Less is More - Week 62 Three Shades of Green

Thanks to the typical Bank Holiday weather and me feeling unwell, the Easter weekend was a bit of a washout.  However the girls enjoyed the 'indoor' egg hunt and today, when I was supposed to be back at work, the weather changed so I booked an extra day's leave and we drove out to our friend's farm in Ludlow and had a brilliant day riding on a trailer on the back of a quad bike, feeding the baby lambs and  finished off with a lovely meal in a little country pub. The girls really enjoyed themselves and both fell asleep on the journey home.

Stamps: Leaves Set from http://www.craftfairy.co.uk/, Craftwork Cards 'Springtime and Sentiments'

Inks: Distress inks Peeled Paint, Shabby Shutters

Embellishments: Kraft card, twine, button

All the green of the countryside reminded me to post my entry for this week's Less is More challenge which is Three Shades of Green. I don't know why but green always makes me want to go 'au naturale', hence the twine and kraft card.

Less is More - Week 61 Lucky Dip

I am so chuffed that I managed to submit a challenge entry over at Less is More every week throughout March. It's great seeing everyone's different interpretations on the challenges and it's really nice to receive comments from other crafters; it really makes my day when I log onto Blogger and see 'Comments to Moderate' (how sad am I?!).

These weeks's challenge is a Picture Inspiration based on this picture from Design Seeds.

Apologies for the quality of the photo, but despite the lovely spring flowers in the Picture Inspiration it actually snowed here nearly all day yesterday. Crazy weather - last week the girls had their summer dresses on, this week it's back to layers and boots!

Stamp: Hero Arts 'Large Blossom Background', Craftwork Cards 'Springtime and Sentiments'

Inks: Memento London Fog

Other: Promarkers

I was on the hunt for a poppy stamp at the Hobbycrafts show at the NEC but couldn't find one. I've since ordered the Hero Arts Poppy Background which inspired me to use the Blossom background I already have. I stamped the image in grey then coloured with promarkers and mat and layered onto white then grey cardstock. I rounded the bottom right hand corner for a bit of interest and embossed a single line below the sentiment on my Hougie board.

I'm really not sure about the finished card though; I think there's maybe something missing?

Less is More - Week 60 Recipe

As you can see from these two photos of my gorgeous 40th Birthday cake (made by my vary talented cousin at Karen's Celebration Cakes), two of my favourite things are purple and butterflies. So when I discovered that this week's Less is More challenge was a 'Recipe' challenge, I immediately knew two of the three challenges that I would be using; Week 16 Butterflies and Week 49 Predominantly Purple.

Inks: Memento Grape Jelly, Versa Color Heliotrope, Memento Tuxedo Black

Stamps: Craftwork Cards 'Springtime and Sentiments'

And this is my card. I stamped some off the butterflies 'off the edge' of the card giving me my third challenge; Week 6 Off the Edge. I needed a quick card for an elderly neighbour whose been taken into hospital so I made my second ever one layer card; I think I might be getting the hang of it!

All shopped out!

Especially for Steph at Stamping & Sharing by Stephanie, here's a pic of the goodies I bought at the Hobbycraft show at the NEC yesterday.

Doesn't look much there considering how much I spent but I did get most things off 'my list'..... and some!  I seem to have gone a bit OTT on the stamp sets but I just had to have them all! Every other store seemed to be selling Memory Box dies, obviously the 'in' thing at the moment, but as far as dies are concerned all I bought was an Xcut nesting heart die and a Spellbinders Nestabilities (Labels Twenty) to go with a gorgeous Justrite stamp set; looking forward to playing with those. There were a few things I didn't get; Inkyliscious do some lovely, excellent value for money stamp sets, but the ones I wanted all sold out on the Thursday :( Will have to wait until pay day before I think about ordering them and another Spellbinders Nestabilities die I couldn't find.

Less Is More - Week 59 Masking

This time tomorrow I will be back home stroking all the lovely crafty things I'm planning on purchasing at the Hobbycraft show at the NEC! Fortunately, living in Birminhgam, the NEC is just a short hop away on the motorway for me - less than half an hour. I've chatted to ladies at shows before who have travelled miles and spent a small fortune just to get there.  I don't think I could ever be a country bumpkin, I'd miss the convenience of surburbia far too much! Last Friday I took my 8 year old daughter to see JLS at the LG Arena, then Daddy took our 4 year old to the NIA on the Saturday to see Disney on Ice, then back to the NEC for me tomorrow for a full day of craft shopping!
Anyway, the challenge over at Less is More this week is masking. I must confess, after watching the very talented Barbara Gray making brayering look sooooo easy, I more or less demanded a brayer for Christmas from my other half! Unfortunately, I've had very little success with it and it's only been out the box twice - ooops.  So the sunset (or sunrise?!) on this card was done with distress inks and a blending tool. The masking technique I used was the old favourite "circle punched post-it note for the sun" technique. I also tore some copier paper to mask the sky whilst inking in the landscape. I'm pretty pleased with the way it turned out, what do you think?

Papers: First Edition 'Desert Blooms'

Stamps: Inkyliscious 'The Coppice' and  'Take Flight - Birds'

Inks: Spiced Marmalade, Fired Brick, Brushed Courdroy and Mustard Seed Distress Inks,

Memento Rich Cocoa

Sentiment: Paula Pascual Double Sayings by Personal Impressions

Stampin' Up inspired CAS card

Have had the day off work today as my 'ickle car had to have a service and MOT. As well as catching up on housework that I didn't do yesterday (tut, tut), I managed to fit in the time to make this card for a friend's birthday. The design is based on a Stampin' Up card in the current Idea Book & Catalogue.

It's quite sad how reliant we are on our cars - I was so glad to get mine back!  Had to take the girls on the bus from school to collect the car from the garage. £3 to go less than a mile - no wonder so many people drive! Thought the girls were going to freak out when about 40 noisy secondary school kids got on, but thankfully our journey passed without event.

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to all the lovely Mums in Bloggerland.  I was a very lucky Mommy and had 2 lovely cards off the girls (Daddy chose v well this year!) and a foot spa which I will be trying out later.  Mia, (my 4 year old), decorated 2 cupcakes at nursery which she polished off herself.  Not sure whether her nursery teacher is trying to tell me something but the one cupcake was decorated with a Loveheart sweet; how cute I hear you say, but my Loveheart said "Grow Up"!  How very rude!
Lastminute.com as usual, I finished my Mother's Day cards for my Mom just before we went to visit her today! 

Papers: First Edition New Leaf

Dies: Spellbinders Oval, Xcut Tags, Joycrafts butterflies

Punch: Fiskars Apron border punch

Stamps: Magnolia Love Letter, tea cups free with mag

Sentiment: Computer generated

Inks: Antique Linen, Brushed Courdroy Distress inks, Memento Rich Cocoa

Embellishments: Seam binding, adhesive pearls 

And then this one (my favourite of the two) is from the girls to their Nanny. It's an easel card with a post-it note pad attached to the base so Mom can keep it by her telephone.

Papers: HOTP free with mag

Dies: Spellbinders Circle, Scalloped circle and Oval

Punch: Stampin' Up Heart to Heart, Martha Stewart branch

Stamps: Magnolia 'Tilda with Straw Hat'

Sentiment: Computer generated

Embellishments: Wild Orchid Crafts paper flowers, Chocolate lace, post-it note pad