December ATCs

Here are what I have been up to over the holidays. As predicted I am waaaaaay behind with my Journal but I am catching up slowly and will post pics of that soon. Meanwhile the UKStampers December ATC swap was to use 3 things the same on each ATC.

I am all Christmassed out so whilst having a rummage I found these stamps that I actually got last Christmas as a present and have barely used, even though I LOVE them.

So three home-baking inspired ATCs raised slightly on silicone glue and just a touch of sparkle added too. Hope they will be well received.

JYC Days 4 and 5

I knew it wouldn't be long before I got behind! But I do have an excuse...last night I started knitting so I was absorbed in that. So this morning I had to catch up quickly. The prompt for yesterday was about "The Perfect Christmas". A tricky one for me because I don't ever build things up into a big ol' doo-dah. Christmas happens and we always enjoy it even if things aren't quite as planned. I saw this quote already used by another JYCer and it just said it perfectly....so I pinched it. I hand stamped white card for the B/G just for a change.

Hmmm not so pleased with this one. It was about counting down to Christmas. Previously I have talked about our advent calendars so this year I focused more on the numbers aspect. Not terribly happy but I shall just go with it and move on!

JYC Day 3

Today's prompt is about cards; do you make them, how many, when do you send them and so on! My journalling is on a tag in the envie. The photo is of the cards I have made so far this year. I have to make about 50 I reckon and I have done 25 so far. I think now I shall change to a simpler design for the last half. I do get bored so I tend to do a variety of designs!

Some more sewing.

Uh oh.....more pears! The one on the right I actually did a few days ago and I also started the other one too! BUT I ran out of red thread so I nipped down to Mums to borrow hers to finish it off today! These are rather more glamorous than the tartan one, being made of satin (on the right) and velvet with a super shiny, stretchy dance type fabric (on the left) Honest IRL it is very shiny! I think these are destined for Christmas.....maybe gifts?

JYC Day 2

Day 2 was about the weather; what it's like for Christmas or what we might like it to be like! I think I can safely say that THIS is proper Christmassy weather! After waiting for ages we have good snow....a foot of it. These pics I took this morning whilst walking the dogs. I covered the main pic with some embossed acetate that I inked over bits of and added some sparkle! Another idea for today was paper snowflakes. I am trying to keep my album a bit plainer this year but I did slip one in behind the page number!

This just shows the embossing detail a bit better.
I am managing to keep up whilst we are having these "snow days"! So it's looking good til Monday then...very little chance of school opening tomorrow.
Keep safe everybody.

Journal Your Christmas Day 1

Yes it's this time of year again. I will be trying to complete this journal once more. I had an unexpected snow day today so I was able to start. I managed to cover the front and do page 1 which was the dedication....what you want to achieve etc.

Here is the first of the tiny page numbers I made. They took aaaaages but I think they look quite cute so worth the time spent. Lets just hope I don't lose any now!
So far I am up to date.....!

Bit more LSNED...

Day 20 was thoughts about what is your current "thing". I am having a jewellery phase...

Day 21 and I can't remember the prompt but this was a cutting from the paper. A silent but powerful objection to plans Tesco have for "redeveloping" the town centre.

Day 21 was thoughts about a lesson learnt from someone else (Ithink!) This tells the story of an early morning chat with a child in the playground. I have forgotten to add the craft challenges but this one was to write in something other than your usual pen, so I used coloured pencils.

Jasper and Eliza's birthday was on the 22nd and as always everything is a terrible rush when it is a school day. It seemed even worse this year as they are at secondary school.

So as I neglected to finish this in September I did ponder about thinking of some other things I had learnt to finish the book up to 30th. In the end I decided to draw it to it's end here so my final page explains that maybe this was the last learnt lesson for the month!

Now I can get onto guilt free Christmas crafting!

LSNED...finally!

For some reason I am having a few problems loading pics at the moment. I am doing nothing differently but some aren't loading and those that do are randomly choosing which way to orient themselves, resisting all attempts to rotate them! Please bear with me or contact me if you too are experiencing similiar difficulties!

Yes I know...it was meant to finish in September! But I didn't. However like a good girl I decided to finish what I could before I clear the decks to make Christmas cards and Journal my Christmas. Now I absolutely cannot miss doing JYC as I am trying to make one for each child so this will be No3.
With that in mind here are the last pages..16th was a story written by a child in the class, who is 6. I repeated it with her spellings and it is really lovely!
17th is fairly self explanatory. I don't get lie ins very often. A lie in to me is 7am as I am usually up at 5.45. On 18th I booked online for air tickets to a Uni open day in Edinburgh. Another new thing I have never done before.

I went to Mayfield Bonfire with the children in the parade. Now it is just too much to lug my great big camera all the way round so at the end I took a quick pic of the fair on my mobile and I love the fact this pic show just the blobs of light.

More sewing!

I did say I would show what we have been up to at Guides. Way back in April, when the V&A had their patchwork exhibition on, they had a special charity patchwork day. You may remember that we took a group of Guides up and sat in the Raphael Cartoon Gallery, stitching patchwork for a charity called Project Linus. Well off the back of that we heard about another charity project called Quilts for London. Their aim is to present fabric banners to every athlete who comes here for the Olympics in 2012 by getting individuals and community groups to make them. So now the evenings are drawing in, making it hard to take the girls outside, we decided to crack on with them.
Us adults came up with the design to represent Guiding and that allowed every girl to do a square each. Lots of the girls have never sewn, or said they couldn't, but these are what they came up with! One of the Mums did the words for us and another Mum who makes church banners mounted them onto the red velvet but otherwise the girls did them all by themselves. We just have to label the back and then they are ready to be sent off. I hope they like them! We also decided to make a banner for the Unit to keep as it is our Centenary year and that is nearly finished so I will show that when it is completed later on!
Last night I was a bit naughty! I should have been soap wrapping but after looking at Efemera's blog I HAD to make this cute little pear! Jess said it looked like a tartan scrotum (!!!!!) but I shall ignore her rude comments. I might even make some more!

The finished article.

A few labels and bits and buttons that I used to embellish the squares. My fave is this typical label from inside..."Trousers Combat Temperate DPM"! Army speak gone mad and usually followed by the phrase "pair 1"!

This is a selection of pockets and tabs, Ken's stripes and an arrow cut from red fleece with a Sizzix die!

Last of all I sewed it onto a fleece I got at good old Primark for £3. In fact that and a reel of thread was all this quilt cost! Bargain!!!

Guess what I am up to now?

Yes...another quilt! Well I cut this one out in half term and it has just been shoved in a shoebox and shunted about getting in the way and on everyones nerves! So finally I sat down and embellished a few squares..not too many as this is for my son. Not only that, it was made from my husbands old Army jungle DPMs and the desert ones he got 20 years ago when HE went to the Gulf War. They have been languishing in the loft and he finally agreed to let me chop them up. I digress....they are full of pockets and tabs so most of the squares had some kind of decoration on anyway. I added 2 pairs of my own trousers that I am too large for and that was enough!

So this is it, nearly all laid out, once I hoovered the carpet!
It is all finished now so I must go and take some pics of the finished article and will add them in a bit!
I also want to share with you what we have been making at Guides....

Yes it's coming!!!

Don't faint but I have started my Christmas cards! Last Monday I went to Burn's cabin and had a rummage in her stamps! Linda was there too with her christmassy ones, so we had a swap about of images. This one was Burn's, stamped in a brown. When I brought it home, I matted it on that lovely bazzil called "raisin". Then I broke open my new pad of My Mind's Eye christmas papers which are all glittery and delicious, to use for the next mat on a green card! Simple but made fab with this lovely stamp!

Think this one was Burn's too; stamped in grey this time and mounted on some gold and christmas scraps with some gold ribbon.

This is a stamp I bought for this year. I whiled away an afternoon or two putting different glitter and stickers and gems on this (and the following one) which I then took to Burn's to make up into cards. I have done these in several different colours so I can use up my scraps.

So a few more to go I think!

Getting messy again.

Finally I get to get inky and messy again! I have been very unproductive as of late. That is because I have been tripping all over the countryside to University Open Days with Jess. So far we have been to Edinburgh (plane), Nottingham Trent (trains) and Bournemouth, (automobile...ha ha couldn't resist!). Last one is Sidcup and I don't think we can go by boat so short of hiring a helicopter it will be car again!
Anyway....I digress. I HAVE managed to finish my sister's wedding album so I might take some pics of that later. I have also been getting on with Postcrossing. Remember I told you about the site where you get random postcards from all over the world. Well one lady sent me one from Finland and said that one of her hobbies was ATCs. Soooo we arranged a swap and these are the two I made for her. I did them at the same time as the November ATC swap on UKStampers too. I am just too organised! I did all the backgrounds the same; beige mountboard painted with white, ochre and sienna paint. Then a blast of cosmic shimmer. These two I then overstamped with a postcard stamp and some other postal bits. I triple embossed the frame/swirl with pewter powder and then popped it all on with some vintage images.

The November theme is "Stamped Collage" Now a few of you might be thinking "hang on where did the October ones go?" The theme was Halloween and I posted them before I remembered to take a pic!
So back to November..I already explained the BG bit; for these I decided to collect random, linked stamps and put them all over the BG, masking as I went.

I then picked one image that stood out a bit more and re-stamped that, rubbed on the back with an embossing tool and attached over the original with silicone glue to make it stand out.

Finally I embossed that lovely pewter around the edges in a "shabby" styley! Once again not great photos but the light is just rubbish this time of year and its too cold and windy to try and take pics in the garden!