Happy Everything

This is a quick card created using one of the new Hero Arts "Card Art" stamps... it comes packaged with two brown "kraft" cards and envelopes and a couple of strips of self adhesive gems. It's a fairly large stamp.

The composition isn't earth shattering. I've watercoloured the image after stamping it with Black Stazon on SU So Saffron cardstock. The black and So Saffron floral die cuts were made using Cuttlebug dies and the brad is a pearl effect brad (I think it's by Bazzill). I've used three of the self adhesive gems to lift the image a bit. I think the green/white paper is from the Basic Grey Lily Kate collection. I've chalked the edges with a sponge and Spanish Olive chalk ink.

This is the first card I've created using Tombo Multi glue. I bought a bottle a while ago and this is the first opportunity I've had to try it out. I'm hooked! It's dries like concrete (but it is not brittle like some cheap glue sticks), although you have the chance to slide it around a bit very quickly before it dries, which is great for aligning paper (e.g. the backing paper on the right hand side) and much better than Tombo mono, sticky dots, double-sided tape or other adhesives that don't give the opportunity to move something once positioned.

"Be careful what you say... 'cos reality offends"; (c) David Gray - "When a Century Ends".

Craft Room... Flarke!

This is a new item purchased from Ikea for my craft room... I picked it up the other evening along with the extra Bygel poles. It's called a "Flarke" (http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/catalog/products/90086985) and it was a bargain at £9.99. It's a pretty flimsy unit, I suppose, but it more than does the job for craft items (or cds - which is what it was manufactured for!). It's also very slender... which is a good job, as my craft room is really a big cupboard with a window and I've had to squash this in behind the door! Yes, I jest not - it is behind the door and I keep the door wedged open with a wooden wedge to make space for it. I have no storage space left, so it's a case of "beggars can't be choosers"!

There are four shelves. I've used one for my Stampin' Up background stamps (a perfect fit), one for 6x6 paper pads (<> .... yes, I do have THAT many and I couldn't fit the others on the shelf...) and Cuttlebug embossing folders standing upright, one for some SU stamps and the final shelf for an assortment of blank cards and DCWV paper and card "stack" pads.

I'm trying to clear out my room at the moment to make way for the two additional Bygel poles... you can see the current two in situ along with all my mess (and cows):-

The little white Quickutz Magpie storage unit has been moved from the left side of the desk to the right to make a space on the wall. It has already made a huge difference and I can see my desk again, which is a revelation.

Wind and Rats...

We had horrific weather overnight last night. The wind was the worst I've experienced in five or more years. I think the gusts were up to 100mph. We thought the roof was going to blow off of our house. We got up at 2am to retrieve our wheelie bin, which had bounced off my car and disappeared 20 metres down the street. When we got up again this morning, it had gone off on another frolic - 50 metres away. It's "bin day" tomorrow and the binmen won't have much rubbish to take away - almost everyone seems to have had a wheelie bin incident last night, with the result that most local rubbish has emptied itself - all over the streets!

Almost all of the main local "big" bridges were closed today - e.g. the Erskine bridge and the Forth road bridge - and much of the public transport was cancelled. I think most of our trees have remained intact, which is amazing. Several of my friends have broken house alarms, phone lines, roof tiles and trees... The BBC web-site is showing photos of numerous trashed cars.

On a lighter note, I ordered some of the new Basic Grey "Two Scoops" paper, buttons, brads and clear acrylic stamps on Monday and they were delivered today. I made this quick card using the paper (shown on the left hand side), together with some SU Sage Shadow, Whisper White and Basic Black cardstock and two of the flower stamps from the SU "Sending Happy Thoughts" set.

I went to Ikea last night (pre-wind!) to buy a couple more of those "Bygel" metal poles for my craft room... I've yet to screw them to the wall, but I'll get to it in the next few days. I also bought this in Ikea:-

It's called "Minnen Ratta" (yep, it's a stuffed rat toy) - can you believe it? It's pretty big - a foot long including the tail! - and they're also selling sets of three tiny mice. I demonstrated it to my mum and she had a hairy fit! From a distance - and particularly with the long tail - it does look quite rodent-like and not necessarily like a stuffed toy... I think it's quite cute, but it's an odd thing to sell as a cuddly toy... Anyway, "Ratta" the rat now has pride of place in my craft room and he's jostling for room with my cows. I didn't buy any of the stuffed mice - I thought that would be too close to the bone given our recent house mouse problem.

Overnight Snow

It snowed for six hours from midnight - quite heavily at times - with the result that we had a thin layer of snow cover this morning. It had started melting quite considerably by the time I took this shot late morning. The sky looks very white - snow clouds? The forecast is for rain with a small additional amount of snow around 6pm. I wonder whether we'll get any more this winter. I wouldn't count on it, as we had merely one day of snow last year!

Further Happy Thoughts!

My cup is clearly overfloweth with happy thoughts at the moment, which makes a pleasant change from my usual grumpy demeanour!

This card was made using half a sheet of Pumpkin Pie cardstock folded and creased. The patterned paper on the lower portion is part of a sheet taken from the Certainly Celery "Designer Series" paper pack (page 73 of the UK catalogue), with a strip of Old Olive cardstock adhered on top. I chose this particular sheet of patterned paper because the white flowers appeared to dovetail well with the little flower in the centre of the stamped piece (albeit part of it is now hidden by a brad!).

The scalloped circle was punched from a sheet of So Saffron cardstock and the two circles adhered to the scallop were punched from Old Olive and Whisper White cardstock respectively. The floral stamp was stamped on the white cardstock (before it was punched - this makes it easier to centre the piece in the circle punch by turning the punch upside down before punching) using Pumpkin Pie ink and a metal brad was added to the centre of the piece once all of the pieces had been adhered together. Thereafter, two short pieces of Pumpkin Pie ribbon were taped to the rear of the scallop to give a "medallion" feel and it was mounted on the card with Stampin' Dimensionals foam pads - I've used this effect on quite a few cards and it's quick and easy. As with the previous card, glitter has been applied in dot formation to the edges of the scalloped piece. The "sending happy thoughts" sentiment is stamped in Old Olive ink.

Snow!

This is a photo of the snow we had yesterday (3rd January) about 2.30pm... it lasted a grand total of FIVE minutes! Other parts of the UK had much more snow (in particular, the east of Scotland and the north east of England). We were wondering what all the fuss was about!

It's now 2am on 4th January... and, as forecast, it has been snowing fairly heavily since midnight. It's forecast to snow until 6am, but we'll see! If the snow is still there in the morning, I'll take another photo. I don't fancy venturing outside at the moment.

More Happy Thoughts...

This card was created using the stamps from the "Sending Happy Thoughts" set and a couple of the stamps from the "In the Spotlight" hostess set. It was incredibly quick and easy to make, as there are no real layers except the punched flower heads. You could make a batch of these fairly quickly, which is great if you need a quick card or two.

Cardstock: Whisper White, Pumpkin Pie and Old Olive.

Stamps: "Sending Happy Thoughts" (both flowers and the stem and leaves on the left) and "In the Spotlight" hostess set (the stem and leaves on the right).

Punches: scallop circle punch and an assortment of the circle punches.

Ink: Real Red and Old Olive.

Extras: glue pen and SU Dazzling Diamonds glitter (used for the centres of the flowers and on each of the scallop "petals").

If you would like to order this set or see a demonstration/host a workshop, please contact me.

Sending Happy Thoughts

I've been using the "Sending Happy Thoughts" (Simply Sent) kit to create quite a few cards and gifts. I love this kit. It's shown on page 75 of the current UK Stampin' Up! Catalogue and Idea book.

The instructions for two cards are included with the kit, but there's so much more you can do with the various items which are included. It was the stamp set itself which tempted me to purchase the kit, as I really like the various cheery, modern flower stamps which are included; in addition, the "Sending Happy Thoughts" sentiment is fairly universal and should be very useful as a default stamp for a number of cards. The kit seems - and is - expensive as a single purchase item at £49.95, although it is actually incredibly good value when you consider the number of items included. The stamp set alone includes six stamps. The stamps are die cut, which makes them very quick and simple to mount. I've been mounting stamps for years and I don't find the process a difficult one anyway, but this simplified things even more! The kit even includes Stampin' Dimensionals 3D foam, glue dots, lots of zig zag twill ribbon, brads, a glue pen and glitter. If you can afford the initial outlay, I think it is well worth taking the plunge. It's a great kit for beginners too, as it gives you enough to get going and you'll still have lots of bits and pieces (and the stamp set and inks themselves) left over for future use. The three Stampin' Spots included are a great size of ink pad; easy to store and easy to use for inking up any size of stamp.

The sample shown above uses a similar template to one of the cards included with the instructions supplied with the kit, but I've changed it a bit and added a handy bookmark/gift voucher idea. I've also added the Canvas background stamp to the Old Olive cardstock backing card. I've used some strong double-sided tape to adhere the Very Vanilla stamped piece at the top and bottom of the piece only i.e. leaving the middle section without any form of adhesion. This means that the little "bookmark" Pumpkin Pie piece can slide out from the section and be used separately. Alternatively, the Pumpkin Pie piece is the ideal size to use for a gift card e.g. a Starbucks card, which could be adhered to the rear with a couple of glue dots. The Old Olive, Very Vanilla and Pumpkin Pie pieces used for this card are those included with the kit; if you are a beginner, this is really easy to make - no trimming required. I've punched a hole in the Pumpkin Pie piece and knotted a portion of the ribbon through the hole. The red circle stamps shown on the bookmark are from the "In the Spotlight" hostess stamp set (shown on page 18 of the UK catalogue).

I've made several more cards with this kit and I'll upload them separately; many are completely different from those shown in the included instruction leaflet.

Lastly, a tip: when I've lost my inspiration and/or I don't have a specific card to make (or I lack the time to make one... which is not an entirely uncommon scenario!), I quite often create little "bits" for my "bit box"! I've heard these called "card candy" in the past, but I like to call them "bits"... I quite often make punched and stamped pieces and save them for a later day. If I'm lacking inspiration at a future date, rummaging through the box can give me the starting point and focus I need to get me started on a new project. The Sending Happy Thoughts stamp set lends itself quite well to this idea! I've attached a photo of one of my boxes.

Note: this post was also uploaded to the "Stamping for Real" blog, which is a blog created and maintained by a group of UK Stampin' Up! demonstrators. It includes lots of excellent samples.... please spare a few minutes to visit it, if you can!

Spring?

It doesn't feel a thing like Spring in Scotland, that's for sure... although I've made my first Spring card in anticipation! It rained all day today; it was rainy and foggy yesterday. I was trying to shake off that whole "Christmas" thing in the most blatant way possible!

I decided to buy the French (Voila le Printemps) version of the UK Spring Fling set and it was delivered just before Christmas. This is the first card that I've had time to make with it.

SU products: "Voila le Printemps" stamp set (tulip and sentiment stamps); "Sanded" background stamp; Certainly Celery ink; Garden Green and Rose Red Stampin' Write markers; Certainly Celery ribbon; Rose Red, Whisper White and Certainly Celery cardstock.

Non-SU products: Quickutz Revolution scroll die (Certainly Celery cardstock die-cut); Stickles Stardust glitter glue; Doodlebug self adhesive red gem.