I sooooo want/neeed a cricut

Lovely Emma has let me borrow her cricut this weekend for a project I have on the go.  I'm making some paper bunting for when my siser returns from Afghanistan.  I asked her whether she'd mind cutting them out for me but she offered to let me borrow the machine instead.  "&son" and I have lusted after it all day.
Trouble is it such an expensive piece of kit - I reckon what she's lent me for the weekend would cost £600 ish in the uk to purchase.  The other trouble is, it's such a marvellous machine - I can almost feel myself justifying that type of spend - and believe me, I really don;t have that kind of money to spare!

I'm going to try and declutter my house this year.  "&son" wants to save up for a wii and I said I'd sell some of his stuff for him on ebay to help him along so maybe I'll set up a cricut fund from ebay profits and see how things go.

Tonight I played about a bit with the fonts.  As the bunting is triangles cut from a 12x12 sheet I had to work out which font would give me the largest letteryet still fit on to the triangle if the letter had a 'broad bottom' like W or M

Off topic I know but when we travel to manchester we always drive to Glossop then catch the commuter train in - it stops at loads of stations with brilliant names but our family favourite is 'Broad Bottom' - "&son" firmly believed it was called 'Wide Arse [said with a Mancunian nasal twang] until he could recognise letter's!

After much faffing I couldn't resist Winter Woodland. which has a bonus font in it.  You can also cut 3d houses, trees etc to make a Christmas scene. 

The bunting is going to be a kind of shaby chic patriotic red white and blue.  As a taster, here is the W scanned in.  You cut out the shadow and the letter separately.  How pretty is that!  It's about 7 inches wide and just over 5 inches tall

Christmas Catch Up Part 2 - Shadow Frames & Clocks

I'm glad I waited to blog these because at the time I was just too frazzled to enjoy it.  I gave myself too much to do and kept beating myself up about 'not being as organised as last year'.  It was nearly Christmas before it clicked that 'last year' I'd been signed off sick for most of December so had plenty of time to do lots of crafty things.  It's not so easy when you're working late, taking kids to Christmas parties etc etc etc.  Some of these went to the wire - I was up at 2 in the morning on Christmas eve finishing off one of the clocks but, in hindsight, they seem to have been worth the effort.

I bought the kits from home bargains (where else?) a while ago and they were ridiculously cheap.  From memory the clock ones were £3.99  and the plain shadow boxes were £1.99.  They came with paper, etc but I used my stash instead

First up - for my sister Jane.
this uses Crate Paper 'lil sprout

This one was for Mum and Dad using a mini-kit that my lovely friend Emma G gave me containing the letters, ribbon and bling.  The background paper is by Cosmo Cricket.  The bling by basic grey.

Next up, my other sister, Ruth's clock - she's moved to Germany now so she'll have this in her new flat as reminder of her darling nephew

The polka dot paper  and charm came with the box on this one, The other paper is MME - Bloom & Grow

And finally

A picture of my godson for his Mum, my best friend from Uni.  Crate paper again but Orbit range this time.

The art of Crochet?

It's been a long standing ambition of mine to learn to crochet but I keep on trying and getting nowhere.  I rarely see adverts on the tv but spotted one after Christmas for ' The art of Crochet'  It seemed perfect having a dvd with the first edition so I could actually see how it worked rather than have to imagine it from pictures in a mag.  Sadly, everyone else thought it sounded like a good idea too and it was impossible to get hold of.  Mum was put on the case and she tried newsagents across Sheffield to no avail.  And then I struck lucky.
Over on MSE there is a thread called Learning to Crochet and I'd been popping in now again to see if there were any updates on stock availability.  Then a lovely lady on there called magpye offered me her dvd and magazine and promptly sent them off to me.  I've been doing my best ever since to make something impressive but to date have not even mastered casting on neatly enough.  But I'll keep trying!  Nothing beats me in the end!
I made this card to say thank you.  The card blank is pre-printed with gold swirls.  The flower fairy was from 'Lets Make Cards' and the ribbon was from a cracker at Christmas (I'm going to end up on the life of grime at this rate if I don;t learn to start throwing stuff away).  It's not really tied in a bow, I just pushed the ribbon through the hole in the sentimenet but I like the full effect of the 'bow'.  Sometime soon I'm hoping to have crotcheted flowers on my cards.  Some day......

Proud Mum

My son, Tom has taken it upon himself to sell cards in aid of the Haiti earthquake appeal at his school tomorrow.  He's spent yesterday evening and this evening (once he'd finished school and street dance/cross country) making cards and has managed a staggering 31 cards! 

In on the other hand have amade 1.  Pathetic

Here's a linky to his blog so you can have a look at most of his makes - I found 4 more in his box after he'd gone to bed.

I'm really hoping they sell ok as he's put so much work into it. I've told him that in the unlikely event that he doesn't sell them all, to bring them home and I'll hawk them at work and amongst my friends.

Fingers crossed for tomorrow.

Christmas Catch Up part 1 - the cards

Far too busy making things in December to blog them but I like to have my piccies up on blogland so here I go

how many ways can you tie a teabag card?

After making my first teabag crad on Thursday, I've made 2 mote today as am trying to finf the best way of tying them off

The first card - I used a brad and a loop. 

The second, I used ribbon and velcro.  Paper and embellishments from MME Bloom & Grow)

The third I tied the ribbon using the lovely Basic Grey Boxer papers I got from my Granny for Christmas.  This card id for her so it seemed apt.

But which one is best?  There's only one way to find out...........

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FIGHT!!!
or I could ask you lot.  What do you hink?  How do you close yours?

They say it comes in 3s.....

If bad luck comes in 3s and I'm on my 3rd multiple but I was actually talking about my blog posts.  I son;t know you wait a month before posting and then post 3 times in 1 night!


Quick teabag holder card - thanks to CT19720 over on MSE for measurements.
Thanks to Rusty for sending me this gorgous stamp.
Inside there's a bag of twinings traditional English tea and the rhyme:

If I could take your Troubles,

I would toss them in the Sea.
But since I can't, I'm sending you,
My favourite cup of tea.

Paper and brad from stash
Stamp from Rusty coloured in with promarkers
Teabag from the travelodge at Gatwick!

MSE KISS Challenge

Sadly, I wasn't challenged to Kiss David Tennant for 24 hours.  SOB I Still haven't got over New Years Day  - "I don;t want to go!" SOB.  But enough of all that....

The challenge on MSe was to make a simple card - thanks to TomsMum for setting the challenge

Imagine you're just starting out with your card making and you haven't got much in your stash, see what you can do with the minimum amount of stuff.

1) Try and use card stock that doesn't need covering with backing papers (but they're not excluded).
2) Stick to just two or three things to put on,

This is my effort. 
 
 

 
The card came free with a magazine - probably the flower fairies edition of Let's make Cards
Stamped image by inkinadoo
Spotty paper - scrap from stash
Ribbon probably came from the inside of some clothes - I always snipp the little bits of ribbons out to re-use if I'm not going to hang them up - come on who needs hanging ribbon on a pair of pjs!
So all in all it's uite a money saving card too
 
It's going off to Helmand

HAPPY NEW YEAR! Am I the last to say it?

Yes, it really has been that long since I blogged.  Had very good intentions for this year but they went the same way as the diet....again!

My little sis came home for Christmas but sadly had to return to Helmand for a couple more months.  I'd hoped to send her a few pages for her scrapbook in her frist post Christmas parcel but, and I know many of you may not be aware of this - we've had a little bit of inclement weather around here.  Blimey its been cold/snowy/icy, etc.  I've not been able to make it out to collect photos as that little bit of snow (ok it might have been more like 8 inches in my garden) caused no-end of problems.

So just the one LO to send out and it's taken me two evenings to finish it which is ridiculous because it's really quite a simple LO but I wanted it to be Christmassy without being CHRISTMASSY is you know what I mean.  Anyhow it's done now

The photo was tkane on the 20th of December when we all tripped down to London to see the real father Christmas!  We had a great time altho perhaps staying in the campervan in inches and inches of snow was not the best idea we've ever had!
Red background paper is the reverse of a sheet of Bazzill Bling - Ruby Slipper (what a waste but I couldn't find anything else in my stash that was the right colour)
Flower fairies embellishments from LEt's make cards magazine.
Stamps by inkinadoo