Rubber Stamping - North Wales

Birthday Greetings Today is 31 March & a Mold II member has a birthday Happy Birthday Elma Have  lovely day 

Hi everyone Just popping in for a quick chat. Tomorrow, as I might have mentioned earlier, is the last cake making day for my god-daughters wedding cake.  In the afternoon I am going round to my daughter-in-laws home to make the cake.  She is a very good sponge maker so I am hoping for some of her success to rub off on me.  Also our oven does bake a little unevenly - so I hope to also get rid of that problem. In the morning I will be picking up the ingredients plus visiting the cake decorating shop in Mold for all the final bits & pieces - such as a cake box, a couple of boards, the nice lacy tape that goes around the edge of the thick boards (actually I have just had a thought - they would go well on cards too - hmmm! think I might buy a bit extra to see), plus the icing for the Madeira/sponge layer.  I will also need a quick check to see if I have enough ribbon - but I know I can match that up at Hobbycraft. Sunday I hope to put the ribbon around those ...

Hi ladies Just popping in to say that I have made an update to the Mold II club page. On Tuesday's club night I forgot to take along the sketch for April's Show & Tell.  So we decided to swap April & May around for just the Show & Tell,  So I have noted this on the club page (in red - so that it stands out).  Honestly, my head.  Just as I thought I had got everything organised.  Ah well! back later 'Bye

Good afternoon ladies. Another beautiful day. I have just come in for a little walk around the area.  I am trying to go for a little walk each day & if I need anything up in the village to walk, & also if i go down to the craft shop - as long as I am not carrying a lot of things. I do hope this good weather is not going to come at a price for the weather in the summer months, but I also hope it carries on into next week.  We are never satisfied are we? Right here are the photos from the Mold II meeting on Tuesday.  It is of their project for the evening - the Napkin fold card. I used to have some of that blue poppy paper it is so lovely.  Another blue one - the contrast of spots & stripes is really good & a lovely glittery flower in the centre. Really nice bright version with a lovely shiny floral image in the centre.  A butterfly napkin - very delicate That burgundy shade works really well against the blue & what a great sent...

Good evening ladies I am sorry I didn't blog last night.  Although I was home at a resonable time after the Mold II meeting there were a couple of phone calls from whilst I as out that needed my attention. The evening went really well & the photos in this blog are for the Show & Tell for the evening which was to make a card using the colours cream, pink & red.  Now, it appears that pink is another colour that changes when photographed.  Or it does with my photography.  I recently acquired a little battery operated desk lamp - halogen I think.  I am going to try taking photos with that on to see if it helps. I loved this paisley design & that doily style edging - which was very definitely pink. It is a long time since I have seen - & also used - these mosaic punches.  don't they work well & nice & evenly spaced too. A fantastic shaker card - again, definitely pink not lavender Isn't that butterfly gorgeous - so delicate ...

Good evening ladies Well! I did a little more sorting out of my stash today.  I am trying to reduce the items where I have more than one, or one set, & hopefully someone can make use of them. I also took photos of the 4 cards I put together yesterday.  I keep finding partially made cards - or envelopes with images in for going on cards - so I am trying to put them together as I find them. Here are the 4 that went together yesterday.  I must apologise I didn't  take them out of their cello bags; These first 2 - were from the days when I did quite a bit of Spirelli.  You know! The technique where you wound threads around the image - like the zig zag shape above.  A bit like the old nail & thread pictures back in the 60's?  OK so you are not that old.  But I didn't do that part on these cards just left them plain. these 2 were made from background papers & topper images from a magazine (I think). Tomorrow night is the March m...

Birthday Greetings Today is 26 March & a Mold II member has a birthday Happy Birthday Rita Have a lovely day I am sorry I had your birthday in the wrong meeting month so here is another flower just from me

Good evening ladies I hope you have all  had a lovely weekend & made the most of this beautiful weather.  It seems this coming week is going to be good too. Today I have tried to do a little sorting out of my craft stash - & it was just a little sort this time.  I am going to have a good purge on some things - so keep an eye I may have them with me on club nights. I also sorted the cards left over from the fund-raising function I took them to - plus added to them some more that I had sitting in a box.  I now have quite a large basket of cards.  Then I sat & finished making a few more that were only partially made.  I will probably take some photos tomorrow. That is all for today - I just wanted to pop in for a quick chat. Sleep well.  More tomorrow - 'Bye for now.

Hi ladies This time I am writing & posting to the correct blog. Following on from yesterday .................... Considering the small size of the craft section at The Range - I still managed to buy some things.  I found a brilliant set of stamps of cars - there was a Model T Ford, Porsche 911 & a VW Beetle & something else.  My neighbour thought they were so good she bought a set too - even though I told her she could borrow mine.  I think they are going to look great as monochrome images - but we will see what comes out once I get to play. There were some nice ribbons on special offer per roll. I currently have a thing about ribbons - I need them in all colours, sizes & patterns.  Plus I bought 2 little papier mache drawer units - which I am hoping to alter.  By alter I mean decorate in some way - not change how they look - well yes, it does mean that too - I mean, they will still each be a 3-drawer unit, but looking different.  St...

Hi ladies Late yesterday I did my blog report for you - but tonight as I came here to write again I found that I had posted it to my personal blog instead.  You know, if I had a brain ............................. Anyway I have copied it here for you for tonight............ I had a really nice day today  (that will now ready - yesterday) with my neighbour Sylvia - in our visit to "The Range". We went to the Blackburn branch. They have a reasonably good sized craft section - but a little of lots of things. None the less I did find some good things. I bought a set of unmounted stamps that were all cars. I walked around the selection several times deciding I would buy them then changing my mind, then changing it again. I also bought a couple of sets of papier mache drawer units. I fancy doing some "altering" on them - ooh yes & a sort of picture frame with 3 recesses (also in papier mache). The journey home was a little fraught as the M6 was really ...

Good afternoon ladies This afternoon I made some time for a play session.  Quite a while ago I joined a group that makes & exchanges tags.  Rather naughtily I have fallen behind - so it is time for me to catch up.  My favourite oriental poppy stamp This butterfly & little flower were part of a free set with a magazine Another freebie set, I love the dovecote These 3 stamps are part of a 6 stamp set they are all just under 1" square The bird is from the same set as the dovecote, & the little flower from the magazine free set Each of the tags has been coloured with dye-based inks (not distress inks!!! for a change) & all images are stamped with black archival ink.  I need to take another look at them tomorrow to see whether I want to add any embellishments & of course add some fibres or ribbon. Tomorrow I am taking my friend & neighbour out for the day.  She too is into stamping & all ways of card making.  We are going to...

Good afternoon ladies I thought you might like to see the 70th birthday card I made for Bob's friend.  I do hang my head as no stamping was involved. I created everything through "My Craft Studio".  The background paper & the large round central image with car I printed to fit an 8x8 card.  I then layered the background paper onto some silver paper to frame it & mounted it onto the square white card, then mounted the circular image on foam pads, & manipulated a second version of the image so that the car registration was UR70.  I then cut out just the car & mounted it onto foam pads, placing it over the other image for a 3-d effect.  The second photo is of one side of the card inserts.  Again through MCS I was able to manipulate the text to appear in a circle within the faded version of the round image. Definitely one for "large" postage, this one. All in all I was rather pleased with the outcome.  I hope the person re...

Good evening ladies Well today did not go well.  I took the petals I had made yesterday to make them into flowers.  Oooh no!  Complete failure - several broke & the rest would not make a "round" flower - they just seemed to want to go in a straight line.  I was at a loss. This afternoon I was in Mold - so I popped in to a flower shop - Pot-Pourri? - & the lady there let me have a good look at the flowers & was really helpful, - as soon as I said I would like to look at them she knew I was going to be making them in sugar paste.  In the end I bought a couple of stems in order to study them. From this study I learnt that the petals were a little more spoon shaped than I had created earlier. So I am now waiting to see what 6 petals left to dry in dessert spoons will look like when dry. This evening as I sat thinking about the flowers I remembered the lady in the florists saying - "well, if you can make roses - you can make these".  So then I h...

Good morning ladies! So! the first day of spring - it doesn't feel like it - although all those lovely daffodils do make you feel like it is here, but it must be right as that is what Google says this morning. Last night was March's meeting at Happy Stampers & for our project we revisited the grid technique.  I haven't used this technique for quite some time & really enjoyed trying it again.  Here are my 2 pieces of work from the evening - the dark surround is the mat they were laid on when I took the photos; The 3 stamps used in the photo above had not seen light of day for some time ................... ............... whereas these 4 stamps were brand new.  Caroline had some sales items with her last night & I couldn't resist these different flower heads.  I think that's the quickest I have ever used newly purchased stamps. I used Crushed Olive, Rusty Hinge & Wild Honey distress inks.  Then the images were...

Good afternoon ladies Things are slowly moving on with the cake, I think I have already told you that my god-daughter changed her mind about the tulips.  I now know the flower - Lisianthus (I showed you a photo of one), but there still seems to be some decisions to be made.  This is mainly about the depth of colour I think.  Anyway I have today made a start on a "dry" run of the flower in 2 sizes.  At the moment the individual petals have been made & they are drying on some bubble wrap.  Tomorrow I shall put them together & possibly colour one in a light shade & one in a darker shade then send the photos to my friend for Karen to look at. I have never made this flower before but it uses a rose petal cutter so that is at least something I am used to.  On Saturday my friend sent some lavendar ribbon to go around the cake - then this morning she phoned me to say that she had found a slightly wider version & was sending that to me today...

Hi - I am back. This time with the photos from Thursdays project which was the Napkin Fold card, & Joanna showed the ladies how to make this. Some of them have just the decorated paper, some have central images & the best way to show them was to lay them down partially open.  I won't write a comment under each - just scroll through them & enjoy them.  I was pleased to see that some had stamping on them. The next one is one of Joanna's that she brought along to show.  The sentiment on the front is off her birthday card that I made for her at some time.  Doesn't it look good in the centre of that napkin fold. This is a nice way of using up background papers that are left from other projects because you only need small pieces.  Plus of course preprinted background papers can be turned into something different if you stamp over them. Another good project & I hope that Mold II & CSNW will enjoy making them when their turn comes...