ATB's for Indigo Blu

Good morning lovelies! How are you today? I'm waiting for my lift to arrive to take me to the hospital - I've been managing to get a lift once a week from Shaun's work colleagues. They are so very good. I don't think there are many groups of people who would get their heads together and organise this - so thankyou so much those involved - it really is appreciated! Shaun is doing very well still. He had a bronchoscopy  again yesterday and his lungs are looking fine. He's also doing more time on the trachymask and generally doing more physio too - here's hoping this lasts and he continues to get stronger every day.

Today I have my first set of ATB's (artists trading blocks) cut using my own die. I finally invested in it and I think you'll be seeing a few of these now - they're cool! The die is by Eileen Hull from Sizzix and comprises all three boxes. There ai also a bigger box but I haven't got that one as yet. I used distress stains to colour up a piece of A3 card then used the die to cut out all the pieces and assembled the boxes. Then I did the stamping and used masking as a feature - thats because this months Indigo blu challenge is all about masking.

I stamped the images onto colour stained card then masked and overstamped with the bubble or the ripple stamp. Then some of the images I coloured slightly but it hasn't come through too well!

I'd like to enter this into the following challenges:

indigoblublogchallenge-21-magical-masking

eileenhull - art-with-heart-challenge-november-favorite-recipes

I have used my favourite recipe of distress stains to make this - mowed lawn, salty ocean and peacock feathers!

Big hugs to you all and I hope you have a great day!

Rachel xx

Sparkle and snow at Lavinia

Hello Lovelies! Well its been another good day at the hospital. Shaun has stood five times today and even lifted his feet in a sort of shuffle. His NG tube is out as he is eating all of his meals. He's progressing very well but he still isn't good enough for his place back on the transplant list. Still - the stronger he is the more likely the transplant is to be successful - we have to think long term here so I guess I know it makes sense!

Today I have the card to share with you that I made for this months Lavinia Challenge - I treated myself to three new Lavinia stamps and have used them all on this scenic card.

I also used distress inks and the landscape mask from clarity plus some glitter and a quickie glue pen.

I also used a star stamp from Lavinia.

I would like to enter the laviniastamps-challenge-snow-and-sparkle. I think there may be a few of these going out at Christmas - as long as I get the chance!

Hugs to you all and thanks for your continued support!

Rachel xx

a sneaky peek at Imagination Crafts

Hello all! Just a sneaky peek from me today!

You can find out more at imagination-crafts blog.

See you soon!

Hugs Rachel xx

Its A Okay for Lungs!

Hello lovelies! Another post from me today - wow - I can hardly believe I used to manage to blog every day! Seems like a lifetime ago now! Anyway we had good news with Shaun's lungs yesterday. Although there was one tiny clot they seem to think that Shaun's lungs are good to go as far as transplant is concerned so we're hoping for more good news on Tuesday.

Thanks for your comments yesterday - I think my friends kids both enjoyed their cards so thats good. Onto today - its week 2 (already?) of the challenge at Craft a scene which is trees. Here's my card.

The stamps are from sheena - the background is done using distress inks!

Thats all for today! Off to check out some blogs!

Hugs

Rachel x

Pipes, CT and a party

Hello Lovelies! How are you? Well I hope. We are good and have had a good couple of days. Yesterday Shaun finally had his tubes changed - apparently the procedure only took 44 seconds. Shaun was very impressed! We managed to see Shaun for a very short time and then he went off for another CT scan - I believe they're looking at the condition of Shaun's lungs so they know exactly where they are before he goes back on the transplant list. We'll know more about the results tomorrow and the transplant list on Tuesday. Fingers crossed for good news.

Yesterday I had to pick the girls up from a party - I only remembered Thursday night I had to make a card - and I also remembered it was another friends birthday on Saturday too - so off I trotted to the attic and made these two cards:

This is the boy who had the party - he used to come to gardening club when I was involved and I thought this was the perfect image for him!

This one is for a girl who is very sporty and outdoorsy from Lucy's class. I hope she likes it!

Thats all for today - I hope all is well with you and I thankyou for any comments you leave! 

Big Hugs rachel xx

Colour challenge at Chocolate Baroque

Hello Lovelies! Well another good day at the hospital - Shaun has managed to keep all his meals down yesterday - and the infection indicators are very low. The kidneys are starting to show signs of recovery but Shaun is still dependent on the filter. Each time they take him off the filter his lungs start to fill up. But we'll get there. He's getting his pipes changed today so fingers crossed that all goes well.

I chose this stamp from Chocolate Baroque using the voucher I won last month - I love these big bold background stamps and enjoyed making this card up using the colour scheme from the current colour challenge. I started by creating 4 colour sheets by applying distress inks (milled lavendar, wild honey, aged mahoganey and worn lipstick) direct to paper then stamping the image on each sheet - I chose the aged mahoganey as the background then paper pieced the baubles.

Finally I applied glitter and layered the piece up onto card.

I'd like to enter this into the chocolatebaroquechallenge-four. The colour scheme is as follows:

Last night me and Bez (thats Shaun's mum - she has been staying with me since Shaun has been in hospital) took the girls to the village bonfire and then afterwards they had gigantic sparklers in the back garden.

Thanks for visiting today and for your continued comments and support!

Big Hugs

Rachel x

coloured crackle at CC3

Hello Lovelies! I had a good day yesterday at the hospital - Shaun's breathing is doing really well - he's managing on a lower level on the vent and has his cuff down on his tracheostomy all the time - he even tried a tracy mask a couple of times for short times and did very well. Onwards Shaun! His kidneys still aren't working by themselves yet though and he's experiencing a lot of nausea - but despite this I feel things are going in the right direction.

I had a great time in the attic on Sunday night and I managed to make my entry for the current challenge for the Compendium-of-curiosities-3-challenge-14 - coloured crackle. I followed the technique outlined on page 53 of the book - I won't go into that here but everything else I will! There are two prizes for the challenge - the first is a selection of goodies from Tim and Mario and the second is a $25 voucher for the thefunkiejunkie boutique.

Here's what I made - I'm rather pleased!

The background was made using distress stains and ink. I also used layering stencils from Tim Holtz. The iceskate die is a bigz die from TH (Sizzix) - Its a fabulous die - you'll be seeing a lot more of this I think. The sprig is also a TH die - its a thinlets die though and comes in a set of four dies. The ornate frame at the top is a piece of TH ideology. 

I would like to enter this into compendium-of-curiosities-3-challenge-14.

Hope you all have a good Tuesday! Thanks for dropping by!

Hugs

Rachel xx