Playing with Copics again!

In between making the cards that I have to, I have sat and played with my Copics every now and then. Still trying to get blending right and experimenting with a few differnet colour combinations!

To save some much needed time I thought I'd work with images I had already got ready in my little box...problem with that is that most have probably been stamped in Stazon...so I resorted to a few little downloads I am ashamed to say I have never ever used!!

Yep, I know I haven't finished yet but I dread to think how long these images have been sitting in that box. At least they are one step closer to being on a card now. LOL


I have stuck with my bright and cheerful Copic colours, finished with a little bit of glitter gel pen and my ever faithful Glossy Accents.

Dottie's World and Sketch Saturday

For "my slot" on Dotties World today I decided to make a card for this week's sketch on Sketch Saturday. My card was made in dribs and drabs because my week has just been so hectic...but I got there........eventually.

I used Oh so Pretty Dottie from the Back 2 Front download collection. The colours were inspired by the cheery Urban Rhapsody paper by K & Co. I might still need to attack my card with glittler pen or some glossy accents...I haven't decided yet.

A little bit of news!!!

I have been bursting at the sides to tell, to shout to jump up and down a bit. Have a little look

HERE!!!!

Copic Colour Challenge #2

Today has been a funny old day....the morning was awful, spent it on phone to LEA and schools regarding the complete lack of inclusion in Amelia's school and it seems the fight that is ahead of of us to get her into a Special School in September when she is due to start Juniors! I got quite emotional I am afraid to say, the thought of putting us all through another tribunal process is terrible but if it comes to it, we have no other choice!

I spent the afternoon with ten screaming two year olds and I am eagerly awaiting news of my last NVQ assignments I rushed through and submitted yesterday!!! EEK...I am all over the place but I have got a few things done and off my to do list ...for a while anyway!

Let's get on with a bit of crafting...I started this card this morning but dithered so much over what colours to substitute with in this weeks Copics Colour Challenge...I ran out of time before work this afternoon. This weeks colour are:

Now I really struggled with thes, perhaps the mood I was in this morning all the talk of tribunals didn't help but I just couldn't work out the closest colours to use!LOL Eventually I went for R27 as my nearest red, YG41 my nearest green and B23 as my nearest blue but I don't really feel happy that the combination is anywhere as is should be!! I obviously NEED more Copics to avoid this situation happening again! (wink, wink!)

What with my colour combination, my next stuggle was a patterned paper, I found a few but just wasn't happy....I was very hard to please earlier I will tell you now......so I settled for a very clean, simple and extremely basic approach. The pplan was to make the colours of the Copics do most of the work for me...I hope it worked!!

A Stampavie card for Cute Card Thurdsay!

This week over on Cute Card Thursday the challenge is Signs of Spring! I had this paper in mind for this challenge last time I used it, I think the colours are so fresh and cheery. Once again I coloured with my Copics and highlighted with gel pens.

I decided to do a bit more hand-stitching after I had enjoyed doing the recent Dottie's World Challenge card so much. The plan was to pierce all the holes and sit a stitch of an evening whilst watching TV with hubby...but I got a bit carried away and just couldn't put it down!! LOL

Experimenting with Copics and Paper Artsy!

I fanicied trying out something a little different to my cutie stamps last night but was pretty uninspired by the lack of "non-cute" stamps I have. (Must try harder!) But I used a scrap of card, quickly stamped a Paper Artsy image and took it downstairs to play whilst I watched Supernatural...yes, I know I lead such an exciting life don't I!!! LOL

I thought I'd try out the colours from the Copic Colour Challenge again....cannot wait for ther next colours to be announced to be honest...I have gone Copic mad!

Not sure it "works" not even sure what to do with it now.....but was quite fun attempting a different type of image.....Now - please , what should I do with it apart from bin it ?

Cupcakes from a crafter!

I am SO NOT a cook! BUT for a while now I have wanted to start to do a little bit more cooking/baking with the children. I thought it would be good learning skills for Jack and Amelia and just something we could hopefully all do together. We so need some good family time!

So when I saw that Jules had started up a Family Challenge Blog - I earmarked it straight away. Yesterday Jules announced the first Family Challenge - CUPCAKES!


Well I told Jack about it last night and he is making himself a bookmark and this morning as I did the housework, hubby went down to the supermarket for a few bits and I added a few ingredients onto his list! This afternoon we have had a great time, weighing out and mixing and we have just sampled our efforts. Not as light and fluffy as I would have liked but not bad for a first attempt at any baking (apart from a mixture in a box!) in quite a few years.

Dottie's World- Blast from the past!

It's Lou's turn to set the challenge over on Dottie's World this Sunday and what a great challenge it is-I thoroughly enjoyed this one Lou-thank you.

"This week I want you to look through your photos of cards you've made in the past, find one you really like then recreate it using the exact same layout but with different papers and embellishments! Of course there must be a Charmed download image in there too! "

Now-my biggest problem, being the ditherer that I am...what one of my old cards do I use? To make it simple I clicked on my blog labels and found my first ever Dottie download, in fact my first ever download image.

Here is my original;

and here is my challenge card!

I can remember feeling so proud of myself for managing to download! LOL. The original card was made April last year.

Remember to pop over to Dottie's World to see what the rest of the Design Team have come up with and join in the challenge this week to a) get your FREEBIE download and b) be in the the chance of being selected as Guest Designer for March!!!!

Stampavie with Ismaki sketch challenge!

Another image I coloured from last night and made up this afternoon. I haven't used these stamps much yet and I have a few more crying to be tried out with my Copics!

I made this card to the sketch over at Ismaki Challenge this week by turning the layout on it's side. Papers by K & Co.

Basic Grey and a free Holly download!

Last night Lou emailed over the latest freebie download image up for grabs over on Dottie's World tomorrow. Meet Holly in the USA!

I printed her off straight away and coloured her in. This morning I decided that she went quite nicely with my new Basic Grey, Two Scoops paper so popped over to BasicGrey Challenges to see what the challenge was this week. I was so pleased to see it was a colour challenge as I am loving them at the moment, and one of the options being pink & green suited my card perfectly.

Pop over to Dottie's world to see another example of Holly in the USA and get the details of how you can get a free download.

Copic colours used; E00, E21, E02, E33, E35, BG10, G21, E47, B32, B23.

Imaginisce meets Toodles and Binks!!!

This card has taken so many changes today. The idea came to me in the middle of the night (!!!) when I was thinking about what to work on next and ways to use some of the design team images. I thought about incorporating the little Imaginisce Snag'em Stamps I have fairly recently treated myself to...but never used!! So after breakfast I set to work on this idea with a blog sketch challenge but somehow it just never worked out with the proportion of the images and the layout required. I also couldn't face myself to cover up any more of the beautiful Fairest of them all glittery paper! Then I decided to make a little matching topper/tag to meet the requirement of this week's Papertake Weekly Challenge!

"This weeks challenge is to make a matching set! You could make a matching card and envelope, a card and tag, a card and ATC, a LO and a tag - the combinations are endless!"

Now I am not actually sure whether or not to make it into a tag or even use it inside the card or on the envelope....decisions, decisions! I have so enjoyed going all girly and glittery though!

I used the beautiful Celeste stamp from Toodles and Binks but I must admit to panicking a bit whilst trying to colour her dress, I MUST get myself some different card for my copics!

Here are the colours I used:

E00 Skin white, E21 baby skin pink, E02 Fruit pink, RV21 light pink, RV23 pure pink, E04 lipstick natural, Y17 Golden yellowYR23 yellow orchre, B32 pale blue, B23 phthalo blue, C1 cool gray and C3 cool gray.

Tilda and Copics sketch card.

I couldn't resist a little Magnolia stamp a fellow crafter was selling the other day and today it arrived. So this afternoon a stamped a few images and let Amelia loose on one of them with her pens (NO WAY is she going anywhere near MY Copics! LOL) While that kept her occupied for all of 5 minutes, I made a vain attempt to make a card. That was just after lunch and I have been working on it in fits and starts all afternoon- basically when the children were calm!

I decided to try out this week's challenge over on Friday Sketchers.

I uhmm'ed and arhh'ed about using one of the many scraps of paper I have all over my little room....then I reached straight for the Basic Grey Two Scoops that arrived from Charmed the other day! Naughty...but rather nice to say the least! It was the candy sweet colours that appealled but unfortunately the lighting is awful once again. Must look into making a make shift light box thing! LOL

Copic colours I used ;

E00 skin white, E21 Baby skin pink, E02 Fruit pink, E 33 sand, E47 Dark brown, C3 Cool gray, C5 cool gray, RV42 Salmon pink, E04 natural lipstick, Bg10 Cool shadow, G21 Lime green, Yr23 yellow orchre.

Mid-week mojo, a little bit of love!

With the arrival of my new leafy quickutz and my crystal brads yesterday I took inspirations from a challenge over on A Spoon Full of Sugar. It was a sketch challenge by Debbie;

Well this sketch reminded me so much of the Dream Street papers I had lurking in my stash I just couldn't resist. I used Madison- Oh la la, from the Holly and Madison collection coloured with my wonderful Copics of course.

Whoo Hoo for Charmed Cards and Crafts!

I almost attacked the Postie today as he has loads of parcels for me. Some were quite small ( the images from the latest rubber stamped image swap I am hosting over at Carolyn's) but there was also one larger one....a 12x12 size one........whoo hooo!

Here's what I have spread all over my little craft room at the moment!

Some more Basic Grey!

Some K& Co!

And a few odds and ends.....as you can see, I ripped the quickutz out of it's packaging and had to try it out straight away! (doesn't everyone do that?)

Lighting is awful, but I couldn't resist spreading them all out.....beautiful Karen, and wonderful service as ever. Thank you!!!!

I also need to send a special thanks to someone else who will remain nameless- Thank you!

Sugar Nellie goes Copic too!

LOL...well have I told you I have this burning ambition to try out all my images with copics? EEEK!

Today I needed something quick and easy to pick up and put down as the children are at home. Just taken my pics and in the rush to get it finished and blogged before lunch, I have realised I didn't finish the little nose and the heart with glossy accents , or highlighte the little jumper with glitter pen as I had planned to!!! Oh well I can do that later! LOL

Anyway I have done this card for the challenge over on the Sugar Bowl where you must "Create a card using only one piece of patterned design paper." I took a very simple outlook on this! Great fun to colour this, my biggest issue initally was what could to do the little jumper so I picked my paper first!

Seeing as I had my copics out...

.....I made another card in the same colours as the last card!!! Well, would have been rude not to!

I am using some of the images I recieved from the Magnolia swap over on Crafts by Carolyn's forum last month. It's great to try out a few different images and my wish list is getting longer by the day!

For details of this colour challenge see the previos post or pop along to the Magnolia V Stampavie blog !

Another colour challenge!!

I am loving these at the moment-what better excuse than to try out my copics!LOL

Over on Magnolia V Stampavie this week they want you to use the following colours:

so I went to my stash and ended up with this!

I used combinations of ;

E35 Chamois and E47 Dark Brown for the chocolate colour, YG95 Pale Olive and G99 Olive for the olive green, B32 Pale blue and Bg09 in place of not quite Navy.

Loving these colours!

Dottie's World - A stitch in time!

It was my turn to set the challenge over on Dottie's World this week and seeing as I have a passion for texture I thought I'd ask for a bit of sewing!

This week I want to see stitching, hand or machine - but REAL stitching, no faux stitching like I am so fond of in my work!You must of course use one of more of the many, wonderful Charmed Downloads but the rest is up to you.

I am also going to see if I can enter this card for the Colouring Challenge over on the Charmed Forum......as this is the first time I have EVER hand stitched all the way around a card....LOL..and probably the last too!!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Rushing around today trying to catch up on life so hubby and me can relax a little tonight with a bottle of bubbly and a few (only a few) of the scrummy choccies he gave me this morning! YUM.



Not got any crafting to show you yet today as I am still completing my card ready for my challenge over on Dottie's World tomorrow morning. But I wanted to let you know about a fabby challenge that has just been launched over on the Charmed Forum. The challenge involves colouring a Charmed Download and one lucky entrant will get to choose a set of Marvy Markers!

The more entries you submit, the better your chance - so download now an get colouring! (Full info on the Charmed Forum!)

My latest card!

Just popped my latest card up on Dottie's World! I made it using one of the images I coloured in for the new download collection.....quite grungy, don't you think!

Sorry, colours are awful because of lighting-will try again later!

Funny Thursday!

Not in the HA HA sense either. Just feeling so tired and fed up with all the school issues. I had a bit of a run in with the SENCO yesterday morning as Amelia's support is being mucked up again. It's been hovering over us all for so long now and the school are no better prepared to take in a child with Down Syndrome now than there were nearly 5 years ago when I first approached them about Amelia.

On top of all that, I ahd to collect Amelia from school yet again this morning as she had a bit of a funny tummy. Had to phone in work and I HATE letting anyone down!! Saying that she has been a pleasure to be with this afternoon, we had so much fun and the sound of her laughter kept me going for a while.

I have just finished making another card, again, I am not sure of it but I think that just the way I am at the moment-trying to do so many things and not really feeling successful in any of them.
Anyway, seeing as I now have a few more Copic colours to play with I decided to have another go at the Copic Colour Challenge.

I still haven't got any of the actual colours requested so I used;



Y17 Golden Yellow, YR04 Chrome Orange, YR16 Apricot, YR23 Yellow Ochre

B23 Phthalo Blue, B32 Pale Blue, BV 04 Blue Berry

I am loving my Copics!!!