Spot the Difference

I ran out of time to make Faith's playgroup leaders' thankyou cards - I'd forgotten that they broke up a week earlier than the school. I had started colouring in some of the new mangas from Sugar Nellie, but quickly realised I just didn't have time. So... I thought I'd go with clean and simple... just a cuttlebug embossed panel, matted, and a wee embellishment flower. Well that was the plan , and you know what happens to the best laid plans....

In my infinite wisdom I decided to use one the gorgeous Marianne D ribbon flower die cuts - bit of a pain in the bum and surprisingly time consuming!

So, I made each of the flowers slightly different...

I embossed the SU Kraft cardstock with the Thankyou cuttlebug folder, then trimmed and matted it onto either lilac or purple core'dinations card and attached the panels to craftwork cards scalloped card blanks

The Marianne D ribbon flowers were cut from the same purple and lilac core'dinations cardstock and threaded with ribbons from Angel Crafts (apart from the purple satin ribbon on the 2nd one) The little swirl is an EK Success punch from Simply Create.

Seeing as the sun is in hiding today, I'm going to have a quick scoot around doing the housework then nose to the grindstone to make 7 more teachers cards for Scott and Willow, and hopefully a start on some cards for Jacqui's Save the Children event at Simply Create. If I'm not back by the weekend, send a search party lol

Don't want to jinx it....

So I'm not going to mention the weather ;)

My life seems to be passing in a blur, all the kids activities at school and playgroup are keeping me busy - Scott and Willow both had their sports days, Willow's had her end of year trip, Faith's had her end of playgroup trip, apparently Scott's class isn't having a trip this year - which I'm not terribly impressed with seeing as his class has had crappy trips the last 2 years and none this year. Then Willow and Scott found out who their teachers will be next year - I haven't met Scott's new teachers before, unfortunately I have come across Willow's new teachers for next year and let's just say I'm not over enamoured with them.

Here's a few pics of Scott and Willow at their sports days...

Scott, decided it was too cold to wear gym kit!

Here's weary Willow...

Must be something about my kids, Willow also decided it was too cold and kept on her tights and jacket!

Faith managed to get some kind of bug over the weekend, so was sick on Sunday morning all over her bed and bedroom floor, and she had the runs up until yesterday so in line with policy I've had to keep her off playgroup even though she's been well in herself.

So she and I decided to have a wee jaunt out to Alford to Simply Create and had a wee splurge - just a wee one lol Picked up one of the new Hero Arts stamp sets, some MME and Making Memories papers, some Craftwork Cards stuff, some paint and crackle paint for a wee project I have planned. And of course there is always a sneaky wee EK Success punch that manages to jump into my basket. Unfortunately I didn't see Jacqui, she was too busy preparing for the marathon crop next week - you'll find all the info on the SC blog.

I was asked to make a wedding acceptance card by a regular customer of mine (Hi Angela if you're reading this) and she wanted it to be simple and elegant, so this is what I did...

The "acceptance" stamp was bought at the wee crafty shop in Stonehaven, I used Brushed Corduroy Distress Ink to stamp it. The white and caramel cardstock is core'dinations, I embossed some of the white card with the cuttlebug "birds and swirls" folder and added some latte kaisercraft adhesive pearls to the pattern. I used the garden lattice MS punch on another piece of white card and attached both panels to some caramel card, covering the join with plain white grosgrain ribbon.

Oops

I think my head is in a bin just now... I completely forgot to share a couple of things with you.

Firstly, and I don't know how I managed to forget to tell you this, but on Thursday I had a wee treat. Dropped Graham off at the heliport and had a run over to our very own local superstar Kath for a cuppy and a crafty gossip. We were blessed with a little sunshine, fab scones, wonderful company - not just Kath, but the lovely Anne from Simply Create, and the gorgeous Lyn who I'd not met before. It was lovely to catch up with you girls and really nice to meet you Lyn - get that blog up and going so I can nosey at your crafting missus!

 And of course we can't forget to mention the stunningly handsome and all round cuddly gorgeousness that is Buddy, who Faith has fallen in love with. We had a great time and we'll have to do it again soon ladies.

Now, the other thing I forgot to share with you was my last DT Tutorial over at the PfP Weekend Workshop. It's just a simple one this time with a very cute little Scotsman - I just had to overdo the Scottish/tartan theme for my last DT card, I was having a bit of a rebellion of my own because I'm getting a bit overwhelmed with the sight of St George's crosses everywhere with the World Cup lol

So here goes....

This week I've chosen the Scotland Ian set from Digital Delights by Louby Lou as it fits in well with my theme for next week's PfP Challenge (you'll have to wait til then to find out the theme)

I use a slightly different style of colouring for this kind of whimsical character compared to the style I use for more anatomically correct characters.

Firstly I have printed the image out onto Stampin' Up Whisper White cardstock on my HP Photosmart printer

I've chosen to colour the skin next - I started colouring the darkest areas, under the hair line, under the chin, under the sleeves and kilt with Coral. Just colouring a small area. I then coloured over the Coral and outwards with Sunkissed Pink then repeated this for the remaining skin areas with Blush, colouring with small circular motions. By colouring over the darker shades, you blend away any hard lines between the shades.

I chose to colour the jacket and hat with one of the grey collections - in this case I've used Warm Greys 1-5. I started out with the WG5 next to the outlines of the jacket and hat. Colouring over this and slightly more towards the middle of each area with WG4, I repeated this stage with WG3, 2 and 1. Again, by colouring over what you have previously coloured at each stage, it will ensure any hard lines are blended.

At this point I added a little shading with WG1 to the areas of the image that I wanted to remain white eg; his frilly shirt, the pompom on his hat, his sporran and his socks

To complete his outfit, I used WG 4 to add some shading where I imagine there would be some shadow on his kilt. I did this before I coloured it as I find it easier when using several colours to colour in an item of clothing eg tartan, checks, patterns etc

I then used Yellow, Petrol Blue and China Blue to colour his kilt. I also used WG 3 & 5 to colour the other parts of his sporran, and Black to his shoes. I haven't shown it in the pics, but I will add some embellishments to his jacket for the buttons and I will highlight his shoes with sakura white gel pen.

Tetanus!!

tell me something.... why is it, if anything is gonna go wrong it always happens when Graham is offshore. I have a never ending list of disasters and emergencies that have happened as soon as Graham goes offshore. Probably the most memeorable being Faith's birth - with him offshore, and my contractions 5 minutes apart, the maternity hospital still wouldn't let me call an ambulance! Anyway, the latest drama here happened last night. I was out in the garden with the dog after teatime and stood on a bit of log roll that surrounds an area of the garden that's covered in bark. Well, was there not a 3 inch nail sticking out of it??

So after a few sweary words, I got it pulled out of my foot.

I phoned NHS 24 and told them all about it when they called me back. The lassie told me I had to go to A&E for a tetanus shot just to be on the safe side. But I explained the problem that I had 3 kids and my man was offshore, so she told me to get there within 36 hours.

After a bit of humming and haaing - I finally got my mum and dad to come in and watch the kids for me today. So they arrived with my nephew Kyle, and dad drove me up to the hospital. The nail went into my left foot and I didn't think I'd be able to use the clutch in the car.

Only had to wait an hour and a half to be seen so it wasn't too bad. I got my tetanus shot and enough antibiotics to start my own pharmacy.

But its still throbbing and I can't put any weight on that foot, but hey-ho, just have to get on with it. Especially as the 4 kids made a pretty good job of trashing my house while I was away

Pepsi is getting back to her usualy cheeky self, and she's starting to put more weight on her healing leg. I was a bit concerned that she didn't seem to be eating much, so I gave her some cooked chicken the other day and it lasted all of 0.3 seconds so I don't think there's anything wrong with her appetite.

So, to finish today's post I thought I'd share a couple more of the samples I made up for last week's demo day. I've also got an Acceptance card to share with you, but I'll leave that for another day. I'm hoping to fit in a few challenges this week too, have made a start on a card for the Sugar Bowl and want to do one for Penny Black Saturday now that I've figured out how to colour the hedgie stamps with promarkers.

Have a great weekend everyone

I coloured a bunch of ribbon scraps of all different textures with various pink and purple promarker shades, then stuck them to a scrap of card before cutting the butterfly shape out with a sizzix die and stuck on some gems - thought it was a pretty cute way to use up some scraps.

Hero Arts - Four Dolls stamp set and sentiments

The gorgeous teddy bear is Dexter from Sugar Nellie - isn't he fab?

A Tale of Woe

Now, before you start thinking, oh God, what's up with her now - this isn't about me, its about my poor little sausage - Princess Pepsi.

Over the last week I've noticed she seems a little wobbly on her back legs and has fallen over once or twice - the only way I know how to explain it really is to compare it to when my legs just go from under me, I have bilateral hip dysplasia so it happens now and again.

So I took her along to the vet and explained all of this to him, he examined her back legs pretty thoroughly and came to the conclusion that she has luxating patellas in both back legs. Basically what this means is that instead of sitting in the groove at the end of the femur (thigh bone), her kneecaps float around. She has quite a severe case so her kneecaps are sitting on the insides of her legs instead of where her knee should be.

She needs surgery on both legs - obviously not both at the same time though or we'd have to rig her up with some wheels!. She had the first leg done on Monday - they deepend the groove on the end of her femur so that the kneecap sits in place better and they also had to move the tendon with a bit of bone to keep everything straight. So quite major orthopaedic surgery really.

She got home on Tuesday afternoon and looks so sorry for herself. She's got one of those lampshade collars on to stop her from licking at her stitches - although the wee monkey still manages to have a sly lick when I'm not looking. They also shaved both hind legs from her feet right up past her hips - so she looks like she has a mohican on her behind.

I've uploaded a wee video and some pics of her so you can see my poor wee pumpkin.

She's actually recovering pretty well, but as is typical of cavvies, she is milking the sympathy vote. :)

 You can see her stitches in that one

And of course there's no show without Punch - so Ziggy, who missed her heaps when she was away at the vet's wanted in on the act...

Ziggy was just so lost - he spent the whole evening on Monday, mooching around looking for pepsi then curled up in her bed to wait for her .

My Last PfP DT Card

Well, this is my last DT card for Passion for Promarkers which is also my last DT tutorial for the PfP weekend workshop.

I've really enjoyed the last year at PfP, and will miss the teams loads

This week you could win a stamp of your choice from Whiff of Joy remember, you have to be in it to win it.

The theme this week was chosen by me and it is "male cards" what with Father's Day coming up this Sunday and I have also done a nice and simple sketch which is very adaptable and will give you plenty of scope.

So, this is the card I made for my dad for Father's Day...

Image: Scotland Ian from Digital Delights by Louby Lou, coloured with promarkers: Coral, Sunkissed Pink and Blush for his skin, Spice, Apricot and Lemon for his hair, Warm Grey 1-5 for his jacket, hat and the shading on his pompom, sporran, socks, shirt and kilt. Yellow, Petrol Blue and China Blue for his kilt and Black for his shoes. (You can find the tutorial for the image, either on my Promarker Tutorials Page or over on the Weekend Workshop)

Tartan papers are from my stash, the centre lattice panels were made using a MS deep edge punch trimmed down, Papermania eyelets, greeting is Daisy & Dandelion, card is core'dinations.

So, pop on over to PfP to check out how the rest of the DT have interpreted the sketch

Demo Day

Gosh, its been ages since I blogged - life has just been a blur to be honest. It's a busy time, coming to the end of the summer term for the kids, so they're all off on various school trips, sports days etc etc and I have a whole story to tell you about wee Pepsi, but I'll save that for another day.

As you know, I was booked to do a demo day on Saturday at Kitty Krafts in Dundee, so I thought I'd share one or two of the samples I made up to take along with me. The day passed so quickly and Louise seemed to sell a few Promarkers too, so a good day all round.

Sad (for me) news, and A Happy Day

Sadly I have decided to resign from Passion for Promarkers, for various reasons. I'm very very sad about it as it has been such a huge part of my life, but I have a string of other things in my life that have been badly neglected and really need more committment from me.

But.... I had a very special visitor today, the absolutely gorgeous Sarah Horne (my ex Teamie at PfP). So we had a good catch up, and sat in the garden enjoying the sunshine - yup, it does come out here now and again lol

Just in case you're reading this Sarah - my parcel arrived about 10 minutes after I got back home from dropping you off haha, and I hope you have a great time out at Simply Create

Simply Create's Anniversary blog candy

As you know, my favourite local craft boutique is Simply Create, and Jacqui has just celebrated her first year and wants to spread a little happiness by giving away some super duper candy

So pop on over and have a nosey at the Simply Create blog for your chance to enter

Passion for Promarkers #54 - Books

Morning folks - wow what a busy week!! We're so chuffed that so many of you entered our anniversary celebration challenge last week, and we've had a ball going round and seeing all the entries. I'm really excited to see who wins each of the prizes too .

So this is our first week with the new Design Team on their own - as you may already know, the bosses, Gina and Denise are staying on, and so are Michele and myself - so you'll have to put up with us a bit longer lol

Andie has picked this weeks theme of "Books" which can be interpreted in a number of ways, I've chosen to use a book as an embellishment. You can use any colours, but do remember to use your promarkers. 

Up for grabs this week we have £10 voucher for

Remember to pop on over to Passion for Promarkers to see the new Design Team's samples, and enter our challenge.

Image: WS Nahla from TGF, coloured with promarkers: Burnt Orange, Coral, Sunkissed Pink and Blush for her skin, Caramel, Tan and Walnut for her hair, Pear and Olive Green for her dungarees, Sunflower Yellow and Mandarin, Caramel and Walnut for her stripy top and the sunflower.

Paper is SU, cardstock is all core'dinations, nesties for the book shape and mats behind the image, Marianne D's creatables ribbon border with Anita's spotted grosgrain ribbon. Prima e-line pearls, Penny Black greeting and flourish stamp. The sunflowers were made using 2 sizes of daisy punch and craftwork cards card candy

Here's another view and her close-up...