Simply Adorable

Hi everyone,
My card today is being entered into 2 challenges.The first is Cute Card Thursday and I designed my own sketch for this card.
The second is Simon Says Stamp where the theme is 'Anything Goes' and they are also having a lovely blog hop to celebrate their second anniversary.

This image is one of the new 'Adorable' Sugar Nellie digis, I couldn't resist buying this sweetie, together with a little boy image that reminds me so much of my youngest son when he was small.

Card Details:
* Image - Sugar Nellie 'Melissa'
* Colouring medium - Promarkers
* Papers - Papermania 'Blueberry Hill'
* Punch - MS PATP 'Cherish' & EK Success 'Photo Corners'
* Everything else from my stash

We've had nothing but problems regarding the house move this week, I'm just hoping things look a bit brighter next week. No wonder moving is high on the 'most stressful' list!!!

Sketch N Stash DT Card - Challenge #60

Hi everyone, it's time for the Sketch N Stash challenge again!!!
This fortnight we have a choice of sketch for you to follow, you may choose any of the last 59 sketches (but please remember to post a piccy of the sketch you have chosen together with your creation)
I've chosen to follow sketch #46, although as you can see I've made a couple of changes in order for my image to fit .
I made the flowers myself from following THIS tutorial and the little beads around the frame are Cosmic Twinkles.
I'm also entering this card into the Truly Scrumptious challenge, whose theme is 'Vintage'

Card Details:
* Image - Cardmaking Heaven 'Ladies Oval Topper Selection'
* Embossing Folder - Craft Concepts 'Cottage Floral'
* Frame - Nellie Snellen 'Ovals Die Set'
* Punch - MS Doily Lace
* Everything else from my stash

The prize this fortnight is a gorgeous Faye Whittaker stamp set, so be sure to join in with us, oh and don't forget to check out the lucky winner and the Top 3 from the last challenge!

DP2 Challenge #79 - The Carnival

Hi everyone!
Today's card is to celebrate Mo & Zo's bloghop 'The Carnival', it's a HUGE blog-hop but seeing the fabulous cards and creations from the DTs involved was well worth it. I've been inspired to buy not only Mo's $1 special image 'Cotton Candy' but also this one called 'A Little Smooch'
I'm entering this card into the DP2 challenge and it's also going into My Time Made Easy as I used their sketch.

Card Details:
* Image - DP2 'A Little Smooch'
* Colouring medium - Promarkers
* Papers - Papermania and K & Co
* Punch - MS 'Deco Fan'
* Everything else from my stash

My eldest son has just persuaded me to try playing 'Lord of the Rings' online, so I may not be doing so much crafting if I get addicted to it. To be honest, I really need something to keep my mind occupied at the moment as it stops me thinking of all the things that could go wrong with our house move!

Teddy Bo Challenge - TAG IT!

Hi everyone,
I'm sorry I didn't get this card posted on Wednesday as planned, but as it was such a beautiful day DH and I decided to visit Mottisfont Abbey for the day. It's a National Trust property near to where we live and we often go there, it's such a lovely and peaceful place.
My eldest son came over for the day yesterday so I didn't get a chance again and I'm expecting my youngest son today, so this is quickly being posted before he arrives.

Apologies for the wonky (technical term) photo, DH took loads for me and this was the best, the sunlight seems to play havoc with the colours. I usually scan my cards, but the flowers made that impossible here.
This is my card for Teddy Bo's current challenge, they want to see a tag on your card which gave me a chance to use my new Marianne tag die, I used my Marianne frame die too. The end result of these is lovely, but it's a bit of a pain getting the dies out in one piece.
As I confessed in my previous post I bought a new image for this challenge as I wanted to give it a slightly vintage look (not sure that I succeeded)

Card Details:
* Image - Teddy Bea 'Bea with a little friend'
* Colouring medium - Promarkers
* Papers - Papermania 'Blueberry Hill'
* Punch - MS Doily Lace
* Dies -  Marianne Design 'Cirkels' (this is the correct spelling!) & 'Labels' dies
* Sentiment - Woodware 'Circular Greetings'
* Everything else from my stash

I'm looking forward to doing some more crafting in the next few days as I've been very naughty again and had another little spending spree. My ever patient DH won't be too pleased (more stuff to pack for the move) but I'm sure Joanna Sheen loves me at the moment!

Happy Birthday!

 

Hi everyone!
The Just Magnolia and hAngler & sTangler Challenge is celebrating it's 2nd birthday and although I haven't managed to join in with them for as many challenges as I would have liked, I really wanted to make a card to celebrate their birthday
HAPPY BIRTHDAY GIRLS!!!!
I thought I'd use one of the sweet H&S images instead of a Tilda (it was a hard choice) and this little cutie is one of my favourites.

Card Details:
* Image - hAngler & sTangler
* Colouring medium - Promarkers
* Tag - K & Co 'Wild Raspberry' tag pad
* Punch - MS Doily Lace
* Sentiment - Pink Petticoat 'Curly Girly'
* Everything else from my stash

As I seem to be finding time to do some crafting at the moment, I'm hoping to be back tomorrow with an entry for this week's Teddy Bo challenge, you know how much I love these so you won't be surprised to learn that I couldn't resist buying a new image today.
In fact, I seem to have been a little naughty today as I also bought some digis from Funky Kits and another MS punch from Joanna Sheen. Oh well, that's addiction for you!

Tulips from Andover

Hi everyone!
I know the song title is really Tulips from Amsterdam, but these ones are from Andover, sent with my love.
I've not been managing to much crafting,  posting or blog visiting lately, but I wanted to join in with the lovely TeddyBo challenge if I could and I think I may have just scraped in in time. Their theme is 'Punch It Out' and they want to see us use some of those punches we all have hundreds of!
Things here seem to have calmed down a bit (temporarily, I'm sure) so I managed to get a card done and I'm hoping to visit some of my favourite places later on today.

Card Details:
* Image - Teddy Bo - 'I Love You Bunches'
* Colouring medium - Promarkers
* Punches - MS 'Cherish' ATP and 'Embossed Zig Zag'
* Sentiment - Lily of the Valley 'Girly Curly Sentiments'
* Everything else from my stash

On the house move front, we've organised everything we can and now we've reached that horrible 'just waiting' period when the stress sets in because you have time to imagine all the things that could possibly go wrong.
The survey results were good and the quotes for removals were horrendous (as expected, after all it is about 150 miles away!)  Anyway, I'm keeping everything crossed that it all goes smoothly and quickly, because now I've mentally moved out I just want to get on with things.

Sketch N Stash DT Card - Challenge #59

Hi everyone, time for another Sketch N Stash challenge. This week's sketch is by Julie and I loved using it, I think I'll be using this one a lot!
I just couldn't stay away from these little cuties any longer, so yet another of the Sugar Nellie images today, this one is 'Verity' and I think she's gorgeous. I re-sized her this time so she's in close-up instead of the full length image.

Card Details:
* Image - Sugar Nellie 'Verity'
* Sentiment - Sentiments 4 You
* Colouring medium - Promarkers
* Papers - Basic Grey (not sure which ones as the front of the pad has vanished)
* Punch - MS 'Doily Lace' & EK Success 'Photo Corners'
* Everything else from my stash

Our prize this fortnight is from our main sponsor, the ever generous Steph at Simon Says Stamp and she is offering our lucky winner a $15 voucher to spend in the shop, so definitely worth joining in for.
Don't forget to take a look at the DT cards for some inspiration and also check to see who won our last challenge and the who the Top 3 are.
I can't believe how many of you continue to join in with us each fortnight, thank you all so much for your continued support and we love visiting and checking out all your wonderful creations. Please remember though that the whole point of our challenge is to follow the sketch, of course you can make changes to it but we must still be able to see the original in there somewhere. If your card bears no resemblance to the sketch I'm afraid it will be deleted, I think this is only fair on the other entrants for the prizes.

On the personal front (if you're interested, you may want to make a coffee first as this could be a LONG post!!!!!)
We recently spent a week house hunting  in Norfolk  and viewed so many properties that I was actually sick of looking at houses (I never thought I'd say that!) We saw some lovely places, but none of them was right for us, so we decided we'd go back up there again once our property had sold and take another look around then.
On our last day one of the Estate Agents persuaded us to view a final property in our favourite location, we'd already seen and discounted this property on the internet and didn't really want to go as we knew that it wasn't what we wanted, but we decided to check it out anyway. We walked in and both knew immediately that this was the one!
It has oil heating (we wanted gas)  has most of it's garden to the side (I wanted a private, rear garden) has a stream running across the bottom of the rear part of the garden (DH has a phobia about living near water in case of flooding) and is much bigger than we need AND WE LOVE IT!

Since our return last week we've sold our house, had our offer accepted on the bungalow, had a survey carried out, arranged a solicitor and removals firm and we're now counting the days to our 'Escape to the Country' and this new chapter in our lives.
In view of all this, I must apologise for not posting or commenting very much, but I look forward to getting back into things properly once I'm settled and all my craft stash is unpacked.
Thanks, if you've managed to stay with me through this very long post that's what I call a 'follower' ha ha!!