Blue jay cloths, the last line of defence

Afternoon all, it's been an utterly horrific day here in Birmingham. I've been at work, not that we saw anyone at the museum but that's not the point. It turned out that it was just as well we were on site as the timber framing of our little Tudor house had finally had enough and water was pouring down the walls and through the beams.

Blakesley in the sun

It's been a real challenge cleaning up and trying to stem the spread of water in a property which has limited heating, conservations issues and no real tools. Solution? A serious disregard for clothing, 3 determined young women trained in conservation and jay cloths, lots and lots of jay cloths.

Windows!

Attic floorboards

Jamming gaps to the outside wall with cloths, lots and lots of cloth!

Hopefully the house will stop leaking water soon, but if the rain continues like it has today then it could get to the stage of a sheet of water across all the floors and some serious structural instability in the attics - eek! only time will tell.

Until then, well I feel like a human sponge!

Could you help?

Morning everyone,

Just a quick message - an appeal really. I wanted to spread the word - so the question is could you help?

From Mina's blog:
Hi everyone me again I have popped on to tell you about a lovely friend called Steph who is running the Belfast Marathon on the 7th May in aid of the Macmillan Cancer support, her life and the life of her family have been touched by this horrendous disease and Macmillan helped them to get through it...there is not one of us who hasnt been touched in some way by it and the Macmillan support are amazing and so deserve our help...Steph is going to be dragging herself all that way around the marathon bless her but is really struggling for donations...heres the link to her just giving site and you can even donate using paypal (thats what I did)...even 50p/cent or £/$1 in fact any amount would be fantastic...thank you all so much and as an extra thank you if you donate you can have an extra entry to my candy, just enter again and put donation in brackets after it and I will speak to you again tomorrow...thank you again
Mina xxx
p.s. if you cant make a donation could you please post this on your blog so we can spread the word...every little helps

I know we are all strapped for cash at the moment - but Macmillan is a charity which is also close to my heart. Their nurses gave my uncle a dignified end to his life after a long battle with cancer. They helped my parternal grandmother settle her accounts and provide home care when she was given 6 weeks to live following being diagnosed with stomach cancer and most recently were on hand to help my godmother navigate her way through all the red tape of benefits when her husband was diagnosed with bone cancer last January.

They seem to keep popping up in my life and for all the help they've given my family and the ongoing support they give hundreds of families I would ask you to support Mina's friend and donate. Even if its only a couple of pounds.

Thanks

Congratulations

Evening all,

How is everyone tonight? It's been another long week and my day off went by far too quickly, with a trip to the GP's taking up far too much time for an injured shoulder - turns out i've sprained it; damaged the tendons so that they're swollen and catching under the collarbone..... ouch! So doing anything makes it ache and sadly by the end of the day at work, I don't feel much like crafting at the moment.

Nevertheless, I had to make tonights card, as yet another of my friends has got engaged! I'm starting to feel like a spinster - lol! anyway...... It's not really a new design, rather i've revamped one that you've seen before as I think it works so well (and it's really quick to make so I can shoot it off without delay)

I used the trusty Marianne D die and inside I used a cuttlebug die that I've had forever and never seem to use - shame on me. The papers are all from a SU pad, the sentiment was printed and gems are from stash.

Simple.

I'd like to enter this into the following challenges:
CRAFT - wedding/anniversary
Fussy and Fancy - punches and dies
Everybody Art - wedding

Thanks for stopping by and until next time, happy crafting!

With Love x

Morning all,

How is everyone? I hope you're all staying warm and dry. Sadly I seem to be in a perpetual state of cold and damp this week - but what can you do except drink a lot of tea? lol! anyway, on to todays card. This is for Sketch n Stash's challenge this week:

This is new image for me from the fabulous talent that is Saturated Canary - Isn't she just the cutest? I originally wanted to colour her in black and dark purple - which was my old colour combo when I dressed for a night out at the rock clubs - ok, have you all picked yourselves off the floor from the shock?! moving on.... anyway, I came to realise there was one floor in the plan, I have no dark purple promarkers - oooops! nevermind. change of colour scheme. I'm still really struggling with doing shades of black on things like trousers but I think this is much better than last time.

The papers are from SU, the pearlised card is from stock and the sentiment is a freebie from a magazine. Pips are from stash.

Thats about everything. Thanks for stopping by - your comments mean so much to me.

Until next time, happy crafting!

Count your rainbows

Afternoon all,

How are we today? I'm enjoying having my first day off after working straight through the bank holiday weekend, 13 days..... whew! Anyway, enough of that - the sun is shining (ish) and I have a card to share with you all.

Taking inspiration from the recent weather I a couple of challenges based on April Showers, I have come up with this:

I'd never really heard the saying 'count your rainbows' before but in the last week no less than 10 visitors to the museums have said it, when discussing the weather. Weird. So it had to be the inspiration behind the design - that after the rain comes the sun and new starts, fresh outlooks and everything seems to sparkle just a little bit more.

So instead of using rain as the main focus of this card, I'm going for the look after the rain:

I've used the beautiful Navaeh image from Saturated Canary and kept her in blue for rain. I coloured her with Promarkers and once again tried to do blond hair, I'm not very good at it though. Papers are all odds and ends from stock as are the flowers. Sentiment is computer generated and lots and lots of stickles for sparkle on everything - including the flowers.

I would like to enter this into the following challenges:
Simon Says - April showers and spring bling flowers
Creative Inspirations - Pastels; Purple, green and blue
Saturated Canary - April Showers
Sketch Saturday - For the layout

Until next time, thanks for stopping by and happy crafting!

Smashing holidays

Morning one and all,

I'm back finally with a new creation to share! Today is the first page in my brand new, shiny Smash* album that I picked up at the NEC Hobbycraft show. It's beautiful and I was desperate to get one for my holiday in July. I was in luck at the show though as they had the brand new album range in, which sits nicely in size between the mini album and the full A4.

After a quick look through all the designs though I knew I had to have this one - and not because its pink. But on the first page is this:

The holiday starts on my birthday and I have a sneeky feeling that my best friend has ordered me a cake for my first night on board - so how can this page not be perfect!?! then as you flip through you come to this fabulous double page spread:

It just screams holiday journal! Sooooo happy. But as I can't really smash until the holiday has started (or finished) its been sitting staring at me and I really wanted to do something, so I decided to get on and do the cover page - inspired by this weeks Tiddly Inks Challenge.

I used the beautiful Wryn BFF image and tried to make it look like me and my best friend (well insofar as hair colours), layered it over the tiddly suitcase image - which is about right for the number we'll be taking, lol!  and finished it with the fab free frame that was designed as part of the Tiddly Ink 2nd anniversary week of celebrations. Coloured with promarkers, the wording is sizzix rub ons and its all finished with some butterflies from my MS punch, which have been glittered - I promise! and some pearl drops.

So that's my front page done..... shame its another 76 days until I go, I've got the smashing bug lol!

Anyway, until next time and whatever else you do today, happy crafting!

Sneaky Peaks

Morning all,

I hope the weather is better where you all are. Its not much warmer here, but dry - and that's all I care about! I hate being wet.

I thought I'd share some sneaky peaks of a couple of projects of being working on of late, as I haven't really made any cards in the last week. Two reasons - one, is that i've been feeling mojo-less due to a cold I've picked up and two - I have a craft stand in 3 weeks time and I needed to make a few little bits to suppliment the stock I had left from my christmas stands.... I don't think christmas cards and raindeer feed bags are right in May.....lol!

So here is one project that is for the stand - it isn't made up yet but with all the festivities this year and the current craze for all things bunting I stiched this:

The second project is an ongoing one. I've had this cross stitch since I was about 19 and I pick it up and put it away and ignore it a lot! it's not that I don't love the design but it is so tiny that after an hour of stitching you don't feel like you've got very far on adding to the design. But it needs finishing as I was given two other kits for christmas that I need the frame to stitch and one of them will be perfect for my redecorated bedroom later this year. So I'm itching to get started on it, but this stands in my way:

So there you have it, this is what i've been up to. Throw in finishing the inners to many of my challenge cards so I can sell them and that's been my evenings of late.

I hope to be back with a new project soon and Monday is finally my day off (after working straight through the easter weekend) so fingers crossed I'll get time to get the promarkers and papers out for some of the lovely challenges currently running.

Until next time, happy crafting!

Easter Weekend.

Morning all,

I just thought I'd drop in to say hi and show you what I was up to whilst you were all relaxing over the easter weekend. Whilst many of you I'm sure had a lovely long weekend, hopefully with your families or just chilling, I was working - ah the joys of being in museums. This year I've left the Georgian splendor of Soho House (see previous posts) as they're having renovation works and I'm split between a Jacobean property - Aston Hall, and a Tudor home - Blakesley Hall.

The weekend was spent at Blakesley where we had two fabulous musicians, Richard and Liz York, playing an array of tudor instruments and tunes. It might of been cold and wet outside, but in the house it was all about fun and festivities.

However, with an event day it does mean someone has to be in costume and with the two lads refusing point blank - cowards! and my other colleague feeling very  unwell, it fell to me to done the dress and freeze! but hey ho!

So there you are, whilst you have all been creating lovely cards and hopefully staying warm, I've been cold and unable to craft :( boo! I don't get a day off until next monday and I'm fairly busy most nights this week so i'm a tad thin on the crafting front at the moment, but I'll be back later this week with some sneaky peaks of projects I do have on the go.

Until next time, happy crafting!

Happy Easter

Just a quick message to all my loyal followers to wish you all a very happy Easter. I hope you have a relaxing day filled with love and happiness.

Who needs a Prince?

Morning everyone,

Just a quick post as I dash off to work - on yet another cold and miserable day! yuck! Anyway, todays card is for Tiddly Inks Birthday Bash Challenge. I've had this card in mind for a while so it was a perfect excuse to make it and set it aside until its needed in June.

I had bought the crown in the January Sales and knew exactly what it was I wanted to do with it - this!

The image of course is one of the beautiful Wryn's which I merged with the carriage from Make it Crafty. The inside image is an old tiddly ink called Froggy thoughts, but I just goes so perfectly! The images on the tag are part of the extra's from the Wryn image.

I coloured it with watercolour paints for a change and struggled to get the texture and colour change in her hair, but I think its worked ok. The papers are scraps I've had for an age, I think it was from a Docrafts 12x12 selection pack. The pinky/red flower is a magnolia one, the others are from stash, as are the pearls. A tiny amount of gloss accent on the crown and of course, stickles on the wand and around the edge. Think that's everything.

Thanks for stopping by and until next time, happy crafting!

Monster Mash......

Evening all,

Well hasn't the weather changed? it's vile here - really cold and wet, I was shivering violently when I got home this evening - thank goodness for hot tea and hotter showers! Nevermind, I'm sure we will all weather the storm (no pun intended) and welcome spring back again soon!

In the meantime, here's a couple of really quick cards I ran up on Sunday and managed to get photographed in the last of the beautiful weather after work. They are so simple, but such great fun to make. I found them on pintrest which thankfully linked it back to this fabulous blog. They are part of my project idea's pack to go to Soho House for summer/half term craft activities and I thought these would be really good for halloween and might appeal to the boys too:

I had far too much fun making them and I followed the instructions as laid out on the blog. They take minutes to run up and if you don't mind little-uns getting inky, then why not pull out distress pads or the like and let them do what I did to give it more texture?

I like to enter this into Joanna Sheen's challenge of It's a Man's World, as these were created with little boys in mind, I would also like to enter them into The Pink Elephant's challenge of Clean and Simple

Until next time, thanks for stopping by and please leave a comment! so many of you visit but don't say hi and i'd love to hear from you.

Happy Crafting x