Favourite five (10? 11?) of 2014...

Hi all, back again with my favourite projects of 2014, but before I start, a picture of our new look bathroom!

It's not a great picture, but the room is so tiny it's hard to get a good look at it in a picture, and this angle means you get to see the wall colour, trim and floor all together :-) It's still a work in progress, but we're nearly there!

Now then, on to the

Once again Debby is hosting this super fun event, and of course I needed to play along!

However, I hit a snag... After compiling my favourites, I noticed that not a single one of them was a card! I guess I enjoy non-card stuff more right now. But, I wanted to pick cards too, so decided to do two top 5s here... One for cards and one for other stuff.

Here goes:

Top 5 cards

In 5th place:

A very recent make... What can I say, I just adore everything Tim Holtz, and I'm finally getting my hands on some goodies to play with. This is the result. I'm pleased :-)


In 4th place:

I had a lot of fun with this one... It was the brainchild of several inspiring challenges, and I even managed to work an entire bingo board into it! This ended up as my daughter's birthday card.


In 3rd place:

It has very much been a year for new techniques for me, and after following Sir Tim's Creative Chemistry 101, I just had to have a go at the emboss resist technique. This was the result. I was soooo pleased!


In 2nd place:

Another of those rare creations that came out exactly as imagined. I don't normally like working in black and white, but it just all came together beautifully here.


In 1st place:

In first place the card I made for LOTV's 10th birthday. I really enjoyed making this, and loved how it came out. One of my happiest moments this year was visiting the shop and finding it on display!

Ok, could I just sneak in a special mention here? Because I made a card and liked it so much, I did it again in another colour. I think I prefer the blue, but I do love them both!

Now then, well done for sticking with me so far, but I'm not done yet! On to my:

Top 5 non-cards

In 5th place:

Just my cup of tea... a steampunk box! Loved making this.

In 4th place:

A mini album made with some of my favourite LOTV papers. LOVE the colour combo. Am in the process of re-doing this in pink, but need to stock up on pink blooms first!

In 3rd place:

I love, love, LOVE how this came out. another new technique for me, and it ended up exactly how I wanted it.

In 2nd place:

I have to admit, this canvas inspired by November's VI challenge would have been in first place, if not for the sentimental value of the first. I LOVE this!

Finally, in 1st place:

The mini-album I made for my son's 1-to-1 teacher when he left primary school. It was easily the most sentimental item I have ever made and couldn't be anywhere other than first place! (If you haven't read the story before, the "1st place" line above is a link to the original blog post).

And there they are. Phew! Took some doing! lol.

Have a fantastic day!

Sammy-x

My Favourite Christmas cards of 2014

Good morning all. Well, I'm feeling much better right now, if you don't count light-headedness from the paint fumes! lol. Bathroom is coming along nicely... Though what was originally going to be a quick lick of paint on the walls has turned into walls, woodwork and a new floor! An afternoon's work is now about to start it's third day, but it's going to be soooo lovely when it's done. We've always been "muted" decorators, preferring soft or neutral colours, but this one is rather more eye-popping, and I LOVE it! Pacific ocean for the walls and Charcoal Grey for the woodwork (including the bath panel), offset by the white of the bathroom suite, tiles and radiator. The floor is also a charcoal kind of colour, and as soon as it's in, I'll take a picture! :-)

Now, on to today's post...

It's that time of year again! Debby has asked us to share our favourite Christmas cards of 2014.
I don't think I made many more than 5 this year (I got ill at the very worst time, so have had to disappoint a lot of people...), but I have dug out my favourites for you...

In 5th place

Lots of inky fun and a gorgeous Visible Image stamp. This came out exactly how I'd imagined it (which is unheard of!)


In 4th place

This one uses my absolute favourite Christmas papers of this year (from Dovecraft) and features my first attempt at completely colouring a background (with pens). I was sooooo happy with the result.

In 3rd place

I'm so pleased with how the colours came out with this one. The vintage feel is just my cup of tea, and I think this was my first real attempt at colouring with a lot of red!

In 2nd place

Well, I had to. It's purple! lol. And I kinda love the letter bead sentiment...

And finally in 1st place

I love the subtle muted colours of this one, and of course the adorable LOTV image and my favourite Christmas papers. In fact, I loved this card so much, I re-created it for a big Christmas card order I needed to fill (which is something I never do... I like to make different cards or I get bored, lol)

So there they are. My top 5 Christmas cards. I kinda love how they're all different colours (though maybe that's subconsciously part of why I chose them in the first place...) and I'm also quite pleased with the amount of different techniques I managed to try out too.

That's it from me right now. I've been trying to visit your blogs this morning, but if I haven't gotten round to you yet, please bear with me... I still have chaos in my bathroom to deal with!

Have a most excellent day!

Sammy-x

Anything Goes - Sweet Stampin' DT

Good morning my dears,

I hope you all had a great Christmas and that Santa brought you more crafty goodies than he did me (which is none, lol). I'm sure the old fella is going senile ;-)

Anyways, we have a new challenge for you over at Sweet Stampin', and the theme is Anything Goes. A nice easy one for you all while you're recovering from the Christmas madness! Maybe you want to have a play with some new crafty stash, in which case, why not come and share it with us? (Providing you use a stamp somewhere, of course...)

I took the opportunity to use some of the Tim Holtz stamps I picked up at Art From the Heart when I went there for the workshops. Loooooove these stamps so much! I decided to go for a chalkboard look, and heat-embossed the design onto black card with white embossing powder.

Everything except the corners is TH. The corners were originally bright silver, but I coloured them gold with a leafing pen, then distressed them a little with black ink.

Et voilà!

Your turn folks!

In other news, I am just about back on my feet again, so will likely come and visit you all again from Sunday... Today we're supposed to be decorating the bathroom, so I'll see you all tomorrow if we get done! lol.

Have an excellent weekend!

Sammy-x

Anything Christmas - Last challenge at MilkCoffee

Hello all,

It's with great regret that I have to be a bearer of sad tidings... MilkCoffee are closing their challenge blog at the end of this challenge, two weeks from today.
It wasn't an easy decision to make, but Nana and Esme are both very busy and simply can't keep up with everything. It's not all bad news though, as their Etsy shop will remain open, so you'll still be able to buy their gorgeous digis!

For my card I decided to use the first Christmas digi of theirs I got to play with last year, Charlotte and Candy Cane. I went with a pink and turquoise colour scheme last year, so decided on something a little richer this time.

The papers and sentiment are both LOTV.

So there it is, my contribution to the final challenge. For now... You never know... The girls may decide to re-open the blog in the future. I for one certainly hope so!

So I hope you'll all come along and give this amazing challenge a great send off. And if you use a MilkCoffee image, even better!

Have a fabulous day!

Sammy-x

Oh Christmas Tree - Sweet Stampin' DT

Good morning folks!

Another Saturday. Not too many of those left this year! But at least I get to squeeze in another Christmas card, this time for the great Oh Christmas Tree theme over at Sweet Stampin'.

I used one of my favourite trees for this. One of the lovely LOTV festive foliage ones. I used this several times last year, and couldn't resist inking it up again now!

I teamed it up with my favourite Christmas papers this year, from Dovecraft. They're such lovely traditional colours and have a great vintage touch to them too.

Hope you can join us this week. All you need is a Christmas tree (and some form of stamping, of course!).

And fingers crossed that by the time you all read this, I'm feeling well enough to be on my way to Harrogate for a couple of workshops at Art From The Heart.... I've really been looking forward to those.

Have a fantastic weekend everyone.

Sammy-x

Unstampabelles Guest DT

Morning all!

Slotting in an extra post here, as Susan recently asked me if I would do a guest spot over at Unstampabelles.  Now, I'm always up for a challenge, and not stamping is definitely a challenge, so I agreed.
And then Susan gave me the brief for the challenge...

Summer fun - twist: to make a Southern Hemisphere Christmas card

Eek! Remember, no stamps allowed. So I "ummed and ahhhed" for a while, before getting an idea. Sir Tim and his distress inks to the rescue once again!

I laid down some inks to look like a beach scene, then added a die-cut tree, decorated with Stickles and liquid pearls.
I did a wee internet search to come up with suitable ideas for sentiments, and found the brilliant "Let it snow! ...Elsewhere" quote, which I thought was perfect (and probably wishful thinking, lol), so I typed it up in word and printed it out, then added it to my card (after inking).
And there you have it! A summery Christmas card without stamps.

So, if you feel up to the challenge, why not play along this month? There's an awesome prize up for grabs from sponsor Bizzy Becs

That's it from me this morning. Hope you're all well, and I hope to come visit all your blogs soon!

Sammy-x

Christmas in non traditional colours - MilkCoffee DT

Morning all!

Apologies for my absence... Not feeling at all well, so computer time is just about non-existent right now...

But I managed to set up this post for the new challenge at MilkCoffee this fortnight! The theme is Christmas in non traditional colours, and I decided to go with purple, and this really fab new digi:

That's it from me, short but sweet today... Back to bed I go... I do hope you'll all play along with the challenge though!

Have an awesome day!

Sammy-x

Use the colour red - Buckwells Crafty Challenge DT

Good morning everyone!

Just the one post from me this morning, as Rhedd's Creative Spirit is taking a break for Christmas.

But I do have a new challenge at Buckwells Crafty Challenge to share with you, and the theme is Use the colour red.
All the DT used the same image from sponsor Lia Stampz, and all used the colour red, yet they're all so different! I suggest you go take a peek!

This is what I did with mine:

I used the Lia Stampz image "Christmas Snowmen" and Buckwell Craft Supplies 15 & 10mm red satin ribbon. 

And while I'm on the subject... From today until the 15th, Buckwells is having a Christmas sale, with 10% off everything if you enter the code XMAS14 at the checkout.

Have a fabulous day folks!

Sammy-x