Let's Quirky Celebrate everything crafty!

YAY It's Quirky challenge time again, it is my challenge and the first of our new monthly challenges this year!

My challenge to you is to celebrate anything you like, but you must include the word Celebrate, or Celebration. 

I am celebrating having a new team, new monthly format, and the New Year.

We are sponsored by the wonderful Stitchy Bear Digital Outlet who provided the team with images to use, and are providing three prizes to our lucky top three.

Here are the details:

The digi I used is called Craft Queen by BB Kakes from Stitchy Bear, her craft room is way tidier than mine!

I took one chocolate box and stuck the inside into the lid to strengthen it, then painted it with white gesso before painting it with Paper Artsy Fresco paints. I painted it with Ice Blue then sponged Beach Hut and South Pacific over the top.

I cut a piece of designer printed paper by Me and My Big Ideas to use for the background and adhered it to the box. The image was coloured with Promarkers and metallic pens (and now I see what I forgot, meant to add some gems to the crown - will have to do that and retake).

I found some ribbon sliders spelling celebrate and added them and their ribbon to the top of the frame. Quirky is stamped with an Inkadinkado stamp and heat embossed in gold. DoCrafts scrabble tiles spell out the words round the frame, and some shiny red mirror mosaic tiles are dotted inbetween them.

The die cut corner is a Spellbinders Heartfelt die, and the other corner features tiny buttons. I added real shells, tiny cork stoppered bottles of glittery stuff and some freebie metal charms, an odd peacock feather embellishement and an exercise book embellishment that I hand wrote in. 

To finish it off I rubbed some Treasure Gold round the edge of the frame where the lid edge is.

Here it is from another angle, I made some changes to it from the original below (where you can still see wet glue)! I added two legs made from wooden beads, and I really thought it would stand up - it isn't standing without help! So, as I type, a third leg made from two beads is painted and drying, and I had to paint the back of the box today - now you can only see the embossed chocolate bars and make if you really look. I think I might have to decorate the back, all that blue space!

I added some gems to the crown, and drew some images on the stamps on the shelf, and added another little bottle, who knows what will appear on this next!

This is the chocolate box, the chocolates were a Christmas present from my hubby, he knows what I like!

Challenges entered:

Crafty Gals - #52 anything goes end of year bash and hop (5th Jan)

Tuesday Throwdown - #274 anything goes

Simon Says - Lets Party (Wed)

Cute Card Thursday - #406 anything goes 

Left of Centre - all things new (Fri)

Brown Sugar - New Year (Fri)

That's Crafty - anything goes (11th Jan)

Allsorts - what's new? (Sat)

Glitter and Sparkle - #169 anything goes (Sun)

That Craft Place - anything goes (Jan 17)

Love to Create - anything mixed media (24th Jan)

Crafts Galore - #25 anything goes (Jan)

Rupert the dragon with tomatoes

This card was made for a challenge on the Stamping Dragon facebook group. You use the page above and post something you created. I used Rupert with tomatoes in the center of the frame, which is cut out to give it a 3d effect. I coloured Rupert and the tomatoes with Promarkers, after flipping the image. I decoupaged the tomatoes a little so that they were outside of the frame not hidden in any way. The frame is popped up with foam tape, the tomatoes too.

I stamped a sentiment with a Fiskars stamp and heat embossed it with Docrafts red tinsel EP, but I can't find my antistatic bag anywhere so there is a bit of stray glitter.

Rupert has munched his way into the following challenges:

Incy Wincy - anything goes (Sun)

Papertake Weekly - oh how cute (Tues)

Passion for Promarkers - Autumn colours (Tues)

Fussy and Fancy - #123 mainly red (ends 2nd Oct)

How Old?

I made this card with two challenges in mind, Visible Image July challenge - anything goes using Visible Image stamps of course, and the DCWV July Stackaholic challenge for which there was a sketch.

This is the sketch which I turned upside down. I used the All About Boys DCWV stack for my card, and I thought the cowboy papers went so well with  Silverheels from Visible Image, which I bought from That Craft Place in the sale, bargain!

Tonto is coloured with Promarkers, his hair came out ginger in the photo, I was trying to go for darker but with a red tint and clearly failed! I also coloured the fire and hatchet with Promarkers.

How is cut in grey board from packaging to which I stuck copper slug tape, yes slug tape! Normally this stops the slugs from eating the plants in the pots is it around, not this year! Anyway I thought it was so pretty I could use it on cards somehow. I think it would emboss well too.

Old is cut from brown textured card, all letters are die cut with Sizzix Lollypop alphabet dies. I cut some smoke puffs using a speech bubble die from a Papermania set.

The train is punched from red card with a Martha Stewart punch. The card blank is an 8"x8" Card Craft scalloped blank.

Challenges entered:

Visible Image - July anything goes

DCWV Stackaholic challenge - sketch (Aug 4th for top 12)

Addicted to Stamps - #106 Anything goes (Wed - 10 challenges)

Art By Miran - #11 anything goes (winners 15th Aug)

Creative Fingers - #44 anything goes (Fri)

Fussy and Fancy - #119 Words (winners 15th Aug)

Graphit Markers - July, Hot Colours (Aug 8th)

That Craft Place - anything goes (Sun 3rd Aug)

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge - Anything goes

Happy Birthday Brother

 It was also my Brother's birthday yesterday, and he is a keen ornithologist so I made him a bird card. The background done directly onto the card blank is stamped and heat embossed in white and clear powder to form a resist, the stamps are Crafty Individual. Then I inked over the stamping with Distress inks and rubbed over the embossed images.
I stamped the branches, feather and bottom sentiment with Paperartsy stamps (rubbing over the embossed images again), and die cut then stamped the bird (I tried stamping then die cutting - which is when I found out the die is not the right way round to do that, I had to die cut, flip the die cut then stamp). Happy Birthday is a Hero Arts stamp, and Brother is a Papermania stamp.

Inside the card I used some Papermania Spring paper, also with blue and brown birds, and cut a slot to insert a gift card. Stamped sentiments are Paperartsy.

I was originally inspired to do the heat embossed background when a craft company on Facebook asked a question: if you used what you are wearing right now as inspiration - what sort of card would you make? I was wearing a dark blue fleece top with white silhouettes of birds all over it!

Happy Birthday Brother!

I have entered the following challenges:

Allsorts - All about the boy (Sat)

Cute Card Thursday - It's a wild world

A few of my Quirky favourite things

We are feeling very sad, it is Daire's last challenge so she choose a theme to cheer us all up, and that is My Favourite Things. You can use your favourite colours, embellishments, techniques, mediums, the things you love!

We are sponsored by Robyn's Fetish and Crafty Ribbons, the image is called Paul Penguin Sleighing and is from Robyn's Fetish and the ribbon is from Crafty Ribbons. 

I used my favourite colour combination of purple with bright green, the brighter green the better! I also love penguins, and I used my favourite sparkly glitter purple card for the card blank. I love to add ribbon, and had some in bright green that was perfect, and I even found some of my precious buttons in the right shade of green and purple! The die cuts are all Spellbinders, I'm not sure the tiny triangles were meant to be holes but they are now, the image is coloured with Promarkers and that is another Christmas card made!

I even finished the inside on this one, the papers are from a Docrafts pad of non traditional Christmas papers.

We will miss our Quirky Daire so much, and I hope you will pop over to say goodbye to her, to see more great makes and to join in at Quirky Crafts.

I have entered the following challenges:

Passion for Promarkers - snow is falling (Tuesdays)

Stamping for the Weekend - anything goes with option to include breast cancer awareness.

Stamping Sensations - All Creatures Great and Small - October challenge

Woodware - Monochrome.

Joanna Sheen - button it up (sorry if too early - I thought it was the whole of Oct)

Quick cards

These card blanks are from a pack by Dovecraft of 30 shaped cards. I bought them in a sale I think, and found them when trying to make quick panic cards. I feel a bit cheated that one of the shapes is a rectangle (yes I know that is a shape) and the rectangle comes in gold and silver, which means there are less novelty shaped cards. There is one more shape not shown here which is a bauble, and I will post photos of those in due course. I have found some panels that I did last year, and with the Christmas trees I drizzled Stickles glue for tinsel and stuck gems to them and added wooden Christmas shapes that were a present. I think my favourite shapes are the crackers, I decorated them with Docraft stick on ribbons and felt shapes, and one little Hero Arts stamped dog, and I felt the need to add a cracker joke which I found using Google, printed off and cut into strips and stuck inside the crackers.

I don't like the snowflake one, which is an embossed snowflake on an octagonal card and the card is poor quality. Perhaps I will find a better way to decorate it, I am not happy with the effort above which is stickles and a gem in the middle.

I went to work this morning and distributed cards and gifts, and posted a few cards on the way,  then we were sent home again due to the snow. So having addressed all the cards I had just about I know how many I have left to make now, and have been busy making more this evening.

Quirky Crafts Challenge 24 - flowers

Challenge 24 is Flowers over on Quirky Crafts challenge blog. The challenge is sponsored by Crafty Ribbons so the winner will win some bags of ribbons and we can all use ribbon. My card is one I made for Mother's day. I used the free stamp that came with DoCraft's Creativity magazine (can't remember the rabbit's name but it is in the Daisy and Dandelion range) and coloured the image with Promarkers, then die cut with Spellbinders labels nine, and mounted that on DCWV pocket full of posies - I just love this paper pad.

I used Crafty Ribbons ribbon on my card, and Sizzix embosslits alphabet for the letters finished off with Prima blooms.

Altered storage challenge

I made this for a challenge on DoCrafts, did it yesterday and I am so pleased I did.

It looks so much prettier altered, and I may alter another one now!

Before: Just a frozen yogurt tub.




















Afterwards, a really pretty pen tub that I can't stop looking at!