Spring at last!

Things have been very quiet around here, sorry. I have been fighting the effects of a nasty chest infection for over a month now and I have not been up to much on the crafty front. I am hoping things are starting to settle down a bit now.

This is another card that I made for the workshop I am planning, using silhouette stamps and stencilling. I used a Tim Holtz stencil and Darkroom Door stamps. The sentiment is from a Rubbernecker pick and mix stamp I picked up some time at Ally Pally and the butterfly is a freebie clear stamp from Indigo Blu from Craft Stamper magazine. All the inks are Distress Inks.

On the crochet front, the Twiddle Muff I mentioned in my last post is nearly complete and ready to be sown up when I can get to the fabric shop to buy something nice and tactile for the lining. In the meantime I have started a new crochet blanket. I am planning to take this slowly over the coming months and have made a start on the first of 16 large hexagonal motifs that I plan to complete between other projects. My brain is just about able to cope with this level of challenge again after weeks of feeling like I have been in the twilight zone of being poorly and sorry for myself.

 

Our daffodils in our woodland have finally started to come out. Everyone else's round here are much further ahead. The first bunch we have picked has been gracing our living room this week and has cheered things no end.

 

I hope you are in fine fettle and have escaped the beastly germs that seem to be lurking this year.

 

 

Elaine 



A recycled frame

I don't really do much in the way of teaching workshops these days as I found them far too stressful. Generally I am happy to let my crafting take me on a more gentle journey and away from pressure and routines to enjoyment and relaxation. However, occasionally I like to do things as a volunteer when I feel I can help other people enjoy some of that relaxation. Recently a friend asked me if I would run a session for the Women's Group at her church and that is coming up in March. I have started making the samples and this is the first to share. (Excuse my thumb in the pic!!!).

The workshop will focus on layered stamping with plant images, using lovely words and lots of ink shading. This sample is done with Distress Inks (except the sentiment which was stamped in Memento Luxe ink and embossed). From memory, my colours were Tumbled Glass and Cracked Pistachio for the base layer shading, Bundled Sage for some background text stamping and some plant images and Cracked Pistachio, Evergreen Bough and Chipped Sapphire for the rest of the plant stamping. The edges are shaded with some Evergreen Bough, Peacock Feathers and Chipped Sapphire. The sentiment stamp is from Darkroom Door - an old set I have had ages which is in one of their lovely tins. The test stamp and larger plant image are both Woodware clear stamps and the main image is from an Inkadinkado set.

I was lucky to pick up this Ikea Ribba frame in a charity shop for 50p. It had been pre-used and as a result the stand on the back is very battered, but it also meant it had a pre-cut card mount which I was able to reuse to frame my image. I am really pleased with the result and I hope my workshop ladies will be too.

On the crochet front, I have just finished one major project to be shared in due course after delivery and I have started something new.  This is going to be a Twiddle Muff, you can find out a bit more here . The idea is to make a muff, usually knitted or crocheted with all sorts of texture and added items that can be touched and experienced and they are designed to meet the needs of people with dementia. Apparently they can help calm anxiety and restlessness.

This one is destined for my SIL who sadly has early onset dementia and faces many challenges. I am really enjoying making up a design that I think she will enjoy. I am using lots of shades of purple as that is her favourite colour, plus shades of red, yellow and orange which I was told are good colours for people with quite advanced dementia, which apparently can even affect colour recognition. This is just the start of my design, but I have included things that will be as safe as possible while adding interest so, this far I have included glitter and pom pom yarns and ribbon into my rows. I am off out today to explore a quirky local haberdashery shop that might offer some extra features. I will share the finished result in due course, but I think this is really a lovely idea and I hope it will bring her some comfort.

Whatever you are up to, enjoy your week and I hope you escaped unscathed from Storm Imogen. We did, but locally winds reached storm force 11 and 96 mph so I was glad when the storm had passed over last night.

Elaine

Perspective

It's my niece's birthday today and this is the card I made for her.

I used the Stampin Up Hardwood background stamp, while the butterfly and sentiment are from the Stampers Anonymous Perspective set. I embossed the butterfly in black before adding colour with DIs using a blending tool. I added colour to the letters on the sentiment with a distress marker.

A short and sweet post today, lunch is calling and a walk beckons this afternoon as part of my New Year resolve to increase my levels of physical activity. Got to get those steps in!

Hope your weekend is going well!

Elaine x

Paper Artsy 2016 Challenge Topic #2 - Hearts

Here I am again taking part in a challenge. The second in 2016 already! This time it is the Paper Artsy challenge and one of my favourite motifs for including in craft projects - hearts.

Now I have a few PA stamps, but few that were quite right for this challenge. I wanted to cut out a heart mask and stamp through it and in the end I found an old Squiggly Ink stamp that worked nicely. I stamped in shades of yellow, orange, deep pink and purple. Then I added shading around the edge with Picked Raspberry and Dusty Concord DIs. The letters are stamped from another Squiggly Ink set and I added some little wooden hearts to finish that I had painted with Blood Orange and Eggplant Fresco Paints.

We have just had our first picnic of the year (in the car) looking out over quite a wild seascape.

I was glad to be in the car at this point, but we did find a more sheltered spot for a quick walk ..........

....and enjoyed taking in the highlights of colour that are visible even on a quite murky day.

I am just enjoying a cuppa back at home in front of the woodburner and my next task is to make a big pot of warming veggie stew for dinner!

There are some definite benefits of living in a seasonal climate!

I hope you are enjoying your weekend so far!

Elaine x

WOYWW # 346

Well I think this is a first for me. Which is surprising given how much I enjoy nosing in other people's craft spaces! I am linking up with Julia here in the spirit of doing some different crafty things this year. This is my desk today!  This is the desk in my weeny indoor crafting space I carved out for myself in 2014. It measures just 1m x 2 m and is in the old larder of my house. You can see how narrow the space is by the width of the A4 folder open on the desk!

My desk is currently occupied with my newly completed ink swatch folder. I am something of an ink pad addict as you may be able to see by just some of the ink pads in view. These are also lurking just out of shot! There are more down in the Craft Shed too (they are probably currently frozen!) Yes, I know I have a serious problem with this addiction of mine!

I have used the cold weather of the last week as an excuse to stay near the fire and make up and stamp these ink swatch cards using the idea developed by lovely Jenifer McGuire who must be the queen of craft room organisation! I have had these coin pocket folders for about a year, but finally I got to work on  over the course of the last week.

The reason my desk is currently filled with my lovely folder is not just that I need to stroke it, but also that I am busy choosing inks for a colour challenge for the newly renamed Seven Hills Crafts blog this month. This is the new name for one of my favourite craft companies Make the Day Special.

I have included a few pics of the pages below while I bask in the pleasure of a job really well done (I won't bore you with them all!). It was quite a task as I have over 350 pads of different shapes and sizes. I have yet to index my rainbow pads so the job is not quite complete, but that will need a bit of a different approach.

Hope you are finding a nice cosy place for your crafting in the current cold snap!

Elaine x

Golden Wedding Card

I made this card for my special friends' Golden Wedding anniversary.

It is remarkably clean and simple for me. So much so I am linking to Less is More this week where the theme is flourishes on a one layer card . The hearts with their negative flourishes are from Quietfire and the sentiment is from the lovely selection of interesting and reasonable clear sentiment stamps at Stamping All Day, I embossed both designs in Stampendous gold detail EP.

I can't remember the last time I entered a challenge, but I want to expand my crafty horizons this year, so it's nice to manage this so early in 2016.

Elaine x

Tags and stuff!

This is a sort of Christmassy post, but in fact the subject matter could be any time of year really.

I love the fact that thanks to my rather excessive die cutting and stamp collection, I can knock up a custom made gift tag in record time. These are some I made for Christmas gifts.

This first one uses a Kaisercraft clear stamp, embossed in silver on black. Easy peasy lemon squeezy!

The second uses a WPlus 9 die cut from red satin mirri card, with silver die cut snowflakes. This looked nice added to a gift wrapped in white spotty cellophane. I love using cello for wrapping, it can look really nice.

Here are selection of tags and packaging for crochet gifts I made this year. The tags are stamped with an English Stamp Company stamp I treated myself to at Kirsty's Handmade Fair in September. The boxes are a copyright free template I found via Pinterest.

On the subject of making customised tags and cards, OH decided to write cards for our Post Lady and the ladies in our local Post Office. I offered to make customised cards as I knew a design that would take minutes to make. This is an adaptation of a design I made last year.

The bird is from the Dina Wakely Scribbly Bird set of stamps. I stamped in cream and cut out and ink shaded with Distress Inks. The little envelope is a Waffle Flower stamp I think and the sentiment from WPlus9. The cards actually said thank you inside using a matching WPlus Thanks stamp set I have.

The house is looking bare now with the Christmas decs taken down. I always have to take pics as I pack away my precious decorations back into their nests of bubble wrap to go back into the loft. My decorations have been collected over 35 years since we have been married and I am very attached to them! I tend to add something each year, even though I probabaly don't really need any more. 

I am back into the normal routine now and gradually getting myself focused with tasks around the house and keeping up with some of my new year resolutions. The weather is still making me feel like sitting in front of the fire though and my latest book is proving to be a real distraction from more necessary tasks - I love Kate Morton's books! She is a real story teller. I am whizzing through this one!

Hope you are full of resolve and optimism for 2016.

Elaine x