Cuppa Tea?

Good afternoon everyone!
I've decided to reward myself with a nice cuppa and a crafty day today (and maybe even tomorrow too!) cos I've worked really hard all week catching up at work and I haven't had a good crafty day in ages!
So I thought I'd start off by blogging a card I had made a while ago.  You may remember I showed the image I was colouring in a WOYWW post a couple of months ago, well this is the card I made with it.  I didn't want to blog it straight away cos it was for a swap on the forum, following a spring theme, and I wanted to make sure everyone had received it first.  Then I forgot all about it!

Here it is:

The image is a digi stamp from Charmed Cards & Crafts called Forget-Me-Not (ironically!) which I coloured with my copics: Skin; E13,21,00,0000,R20,04.  Dress; BG18,15,13. Flowers; YR24,23,21,E37. Hair; E49,44,43,41. Leaves & Wings; YG97,95,93,91,blender.  And I used the following Prisma pencils: Kelp Green, Dark Brown, Black and White.

 I used a Martha Stewart Hydrangea PATP punch, a Spellbinders die for the sentiment and a Sizzix Bigz Vine die.  Also the "Spring" letters are die cute using Sizzix "Tina thinks you're cute" dies.  The papers are from the Alla-Prima collection.

I used a few stamps from the U-Mount "Funky Floral" stamp collection using versamark inkpad on mat card - I love the watermark effect that gives.  I did it again on the inside:

I'd like to enter this in the following challenges:

Crafts 4 Eternity; Spring
Crafty Catz Challenge; Anything goes
Creative Inspirations; Anything goes
Deep Ocean Challenge Blog; Use punches/dies
Dream Valley Challenges; Earth Tones
Fairy Fun Fridays; Anything with flowers
Fussy and Fancy challenges; Punches & Dies
Moving Along With The Times; Garden or flower challenge
The Poodles Parlour; Anything goes
Simon Says Challenge Blog; Anything goes
Stamptacular Sunday Challenge; Loaded with layers
The Crafty Pad Challenge; Live on the edge
Truly Scrumptious; Distressing with die cuts/punches

Thanks for looking!
 

Catching Up

Evening all! 
I didn't get to do a WOYWW post yesterday because I wasn't at home long enough to take a photo of my desk and there was/is nothing on there anyway!  So, hopefully I'll have something worth sharing next week.
Thanks for all your get well wishes - my tonsilitis is more or less better, I've just taken the last of my anti-biotics thankfully, I hate having to take tablets!

I'm still catching up on things from before I went on my holidays and this is the start of a few cards I need to catch up on!
It was one I sent to a friend for her birthday and was basically me trying out a few new things that I had got.  It ended up being a bit bright and busy, but I think I liked it!

The stamp is a Sweet November, Twisted Sister stamp called Jessamine.  I coloured her with copics: Skin; E21,13,00,000,R20.  Hair; E49,39,35.  Dress etc: RV29,25,21,BV08,04,00,YG17,13,11,Y06,02,00,0.
I then cut her out and attached her to the card with foam pads.  How I'd so love to have skinny legs like that!
She must've been on the Red Bull cos that's a Doohickey wing behind her.

The extremely bright and colourful paper is Basic Grey from the Lauderdale pad.  The sentiment is a Whimsy Stamps film strip sentiment and I cut it out with the matching die.  I used a Versacolour 504 Lollipop pad for the sentiment.
I used a lot of dies with this card.  As well as the doohickey I used a Go Kreate large frilly frame #2 for the card base, 2 Spellbinders wonky rectangles and a Leabilities frame swirl.
I finished off with some ribbon from my stash and a few Swarovski's.

For the inside I used the wonky rectangle dies again and the sentiments are LOTV postmarks and a Wild Rose Studio.  And a few more Swarovski's, cos I thought it just wasn't busy enough!

I'd like to enter my card in the following challenges:

Crafts 4 Eternity; Something new - new image and new die (the Leabilities one)
Crafty Creations Challenges; What little girls are made of
Creative Card Crew; Ribbon
Creative Inspirations; Anything goes
Deep Ocean Challenge Blog; Use punches/dies
Ladybug Crafts Challenge Blog; Birthday
Ohh La La Challenge Blog; Bold and bright
One Stop Craft Challenge; Sketch (rotated)
Scrappy Frogs; Shape it up
Simon Says Stamps Challenge; Anything goes
Southern Girls Challenge; Get your girly on

I hope you liked it, thanks for looking!
 

Chickadee

Morning everyone!

A poorly post from me this morning.  I've been to the doctor this morning and I've been told I have acute tonsilitis :(  Very painful and not a bit cute!

Anyway, it's friday morning and it's time for another challenge at the Alphabet Challenge Blog and my lovely teamie Emma picked the theme for this one, and it is...

F for Feathered Friends!

A bit of a toughy for me as I don't actually have a lot of stamps of birds!  So I went with a trusty Magnolia stamp and made this card:

 I used Memento "Rich Cocoa" to stamp "Tilda with chickens" and then I masked her off and used a Whiff of Joy "Tree stump" stamp and then masked it off too and used another WOJ stamp "Fall Grass", both of which I've had for ages, I think they came in a seasonal kit.  I like the slightly more subtleness the rich cocoa gives the image.
I coloured her with my Pro-markers this time.  Skin: Sunkissed Pink, Oatmeal, Blush and Pastel Pink.  Dress: Dusky Rose, Budding Rose and Pale Pink.  Hair and tree stump: Umber, Chestnut, Cocoa and Caramel.  Grass: Emerald, Bright Green and Meadow Green.  Flowers: Magenta, Cerise and Cocktail Pink.  Chicks: Gold, Sunflower and Lemon.
I used my large standard circle and big scalloped large circle nestibilitie dies to cut out the shapes.

I then used distress inks around the image: Tattered Rose, Tumbled Glass and Frayed Burlap.
The papers I used are from Echo Park "Country Drive" pad.  I used some Stampin' Up! bevelled window panes and adhered some contrasting paper to the back of them with glossy accents.  I then threaded some ribbon from my stash through the panes and stuck them to the bottom of my centre step card.  I used an old cheapo alphabet stamp set that I've had for years and the Rich Cocoa memento inkpad to stamp out my sentiment which I then cut out into rough squares and used the same distress inks as before to, well, distress them!  They're attached on with foam pads for a bit of a lift.  I finished off the lettering with a clear stardust pen.  I stuck the feathers (also from my stash) in at the top, but I'm not sure about them, they kinda look like what they are - an afterthought!

The inside finishes off my sentiment (Happy Birthday, Chick!)and uses the same materials as the front plus a papermania flower brad.

And that's me card!  If you go over to the Alphabet Challenge Blog you'll be blown away by the gorgeous creations the rest of the DT have come up with!

I'd like to enter this in the following challenges:

Ladybug Crafts Ink Challenge Blog; Shapes
Little Claire's Designs; Doing the rounds
Paper Sundaes; Anything Goes
Scrappy Frogs Challenge Blog; Shape it up
Southern Girls Challenge; Fancy Folds
Stamptacular Sunday Challenge; Freebie week
The Corrosive Challenge Blog; Hit the bottle - glossy accents
Top Tip Tuesday; Spotty dotty
Whimsy Stamps Inspirations Challenge; Punches or die cuts
Just Magnolia; Soft spring shades

Thanks for looking!  And welcome to my new followers!
 

WOYWW 150

I almost forgot about What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday today, I've lost track of what day it is!  But then I saw some other people's posts on my blogroll and realised!  I couldn't miss the 150th!  Congrats Julia on reaching out to so many desks!  Bigger congrats are due in a few weeks time though!

So here's my desk:

 So, I've got pro-markers, the scribbled on piece of card is strategically placed to cover the image I'm colouring for my next DT piece.  I've also got a post-it (under some of the markers) where I'm writing the details of the card I'm making as I go along.  The pen to write said details.  Some Stampin' Up! bevelled window panes, which I would like to put to use on my card and some other bits and bobs that just live on my desk.

To my left, I've still got the shoe from last week.  It's been mended but now needs to be put away.  That's the bit I'm not so good at!  I haven't started the box either.  I swear, I can't believe it's been a week since I posted about that!  Where does the time go?

I'll leave you with a few photo's of where a little bit of my time went this week when I went to feed the ducks with my niece and nephew.

We had a fun, but cold day!

Thanks for looking!
 

That Was Bonza, Mate!

Evening all!

I thought I'd finish off my babbling about my trip to Australia with the card that I made as a thank-you to those who let us stay with them.  I made 3 cards similar to this altogether and one of them went to my mum and dad for helping us out a bit to get there.

Here's my card

I couldn't resist using this cute Magnolia stamp - "Koala Hug"!    I coloured it with my copics: Skin; E21,13,00,0000,R20.  Hair; E37,35,33.  Clothes; YG97,95,93,07,05,03.  Koala; W9,7,5,3,E43,41.  And a bit of black prima for the shading.

The paper is "Origins" paper pad from Basic Grey.  I used a Doo Hickey tag die and ribbon from my stash.  The sentiment is a Stampin' Up! stamp that I've had for ages!  I kept it simple cos time was against me! lol!

And the inside is even more simple, using another Doo Hickey die-cut.

I'd like to enter this in the following challenges:

CRAFT Challenge; Inspiration photo.  My inspiration came from the colours and that it was a holiday, I hope that counts!
Crafty Catz Challenge; Animals
Daring Cardmakers; Hat Boutique
Dream Valley Challenges; Earth Tones
Fairy Fun Fridays; Anything Goes
Joanna Sheen Challenge Blog; Someone Special
Paper Sundaes; Anything Goes
Pixie Dust Studio Challenge; Ribbon
Stamptacular Sunday Challenge; Freebie week
Whimsy Stamps Inspirations Challenge; Punches or die cuts

Thanks for looking!
 

Australia - Part 3

If you've stuck with me so far, well done and thanks!  If you want to start from the start, then go to Part 1.  This is the last of my photo's and in part 2 I left off that we were on our way back to Perth.

We had quite a long flight back to Perth first though, over 5 hours!

The night we arrived back in Perth we went for a meal - Here's Aishling, Leanne and me

And we celebrated Colin's birthday while we were there!

 We only had a couple of days in Perth before we were due to go home so we decided to go to the zoo and get some pictures of kangaroos, saying as we didn't get any of the one we saw in the wild in Melbourne.

And we saw lizardy things!

And snakey things - this one was trying to escape!

And more lizardy things!

And frogs

A rather large Crocodile

An Emu, it did try to attack us but I didn't see Rod Hull (lol, wee one for UK people there!)

And yay!  Some kangaroos!  They were a bit lazy though!

 

And would ye look at the pose of this boyo!  And there's a wee wallaby in the background.

This is a Tazmanian Devil.

And look at the cute Koala!  I loved them, they looked so cuddly and so stoned!  They were hard to get a good picture of though, away up in the trees, my camera kept focusing on the branches between us.  This is the best of a bad lot.

And here's another wee Wallaby

This fella put the cheeky in Cheeky Monkies!  He hung off the fence and drew a crowd and then pointed, em, himself towards said crowd and did a big pee!  Thankfully there was a fence for us to stand behind and he didn't quite reach us!

This lady had her wee baby orangutan with her but I couldn't get a decent picture of it.

And this chap has been wandering the earth for a very long time.

I love giraffes.  They're so elegant and pretty, I could look at them for hours!

These little chaps were very busy scurrying about the place.  And I didn't hear one Russian accent!

A happy Rhino is the best kind of Rhino!

As is a Sleepy Lion!  (Brave birdy!)

I thought he was scarey enough when he was asleep, then he opened his eyes!

This is a tree kangaroo.  Isn't it gorgeous!

And this is Perth from the zoo side of the water.  We got a boat back across.

And then we went to an interesting pub!

On our last night in Australia we went down to the beach to watch the sun set.  The view over the Indian Ocean was spectacular!

Here's the six of us all together on our last night.

So four of headed off home stopping off in Singapore.  We didn't get to feel the air in Singapore on our way over cos we never left the terminal but Colin spotted a roof-top bar, so we called in (or out) there on our way home.  It was night time but it was like walking into a sauna!  It was so hot and humid!  We had a couple of drinks and when we stood up, our clothes were sticking to us!
Don't let the jackets fool you, we had just left the air-conditioned terminal and the jackets soon came off!

Then we had a 12 hour flight to Frankfurt.  Which was bad enough.  But when we arrived in Frankfurt we were told that some flights were cancelled due to industrial action.  Yeah, almost all flights were cancelled, including ours!  So after a while trying to organise some way home we settled down at the bar for a 14 hour wait til our re-scheduled flight!

I'm glad it was the last flight that was affected like this and not one that we would've missed a connecting flight over, but we could've done without it.  46 hours after I left Leanne's house I went through my own front door.  I suppose that sort of explains the jet-lag!

So over 2 and a half weeks - 50 hours of which flying on 9 seperate flights (and not including time in the airports!) - train journeys, boats, buses and cars, I can say I had an absolutely fantastic time!  Even with the fact that everything was very expensive, the bars were so hard to get into (you had to bring your passport with you which was scanned and you were photographed and stamped after being scrutanised by security staff!) and the length of time getting there, I would go back in the morning!  The people were so friendly and you couldn't go into a shop without ending up chatting to the people in it!
And the weather wasn't bad either!

Thanks for sticking with me!