Two firsts -Altered stuff and Allsorts challenge

Before

After

This is my first attempt at altering something and my first entry in a challenge-Allsorts 'rags to riches' I was inspired by Lucy Edmondson's(True Colours Blog) Amazing Alice mirror featured in the last edition of making gifts magazine -it's fab. I decided to make my own majorly inferior version and had a lot of fun doing it. The base is an Ikea mirror which was the bargain price of £1-19 and I used distress inks to make a rainbow like background on pieces of stampbord to signify the wonderland feel (it ended up a bit more like somewhere over the rainbow from the Wizard of Oz but hey I'm still learning) .Then I stamped the Alice images from the Oxford Impressions Classic Alice set -which are stunning and will be featuring heavily in many guises on here over the next few weeks.

I had no idea how difficult it is to photograph a mirror but after many disasterous attempts this is the best I could get. I can't wait to try altering more things -if it ain't moving then I'll be altering -best the cats don't stay still too long lol

Settling In

Well I've managed to arrange my crafting stash on and around my new workspace and this will be the first and last time it'll be this tidy.It's so cool to have a permanent place to work at and be able to leave stuff out .

As I get more bits and pieces I'll definitely have to spread out a bit more -hmmm how can I persuade my hubby to turn the office into a craft room -well we all live in hope :)

Woo hoo its here !

I had a lovely surprise today -while I was out at my craft group my new work desk arrived and my lovely hubby put it together for me so it was waiting for me when I got home. This is my very first  workspace and probably the last time it will ever look like this. I can't wait till tomorrow when I can start organising all my stuff on and around it -I feel the need for more storage coming on and I wonder how much gentle persuading hubby dearest will need to put some shelves up for me. See it starts at one desk and already I'm planning my take over bid of the whole office mwa hahahaha.

Crafting Queen

This is a bithday card I made for our amazing craft teacher Lucy- a definite Queen of Crafting . I used one of my favourite flourish stamps and my new white ink pad that I bought yesterday ,some cute little gems, mini scissors and a book plate image. Happy birthday for the 31st Lucy :)

The Mysterious Case of the Invisible Craft Desk

Well there is a distinct lack of crafting going on in my house at the moment as I am waiting for a new craft desk to come. I only recently started crafting and have been making do with my dining room table and a few crafting bits stored neatly in some storage boxes, but as the addiction has got hold I now have an ever growing stash of stuff and a need for a permanent space to work on as my family do need to sit and eat –or so they tell me.

In response to my plea for a craft space my lovely hubby has cleared half the office (as can be seen in the picture) and we have ordered a desk and chair. How exciting I thought but noooo there’s a delay with the desk –I have my chair but that’s no use without my desk.

Now most of the time I try to be a sensible grown up woman (no sniggering those who know me) but this lack of desk and inability to craft has sent me right back to the toddler stage where I want to stamp my foot and have a tantrum and yell I WANT IT NOW!!! -Mrs instant gratification –who me? Lol

So while I’m learning patience I am enjoying looking at everyone else’s blogs and hoovering up ideas so that when I eventually get my desk I can try some exciting new things.

Hopefully it will be arriving some time this week and I can get organised and back to learning more about my new passion and stop whinging at my poor hubby

Mother's Day Card

Here's the card I made for my wonderful Mother. I used a beautiful balck and white velvet flock paper for the front and back and various designs of black and white inside, topped with nestabilities shapes and various embellishments. I can't express how much I love and appreciate my Mum not only for all she's done for me all my life but for who she is as a person, she' a very special lady. Love you Ma :)

Lucy's Class

In Lucy's class last week we had a go at working with a brayer and kaleidacolours which gave some great backgrounds for stamping . This card was made with various shades of blue and a gorgeous stamp from crafty individuals with a paler image stamped to look like a reflection in water as suggested by Chris -who is queen of brayering :)

Tri-shutter card

My First attempt at a trishutter card which I saw demonstrated on you tube on the splitcoast stampers link.
My sad old camera doesn't pick up the detail very well but I used Linen paper as I wanted an antique book plate look. I inked the edges with Tim Holtz tea dye distress ink and used a fab set of stamps from Artistic Stamper to fill in the panels. This style of card looks great with different papers in the panels and I think I'll try that in the near future.

Lucy's Class

This is my first wardrobe card which I made at one of Lucy's fab classes a few weeks ago. Stamped with some gorgeous Deco ladies from The Artistic Stamper . I just love Art Deco images and can't wait till I've saved up enough to buy some more.

Lucy's Class

Lucy has been teaching us about resist techniques in our group and this was my first attempt. I stamped the swirl with versamark, heat embossed it with white embossing powder and then blended three different distress inks over the glossy paper. I so love the distress inks and bought some at the fab Farnborough craft show last weekend and can't wait to have a play. The stamp is from crafty individuals.

Flowerpot tag card

This is my first attempt at a flower pot tag card using the template from http://andreawalford.com/?p=2231 I used My Mind Eye -bloom and grow papers and some flat back pearls for centres.

Origami shirt

This is my first attempt at a man's card -I always find them much harder than women to get ideas for. Anyway the paper for the shirt and the striped paper at the bottom are free downloads from mad about cards -from where I got the idea ,however I found their instructions on how to make the shirt quite difficult so I found and easier one on you tube. I just added a strip of corrugated card and some buttons and will add the greeting when I send it depending on who it's for .

Third C.D case

This is the last one in the series and annoyingly I managed to crack the case so I'll redo it when I have time. This too was decoupaged and decorated with flower soft and a broken piece of jewellry. The back is again Grand Tour paper and a black leaf skeleton to tie in with the tree on the front. Thanks Lucy can't wait for next lesson.

My Second C.D. Case

This is the second out of a series of three -I chose Art Deco Ladies as my theme and printed them off onto card from a 1920's fashion magazine that I found on the on the web. I then decoupaged the images and the first one  I embellished with some grunge paper roses coloured with Tim Holtz distress inks that Lucy taught us how to make. On this one I used flower soft on the vase of flowers and to make a border around the front. On the back I used some grand tour paper and some world image rub ons.

Lucy's Thursday Craft Class

On Thursdays myself and Chris and Kay have a craft class with Lucy Edmondson ( http://lucystruecolours.blogspot.com/) and it is one of the highlights of our week ,we'd happily go everyday if we could but I think we'd give Lucy a breakdown as we tend to be rather noisy :) She truly is a talented and inspirational teacher and really encourages to explore our creativity whilst teaching us the skills to achieve more than we thought we were capable of. Recently in class Lucy showed us some wonderful altered c.d cases and here are my beginners attempts. Please excuse the quality of photos as I have a rather ancient camera and no camera skills -I'll replace the pics when my hubby has time to take some decent ones.

More starter cards

Some more cards I made from a Basic Grey card kit ( Craft Superstore was £9.99 reduced to £3.49 at the moment)

Starter Cards

These are some cards I made from  a Basic Grey card making kit (currently on sale at Craft Superstore reduced from £9.99 to £2.49) It might be seen as cheating by some purists lol but was a help to a beginner as it gave me an idea of colour schemes and layouts as I didn't have much idea of where to start.