Embrace the simple joys of Nature

 Well… it’s Friday again! It feels like one of those weeks where I’ve been busy creating, but nothing has quite been ready to share publicly—until now.

My latest card for my local swap group has safely arrived with Maxine, so I can finally show it to you all. This month’s challenge was set by Carol, with the theme “Animals Framed.”

I chose to work with some sweet little birdies—because birds definitely count as animals in my book! For the framed element, I used my Tim Holtz diffuser with a Swiss Dot embossing folder to create a soft oval window. I really love how this technique adds interest while still keeping the focus on the centre of the card.

The birds were stamped using a Mangocraft set, then die‑cut and coloured with Prismacolor pencils. A sentiment from another Mangocraft stamp set tied everything together, and I added a touch of soft ink blending around the centre to give the design a little extra depth.

To finish, I popped the die‑cut birds up on 3D tape for some subtle dimension—simple, but effective.

Thanks for stopping by, and I hope your creative week has treated you kindly. 

Woodblock Wednesday.

 I saw about a new challenge - Amy Tsuruta called Woodblock Wednesday   The first challenge has now closed, but the next one starts May.  I managed to get a card done and got it upload via my Flickr page on the last day.  

I had this set on my desk as when Grace and were playing on Sunday, I let her use this one.   She seems to stamp better using woodblock stamps.  I stamped and coloured these at the same time as Grace was stamping and colouring.  I fussy cut my ones out and added them to a white panel .  They are Hero Arts stamps (dated 2007) The sentiment is from another Hero Arts set - a clear stamp set.  The finished it with a doodle frame. 

Beautiful with Altenew

 

 This month's challenge at Altenew is the beautiful inspiration above.   I was playing with some of my new Altenew inks - and came up with this card

 

This is made with a number of Altnew stamp sets, dies and inks.  

Stamp sets: Flowers and leaves - Beautiful Day, green splatters - Watercolour Frames, and sentiments from Simple Flowers. 

Inks: Turquoise, Tide Blue and Starlight for the flower which had been embossed with Platinum EP

Leaves were in Rocky Shores and Espresso and the frame in Olive.  

We had a great weekend away, despite traveling through a thunderstorm to get there.  And another thunder and lightening storm on Saturday, which ended with a hail storm. 

  

It looked like snow!

And we weren't able to sit outside on the deck due to a Mamma Thrush deciding her nest would be situated on one of the deck chairs. 

The chair was about 3 feet from the door out onto the deck.  I got a bit close and she flew off so I got a good look at her four eggs.   It was really interesting to watch her sitting, flying off for something to eat and then back to sit on her brood. 

Thanks for stopping by today. 

Birds on a Branch

Hi there.  It's my first post for A2Z Scrapbooking today.  I am super excited to be on the team and to share my first sample.

Our challenge this month is "Anything Goes"  Nice and easy for me to throw myself into.  My new Hero Arts goodies have not arrived.... so I pulled out some older ones to have a play.  Here's a little peak...

Hop over to the blog post to see the full reveal.

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Cook up a Card Recipe challenge

I had an email from the lovely Monika to tell me about Cook up a Card where she is on the design team. The monthly challenge is based on a recipe - May's is 3 leaves, 2 flowers and 1 bird.

This is what I came up with.... Using my new Stampin' Up! set Vintage Vogue. I stamped the brown card round the edge with the vines ( doesn't count for the leaves!!!) and then put the 3 leaves, 2 flowers on the white inner piece with the bird in the corner. That's from an Inkadinkado set. Sentiment by Hero Arts - Anytime Messages.  I had to take the photo on the kitchen window sill as the wintery rainy weather came back yesterday and today.  Not much fun - especially as I seem to have got a cough!!!!  Came home early and had a 2 hour sleep this afternoon - woken feeling only slightly better.... hopefully it won't develop into anything nasty.

Thanks for visiting and once again, a big thank you for all the wonderful comments... really makes my day.

Take care