This is why I am so busy...

Hello blog friends!

Gosh! It is nearly Christmas and I am so so so behind with my Christmas cards and here is why- because... it is my daughter Jasmine's 6th birthday soon!!

I have been busy making the brithday invitations. Then party bags, cup cakes, and the cake will soon be on the production line. Oh my goodness and all these have to be done before this Sunday! Wish me luck!

No more wasting time, I just want to quickly share these invitations with you. With lots of help from my daughters colouring the images, here is what I came up with:

I've actually made more than three but don't know how to fit them all in one picture. But you get the idea! Both my daughters said they like all the fairies to be different and I guess why not?! So they have used their own artistic skills to colour and make each fairy unique in their own way. Here are a couple of the cards in close up.

And a medium close up photo of another card:

The fairy image is designed and drawn by myself. I am lucky enough to have had this image made into a rubber stamp by Elzybells, which unfortunately is closed now. The image is stamped onto white card and die cut by using Spellbinder labels nineteen. It has then been chalked while still in the die for definition.

This one has been coloured in by my eldest daughter Aimee. I love the way she created the stripy top and just used simple lines for the skirt. She also added extra lines around the star which made it really shine.

This one is coloured by Jasmine. I love this bright and colourful fairy. I have added Stickles Crystal glitter glue on all stars and flowers on the head.

Oh.. forgot to mention the inside of the card. I have printed all the party details on the computer. (For privacy reasons I used Photoshop to remove some of the details.) I cut these to size and punched a half circle on the right hand side. Then I simply attached double sided tape on three sides so that it became a pocket for the RSVP slip.

WOW! I don't think I have ever added so many photos in one post. Hope you have not been bombarded too much with all these pictures. I certainly enjoyed making these invitations with my daughters. Thank you for reading, if you managed to get this far down. Hope you all have a nice weekend.

Yes, Virginia... Happy Birthday!

Hello everyone!

I hope you all had a great weekend!

Virgina Lu is celebrating her 50th birthday on 9th of December and she is holding a virtual birthday party here at Yes, Virginia. Everyone is invited to join the birthday fun!

I've only knew Virginia for a few months. Her blog is very inspiring with lots of wonderful cards and her family stories always make me smile. So here it is, Virginia, my card for you. Hope you like it.

The main stamped image is from Precious Moment. For some reason I don't think Precious Moment stamps are available in the UK. (If anyone knows where I can buy them in the UK, please let me know. I just adore them!!) This stamp, given by a good friend of mine, came all the way from Taiwan. I guess it has a special meaning to use it on a card for Virginia - a blog friend also from Taiwan! Here is a close up photo of the main image.

This image was coloured by Copic marker and water colour pencils. I have added glitters on the flowers and bow on the hair, but I don't think it shows up on the photo. I have also made a small charm and added the Chinese word "珍惜" meaning cherish on the bottom right.

For this card, I have followed the sketch from Quixotic Paperie Sketch Challenge - No. 2  but rotated it 180 degrees.

Happy 50th Birthday, Virginia!! 

May all your wishes come true & have a great day! 

Hugs,

Christmas Cards with Wreath

Hi friends!

I am slacking off big time this month with my blogging. Naughty, naughty!  Well... there is life outside the blog world and it is usually so busy that you just cannot ignore it!

Anyway, I would first like to say welcome to my two new followers: Mary J and Sandra_how. I will promise to blog more often to share more cards.

OK, better get on with it. I am sharing two cards with you today. Yes, not one but TWO. I got this Christmas stamp set which comes free with docrafts Creativity! magazine issue 23. I was impressed by the magazine example as it uses one small holly stamp to create a wreath. I have always admired those people who can think 'out of the box'. Hence, I have to give it a try by recreating the example. So here it is.

I made a circle aperture card and stamped around the edge of the aperture with the small holly image. I also stamped additional holly images on to a spare white card, then cut and decoupaged them with foam pads. This will give some dimension. After this I stamped the robin and bow on to white card, coloured, cut and then attached them onto the wreath. Finally, the text was stamped, cut and attached with foam pads at the base of the card. Here is a closer look of the card.

I was pretty happy with the result. But hey! I can't just recreate what they did in the magazine. I had this other idea of my own using the same technique. The wreath around the aperture is just too huge. It took me ages to stamp and colour all those leaves and berries. Not to mention those extra holly leaves for decoupaging. Cutting them out nearly killed me!! So here is the other card I made.

I decided to make a smaller wreath, thinking that it might be easier and quicker. However, it didn't turn out as I wished because I decided to cut the whole wreath out!! Why did I do that??  All those little pointy holly leaves... my hand hurts even more after all that cutting. But I have to say it turned out quite nice. Do you think? Worth the effort!! The wreath and robin were attached on an embossed card with foam pads. Then I added a red ribbon and bow to finish the card. Just to add some texture, I have attached some beads on some of the berries and glitters on others. Here is another picture of the card close up.

  

Can you believe that? It will be Christmas in less than a month. Although this is a great idea to use a small holly stamp to create a wreath, I guess, due to the time it takes, I will not make another one like it this year. Have you finished all your Christmas cards? I am way behind. Quick and easy Christmas card designs are what I am looking for at the moment. Any suggestions?!

I will be entering my small wreath card in the following challenges:

Goylou's Inimitability- Christmas with a Wreath Twist
ABC DT Challenge- A Christmas Card Challenge

Thanks for stopping by. Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Clean and Simple Card

Hello my friends!

Doesn't it get dark a lot quicker, now we are officially not in the British summer time!! Daylight time has shortened and that is just so depressing.

Yesterday we went to my sister-in-law's place to celebrate her coming birthday on Monday. I spent the morning making the card and then rushed out to town to get her a present and rushed back to wrap the present. (Yes, not very organised. Everything is last minute!) After all this effort.......... what do we do? Everyone in my family jumped into the car trying to get to the party on time and no one picked up the card and present that were sitting at the bottom of the stairs and assumed one of the others had picked it up. The thing is, none of us realised it until we were nearly there. Oh dear~ That was embarrassing! Walking in without card and present in hand. My husband had to make another trip this morning to do a special delivery.

Anyway, glad the card and present have now landed in the right place. So here it is, a glance at the card.

I am joining The Play Date Cafe Challenge PDCC 105 and using the below colours as inspiration-

Kraft/Taupe...Flesh...Cadet Blue

I am also entering The Sugar Bowl Challenge 70 - Maria Therese's Sketch and using the optional theme Clean and Simple.

I am pretty happy with the card. I love the colour combination! Will definitely try this combo again. This is my first attempt to make a clean and simple style card. For me, it is not that easy to leave a huge white space untouched. I hope I am not doing too bad as a first timer.

Here is another photo for a closer look.

The stamped image is coloured with Copic markers. I used a piece of Retro Flowers Oilcloth pattern paper, which was cut out from the Cath Kidston catalogue, to paper piece the dress. The sentiment is from Clearly Hand Stamped set by Crafter's Companion. Then I hand stitched the border. (I do have a sewing machine but never use it to stitch cards. I guess I am just too lazy to take the machine out! ) Crystal Stickles glitter glue has been applied on the flower on her head and the fabric flowers.

That's it for now. Weekend just goes too quick but hope you all had a nice one! Enjoy the rest of your evening.  

Long Forgotten Die

Hello there!

If you were here yesterday, you will be asking "so how is the lemon and poppy seeds cake?" Well, hubby loves it, but my daughter Aimee certainly doesn't like it. She said it is too "lemony"!! My final verdict is......... it is DELICIOUS! The moist cake texture has a lovely tangy lemon syrup mix with the fragrance of poppy seeds. Gosh, it is like heaven! Wish you could all taste it!

Now back to card making. As a crafter, I bet we all have way too many tools, gadgets, stamps, papers etc. If you are like me, who loves to buy buy buy, over time you might forget what you have bought. I think it is about time that we all looked deep into our drawers to see what we've got and haven't yet used.

I have had this Sizzix Birthday Girl Sizzlits die for ages. (I think I bought it when it was on sale and it was really cheap. We all love a bargain don't we?! ) It was stored in my craft box and long been forgotten. Finally, after tidying up the other day it has again seen the light of day. I can't believe that I hadn't even opened it. So here it is, using this die for the very first time, a card for my daughter's friend's birthday.

Did I tell you that I like to personalise cards? I like to add the recipient's name on the card if I can. Here is a closer look.

She looks so happy. How can I forget her?! I feel happy now that I made this card. At least I have not wasted my £££ ! And to have accidently found a new die, well, that has to be a great surprise!!


That's it for now. (Can't believe that I posted for two continuous days!) Enjoy the rest of your evening and hope you accidently find a new item which you have not used before too!

My first Mojo Monday card!

Good evening all,

Hope you all had a good day today. I've had a very productive day. Apart from making a card, I've also made some oatmeal and raisins biscuits and a lemon and poppy seeds cake. One of my mum's friends gave me this oatmeal biscuits recipe ages ago and I never had the chance to make them. My mum kept saying how lovely they were. And hey, no kidding, they are the nicest biscuits I have ever tasted for a long long time. As for the lemon and poppy seeds cake, I just fancied it and found this recipe from the internet. God knows what it will taste like! It has a layer of lemon syrup on top. Apparently you have to leave it for 12 hours before slicing and eating it. I will let you know tomorrow.

Okay, better stop waffling. I am sure this is what you come here for - a glance at my card.  Well, I hope so!  So here it is, a Christmas card (not the first Christmas card I made this year but certainly  the first Christmas card I share on the blog this year).

I am not sure if this card is too crowded. (Maybe I should use a larger card blank?) The green background paper is from Papermania: Naughty and Nice Christmas pack and the cream paper is from Forever Friends: Cosy Christmas pack. The round sentiment image is from Paula Pascual: Filled with Flowers stamp set which I bought recently. This is a great stamp set. I have been playing with it and I will have to show you some of the cards which I made with this set next time.

I sure love the main stamped image. Isn't he cute?! The stamp is free from the Quick Cards made easy magazine. It is coloured by Copic Ciao marker pens and die cut by using Spellbinder labels nineteen. I paper pieced the doggy's jacket and applied crystal Stickles glitter glue on the hat. Here is a better look of the image.

I think I am just in time to enter this card to Mojo Monday 211. This will be my first time to play along with the Mojo challenge. Here is this week's sketch:

School day tomorrow, better go off to sleep now. Good night and thanks for stopping by.

OH NO.... What have I done!!

Oh no, oh no, oh no!!!!

I don't know what I have done but I have lost my original template and a lot of links and information. Now my blog looks so ugly!! Help!!

Not so happy





Update:
Phew....... I found the original template and I think I got my blog back. I panicked and nearly cried earlier on. So to cheer me up a bit, I thought I would change the background to give it a new look.

Birthday Card (for a 6-year-old)

Good afternoon, everyone!

I didn't let you wait too long this time, did I?! Thank you for the lovely messages and welcome to my new follower Virginia. These really encourage me to blog more often. Go Julie go! Keep on blogging!

My daughter is going to her best firend's birthday party tomorrow. So I made this card. Do you think it looks too "mature" for a 6-year-old girl?!

I got this fairy stamp free from the Cardmaking & Papercraft magazine last year and never used it. She was meant to be a Christmas fairy holding a snow flake but since this is a birthday card I asked my daughter to choose a different image. So she chose a little teddy bear for the fairy to hold. The ticket sentiment is from Whimsy Stamps.

Here is a close up of the fairy.

I coloured the image with Copic Ciao marker pens and applied glitter on her wings to make it shine. I always find it difficult to colour wings. Never know what colour to use. Any suggestions? So what do you think of this card? I like it, just don't know if the birthday girl will like it too?

I haven't joined any card challenges for a long while and think it's about time that I should start participating in them again. Thus, I am entering this card for the two challenges below:

The Cutie Pie Challenge #3- Recipe:
Lilac/Silver tones
Fairy image (Hope my fairy image is cute enough!)
Lace/ Ribbon
Glitter
3 Buttons/ Flowers

Quixotic Paperie Sketch Challenge #1: (For my card I have rotated the sketch.)


Thanks for reading. Have a good day!

I am back.... REALLY!

Hi everyone (if there is anyone out there reading this?!),

After a long break (I had a lovely summer holiday back home in Taiwan) and a good repair (our computer is now fixed and runs very fast), I am now back in touch with blogland. Although I have not been blogging for a while, that does not mean I have stopped making cards and being creative. Now I have more cards than ever to share with you all! I have also been reading a lot of your blogs so I am "secretly" following the card making trend.

Well, enough of me talking. Hope this card will be a good start. It is a card which I made for my dad's birthday not long ago. The tea pot and tea cup stamped images are from Elzybells. The sentiment, tea bag and tea cup (on the envelope) images are from TPC Studio- Coffee Cafe clear stamps set. 

This is a mechanical slider card which was featured in Quick Card made easy magazine issue 91. I just love cards that move!! The actual mechanism is not that hard to follow and assemble but it took me a while to figure out how to make it to rotate in the direction I wanted. But I did it in the end, hooray!

Here is a close up of the card. See a hot cuppa tea just being poured?!  I just love how it moves!!

Now I bet you can't wait to see it in motion. So here it is, demostrated by my daugter by pulling the slider to make the tea pot pour.

I hope you enjoyed my first comeback post today and it will not take me too long to share another card with you again.

Have a good evening.