Little gift bag punch board pouch

Just popped by to share with you a little package I made,

to make a friend smile, she's been through a lot lately.

I thought it would be really simple to make on the

Gift Bag Punch Board, (GBPB)

except

it wasn't wide enough,

and I only needed a depth of 1/4".

So, plan B...used the scoreboard to make the sides,

and front n back,

used the GBPB to make the tops and bottoms,

cut off excess bits,

and punched holes.

First time I've used the hole punch,

and if you line it up you can punch gift tag too.

Threaded some lush satin ribbon

and made a very wonky bow!

Tried to unwonky it,

but it wasn't having it!

I'm sure she'll like it anyway!

Hope you are having a good week

Lesley

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Just for you

First of all a very big welcome to my new followers!

I will always try and follow you back,

it might just take a while......

If you'd like me to pop up automatically in your blog list,

it's really easy to do!

Just click the 'join this site' or 'follow' button and see!

Happy Birthday to my sis-in-law today,

I sent her one of my bokeh makes.

I wasn't sure if it was a bit pale, so added some coloured circles.

Just shows you should never give up on a project,

just try something different!

Enjoy a restful Sunday if you can

Lesley

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Rudolph Day in June

It's that time of the month again!

Rudolph Day!

This is when we enter our latest xmas cards

into ScrappyMo's challenge

Playing with my new dies,

I cut a slither of trees, added it to an embossed snowy background,

added some faux stitching et voila!

I'm still in the habit of making two,

so this ones two layers of trees, inked and faux stitch edged,

plus a stamped and punched tree form SU.

Have a fab weekend

Lesley

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Gesso Bubbly

I hope you are sitting comfortably for this one!

Sarn taught us how to make Gesso Bubbles!

First we blended ink onto the card that had already been prepped.

(Sarn glued a diecut to the card, and painted over the whole thing.)

I went for a soft pink and green inks,

which we then stamped onto randomly,

using the same inks.

We then splodged gesso through a stencil,

and heated it until the circles bubbled and stood proud.

White pen enhance the flower petals.

The bubbles are delicate and would squish in the post,

which is also a lovely texture, but I'm not sure I can part with this one!

Thanks for sharing Sarn,

and thank you for visiting,

I really do appreciate you dropping by and leaving your lovely comments.

Have a wonderful weekend

Lesley

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Fresh Flower Shop

Jan brought us this simply elegant card to make.

The card front has been cut diagonally to add interest,

then an embossed triangle layered on top.

She supplied an avalanche of coloured vellum petals,

which was very difficult to choose from!

I went for the new Mint Macaron,

and added rhinestones in their centres.

We also made a matching envelope with the new envelope paper from

Stampin' Up!

I hope you like this Midweek Minty Macaroni Magic!

Lesley

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Pictogram Punch perfect

How cute is this little envelope from Liz,

with the button and tag adding detail.

Just shows that all small packages.....

Liz also helped us make this lovely window blind effect card.

She had us ripping eeek!, but with a template,

so it was 'controlled tearing' lol

We pierced above the rolled up blind to thread the twine through,

and added the cute tag above the flower pot from Pictogram Punches.

I hope your week is going well

Lesley

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Play day swaps

Happy Monday everyone.

Here's some samples to make your week sparkle

From Sarn a stunning stepper card

with matching envelope,

completely awesome in all ways

From Liz a flowering wall of loveliness.....

she scored all the bricks by hand!!!!

From Jan a tagtastic splendour of butterfly beauty,

with all that softly blended ink 

It was only when the sun shone on it yesterday,

I realised quite how sparkly it is!

Hope your week is as sparkly!!!!

Lesley

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Happy Father's Day

Happy Sunday everyone

and 

Happy Father's Day to all the Dads

and

remembering all those no longer with us...

A collage from Guy Greetings

With a pop-up inside from various other stamps

Hope your day is good whatever you are doing

Lesley

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Two little ducks

We have this loving pair visit every day,

their own private spa (our pond),

and fed on demand (when they quackkkk!),

sunbathing around the pool afterwards.

She's just had a dip, and is doing a bit of yoga,

whilst he watches lazily,

and 'Percy Pelican' spouts water in between to aerate their hydro pool!

(our plastic fountain lol)

Lesley

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Thoughts of You .....and ink

I have a friend who's had a major op,

so wanted to send her a card to help her mend.

I bought a new stencil, cut one out, sprinkled brushos through it,

and sprayed/spritzed/misted with water.

It was a bit 'runny' so I tried again and it was even more 'blurry'.

So, plan B was to sprinkle onto approx parts of card,

spritz with water again, and cut the stencil,

lining up the stem and flower within the appropriate colours.

I'm sure I could have explained that better!

Anyhoo, I cut another outline from black card,

inserted the inked bits,

which resulted in the above 'thoughts of you'.

I'm going to enter this in Happy Little Stampers

June CAS challenge

and as I used lots of snippets......

off to the Snippets Playground I go!

See ya later!

Lesley

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New Weekly Deals

This week's bargains have arrived!

Built for Free Using: My Stampin Blog

I hope your week is going well

Lesley

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Happy Little Stampers Sarndangle

I've enjoyed the Happy Little Stampers challenges recently (HLS),
they have two a month, one is a sketch

so I'm entering this one:

I used a special edition stamp from Sarn,

Digi ones can be found at stampingforpleasure.blogspot.com

Also just learnt that:

......just sayin' !

Have fun
Lesley
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52 CCT June Challenge

I was lucky to have a trip to Whitstable recently,

where we like to have lunch at the Whitstable Oyster Co.

It just so happens that there is also a very nice little craft shop

that specialises in stamps and dies.

They were running a workshop, which I would have 

loved to have  joined in if I'd lived locally.

Obviously I had to have a look to see if I needed anything!

I came across this lovely die that consists of two tree-lined hills,

a city scape, and a fence, all in miniature scale.

As soon as I saw the 52CCT June Challenge

to use black, white and one other colour,

I knew exactly what I was going to do,

and for once it turned out like I'd planned in my head!

I used Island Indigo for the base,

then simply added three die cut strips layered,

and stamped a simple sentiment, and my favourite flying santa

from Holiday Home.

I hope you have a good week

Lesley

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Bokeh blooms and butterflies

Bokeh backgrounds can go from this.....

to this.....

to this!......

These two awesome cards were made by the super talented Ros Maggs

who attends my classes, and sells some cards locally.

I hope you'll have a go at this technique.

It's actually quite easy, lots of messy fun,

and very effective!

ENJOY!

Lesley

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bit more bokeh

Some more bokeh produced by my talented class-goers

we used SU Shimmery White card stock for the sponging

very muted but still effective in real life

Textured watercolour card for the watercolour background,

because it needs to take a lorrawater,

love the heart shape formed on this one

you can stamp before or after adding the circles,

just be careful to dry and not smudge the ink

work in progress.....

The green one on the left had added coloured circles

I'll be back with just a couple more!

Lesley

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Bokeh Butterflies

Morning!

Some more Bokeh to share today....

some of the backgrounds,

watercoloured or sponged,

with circles of white craft ink added

Love Butterfly Basics

Papillon Potpourri

Balloon Bash (Retired)

I'll be back with some that my class-goers made

Lesley

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Bokeh

Bokeh

bouquet

bokay

bo que?

so how do YOU pronounce it?!

I've had such fun with this technique,

based on trying to replicate a photographic effect

of a blurred background from a light source

creating circles or other shapes.

Just google bokeh to see what I mean!

Here's the messy bit of making  backgrounds:

watercolour, with reinkers and errr water lol

sponged with inks and errr a sponge

Take a mask (I made my own with circle punches)

and white craft ink, sponge or daub circles of various sizes,

overlapping them until you are happy with the effect

Here's some samples:

The bottom right one shows some circles added in other colours,

as I felt it looked a bit wishy washy.

Here's a couple of finished cards,

where I've chopped bits off

I like the strips so much I stuck some back on!

Here I used the waste to punch from

I hope you like these coz I've a few more to show you!

I'll be back.......

Lesley

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