afternoon to make this little card for ScrappyMo's Rudolph Day Card Challenge for this month.

The background is another one of the pieces I made a few weeks ago using Brusho powder paints. The colour is Brilliant Red. The stamp set is an old one that I think came free with a magazine a couple of years ago - I particularly like the leaping deer.

Materials used:

• a white card base cut to measure 4¼" x 4¾" - I know that's an odd size but I wanted the topper to be centred.
• a scrap of red cardstock for matting the topper
• the piece of Brusho spattered card
• the Magical Christmas stamp set
• Stazon Jet Black ink pad
• Nuvo Crystal Drops Red Berry
• black & white cord which came in a pack of three from WH Smith at Christmas

I think Maureen's Mister Linky is still open so I'm off to add this card to the list.

I wish you all a lovely weekend.

A Notecard - Breathe

Hello Everyone,

This is the last of the posts I've scheduled for the week and today I'm sharing a card made for the UKPC Craft Group Swap challenge for this month.

The theme for June is The Sea with this photo as a prompt.

As you can see, I was very influenced by the image of the sea. It's another Brusho background too - I'm obsessed with Brushos at the moment!

Supplies used:

• a square white card base, measuring 5" square, with a scalloped edge (from The Works)
• a scrap of white cardstock cut to create the background piece,spritzed with water and dusted with Turquoise Brusho ink powder
• a scrap of white card, also given the Brusho treatment but with a lighter dusting of the powder this time and cut to form a banner shape
• stamp - Stampendous 'Breathe'
• ink pads - Vivid Ultramarine (for the sentiment) and a turquoise from G Studio (VP0003) - this last was used to ink the edges of the background and the sentiment.
• another scrap of white card, just a smidgen larger than the first piece, for layering the sentiment.

So that's it. The holiday is almost over but tomorrow we will be traveling up to Aberdeenshire to visit my son and his family. We haven't seen them for a while so I'm really looking forward to being with them again.

Hope you've all had a wonderful week too.

Sunday Snippets - Thanks So Very Much

Hello Everyone,

I may be away on holiday but I thought I'd surprise you by scheduling a post to share this card with you.

It's another one featuring a Brushos background and everything apart from the card base is made from snippets.

How it was made:

• the card base was made by cutting white cardstock to measure 5" wide by 11¾" and folded in half to create a tent shape.
• a snippet of white card measuring approximately 3½" x 4" (sorry, I forgot to measure it accurately) to create the topper. It was spritzed with water, dusted with two shades of Brusho, Yellow first, then Leaf Green, spritzed again and then left to dry. Once it was dry it was stamped with Impression Obsession's Cover-a-Card Flourishes background stamp using Versafine Olympia Green ink pad. 
• a snippet of deep yellow textured cardstock (Papermania) was cut to the same size to make the mat for the topper.
• the topper was layered on to the yellow card at a jaunty angle.
• cream coloured twine was rapped around the topper and before tying this into a bow I attached a small green button - both items from old stash.
• another snippet of white card was stamped with the sentiment from Stampin' Up's Simply Wonderful stamp set, again in Versafine Olympic Green. Using a Woodware's corner rounder, I rounded the corners before adhering it to the topper, just under the green button which I then stuck down with a glue dot just to be sure it all stayed in place. 
• finally, the topper was adhered to the front of the card using sticky pads to add a bit of dimension.

That's my card for today. I hope you will all have a lovely week while I'm away enjoying beautiful Scottish scenery.

Sunday Snippet Make - A Minnie Mouse Card

Good Evening,

I hope you are having a happy crafty Sunday.  After quite a pleasant morning here - managed a couple of hours gardening - the heavens have now opened and it's pouring down. Not that I'm too bothered because it gave me the perfect excuse to retreat to the craft room and finish the card I'm sharing today.

Have you ever wondered how I go about designing my cards? Well, I often wonder that myself and actually it's pretty hit and miss. I don't make sketches and I certainly don't have a clear idea of where I'm going before I start. They just sort of develop - usually very slowly. In fact, a quick card is something of a rarity.  Instead I start with a person, an occasion or, as in this case, one item I want to use and then go from there. What follows is an illustrated walk-through of how I made this card.

The idea for this card has been brewing for a few days. The starting point was that I wanted to make a card for a Minnie Mouse enthusiast's birthday using a Disney adhesive topper from a set that has been in my stash for quite some time, Frankly, I'm a sucker for anything Minnie and/or polka dots and I blame Disney entirely for this obsession.

So I had the topper but there has to be more than that to a card. Once the topper was decided on a very vague idea of what I wanted to include in it began to develop. A background was essential and I wanted to make it myself but I wasn't at all sure how. It wasn't until I was watching a recording of a craft show - I 'speed watch' these to avoid the sales chatter - where the demonstrator was making the most fabulous background using alcohol inks and glossy paper. Now the background I've made is clearly not made with alcohol inks but that demo was the prompt for me to dig out my tiny set of Brushos instead.

I chose a scrap of white pearlised card - using the reverse (non-pearlised) side, a tip from Sheena Douglass - and on a craft mat spritzed it with water before shaking Brilliant Red Brusho ink dust on to it. I found a second spritzing got the spattered effect I was looking for. After putting the card aside to dry, I mopped up the ink that was left on the craft mat and put that aside too.

While they were drying I cut a sheet of black cardstock - Papermill Direct - to make the matting for the spattered background, which was then adhered to a plain white card base measureing 7"x 5" (The Works Make & Create). Next I die cut the matting and layering for the topper. Dotty paper seemed a must and I was lucky to find a snippet of red/white and a sheet a black/white polka dotted paper in my stash. It's old 6"x 6" paper - Raspberry Road Designs Summer Goodness (2012) and a Crafts-~Too Designer Paper Pack - most probably 2012 too. I used a Chinese die set for this. The packaging has minimal information on it so here's a photo of what it looks like.

And while I was searching through the dies I came across the tiny Interlocking Circles die from Decorette (CLDR 11) which gave me the idea for the embellishments. I cut it twice from leftover black cardstock and attached it to the top right and bottom left corners of the splattered card using liquid glue ... it's so fine any other adhesive wouldn't work.

To make the topper I also die-cut the scrap of card used to mop up the ink and then layered it with the red and black patterned papers before topping it with Minnie. The final touch was to add the greeting which also came with the topper set.

And that is how this card was made. I'm submitting it to the following two challenges:

Di's Pixie's Snippets Playground - Week 285 and 286 - where anything goes as long as it includes snippets.

Allsorts Challenge - Week 419 - Use at least two dies

I hope you enjoyed reading this more detailed description of how I made the card. Normally, I simply itemise the steps that go into making a card, making it all seem so quick and easy, but I thought this blow by blow account would give a truer insight into the tortured thinking that goes into the whole process. I suspect that you have a much more organised approach which makes cardmaking easier, simpler and quicker. I truly am the slowest card maker in the World! I'd never be able to make a living at it, that's for sure.

It's going to be a good night tonight. Poldark is back!

I wish you all a lovely evening.

Cardmaking - Golden Leaves Snippet Card

Hello Everyone,

And a happy Sunday to you all. Thanks for joining me on what is a dull and cool day - only 9°C this morning. Almost time for me to go into hibernation with Di's hedgehog family, methinks. That's Di of Pixie's Crafty Workshop - the lady lucky enough to have what seems like the UK's entire hedgehog population living in her back garden.

And talking about hibernation, I believe the Danish have got winter sorted with their hygge approach to winter. Hygge is hard to define but seems to encompass blazing fires, candlelight,  warm woolly clothes, throws, hot chocolate - in fact all things cosy. Sounds perfect to me.

I've just noticed that it's a whole seven days since I last posted anything. Where has the week gone??? It's been busy for me - people to see, places to go, things to do - ending with a visit to my doctor on Friday with a nasty case of acne on my face. Who would have thought that a woman of my mature years could develop acne? Turns out it is acne rosacea and it is no respecter of age!!! Oh, and while I was with the doctor she just gave me my flu injection too - talk about adding insult to injury!

Enough of that! You came to see my snippety make for Pixie's Snippets Playground - Week 251 so here it is at last.

The object of this card was to use up a few snippets from the mountain,  a sadly neglected stamp, and Brusho ink powder, just because it is fun to use.

Here's how I made it.

1. I used a plain white base for a 4" x 5¾" finished size, turned to create a tent style card, opened out and laid flat out on the craft mat for the next step in the process. Before moving on I covered the back of the card with copy paper, taped it down on each side, to prevent the Brusho powder getting where it wasn't wanted. 
2. Next, I spritzed the front with water - not so much that it was saturated but enough to allow the Brusho to do it's magic. I chose the Leaf Green powder for this background, just puffing it here and there because I did not want too much coverage. Where there wasn't enough water some of the powder didn't react,  so I spritzed those areas again, ever so gently, until I was happy with the effect it created. 
3. While the background was drying, I grabbed a snippet of white card and stamped it with Penny Black's Golden Leaves stamp using Memento Pens for the colour. The middle image is coloured with Bamboo Leaves and the outer images with Pear Tart. I also touched the edges of the middle image with a Peeled Paint Tim Holtz Distress Marker just to create a bit more definition. 
4. To finish the topper it was matted on to a snippet of green cardstock. The greeting, which was created by stamping Crafty Stamps Thank You with Bamboo Leaves ink on to a teeny weeny snippet of white and matted on to yet another snippet of the green card, was adhered to the top right corner of the topper.  

And that was the card done.

I have another busy week in front of me with the highlights being my great-granddaughter's first birthday on Tuesday, the same day my second oldest grandson, on leave from Shetland, will be here for an overnight stay, and on Thursday two of our friends are staying overnight and we are off to the Gaiety Theatre here in Ayr to enjoy the sound of Nick Ross Orchestra. Should be a night of nostalgia for my husband  and his pal - they both love the big band sound!

So if another week goes by without me posting anything, I think you'll know why ... I'll be exhausted :)

Weather update - it's pouring with rain now - and I have to go out in it soon, big sigh.

Wishing you a wonderful Snippet Sunday and a great week ahead.

Two More Brusho Background Cards

Evening Everyone

I hope you are having a good weekend and, if in America, a wonderful 4th of July celebration.

I've been making more Brusho backgrounds, combining them with heat embossing, to make two cards.

To create this background white card was misted with water before randomly brushing on gold Aquatint Ink (E70). While still wet Purple and Leaf Green Brushos were sprinkled over and left to dry. Next I stamped the Thistles (Lavinia Stamps) using VersaMark over the background and heat embossed with Seafoam White powder (Docraft's). The finished piece was matted with lilac cardstock before mounting on to a white card base. The final touch was to add two punched butterflies decorated with Crystal Stickles and three lilac gems as embellishments.

The background for this card was created using Orange, Purple and Brilliant Red Brushos. For this one I went for a dramatic effect by heat embossing the stamped Thistles with Stampendous Midnight Black powder. The panel was matted on to a piece of dark orange cardstock which has a texture effect printed on it. Again the embellishments are punched butterflies, decorated with Black Diamond Stickles, and gems - black to match the thistles. One of the butterflies was punched from the orange cardstock and the other from a leftover scrap of the Brusho background.

The insides using leftovers.

And the backs too.

It's been a funny old day, raining cats and dogs early morning, brightening up later, and all the time warm. After last night's downpours - we escaped the thunder and lightening here - some of the taller plants in the garden were in a sorry state. So my job this morning, as soon as it stopped raining,  was to go round with the secateurs and do a bit of tidying up. After that we took a trip to the garden centre to buy some new rose bushes. There's a 20% off offer this weekend ... with our membership 10% off that gave us three bushes for the price of two - too good to miss. So guess what we will be doing tomorrow? That's right, digging holes and planting rose bushes :)

Have a great Sunday.

Snippet Cards On Monday - Brusho Backgrounds

Evening Everyone,

I hope you've had a happy Monday ... if not, hope your evening is going rather better. We've had a good day, still chilly but at least the sun came out to brighten it. I have a couple of snippet cards for Pixie's Snippets Playground - Week 180.

Some time ago I had a session playing experimenting with Brushos. I thought at the time that the results were a bit much - I'd been a tad heavy-handed when sprinkling the powder and/or spritzing with water. It was tempting to just toss them in the bin but I held my hand and stashed the pieces away to give me some thinking time. And having thought about it for a month or two, here's what I did with a couple of the pieces.

 The background on this card was made using a mixture of yellow, green and purple Brushos.

This one was made with green and turquoise Brushos.

Materials used:

- White square card bases, 4¾"x4¾"
- Smooth white card for colouring with Brushos
- Brushos Yellow, Leaf Green, Purple for first piece; Leaf Green and Turquoise for the second.
- Stamps - Lavinia stamps, Floral Spray, Fairy Pods; greetings from Stampin' Up and Ladybug Crafts
- Inks - VersaMark; Memento Tuxedo Black
- Embossing powders - Docrafts Papermania Seafoam White; Stampendous Midnight Black
- Snippets of cardstock for matting - lilac and black
- Punch - tiny butterfly from Woodware 

After cutting the toppers there was enough trimmings left over to decorate the inside and back of the cards.

Today was the estimated day of arrival for my third great-grandchild but so far no news. Maybe tomorrow :)

Watched the first part of the adaptation of Iain Banks novel, Stonehouse, this evening, mainly because it was filmed in Macduff, a town I used to know very well. Macduff, and neighbouring Banff, was where I learned to drive more than thirty years ago ... the ideal location for learning hill stops and starts as I recall!

Thanks for popping by. Have a good day tomorrow.

Happy Crafting,

Experimenting with Watercolours - Sunday Snippets

Good Afternoon,

Actually, it's not really a good afternoon here ... it's windy and wet. Apparently it's only going to get worse because the tail end of Hurricane Gonzalo is heading our way! That being so, you know where to find me, holed up in my craft room experimenting even more with watercolours. Which is what I've been doing whenever I had a spare moment recently and now I have a couple of finished cards to share with you.

This background for the topper on the first card was created with Aqua Tint brushed over white cardstock. I dampened the white card with water before brushing on the colour in a sweeping motion. I think you can see that I went back with more colour several times trying to get a sort of landscape effect. Once the ink dried, I splashed some water droplets over the surface - this has a 'bleaching' effect adding a bit more interest to the finished background.

The fabulous stamp used is a Penny Black slapstick cling called Dreamy. Forest green cardstock from Papermill Direct was used for the card base and the matting with a scrap of white (same source) for layering. The greeting, from Stampin' Up's Wetlands set, was stamped up with VersaFine Olympia Green.

The background for this second card was made by mopping up paints, leftover on the craft mat, from the first and then adding just a little sprinkling of Leaf Green Brusho crystals in the areas that were the dampest. The images, zen poppy pods from Lavinia Stamps stamped with Archival Black ink, have been painted with a combination of Aqua Tints and Brusho crystals in shades of red, yellow and green.

The topper is matted on to a snippet of red American Crafts cardstock and then layered on some of the green card leftover from the first card. No sentiment or greeting on this one ... that way it can be used as a notelet.

And as I've manage to incorporate a fair few snippets into these cards, I'm off to submit them to Pixie's Snippets Playground - Week 147.

Would you believe it, since I started to write up this post the sun has come out to play! It's still windy but so nice to see the sun again, however briefly :)

The EM put on his domestic god pinny this afternoon and has been baking up a storm, fruit scones and my favourite low-sugar fruit cake ... the aroma wafting through the house is simply gorgeous.

Just discovered that the Christmas Movie channel has returned ... it's only the middle of October and we haven't even had Halloween and Bonfire Night yet!!!

I hope you are well and having a wonderful weekend.

Happy Crafting,

PS: Have you seen that I'm celebrating with a giveaway ... do check out the sticky post at the top of this blog for details.

A Tag for Sunday Snippets

Hi Everyone,

I finished this tag a few days ago but deliberately held it over for today's trip to Pixie's Snippets Playground - Week 145, because snippets galore went into the making of it.

Dream, Discover, Create Tag front

I was trying to use up as much stash as possible but, on reflection, it does look rather as though I've thrown everything but the kitchen sink at it!!!

Brusho'd and glittered chipboard heart, gold glitter
encrusted butterflies and flowers

Cotton lace, sequined ric-rac trim, Gelli print with butterflies
and words typed on ancient typewriter

Tag back

As it is still Sunday, I'm claiming Jules Law; that is, it's okay to be lazy today and not list the materials used, however, if there is anything you would like information on do ask, I'll do my best to answer any questions.

I hope you've had as enjoyable weekend as we have had here. The weather was good enough yesterday and this morning for me to get out into the garden and do a bit more tidying up before winter sets in, and before the storm arrives. It was forecast to be here tomorrow but the Met Office got that wrong, it's here already!!!

I hope Di, our favourite Pixie, has got over yesterday's rude awakening by now and that Parsnip is feeling suitably contrite for laughing too :)

Edit Note: At Mrs A's urging I'm entering this tag for her Butterfly Challenge #15 though wasn't sure it met the remit of Butterfly in Autumn Colours! What do you think? 

Happy Crafting,