The craft bug is spreading...

Two posts in one night??!! That can't be right! Hee hee!  (Don't forget to scroll down to see my first post!)

Yes, I think I have passed the craft bug on to my daughters, particular my eldest daughter Aimee!! Whenever I am making cards, they will always say: "Can I make a card too?" Then they will specifically ask for a particular shaped based card and off they go. Rummaging through all my stamps, paper, stickers, ribbons, they happily create cards for their friends. The funny thing is that they love using my Copic marker pens for colouring. I am sure they have discovered the "goodness" of Copic maker pens. They will say to me: "Mummy, your pens are a lot better than our felt tip pens!!"

I recently came across some challenge blogs for kids and showed them to Aimee. Straight away Aimee said: "I want to join too!! Like Mummy!" I thought that wasn't a bad idea. Something for her to do (instead of watching TV all the time) and something to challenge her creativity!! So here it is, Aimee's first card for the card challenges.

I was very impressed with this card. Apart from a little help with using the decorative scissors to cut out the text and some verbal guidance, she made this card all by herself. She has definitely caught the craft bug!!

She is entering this card to:

• Childern's Challenge Corner #28 - March Challenge: Use Spring-ish Colours
• Little Hands Challenge Blog #9 - Make a card for a friend or use an image that has 2 or more friends in it
• Jellypark Juniors Challenge 3 - Make something for someone you love

Unfortunately she is already asleep now. I might ask her to talk about her own cards tomorrow and will add those comments in. I am sure she will love to hear from you and give her suggestions about her card.

That's it for today. Two posts in one night! I'm sure that will not happen that often!! ^_^

Finally, here is the card for my brother-in-law

Hello there!

Got to be quick on this post as I have a husband with man flu and a daughter complaining of a blocked nose. My throat just started to feel sore too. Oh dear~ hope we are not all going to get this cold!!

It was my brother-in-law's birthday last Friday. After making a birthday card for no one (see last post), I used the image that I'd already coloured in last time and made him this card.

My brother-in-law loves penguins. This image is a freebie from Bugaboo Digi Stamps. Just love all the presents that the penguin is holding, particularly that ice cream on the top!!  Here is a close-up of the digi stamp.

This is the first time that I've done zig-zag faux stitches. It didn't turn out too bad, I thought!

Well, better go now to look after my poorly loving people.

A challenge or two:
Sweet Sketch Wednesday #144-43


Willow Sketchie Challenge - use ribbon or twine
I've used a blue and gold ribbon at the bottom of my card.

Have a nice evening!

A birthday card...

ended up for nobody!!

It is so dull and miserable here. Non stop of rain so far!  Wherever you are, I hope the weather is better than here!

Now why did I say the card ended up for no one??? Last night, having my brother-in-law in mind, I tried to make him a birthday card. I chose the colours, the layout, the papers, the sentiment, coloured in the digi stamp and at the very last moment I realised  that my cute cartoon like image does not go with the style, the font of the sentiment, the pattern of the paper... basically it does not go with the whole feel of the card!! What a nightmare!!  Luckily I remembered that I had this Miss Anya image, from The Greeting Farm, which I coloured in ages ago and didn't have the chance to use. This came to save the card. I can't believe it!! The image and the colour matched the card perfectly. Thank God that I didn't waste all the material and time on it. But on the other hand, this card becomes a spare card for nobody at the moment. Well, I am sure one day it will be a card for one special person. ^_^  So here is the card:

What do you think? At least I think it is not too bad. Didn't end up in the bin, that sure is a bonus! Here is a close up of the image:

Thank you to Sarah's candy. I finally have the chance to use the beautiful Amy Butler, Belle designer paper from K&Company and the flowers from Wild Orchid Crafts.

As for my brother-in-law's birthday card... I guess I will have to work on it again tonight! ^_^

A challenge or two:

- CES Challenge blog #75 - Flower Frenzy - Flowers from the image and the embellishment flowers.

- Pals Paper Arts #130- Colour Challenge: Limeade, Artichoke and a colour of your choice - I used similar colours to limeade and artichoke and my colour choice is raspberry.

- Simon Says Stamp Challenge- Anything goes

Stamp, stamp, stamp...

Good evening friends,

I hope your weekend is so far so good.

I took a day off work yesterday (Friday) and took my two daughters to see The Muppets. "Life's a happy song when there's someone by my side to sing along..." just couldn't stop humming the song!! It was a great movie. Aimee and Jasmine loved it too!

Since my first attempt of one layer card last time and it failed (I didn't realise that paper piecing is adding on a layer), so I thought I would have another go. I decided to play at the Simplicity: One-Layer Wednesday (OLW) 70: Stamp, stamp, stamp... This challenge is to use at least three, preferably more, stamps on your one-layer card. The more, the merrier!

This time I made sure it is one layer. Apart from stamping direct on a card base, I didn't dare to add a spot of glitter or gem, just in case that makes another layer. (Does it? Let me know.) This really gives me the chance to play with Paula Pascual Filled with Flowers clear stamps set which I bought before Christmas last year. So here is the card. I counted and recounted and I've used 12 stamps for this card.

And here is a closer look of all my flowers.

I think I have not stamped so much in one card. No colouring, no layering, no cutting, nothing but stamping. I like the card up to a certain point then I guess I got carried away and stamped too much and made it too busy. So here is my second attempt (yes, another card!):

It is less cluttered and simpler. I think it looks a bit better than the first. Here is a closer look of the image. This time I've only used 8 stamps. Oh, forgot to mention that the flourish stamp is from Crafter's Companion Clearly Hand Stamped set. 

What do you think? Which one do you prefer? Surely I've managed a one layer card this time!! Better go and get the dinner ready. Enjoy the rest of your evening.

Hugs,

You're the cream in my coffee

Hi blog friends,

Didn't think that you will see me again this quick huh?! ^_^

Talking about quick, this will have to be a quick post. As it is very very late and I should really be in bed by now!! Just want to share the card that I made for my husband tonight. It is not the usual Valentine colour but I like it!

I guess this is the quickest card I ever made too! I think I am getting used to clean and simple styled cards. All the stamped images, including sentiment, are from TPC Studio Coffee Cafe Clear Stamps set. I have paper piecing the coffee cup. Stamped the row of coffee beans in Brilliance Coffee Bean ink colour. (I am not sure about those coffee beans. I don't think they are straight!!) Then stamped the sentiment "You're the cream in my coffee" at the bottom and added gems on each side.

Here is a closer look of the main image.

I am entering this card to the following challenges:

CAS-ual Fridays - CFC39: Clean And Simple Paper Piecing

Less is More: Week 54 One Layer Card with Stripes (I don't think I ever made a one layer card. It is hard to keep it to the basic. Hope paper piecing still count as one layer, if not feel free to remove my entry.)

*Edit: Just found out that "paper piecing is actually adding a layer as it can't really be regarded as an embellishment". Nevermind, first attempt. Now I know it. Will try again with one layer card next time.

Sweet Stampin': Clean and Simple

Hope you have a great day and Happy Valentine's Day to you all!

  

Free Digi... (if you are interested!)

Hello blog friends!

Hope I have not kept you waiting for too long. I did say that I was going to show you something that you've not seen before in my last post, didn't I?

Well, it was my daughter Aimee's 9th birthday last Sunday (where has the time gone? She has grown so fast!). We had around 6-8 kids around our house for a fun party with yummy food. To start the party off we had a craft session first. We made key rings, ear rings and magnets out of shrink plastic. The kids enjoyed it! It was their first time to see such a thin plastic sheet wiggled and wriggled and shrinked to 7 times smaller into a hard piece of plastic. It was great watching their faces being amazed at the transformation! ^_^ Then we had an intense and exciting sports team competition and funny dance along games on the XBox Kinect. Gosh! I almost forgot that I am not as young as these children. After the party, I was aching everywhere!!

Anyway, enough of me talking. The thing I was going to show you are the party invitations which Aimee and I made. Aimee had a special request for her invitations. She said she would like a fancy dress party at home. Therefore, she would like to have an image of someone dressed up in costume as the main focus on the invites. And as it is the year of dragon this year, preferably someone dressed up in a dragon outfit. Hmmm.... this request turned out to be almost impossible. Where would I find a stamp/ image as she described? There might be one out there (if you come across one, please do let me know) but due to time restriction I didn't have a choice but to try and draw one myself!! So here it is, our first invitation with my creation. You have been warned, there will be lots of pictures in this post!!

I think I haven't done too terribly here, have I? I think she looks quite cute in the dragon outfit! When I drew her I had Aimee in mind, so I decided to call her Em. Here is a closer look of Em, holding a birthday cake too:

And here are some of the invitations which Aimee coloured in. She coloured them in according to her friends favourite colours.

Here's a closer look. I particularly love the colourful wings on the far right. We also added  Stickles Crystal glue on the wings and 3D Crystal Lacquer on the dots of the dragon, which unfortunately didn't show up very well in the pictures.

I also wanted a sentiment specifically for this invitation, thus I used Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 to create the circular sentiment image. We used coloured pencils on the centre smaller circles and attached gems on each side.   

This is the inside of the card with all the party details. I applied double sided tape on three sides so it acts as a pocket for the RSPV tag.

Here is a picture of the RSVP tag.

Hope I have not bored you with all these photos. If you have managed to stay with me this far, I am delighted to tell you that I am happy to share Em with you. I know there are a lot of talented artists out there and their creations are amazing. But if you like Em and would like to use it on your cards, scrapbooks or any craft creations, please email me HERE and I will email you a copy.

Thank you for reading my post. I will come back soon. Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Long Time No See...

Hi friends,

Nice to see you again! You didn't think that I'd disappeared from blogland, did you?! I think I have been too generous to myself and given myself way too much time for holiday and rest, don't you think? Hee hee!  Well, I guess it is time to get back to blogland and keep in touch with my love of crafting.

Here is my first card of this year. (For some of you crafty lot, God knows how many you have made already! Shame on me!)

I made this card for a very good friend of mine. (Hope she does not see this before her birthday!) I am entering this card to Divas by design challenge #19 by following the below sketch:

I followed the sketch exactly. It is a nice layout.

I am also entering The Play Date Cafe Challenge #116 by using the suggested colours:

Plum...Pear...Moldy Cheese

For a million years I would never thought of using these colour combination. I am more of a pastel/ bright colour person. Darker colours to me are certainly a challenge. It was a bit scary at first to use these colours and it took me ages to find the right colour paper. I think it turned out rather well.

For the main image, I have used Pergamano clear stamps - Summer Fairies (code 41906). It is stamped by using Memento Black ink and coloured in by Copic Ciao marker pens. I can't resist by adding Stickles Crystal glue on her wings. You can't make a card without glitters right?!  The text is from Whimsy Stamps - Ticket Sentiments set and a gem has been added for the dot on the "i". Here is a close up of the main stamped image. I hope you like this card.

OK, enough of blogging for today. Now I am back, hope you should see me often. I will be back later for something that you've not seen before. Am I teasing? Surely not!

Have a good day!