Caturday: Tabitha

Meet Tabitha... who has just moved into the home of one of my long-standing customers, Tracey. Tabitha is enjoying exploring the house and trying out different places to sit. She has been up the chimney twice... hopefully this visit to the sink in the utility room came afterwards to get rid of the soot!

Swirly Snowflakes Thinlits

These delicate dies can be a little fiddly to pop out all the tiny pieces but oh, so worth it - aren't they gorgeous?

When I'd made the card, I just had to die-cut some more immediately, to create this cute little tealight. The vellum piece is die-cut using the same set - and this one isn't just for Christmas. As the set (Swirly Snowflakes Thinlits) also features a folding tag, a dotted line and a cute swirl, it makes it a good year-round investment.

PS, isn't that ribbon gorgeous? I love it! (Main catalogue, p198)

Year of Cheer Suite

Three classy projects for you today, using some stunning products from the Year of Cheer Suite in the Autumn/Winter catalogue. 

I LOVE the Winter Wonder Textured Impressions Embossing Folder, which is practically hiddeon on page 37 of the catalogue. If you want quick and easy Christmas cards this year, this folder is definitely one to add to your stash. 

A hint of Year of Year Designer Series Paper adds some bling, along with a strip of tiny silver sequins. 

The products work just as well for gift boxes, with these gorgeous Year of Cheer Embellishments and die-cut snowflake from the Swirly Snowflakes Thinlits set (p35). Come back on Friday for some more projects made with these delicate dies...

Mix It Up Monday: Hearts Come Home

It's Mix It Up Monday again and a fun gold combo to play with. This year I added metallics to my In Color charts as I felt they were lacking, and it's always fun to add a touch of bling. 

But Fresh Fig, gold, Soft Sky and Whisper White? would that work? I wasn't convinced to begin with but now I quite like it... what do you think?

Caturday: Belper car park cat

Always a pleasure to bump into the Coppice Car Park cat in Belper. She sits on warm car bonnets (don't park near the houses if you're bothered about potential scratches) and waits for passers-by to stop and stroke her. She's a delight... if a little dirty of paw.

Two black cats and a sparkly sun

Perfect for a wedding card, anniversary, Valentine, or just to say hello to a friend. This is another of the projects from my Caturday Live event.

To create the shiny sun background, we began with the 'smoosh technique' on some watercolour paper. This is how...

1. Spritz a piece of watercolour paper with water
2. Take one of your clear stamping blocks and press into an ink pad, then 'smoosh' it onto the wet paper
3. Take a clean, dry block and repeat with another colour
4. Allow to dry (or speed up with the heat gun) then die-cut your circle
5. Ink it all over with Versamark and then emboss with a mixture of clear embossing powder and Dazzling Diamonds glitter. 

The result is a no-mess glitter effect. Hurrah!

Moon cat

Cat punch time again! I can't get enough of this punch - it's sooooo versatile and, as you may have noticed, I haven't made a single Halloween project (I never do).

This was from my Caturday Live class and is a simple folded card with a piece of Brick Wall embossed cardstock to hold it all together, tucked under the cat for stability. The stars are embossed in white and there's just a hint of the gorgeous stitched Cherry Cobbler ribbon because it's too nice to share!

Mix It Up Monday: Pieces & Patterns

Mix It Up Monday is back! My computer is still broken but I'm working round it (it's a bit laborious though - I don't enjoy change), although photo quality is suffering unfortunately.

Anyway, here's a fun way of using those circle dies and showing lots of images from one stamp set - in this case, one of my favourites; Pieces & Patterns. My daughter dared me to do the doodling... which was a bit scary when I already thought I had a completed card! 

This colour combination from my In Color charts left me a little cold; I'm not a fan of pink as you probably know, but in this case I enjoyed teaming the Powder Pink with Cherry Cobbler and in fact it was the Marina Mist which threw me. But it's worked out ok, I think?

Caturday: Young Steven

Always a pleasure to bump into this cat - I call him "Young Steven" - on my lunchtime walk. Then a quick getaway to stop him following me home.

Eclipse cat with Wood Words

Eclipse cards don't have to spell out a word, as I showed on Wednesday. Here's another version of the eclipse concept, using the fabulous cat punch.

This was one of the cat punch projects we made at my Caturday Live event last weekend. The Wood Words bundle, Wood Textures Designer Series Paper and Copper Trim all go very nicely with this punched cat I think. And it's so great to have thick Very Vanilla cardstock to make our card bases with now - such a great addition to the catalogue.

Hometown Greetings eclipse card

You don't have to use letter dies to make an eclipse card - this one uses the Hometown Greetings dies, along with the Snowflake Sentiments stamp set... which handily has a little swirl which works just as well as a wisp of smoke.

I love the clean simplicity of this project - and so did the Crafty Friday ladies last week.

Snowflake Sentiments eclipse card

No Mix It Up Monday today, sorry - computer woes coupled with a busy weekend have made it a project too far. But I can show you this fun Eclipse card which we made at my Crafty Friday event last week.

This card style seems to be de rigueur at the moment so I thought I may as well hop on the bandwagon and join in the fun. It's really easy to do - you just stamp your background (or use DSP), then die-cut your chosen letters.Stick the background to a darker piece of cardstock and then pop up the letters so you get this cool 'drop shadow' effect. Done!

And here's one I made earlier, with lighter ribbon...

Caturday: RIP Truffles

Sad news for old lady Truffles, who left this world this week after 19 good years as a loyal and much-loved pet of a friend of mine. RIP Truffles.

Painted Harvest one-sheet wonder notebooks

I needed LOTS of notebooks to give to my All-Day Craftathon guests so the obvious solution was a One-Sheet Wonder... and Painted Harvest is the PERFECT set for this technique.

For those unfamiliar with the concept, you simply take a full sheet of cardstock - any size - and stamp all over it. Then you cut it up to make your projects.

My top tips for One-Sheet Wonders:

1. Always start with the biggest stamps, then work your way down to the smallest, using them to fill in any gaps.

2. Largest images usually (but not always) work best in the palest shades, working your way up to the darkest colours for your smaller images.

3. Once you’ve cut up your cardstock for your projects, don’t be afraid to go back and stamp in any gaps. It’s not cheating!

4. Don’t feel you have to follow an online “plan” for a One-Sheet Wonder... just go your own way!

I didn’t hold back on the colours, here’s my colour combo for this project...

The old-style ink pads don’t show their name on the edge; they are Wild Wasabi, Soft Suede and Pear Pizzazz

Carols of Christmas projects

There are some gorgeous products in the Autumn/Winter catalogue this year, and these lovely cards showcase just a couple of them, including the Carols of Christmas bundle and the Merry Music Designer Series Paper. One of the great things about the paper is that you get 24 sheets in a pack, which means you’ll have plenty for ALL your Christmas projects!

This was one of the projects from my All-Day Autumn Craftathon recently – there are two designs so people can choose how to use the products themselves. Love the splash of copper!

Mix It Up Monday: Hearts Come Home

Feeling festive? I hope so, as today’s project uses the Hearts Come Home bundle and some shiny copper embossing. 

I rose to the Mix It Up Monday challenge by die-cutting the image twice - once in Tranquil Tide and once in Cherry Cobbler - then pieced the trees together. There’s also some Copper Foil behind the house windows and some lovely copper embossing. For more colour combos, please see my In Color charts.

Two special offers this month

TWO special offers this month but beware:

 the World Cardmaking Day one only lasts until 10th October!

Please visit my store for more details