Misty Magic

Made to thank my hubby's Auntie for having us for lunch Christmas day. Her pedigree kitty called Misty looks just like this cat stamp, so I took a photo of her, to make sure I was colouring her the right colours, which I did with whispers brush markers on watercolour card, stamped with stayzon.

I added some tiny gems to the flowers, punched the main card with a "Martha Stewart" border punch, with a couple of layers on top, punched with a photo corner to slide the photo into. I added some ribbon and bows. Incredibly simple, but I love it.

Tracie x

All The Way To India

I enjoyed making this, it's not very often your asked to make a card for someone from a different culture. But the recipient of this card was spending Christmas in India and wouldn't be back here in the UK until after her birthday, which was between Christmas and New Year, so it needed to travel well.I wanted the card to reflect her cultural heritage and found some images on a cd from "my Craft Studio", the images were lovely and bright, just what i wanted. I printed out all the images, the backing paper was a tint of the original image of Indian deities. I cut the elephant out, decoupaged it and mounted it onto a nesty scallop diecut and highlighted the image with a sakura glitter pen. On the black mount I stamped some swirls with versamark and heat embossed with gold. A layer of pink, border punched with "martha stewart" arch, some flowers and organza ribbon and the card was done.

I made an insert to match using "MCS", with a lovely sentiment for birthday wishes across the miles.Thanks for stopping by.
Tracie x

Christening Shoe

I made it for my gorgeous great niece Lexie's christening. Wanting something different from the norm, I had seen this done on "SCS" and couldn't wait to try it. I cut the pattern out onto bazzil bling card in ivory and stamped onto it with pink die based ink and added glitter to the flowers. I followed the instructions to make the shoe up and added funky foam in bright pink for the sole. I used self adhesive braiding around the sole, to hide where it had been glued to the shoe, as it looked a bit messy. With a brad for the buckle and a few punched flowers and narrow (3mm) ribbon attached to the heel, the shoe was finished.I had to make a box from scratch, I added an acetate window, some punched border strips (martha stewart) around the base to emulate fencing, with grass and flowers to finish. I used quickutz die "pea pod" and nesties for a pretty embellishment and printed out the days details onto meltdust paper and heat embossed it using silver meltdust.I am really pleased with my first attempt, many more to come I think.

Hope your having a great day.
Tracie x

Fairie Dreams

Morning ladies, I've had a break for a couple of weeks ... catching up on family etc. I have a couple of cards today, both made using "My Craft Studio". You must all be fed up with me making cards using the PC, but I'm so in love with this program, I can't tell you how much fun it is to have complete control over the images you use. Choosing size, colour, orientation, tint the list goes on and on, anyway back to the cards.

On this one I wanted to use a floral corner image I found on "mcs - floral cd", it comes in decoupage layers, which I thought was a different slant on a card, rather than decoupaging the main image, decoupage the corner detail. I chose a fairy image and a butterfly and colour coordinated them with the corner image and dp. I matted the dp onto brown and gold mirri card, punching the bottom edges to make it pretty and then mounted this onto a burgundy card base.
I then matted the fairy onto brown and the greeting onto gold and brown card that I'd run through my cuttlebug with my scallop nesties and added both of these to the card with some brown organza ribbon in front of the fairy but behind the greeting. I continued by adding the corner decoupage and adding gold glitter pen the the flower centres so they would match the glitter on the butterfly. The butterfly I sprayed with gold glitter varnish, decoupaged the three layers up and added pink mini gems for the body. To finish I made two double bows (one slightly larger than the other) and glued them to the card.I love the way it's turned out, lovely and soft colours with a feel of magic. Hope you like it, back later.
Tracie x

Soapstar Superstar

Good evening everyone, I'm really late today, sorry ... I've been out in the garden with my Mum, planting (well ... I should say watching, as my back injury doesn't allow me to do any digging etc ... but I can manage a bit of weeding and of course sweeping up). Today is the first relatively cool day we've had here for over a week, so we took the opportunity to get all the summer bedding plants out, hanging baskets done and tomato plants into bigger tubs. My Mum did a fantastic job, as she always does for me ... tomorrow I'll take some pics, so you can see.

Ok, back to today's card ... I had an unusual request ... for a lady who loves Martin Kemp (member of the 80's group Spandau Ballet and Actor here in UK). I've never been asked for anything like this before, ever. So, I needed help ... luckily I have a friend who collects 80's memorabilia and she was able to send me some black and white magazine photo's of him.To make the card, I used the fact he is an actor and made a couple of film strips, placing the magazine pictures behind each clip (you can just see by the photo that some of the magazine clippings were a bit big ... but they seemed to work out Ok with a bit of jiggling about). Then on "My Craft Studio", I made a faux film set, with lighting etc and added a couple of swirls for extra details ( I also made an insert to match). I then cut a wide strip of white paper, a narrow strip of silver, punched the edges using my floral geo punch and added them onto the card, butting up the straight edges. Black organza ribbon with a bow helped to disguise the join and add extra interest.I used foam pads on the back of the film strips to raise them up and placed them on the card, the horizontal one first, then the vertical one. The small flower waste from the punch was added to the card, with tiny pale blue gems in the centres.

It turned out far better than I expected.
Thanks for stopping by.
Tracie x

Classic Christening

Good afternoon, Ladies ... well I've had a busy morning. My sister popped round for a cuppa and ended up having a go at stamping. She has recently started scrapbooking and caught the bug really quickly, so is now driving her family as mad, as I drive mine, lol.

So today I have made a christening card, using a Kanban, pyramage kit. The card that came with the kit, I cut up so that I will be able to get two cards from the one kit (typical crafter). I used three layers of the pyramage and placed it in the top right hand corner so that I could get some flowers on the spine. I added a chunky cream and gold bow to the card, with a ribbon slider cut from gold mirri with scallop nesties and a computer generated greeting. Then I wrapped the ribbon around the bottom of the gold card, before attaching to the main card.I didn't have any flowers in the right colour, so I made the flowers from some handmade paper using scallop nesties and cutting each circle into flower petals and shaped them with my Leone em tools. I finished the card with pearlescent blue ash branches.
Time for a cuppa tea ... phew! Enjoy your day, ladies.
Tracie x

Anniversary Quickie

Today I have a real quickie ... I suddenly realised this morning that my friends wedding anniversary is today and I hadn't made a card!So I quickly went through my store of bought cards, that I keep when we have been sent them for our birthdays etc. I found this beautiful silver embossed heart and thought I would use it. I simply cut it out and matted it over some oil on water vellum torn gently and wrapped down the spine of the card, finished with a silver peeloff border on the back to hide the cut edge. Then I punched some flowers from the vellum, added silver gems and placed them on the heart. With a peeloff heart in the botton right corner, just to balance the card.

Quick, easy and simple, yet clean and elegant ...
and just in time, as she arrived just after I had put it in the envelope ... phew!

Enjoy your day.
Tracie x

Disco Diva

Well I did manage to get this card made before the cuttlebug died ... the image is a digi download from squigglefly called '80's dancer', just perfect for Pam as she love's 80's music and dancing.

I printed her out several times and coloured her with whispers stamp pens, then cut my choice of layers, shaped and decoupaged her up and set her aside to dry. I wanted the background to look like a nite club, so I added a disco ball (clipart matted onto nestie) and arranged the papers to look like light radiating from it, with fine border peel offs to tidy the cut edges. I made the central layer by running pure white paper through the cuttlebug using the swirls embossing folder, matted onto red mirri and added a couple of my ruffled border punch strips (which I love doing).
Then I added a greeting plate and mini roses, that were originally cream, which didn't fit the theme, so I coloured them with the whispers pens and added leaves punched from pure white paper. Finally I added the 80's dancer and finished with a few mini flower in red.
This is nothing like my original idea, it just sort of ran away from me and I'm not as happy with it as I could be ... maybe different colours would've been better?

Back later, happy crafting.
Tracie x

Classy Cat

Oh, how I enjoyed making this card. I used My Craft Studio - Finishing Touches.

Apart from my Cuttlebug - My Craft Studio has got to be one of my best buys. It allows you to call in any jpeg and change size, colour, opacity etc and you can just keep adding the artwork cd's to build up your collection (I now have four collections and there are many more I would like too ... shhhh ... it's Ok my hubby wasn't looking).So I decided on the pics I wanted, changed the size and changed them all to the same colour shade. I also made an insert to match and because i wanted it to look like the cat was looking through the window into the garden, I printed the same image onto the reverse of the insert, so it could be seen through the aperture, then I printed everything out.I made the window from white card, edged it with silver peel offs, made a window sill for the cat to sit on and a pelmit to frame the window, then I added acetate behind the aperture. I used peel off vases coloured blue to match and punched ash branches (I seem to favour this punch recently) and tiny black flowers with gem centres and added these to the window sill. I hand drew the cat on black card, cut him out and used glossy accents to make him stand out and not look flat.
I'm really pleased with this one, very stylish.

See you later
Tracie x

Spring Milly

Milly's back, this time I wanted to make it look like you were looking through a woodland into a clearing. So I stamped Milly and coloured her with Whispers brush pens, then I cut two mounts (one green and one cream and used a nesty for the aperture) and cuttlebug embossed the cream layer and tinted the edges with mauve ink.

I punch loads of ash branches in two shades of green and glued them to the back of the cream mount, then glued the green and cream mount together. I placed the mount over the milly image to align it and taped it in place, then glued the whole lot to the card base.
I finished by adding some paper flowers etc and a greeting.

Tracie x

Playful Kitty

Well, April turned out to be a nightmare on the pc front, it totally put me off my stride and I have so many cards to show you because of it, never mind eh!

Ok I purchased this stamp at Hobbycraft, I just couldn't resist it, it's so sweet.I stamped the image onto water colour card with stayzon and coloured it with water colour pencils (both wet and dry to add extra detail). Mounted it onto black card and silver mirri using photo corner punch. I stamped the base card with dandelions and coloured them with a red sakura gel pen. I added paper flowers with brad centres and leone em ash punch branches, with a giant red bow to finish.I can't wait to try different colour kitties, I did this one grey because we have a grey cat (called Misty ... very original) and he chases anything that buzzes.

Back later
Tracie x

Pink Gem Babies

Have you all seen the new baby stamps by Janet at Pink Gem Designs? They are so cute!

And as my nephew and his girlfriend are getting ever closer to their due date, they were ideal for me to make ready for the new arrival.

Do I sound excited? ... because I simply can't wait!For the baby boy card, I stamped the image onto stripy paper and cut out. I then stamped several images onto white paper and used whispers brush pens to colour it in. I then cut them out and decoupaged the layers.

I used the same stripy paper for the matting and layering and added some nautical embellishments I had lying around, I mounted the stamped image onto a nestability scalloped circle and added a greeting and a couple of buttons to finish.
For the baby girl card, I did exactly the same but used border punches and peeloffs for the matting and layering. And flowers with gem centres on the wheels rather than buttons.

How can anyone resist these little cuties ... I certainly couldn't, lol.

Tracie x

Playboy Booty & Boobs

OMGoodness ... I have had soooo much fun making this card ... I mean how often do you get asked to make a bra?I used a booty and boob template. I purchased a playboy decoupage sheet and background duo sheet, obviously I followed the template instructions. I liked the idea of seaming the bra, to make it look more realistic and added faux stitching for effect. I used a border punch on black paper to make fancy ribbon and ruffled it up as I added it to the bra and panties.I cut a couple of small bunnies and used pink gems for the eyes, tied organza ribbon into bows and finished the card with an 18 necklace and a fake name tattoo to the booty.

I cant wait to do more ... I had so many ideas when I was making this one ... and wouldn't they be great for hen night invitations!

Tracie x

An Orchid Moment

When I came to make this card, I only had blue orchids, when I needed purple/pink ones.

So having recently purchased a 'my craft studio' cd rom, I thought I'd give a go at changing the colour ... if I was a little sceptical ... but I'm amazed. It was so easy, as long as your orignal image is a jpeg you can import the pic and change it to any colour, size, opacity etc ... no limits ... I can see this becoming one of my most used items.So to make this card I used pink/purple orchids and a purple background (both colour changed on 'my craft studio'). I matted the background paper onto silver mirri and stitched around the edge with silver thread. I used purple grosgrain ribbon across the card with a bead cap, gem and beaded heart pin and punched leone em ash branch in mauve to finish.For the circles, I cut two in the different background layers one slightly larger than the other and mounted together and edged with fine silver peeloffs. For the main image I layered to scalloped circles and placed the decoupage on top. I raised the scalloped circle up with extra thick 3d foam so that I could pass the ribbon behind it and so that you can still see the pink card underneath through the circle.I finished the card with a 'to you from us' sentiment, cut with labels 2 nestabilitie die and three purple gems.

Tracie x

Get Well Milly - Feeling Blue

I love Milly, did you guess, lol.

On this card I used silver thread to stitch around the outside of the mat and to do some spirelli behind milly herself. I drew a background of flowers and grass for milly to stand on. I added white 1" organza ribbon with bow, blue silk flowers with some ash branch's.I tore around the matting to age it and did the same with the silver mirri card. I mounted the whole thing onto a white card, with baby blue swirls stamped onto it. the daisy backing paper is by papermania.Tracie x

For the Love of Lauren

I made this card for my son Ashley to give his girlfriend for valentines day. I used spellbinders labels 2 dies to cut out a single layer of decoupage and the outer frame. I simply added these to a 5" square card that I had swiss dotted. The frame was raised with foam pads.

I used quickutz metro alphabet for the love sentiment, cut from red to match (though on reflection it may have looked better in black, to balance the card a little better?) I used black silk flowers, with a silver finding and a brad in the centre, with the ash branches in yellow. I added a heart ribbon bow to complete the card.

Isn't young love sweet!

Tracie x

What No Embellishments!

It was my birthday at the beginning of the February, and my hubby bought me a filing cabinet (his vain attempt to get me to sort my craft stash), I took the hint and since then I've been slowly sorting through the numerous boxes ... you wouldn't believe the amount of stuff I have (on reflection you probably can!), anyway ... I found so many flowers, beads, gems, ribbon and so on and so on.When Craig saw exactly what I had, (and after he recovered from the shock), he wondered if he took every thing away, except card, paper and tools, would I be able to make a card or were all the extra's actually needed?

... I can see his point, I do have an extremely large craft collection.So, I set myself a challenge, can I make a card using no embellishments at all ... of course I can.

I'm now rather embarrassed that I've been buying things I don't need ... just believe I do ... this may, I realise, have been Craig's plan all along!This card has been hand drawn (so no stamps were used) the flowers were hand drawn, scallop punched and cut into to form the petals, they were then shaped with a bone folder. I used a border punch on the base layer and the scraps from the punch used as small flowers on the card ... so no prima flowers, ribbon, beads, brads, gems or even glitter in sight.

Who needs embellishments ...................... I DO, there's nothing like a gem or two to change the feeling of a card, just don't tell my hubby, lol.

Tracie x

Milly In The Rain

This card is stamped with one of the new stamps by Janet Roberts at Pink Gem Designs, isn't she simply gorgeous!I stamped her several times with black stayzon, coloured her using whispers pens, decoupaged her up and placed her behind an acetate sheet. Added punched strips and grosgrain ribbon down either side, I then added flowers, with flower gems and a brad, an odd earring, punched ash leaves (leone em) and a double ribbon bow.

I then used papermania designer paper along the bottom edge and cut out extra flowers for a decoupage effectand added red gems to finish.

Tracie x

Swell News

We had some swell news this new year, my nephew and his fiance are expecting a baby. I'm already a Great Aunt, my eldest niece saw to that fourteen months ago, with a gorgeous great nephew, Toby. For our family 2008 had been pretty rough all round and the news of a new addition brought everyone to tears.

So naturally, I had to make a card for them.Made using handbag cards I got from a £1 shop (six handbag cards, envelopes and a bag of gems for £1, what a bargain) and magnolia "expecting tilda" and "fence" stamps. I coloured the images with whispers brush stroke pens. Diecut the mount using nestability scallop dies, the tilda is cut out and layered with silicone glue, to add extra dimension. I added prima flowers with pearl brads and punched grass. For extra detail I added fake stitching around the handbag.

Now we just have to wait for the happy event in July.

Tracie x

Dotty Breakfast Set

With Mother's Day fast approaching, you just have to go all out and do something special.

To make this set I first purchased a one person teapot with cup base, as this would dictate what colour scheme I would be using. I found this gorgeous red and white dotty one in my local supermarket.

I then purchased food items to go in the basket (i.e. marmalade, teabags etc). I stamped some red paper stock with a cup design in white stayzon and wrapped the items up. I used the PC to typeset the names of the items into circles, in red on white paper, for use on the medallions. Using my cuttlebug and nestabilities scallop circle dies, I diecut using a small circle around the printed circles and with a silicone sheet embossed it too. I then cut a larger scallop circle in black and glued the white circle on to the black one, to form medallions, with a flower in the centre to finish. I did this for all the items.I purchased a basket gift wrapping set from my local supermarket. With white stayzon, I stamped the same cup design all over the wrapping (which seemed to take forever, as it was rather a large sheet). After arranging the items in the basket, I made sure it was centred on the gift wrap, gathered up the top and tied it with paper ribbon in red. Rolled the sides and stapled them together (I didnt want to use sellotape, as I think it can look untidy).

Now I've just got to hope she likes it!

Tracie x