Wonderful Blog Candy ......... Go take a look!

Good Morning Everyone,

This morning is a perfect example of why I love this time of year because it's a lovely bright, sunny morning with just a slight nip in the air.  I hope it's like this next week as my OH and I are off to Wales for a few days and I'm hoping to see some pretty scenery dressed in my favourite colours of Autumn.

Anyway, the main purpose of this post is to tell you about some fabulous blog candy that Hels Sheridan is offering over on her blog to celebrate passing 800 followers.  I don't often advertise blog candy but Hels' blog is one of my favourites because as well as being one talented lady she's also very funny and reading her posts always brightens my day.  Do drop by and see what you have to do to be in with a chance of winning this lovely booty.  Just click on the pic in my sidebar to be transported to her lovely blog.

Hope you all have a lovely sunny day and thanks for visiting.

Hugs
Lesley  Xx

This fab blog candy has now been won by a very lucky visitor to Hels' blog ............ and it wasn't me :((, lol!

Birthday Card for a Wonderful Friend (& it fits in with my buddy's friendly challenge)

'Morning Everyone,

Yay, it's Friday!  I hope everyone is looking forward to the weekend even if you're not doing anything special.  We're planning a weekend of re-organising 2 of our bedrooms.  They're becoming a bit of a dumping ground for stuff that needs to go back in the loft (like the big pedestal fan that I doubt we'll need again before next summer, lol) and stuff that has nowhere special to live so they need sorting out before it gets out of hand and we end up with nowhere for our Daughter and her family to sleep when they visit, lol!

Anyway, enough waffling and onto the crafting.  This week has seen the birthday of a friend who has become especially dear to me.  Elaine is one of my Craft Stamping Quartet buddies as many of my visitors already know and along with Jo and Judith she has become one of the main 'constants' in my life so making a card incorporating things she likes was such a pleasure to do.  Elaine loves nature and has a huge wild garden with lots of mature trees and I know she loves it in whatever coat it happens to be wearing.  As it's September, I decided to go with an Autumnal look both with the colours I used and also with the leaf embellishments.  Elaine knows one of my favourite things to do is blending inks over masks and as Chocolate Baroque have just started stocking some exceptionally pretty Prima ones which I couldn't resist buying I thought that's where I would start my design.  I followed this with some light overstamping using a stamp from an Inkadinkado set called Autumn Fall which I must have had for at least 2 years and never inked up.  Shame on me because the stamps are really dainty with lovely leafy swirls.

I then blended inks over a sheet of card and cut out the leaves I wanted using a Shapeabilities die set (again in my stash for ages and never used) using the same dies to emboss and then adding some ink highlights.  Another neglected die from my quite substantial collection is the Marianne Creatable doily die,  It's really pretty and I've now managed to use it twice in one week :).  I cut the doily from the same ink blended card and then spritzed this and the leaves with gold Glimmer Mist before stamping the sentiment in the centre of the doily.

 Finally I used a lovely new Crealies die (again from Chocolate Baroque) which consists of separate multi sized petals that you build up to make a flower the size you want.  I used all four petal sizes and cut it from Glassine paper, stamped with the same Inkadinkado stamp but this time in Encore Gold ink and then heated it gently for a few seconds to 'set' the ink into the Glassine.  I shaped all the petals and joined them together with a pearl brad.  I attached the doily with 3D foam pads and the flower and leaves with Pinflair glue.

Now, it just so happens that as I have used a much neglected stamp and two dies to make my card, it fits in with my buddy Judith's friendly weekly challenge called Forgotten Friday so I'm popping over to her lovely blog in a minute to add a link.  I haven't seen her post yet today but there's always something lovely to see so do pay her a visit.  I have to say thanks to Elaine too because I was in such a hurry to get her card in the post (it still ended up being late :( ) I completely forgot to take any pics, lol!  Elaine very kindly emailed some photos over to me first thing so I could do my post.  Thanks Buddy!!!

Well enjoy your weekend everyone whatever you are doing and come visit again soon.

Hugs
Lesley  Xx

September DT Project for Snazzys Part 2

Good Morning All,

Over on the Snazzy DT blog I'm showing the 2nd part of my project for this month.  Here's a couple of peeky pics and I hope you have time to go over and see the whole thing.

Once again I thoroughly enjoyed working with the fab products from Snazzys' which included Darkroom Door Stamps - Music Collection, Tando Creative Music Mas and chipboard Music Shapes and Tim Holtz Tissue Tape, amongst other things.

Thank you for your visit today.  I always appreciate you stopping by.

Hugs
Lesley  Xx

September DT Project for Snazzys

Hi everyone,

Just a little post to say that my September project for Snazzys is being shown on the DT blog now (link in my sidebar).  I was sent some lovely products to pl .... er, work with, lol!  The stamps are the Music Collection from Darkroom Door and my DT pack also included a gorgeous Tando Creative music score mask, some Tando chipboard music shapes and some of Mr. Holtz' Tissue Tape. 

This is a teensy taster so if you'd like to see the rest of it please do pay us a visit over on the Snazzys DT blog and if you have time to leave a comment that would be great.  Of course the products I used are available from Snazzys.

Hugs
Lesley  Xx

Romance and Relaxation ???

Happy Weekend Everyone,

Sorry, I've got to be very English here and mention the weather because it's glorious this morning where I am.  Beautiful blue sky with whispy clouds and bright sunshine.  At the moment the temperature is just right but it doesn't bode well for my craftroom later, lol!  I may have to brave the heat though as I've been away for a few days looking after little Izzy before nursery reopens next week and I'm getting withdrawal symptoms!  On Thursday I took Izzy to Newby Hall in North Yorks and we had a really fun filled day.  I haven't been in the hall but the gardens are lovely and there's a really great adventure garden for kids (which is where we spent most of the day, lol).  Izzy isn't four until December but she is such a daredevil and she spent the day making me a nervous wreck watching her daring exploits.  My Daughter said I would have been okay to sit and watch her from one of the many seats but as her Mamma I felt I had to be 'right there' to catch her if she fell, Ha! Ha!  I don't know who was the most exhausted at the end of the day but we did have a good time and I would recommend Newby Hall as a lovely family day out with something for all ages.  Oh yes, there's a really good restaurant too where I tried their very nice Beetroot and Spicy Parsnip Soup ....... delicious!

Anyway, on to the crafting now.  Finally, I have something I can show you on my own blog.  Everything I've made for quite a while has been DT stuff that I can't blog on here, at least not yet.  However, my card today was made for my lovely friend Jo's birthday a few weeks ago and I couldn't show that until now because I used some lovely new Chocolate Baroque (formerly Elusive Images) stamps which have only been released this week.  There are two new A5 stamp sets called Music Fanfare and The Art of Chess and if you check out the DT blog (link in my sidebar) you will see lots of inspiration from the Design Team.  Please scroll down over the last few days as Glenda has been publishing our draft posts since the middle of the week and she kicked the launch off with a look at the two stamp sets, some inspiration from the Queen of Stamping herself and a hint that there might be a random give away.  I would guess that means the more comments you leave on the DT blog and the teams individual blogs the more chances you have!

The colours I used for Jo's card were rather delicate shades of Versamagic ink blended over a lovely Tando Creative music score mask (mask available from Snazzys).  All the stamped images are from the two new Chocolate Baroque sets and the flowers and leaves were left over from the decorated initial I did for the Snazzy DT launch which fitted in with my colours perfectly.  The little violin charm (from IndigoBlu) was originally an antiqued brass colour so I rubbed some silver Inca Gold into it.

I always forget to mention that most of my photos are clickable, once to zoom and again to get a real 'in your face' closeup, lol!  I always like to look at closeups on other people's creations to get a better idea of the texture and dimension.  It's the next best thing to actually touching them I think.

 Don't forget to hop over to the Chocolate Baroque DT blog as there are some beautiful creations to see.

Have a lovely weekend everyone and thanks for sparing time to visit.

Hugs
Lesley  Xx



PS   I thought it was time I gave a bit of explanation for my lack of posting in recent months and lack of commenting on my favourite blogs to some extent too (I do drop by them often though).  Unfortunately we have had a few family trials and tribulations which are likely to be ongoing for quite sometime and these are also the reason I haven't managed to do the blog post I intended on Jenna and Tony's Wedding.  Around the time of the wedding I had set in motion an assessment of my 83 year old Mum and what we suspected has been confirmed, she has Alzheimers and we are now waiting for an ECG next week to see if she is able to have the drugs which will hopefully slow down the effects of this awful disease.  It will be October before she sees the consultant to get the prescription though so that's another month for the deterioration to progress.  The other event which  as a Mum and doting Mamma is occupying much of my time and thoughts is that our lovely Son's marriage has ended.  I know it happens all the time and is not the end of the world, it happened to me over 40 years ago but thankfully, I had no children at that time and could quickly move on with my life.  Jamie has a little girl (as my regular visitors will know) who he adores and the effect this is having on both of them is the really upsetting (to put it mildly) part.  Anyway,  that's the situation put very simplistically and I'm trying hard to recover my normal rather leisurely rhythm, lol!  I'll be back a bit quicker next time I hope but in the meantime thanks for bearing with me.  Lots of love Lesley  Xx