Snowmen!!!

My most favourite of all my PC Crafter images are these two snowmen......love, love, love them. Especially the second one.
I've used Pink Petticoat snowflake and gingham papers and today's 'using up' is the wording and snowflake peeloffs.
Another productive day. Finished the nine cards I started yesterday which are the ones up yonder. I am being good and packing all the cards as they are done and I am just filling my second box of Christmas cards now. I need to make loads as I already have an order for fifty.

Just need to warn you that if I disappear from Blogland it's because I have kicked the computer down to the bottom of the garden. It is seriously getting on my nerves now. The internet won't stay connected and we have to keep resetting it. So far today we have reset it eight times. It keeps putting up a box saying 'Internet Explorer has stopped working'........I will punch it before long.

Anyhoo......tea is a-cooking so I am off to have a browse round some blogs while this heap of rubbish is behaving itself.
Thanks for dropping by.
Sheila-x-

Traditional, Modern and Cheeky!!!

Traditional-:
Stamped holly with tartan.
Stamp is Magenta. Embossed in gold and painted with H2O's.
Berries are Card Candi
Using up......peeloffs.....yay not got many Christmas ones left now.

 Modern-:
Gorgeous pearl gold and silver card cut into tree shapes.
Using up ribbon offcuts and peeloffs.

Cheeky-:
Ruby's little face with a cheeky grin after she was bought a tumbler with a curly straw in it at the zoo yesterday. She has just learned how to drink through a straw and is sooooo chuffed with herself.

I've had a good day today......twelve of the tartan cards and eight of the tree cards plus nine others that just want finishing off tomorrow.
Must have worked off the migraine as it was gone by dinner time.
More cardmaking tomorrow but I will have to cook a roast dinner for Mr Manic when he gets in so I won't get quite so long upstairs.

Just off for a cuppa and a bit of Bones.
Tara for now.
Sheila-x-

Shattered!!!

Another week of prepping in snatched hours and no actual cardmaking. It's driving me nuts now.
Luckily I have no commitments tomorrow apart from making a bolognese sauce to go with some pasta for tea which I will get out of the way in the morning then the rest of the day I'm going to be upstairs come hell or high water.

DDIL took me shopping Friday afternoon. My normal shopping day is to whizz into Tesco and be back home in about one and a half hours..........it took us four hours.......lol!!! After that I only had a couple of hours to whip round the house tidying before DS picked me up to go and babysit Miss Doodle. It's a good job I had spent those four hours with her as she wanted to go to bed and was asleep within half an hour of me arriving. I settled down and watch The Lovely Bones. What a fantastic film. I read the book a long time ago and loved it so didn't expect to like the film.
Yesterday I was up early and in the kitchen preparing a fabulous picnic to take to Trentham with us last night. We had a fabulous time. We ate our picnic under umberellas in the rain, we sang, we danced and arrived home just after midnight completely shattered.
I had to cry off the visit to the zoo today due to migraine so spent the day sleeping and pottering about flicking a duster and stuff.
Anyway I hope to be back with a card or two tomorrow.
Thanks for dropping by.
Sheila-x-

PS.......Is anyone else having trouble with Blogger. I've had a heck of job to get this post done and I can't leave comments on blogs. It's doing my head in big time.

Hello Stranger!!!

 Gawd this life and busyness thing doesn't half get in the way of doing anything remotely pleasurable like crafting......apart from a couple of hours stolen here and there.

I managed to make a couple of the card up yonder.

Paper is Crafty Individuals and I used it only as a last resort after going through my paper stash twice to find an alternative. I love it and it broke my heart to use it.

I think the rose is Rubber Stampede/Delta and it has been stamped in Versafine and coloured with Aquatone pencils and a damp paintbrush onto watercolour paper.

Background is stamped using a Viva stamp and coloured with distress inks. The rose was masked off first with Masking Magic.

 Last week we took the Doodle Bird out to a local farm centre and had a fabulous day.
Here she is milking the pretend cow.

I very nearly stuffed these up my jumper to bring home. Oh my word they were so cute.
Ruby was in her element as she loves animals......to look at but not to touch bless her.
I have to be honest and say it wasn't a day out I was looking forward to but it was a beautiful place and we will definitely be going back again. There was lots to see and do and there is a good restaurant with an adventure play area for the littlies.
For anyone who's interested it is called The National Forest Adventure Farm and can be found on Postern Road, Tatenhill, Staffordshire.

Well I've got a busy few days coming up with Ruby. Then Friday DDIL is taking me shopping after she gets home from work at lunchtime. I'm babysitting at nightime and then Saturday will be spent getting our picnic ready for Trentham when we go to see the open air showing of Mama Mia in the evening. Sunday we are all off to Twycross Zoo with DDIL's family. I have a few days grace then until next weekend when DD's fella is coming to stay again. I know I've said it before but.........how on earth did I ever find time to go out to work.

Mr Manic has had a bit of an expensive weekend. He washed his mobile with his work clothes on Saturday night and then on Sunday morning the tumble drier blew up.......we are now awaiting the third thing.......lol!!!

Anyhoo.....I am going to treat myself to a couple of episodes of Bones.......I've started again from the beginning........and then I am off to bed to get my strength up for a day with Ruby tomorrow.
Bye for now and thanks for your visit.
Sheila-x-

Cookin' And Craftin' Up A Storm!!!

Last week hubby got me a fabulous bargain from the staff shop at work. Huge jars of cooked, dried shallots and I have to say that I am loving using them. No more peeling and chopping of onions for a while.
Today I have used them to make a batch of Cottage Pies for the freezer, the filling for a cheese and potato flan for later in the week and a huge bowl of homemade sage and onion stuffing....some for tomorrow's tea and some for the freezer. So quite a productive few hours in the kitchen.
I have Ruby quite a lot this next week so I have also been doing lots of prep of card fronts etc so that they can be put together quite quickly. I think I prepped about fifty Christmas cards in total. They will get done in the precious hour or so I get upstairs at night when Ruby has gone home.

Well I am on a fast now until about 10am tomorrow when I have blood tests. Can't even have my bedtime cuppa which is a major trial for me. I love my bedtime cuppa more than any other drink I have in a day.
Need to keep myself busy so I am off to a few jobs instead of sitting watching Bones as I will be too tempted to put the kettle on.

Thanks for dropping by.
Sheila-x-

Festive Friday!!!

Today's card is one I put together using some toppers I made up last year and some Making Memories paper.....one of those annoying double sided papers that is gorgeous on both sides and you put off using because you can't decide which side to use. Anyway I bit the bullet and chopped it all up and I think there are only a few small pieces left now.
The diecuts are Cuttlebug embellished with tiny gems.

I've spent some of today doing prep for Christmas cards. Chopping up layers and making toppers ready to put together. I picked up a gorgeous set of Kanban stamps the other day so I hope to get time to play with those this weekend although I will need to tidy the desk first.
I've also done some tidying and condensing of stuff in my workroom so that I can get rid of some of the bigger boxes that fall off the shelf if I look at them never mind touch them....lol!!!

Well everybody has been fed and watered and the kitchen is nice and tidy so it's time a bit of me time. I'm missing Bones so I'm going to start again at the beginning and that will hopefully take me up to the release of season six.
Bye for now.
Thanks for your visit.
Sheila-x-

It's All About The Birds!!!

 The first bird is a peacock.
Stamped and embossed in silver onto Basic Grey paper. I have then coloured areas with Tombow pens and added Stickles in Lime Green for a bit of twinkle.
After I had mounted it onto black card I felt it needed something else.....hence the diecut flourish.
I think the stamp may be Magenta but I'm not sure.

Next we have Doodle Bird snuggling up to an owl. Oh she did so love this carving. She kept kissing it and going shhhhh as if she was trying to make it go to sleep. So cute.

It was my day off today so I spent most of it upstairs and made twenty one cards. I did get a visit from Doodle this morning as she wanted to show me her new shoes and then again this evening while DS went to the docs.
A bit lost tonight as I have finished Bones. DD has given me another series to try but I'm not sure if I will like it. It's called In Plain Sight. I'll give it a go but if I don't like it I have Brokeback Mountain to fall back on.
Thanks for dropping by.
Sheila-x-

Blankety Blank!!!

A very simple card today.
Background is stamped straight onto the card blank using Ancient Page-Deep Harbour.
The two step flower is stamped first in StazOn and then the solid image in the same ink as the background.
I also used the Deep Harbour to colour a piece of card for matting.
Just added three tiny gems to embellish the flower.....job done.
I made twelve of these in various colours and I love how soft the inks look on this pearlised cardstock.
Stamps are all Artemio.

I've had a fabulous peaceful day upstairs today as I decided I would cook our Sunday lunch for teatime. I managed to make twenty four cards so that was a very productive session.
The computer is driving me mad at the moment. We had a virus last week......despite having anti virus protection. It wiped out all my picture files, removed everything in my favourites lists, ate the Google toolbar and won't let me download it again and now using the Orange search tool when I click on the site I want from the lists I am getting the most revolting websites coming up instead of the ones I need. It's doing my head in.

Anyway I'm off to watch more Bones. I'm on season five and will have to wait until October for season six...blah!!!
Thanks for your visit.
Sheila-x-

Snoozy Saturday!!!

Today's card has been made to use up some purple card. I'm not a big fan of purples and lilacs and the only paper I had in my stash was the spotty one so I printed a Pink Petticoat pattern for the rest of it.
The image was a free download from Twisted Papers and for the punched strip I used a Papermania edge punch.

We've had a fab couple of days out with Ruby. On Thursday we took her to Trentham for lunch and we decided to go Italian. Ruby ate enough to last her until Christmas I think and she thoroughly enjoyed herself. I tried olives for the first time in my life.....oooh I shan't be eating them again any time soon.....they were disgusting.
Yesterday we took her to Rosliston Forestry Centre. What a fabulous place. Ruby walked all the way round and had a great time despite being full of cold. She fell in love with a carved wooden owl and was cuddling it for ages we had a job to prise her away from it. I think her favourite bit was the ice cream at the end though..lol!!!

Today I am playing catch up with jobs in the house, shopping and trying to get some cards made but I don't have much time for upstairs as DD has booked me for a DVD session tonight.

Right...off to do a bit more.
Thanks for dropping by.
Sheila-x-

Still Using Up!!!

Having only had these Heidi Swapp embellishments for about 18 months they are relative newcomers to the workroom. I got them from Graphicus when I went up that way for a short holiday last year.
Elements from the sheet are just layered and I have added a watch face with a Tim Holtz gear plus some peeloff corners around the compass to fill in some gaps.
Sorry the picture isn't brilliant but the light up in my room is diabolical.

DD and I have just finished painting the ceiling on the hall, stairs and landings. I did the cutting in and DD followed behind with the roller and filled in the gaps. So that's a job well done for today and I am going to spend the rest of the day upstairs playing......erm sorry working.....lol!!!

Tomorrow we are off to Trentham Gardens to take Ruby out for some air and also to pick up an extra ticket for the open air showing of Mama Mia that we are going to at the end of August. DDIL's mum is now joining DD, DDIL, her sister and myself and we are looking forward to a fun night......with dry weather hopefully.

Thanks for dropping by.
Sheila-x-

Hot, Hot, Hot!!!

Another 'using up' card and I have to say that I thought I would end up throwing these flowers out as they seemed to be breeding...lol!!!
I have managed to use up every last one though.....both pink and blue....yay!!!
I'm not sure who made the corner punch I have used. It was one I got from Trentham Gardens when they used to have a small craft department.

Well it's been miserably warm here today. Not ideal when you are chasing about after an eighteen month old who had a touch of the minx about her. We are having battles trying to get her to eat proper meals and she seems to be surviving on nectarines and yoghurt at the moment. She is so like her daddy was when he was little.

No crafting tonight as I have been cooking tea for tomorrow. Mr Manic is at work until six and DD has a training course so there will be nobody to watch Ruby while I cook the evening meal. Roll on Thursday and Friday when the kitchen will be closed. We are taking Ruby out for those days and will eat out.

Right....tea is simmering nicely so I am off for a cool shower and then a veg in front of the tv watching some more Bones.
Thanks for your visit.
Sheila-x-