I've never ....

.... made cards so far in advance before! I made these 2 cards for my uncle's birthday which isn't until the end of April. The reason for doing them so early is that a friend set a challenge - to make a card for a male and it had to include a flower.




I used sketches from a blog as inspiration but I can't remember which blog it was --- sorry!

Mother's Day

Did think that I was going to have to postpone Mother's Day this year as I was really stuck with mum's card. Luckily, I've got the day off work today and have finally finished it - mum will be pleased :o)

The image is mum's fave again - a 3D Paintbox Poppet. The embossing is one of the new Cuttlebug folders - Birds and Swirls

Deja vu

I made this card for a forum friend and was really pleased with it.

In fact, I liked it so much that I used the same idea for an anniversary card for my mum/dad to give to my aunt/uncle LOL

Challenge

A lovely friend of mine set up a challenge to make a card. She sent us the white embossed card, flower, ribbon and 3 bits of bling. The only thing we could do was use our own blank card, add a bit of colour and a sentiment.

I really struggled with it - isn't it weird how having just white can be soooo daunting. Anyway, here's the card that I made.



I added the sentiment (which is one of the new Hero Arts ones - that I'm addicted to - thanks to Kerrie LOL), coloured the ribbon and tips of the flower with a silver ink pad and added brown and pink bazzill to try and give it a bit of ooomf <<< is that a real word LOL

I was quite pleased with the result but the total surprise was that I came 2nd in the competition. I didn't know it was a comp - making the card was a challenge all of it's own but I'm soooo pleased that everyone liked it.

What no Penny Black's???

My cousin's daughter was 12 today (Happy Birthday Emily). I know that she's opened her card as her grandad has emailed me to say that she loved it. Seemed to get really stuck with this one as I didn't want to be samey so tried to avoid using Penny Black stamps LOL. She's also a card maker ;o)

Very very very happy :o)

Well today has been a "football" day. Started off this morning going to watch eldest nephew play for Hatfield Sports in their cup semi-final --- which they won 5-1.

<<< he's going to hate it that I've put his piccie on my blog ;o)

Then the big one happened --- the league cup final. It was probably the most nervous I've been for ages watching Spurs play. After seeing them play at White Hart Lane on Thursday, I wasn't very confident. After 120 minutes of non-stop, fast track, brilliant action - the mighty Tottenham Hotspur beat Chelski 2-1 to WIN. It's been 9 long years without a trophy so this one is extra special. Have to admit that I did cry but we'll put that down to the emotion ;o) Just a soppy Spurs fan - guilty as charged!!!

Craft Shopping ---- again :o)

Well I had to support a craft shop that has just opened up 10 minutes from my house. If you're ever in the Baldock (Hertfordshire) area, then I thoroughly recommend that you pop into Scrap Revolution. Lots of yummy stash and Lorraine is lovely.

Come On You SPURS

Warning warning warning - Footie Chat LOL

Yep, I'm a bit excited as we're off to White Hart Lane tonight so see the mighty Spurs play in the UEFA cup. It's the 2nd leg against Slavia Prague and we're already 2-1 up so the atmosphere should be great. It will be the 1st time that we've been to a European match. Just hope we win now :o)

Tilda Birthday

A very good friend of mine Kerryn was 30 yesterday and this is the birthday card that I made for her. I was going to do a football card as she's a fellow Spurs fan :o) but I decided against it as I knew that she'd love a Tilda card. Will have to do a Spurs one next year LOL

Great Weekend

I had a brilliant weekend over at Kerrie's. Lots and lots of chatting and laughing combined with a little bit of shopping and oh a bit of crafting is definitely a recipe for a great weekend.

We did manage to fit a little visit to Capture The Magic. Was only going to pop in for a quick visit but we ended up being there for 2.5 hours - don't know how that happened.

Apart from all the yummy stash, what we did see (very excitedly) was the new Doodlebug goodies that have just been announced.

Don't know when they're going to be available to buy but OMG I want it all. There's gorgeous velvet fluff :o) - it looks like sherbert that you can just stick your finger into, papers, velvet papers, ribbons, chipboard shapes to use with the fluff. OMG I nearly forgot the velvet brads - if you love the sugar coated brads then you are definitely going to love the velvet brads.

No stamps, which is a bit sad as the other Doodlebug stamps (that I've got) are well used so I was hoping that they'd have some new ones.

Kerrie did show me her new Stampin' Up goodies and OMG I've seen the light with the Stamp-ma-jig (I think it's called that). A very simple idea but what did we ever do without it - yep I know - either throw away cards or have to cover the "mistake" up LOL

Anyway, we did "surprise surprise" actually make some cards - well 2 each - but that is a massive improvement on last time we got together. Here's the 2 that I made:




Apart from the few bits I bought at CTM, the other thing I came home with is a list of stuff that I really have to do or get - storage drawers for my paper off cuts (which I stopped off at Staples for on the way home :o), pens to colour my Penny Black ellie in etc etc etc. All in all, a brilliant weekend spent with a very good friend xxx

A couple more cards

Here's 2 cards that I don't think I've shown on here :) They are my 2 main stamp loves at the mo - Tilda and Penny Black (of course LOL)

Oooh I've just noticed that both of them are pink and green - I do love that colour combo :)

Drive my Car

I love this picture of my niece and it seemed ideal for last weeks challenge over on UKScrappers The challenge was to use a Beatles song for the title, red, summer colours, paint and 7 of something.



Amy loved this car that her nan and grandad got her for her 4th birthday. Over the years, that car got a lot of use by her and her younger brother.

Uncle's birthday cards

My hedgie golfer stamp has got to be one of my most used stamps LOL

A few cards

Here are some of the cards that I've made/sent recently to my fab internet buddies.

I've started it

I spent most of last year saying that I was going to do a scrapbook for my sister's 40th birthday next year. Well, the big news is that I've finally done a couple of pages for it.
It did take a bit of doing to get her to give me her adoption certificate, without her getting suspicous. I told her that I wanted to do a scrapbook page with all our families important certificates on - hope she't not expecting to see it ---- eeeek! After finding it last week, she declared that she had 2 birthdays - her actual one and the one where she officially became mum and dad's daughter 15 months later. Double eek she'd better not be expecting us to make a fuss for her 40th two years in a row.



I now need to work out how to get her to hand over her wedding certificate and her kids birth certificates. Any ideas welcome. Think I might have to rope in my niece to help ;o)

I used a Pencil Lines sketch - I think it was #69. The papers are Doodlebug and the chipboard alphas are from K&Co - they are gorgeous and glittery IRL

Tagged

I've been tagged by my very good friend Kerrie

The rules are that I have to tell you 7 things about me and then tag 7 people at the end of the post. I also have to add the links to their blogs and let them know that they've been tagged.

1. I've worked for the same company for 20 years. Only female in a department of 25 guys and I have to admit that I am a bit bossy LOL

2. My nan (mum's mum) had 10 children and 22 grandchildren (I'm number 21). I'm the youngest granddaughter. If she'd still been alive now (which at 104 would have been something), she'd have 42 great grandkids and 12 great great grandkids. Yep, family parties are a bit large in our family. Thankfully, my dad has 1 brother who has 3 kids (who are all similar ages to me) and 4 grandkids - much calmer LOL

3. I'm the only Spurs fan in my immediate family. The rest are a mixture of Liverpool, Southampton, Brighton & Luton Town. My niece also reckons that she supports Ar5ena1 so I'm trying to disown her LOL

4. I've got the complete range of Luminarte Twinkling H2Os. A certain person ;o) got me started/addicted.

5. Nickname at school was Chatterbox. It's now Gobby. Ooooh electronic design engineers can be so cruel ;o)

6. I don't like coffee or bananas.

7. My middle name is Marie.

The people I'd like to tag are >>>>>>

Lily
Leigh
Lorraine
Gemma
Nic
Debbie
Dawn

Swap Cards

I've just finished running a swap on a fab forum, so I thought I'd show the cards that I did for it.

Flowers


Spring


Quote


Bling


Ribbons