Certainly Celery a lá Sharon

Well after a month of being sick with this awful bug that's going around, I'm finally feeling a bit more myself. I'm now playing catch up with everything including my blog reader. So if you were wondering why there hadn't been any comments from me, that's why. I did manage some cards while I was sick, orders to fill etc etc.
This is one of them. The tulip ribbon is from my favourite ribbon shop, Stamp Simply Ribbon. When Sharon first put this ribbon up for sale, she said that it went nicely with Certainly Celery and it does.
Here is my version of a Sharon card. I had to use one of my pendant nesties and of course, my new stamps from Claire at Waltzing Mouse Stamps. Gorgeous. The sentiment is a Just Rite one which along with Claire's stamps all fit nicely into different nesties. Got to love that. Card stock of course is SU Certainly Celery and Whisper White with the paper being from a Certainly Celery designer series pack that I've had stashed away. The punch is a Martha Stewart one and with some bling, voila, a finished card.
Thanks for visiting and hope you all have managed to miss this dreadful bug.

Jan's Birthday Clock

It's my friend Jan's birthday and this is the clock I made her. The papers are from one the Anne Griffin ranges. I just love them. So pretty and the colours gorgeous. Lots of flowers, punched leaves, pearls, lace and a couple of charms. I also used some wired purple glass strands from Magnolia. I love the friendship rub ons and were just right for Jan.
Thanks for visiting and hope you all are well.

Purple and Pansies

A lady in our craft group that I'm a member of, is having a birthday on Saturday and as I'm the card maker in the group, I get to make all her cards. lol
This one is a special request because the gift is a crocheted pansy doiley so the card had to have pansies on it.
Here is the result. I used my Flourishes pansies. The first attempt at colouring was with copics. Well wasn't that a damm disaster!!!! Those efforts are in the bin. I went back to my old faithful Prisma Colour pencils. The paper is some that I've had for some time by Alison Ellis, so beautiful. I matched colours of the pansies to the papers and then picked the Bazzill cardstock to match. The flowers have been cut out and layered onto another stamped image. Half way through cutting them out I did wonder whether I was insane. Yep, very fiddley and it would have been easier just to cut the oval nestie around the whole image. Anyway it's done now. I layered the ovals onto the lattice pendant nestie then layered that onto the card. The gold was embossed with the Dawny CB embossing folder to give a bit more texture. In the original sketch there was a sentiment in the top right hand corner but I've replaced it with a bow.....yep, my favourite Stamp Simply satin ribbon. The white picks up the butterflies as well as the pansies background. I sponged purple ink very lightly around the edge of the white c/s, and added three gold brads to balance.
The sketch I used is from Sketch Saturday week 112 and was really easy to use.
Thanks for visiting.

Carousel Dreams

My girlfriend asked me to make her a card suitable for a 3 year old girl who like pink and purple. Mmmm well I don't have much in the lines of images or for that matter, patterned paper for that age group but I knew I had this stamp and had been wanting to try it out. It's called Carousel Dreams by Elisabeth Bell. I don't really think it was the ideal choice for my first go at using my new copics. Yes, Kathy, they have been used. Anyway, after I had cut the image and layered it, worked it in with the papers I wanted to use and the sketch I had chosen, I now am very happy with the result.
I used a 6 x 6 Kaisercraft paper pad called La-Di-Da and matched some SU cardstock to it. I embossed the green panel with my new Vintage Wallpaper Textured Impressions embossing folder which is in the new SU catty due to go live September 1st. Of course, I had to use some of my Stamp Simply Ribbon Store crinkled ribbon and some of my vast collection of flowers.
I'm sorry but I can't remember where I got the sketch from but it is a recent one that I've collected out of the many blogs I follow.
It's a horrible rainy, cold day here and I'm glad I'm inside warm and cosy.
Take care all,

Bella Bleu Sympathy

My good friend Robyn lost her Mum last week so I wanted to make a very special sympathy card.
This is the result. I saw a card on Gretchen Barron's blog that seemed just perfect for what I wanted. Thank you Gretchen. I kept to same colours but changed the papers to Bella Bleu from SU and used cardstock to match, Kraft, Not Quite Navy and Very Vanilla. The frame is one of a set from ODBD(Our Daily Bread Designs) which I absolutely love. I combined it with a sentiment from a set called Encouraging Words by Stampendous. I've had this set for some years now and found it again while going through my clear stamp sets. I used Not Quite Navy ink for the frame and Vintage Sepia Versafine for the sentiment. The satin ribbon is from Kitchen Sink Stamps and the cream wrinkled ribbon is from my favourite ribbon seller, Sharon at the Stamp Simply Ribbon Store.
Thanks for visiting today.

Lilac Avenue

Don't fall down with shock people, I'm here again. This time with some Lilac Avenue cards that I have finally finished. Once again I used Leslie's idea and pre made kits and had the bases done and only need to add the toppers and ribbons. The post that I've highlighted is actually the post i was looking for yesterday to put in my Blue Awning blurb. The sketch I've used here on the square and A5 cards are based on this card by Sherry Cheever which I used to make this card.
These cards use a mixture of different companies items as with my Blue Awning cards. I love doing this, mixing the different products I have. That way at least I use them.
As much as I am a SU demo, I love all the products out there and can't help but buy them too.
Already one of these cards is spoken for so I must be doing something right don't you think?
I won't go into too much detail, I think most you will recognise the components used to make these cards.
Have a wonderful afternoon everyone and take care.

Blue Awning

Some years ago I bought a 12 x 12 K&Co Blue Awning paper pad. It sat in my stash for years until Sharon came out with a kit using the papers. In the kit is ribbon, bling and of course the 12 x 12 paper pad.
Well I couldn't resist, I purchased the kit. Absolutely gorgeous.
Now to make cards with it....Leslie Miller posted on her blog one day how she makes up card kits ahead of time using sketches and then when she's ready to make a card, the kit is ready. Well I thought this was a fabulous idea to do with my Blue Awning kit so off I went. I did up 40 odd kits all ready to add ribbon, bling and topper. Thank you Leslie for your wonderful tip.
Here is the results of some of my endeavours. I freely admit that I cased some of Sharon's cards and I think Leslie's too. Thank you both and also to anyone else that gave me inspiration. Also I've used different sketches that I collect.
All the cards use different stamp sets from different companies, such as Stampin' Up, Wordsworth, Waltzing Mouse Stamps, Just Rite Stamps etc.
I've also used nesties, Marianne dies, MS punches to name a just a few. Inks are mainly SU and Versafine. Cardstock, well here again, lots of different sorts, SU in particular because Soft Sky, Night of Navy, Very Vanilla, River Rock, Soft Suede and Kiwi Kiss all match these papers wonderfully. Other cardstock is Bazzill and Cordinations.
I think that's it for what I've used. I've made little notes on the bottom of each picture as extra info.

I had two of this particular card, the other had a different saying in the oval. It's already been taken by a friend of mine before I could get a photo.
Crochet lace, silk ribbons all from Sharon's kit.

Claire from Waltzing Mouse Stamps has wonderful stamp sets that match the Nesties labels sets so I used those stamps with these two cards. Once again, lace and ribbon from Sharon's kit. The sentiment here is SU and the little flourish is from one of Claire's sets.

I think this card needs something else, maybe a bow from the lace I've already used. Again there was another one of these cards, but it's gone. The embossed background is a Cuttlebug small embossing set, that cuts and embosses at the same time. Sentiment is a Just Rite one I think.

Originally there was another one of these cards too. I made four of them. Each with different sentiments but same sketch. I'm pretty sure I used an EK Success punch on these. Lace and silk ribbons all from the kit.

I realise I've been neglecting my blog but I have been doing cards as you can see. There are many others that I've completed that I'll show you over the coming days. Not all stamping ones, they say a change is as good as a holiday and I feel the same thing is true with my cardmaking techniques.

This week has been a bit of write off I'm afraid because I caught a bug which is proving hard to shift. I spent Wednesday night sleeping in the recliner to keep me upright and able to breathe.

Not good.

Then this afternoon my son rings me to say that his money has been stolen from his bag at the Sarina High School. Am I peeved, well actually a lot more than that but I won't say it here.

Thanks for reading this very long post if you've got this far.

Enjoy the rest of your day or night as the case may be.