New Year Rubber Stamp Giveaway

*This post will remain sticky until 28th February, so please scroll down for new posts*

Good morning everyone! I'm so late with this Candy, but unfortunately when I went to get the box I'd packed it away in before Christmas I couldn't find it lol! It had got tidied away in all the pre-Christmas preparations and I forgot where I'd put it, senior moment or what?!

Anyhooo.....it's found now so without any further ramble from me, this is what I'm giving away this time. I thought I'd do a little rubber giveaway, because regardless of what embellishments or design paper you like to use or not, most of us do like to stamp on our cards, so I am giving away quite a lot of stamps today.  I could not get them all to show clearly in the picture as there quite a few, so I've listed them all for you below.

Time for Tea - Presents

Kraftin' Kimmie Coco Chocolate

Saturated Canary - Piper

Saturated Canary - Novel

Saturated Canary - Schoolhouse

LDRS Vintage Affections - Friends (Sentiment Stamps)

Magnolia - It's Cold Outside Tilda

Magnolia - Lemon Tilda

Magnolia - Tilda's Summer Car

Magnolia - New Year's Glass

La-La Land Crafts - Dia De Los Muertos Marci

La-La Land Crafts - Egyptian Mummy Luka

So that's 12 different stamps or stamp sets there, up for grabs and a variety that I hope will suit everyone.

If you want a chance of winning this candy, all you have to do is:

1. Be a follower.  If you aren't one already, don't worry, you can become on by clicking the 'Join this Site' button above the pictures of my current followers at the top of this page. You can also be a follower on my Facebook page here . If you follow both my blog and my Facebook page you can enter twice (I haven't done more than one entry per person thing before with Inlinkz, so if you have any problems entering twice for both, let me know in a comment and I'll try to sort it, if I can't add it myself to the inlinkz linky, I'll keep a note and add those names as extra numbers manually when doing the random draw :) ).

2. Link back to this post. This can be by adding a box to your sidebar (instructions can be found here if you don't know how to do this), or by making a post on your blog and telling people about it with  link to this page, or by sharing on Facebook.

3. Don't forget to add your details to the linky below this post. I'll ship worldwide, so doesn't matter where you're from.

That's it! But please no candy only blogs, I will check before making my draw.  To give people plenty of time to enter and because my birthday falls at the beginning of February and I may be rather busy at that time, I'm running this till the end of February. 

Good Luck! :) xx

Anything Goes with a Spring Feel at Saturated Camary

Oh my goodness I am running late with all my posts this week, really looking forward to the weekend and resting up, hopefully clearing my chest a little. I hope you are all keeping well and I'm giving big waves to all my new followers, I hope you will stay with me on my crafting journey and find some inspiration along the way :)

Righto then, on to the reason I'm here today and it's as GDT for Saturated Canary, we ave a new image showcase challenge over on the Saturated Canary Facebook page and this time it's

Anything Goes with a hint of spring!.

You can make any creation you like be it card, scrap page, an altered something, smash book/journal page etc...just let your creativity go!

The prize, as always, will be 2 digital images of your choice from the shop and the rules are super simple too..

* you can enter ONLY ONCE. 

( this makes it fair for everyone )

* you can enter with any NEW and FINISHED creation but...IT MUST BE HANDCRAFTED. 

(digital colouring of Krista's images is not permitted in accordance to TOU's)

I have been positively itching to use this image ever since I bought it, just love that hair! I decided my hint of spring (well a bit more than a hint lol) would be the colours used, though I did also add a spring sentiment and well spring is all about the flowers right?

Now for me whenever I think of spring I think of daffodils and crocuses, so I went with yellow and lilac and pink.

I apologise for the lack of links, posting this reeeeeeally quickly before dashing off to work, so I will add all the links and colours used when I get back from work this evening in about 11 hours. For now you have the pics, hope you enjoy them :)

This is Color Me Wonderful and I coloured her with distress ink markers and Spectrum Aquatints (I'll add the colours used this evening) I just loooooved colouring that hair!

She's so beautiful and the papers are so pretty, (these are Bo Bunny) that she didn't need a lot of embellishments. Just some seam binding, lace, a few flowers and gems and to top it off some simple punched butterflies.

I do hope you like her.  Don't forget to drop in on the blog to see all the other SC team's make, but cover your keyboard because you will be drooling over all the gorgeousness! If you have FB, why not join in with our challenge!

I'll be back this evening quickly to edit my post for colours and links. Have a great Friday! :) xx

Furry Friends at Deep Ocean Challenge

Good evening! I'm here  with the latest inspiration for the Deep Ocean Challenge blog.

This fortnight our challenge theme is 'Furry Friends', so I've given Tilda with Maggie the Monkey another inking up, but this time I went with pencils and a bit of a darker skintone to go with these lovely Lili of the Valley papers I used.

I'm afraid I don't have the pencil colours used this time, I coloured this up several days ago and have been quite unwell with a chest infection since ....and back at work this week, so I just haven't had a chance to work out what I used, but she was coloured with Polychromos pencils. I rather like the way she turned out.  I'm a lot happier with this paper, which is Stonehenge, the only downside is that it doesn't have as much of a 'tooth' to it, so colouring with a light pressure is much harder.

I added lots of lovely embellishments from my stash, many of these are from the Ribbon Girl

The sentiment is also from Lili of the Valley.

Right that's all from me today, I'm off to curl up with a hot drink, don't forget to check out my teamies wonderful makes and we'd love to see you enter something!

TTFN :) xx

Red Riding Hood

Good evening! I'm very late with my post today as my daughter has been visiting and we've been spending mother daughter time together until she went home today (and I'm missing her already). So it was a big rush to get this ready in time. 

Luckily I already had the image coloured as I was practicing my pencil work.  I have to admit that while I'm happy with my colouring I will redo the image as the paper (which was one of several I bought to try out, ended up being far too soft for this technique and as you can see the paper started coming away and 'splitting' a little. Which doesn't look tooooo bad on the cloak as it looks a little like velvet, but I'm not happy with it so I will redo and replace the image on the card later.

Colours used:

Skin: 285, 179, 188, 189, 132, 132, 103, 101, 131(blush)
Hair:, 199, 274, 271, 270, 101
Outfit: 199, 274, 271, 225, 219, 121, 101

I went for a slightly darker look here, some of the Brother's Grimm tales are quite gruesome, so I added in some black and the clock? well I kept remembering that old school playground game 'What's the Time Mr Wolf' lol.

I used the following products:

Red Riding Hood Stamp

Maja Design Crea Diem - It is Written Script Side

Maja Design A Gift for You - Cause you're my Angel (Gingham side)

Reverse Wonky Rectangle Nestie
Wrought Iron Fence Die

Steampunk Clock Die

The ribbon, charm, lace and pearl trim are all from the Ribbon Girl

Well that's it from me today, I hope you all have a wonderful weekend! :) xx

Feeling Groovy

Well my most of my first day off work has just flown by! But I've been busy after my little lay in to catch up on some much needed sleep.

I've been working on this card for a while now, she was going to be for a DT commission, but then I realised I'd completely messed up because it needed to use a rubber stamp and this was a digi, so then I had to super rush stuff to get it finished in time.....but that's a whole other story.

Anyway, I had this Saturated Canary image all coloured up and had even chosen papers, since I like to colour to match paper normally. But looking through my upcoming work, I have nothing she really fits, so I've been working on her slowly, 30 mins here, 15 there, and this morning with a bit of spare time on my hands I finished her off.

I thought that as the image is called Hipster, I'd go ahead and theme the entire card, so I chose very 70's looking papers and colours, and also decided to add the word 'groovy' to the card. I made the little scrabble type tiles from the 'windows' of the lovely view die. The lovely view die? Well viewmasters were a very 70's toy ;) 

I coloured her with a mix of Distress Ink and Spectrum Aquatint markers.

Skin: Tattered Rose, Tea Dye, Spun Sugar

Hair:  Spun Sugar, Picked Raspberry, (Blossom & Rose Pink SP AQ).

Outfit: Antique Linen, Picked Raspberry,Spun Sugar, (Marigold, Jasmine & Rose Pink SP AQ)

I finished off with some psychedelic swirls and some lovely goodies from The Ribbon Girl.

I kept the inside quite simple as there was so much going on at the front!

Items Used:

Hipster

Bazzil - Miss Teagen Sue

Lovely View Die

Prima Mini Swirls - Rosarian

Memory Box - Alphabet Soup

Ophelia Lace

Deep Rose Velvet Ric Rac

Peach Seam Binding 

Deep Pink Cosmos Daisy

All the rest from stash (also known as I can't remember exactly where I got them from and don't have links :P )

That's all from me today, my daughter is coming to visit tomorrow for a few days, but I will try my best to get round some blogs befor then. Enjoy the rest of your day, and as our little Hipster would say 'don't let the man grind you down!'.  Oh and apologies if you have the Simon and Garfunkel song rattling around in your head all evening now! :) xx

Spring at La-La Land

Good morning, Monday has rolled around again, but for once I don't mind work on a Monday because I'm on holiday for the rest of the week. Yay!  I'm here for my regular GDT spot over at La-La Land Crafts, and our inspirational theme this week is 'Spring'

I decided to use Paper Doll Marci - Spring Showers, because ...well...she seems so perfectly suited for an English spring!

La-La Land Products used:

Paper Doll Marci - Spring Showers

Stitched Sun and Clouds

Picket Fence Die

Butterflies Set 1

All these stamps and dies are also available at Dies to Die for if you're in the UK or Europe.

I coloured her soft and pretty with Distress Ink markers.

Skin: Tattered Rose, Vintage Photo, Aged Mahogony, Victorian Velvet

Hair: Milled Lavender, Victorian Velvet

Outfit: Scattered Straw, Faded Jeans, Milled Lavender, Victorian Velvet.

I've matched her with some lovely Maja Design papers, from the Spring Basics collection.

I was very rushed for time this weekend, so I haven't decorated the inside yet, I'll do that later.

Well that's all from me today, why not share your own take on this theme in the La-La Land Facebook Group

I'll see you again soon, happy crafting! :) xx

Gemini Brights

Happy Sunday everyone! I have you're all having a lovely weekend. I've had a lovely relaxing time, I've caught up with some much needed sleep and spent a lovely relaxing Valentine's evening at home with my OH. I generally dislike going out on Valentine's evenings because it is so packed full of people there is no privacy and it's very noisy, not at all my idea of romantic!

Anyhoo.........today we have a new challenge over at Totally Tilda & Friends and it's Pastels or Brights, so we want to see your makes following one or the other of those themes. You can use any image (it no longer has to be Tilda) but it must be hand stamped,. no digis.

I've gone back to one of my Tilda stamps today and followed the 'Brights' theme, well this is doubly bright because I used Gemini Tilda.

I've coloured Gemini Tilda with a mix of Distress Ink markers and my new Spectrum Aquatint markers, and added some little dots on their dresses with a white Posca marker.

I also added a little glitter trim to their dresses with some Glamour Dust.

I used papers from the MME sale box and a Stitched Circle Die.

Embellishments from The Ribbon Girl

Victoria White Antique Lace

Meadow Green Large Spot Ribbon

38 mm Fuschia Pink/White Spot Organza Ribbon

Pale Pink Small Polka Dot Buttons

Clear Crystal and Diamante Flatback  (coloured with a Copic marker)

I've also used flowers from Wild Orchid Crafts and some lovely Prima Bling from Dies to Die for.

Our sponsor this week is 

and you could win the following lovely prize

So why not join us for this easy challenge!

That's all from me today but I'll see you again tomorrow, enjoy your Sunday! :) xx

Love is all around at Deep Ocean Challenge

Happy Tuesday everyone! I hope your week is going well so far. I had a lovely birthday yesterday, even if I did spend the whole day at work and on my own, at least I finished a bit early and went for afternoon tea with my friend Emily at Browns, which was rather lovely.

Anyhoo.....on to the reason I am here today as I'm sure you're wondering. A little while ago the sweet and lovely Karina of Creawitch approached me and asked if I would like to join the Design Team at Deep Ocean Challenge. I'll confess that initially I was hesitant as I did not want to over commit myself and I'm already very stretched....but she was persistent and persuasive and I must say that I was extremely flattered to be invited to such a talented team. Anyway, since the challenge is a fortnightly one and I was already planning on making some changes over the following weeks to free up some time, I said I would give it my best and see how it goes, so they're stuck with me now lol!

But enough waffling and on with the challenge. This time the theme is 'Love is all Around', now I like this theme much better than a straight forward 'Valentine' theme, because while you can of course create a Valentine make....you don't have to. It could be a wedding card, anniversary, engagement or just a card to say 'I love you'. I decided to make a card that could stand for any of the above and I plumped for a vintage theme, as I've had this image sitting on my computer for like...forever, waiting to be used and I thought it was really perfect for this theme.

I matched it to these beautiful Pion Papers from the My Beloved Son collection, and yes I matched the image to the paper, not the paper to the image, as originally the photograph was more black and white, but I gave it some sepia tones before printing.

I've edged every layer with Walnut Stain distress ink and added this love paperclip that's been in my stash forever along with lace, ribbon, pearl string and flatback pearls from the Ribbon Girl.

I hope you like my make, don't forget to go check out the rest of the team's makes here you won't be disappointed :) and why not join us in our challenge? We have a fab sponsor in The Ribbon Girl and a lovely prize from them of a £10 voucher, all details can be found on the blog.

Have a great Tuesday! :) xx

Valentine - Inspiration Monday at La-La Land Crafts

Happy Monday!  It's a mixed bag for me today, happy because it's my birthday, but sad because I have to work on it...but then again happy because I'm finishing work a tiny bit early and going for a late afternoon tea at Brown's with my friend Emily.

Anyway....birthday shenanigans aside, it's Monday and that means that Team Monday at the La-La Land Inspiration Blog have a new theme. This week it's Valentine, very topical with it being on Saturday.

Now I could have used one of the many love/valentine themed images, but I decided to make my card with singing Marci, because one of the sentiments that comes with the stamp says 'You make my heart sing' and I thought that was a lovely valentine sentiment.

I've used the following La-La Land products on my card and if you're in the UK or Europe, all of these can be ordered from Dies to Die for.

Stamp - Singing Marci and Sentiments

Hanging Hearts and Love Word Die 

Open Hearts Doily Border Die

Stitched Nested Circles Dies

Heart Treble Clef Die

String of Hearts Border Die

I coloured Marci with Distress Ink markers and a couple of my new Spectrum Aquatint markers, these are amazing, still geting used to the depth of colour, they are very vibrant, which is lovely for contrast and less vintage looking cards.

Skin: Tattered Rose, Tea Dye, Fired Brick, Rose Pink (SAQT)

Hair: Antique Linen, Walnut Stain

Outfit and Microphone: Spun Sugar, Begonia (SAQT), Pumice Stone

The beautiful papers are 'Romance' 6 x 6 collection from Whimsy. I've edged them with Pumice stone DI, but didn't get a chance to stitch them today as I was running short on time (a common theme this week).

I cut out the sentiment and popped it on a Spellbinders heart and embellished the card with some goodies from The Ribbon Girl

Monique White Guipure Lace

Silver Grey Organza Ribbon

Pink Button Twine

Wooden Heart Button

We'd love to see you join in the fun in our Facebook group and we also have a Pinterest page so you can catch up with all the inspiration.

Well that's all from me, but I'll be back again tomorrow with something new. Enjoy your day! :) xx

Wish Upon a Star. It's Charming-Lovely Lili Challenge at The Ribbon Girl

Good morning! (or afternoon or evening, depending on where in the world you are), I hope you're all enjoying the weekend. I've been re-charging my batteries and making some more cards.

It's time for a new Lovely Lili challenge at The Ribbon Girl

 so we would like to see your projects using the LOTV image stamps, artpad images, sentiments or papers and the challenge is  'CHARMING' so just add a charm 

I used the lovely 'Wish Upon a Star' stamp, isn't she just the cutest?  I thought that this little wand charm went perfectly with the little ballerina's fairy wand.

The papers are Pion, Floral Frames, I've edged them with Walnut Stain distress ink.

I coloured the little ballerina up with distress ink markers.

Skin: Tattered Rose, Tea Dye, Spun Sugar

Hair: Vintage Photo, Brushed Corduroy, Gathered Twigs

Outfit: Milled Lavender, Dusty Concord, Pumice Stone

The fabulous star die cut border and die cut stars were made form the dies in the January club kit from La-La Land Crafts.

Love this ribbon, it makes fabulous bows!

I used the following Ribbon Girl products on my card:

50 mm Ophelia Ivory Tulle Lace , 25 mm Heliotrope Satin Ribbon , 38 mm Ivory Faux Silk Ribbon , Ivory Rolled Roses , Lilac Rolled Roses , Small Beaded Berries Lilac , Cherry Blossom Lilac/White , Rose Bud Semi Open Lilac, Heart Diamante Amethyst Embellishment , 

8 mm Round Lilac Acrylic Gems , Star Wand Charm

Do come and join in the challenge with us, you could win

and 

and don't forget to check out the rest of the team's gorgeous makes!

Hope you have a lovely crafty Sunday, and I'll see you all again tomorrow! :) xx

Rebecca masquerading at the ball.

Happy Friday everyone! Thank you so much for your lovely comments on my Steampunk Valentine card yesterday. I have another Saturated Canary creation to share with you today, this time in rubber from Little Darlings Rubber Stamps.

This is Rebecca, isn't she just dreamy?

I've coloured her up using my distress ink markers again and I don't have the colours for you today I'm afraid as I coloured this a while back and I cannot find where I scribbled my notes!

I coloured her to match these beautiful Pion papers, these are from the My Beloved Son collection, but they look wonderful used on girly cards too! That wonderful mask die is from La-La Land Crafts, I can see myself using that a lot.

I've finished with some gorgeous embellies from the Ribbon Girl and gone all shabby chic here with lashings of Gesso.

The inside is simply decorated with more of those pretty papers and a blank space for a message.

List of products used:

LDRS Saturated Canary Rebecca - Sadly out of stock

Pion Design Paper - My Beloved Son

Pion Design Paper - My Beloved Son - Pansy

Memory Box Victorian Frame Set

La-La Land Masquerade Mask Die

Walnut Stain Distress Ink

I also used lots of lovely embellies from The Ribbon Girl, including that gorgeous blue silk ribbon!

That's all from me today, but I'll be back on Sunday :) xx

Steampunk Valentine

Hi everyone, big hugs to all my followers new and old and a big thank you for all the lovely comments you've been leaving for me recently, I really love to read them and totally appreciate every one of them :)

Unusually for me today I'm not here as part of any challenge or DT....well I suppose it's kind of as GDT for Saturated Canary, but this post was not required, or for anything special other than that I totally fell in LOVE with this image when I saw it, and couldn't wait to make something with it!

Well of course I had to wait a bit, because you know ...life...I work full time with quite a long journey to and from work, and then there are DT commitments etc, not to mention chores and squeezing in family and a social life lol!  I did manage to get it coloured up last week and shared it in the Saturated Canary Facebook Group, but I've been itching to make something with it since then.

Now I have a thing for Steampunk, though I don't often get to indulge, but this was really pretty too, so I didn't want to go too far down the dark and utilitarian Steampunk path, so I decided to make a Steampunk Valentine card.

I love the way this turned out.

The colouring is done with Distress Ink markers.

Skin: Tattered Rose, Tea Dye, Aged Mahogany

Hair: Antique Linen, Walnut Stain, Gathered Twigs

Outfit: Victorian Velvet, Frayed Burlap, Gathered Twigs, Pumice Stone, Antique Linen.

The beautiful papers are Maja Design Vintage Autumn Basics, they're edged with DI and hand stitched.

I used the Steampunk Clock and Heart Cogs from La-La Land  Crafts and some other cogs cut with a Cheery Lynn die set. They've been edged with Vintage Photo DI. I added a little lace and seam binding and a brass coloured key. The little screws are brads and are by Tim Holtz.

Finally I decorated the inside with complementary paper and some steampunk vehicle stamps.

There you go....not a flower in sight!....well only on the patterned paper.

Sadly this stamp is not yet available, it's going to be used for a project kit over at Kit and Clowder, so I was very lucky to get to play with it early :)

Items used

Maja Design Papers

Steampunk Clock

Heart Cogs

Cheery Lynn Gears

Clementine Lace

Seam Binding Oloroso

Cream Top Stitch Thread

Pink Top Stitch Thread
8mm Flat Back Ivory Pearls
6mm Ivory Flat Back Pearl Trim

That's all from me, but I'll be back on Friday with more to share, see you then! :) xx