ALL ABOUT THE CATS

If you are regular reader to my blog you will know I'm all about the cats - a bit of a mad cat lady. As well as my own two I am a fosterer for our local cat's protection charity.  That means I voluntarily have two cat pens in my garden and look after cats while we try and find them homes.  I have had one particular cat called Scrumpy with me now for nearly three months - the longest I have had so far - all the others have been going within two weeks.  Scrumpy bless her is a special case because she is a grumpy old lady.  Turfed out of the home she'd know for 10 years because a baby came along, she has a tendency to be a bit free with her claws and we are finding it difficult to re-home her.  We have a Facebook page and I added a little poem for her this week - so far we've had a bit more interest and we have someone coming to see her on Tuesday- so paws all crossed - I hope she behaves. Here's my little poem

An Ode To Scrumpy:

I'm 10 years old, A Female Ginger
And my given name is Scrumpy
I'm looking for
An Experienced Owner 
Who doesn't mind I'm Grumpy!

On my own terms
I like a fuss and I like to play
But if you see my ears twitch
It's time to back away

I'd like to sit and play outside
And be part of all I see
So if you think I'm the cat for you
Please... Take a Chance On Me!😹

And a 

And here's a picture of the lady in all her glory - 

So as I am in a cat mood I decided to have another play with Pretty Kitty from Stampin up!  I used the challenge from Just Add Ink for my inspiration and added the flowers from Colourful Seasons.  



I've kept the colours soft for the card and the pink I've used is a very old SU one called Regal Rose.  The pearls are from the new catalogue from the Share What You Love suite.  The flower pot is also an old colour called More Mustard - one of my favourite colours of all time from SU.

GIVING THANKS

It's late here in the UK and once again I can't get to sleep.  Hubby is fast asleep as he works so hard during the day that as soon as his head hits the pillow he's gone.  I then toss and turn so this evening I decided to come into my craft room and do something productive.

One of the sets I love from Stampin Up is Thankful Thoughts - so often the word stamp sets don't get as much attention as the ones with the images but this great set is always my go-to for thank you cards.  I love all the different sentiments.  My card today uses one I've never actually used before.  I'm not even sure that 'fabulosity' is a word lol!

I was thrilled then to see that What Will You Stamp challenge #174 has this set as their example this week.  I've wanted to play along for ages with them but I've never had any of the sets they've chosen.




I've used some of the new DSP Share What You Love which was gifted to me by a member of my Joy of Sets Facebook Group.  The sentiment for this card then is right up her street and will be winging its way across the sea to the US to say a big Thank You to her for her generosity to me and others in the group.  She has become known as our RAK queen and her name is Margaret Reuter.  I've added a touch of the new twine and used Bermuda Bay for my ink.

 

GLOBAL DESIGN PROJECT

The Challenge over at Global Design Project this week is a Case the Designer challenge.  The card on offer is very similar to one I did last week so I thought I'd better not replicate that one and try and do something different.  Here's the challenge card:



Here's the card I did last week - quite similar. 

I steered away from the Share What You Love papers and had a look to see what other current papers I had I could use and found my Wood Textures DSP.  I've added some Burlap Ribbon and cut out a frame for the sentiment with the Stitched Framelits.  The Sentiment is from Colourful Seasons and I've added the branch from the matching Seasonal Layers framelits and a cute little button with some linen thread.

 

HERE COMES SUMMER

Summer has definitely arrived in the UK with temperatures soaring into the high 20's and, as often happens when it's hot, everyone is complaining about the heat!  It's really the fact that our country is not set up for this sort of heat - few homes have air conditioning and at the moment not even my car has it as it has decided to stop working - aarggh!  It's a full time job also trying to keep my little foster cats cool in their pens - lots of iced water and damp cool towels for them to sleep on seems to be helping them.

So with summer in mind my card today has a definite summer feel to it - It uses one of the new colours from Stampin Up which is called Pineapple Punch and lots of other retired SU products going back years.

The cardstock is the new colour - I've then used some of the retired DSP Color Theory, Colourful Seasons stamp set and matching thinlets, retired banner thinlets, retired Summer sentiment comes from Season By Season and the little flip flops is from an old set called A Little Love.  The gorgeous Bermuda Bay ribbon is also retired. Luckily the ink is still current.

I'm adding my card into the following challenges:

TGIF Challenge -     Summer Inspiration
Fab Friday -            New SU In Colours
The Paper Players - Sketch 





 

THINGS WITH WINGS

Over at my Facebook Group The Joy of Sets we have just done an ATC swap with the theme of Wings.  The challenge over at Try It On Tuesday this week is also Wings.

I used Tim Holtz distress inks for the backgrounds and various stamps I had in my stash.  I think the Angel is from Cherry Pie Art Stamps - I can't remember where the little girl stamp is from, and the butterfly is from Stampin Up In This World. The background words stamp is another old one from my stash called Manuscript Background from Hero Arts.





 

THE GRADUATE

My page today is of my daughter and her Graduation in 2012 - how quickly the years go - it really does seem only yesterday she was having her first day at school and I was in tears having to leave her in the hands of others.  Now she's all grown up - the words of that old song Sunrise Sunset really are very poignant.

I think Scrapbooking can bring with it a real sense of nostalgia - I'm a person who sadly lives in the past and it doesn't really do me any good - I need to look to the future but I find that difficult.  That's probably why I like to scrapbook - I can get lost in the past again for a while.

My page has been inspired by the Let's Get Sketchy sketch - 

I've used the lovely Kaisercraft papers in from the Memory Lane Collection together with other added bits and bobs, the butterfly from SU Bold Butterfly Framelits and the tags from an SU punch. The title stickers are called Thickers from American Crafts.

I'm also adding this into Kaisercraft's own challenge of a Tic Tac Toe box - I've used the bottom row.



 

ME - NOW AND THEN

Inspired by a couple of challenges that have asked for us to scrap ourselves I've done this page. I have done a page about myself before but that was about 10 years ago and to say my style has changed since then is an understatement!

I've used a piece of Basic Grey Periphery for my background and various bits and pieces from my stash.  I have been away from scrapping for a while and have really missed it - my stash is now very slowly growing with lots of lovely goodies to use.  

I'm putting this into the following challenges:

Challenge Yourself - 





The Studio Challenge Their theme is You.





 

BUTTERFLIES - IN THIS WORLD

I'm using this new set I've got my hands on again - I always seem to love sets once they retire - what does that say about me? I'm behind the times maybe!  

My cardstock base is one of the new colours from SU - I think it's called Pineapple Punch.  I've used some of the new DSP Share What You Love which has been torn and inked as a background. I've also used SU Kinda Eclectic - another retired stamp set.  I've stamped the large sun from this set behind the butterfly and a retired butterfly punch to punch out the mini butterfly.  The sentiment is from a very old SU set - I'm not sure of its name.

There is a touch of the Copper Thread behind the butterfly and some new twine.


I'm adding this to the following challenges:

 Double D Challenges butterflies 
Try Stampin on Tuesday - sketch
Time Out Challenges - Warm 




 

A SIMPLE THANK YOU

A simple thank you card from me today using a lovely little set from Penny Black stamps called Enjoy.  I've also used a retired Spectrum Ink Pad from Stampin Up - these were great inks - it's a shame they are not around any more - they have a choice of five inks in them and when you push them together you get  a rainbow effect on your stamps.  I've had this ink over 10 years and it still inks really well.

 I stamped the image onto a piece of white cardstock and then ran it through the crimper.  The edges were also inked with the ink giving the different colours all around the edges.  I used an SU banner punch for the sentiment and simply sponged the edges.

The inside is stamped with the word Friend from Stampin Up's Jar of Love.  The flowers have been stamped again but this time the other way round on the ink so the colours are different.

I'm adding this into the following challenges:

Addicted to CAS - Rainbow 
Less Is More - Friend 



 

A TRIBUTE TO DAD

The Challenge over at Try It On Tuesday is entitled For The Boys.  I chose to do a Scrapbook Layout for this one and, as it was Father's Day on Sunday here in the UK I did a page for my husband - the best Dad to our two children - not children any more though.

I used some of the gorgeous Kaisercraft paper for the 12 x 12 and some papers from a small block of 4x4 I had in my stash.  

Gifts from the kids for Dad for Father's Day were goodies to do with Fly Fishing - his favourite pasttime - so while I was at it I also did a page just for him - best type of fishing as far as I'm concerned is where the fish swims free.  I love the way hubby managed to capture the image of the fish underwater being released back into the wild river Test in Hampshire.

 

IN THIS WORLD

I always seem to be a bit behind the times when it comes to Stampin Up sets - I seem to fall in love with them after they've retired!  This is what happened with In This World - a set I've only just started using and I love it.  It gives me the chance to do the sort of cards I really love - which is lots of layers, inking and vintage style.

I started off with a piece of ST Cardstock in Pool Party - with some retired DSP which has been torn and inked up in Soft Suede.  I stamped the butterfly image and the key from In This World and used the dots from Painter's Palette.  The door was inked sponged and cut out and added on top of some Burlap Ribbon.  The butterfly was cut out of Bold Butterfly thinlets and the small butterfly punched out with a retired SU punch.  A touch of ribbon and thread is added to the butterfly.  The words are from the set and were stamped and cut out and added on dimensionals - very fiddly.

This card shows my love of crafting and what got me into it - I love the inking and when I first got my Big Shot it was a revelation.  Global Design Project  #143 have asked us to show what got us into crafting and this has all the elements for me.

I'm also including this into the following challenges

As You See It Challenge - FRESH - this was a fresh stamp set for me 
TGIF Challenges - Doodle - I doodled on the door adding inked bits for shading 




 

HAND STAMPED SENTIMENTS - SKETCH CARD

It's Tuesday again and that means time for another Hand Stamped Sentiments.  Here's our sketch for you this week.

This was actually quite a difficult challenge for me and the first card I did I didn't really like.  It was similar to this but the choice of background card stock just didn't seem to work.  I tried Very Vanilla instead and was much happier.

I've used an old SU set here called Riveting which I've had for a good many number of years but never wanted to part with it - as soon as I saw the circles on the sketch I knew I had to use it for this card.

I've also used some of the lovely new DSP from SU called Share What You Love - this was very kindly gifted to me by a member of my Facebook Group The Joy of Sets in a RAK group that we have running - I was overwhelmed to receive such a fabulous gift from one of the members Margaret Reuter and these colours are so my colours.

I've added a piece of the lovely new twine too and the sentiment is from Feather Together.


I hope you come and join in with the challenge - pop by the rest of the Design Team and see what inspiration they have for you.

Til next time...Happy Crafting 

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TGIF CHALLENGE

I was recently gifted some of the gorgeous new DSP from Stampin Up called Share What You Love and am having fun making cards just with this DSP and not the matching stamp set - well I presume there is a matching stamp set - I haven't yet seen a new catalogue!

I thought I'd have a play with Beautiful You from SU as I haven't used this set in such a long time - when it first came out I think it was everyone's go to set.  On my Facebook Group The Joy of Sets it is definitely the most popular set with more project examples than any other of our albums.  Why not come and join us - we celebrate SU current and retired as well as other stamp companies.

I'm using the sketch from TGIF Challenges #tgifc163 this week which is:




I turned the sketch around for my card.

I've used one of the sheets of DSP both ways - in other words this shows you both sides.  I wanted it to look as though the girl was running through a field of flowers.  I cut her out with the Stitched Framelits and also made a frame for her.  The pearls are the matching pearls for this paper, as is the twine.  I coloured her in with the blender tool and So Safron, Old Olive, Powder Pink and Island Indigo inks.

SHARE WHAT YOU LOVE....

I was so overwhelmed to be RAK'd a sample of these gorgeous papers from a member of my RAK team on my Facebook Page Joy of Sets recently.  How generous is the lovely Margaret Reuter! 

I decided to use some of these lovely papers for the challenge over at Global Design Project this week #GDP142.  They gave us a sketch to work with 

I used a retired embossing folder from SU for the background dots and some of the lovely green twine.  The little flower was fussy cut out of some of the matching papers and added to the Stitched Framelits with some Share What You Love Artisan Pearls. The sentiment is from Watercolor Wings. 

These are definitely my kind of colours and there may be lots of examples from me using this lovely Designer Series Paper.



 

CHRISTMAS HAS COME EARLY

Christmas has come early on my blog today with a scrapbook page I've done for a couple of challenges.   One is for my own challenge on my Joy of Sets Facebook Group which I run - each month we hold various challenges including a Sketch Scrapbook challenge to encourage members to get back into or start scrapbooking again.

The background page I used I've actually had for over 14 years - in my craft cupboard - I bought it when we lived in Texas and have never used it - I  think that's long enough for it to sit unused - It has the words of The Night Before Christmas on it.  The extra papers are retired Stampin Up DSP.

I'm also including this in Time Out challenges for their theme of Holidays.






 

STICK IT DOWN

This great new challenge blog Stick It Down caters for both scrappers and card makers.  I've already joined in with one of their scrapbook challenges and this week thought I'd have a go at their card challenge too. Here's their sketch for us to follow.




I run a Facebook Group The Joy of Sets and we have a RAK (Random Act of Kindness) group within the group.  I was overwhelmed this week when one of the members sent me a load of goodies in with my RAK card as a thank you for running the group.  How generous - she sent me some of the new Share What You Love DSP from Stampin Up's new catalogue as well as some other cardstock and embellishments.  I chose to use this for my card today.  As I don't have the matching stamp set it's nice to show the paper taking centre stage - I've used a little stamp from another non SU set.

The paper is extremely thick and has a slight shimmer on some of the pages.  This is one page and its reverse side.  The twine is part of the same Suite.  It's very busy but I don't think the little ladybird gets lost do you?