BOO - INCHY CHALLENGE THEME - HALLOWE'EN

The theme over at inchy challenge blog this week is Hallowe'en. I've used some Cherry Pie Stamps and a Stampin Up stamp (the Spider) for my inchy this week.

The witchy among you will know that the word Samhain is the magickal word for Hallowe'en. Hallowe'en is one of my favourite Sabbats in the Magickal calendar - I always lay a place at the table for those of my family who are no longer with us - the practice of candy at Hallowe'en stemmed from the ancestors putting out food for their loved ones who were no longer with them. How many people realise that today? Once you get away from all the hype of Hallowe'en it really is a magickal special time.

DD and I are off to Glastonbury this week -just to soak up some atmosphere and, as we have a Hallowe'en party to go to, we may just pick up a few bits and pieces.

Have a great week!

LEAF ART

I've been playing around with leaves lately - here are some works in progress.

Stamps are Cherry Pie

INCHY CHALLENGE - BABIES

The theme over at Inchy Challenge blog this week is Babies - human or animal.

Why not give it a go - they don't take long to do!

INCHY BLOG - GUEST DESIGNER - TIME

I'm so late this week with my own inchy for my own Challenge Blog! Our guest Designer is Ali Manning and she has a wonderful theme of Time.

Here's my Time inchy - I don't know why but I always seem to quote this saying whenever there is a time theme - am I predictable, unimaginative or just plain scared silly about how quickly time passes! Don't answer that!!! lol!

The stamps are from Tim Holtz

I've also been doing some Christmas Cards which I'm going to donate to a charity - Too Many Tears - this is an animal sanctuary mainly dealing with Cats and Dogs - its a fabulous site and they do a lot of good work around the country. If you are thinking of adopting a dog or cat - do check out the site - don't say I didn't warn you though - its not called that for nothing.

his Santa stamp is one I tracked down last year - I knew he'd become one of my favourites. The Do No Open stamp is from Stampin Up.

I can't remember where I got the stamps for this one - I've always loved the sentiment Have Yourself...... - stems from one of my favourite films, Meet Me In St Louis with Judy Garland - I've blogged about this before so I won't bore you with it again!

RED SKY AT NIGHT.....

I just had to take some pictures of the red sky tonight just outside the front of my house - should be a good day tomorrow then!

If only I could do as well with the Brayer!

SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT....INCHIES

The challenge blog Something Completely Different is doing inchies again this week - the theme is birds. Don't forget my inchy challenge blog every Monday if you enjoy doing inchies.

CHRISTMAS STEP UP CARD

Trawling through Splitcoast Stampers, the way we do! I was inspired by Jennifer's Step Up Card using Winter Post - I love this set and want to find new ways of using it.

I used some old SU Designer Series Paper for the actual card - the paper is so thick it doesn't need cardstock!

INCHY CHALLENGE BLOG - RAIN

Rain rain go away ........ I know its not been here for a while but I so enjoyed those sunny autumn days - so the challenge on inchy challenge blog this week is Rain. Here's mine:

We will be having a fabulous Guest Designer next week so pop along for some extra inspiration.

LOOK WHAT I GOT!

I received a gorgeous card from my friend Julie this morning - Julie is my downline in our little Stampin Up family and she sent this card to thank me for my help when she first started as I am now leaving Stampin Up behind and going on to other things.

Julie made the card with all SU materials and you can find out more on her blog - the photo doesn't do it justice - such a beautiful card - thanks Julie and I hope you continue to do well with SU.

GINGERSNAP CREATIONS CHALLENGE

Gingersnap Creations has a challenge of Movie Stars this week - I've used Scarlett and Rhett! The background was made using the Brayer and I've used various stamps including Cherry Pie, Stampin Up and Tim Holtz. The inks were all SU and I used a total of 7 colours to make the background. Gone With The Wind is one of my favourite books and the film, although great, doesn't really do the book justice as its not just about a love story but is far more gritty.

NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM - SCREEN 2 SCRAP!

This week's challenge for Screen2Scrap is to be inspired from the Night at the Museum Poster, together with the following criteria:

1. Use a group photo

2. Yellow or gold title

3. Use one element from the poster - a dinosaur, monkey, plane, rocket, squid etc.....OR

3. Something inspired by one of the figures in the poster.......example #1 The Pharoah = a pyramid or egyptian themeexample # 2 Napolean Bonaparte = the Eiffel tower

The poster reminded me of when we'd taken the children to the Natural History Museum in Houston when we used to live there - they've always both liked dinosaurs so I dug out these pictures - well its very nearly a group photo! The paper was Cloud 9 Design and I used some of Tim Holtz Idea-ology masks to add to the background. I actually have a Texas punch, which is the little ones at the bottom!

BLOG CANDY

Wow - some fab Blog Candy here to celebrate Sharon's special birthday.

INCHY CHALLENGE BLOG - MASKS

The Challenge over at my inchy challenge blog this week is Masks. Here's mine:

Doing our bit for charity

Mrs Dunnit (Julia from Stamping Ground blog here ) and I had a great time meeting up for coffee today and doing our bit for the Macmillan Coffee morning - I'd noticed our local garden centre was holding an event so we went along and did our bit - and of course we had to have cake - what's coffee without cake??????? Its like stamps without ink, paper without scissors, cards without envelopes - I think you get my drift! lol!!!


I really should have some craft bits to show you but I'm so nervous as I have a job interview today (a job after 20 years home looking after kids - faint) that my hands are shaking too much to do anything.


Maybe later................. gulp! In the meantime here's a picture of my strawberries - thanks to the lovely weather we've had the last few weeks - they are still going strong and so sweet. Not enough to share around though - what a shame! I've also made some sun-dried tomatoes - Well Aga dried tomatoes with my crop of toms! Yum!

INCHY CHALLENGE BLOG - LEAVES AND A BLOG CANDY GIVEAWAY

Oops - I was somewhat late with this week's challenge over at my inchy challenge blog. Blame it on the fact that I've been away celebrating my wedding anniversary - 24 years! Yikes - I feel too young to have been married that long - I can still remember my parents' 25th! DH and I reckon we need long service medals! lol!!! We're already planning next year's extravaganza!

Anyway - enough of real life and back to blogging - the challenge over at inchy this week is LEAVES. I just love autumn - its my favourite season and I love the colours of the leaves - this is a great leaf which comes in the new Autumn Days set by Stampin Up which I just seem to be using all the time at the moment! I've used SU's marker pens to get the different autumnal colours on the leaf and a leaf brad I found in my stash!

I've got a little stash of assorted brad shapes that I will give away to the first person who leaves a comment and becomes a follower. If you are one of my lovely followers anyway - that's fine!

BLOG CANDYS

In my hunt for scrapbooking challenges - its amazing how one thing leads to another - here's a great scrapping challenge site and they are also offering Blog Candy if you fancy becoming one of their followers. You'll find Sweetie's Sketches here . Good luck!

Here's some more Candy up for grabs too you'll find it at Sassy's Designs here

WOYWW!!

Or What's On Your Workday Wednesday for those in the know! Well, mine is a mess, as it usually is - its a wonder I ever find anything. Today I was busy doing the layouts - see post before this one!

But I also thought I'd show you WOYCW - which translates as What's On Your Chair Wednesday - I ask you - how am I supposed to get my big butt on that chair to do any work when Pepper is taking up all the room! lol!

SCRAP CHALLENGES

I was prompted by Shazza stopping by my blog and asking me to join in with some of her scrapping challenges to do some more layouts this afternoon.

The first one is for her Artastic Challenge blog and this was their challenge - produce your layout inspired by the following picture by the artist Kandinsky - I must admit I had never heard of this artist but I love finding out about new things and new people. This was the piece we were given called White II.

I produced my layout called White on White II as I've chosen a picture of me in the snow. Honestly, I'm in the picture - just that dot over there on the right! lol!

I then discovered that Shazza runs another challenge - this one is called from Screen 2 Scrap where she takes a Movie Poster and you use it for your inspiration. The poster was from Home Alone.

She also included the criteria that you had to use either blue or red, a piece of patterned paper and a two word title.

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Pleasant Pheasant Sunset!

Funny isn't it - a few weeks ago I was bemoaning the fact of making cards - and all it took was a new stamp set to get me going again!

I'm loving this pheasant stamp from SU's new set Autumn Days. This is the first really successful card I've managed with they Brayer - thanks to a youtube tutorial I found - can't remember who - I'll have to check and get back to you. She said though to start your rollings off card before you start on the card - if that makes sense.

Anyway - this is my card - hope you like it!

PS - here's the link to the brayer tutorial I found on you tube which really helped me, sorry I couldn't get the video to download

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPRVv1qF5Uc

You'd better watch out.......

You better take care....... cause I absolutely adore Reindeers at Christmas time and I couldn't wait to have a go with the Reindeer from the new SU set Winter Post. I can see he's going to become one of my faves - all details on the card are on my SU blog here where you'll also find details of up and coming Christmas card classes!

WINTER POST

That's Winter Post stamp set by Stampin Up - yes I've done my first Christmas card - woohoo only 100 or so more to go! lol!

All details on my SU blog here