Merry Christmas!!!

Just wanting to wish everyone a very happy, safe and joyful Christmas this year. Please take care on the roads if you are driving anywhere.

We are having Christmas here with my Dad and brother. Will visit OH's family in the morning and come back home for lunch.

I'd like to thank everyone who visits my blog and all the wonderful comments on my work. Thanks so much.

Be Merry Again!

I've so enjoyed making these Christmas cards. Here are two more that I finished a few weeks ago. For the first card I cuttlebug embossed the Basic Grey pink background with my new snowflake flolder. I made a Christmas tree using punches like Francie did. I think it looks fabulous. The star at the top of the tree is an acrylic embellishment out of my stash as is the lace and bling. Stamps are by Papermania and the papers are My Minds Eye Be Merry and Basic Grey.

The second card uses Nesties for behind the Christmas trees which have been cut out of the Be Merry paper by My Minds Eye. I cuttlebug embossed the pink layer with another of my new embossing folders from the UK. Stamps are by Papermania with Stampin' Up punches used for the greeting. Lace and bling from my stash.

Today I received some gorgeous crystals in the mail so hope to get some more of these cards made using them.
Jennifer requested that I do a tutorial on making bows. Well all I use is the Bow Easy and sometimes the rabbit ears technique. I'm not allowed to put the link on here where I purchased my Bow Easy but if you email me, larleigh@bigpond.com, I'll be more than happy to send you the link to where I purchased mine from and also on that same website is a fabulous tutorial on how to use the Bow Easy.

This last week has been spent in non crafting activities for the most part. CWA is finished for the year, the crafting groups I go to have finished up for Christmas and Sunday afternoon was spent with 4 other girls that I went to Primary School with. We have an annual get together at this time of the year.
The fine tuning of my craft room clean up is nearly finished.
Thanks for the many wonderful comments on my blog, I truly appreciate each and every one of them.

Christmas Past

Yep, more Christmas cards. I actually love making Christmas cards and always, always leave it to the last minute to do them. Every year I'm determined not to do that but it always happens.
Yesterday (Monday) was spent with a friend of mine who came down to help me tidy my craft room. I had moved all my sewing and cross stitch items into the spare room cupboards and so had that part of the work done. Thank goodness. It took the whole day but I can now see the floor (because all the stash is in the cupboards now), have tidy and neat shelves and I know where things are.

On Friday and Saturday I managed to make these cards while out crafting both days. lol
All four have been 'cased' from a lady called Debbie Olson, a very clever lady who did a series of Graphic 45 cards, part one and part two. I would wholeheartedly like to thank her for making these cards because I just love them. I did try to make them a little different but that was difficult because I loved the originals so much.
The photos have picked up the light on the Swarovski Rhinestones that I used, well I hope so anyway. My Bow Easy was used and the ribbon used on the bottom cards is gorgeous silk ribbon. I can't put the link to the silk ribbon on here but I can email it to you.
Hope you like these cards çause I have more of them to do yet. lol
Thanks for looking and all your wonderful comments that I know take time to leave. Very much appreciated.

Boxes, boxes!!

I saw a box that Beate created while browsing her blog. Well it seemed just right for the Christmas gifts I make for my girlfriends and for cent sale prizes. Sorry about the lousy photo, in a hurry as usual. In total I think I made 48 of these so I am definitely over boxes. 24 of them I filled with cellaphane bags of Christmas lollies and the others were filled with good quality mini chocs, like flake, cherry ripe etc. I used my big Bow Easy to make the triple loop bows and some lovely organza ribbon that I bought on sale at Anne's when she was closing down. The tops of most of the boxes is Basic Grey Eskimo Kisses 6 x 6 paper pad and the other 12 were done with some dsp that I had around. All the bottoms I matched up SU plain c/s in the A4 size.

I think that most of my friends appreciated the work that went into these, hope so anyway.
At the moment, I'm decluttering my house and trying to make Christmas cards at the same time. Not easy, especially when my craft room is part of the decluttering lol. My OH is on holiday at the moment, so I'm making use of that.
Hope everyone is having a wonderful weekend.

Chocolate and Pink

Another birthday card, this time my card for Chris. She loves lace and bears so I thought these papers from Basic Grey teamed with pearls, pink velvet, roses and lace would do nicely.
She loved it. I cased a card I found on one of the blogs I look at, changing papers, colours embellishmets and picture, unfortunately I can't read the watermark on it. I'll have to make sure I print the pics for my idea book at a bigger size.
I thank the original maker of this card, fabulously easy to put together.

Another hot day, yesterday was 39C and today isn't much better. The fog at 5.30 this morning was so thick I couldn't see more than a metre or so in front of the car.
Hope everyone has a wonderful day.