Rubber Stamping - North Wales

Hi everyone Wow! I have had a weird day today - not sure where my crafting head was. After doing the shopping this morning I sat down & worked out how I was going to make my next challenge card.  Found the design, decided on the shape of card, made it. When I signed in to my other blog & started to write it up I discovered I had made it for the wrong blog so I had to go & find which blog the theme was for - only to discover that it was for a stamping blog & I hadn't done any stamping.  Just a few minutes ago I thought I might enter a "cheat" by just stamping a greeting on it - but that didn't seem right.  So it is now part of my collection awaiting the right birthday occasion & person.  I have detailed the whole process over on my blog - but here is the card for you to see. An easel card with a difference.  I decided to stick the right hand flap down flat instead of making it another easel. I am off now to set up the birthday greetin...

Good evening ladies This is a short posting to give you some news about my personal blog.  I have been given a blog award.  Please pop over & take a look.  If my blog is not on your Favourites (& why not!!!!!!! - te he) just click HERE Did you watch the wedding - wasn't it beautiful!  Television does give you some wonderful opportunities that the people waiting in the streets didn't get to see. A couple of things stand out for me - Prince Harry looked back when Kate was walking down the aisle,  & said something to Prince William which looked like "wait & see", then Prince William telling Kate she looked beautiful - that was a clear as clear & finally when they walked out onto the balcony Kate said "Oh Wow".  The sight of all those people really surprised her. I suppose I really should have talked above about the Duke & Duchess of Cambridge -  I don't want to be sent to the Tower for being disrespectful. Needless to s...

Birthday Greetings It's 29 April & a Mold member has a birthday Happy Birthday Jill Have a lovely day  

Our very best wishes to the happy couple

Good evening ladies Today I managed to find two challenges that I thought I would enter.  One is at "Allsorts" where the theme is April Showers, & "My Time to Craft" where the theme is Perfect Pets.  Here is the April Showers photo; I have had this little froggy for sometime & it was time for him to have an outing again. I found quite a few clear flat backed gems that I realised would be suitable for creating raindrops.  Tell me, do you have trouble getting those little gems off the acetate they are stuck on?  Whilst picking them up to place them on the card they kept flying out of the tweezers.  I have no idea where they went either - so I probably have sparkly gems in my hair, stuck to clothes & certainly stuck to the carpet.  Isn't crafting fun? If you want to see the other card just pop over to my blog, by clicking HERE .  There are two new posts - one for the frog card & one for the pets card. The prize for my winning card ...

Good afternoon ladies & once again what a beautiful one.  Will it last to the weekend? OK, so here are the photos from the project as last nights Mold II meeting.  We had a session on easel cards & these are the work in progress cards;  This really is a nice card whichever way it is made - looks good on a mantelpiece. I really enjoy making them myself too.  I have already mentioned that the altered pegs show & tell will appear in early May - after Wednesday 4th in fact. I was knee deep in Easel cards again today as that was the project in my workshop at PBC.  I had seven ladies & they each made the bases of 3 cards, then after a break went on to decorate one or more - much as we did at club night. When I got back from my workshop I had had a delivery from C&C.  I had ordered the Crafters Companion Envelobox maker.  The first item I am going to try is an envelobox for that gatefold card with recessed frame.  So, when I have ...

Hi everyone I have just got in from the Mold II Club night. Tonight our Show & Tell was the Altered Pegs & some really great designs & alterations.  Photos after the first week in May. The project was Easel Cards.  We played with a couple of layouts & then everyone chose one to decorate.  I took photos of the work in progress cards & will be creating a slide show tomorrow. An idea I put to everyone was the possibility of arranging a coach trip somewhere crafty.  One idea was to go to Crab Apple Crafts at Frodsham, as there are other places of interest there - a patchwork embroidery shop, a candle shop, a second hand book shop, various antiques.  I suggested Topaz Crafts (Dawn Bibby) as suggested by ladies at CSNW, & someone said that Topaz was up for sale as Dawn Bibby was going to concentrate on TV.  I will think of some other ideas - it would probably be about September time. That's it for tonight - more tomorrow...

Hi everyone I am so excited - I have just found out that I won second prize in the CD Sunday Challenge for Sunday 18 April - their Happy Birthday Theme. Here's the card that I won with; Now I need to find a challenge with stamping to win. I will be back later as tonight is Mold II club meeting - the show & tell is once again - Altered pegs - I am looking forward to seeing those. 'Bye for now. 

Good evening everyone Just popping back to say I hope you have all had a lovely weekend & just think we have another one at the end of this week. Yes I know there is always one at the end of a week - but I mean another long weekend,  duh. Today I did a lot of catching up on my personal blog & made a card for a challenge (a stamping one this time) then around 3:00pm Bob & I went to the "Running Hare" for our meal.  We went to celebrate our anniversary which is today.  It's strange to think that this time last year we were in France & our anniversary meal was in a canal side restaurant called Napoli.  Yep - I know - in France - Italian restaurant!!!!!!!!!!!!  The weather was similar to today. I realised yesterday that I had missed 2 opportunities for an animation on the blog on Saturday as it was not only St. Georges Day but Shakespeare's birthday too.  Never mind. That's it - more tomorrow.

Good evening ladies Just popping in to let you know about one members news. Joanna of Mold Club has entered a challenge on the Michael Strong blog & won a prize.  They had to make a card with 15 (& 15 only) items on it. Please pop over to Joanna's blog to take a look.  Click HERE .  You have to pop over to her website as I cannot pinch a copy of the photo to put here. It is a beautiful card & I love the stamp.  So much so that I popped over to Michaels website to see what his stamps were like.  Oooh yes, got to have some of those - particularly the ones that look like Joanna's fan stamp. I will be back later.

Hello ladies Another beautiful day - it has been kind to us. I spent some time earlier today creating some more caught-in-crystal.  When it is safely dry I will photograph them & put photos on here.  A couple of blogs back I had a comment from Caroline that said ".... re crystal one, have you got a scanner, might give you a better picture".  It took a couple of days to sink in what Caroline was referring to - the picture of my workshop caught-in-crystal. How daft is that.  So I shall try that this time with the ones I have done today. I also pulled my finger out, so to speak, & made my card for today's CD Sunday Challenge, where the theme was Butterflies.  Click HERE if you want to take a look. Right! that's it just a quick pop in today. More tomorrow - don't wear yourselves out in your gardens.  give yourself time to sit back & smell the roses.  Well whatever flower you have out at this moment in time. 'Bye

Hi everyone Just decided to pop back in quickly in order to show a card from the March show & Tell at Mold.  The theme was the card in just cream, coffee & aqua. Rhiannon one of the members could not attend that evening so she brought it along this week.  I like that because it is still taking part.  So if you get caught like that - always bring it along next time - or the time after even.  It's still good to see what you did. Here is Rhiannon's card; I love the bird cage.  They are quite popular at the moment, aren't they? 'Bye

Hello Ladies Here I am with the photos from Thursday evening - when the project for the evening at Mold Club was easel cards.  After we had a play trying out different styles I left the ladies to start decorating one of their designs. I was allowed to take photos at the end of the evening - but I must stress that I took them in a "work in progress" state.  But some good designs were coming through. I think I mentioned in the last blog that the photo's of the Show & Tell of Altered Pegs will not be shown until all three clubs have shown them.  The same applies to the Andy Warhol Show & Tell.  I may have repeated myself here - if so - I apologise. I must apologise that a couple of the photos are just a little blurry.  It is also difficult not to get a shine back from the table.  I am going to look out a cloth that I can put down when taking the photos.  It has worked when taking some of the photos here at home.  Here is the slide...

Hello everyone Just popping in quickly as I have not long been in from the Mold club evening. I took pictures of the Show & Tell altered pegs - but like the Andy Warhol cards I am not showing them on the blog until each club has had their evening with them,  But I can tell you there was some brilliant pegs tonight. The project was easel cards & after trying out a couple of shapes many were decorated so I took photos of those too.  But - sorry - I am really tired, so you will have to wait until tomorrow to see them. Another beautiful & hot  day - lets hope it continues. Chat more tomorrow.

Hi - it's me again. Now that I have handed over my work for the Festival Exhibition board I think I can show you what I did.  it's not like it is the competition.  The board had to be just white & silver - no other colour.  That is a bit testing but once you get in the flow it's not too bad & in the end I made 3 & I even had an idea for another one - but I didn't want to go overboard. We do the exhibition board to reflect the competition which this show is "Silver Celebration" as it is our 25th show, which also have to be in only silver & white.  It will be interesting to see the creativity - our followers  never cease to amaze me with how they interpret our competitions. So - here are my 3 board cards; We are given 4" x 4" white card to start us off.  So I trimmed mine a little & layered them on to silver card.  All the stamping is silver embossed & the gems are flat back silver pearl-type gems.  The first ...

Hello ladies My what a beautiful day - will it last over the bank holidays? Today I have got the photos of the 2 cards I made for my workshop yesterday.  I am afraid the caught in crystal one is not very good.  I tried several different ways of taking it.  Without the flash wasn't any good & with the flash you get a light in the middle & the stamped image on the front was not so clear either.  But the colours have come out well.  In fact I have so enjoyed playing with this technique again that I am going to make up a couple of sheets with different inks & just save them for backgrounds.  The spotlight technique is very simple & basic.  Here they are; The other card I have to show you is the very quick card I made for my friend who had just become a grandmother for the second time.  There is stamping on it so I do save face; Isn't that pram cute?  It's from a range by the maker "Kars" & they are all small stamps....

Hello everyone Sorry I haven't blogged for a few days - nothing wrong - it's just been reasonably quiet. Bob & I decided to have a quiet restful weekend.  Poor thing he has been getting up about 5:30 every morning for a couple of months now - a good long contract job, & there are still more weeks to go.  But it means he is pretty tired by the evening time - so we don't do much.  He's not getting any younger - te, he - Ooooh he'll kill me.  But then I'm not either - hence the quiet restful weekend.  During the weekend I got little bits & pieces done towards projects & workshops whilst Bob attended to the lawns. Yesterday evening was the HSNW club night & we had Tracey from Lavinia's Stamps visiting us.  We had a great demonstration & she has some lovely new stamps.  So remember to take a look at her stand at the festival.  I was very good - I didn't spend a lot.  I bought 2 small word stamps - both the same ...

Good afternoon everyone I have had another good stamping session this morning & completed my entry for the HSNW exhibition board for the May show.  In fact I got carried away & made three - I will photograph them over the weekend for you to see.  Now! Shall I enter the festival competition? After my lunch I sat with all my latest magazines & had a good look through for inspiration, & for a change I decided to enter for some of the freebies that are always on offer.  So I now sit & wait with baited breath & fingers crossed. After having a read of the latest Craft Stamper & checking what the new Swap was, I decided to go to their website & have a look around.  The readers gallery is full of some great looking cards & very inspirational. During my look around I went to the swap area where they show more of the entries than are featured in the magazine, & who did I find there? Annette Jones of Mold II club ...

Good evening ladies Quite a quiet day today - well after the workshop anyway. Once again a good workshop - did I mention it was for the Hougie board?  Looking around craft shops you wonder if another gadget is required let alone another version of gadgets already created.  I thought that when I first saw the Hougie board - but I have to admit it is very handy & useful.  I have several printed "templates" of cards & you have to cut card to size then put markings all over the place before scoring & further cutting.  All that can get a bit confusing - on the card I mean.  Too many marks is not good.  This is where the Hougie board comes into its own. We had great fun this morning creating different patterns on standard card size pieces of card - putting it to the use as of an embossing folder in a Big Shot or similar machine.  OK you can't do the fancy swirly patterns but as one of the ladies said she wished she had had the board ...

Good evening ladies More a domestic day today than a stamping day - but I still got a little done. A friend of mine became a grand-mother for the second time at the weekend so I made a card for her.  I used some background paper & a plaque type topper from an oldish issue of Making Cards & then stamped a little pram onto the plaque.  It was a small stamp that I bought at PBC for just £1-25.  I can't remember the make - I must check that. After that I prepared those cats & butterflies that I had stamped yesterday for putting on to cards later.  Also yesterday I stamped a rather pretty flower garland - so I coloured those with my watercolour crayons. Before all that of course I had to take Russ & Nadine to the station - mind you I was a bit worried about the size of their case - I only have a little car!  But we all fitted in ok.  They return on Monday when I will be going to the station to pick them up again. Tomorrow I have a w...

Good evening ladies Well! I promised myself a stamping day today & that is what I had.  Most enjoyable.  Mind you I had to clear my work desk before I could start. Then of course it's a little think about which stamps, which inks, what card.  I did change my mind a couple of times before I settled down to stamp - but you do don't you? I used my oriental poppy again, stamping it in black memories ink pad onto white tags.  Then I coloured the tags with distress inks - the one below is in Stormy Sky.  In my wooden mounted stamps drawer I found a small bamboo stamp so I used that to decorate the side of the card. Then I decided to use a vintage car stamp that I hadn't used for some time & stamped & embossed it in gold EP.  Actually the label on the jar said "champagne".  I then coloured them in with H2O style watercolour paints.  It was a set that I had bought a couple of years ago from "The Works" in Chester.  They hav...

Good evening ladies Today, as I said it would be, was time out with our daughter-in-law Nadine.  I took her over to Liverpool to show her some of the areas where one side of her family ancestors came from. I went to Liverpool through the tunnel at the end of the M53 motorway.  I still cannot get to grips with which one that is - name wise I mean.  Then we drove along by the Liver Building, & the Albert Docks.  Instead of following the main road up Parliament Street (I think it's Lower Parliament Street at that point) - we went along Sefton Road towards the old Jubilee Gardens which are undergoing a make over.  One of the roads that were in her family history was off of Sefton Road - but Google maps showed it in 2 different places - but where I thought it was was a dead end road.  So we continued on to Otterspool Promenade.  Back in the late 1800's one of her ancestors & his family had lived down by the shore just there in the Fisherman's Cot...

.. which of course is what us Ladies are allowed to do. Good evening ladies & what a wonderful weekend of weather.  I hear it may rain tomorrow.  Ah well we should be used to that by now, shouldn't we. So what did I change my mind over?  You will remember I was going to go out & purchase one of those metallic pens in silver to go around the edges of my pillow box tags.  During the night I woke up & the first thing that came to mind was ..... "layer them onto silver paper or card for the border".  Well! you do don't you - wake up & think of things like that I mean.  I can spend ages trying to think of different ways to do things with no luck at all - then wake up in the middle of the night & instantly solve the problem. Out came the Big Shot again & I used the next size up Nestabiltie die to the tag size & cut 35 silver plaques.  Then I glued the two layers together.  Just what the doctor ordered - so to speak...

Its 9 April & a Mold II member has a birthday Happy Birthday Phyllis have a great day 

Hello ladies Well! I didn't get as much done today craft wise as I had wished.  No great problems - just several other little things cropping up. At one point in the afternoon I decided to put the silver edge on the logo tags for the pillow boxes.  I have had my container of silver embossing powder for some time now - so I am wondering if it has "gone off".  It didn't emboss very well at all - or alternatively it is possible that the card I used soaked up too much of the embossing ink before I got the powder on.  Then also I couldn't seem to avoid having little splashes of the powder on the main part of the tags, even though I had used my little anti-stat bag.  So after using up 12 of the tags I decided not to continue as I didn't like the way they looked.  So I have stamped 12 more to replace them & tomorrow will have to cut them out with my Nestabilitie die. I was very disappointed as the silver edge did look better when laid on the coloured p...

Good evening everyone & hasn't it been nice to see the sunshine again. Today has seen the next stage of the pillow boxes.  First I popped into PBC for some ribbon & a Versamark pen.  I need the pen because I am going to emboss the edges of the HSNW logo tag with silver, & the pen will be easier for more precise placement of the embossing ink.  I think it will look much nicer than just plain.  The ribbon I bought, which is going to go around the boxes, has silver edging as well. Before settling down to make up the pillow boxes I spent a little while searching through my CD's for the materials for this weeks CD Sunday Challenge which I want to enter.  I had to make a decision today in order to make the card, as the challenge changes again this coming Sunday.  That decision made & some manipulation done I printed off everything I required.  Tomorrow it's cutting out & putting together.  I have chosen  ........... wel...

Hello ladies Uhm! I seem to have lost a day again - who stole Tuesday? So Tuesday - in the morning I had a really pleasant workshop down at PBC doing the embroidery on paper workshop. There was supposed to have been 3 ladies but one of them had a rather nasty cold & decided to give it a miss.  I don't normally run them for less than 3 - but couldn't very well send the ladies home.  Still it was a very pleasant workshop & they enjoyed the work. Before the workshop started I spoke to Lesley about Friendly Plastic & doing a workshop with it.  The shop doesn't sell it but that evidently doesn't matter.  So we decided to try one in May. Then later in the morning whilst my ladies were having a coffee break, I was walking around the shop having a look to see what new things had come in & overheard 2 ladies talking about jewellery making & one mentioned Friendly Plastic.  Me being me I poked my nose into their conversation, apologising but ...

Hello ladies I hope you all had an enjoyable weekend, & that those of you who are Mothers and Grandmothers were spoilt rotten yesterday. On Saturday Bob & I drove over to a little village in Staffodshire called Gnosall.  This is where Bob spent a lot of his younger life & we went to put some flowers on his parents grave.  I picked some beautiful daffodils out of our garden to take as I thought they would be nice for Mothers Day, & Bob told me that they were one of his fathers' favourite flowers, which I didn't know.  So a good choice. Yesterday we had a quiet day rounded off with family round for dinner in the evening.  Gareth came round & Nadine came without Russ as he was working until about 10:00pm poor thing, but I plated him a meal for Nadine to take home with her. Craft wise I put the finishing touch to the couple of samples for the Embroidery on Paper workshop that I am doing tomorrow morning.  Here is a...

Hi ladies Well! today was supposed to be warm & sunny - but I think they got it wrong don't you? I didn't fill my day as planned after all as Gareth rang me yesterday on his way back home from Germany to see if I would like to go out to lunch today for my Mothers Day treat. Now I am not one to turn down a pleasant few hours over a good lunch - so I said yes.  Of course Bob came along as well - couldn't leave him at home.  We went along to the newish pub near us - the Running Hare.  It is a newish pub but had recently had a fire problem & only re-opened yesterday after its refit.  A lovely meal & most enjoyable couple of hours in good company. I had spent most of the morning hunting for a book I felt sure I still had, to do with embroidery on paper.  I am running a workshop on this & wanted to look out some new designs.  I can't find it anywhere so  I hope I haven't lent it to someone & forgotten who.  Anyway I di...