My New CJ!

Yeay!! I am off on a new CJ journey! I love love LOVE CJs, especially the ones I have done on UKStampers where we send a stamp round with it. So here is mine....a PaperArtsy squiggly heart stamp is what I have chosen to send!

I made little envies (from an old copy of Hans Christian Anderson Fairy Tales) and added a tag in each. For my entry I found some anatomical heart drawings on the net and printed them off to add to the envie and tag. The quote says "Be still my beating heart" but I couldn't find out where that came from!

I stamped the heart on a burnt coke can (heated in the flame on the gas cooker....makes it go a groovy colour) then went over the squiggles with an embossing tool to indent them slightly.

This is the whole book...unbound for now as I will do it with the BIA when it comes home!
So off it goes on it's journey and I will see it in 12 months! Can't wait!

Now I have been lucky enough to receive a blog award from my pal Burnice...

...but I can't work out how to get it up so please just bear with me and I will show it to you in a day or so when I work it out!!!

On the 3rd Day of Christmas....

These are my Three French Hens! Or maybe they are just one three-headed hen! I am not quite sure! Still I assure you they are meant to be loosely based on a French breed called a Copper Maran (at least I think it is!).

Not very good photoes I am afraid but I was determined to blog as I haven't for so long! I just don't seem too have had two minutes to create ANYTHING, let alone blog it! Anyway back to my hens; They are made from scraps of black velvet (the sleeves off a ball gown from the charity shop), orange slub silk and red poly cotton with felt feet and corn! I added a sequin for the eye and stitched the beak.
Now I need to do 4 Calling Birds.....

The 2nd day of Christmas...

As usual I started this weekly challenge a week late so THIS week we should have been on the 2nd day.... So now I have caught up as the next challenge starts on Sunday! Here are my Two Turtle Doves.

Same BG as before...I think I will stick with this one all through to give some continuity between the pieces; but the doves are ivory velvet. I stamped the wings with copper Brilliance ink ( not sure if it is meant to work on fabric but it seems to have done!)

The leaves and branches are from scraps of felt and fabric that I have about (!) and then I machine doodled the skinny branches! Just a few red glass beads which I think give it a little lift and done!

Now I look at the 2 side by side I am wondering whether I should have done some work into the sky or whether I like the space..... I have also started to think about whether I will actually do 7 swans and 12 Lords when the time comes or just show 1 or 2 of them.

I would also like to add a big thank you for all your good wishes! I am feeling heaps better now but get tired quite quickly! Just a shame it had to be in the holidays.

New Weekly Challenge

So now the tag challenge is all finished over at UK Stampers, there is a new weekly challenge. Well MOST people have finished their tags, I still have to catch up, but I will and planned to this week until swine flu hit! Well after 4 days of doing nothing I am very bored but not terribly energetic so I decided to craft in the hope that it will make me tired so I can sleep tonight.
So the new challenge is to fill the 12 weeks (yes that's all it is!!!) until Christmas! It is on a 10x10 size base. I decided to go with fabric for this challenge. So I haven't stamped on this first one...hope that will be ok!!

The base is a piece of plain blue cotton, mounted on very stiff interfacing. I then cut random green leaves and stitched them on just along the spine of the leaf. The partridge was cut from felt first and then I applied two different fabrics onto that. I stitched feathers on top of that. Those very clever country sorts will spot they are pheasant and not partridge feathers!!!

The pear is a lightly padded scrap of slub silk, again mounted on felt. Then I stitched the whole lot together and there you go; a Partridge in a Pear Tree!

Apologies!

Sorry to those of you who pop in regularly! I was planning to post lots of lovely new stuff on here, what with it being half term and me having a lot more free time. But I have been struck down by the dreaded swine flu. Now those of you who know me, know what a cynic I am, and as always, I thought swine flu was just a souped up idea to justify all the training medical staff have been given over the last few years in preparation for a pandemic. Well let me tell you that I am utterly ashamed of my cynicism now....Those of you that have ever had flu, well think back and multiply it by about 20. There were times yesterday when I really thought I was going to have to be taken off in an ambulance and I began to lose the power of rational thought. Now in the cold light of another day (and several doses of tamiflu later) I know that it was just the high temperature making me think strange things!
Today I feel a lot better but so, so weak. All I can manage is making the odd cuppa and then I need to lie down on the sofa. So all my creative plans have had to go on hold.....

So I have had my come-uppance! From now on I will be sympathetic to people with swine flu.....but only if it's REALLY swine flu!

Some more Scrapbooking...

Another entry for my 2009 Scrapbook. This one shows my son being invested as a Scout. A few weeks after he was invested he was presented with his Scouting International Friendship Partnership Award along with several other boys.

He and a friend arranged a "bagging" session at the local supermarket, raising over £300 for Kenya Street Scouts. This amount was then presented to a representative from their group so that the Kenyan Troop can buy goats to help support themselves. Definately a "Proud Mummy Moment" this one!

Gift Book

I am sure you will remember the book I made a few days ago for the dedication of a friend's baby son. The photos arrived really quickly so tonight I put them in the book! This was a particularly lovely stained glass window in the church...

I have included these just to give you an idea of how the book was laid out. Now obviously it is a bit difficult for me to post clear images because they are other people's children and I can only work out how to do an overall blur rather than a focused blur for faces! But I hope you can still see enough.

So I shall give it to them tomorrow..better late than never!