Celebrations - Crafty Boots Challenge DT Project

Hi Everyone,

I hope that you have all had a wonderful Christmas and are enjoying your boxing day.

Here is my Design Team project for the Crafty Boots new challenge - Celebrations.

I used this cute (and free) digi image from Cuddly Buddly and coloured it with Letraset promarkers.  I used the scalloped square spellbinder die for the pink pearlised emobossed card layer behind the image, and various embellishments including gems courtesy of the Glitter Girls.  The card itself is a Precious Gemstones Fancy Shaped Card Blank from Hunkydory, backed with a bit of holographic paper. 

Well, this is going to be a short one, because I am writing it on the Friday before Christmas and I have to nip out to the shop before it becomes an abosulte zoo!

Take care and thanks for checking out my blog.  All comments are not only welcome, but very much appreciated!

Happy Crafting
xx Denise

Forever Friends Classic Christmas

I know it is getting down to the wire, but there is still time for a few more cards!

This one is for Gracie's groomer, who has the patience of a saint to get Gracie looking so pretty.  She (Gracie) can be a bit of a pickle when getting combed and brushed!

Anyway, I realised last night that I hadn't done the card for the groomer (Jackie at Adorapaws).  As I often do in a pinch, I turned to docrafts Digital Designer!

Here is the card. 

I used the Forever Friend Retro Christmas CD and chose one of the preset decoupauge scenes.  A bit of cutting, gluing (with pinflair), matting and layering, and viola!

The image is so sweet (as are all the forever friends images), and although this isn't for any challenges or anything, I thought it deserved a place on my blog.

Best Wishes for a very Merry Christmas!

xx Denise


p.s.
As often happens, Lily decided she wanted to inspect the card very closely to ensure it meets her quality standards!

It's a Clarity Christmas!

****Spoiler Alert*****

if you are one of my co-workers, neighbors or family in Germany, do not look any further ;)

Ok folks, they have been a long time in the making, but the Christmas cards I will actually be giving out to most on my card list are finally done.  My other half and I decided to pick a card to give out to everyone each year so we would not have to worry about to whom we gave which card.  This year, we chose to use one of the lovely designs introduced by Barbara Gray using her Clarity Stamps.  I tried to mix it up a bit, but the essence is definitely Barbara's lovely design.

A couple of my favorites

A random sampling

A closer look at the top row

There is no doubt that these cards took a bit of time and effort, but I think they were worth it.  I cannot take credit for all of the coloring as I did have some help from my other half and a dear friend.  Speaking of the coloring, they are done with Letraset Flex Markers and Pro Markers.  The stamps are all Clarity Stamps which were stamped with clear Versamark heat embossed with a variety of embossing powders in gold, silver, gold sparkle, pewter and even one in iridescent blue.

I will be proud to give these out, and I cannot thank Barbara Gray and her uber talented team enough for their products and ideas.

Now I am off for a nap I think.   Take care and have a happy and healthy holiday season!

xxDenise

Masculine Santa Moon and Sparkles

Hello all!  I hope this finds you all well and done or nearly done with your Christmas preparations.  I, on the other hand, am way way behind, but there ya go!

First things first - the winner of the Crafty Boots Blog Hop for my blog's candy is  
Lindsay/Craftmonster81.  Congratulations and thanks for hopping over to my blog in our first blog hop!  Please email stephanie-emma@craftyboots.co.uk  so she can arrange to mail you your prize!


Anyway, one of the few things I have managed to do was to make my design team card for the Crafty Boots Christmas Challenge.   As a multi-tasker at heart, I thought I would try to do something that I could maybe use to enter in a few other challenges, one of which was to make a masculine card.  I found this LOVELY digi image from Sassy Cheryl's Digi's and I thought it would be perfect.  She has some lovely digi's so I would encourage you to take a look if that is your sort of thing.

Ok, so here is the card.....which I must say does not photograph quite as good as it looks in person.

I wanted to put Santa (who is coloured with Flex Markers) into a starry glitzy sky so I used a royal blue glitter paper and then topped that with a printed acetate from Kanban which has some black flourishes and swirls.  I wish the pic showed the detail better, but I am surely a better card maker than a photographer!  I used my Crop-a-dile with some flat top black grommets / studs to attach the acetate.  Now, for the confession...this card has two Santa layers on top of each other.  The first one was attached with Pinflair and to my horror, even when it dried, the glue was visible through the paper with all the white.  It was my own fault, I should have known better, but after a moment of 'oh no.... it's ruined!', I remembered that I love to colour and it is a digi image anyway, so I will just colour another and stick it on top!  So now Santa has a bit more dimension than originally planned, but I think it works.

Sorry for the book, but I have just had my morning does of caffeine and am experiencing probably the only energy burst I will have all day!

As always, do please let me know what you think.  I love to get your comments!

Take care and all the best for you and yours this holiday season.
xx Denise

Forever Friends Christmas

If you are looking for the Crafty Boots Blog Hop, you are in the right place...so please just click here.


Ok, for a change.... card first, blather after.

Forever Friends Retro / Traditional

 
Without being a 'downer', many of you know I am currently having some serious issues with my back which has made my life in general, as well as my crafting a bit of a challenge.  The doctor has recommended that I try to keep moving around as much as possible, and considering that at the moment my lounge and dining room are essentially mini (or perhaps not so mini) craft supply rooms, I thought I could try to go through a little each day to cull out what won't be needed or used before Christmas (or at all).  This way we might actually be able to put up the Christmas tree IN the house.

Today I went for going through stacks of papers and I came across a pile of artwork that I had either printed or colored at some point.  I do this all the time, so I suspect there may be a few more similar entries (for cards made from 'found' elements that got so deep into the middle of paper stacks that I forgot about them).

Anyway, I came across these forever friends characters from Forever Friends Retro Christmas CD using docrafts Digital Designer.  I printed three of each - obviously with the intention of decoupaging them.    I did just that, then layered a 5x5 square card with patterned and textured papers.  The die cut Merry Christmas was purchased on line as it is.  (I have been trying to find out where to buy the die to cut them myself, but to date I have had no such luck!)

I wanted to keep this one relatively simple, but since every Christmas Card needs a little glitz I added the crystal stars.

I do think this card meets the criteria for a few challenges, so I would like to enter it in :

Paper Sundaes Challenge Blog - Sundae Bar Toppings (Red and die cut)
ends Sat 10 December
Pollycraft Monday - Challenge #120 - Christmas Fun
ends approx 21 December
The Crafty Bloggers Network - Challenge 5 - Shades of Winter
ends 10 December 

Willow Sketchie Challenge - Anything Goes
end 7 December

Please feel free to leave any comments (even constructive criticism).  I am always striving to improve techniques and am still developing my style so I am open to input from everyone.

Thanks for looking and I hope you all have a very happy and healthy holiday season!

xx Denise

Here's one for the books (or for the gifts!)

Hello, if you are looking for the Crafty Boots Blog Hop, you are in the right place so please click here.

Ok, so those of you who are familiar with my 'work' will know that my papercrafting has been all but limited to cards and card toppers and a very little wall art ala' paint fushion.

I came across another 'Anything but a card' challenge and as usual, went to click to the next challenge blog to find a challenge I could enter.  Then I said to myself, "Wait - why don't I try something that isn't a card?"   I think the challenge has now expired as I can't find it, but no matter, I was on a mission!

I tried to think what would be reasonable to attempt, and I decided on a gift bag.  Certainly a gift bag would not go amiss this time of year anyway!  As I didn't have a gift bag to decorate, I decided I would make one from scratch.  And here 'tis.

Side view to prove it is a bag!

I had no idea how to make a gift bag from paper, but thanks to a bit of searching on you tube and a few tutorials I was ready to take the plunge into making the bag itself.  I would be fibbing if I said I got it in one, but I was happy enough with my thrid attempt to move on to the paper I wanted to use for my actual project!

The paper came from an assorted 12x12 pack that I was lucky enough to get from the Summer Crafting workshop I attended (run by My Craft Studio).

Then onto the decorating:
I used the Sweet November Neva Digi Image by Amy Young which I got from All That Scraps.  It is colored with Letraset Pro Markers and Wink of Stella Pens.  I used a light blue glitter card cut using Grand Nestabilities Label 23 die for the layer behind the fairy.  Some of the snowflakes are punched using a tonic punch and the others are from a pre die cut set from Kanban.  On the inside of the bag, I die cut a couple of offset circle strips for stability, then using the Crop-a-dile, attached silver grommets and then threaded the ribbon through to make the handles which are fairly standard red satin ribbon.

I hope that you like it, and as always I love to get your comments.

Take care and best wishes for a happy and healthy holiday season.

xxDenise

Crafty Boots Blog Hop

The theme at Crafty Boots Challenges this fortnight is ‘Anything Goes’.  You can join in the challenge as normal but there are 12 extra chances for you to win a prize by joining the first ever Crafty Boots blog hop!

If you are joining in the hop you should have got here from Stephanie-Emma’s blog .  If you haven’t blog hopped before it is really simple, just start at the Crafty Boots Challenge blog and hop through the design team blogs in the order set out on that page.  Each of the design team members has a word or two for you to collect which will reveal a message at the end.  Once you have collected that message email it to bloghop@craftyboots.co.uk to be entered into the draw to win the prize of three digis of your choice from Hope Jacare Doodles.  You must also become a follower of all the design team’s blogs (and Claire’s) to be eligible to win the prizes.



Hi everyone..... My name is Denise and I have just become a member of the Crafty Boots Challenge Blog Design Team.  I am so thrilled to be part of the team, and I am also very happy to be able to be one of the stops on the blog hop!

Since I am in Christmas card mode, I chose the lovely Snowman Wreath digi image from Hope Jacare Doodles.  Here is what I came up with....

Hope Jacare Snowman Wreath

The image is colored with Letraset Flex Markers.  I used a lovely holographic card that I got from Create and Craft.  It doesn't come across that well in the pic, but the base color is about the same as the green in the ribbon.  I used the Grand Nestabilities Labels 23 for the die cut layers and the ribbon I got from the US (at JoAnn's Fabric I think).

Now back to the business of the blog hop......



Don’t forget that myself and each of the design team members has a prize of candy up for grabs, this will include a sample pack of the fantastic new Crafty Boots Deluxe card along with a few other goodies.  Be sure to leave a comment on each of our blogs and follow us to be in with a chance of winning our candy!

My words for the secret message are:
IN

Your next stop is Tracie’s blog
The deadline for both the Anything Goes challenge, and the blog hop (and candy) is Sunday 11 ^th December at 12 Noon (UK time).

Baby Monkey

Ok, so as many of you know, I am all but laid up with a bad back and now a cold / the flu to boot.  It is had to tell if my muscle pain is back or illness related, so suffice to say I am just a mess all around.  However, my will to craft is strong, and although it has taken me the better part of 4 days to put this together, I managed to do a card that fits a couple of challenges.

The first challenge / inspiration came from the Crafty Bloggers Network Challenge 4 - Sketch Challenge.  I have never entered a sketch challenge, because I usually let the card's format come to me as a result of the elements.  However, I remembered seeing this adorable digi stamp at Pollycraft  - Christmas Chester, Chester's Star   and I thought he would be a nice way to follow the sketch.

Here is the card:

 

Here is the sketch:  

 It is really a lovely set up for a card and I don't know that I would have thought of the checker board backing.

Here are a couple more pics of the card to show some of the detail in the monkey and a bit truer representation of the colors with the flash.

I colored Chester the Monkey with Letraset flex markers and pro markers.  I wasn't happy with the color the star ended up, so I thought some heat embossing with gold sparkle embossing powder would do the trick (and I think it did).  Finally I wanted to bling it up a bit with various colored gems and a few small pearls.  (What is Christmas without a bit of bling?)

I was lucky that my brand new Hunkydory paper came in the post today (yes, on Sunday - my mailman chooses random days to take off and / or deliver the mail).  Anyway, I used two different sheets of the beautiful lavender / purple with gold flourishes paper as the checkerboard in the back.  I cut a small strip of gold mirror board and put some purple Happy Christmas ribbon on it.

Then for the layers behind the monkey I used dark blue holographic card from the Hunkydory pack topped with a textured white paper that has been in my stash for ages.   You can see the texture a bit better in the close up of Chester (above).

In addition to The Crafty Bloggers Network Challenge, I would also like to enter this card in the following challenges:

Passion for Promarkers - Week 127 Theme Swirls and Sparkles
ends Monday 28/11/11

Pollycraft Monday Challenge - Challenge 120 - Christmas Fun 
4 week


I think that is about it for now, as it has taken me literally 3 hours to put this post together..lol.

Thank you as always for looking and I love to get your comments!

Take care and keep on crafting!

xxDenise