Waltzingmouse Farewell Hop

So sad to read the news that Waltzingmouse Stamps will be closing - Claire Brennan

created a fabulous company with fabulous products and

some of the sets she designed are among my all time favourites! 

So I'm pleased to participate in the Waltzingmouse Farewell Hop organised by Tara and Deborah

giving us a chance to share some of our favourite Waltzingmouse creations.

 

I always struggle with masculine creations so I've loved being able to reach for My Kind of Guy!

 

 

Here are three creations made with my absolute favourite

Waltzingmouse set - Fine Feathers with the matching Fine Feathers dies.

I made this paper tea cup using A Nice Cup of Tea template

while on the Splitcoaststampers Dirty Dozen team

when our monthly theme was about cozy comforts!

I've used the fabulous sentiment set Say It Loud time and time again!

 

Thanks, Claire, for sharing your talents with us and I

wish you all the very, very best in the future, including lots of extra

time to enjoy your beautiful family! 

Taste and See!

A friend and I led a group of ladies at our recent church retreat weekend in making

these fun cookie jar gifts.  We made up most of the die-cuts ahead of time but

allowed the ladies to choose their own colour scheme with the twine,

 the die-cut oven glove and felt flowers, all of which made a good combo

 with the kraft tags and doilies.  The top of the jar is

decorated with a die-cut using a My Favorite Things doily die

 and felt flowers using Papertrey Ink Beautiful Blooms II dies.

The recipe is for Cranberry White Chocolate Oat Cookies 
and if you're interested it's found on Pinterest here.

We made the recipe and the cookies are delicious!  Here's what the jars look like

when they get layered up - we printed the ingredients and the recipe for finishing them

up with eggs and melted butter and tucked the recipe in the top of the jar.

The tags were cut with Spellbinders Circles Large and embossed in white using

the fantastic Verve Plain Jane  Psalm 34:8.  The little oven glove and whisk were

cut with Marianne Design Craftables Kitchen Set dies and attached 

with a mini clothes peg/pin. 

This was a really fun project and it would be suitable for children to do too - you

 just need an area where a few flour or sugar spills won't be a problem as they're

scooping the ingredients by cup fulls into the jars - a good suggestion here is

to use a wide mouth funnel to help!

It was fun to see how delighted everyone was with the result and also fun to

hear them all trying to decide who they were going to give their finished gift!

Thanks for stopping by, I hope you have a very good day!

Daisies and Distress Inks

I had so much fun making the first card, that I ended up making a set of four!  

Inks include a variety of bright colours in the Ranger Distress range including 

Picked Raspberry, Dusty Concord, Twisted Citron, Shabby Shutters, 

Spiced Marmalade, Mustard Seed, Evergreen Bough, and Peacock Feathers.  

I sponged some of the ink on the corners of the  thick water color card bases, 

then added the flowers using an Imagination Crafts stencil.  

Other stencils were used to create a random background pattern.

The sentiments are four encouraging Bible verses from 

the fabulous set Good Work by Verve.

I added some ivory sequins and random dots of glitter (Stickles) 

though none of the sparkle shows up in my photo's, just some little spots!

I sure don't have the skills to be able to pick up sparkle in my photography, 

which is a shame because I've really been enjoying 

the eye-catching quality it adds in real life.

Thanks so much for stopping by today - I hope it's a good one for you! 

Happy Birthday Hearts

So happy to be able to join in the Seven Hills Crafts Blog Challenge this month - the store has just re-opened with a brand new name.  If you're in the U.K. or Ireland and want to be able to order from a huge selection of some of the current trendy stamps, dies and supplies, this is the place for you!

The challenge is to use one of these colour palettes:

Using various Ranger Distress inks I sponged a background with some of my favourite shades from the middle palette.  I used Paper Smooches Linked Hearts, cutting and stacking four layers in white, then inserting the heart pieces with matching card stock - fun process, just like doing a jigsaw!

The happy birthday message is stamped in Versafine Black Onyx ink using Paper Smooches Sentiment Sampler, and it's finished with some scattered sequins.

Had so much fun with this, I had to try another colour scheme as well!
I have another card to post in a day or two using this fun die with the inlay technique.

Thanks so much for stopping by today, I really appreciate you 

popping in for a visit as you travel through blogland!

Snowflake Treat Bags

Today was my last day of work before the holidays so I wanted to take some treats in for the girls I work with and who doesn't like Lindt chocolates this time of year!  For a red and white theme I used the individually wrapped ones below.

The treat bags are cut using  the Papertrey Ink Favor It Box 2 die.  I have a
Cuttlebug for die-cutting, and this die fits perfectly fine in it.  It's fairly easy
and quick to cut two pieces from your chosen designer paper and
put them together with double sided tape along the bottom and
sides.  They're perfect for 3 to 4 of these chocolates but also for a
small handful of any type of individually wrapped sweets or candy.

The large snowflake is cut using Sweet 'n Sassy Stamps Large Snowflake die set,
though I don't see this currently available on the website.

I used  Sweet 'n Sassy Stamps Mini Tags for the circular tag and
Cheery Lynn Designs Snowflowers  Set 2 dies for the little snowflakes.

I'm sure it's been done a lot before, but I had never tried using a coloured paperclip to attach the tags at the back in order to leave the bows at the top in all their glory!

Thanks for stopping by today, I hope this Christmas week isn't too crazy busy for you! 

Happy Birthday Sweet Friend

Right in the middle of all my Christmas card making comes the birthday
of a dear, dear friend - I enjoyed using several favourite Wplus9
sets for a little floral break from snowflakes and frosty images!

The circle is cut with water colour paper and a very large Spellbinder die,
then partially sponged with Memento Pear Tart ink (love that name,
it makes me hungry!)  I used Fresh Cut Florals stamps and Fresh Cut Florals Dies
 with various inks to create this bouquet on a card!  Another much
used die is Hand Lettered Hello, the die-cuts are layered up three
 times here for a bit of dimension. I love the way the sentiments
rom the Hand Lettered Hello stamp set can be combined
to make a message which is just right for any occasion.

To finish I added dots with a copic marker, tiny pearls on
 the flower centers and some ivory sequins.

My card is also for the Wplus9 Throwback Thursday #9 challenge.

Thanks for stopping by today - whatever your day holds, I hope it's a good one!

Happy 8th Birthday SNSS!

Sweet 'n Sassy Stamps is celebrating it's 8th birthday and I made a
card in honour of the several years I spent on the Design
Team for this fabulous company!  

What a talented bunch of ladies and each one is just as sweet as can be!

I used thick water color paper which is by far my favorite for 

cards these days, loosely water coloring with Ranger Distress Dusty 

Concord and Picked Raspberry ink, and then splattering to finish.  

I then die-cut banners using SNSS's Banner Dies.  
The sentiment is from Birthday Word Art by SNSS. I find    
myself reaching for this set a lot and even using some of the
 words and phrases to combine with other sentiment stamps - for example
 this "happy" works really well for a "Happy Christmas" combo!
(Yes!  I confess - I do cut my sentiment stamps up sometimes so
they can be further mixed and matched!)

I punched holes at the top of each pennant and strung
white twine through for a banner.

It's finished off with sequins and tiny flowers with micro pearl centers.

Happy birthday to Sweet 'n Sassy Stamps, Korin, and the whole team!