Last post of the year.

Just thought I would nip in a quick last post for this year. I was going to show my best bits for this year but I don't have the time to go looking. So I thought I would start off the new year ahead of myself and show you the pages I have ready for January.

The first year I did this challenge I did my month over 4 pages and really enjoyed doing it but last year I decided to do the month over 2 pages and had stopped by April. I think the book was just too big as I find I can carry this size with me when I go anywhere and fill bits in, as I love to add to the pages as the month goes on. If you would like to know more about this challenge go over to Kate's blog HERE and see what she has done.

Well that's me for the year, off to get ready and paint the town red. Whatever you are doing to see the New Year in enjoy.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

Thoughts for this coming year.

I have been sat thinking about my goals for next year, I do not make resolutions as I have found I break most of them by the end of the first month if not the end of the first week, so by changing them into goals I have a lot better chance of achieving them.... I do know I want to get back into doing Kate's calender challenge (look here for this years prompt) I got as far as April this year and then gave up so this year I intend to finish this, I know I can do it as I managed to do it the year before. I want to concentrate a bit more on the arty side of my crafting as I do enjoy this, and I also wanted to join in with some of the postcard art that is going around at the moment, so with these in mind I am going to join in with Darcy and her Postcard Challenge for 2012. I am also going to play a more active role in WOYWW as I have been neglecting this for the last few months and I do enjoy having a nose at what others are doing. I have also been neglecting my blog followers, how can I expect them to keep following if I don't go and comment once in a while on there blogs. I have also noticed that I have not put one Scrapbook page on my blog this year, so that is something I will have to change as with a new granddaughter I have loads of photos to use. And also this year I am going to make more of my Design team position at Make My Monday and try and stretch myself a lot more, as it will benefit both the team and myself to try new things.

I have written this all down so I can come back to it at a later time and see just how well I did.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

Merry Christmas everyone.

Hope you all have a great day, have lots to eat and get everything you want of Santa.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

Last Make My Monday of the year.

This week is the last Make My Monday challenge of the year, we will be back in the new year with a lot of new theme's and believe me I have had a sneak peek at them and there are all great. So to end this year we are finishing with Tags. So show us your tags, I know a lot of you have been following a certain guy and his 12 tags, well now is the time for you to have a go.

I am not sure why I went for red for this tag! I started off by cutting blank white card to size, I then stamped a Artistic Stamper music stamp in VersaMark and covered with clear embossing powder. Then rubbed the whole tag with Fired Brick DI and wiped over the embossing. I then added a strip of printed velum down one side, and added a tree that had been stamped and embossed as before but this time covered with Old Paper DI. The tree was wrapped with thin gold string, a charm and red glitter was added, it was then attached with foam pads. I added some gold tinsel around the tag and through the top and a sentiment to the base.

Do go over to see what the others on the Design Team have done over on Make My Monday and have a go yourself.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

What a week...

Had quite a busy week this week, starting off with the class on Monday morning then a friends birthday. I have also started singing lessons, yes I know at my age you would of thought I would know better, but it is something I have always fancied doing so I thought I would give it a go. Who would of guessed that I would be a soprano. I went shopping with some friends for the day yesterday and finished up last night watching the Whirling Dervishes.

The photo is from google as all the photos I took were just not right. If you ever get chance to see these guys I recommend them.

I am also showing you all a photo of a card I did but have not been able to show you until now, you might of seen the remains of it on my desk a few weeks ago.

If you look close you can see that it is bow fronted. I die cut the front and the mats inside with a spellbinders die and used a Tim die for the flowers. The card itself is quite easy to make it is just a gate fold card with an aperture cut into the front. The bow front is done with a sheet of acetate cut just larger that the width of the card.

I thought I would enter the Craft Room challenge with this card.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

I'm back....

I am so sorry guys if you have been here to see this weeks project, but Mr B and I have had a major falling out. First he totally ignored the schedule I had for Mondays post, then he manages to totally lock me out of blogger and when I get back in he has deleted what he should of posted!!!!

So here is my card for this week's Make My Monday challenge.

We are still with seasonal but this week we have to use Red Ribbon in our design. I went with a simple easel card this week as I love doing them. The photo does make it look a bit crooked but its ok in real life. I started of with just a plain white base card, then added a green embossed layer and a stamped layer. The embossing was done with a snowflake embossing folder then lightly sanded. The tree stamp and the sentiment are from a set that comes out every year, its the same set as the Santa I use. I coloured the tree in using gel pens and added the ribbon and bling before attaching to the embossed card.

Please do go over to the Make My Monday blog and have a look at the rest of the teams work, there are some amazing pieces.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

WOYWW 131

Just a quick post today as I am off out in a few minutes.

As anyone who follows me knows this is not my normal desk, but as it has been so cold and wet here I have started bringing things inside to do and this is my small bedroom. All you can see today is the remains of a card I made a few days ago, sorry cant show it yet. On the side is the box I got last week and my bag of ribbons. Sorry its a short one today but got to run.

Will be around as many as I can this week.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

Glitter............

Its a bit like Marmite! you love it or hate it. Personally I am ok as long as it's in a tube of some kind with glue, the loose stuff I get all over and still find on me days later. So when this challenge over on Make My Monday was posted my heart sank, but I thought I managed with the Father Christmas a few weeks ago, so how bad could it be! To start with I could not get my head around it at all, I thought about doing baubles and filling them with glitter but the only stamp I have really isn't the right one for that, I also thought of a shaker card but the only loose glitter I have is too fine for that. So I went off and did something else, whilst there I I found my house die and thought ok snow on the roof would look good so off I went with my white glitter glue and this is what I got!

Why does my glitter look green when it went on white?
The house die is one of Tims, the Santa is a very old CeeDee stamp set and the moon I am not sure of. What I do know is I will be redoing a glitter card sometime this week on Make My Monday.

Please do go over and see what the rest of the team have been doing, I promise there are some truly stunning cards this week.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

Bits and bobs......

I have been at the paints again to see if I can do anything with my lady! To tell the truth I went to start on my Christmas cards, yes I know everyone else is finished but when there are no Christmas adverts, or shops full of things you wouldn't buy at any other time of year it just passes you by a bit. Anyway my book was there and so was my water colour pencils and gesso so I just had to have a go!

A work in progress I think but an enjoyable one. I went to collect the post yesterday and spent some time looking around the shops, they do have Christmas on that side of the Island so it was a nice change. Anyway I was just walking past a shop and I saw a large bag with what looked like books in it, so of I went and had a word with the woman inside who said no they were boxes and would I like one, is the Pope catholic!

What do you think? I left the books in the background and the monitor in the photo so you could see the size it must be about 9x12in I haven't measured it yet. I think I can feel a Christmas box coming on here, as we lost all our Christmas decorations on the move out here I think I will use it for the few decs we have collected over the last few years.

Ok off to play. .

Thanks for reading,
Cath

We are all box mad

At Make My Monday today. We still have the Christmas theme but this week we are making or decorating (or both) box's.

I decided to decorate a box I have had in the craft room for a while, it is a wooden and card cheese box that I was given to alter and all I had got done was to paint it black. So the first thing I had to do was cover it with a couple of coat of gesso, then a coat of white acrylic. I then covered the top with dried leaves that had been covered with glitter. The top is made from Mr Tim.s flower die and printable canvas that had been sprayed with a gold shimmer spray. The smallest two flowers I cut a leaf out and glued them so they made a better shape for what I wanted, I then threaded them all on to a long pin that I attached to the centre of the lid with foam. I used 3 large flowers and 3 small buds to fill in the gaps. On the sides of the lid I wrapped a string of pearl beads around some red ribbon and attached that with tape. I decided the sides were a bit too white so I went over them with the shimmer spray on a paint brush.

Nip over to Make My Monday to see what the rest of the team have done this week, and to say hello to our two new team members, Mynnette and Val.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

100th post this year......

I have made it to 100 posts, that is the most I have ever done on this blog in one year since I started this in 2007. I almost made it last year but dear Mr Blogger decided not to post some of the posts I had scheduled whilst I was away so I only made it to 97.

I was wondering if I should do anything special for this and thought long and hard but could come up with nothing then a few weeks ago one of my blog friends sent me a blog award. Now I am not normally one for these kind of things but I thought I would give this one a go, so here you are a few things you didn't know about me...

1/ I have lived all over the place as my dad was in the forces.

2/ I was Akela to a Cub Scout troop in Yorkshire for years.

3/ I opened the first ever craft shop in North Cyprus, sadly I had to close after 18 months.

4/ Before moving out here I used to eat a tuna mayo baked potato every day I was at work.

5/ I worked most of my working career in shoes, but only own two pairs as I hate them.

6/ I retrained as a Life Coach just before we left the country.

7/ I live with my sole mate, a dog and 10 cats.

So the rules are I have to thank the person who sent this, so thank you Jacqueline I did enjoy thinking up the answers. I now have to send this to 7 others, so if you are reading this and would like to do it please count yourself as one of my 7 as I will not be sending this on.

So on to the next target.......

Thanks for reading,
Cath

This week on Make My Monday

The theme for this week on Make My Monday is Christmas foliage, flowers or snowflakes, I went for the snowflake option as the stamps I have with Christmas trees on are not that good. No that's wrong the stamps are fine its my stamping that is not that good with them.

This was a very quick card to make up as it is just embossing and die cutting. I used a snowflake embossing folder for the base card and added a few sparkles and some snowflakes that had been die cut. Then using a Papermania embossing folder embossed the Let it snow with card stock and went over with a piece of sand paper.

Do go over to the Make My Monday site and have a look at what the others have done, including our guest designer Mynnette.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

WOYWW 128

  It has been so long since I did this I am afraid I have some very nasty photos for you, so those of you who are easily upset do not go further than the first photo.

As you can see my work area is almost clear just needs cleaning as I have been playing with paint and inks. You can see I am taking this photo looking down onto the table as you can see the camera straps at the bottom of the photo. But if I move to the side to take the photo this is what you get!

Yes my push back pile is now a mountain. I must admit most of it came out of the purple bag you can see at the top that I have emptied to refill with other things.

But there is no excuse for this side. So guess what I am doing this week? As well as running around with a bucket in the house to catch the rain as it pores through the roof I will be down in my craft room trying to get it into some order so I can start working on my own Christmas cards, yes I know I'm late but isn't that just me all over.

If there is anyone out there who is wondering just why I am putting myself through this shame and showing all to the world, just go over to Julia's blog HERE where you can be transported around the world nosing sorry looking at other desks a lot tidier than mine.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

Make My Monday this week

We have Clean and Simple cards with a Christmas theme.

This is my card, I used part of a Papermania stamp, I just masked the rest off and also used the sentiment that came with it. I have definitely got to get more sentiment stamps as this is the only on I have other than a selection of Merry Christmases. I then coloured it in with gel pens that I picked up from my local pound store. This is definitely not one of my best as I find this style of card quite difficult to do, but it has got me out of my comfort zone and I will try this style again.

Do nip over to Make My Monday and have a look at what the rest of the team have been up to and join in with us. Also don't forget there is still time to apply for the Design Team HERE.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

Bits and pieces.... (photo heavy)

I will be glad when this year is over due to one thing and another. As you know if you follow me its not been a good time for me and the other day I added to it by dropping my netbook on the floor. I now have a very nice white door stop as we have tiles throughout  the house. I had just finished editing the photos I had taken when we had visitors, but of course I hadn't got around to backing them up, so lost everything including all the photos I have taken since April when I got the netbook. So I have had to go back to my old and slow pc that I thought I would never be using again. But I must admit with having to go back I have rediscovered some old photos of work that I havnt seen for a few years, like this one taken a few years ago of me in a dress!

And this I did for a local art competition about the girls who lived on the corner of my street.

 I must get back into scrapbooking as I do miss it. There was also some of other work that I have done just for me. Things that I did just playing around in my craft room like this, a canvas I did years ago.

A page out of my 365 day journal from last year.

A wall hanging using thick paste and die cuts.

A love design using an old photo of me.

A tag.

Another tag, think I did this for something but cant remember what or when!

And a try at art.

If you have got this far thank you for letting me just waffle and reminisce. I will be back to my normal self (whatever that is nowadays) soon.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

R.I.P. Katie

I don't know if any of you knew about Katie a fellow crafter who was diagnosed with cancer less than a year ago and who has fought so bravely against it these last months. Her husband has been keeping us up to date with how she has been and has just bloged that she passed away on Monday.

 Her blog is just amazing to read, she held nothing back and was so brave, if you would like to read it it is here at My Paper Haven.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

New month and a new theme

Over at Make My Monday the theme for this month is Christmas. And this weeks challenge is to make something in the Traditional/Vintage style. So here is the card I have done for this.

Now I think you can get no more traditional than Santa himself and this stamp is one I turn to most years, I actual got this SeeDee's set about 5 or 6 years ago and they get used every year.

Here is a close up of the sparkle on his hat and beard. The stamp was stamped with black archival ink then coloured with pencils for the face and gel pens for the hat. I added glitter glue to the trimming and the stars to give him that extra twinkle. The stamped image was cut out and matted onto green card, that was then matted on to patterned paper from the Papermania Christmas range. I then added a doily that I had inked with DI and highlighted the design with a gel pen, just added the sentiment and it was finished.

This months theme is a great one for this time of year as we all can do with the extra push to make another Christmas card, so come over to Make My Monday and join in with the challenge.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

Design Team Call

The Make My Monday Deezine Team is growing and we need two more designers. If you would like to be part of my of team of fabulous crafty ladies - read on.
You will need to commit to making a card every week for at least six months - all our challenges are decided well in advance so you will have plenty of time to prepare your projects. You will be expected to comment on challenge entries and choose a top 3 every week.
To take part in our DT Call please make a card or project and upload it to the linky on the Make My Monday site by Tuesday November 15th. Your subject is

CELEBRATION

The rules are:
1) Only one entry per person please.
2) You may take part in other challenges as well as this but no more than 5 plus this one.
3) Please put a link on your blog to this blog and the DT Call.
4) Please put a few words in your post stating why you want to be on this design team.
5) Please turn off word verification
6) Please link your post - not your blog
7) Have fun!

Please note that those not following rules 1 - 6 will not be considered.
Successful applicants will be notified before the end of November by e-mail so please make sure that this is visible somewhere on your blog.

DT Call - CELEBRATION 

Thanks for reading,
Cath

Last week of Autumn

This week is the last week of the Autumn theme over on Make My Monday, I don't know if anyone who reads this blog has been over and had a go this last few weeks, but I have really enjoyed this theme.

For this last card I have gone back to the stamps I used at the beginning of the month.

I used the same technique we used then but this time I cut out the extra stamping and added that to my card with foam pads, I also added a rosette that I had coloured to match.  I do hope you have a go and join us on Make My Monday, its a great blog with some amazing people showing there work.

If anyone was waiting to see what I bought when I went craft shopping the other day, you will be disappointed to know all I got was a large acrylic block for my clear stamps! I know its just not me at all, will have to sort out an order online instead.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

On Make My Monday this week,

We are going Black and Orange, with the theme being Halloween or not.

For my card I started off by covered white card with ink from my Big and Juicy pad with a brayer, and used the outside of a Tim mask as a stencil to add my witch. I then added my trees masking off the witch with the mask, added a sentiment , matted on black then onto orange base card. Hope you like it.

Do go over to the Make My Monday site to see what the rest of the team have done and join in.

Just a quick post today as I am off shopping with my mates, will let you see what I get when I get back.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

What a week......

this has been, we have had family over for a few days from Hong Kong and have had to do the whole touristy bit, but at top speed as they were only here for 5 days. Here is a quick photo run down of what we did.

Notice anything missing from this photo? It was a Cathedral but is now a Mosque so has had all figurines removed.

I put these two in just to show how the inside has been changed and also to show how the locals pray and the tourists just wander about! The photo of the carpet is for Elizabeth as I thought she would be interested in the whole carpet of individual prayer mats.

In this one you have Venetian walls, cannons from the 13 hundreds with there cannonballs, a Roman sculpture and a Coca Cola bottle!

This is one of the hotels at the dead city of Verosha, its been like that since 1974.

And then at lunch today before they left we went out for something to eat and found the large umbrella at our table was held down with 4 containers of snot!!! Sorry about the sense of humour.

Just a quick look at my week, sorry about the state of some of the photos but I have just downloaded them and haven't had time to edit them yet.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

This weeks card

Looks like I will be getting this on my blog on Monday for a change, lol

This week over on Make My Monday we are doing Inchies, still with the autumnal feel to them, this is what I have done for my card for this week.

For this card I used the same leaf stamps that I used for the embossing the other week, but this time used them with Versamark ink and then brushed them over with red Perfect Pearls. I stuck with the Orange, Green and Beige colours as I think of them when I think of autumn and they go so well together.

I did this close-up to show the Perfect Pearls but I just don't seem to be able to catch the shimmer.

Do go over to Make My Monday and have a look at the great cards the rest of the team have made this week and have a go.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

This week on Make My Monday, very very late...

I cannot believe that this is so late this week, I thought I had it scheduled but I was wrong on that count, and then we have had problems with the internet for the last few days so I didn't even notice that my post was not up!

Anyway enough of my moaning you came here to see my card not listen to me waffle on.

This week the theme is Trees and this is the only set of stamps I have with trees on. I tried to photograph this a few times but each time it looked off, it isn't in real life. The stamp is from a set by Kanban stamped with black archival on to beige card then attached to the brown card base.

Will do better next week promise.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

A new month so a new theme

Over on Make My Monday we have a great new theme for this month, its Autumn. With this weeks challenge a great resist technique brought to you by design team member Cazro to see the instructions for it go here.
Here is my card using this technique.

I used a few leaf stamps inked up with a Versamark ink pad and embossed with clear embossing powder on white card stock. I then took a Big and Juicy ink pad in Foliage and using pieces of foam rubbed the different colours over the embossed card. Trimmed this to size and added ribbon before sticking it to a white card blank. I then added a flower in the same tone's in the corner to finish.

Hope you like this and nip over to Make My Monday to have a look at what the rest of the team have done.

Thanks for reading,
Cath

Apology's to all.....

My friends and followers for my distinct lack of anything this last few weeks, all I can say is I am sorry and I will try harder from now on. I think everything just stopped when my best friend died. I have never felt anything like it in my life, even when my dad died it didn't affect me as bad as this. And my oh and I have just had the busiest time of our lives this last few weeks, a few photos to follow. So I would like to say a BIG THANK YOU to everyone, friends, followers, design team mates and lurkers, I am back (I hope lol) and will start to get things back to normal again.

This is some of what I have been up to this last few weeks,
It all started on the 17th with a parade through town, I showed most of the photos on my blog on the Sunday so If you would like to see more just have a look back.

 Then on the Monday it was up to the Abbey for rehearsal for the choir.

 For the performance on the Tuesday.

 For some reason I cannot find the photos of the Shakespeare or the Jane Austin that were on the Wednesday and Thursday

We then had Bex Marshell and her band, plus support on in the ampitheatre on the Friday.

 Then on the Saturday we started the rock night. The first act was a local band called Funky Monkey, then came The Secret Police a great Police tribute band

We then had an interval during which we all did just what we Brits are famous for and queued for the beer.

The last act to come on were The Bohemians a Queen tribute band.

And they brought the house down. I threw a camera at one of the security guys and got him to take a few photos from the back of the stage just to try and capture the audiences enthusiasm, as you can see it was full and everyone was on there feet. We got home about 3 in the morning after cleaning up and making sure everyone was ok.

So for the last few days I have done nothing but sleep and catchup with everything that had been shelved, if you were expecting an email from me, I am on to them next.
Just hope mojo hasn't gone on his holidays....

Thanks for reading,
Cath