MerryMade Crafts etc ...

I discovered yesterday that when I have been pinning my cards to my Pinterest albums they just link to the entire blog.  So when a person clicks on the link in Pinterest they are sent to my blog and then have to scroll to find the card.   If the everyone is like me, I can't be bothered and will go back to Pinterest to find a similar card with a direct link to the card. What I have been doing is the day the my card is posted I hover on the card until the Pinterest save button comes up and save it via that.  Purple arrow. What I should be doing and will be doing from now on is actually clicking on the post title (pink arrow) so that post is all I see on my screen then click on the Pinterest save button as then it saves to that post only. I am now going through my boards and seeing where the link takes me if it is just to my blog I find the post I want and right click on the post title (pink arrow) and copy link then go back to my Pinterest board and edit the...

This is me catching up on the Craftmad sketch challenges for 2016.  I have decided to work backwards.  This sketch was for December. My take on the sketch, I ended up turning the topper sideways as it was to large for the card the other way round.  I plan on giving this to a male friend for his birthday, so that is where the colour combo came from.  I found the die cut stars/flowers in my stash and went from there finding papers to add to it.  The panel behind the stars is a piece of copper coloured embossed foil.  The background paper is Graphic 45.  Finished with the lovely glossy gel dots.  Not sure if I will add a sentiment or not, I will wait till the day I mail it. Take care and hope it is a terrific day for you.

I think I have six months of 2016 Craftmad sketch challenges to catch up on but I will get there.  Hoping to keep on track during 2017, so here is the Craftmad January sketch challenge. ( Pinterest Board here to see everyone else's take on the sketch ) This is what I came up with.  The patterned paper came from a magazine giveaway years ago, the embossed flap and die cut banner from an earlier Craftmad swap.  I used my die cut for the Happy Birthday and attached this lovely flower bling which I bought with my birthday money two years ago.  I do find that using sketches gets me digging deep into my stash which I just love. Thanks for dropping on by.

I made a couple of Thank You cards recently.  I wanted to keep them simple so used the Hydrangea stamp from Stampin Up Both Way Blossoms.  A little layering and Thank You stamp finished with some glossy spots. Thank you for visiting. :-)

Love it when I finish a swap during the month it is on and not on the final days. :-)  This month over at Craftmad ( Facebook page here ) we are swapping two cards with the theme of Trees.  At first I thought this would be tricky but I had fun creating both cards.  I tore out a page from one of the kids school dictionaries, not just any page but the one that describes a tree.  Midway on the left.  I then hand cut shapes to form a tree and machine stitched them to the card front.  Finished with a simple 'Just to Say' sticker sentiment ( Sticker Store ), I figure the recipient can choose the occasion by what is written on the inside.   For my second Tree card I used this fun digital stamp from PixieARTish - Catastictorments.  I have had this image a long time, actually since 2010 and when I googled I could not find a link for the owner so if you know where they are could you please share a link.  I coloured the image with my Copics...

Another interactive card - Peek-a-Book card.  This one was meant to be for our daughter but the more I worked with it the younger it became. :-)  Luckily my niece turned 13 a week ago and she loved it.  I have used a Mo Manning 'Birthday Girl' image coloured with Copics.  I followed the tutorial by Norma here.  The placement of the 13 oval was a bit tricky, next time I would try to have a smaller cut out to fill giving me more room for placement of that oval.  It is another interactive card that I will do again as it was fun to make and so much fun to play with. 

Unbelievably our daughter turns 21 today.  Unbelievable to me as the time has gone so quick as they tell you it will when you have your baby.  Melissa is a beautiful, caring and very independent young lady discovering where her life will lead her. Melissa starts her Bachelor of Graphic Design at the end of February so she will be busy with that and hopefully it leads to an exciting job. The card is a Gatefold Shutter Card, I followed this tutorial by Sandi .  Normally, I like to follow tutorials with photos but I could find none for this style of card.  The video was helpful as I could see the card action was meant to happen.  Lately, Melissa has been telling me how she is into greys and black and not much colour so that is where I headed to find some paper for the card.  Came across this daisy paper which I have always loved and waited for the right card.  Thought a splash of pink was perfect so dragged out my Stampin Up card stock which I kn...

Stencils are not something I normally use in card making which showed when I went to find some in my stash.  All I found was the Spellbinder Impressionabilities that I used above. I daubed it with Stampin Up River Rock ink, added the Thank You sticker sentiment.  Finished with this wonderful collection of paper flowers from stash and a pretty pin given to me by Kaye .  The second card I had to get inventive and created my own stencil from a used section of stickers.  I cut out the backing paper for the large butterfly then used it as a stencil daubing on a variety of blues and yellows.   I then used the stencil as a mask when I stamped it with a flourish and some words.  This card is so full of mistakes but I do like the end result. #1. When I stamped the flourish it did not stamp to the edge of the butterfly, hence the words. #2. The first lot of words I stamped upside down so put another layer above to hopefully cover up this...

I think turning 50 should involve sparkle and gold so this is the last card I made using the inspiration for Pinterest.   Simply a change of words from the New Years cards I made. Wishing my brother a Happy 50th however he spends the day.

These are two of the three birthday cards I made using the same inspiration from Pinterest as I did for my New Years Cards.  Just added some diecut stars with dim antes in the centre of each. Happy birthday Jan This time I used couple of my leftover circles from my Christmas cards and a single die cut star with a dimante centre. Happy Birthday Anita Thanks for visiting, I am off to see what this day will bring.  Breakfast first.

Well the first birthday for the year - my husband's - 1st January. Sticking to my resolution the first interactive card I hope of many. This is a Twist and Pivot card which was fun to put together, not that difficult. I used this tutorial by Nicky. The papers I have used are Kaisercraft, years old, nice to put them to use.  My husband loves his cars, he owns two and we have four replica models in the house that is where I took the theme for this card.  I found this fun image through Pinterest here - just scroll to the bottom  coloured it with my Copics. This is the card on the inside.  I have used car stickers ( Sticker Store ) which I also coloured with my Copics and a touch of silver Wink by Ella pen.  My first time adding a video to a blog post.  Not the best but I wanted to show the card in action. What to get for my husband who couldn't offer any suggestions? Scratchies and Gift Cards presented in a beautiful frame. ...

Happy New Year everyone I hope 2017 treats you well. I ran out of time this year making Christmas cards, so I stopped and decided the last few people will receive New Year Cards, not something I have sent before. I had fun creating this card from inspiration on Pinterest which was a poster I liked.  I have a couple of family and friends celebrating birthdays very early in the new year so I adapted the card above for birthdays too.  I will share them as each date rolls around. Take care and thanks for visiting. Oh two resolutions from me this year which I know are achievable.  No sorrys for not blog posting or blog visiting, I will get there but I know real life will get in the way.  No 2. Make more interactive cards because they are fun to make and give.