My shining star

My shining star

Saturday 28 February 2015

Poinsettias at christmas card club

Hello lovelies! How are you! I hope you are well and happy and if not sending you hugs to try to help. Well the belly dancing was interesting!!! No pictures Diane - don't want to frighten you all - lol!!!! No - it was good fun - we got to wear those scarves around our waists with metal bits that jangle when you shimmy - so yes it was funny!!!!! I may go again - but it depends if I'm aching around the belly area later!

So today I have a trio of cards to show you for the latest Christmas Card Club topic which is Poinsettias. My stamps are a combination of Card-io and Chocolate Baroque.


Just one design this time - three makes! I enjoyed this one!

I used distress evergreen bough to do the background and overstamped with Card-io stamps using cranberry, bottle and expresso adirondack inks. The verse/story and sentiment were stamped with versafine - the poinsettia was stamped with versafine then painted with adirondack cranberry and bottle.

Just wanted to show you the gecko I painted whilst at centre parks too:


Have a great day!!!!

Hugs

Rachel xx



Thursday 26 February 2015

More Bokeh!

Well hello there! How are you? I'm good and have had a good couple of days - I tried a new class today too - body balance - its a mix of yoga and tai chi and was very good! I'm having a bit of a giggle tomorrow - I've signed up for a belly dancing class! I'll let you know how that one goes!

Today I've got my good friend Sandy's birthday card to share with you - I'm pretty sure she doesn't look at my blog so here it is:


Here's a close up:


Its that bokeh look again done using Jo's bubbles stencil and distress inks - mowed lawn, shabby shutters and cracked pistachio plus white brilliance ink. I have also used chocolate baroque stamps plus a TH one too! I used glossy accents on the butterflies after faux bleaching them!

Big hugs to you all! Have a great evening!

Hugs

Rachel xx


Tuesday 24 February 2015

swap card

Hello lovelies! How are you today? I hope you are doing fine! I've been having quite a bit of exercise since I last blogged. I did a 4 mile run last night then swam 50 lengths this morning! All good - and I have yoga and more running on the agenda for tomorrow. It all helps! Keeping busy and exercise are definitely good for the soul. I needed it after visiting the University on Monday - we (me and Bez) cleared Shauns office of his personal effects. Not an easy task but at least it is done - everyone was very kind and sensitive but I still found the whole thing very difficult! We also talked about how to honour Shauns' memory - more of that in the future but it all sounds good to me!

Okay so today I have a card to show you made with the Chocolate Baroque colour challenge in mind. Its also for the Joanna Sheen card swap this month - the theme is hearts and flowers. The chocolate baroque colour challenge is here:



Here's what I did:


I've used distress inks dusty concorde, shaded lilac, spiced marmalade and scattered straw. I made the background directly on the card using all four colours then did  2 more loose backgrounds using just the purples and just the oranges. Then I used these to stamp on and fussy cut the images to add to the base card.

I would like to enter this into chocolatebaroquechallenge-8. 

Big hugs to you all - and I hope you've had a good day!

Rachel xx

Sunday 22 February 2015

Journal page

Evening all! I hope you are well and happy. Thanks for your kind comments on yesterdays post - we truely did have a lovely time on holidays and my day at Clarity Cumbria was fabulous. Today it was world thinking day so we went down to service at the church then we had a roller disco at a local sports hall - I think the girls enjoyed it and thankfully there weren't any broken bones!

I wanted to show you my journal page from last night - but before I do here's the card that inspired the technical side of the page.


So its the Bokeh technique - I used faded jeans, ripe persimmon and cracked pistachio distress inks plus  plus Jo's bubble stencil and then added the white circles in white brilliance ink. I used exactly the same idea on the journal page - the theme for this was Chinese New Year - its now the year of the goat - I found out that 1967 was also the year of the goat so I decided to make the page for Shaun:


All the words in the circle came from information on goats personality traits - it seems that they all fit Shaun so well. I used abandoned coral, cracked pistachio, peacock feathers and picked raspberry this time in distress inks - love the new abandoned coral - so very pretty! The stamps are all Clarity Wee Folk. 

Hope you like my interpretation of the theme - a bit lateral I know but thats what happened! 

I'd like to enter this into pinkleart sunday-stamper-week-346-new-moon-on - abandoned coral is my new!!!

Big Hugs

Rachel xx


Saturday 21 February 2015

Clarity Cumbria

Hello Lovelies! Well we're back from our hollibobs - it was truely a fabulous few days - I officially love Center Parcs - we're hoping to go again when my sister visits in September - she lives in New Zealand and we rarely get to see her! Anyway here's a few holiday snaps:



Lucy and Penny both enjoyed the climbing wall!


And the bikes ....

Lucy loved the treetop trek! It was an all round fabulous experience! Loved it!

Today I had a fabulous day at Clarity Cumbria - thanks to Jo Rice for a wonderful day. Here are the makes we made:

It was a fabulous workshop - I loved it but the third card using the Bokeh technique is my favourite make - I did my next journal page using the technique when I got home. You can see that soon!

Thankyou so much for all your support whilst we were away and for the well wishes for Penny's birthday - thanks Sylvie for the card also! She loved it!

Big Hugs to you!

Rachel xx





Friday 20 February 2015

Penny's birthday

Hello Lovelies! Hope you are well. Its the last day of our hollibobs today and its Penny's birthday too. Here's the card I made for her:


I do hope she'll like it - I've used Tims embossing folder and memory box dies - the image is a sassy studios one. 


she'ss find this one when she opens the card! Another sassy studios digi. 

Hope you've had a good week.

Take care!

Rachel xx




Thursday 19 February 2015

crazy bird

Hello lovelies - this is another scheduled post! Its my art journal piece for this week - we had to do a page using washi tape that we had made ourselves. I had fun making it - using distress paints and stamping. I included the new cracked pistachio - beautiful colour Tim! I also used three of the awesome new bird crazy stamps - love them!


I've used the lovely new fluorish  layering stencil too!

Big hugs to you and I hope things are going well!

Rachel x



Wednesday 18 February 2015

Bright colours at Lavinia

Hello Lovelies - how are you today? I hope you are well and happy! This is another scheduled post - I am hoping that I will be able to use the computer on holiday but never having been where I'm going I'm not sure! Today I want to show you a card I made for a little girl who was 5 on Sunday!


I hope she liked it!  The stamps are all Lavinia and the background is made using distress.

I would like to enter this into the lavinia stamps-challenge-2-bright-and-beautiful

Big hugs and thanks for visiting.

Rachel xx

Tuesday 17 February 2015

Snowy trees at christmas card club

Hello lovelies! How are you? This is a scheduled post so I'll keep it brief - on Sunday at our christmas card club the theme was snowy trees. Here's what I did:


The tree stamp is from Andy skinner and the sleigh stamp is clarity. I'm not sure who the sentiment is from - but I found it in my lovely mums draw!

Thanks for looking today!

Big Hugs

Rachel xx

Monday 16 February 2015

Sneaky peek at Imagination Crafts

Hello Lovelies - just a quick one for today - over at imagination-crafts blog I've got a tutorial running - follow the link if you'd like to see more from this sneak peek:


Hope to see you over there!

Hugs

Rachel xx

Sunday 15 February 2015

Mid month at Imagination Crafts

Morning Lovelies - How are you? I suspect I'l be starting to run around like a headless chicken by the time this post goes live - Penny's party day! Its time to be making sandwiches and cooking pizza and decorating cakes - wish me luck.

Its mid month already - how did that happen? Here's my mid month make I want to share with you. The challenge at Imagination Crafts challenge blog is always anything goes and if you use Imagination crafts goodies you can be in with a chance to win £40 worth of stuff from their shop! Great prize!!!

I've used the following imagination Crafts in the making of my card:


I used the flakes with a sticky sheet, die cut the houses and added them - then made the background using the stencils and distress inks!

I hope you can join us - the challenge details are here.

Big hugs and thanks for your visit!

Rachel xx

Friday 13 February 2015

floral at Clarity - and some cakes

Hello Lovelies - how are you? I'm feeling good but drowning with stuff to do - its Penny's party on Sunday and then we go off on hols on Monday - so the pressure is on! Not sure I like pressure!!!
I've been in my attic for a little time today though after a run - here's one of the things I managed to make - its for the Clarity challenge which this month is Floral.


The central portion was made using a technique for making your own stamp pad for frequent stamping. The lovely Jo Rice taught me in one of her Clarity cumbria days. Looking forward to going there again a week tomorrow! I've also used a clarity phrase stamp and a stencil.

Here's a closer view:


So there you have it - just wanted to share a couple of cakes with you - the first are made by me for the Valentine cake sale we had at school today - we raised £50.10! Excellent:


The next one is not made by me but by the lovely Nicola from Lily pad bakery in Ingleton. Its for Penny's birthday party on Sunday:


Thanks Nicola - brilliant job!

So anyway - I'd like to enter the card into the claritystampchallenge 24

Thats all for today - take care and have fun!

Big hugs

Rachel xx






Wednesday 11 February 2015

Tims tag february

Hello Lovelies - how are you? I'm good and have spent most of the day in my village - the village institute is in a bit of financial trouble and we had a meeting today to discuss a proposal to get more money via council tax. Most people seemed to be in favour which is good. I really hope we can manage to save the building - it really is a fabulous facility. I've also been for a walk and the vicar came around this afternoon - we had a chat about putting Shaun's ashes in the graveyard at the church. Then we discovered that Shaun and the vicar went up to Oxford at the same year! Small world isn't it!


This is my timholtz12 -tags-of-2015-february entry. I followed most of the instructions that you can see if you click the link although I chose to do a UTEE heart rather than a sewed one - personal preference!


I love this heart and rarely use it! The mould is a WOW powders mould and I used Cosmic shimmer UTEE.



I really enjoyed making this one and again have made reference to my lovely Shaun throughout.

I would like to enter this into timholtz 12-tags-of-2015-february.

I hope you have had a good day! Will be around soon to see what you've been up to!

Big Hugs

Rachel x


Tuesday 10 February 2015

coffee pot cards

hello lovelies! Thanks for your kind words on my art journal pages - I really am enjoying this new interest and am finding it very therapeutic too! I promised yesterday to show you the coffee pot cards - we had a lovely morning working with the new crafters companion texture goodies - although some extra bits and bobs crept in there too. Here's my two inspiration cards plus the demo card that I made:


The one on the right is the demo card and on the left are the two inspiration cards.


To make this one I used weathered wood distress ink to colour the background then put the colour face down in the embossing folder so that I could then, once embossed, emphasise the bricks by wiping over with vintage photo distress ink. I used the same weathered wood on the smaller central piece of card then stamped onto it using the brickwall stamp from the set. The text stamps were also from the set. Finally I coloured a further piece of card with weathered wood and used the diesire ivy leaves die and cut them out. The whole thing is mounted onto an anna marie designs card blank.

The other two cards were made in a very similar way - the lighter blue one was done the same except for using the embossed rather than the debossed wall. The brown one includes a sentiment from Tim Holtz and also the bird die is from TH too.  The embossing folder used was the parquet floor one.

Hope you enjoyed your visit.

Big hugs and enjoy the rest of your day!!

Rachel xx






Monday 9 February 2015

no paintbrush

Hello Lovelies - a quick post for me - I'm trying to get this done before coffee pot. I'm in charge this week - I'll show you what we make tomorrow. Today I want to share a journal page with you that I made last night - the theme was no brushes allowed - well I got very painty hands and had lots of fun!


I've used acrylic paints, sprays and treasure gold. The layering stencil I used to make the clocks was done using grunge paste through a TH stencil. You can't see the clocks too well but they are there!

This one shows them better but still not very well. Oh well - it was great therapy!

Off to coffee pot now!

Big Hugs

Rachel xx

I'd like to enter this into countryviewchallenges: drips and drops



Saturday 7 February 2015

Jessica's card

Hello Lovelies! How are you? I'm okay and have had a good Saturday with my girlies following on from a lovely friday - I went along to the Hobbycraft and stitches show at EventCity in Manchester and met up with the wonderful Redanne. We had a good natter and did some shopping!! It was lovely to see you Anne and I look forward to coming to see you soon! Back to today - we went for a natter with the drama group ladies down at our village hall then after lunch went to see my lovely mum and dad.

I have a card to share with you today that I made for a little girls 8th birthday yesterday. Its very CAS - I love this LOTV image:


I've coloured it with spectrum noir pencils.

I hope you have had a good Saturday and I thank you for visiting.

Big Hugs

Rachel x

Thursday 5 February 2015

colour challenge at chocolate baroque

Evening all - how are you? I do hope you have had a good day. Mine was okay - been to see the solicitor - such a nice lady! And I went to see another very nice lady for a coffee this afternoon and had a good blether. So all in all a good day with only one or two minor wobbles - thats progress for you!!!

Thanks for your kind comments on yesterdays card - I have another challenge card for you today - this time the chocolatebaroquechallenge-7 - this is the colour palette:



And this is my card:


I love this stamp - she's such a seventies girl to me - I had to go for the blobby background to go with it!! That was made using the double bubble stencil from Clarity - the stamp is, of course, chocolate baroque. I also used another chocolate baroque stamp around the edge.


I painted the main image using distress inks - peeled paint, rusty hinge, wild honey and then adirondack expresso.

I would like to enter this into the chocolatebaroquechallenge-7

Thats all for today - off to visit some blogs - big hugs Rachel xx


Wednesday 4 February 2015

Red at Indigo Blu

Evening lovelies. How are you? I trust you had a good day. Mine's not been too bad - a few wobbles but overall pretty good. Been to a yoga class - that was nice and relaxing - I think I will go again!

Tonight I would like to share a card I have made for the challenge over at Indigo Blu - its a splash of red - mine's very red!


I have used the Elizabeth Bennett stamp plus the sentiment stamp from Indigo Blu. The background is made using a TH layering stencil. I have used fired brick distress ink throughout plus a little barn door here and there and a red spectrum noir pen too.


I adore this stamp - so very beautiful!

I would like to enter this into the indigoblublogchallenge-24-touch-of-red

Hope the rest of your evening is good and thanks for your visit.

Hugs

Rachel xx


Tuesday 3 February 2015

Coffee pot card

Evening all! I hope you are well. Thanks for your kind comments on my journal cover - I look forward to continuing with it. Thanks for your kind words about my new Header too - he was such a gorgeous man - it only seems right that he's with me on my blogging journey.

So here's a quick card that I made at coffee pot yesterday. The lovely Diana was in charge and she brought with her a fabulous set of stamps including the one that I used from Penny Black.


ooer - my picture is obviously suggesting that too much of a good thing is not wonderful - its not that way up in my folder so why its coming that way up I don;t know - please forgive me!!!! I stamped in black archival and coloured in distress ink (spun sugar, peeled paint and shabby shutters).

I would like to enter this into the Penny Black and More Challenge february-challenge-anything goes but a digi.

Thats all for now - back again tomorrow!

Big hugs

Rachel xx



Monday 2 February 2015

Journalling starts here

Hello lovelies - how are you today? Hasn't it been cold - I went for a run this morning - it was absolutely freezing but thankfully not icy - I hope I have no ice for my run in the morning too. It doesn't seem to be getting any easier but I will get there! I hope.

I went to coffee pot after that - Diana was in charge today and I made a couple of floral cards - one of which I'll try to show tomorrow. The other one went off to a poor lady of coffee pot who is in hospital with a dislocated hip - she only had it replaced three weeks ago and is definitely suffering.

I want to show you today a journal cover - I just got myself a journal and look forward to filling it up as the year goes on. I've joined a journalling group on facebook and we get a prompt to follow every week - this week its all about lettering.


Lots of messy play here - I've used black gesso, distress paints, an imagination crafts stencil, dylusions stamps, double bubble clarity stencil, distress ink and grungepaste plus a white pen and a black alcohol marker.


I'm happy with it. 

I'd like to enter this into the anything goes challenge at stamping sensations

Hope you have had a good day! Hugs Rachel x


Sunday 1 February 2015

Hello lovelies - well two days in a row - this has become unusual for me - but since its the first of the month there will be a new challenge starting over at the Imagination Crafts Challenge blog where the theme is always Anything goes. Take a look here to see what my teamies have done for your inspiration and link up your make. If you used Imagination crafts goodies you will go into a draw to win £40 woth of goodies from Imagination Crafts. Here's my piece - it was the birthday card I made for my nephew Tate.


I made the background using the alphabet stencil and sailboat blue adirondack ink applied with stencil brushes. I also used skateboard-boy stencil and gunmetal sparkle medium. Such a useful stencil - I love it. I can see many of the boys in the family getting a card using this stencil this year!

We had a great day yesterday - me and the girls went off to the gym - they went to fit kids and I went in the gym itself. Then we all went into the pool before heading off to Pizza Hut. When we got back I got some time in the garden whilst the girls played then we watched a film before bedtime. Its so hard without Shaun but we are all trying to carry on and do as much as possible to enjoy life. We're off to visit my mum and dad today. Hope they are well!

Big hugs to you and thanks for visiting.

Rachel xx