New Beginnings

Good afternoon, how's your Sunday going?  Whilst Sunday's are nice relaxing days, I also feel a bit sad as it means the weekend is almost over.

Yesterday I said that I'd made a couple of cards so today I would like to show you the second card.  Being the start of a new year, there are a number of challenges with a theme of New Beginnings and this gave me the perfect opportunity to use my Bundle of Joy set which I've ashamedly had since April but not used!  The papers are also from an old DCWV pad - Nana's Nursery which I think I've had for nearly 2 years and not used a single piece!

 Supplies:

Stamp: Bundle of joy - Penny Black; Medium: Copics

Cardstock & Paper: Core'dinations & DCWV; Tools: Circle & Scallop Nesties

Embellishments: Ribbon - Papermania Capsule Collection, CWC Sentiment Oval

 I wish now that I'd put some Diamond Glaze on the bottle to make it stand out, I might actually do that a bit later on!

I'm entering this card into the following challenges:

Penny Black Saturday - New Beginnings
Ellephantastic Challenges - New Beginnings
Fairy Fun Fridays - New Beginnings
Stampin For The Weekend - New & Blue
Creative Card Crew - New Beginnings
AiFactory - New Beginnings
Cute Card Thursday - Out With The Old (papers)
Dutch Dare - New Beginnings
Simon Says Stamp - New Beginnings
Sketch & Stash - Sketch & Neglected stash is DCWV papers and stamp.

Thank you for stopping by and for any comments you may leave, they are greatly appreciated.

xx :0)

Snowflake Wishes

Good evening, I hope your Saturday has been enjoyable so far.  I've been making a couple of cards whilst listening to my team, Reading, beat West Brom in the 3rd round of the FA Cup.  There's something magical about 3rd round weekend, when all the underdogs dream of beating those top teams and getting to Wembley.

One of the cards I have made is for the Lili of the Valley Challenge which was great sketch.  I had a number of James Bear images already coloured so I thought I would get a head start on those Christmas as it will be here before we know it lol!! 
One of my craft related resolutions is to use up some old stash before I even consider treating myself to anything new.  The papers are from an old Forever Friends pad that I think was from 2009, the border punch I've had well over a year and I think it's only the second time I've used it and the corners are from an old sizzix die that was just shoved in the draw!  I wonder how long I stick to this resolution?!

Stamp: Lili of the Valley; Medium: Copics

Cardstock & Paper: Core'dinations & Forever Friends

Tools: Circle & Scallop Nesties, Fiskars border punch, Snow Dots embossing Folder, Sizzix Corner Die

Embellishments: CWC sentiment oval, Glamour Dust, Gemstones

I didn't take a close up of the image, but the fur trim, snowflakes and ground is all coated with Glamour Dust.  I really love this stuff at the moment!

I am also entering this card into the following challenges:

Secret Crafter Saturday Challenge - Lots of Texture (Glamour Dust, embossing and gemstones)

Winter Wonderland - Lets go Dotty - (embossing)

Christmas Cards All Year Round - Anything Goes

Fuzzy Wuzzy - Anything Goes

Cute Card Thursday - Out With The Old  (Papers, Corner Die, Sentiment Oval, Border Punch)

ABC Christmas Challenge - A is for Anything Christmas

I'm off to do some blog hopping now, if the cat will let me! Thank you for stopping by and for any comments you may leave, they are greatly appreciated.

xx :0)

Teddy Stampers #27 - Celebration!

Good morning all, sorry I've not been around the last couple of days but I've been looking after my poor hubby.  I was very concerned yesterday that he might have swine flu so got the doctors to call him and apparently he just has a very nasty virus that seems to be affecting a lot of people in our village.  He's not one of your typical "man-flu" guys and I've not seen him look this poorly in the 8 years we've been together. I'm over-cautious about all this because I'm asthmatic and only had my jab last Thursday which was 48 hours before Jon became unwell again.

Anyway, it's my first challenge with the wonderful Teddy Stampers gang and I'm so excited!!  Our first challenge for the New Year is Celebrations and we're being sponsored by the wonderful Whimsy Stamps!

We've all been provided with some digi stamps to showcase for this challenge and this is my first foray into the world of digi stamping.  I know many of you have been using these for quite a while, so I'm a late starter! Whilst I did enjoy using my image, I don't think you can beat that feeling of holding a rubber stamp in your hand and stamping away to your hearts content. 

I used the Baby's 1st Christmas image and coloured it with copics before cutting out with my label nesties. The fur trim and bobbles have been glittered with Glamour Dust.  The CS is Real Red SU and the papers are from an old Forever Friends Christmas pad. I finished off with two MS punched snowflakes and gems and the sentiment is from a Personal Impressions set that I have.

I am also entering this into the following challenges:

ABC Christmas - Anything Goes

Papertake Weekly - Anything Goes

A Spoonful of Sugar - Christmas

Craft Your Passion - Anything Goes

The Pink Elephant - Winter Wonderland

Christmas Cards All Year Round - Anything Goes



I really hope that you'll join us for our 1st Challenge of the year as I love visiting your blogs to see your interpretations.  Just remember it must include either a stamped or digi teddy!! Please check out the rest of the DT's amazing creations.

Thanks for stopping by and for any comments you may leave, the are greatly appreciated.

xx :0) 

Stamp Organisation?!?

Afternoon everyone, I can't believe that the 10 days off work have all but gone and we go back tomorrow! How hard is it going to be getting up at 5:30 tomorrow morning after all those lie-ins?!?

Enough mopping! My reason for posting is to ask how everyone organises their rubber stamps?  I have so many stamps, many that have not been inked up since they were purchased!  I want to try and ensure that I use more of my stamps and show you that I do own more than cute teddy bears.  You may be surprised to hear, but I do own a few Magnolia's and Miss Anya stamps, among the many others that are scattered all over my room.  The majority are cute animals, including a HUGE collection of Penny Black stamps.

Do you have a specific way of organising them or have you catalogued them maybe by stamping them all up and putting them in a folder?

I would love to hear your suggestions.

Sarah xx :0)

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year everyone!  I hope you all had a lovely Christmas and Santa brought you everything you wanted.  I also hope that 2011 will be a happy and healthy year for you all.

On a personal note, I aim to not let things that I have no control over get me down this year and to concentrate on all the good things that I have in my life, not the the negatives.  If it looks as if I'm starting to go down hill, you have my permission to tell me off!

As a family we had wonderful cause for celebration over the festive season when my sister got engaged to her lovely boyfriend Phil on Christmas Eve!  As we were all going to be spending New Years Eve together I obviously had to have a Congratulations card to give to the happy couple.

Apologies for the darkness of the photo, I will be so glad to have those long, sunny evenings back!  I've had this adorable Penny Black stamp since April's Ally Pally show so it was about time that it was introduced to an ink pad. I remember being very lucky to get this at half price!  It's been coloured with copics before being cut out and mounted onto Real Red CS cardstock.  The base panel was embossed with the Love Language CB folder.  Unfortunately I realised only after I'd stuck the ribbon down that it was the wrong way so the hearts are sideways!  I've had these heart ribbon sliders for so long and I only remember them when it's too late, but I was prepared this time.  The sentiment is a CWC oval.  The heart has been covered with Glossy Accents that you can just see with the shine on the top half.

I am entering this card into this months Penny Black at Allsorts challenge which is All You Need is Love
I don't want to list my personal goals that I am trying to set myself this year craft wise as I have done that in past years and have not managed to fulfill them.  However, I do know what that I are and will do what I can to achieve them.

Thank you for continuing to stop by and support me, even with the lack of response in return.  I do really appreciate each and every one of your comments.

xx :0)

Some Good News!

Afternoon all! Well the snow has finally caught up with us down in the South! We've got about 5 inches here, but it appears to have stopped now which is good because the original forecast was that it would be in for the day.

After the doom and gloom of my last post, it's nice to be able to share some good news for a change.  I have been chosen to be part of the Teddy Stampers Design Team for the first term of 2011!  This opportunity came at the right time with the sad news that the Just Cute Bears & Friends Challenge is to close.

I'm really looking forward to working with this amazing team and the fact that I can continue to use my lovely teddy stamps!

Thank you for all the lovely comments you posted after my last post, they really did mean a lot to me.

Please take care everyone and thank you for stopping by.  I really do appreciate all the support you continue to give me.

xx :0)

An Explanation and apology

I think I need to explain the reasons for my lack of crafting & blogging just recently.  There have been a few things going on that I have been struggling with and instead of crafting to relax & forget, I have been letting it all get me down.

I work for Natural England which is part of DEFRA (Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs).  As the majority of you will know, the Government have announced a number of cuts to reduce the country's debt, one of which is the cut of around 500,000 public sector jobs.  Natural England, as part of this review, announced that they would be reducing the number of offices around the country and, unfortunately, Reading appears to be one of those offices that are due to close.  The work of the team that my husband and I are part of means that unlike a number of our other colleagues, we cannot work from home.  At the moment, the latest we will be in work could be until 2014.  This may sound a long time but it is dependent on a number of factors including how many people decided to take voluntary redundancy now.  This is also being affected by the Government who are trying to change our accrued rights.  For me this isn't such a major issue as I have worked there 14 years so do not reach the maximum of 21 months (1 month for each year worked), but for my husband, these changes will mean that he will lose out on another 8 months money as he will have worked 29 years next month.  We do not want to take the redundancy, we want to work it out in the hope that things may change as 3 years is a long time in politics. However if things go against us, we could find ourselves out of work sooner and also potentially only on 12 months redundancy.

That is just of the things that has been troubling me.  The other is problems with my back/spine.  As a child I was diagnosed with Scoliosis (curvature of the spine).  I have a double curve.  I had spinal fusion at the age of 13 to help reduce this.  At the age of 25 I  had to have the rods removed from my spine as they had started to move.  Last Christmas, I had a fall in the snow and have been in pain ever since.  After 4 months, I went to the doctors as I was having pain down my leg. After an MRI scan I was told that the 2 remaining discs at the base of my spine had started to degenerate and one was bulging and pinching the nerves.  I had a nerve block into the spine 6 weeks ago where they also said that it looked like I have arthritis around some of the joints.  Yesterday I went back to the hospital.  The nerve block didn't really work as I am only getting maybe 2 days at the most without pain.  After telling me I had a choice over what was to happen next, I found myself being pushed down the route of a different type of injection (apparently I'm in no hurry according to the doc - let him say that after a year of pain!), so I am now back on a waiting list!

This has all been getting be down and I hate to say it but I've been feeling a bit sorry for myself including my crafting ability.  I entered the Cardmaker of the Year competition this year and didn't win anything, but one of my cards did get chosen for a High Commendation. You can find it here if you scroll right down to the bottom, I'm the 4th row down and the final one in the row.

I will show everything at a later date if that is okay.  I'm doing a Christmas fayre at the local primary school on Friday so have been a bit panicky about everything as I'm trying to make gifts more than cards!

If you're still here, sorry about the rant but thank you for staying with me, it is much appreciated.  I know I've said it the last 2 years, but I do aim to be a better crafter next year, I think I need to be for my sanity!!

xx