MerryMade Crafts etc ...

Sadly, we had to say goodbye to my Uncle Len a couple of weeks ago.  He made it to the wonderful age of 87 and he was never keen on travel, always asking if it was time to go when visiting but had a great sense of humour and cheeky grin.   I found these punched birds in my stash and for some reason they reminded me of my Uncle.  I kept it simple with a small piece of patterned paper, matching cross grain ribbon and a ' with Sympathy' sticker. Thanks for visiting.

This is the inspiration  Googly Eyed card I found in bogland and thought this would be perfect for my nieces birthday last December.  So dug out all my circle dies and punches and created this card to match the present wrapping paper.  I first ran the base card through the embossing machine with the Swiss Dots folder.  Then hand cut the mouth curve and two white teeth.  Next I die cut all the circles to be layered up to create the eyes and nose.  I used silver pen on the black of the eyes. Wishing you a fun day.

I found some time to catch up on the Christmas sketches over at Craftmad - (Pinterest album here ) - some beautiful takes on this sketch.  I am sticking with my own challenge of making three cards with each of these sketches.  I started with the sketch then found this christmas image that I had coloured with copics on holidays last July.  The image gave me the colours to use. I originally had more of the pink in the layers instead of the spotted vellum but it was just too much.  Glad I found the spotted the spotted vellum to add amongst the silver and green card stocks. Another image I coloured with copics last July (everything eventually gets used).  I went over the wings and the ribbon with my silver wink pen so it has a lovely sparkle when the light hits it just right which I could not get in a photo.  Sorry I can't remember the brand of this beautiful Christmas paper (edit- Thanks Mandy for reminding method this is   Allison Ellis pap...

This is the Starburst card I sent to my brother for his birthday in January.  I pieced on the papers together then sprayed with my gold spritz.  Finished with a computer generated sentiment  This Starburst card went to my niece for her birthday in January.  I had fun with all the pink papers.  I went around all the edges with my Stella Wink Silver pen to give the little bit of sparkle that a 12 yo girl needs.  I cut out some die shapes for the computer generated sentiment.  

I made this card for a baby shower for a work colleague last year.  I kept it simple by cutting some yellow baby fabric into a circle with one of my dies.  I cut a quarter out to create the pram shape.  Dug out my sewing machine and stitched around edge of the pram and some straight stitching for the legs.  Two yellow buttons for the wheels.  I finished with the stamped sentiment. This lady was visiting last week with her beautiful 6 week old daughter.  Boy, am I slow posting these photos……or time just flies. :-)

Yes, more starburst cards.   I did have a wonderful time creating all these cards.  This card I have adhered all the strips to the front of the card then run through the embossing machine.  Next out came the sewing machine to sew along each of the seems in zig zag and straight stitch.  I added these lovely metallic butterflies and finished with a computer generated sentiment.  This card was heading to a male and I thought it needed a bit of grunge.  So I distressed the edges with ink and the blade of my scissors.  The sentiment is computer generated.

The last of my craft room makeover.  I found these wonderful pen holders at the Reject Shop and thought they would be perfect for my Copic pen storage. I glued holders altogether to form one big container.  I have just enough room for a couple more pens.  :-) After I had decorated my ribbon storage with the Graphic 45 papers I thought I should use a bit more of it around the room to tie everything together.  So the Copic pen holders was covered in some the offcuts. I have had my envelopes sitting in the little boxes that they are bought in.  Over time I had three boxes with different sized envelopes.  I decided to glue these boxes together to create one container then covered with more of my Graphic 45 paper offcuts. Showing all the the sides. The coloured envelopes you see are ones I have made up from some scrap pages that I have had in my stash since forever.  As I don't do scrapbooking and the patterns mu...

My friend and her husband have sold up there house and are heading south to start a new life after a tragic event last year.  Although it is sad to see them leaving we are all happy to see that they have a new start in their lives also they are not far away with technology.  So when I spied a card on Pinterest (Sugarpea Designs) I knew that was the card I had to make for them.  As I am sure they will have many new adventures.  I printed out a map of the Queensland coast line on the front and back of card stock.  Yes, the inside map is a little blurry as I printed on that side twice when figuring out which way the printer printed.  :-)  I then cut an 8cm square of the map and cut slits in the corners so that I could create a pinwheel, a bamboo skewer is the handle.   Friday already….wishing you a fantastic weekend.

This is card number two that I created for our March Craftmad Swap - (Pinterest board here) .  We had to use the colours Pink, Aqua, Silver and Taupe.  I found this wonderful bike image in with the same pad of papers where I found the aqua background.  So that was taupe, pink and aqua solved.  Silver corrugated cardstock became the card base then a layer of aqua with the background paper.  I cut out some silver glitter paper and pink card with my dies to go behind the bike image.  Finished with a lovely satin pink ribbon and ' Thank You' sticker .   This was one of those cards I did think of keeping and making something else as I just loved how it all came together. :-) Thanks for stopping by.

This month at Craftmad we had to swap two cards using Pink, Aqua, Silver and Taupe.  This is the first card I came up using this fun colour scheme.  As I was going through all my papers for a little inspiration I spied the little Tilda on a tag attached to the side of my cupboard.  This got the ball rolling on where my card would go.  I found my Tilda stamp, inked her up with Momento and then coloured with my Copic pens. I went over the top of the coloured dress with my new Silver Wink Stella pen .  I just love the fine glitter effect, a shame it doesn't show too well in photos.  I found this wonderful ribbon for the little girl to sit on.  Created the tag with my Stampin Up tag punch and finished with some taupe coloured bling. Another angel. The tag that inspired me which I received from a person in blog land.  Sadly, I can't remember who…..so if you pass by can you just let me know as I would love to put your name to you...

Happy Birthday for today Mum. :-) Mum loves dragonflies and I spied these in my stash which were punched by a lovely friend.  This was the starting point of my card.  I then found this wonderful paper to use as a background for the dragonflies.  The Happy Birthday was also punched and white so I have coloured it with my new Wink Pink Stella Pen.  You can't see it in the photo but the pens give a very fine glitter effect.  So pretty.  Finished the card with a border die and some bling. Thanks for passing on by wishing you an awesome day.  Another week done.  It's drizzly rain outside this morning so I am thinking I may just be stuck inside this coming weekend and have to do craft. :-)

I received this bling Happy Birthday from my Secret Santa at Christmas time.  As I am not a scrapbooker I wasn't sure I would be able to use it but when my friend turned 50, I thought she deserved a big bling card for such a momentous occasion. I cut a card front large enough to hold the bling which is much larger than I normally do.  Then I simply layered up purples, gold and some acetate paper, attached the bling and made a little tag for the side to hold the 50.  (The flowers were also part of the gift from my Secret Santa, yes I was spoilt) Finished with the cute bird paperclip I have had in my stash for a while.

Yes, it was a big year for all of my friends and myself in 2015.  Another blurry photo with my old camera. This card I created for my close friend Helen.  I really enjoyed the layout I used when I created a card for my cousins parents 55th wedding anniversary here , so I used that to start off my card for Helen.  Purple is a colour I associate with Helen so thought that was a good place to start and yellow always goes so well with it. It was a matter then of going through my stash and slowly layering up the card front.  I really like these flowers I have created using one of my dies for the second time.  I used glitter paper for the leaves and the '50' and finished flowers off with bling centres.  It's nice to finally have the time to do up posts for all these creations for last year.  Still at least ten more to come. :-)

Yes, I am delving back into 2015 cards that I have not shared with you which means my old blurry camera.  :-)   We had an acetate card swap with Craftmad.  I really enjoyed making this card although it is a one off as it was time consuming attaching the torn pieces of paper around and in the hedgehog image.    I stamped the hedgehog in Staz-on ink to the rear of the acetate then slowly attached pieces of coloured paper to a piece of card stock so that when the acetate with the image sat on top of the card stock the coloured pieces fitted into the shape of hedgehog.  I simply layered up the front of the card and finished with a Merry Christmas rub-on. We always do two cards for our swaps and this is my second use of acetate on a card.  The good old shaker card.  I haven't done many of these in my lifetime as I find that I never seem to put the right amount of glitter in the shaker.  I dug out my Christmas Stampin up papers and ...

It took me two months but I have reorganised my craft room to a stage I am happy to be crafting again.  This is a before shot. Another before - note the curtains and I am sitting right over in the left corner of the room. The spring clean starts. Everything was moved out from the walls and cobwebs and gecko poo removed. The shelving did live over here. Amazing how things get messier when you are cleaning and tidying up.  The cupboards are on the move and items from inside are now on the floor. Looking towards my craft area. One cupboard moved into it's new home. If you open the doors even now there are two shelves that need sorting but they will wait for another day. :-) Now the shelving has been moved and my desk has shoved along the wall and I still have a vantage point of our front yard and street.  So will know who is coming and going. :-) New curtains are up and shelves are full….now to find a home for this g...

I know it's early for Christmas however, I am making a start on my stash for this year.   'The Plan' - make three of every sketch that Kaye posts for the Craftmad Christmas All Year Round sketch challenge.   By the way Craftmad have moved their photo albums over to Pinterest to make it more accessible to everyone. Here's the link if you would like a look.  Craftmad Pinterest So for this card I used Stampin Up Christmas papers and coloured a digital stamp - Christmas Elf by Cardmadfairy.  The card is missing a little something, maybe it's the sentiment or maybe a little red behind the glitter banner.  I am sure I will figure it out by the end of the year. Thanks for visiting.

Another birthday we celebrated on the 22nd February was Ella's who turned 14.  February 22nd is the day of the year that I know multiple people celebrating their birthday.  Do you have a day like that?  Including Ella and my Dad, I know of four people. This card I created for Ella started with an aqua base card, a layer of silver glitter card, then some sage which I ran through the Happy Birthday embossing folder.  I then attached the bright pink card which I had run through the Hexagon embossing folder.  Next I attached the stickers to patterned paper and hand cut around them and then attached to the layered squares.  I made the little pom pom from embroidery thread wrapped around tines of a fork.  The easiest part of this card was the layout as I have used the February sketch challenge over at Craftmad Sketch Pinterest Board. Have an awesome day.

These are a couple more Starburst cards I have made for friends birthdays.  Again, using left over scraps of Stamping up paper.   The above card I ran through the Cuttlebug with a Hexagon embossing folder then I used an emery board to rough up the raised edges.  I also dragged out my sewing machine and stitched along the joins in the starburst.  I have gone around the edges of the labels with my new Wink Glitter pen.  I love how sparkly and fine the glitter is. I like how you can make the cards look so different by moving where the starburst starts from.  Again, I ran this Starburst front through an embossing folder before attaching to the card.  The sentiment is computer printed. Thanks for dropping on by.