My Minion Pumpkin!

No-one can say I don't make things I see on Pinterest!! I've seen some fabulous minion pumpkins on there over the months, and decided I needed to have my own one!

I just painted him with the kids' poster paints (it took a couple of coats), and used circle dies and card stock for the eyes. I thought he should have his own little pumpkin too...

 Here he is just trying to blend in with the other pumpkins. Ha! It will make me smile every time I look in the porch!

Stephanie Barnard Stand-Ups Boy's Birthday Card

Carrying on with the family birthday cards, with one for my nephew Ethan.

I had the 'Boys will be Boys' Cricut cartridge box out still from making Dan's card, and the picture of the baseball boot on it caught my eye. I cut out the boot and letters from the cartridge.

I thought a nice base card for it would be Stephanie Barnard's new Sizzix Movers and Shapers Square Stand-ups card. This is a really easy die to use - it puts all the folds and cuts in that you need.

 I used a circle framelits die to create a background for the boot, and added some stars cut with Tim Holtz's Crescent Moon and Stars die.

The space under the stand-up part of the card provides a good place to write your message.

I used a Signo White Uni-ball pen for it, and added some stitching detail round the lettering and to the boot with it too.

Some of products used:


   

Kids' Crafts

This week is the kids' half-term holidays, and for the first part of the week we've had a quiet time at home. My youngest two boys would happily watch films and squabble all day, so I have encouraged some creative stuff...

Acrylic paint and some lining paper kept Harry happy for quite some time. We don't really do much for Halloween, but I thought we might as well have a theme! Harry told me what to draw for an outline, and he painted it in.

The finished article!

When a holiday is coming up, I usually start collecting a cardboard box full of boxes/cartons/rolls etc, for the kids to do junk modelling. Tom started off making a home for Playmobil people, but this somehow morphed into a villain's lair, under the base of the Statue of Liberty (an evil version!)

There are little stairs and things made from cardboard inside the box. It has yet to be painted. I think it's quite inventive, if a little worrying!

Harry was busy working on a fortress, complete with with drive-in garage, which later had the addition of a working portcullis, and huge roof. Yes, the whole house is a complete tip!

Harry came to me on Monday with this picture he had drawn, which he wanted laminating. He has been really interested in birds for the last few months, and I have been buying cheap books on Amazon of birds from around the world. Anyway, I thought this was pretty good for a seven year old to do on his own!

Harry and I also worked on some bats and spooky canning jars.

We used Eileen Hull's Sizzix 'Canning Jars' die, and had fun filling them with horrible things. I love Harry's eyeballs! We grungied up the metallic lids with Tim Holtz Distress paint, and used some of his dies. 

Some of the products used:


   

Stacey Yacula Stamp Give Away from Purple Onion Designs

I just wanted to let you know about a chance to win a wonderful new set of Stacey Yacula's winter stamps, from Purple Onion Designs. Stacey's designs are just beautiful...

The set is being released on 1st November, and available to buy on the Purple Onion website on 11th November.

Here is the information, from Michele's Purple Onion blog: 

There will be a giveaway of the entire Winter Wishes! stamp collection by Michele and Stacey.  The collection contains 26 individual super cute unmounted stamps!  Michele will hold a giveaway on her blog and Stacey is holding one on her blog here.  Make sure you pop over to Stacey's blog as well as the Purple Onion blog, for another chance to win this collection.

Here is how you could win from Purple Onion:

1.  Follow Purple Onion Designs on Twitter (there is a link in the upper left hand column on the Purple Onion Blog).  The Twitter account is @PurpleOnionRS.

2.  Tweet about the giveaway or Purple Onion Designs in general.  Make sure you include @PurpleOnionRS in the tweet so Michele can see it. 

3.  Leave a comment on Michele's blog post telling her how you found out about the giveaway and share what project(s) you have planned to create for the upcoming holiday season.

4.  Subscribe to the Purple Onion blog (there is a sign up in the left hand column on the Purple Onion blog).

5.  Sign up for the Purple Onion Designs Newsletter (sign up along the left hand column on the Purple Onion blog).

Now you don't have to do all of these to win.  The winner will be randomly chosen but your odds are greater by doing as many of these as possible.  Michele is sure she will be feeling generous and will do some smaller prizes for a winner in each category!

The giveaway runs from now till midnight EST on Thursday, October 31st.  Michele will announce the winner(s) on her blog Friday morning.  Good luck!

Pop 'n Cuts Chevron Male Birthday Card

There seem to be flurry of family birthdays around this time of year - this time I have made a birthday card for my brother-in-law, Dan.

I used Karen Burniston's A2 Pop 'n Cuts base with Circle Label, along with a super embossing folder from her new 'Snippets' collection, which embosses a great chevron pattern around the pop-up part, and adds some nice decoration to the label part too.

I also used Karen's new Chevron Border Decorative Strip, for the red card stock borders.

Dan cycles a lot, so I added bikes from the Sizzix/Hero Arts Framelits Bicycle set. The arrow die and sentiment stamp are also from this set. I backed the whole card onto a larger sheet of black card stock.

 I used the Boys will be Boys Cricut cartridge for 'DAN', and also added a gorgeous little polaroid camera (from the Die-namics 'Cute Cameras' die set), because Dan is a photography and camera enthusiast. The polaroid picture coming out, is from Sizzix Framelits Instant set.

The card front is pretty simple, with just a strip cut from the chevron border die, and some writing using the Signo White Uni-ball pen, which incidentally I think is the best opaque white pen going (and I've tried quite a few.) Dan's a doctor, and the googly eyes are a nod to the fact he is now training as an eye surgeon.

Some of the products used:


   

Holiday Design Team spot for Purple Onion Stamps!

I'm happy to say that I'm one of the new members on the Holiday Design Team for Purple Onion Designs!!

I've liked Purple Onion stamps for some time now... here are a couple of my past cards, made using some of their products:

Pop 'n Cuts and Scoreboard 16th Birthday Card

I made another 16th birthday card recently, this time for one of my daughter's best friends.

I have been dying to get my hands on Karen Burniston's new Multi-tier Pop 'n Cuts insert, and it didn't disappoint! I've also been itching to use Eileen Hull's beautiful Garden Gate Album die. I have an actual album planned that uses it, but for this card I used the front fence section of the album to cut some thick mount board, and attached it to the tier insert, which was used in the Pop 'n Cuts Square Card with Ornate Edges base die.

I made 'wooden' poles using Karen's Flagpole die, and hand cut some bunting flags, and added clouds cut with a Papertrey Ink die (I've used it loads lately!)

 I made a little mount board sign, with eyelets and twine threaded through, to hang over the fence, and used Beacon's glue to attach a couple of paper flowers.

I inked the edges of all the pieces. 

I chose not to use the top pop-out part of the tier insert, so just folded it back.

For the bottom pop-out part of the tier insert, I added a hand cut grass strip, and another to the fence.

The large glittery letters were cut with Cuttlebug's Olivia Alphabet, and glued down with a fine tipped glue pen.

 The pink swirl comes on the card base die.

I die cut an extra end white piece of card stock, and embossed it with one of Karen's new folders from her Trellis and Swirls set.

You can see all the great layers of the Multi-tier insert die better, below.

Some of products used:


   

Happy Birthday Lucy!

 Our eldest child Lucy, is 16 today! I made this card for her yesterday afternoon in short bursts, as she kept coming in the room while I was working on it!

I used Karen Burniston's Pop 'n Cuts Square Card with Ornate Edges base with the Ornate Square Frame insert.

 I covered the frame with another frame I die cut from some October Afternoon wood grain paper, and added some poles cut with Karen's Flagpole die. I put a recent picture of Lucy in the frame behind some acetate sheeting, and added stars from Tim Holtz's Cresecnt Moon and Stars Bigz die, and glued some Sizzix Stampin' Up numbers onto twine.

I inked all the edges of everything.

 For the card base, I cut the Happy Birthday with Cheery Lynn dies, the 'Lucy' with Cuttlebug's Olivia Alphabet, and the banner with Karen's new Banner and Borders Thinlits set.
The ruler sticker (which conveniently had a number 16 on it!) is from October Afternoon, and the star is from Karen's Star and Circle Movers and Shapers set.

I also decided last night to make some cupcakes for Lucy to take for her Seminary class this morning. One of the other girls is also celebrating her 16th birthday today! Seminary is a scripture class which Lucy takes before school, with other 14-18 year olds from our church. They can do four years of study - one year learning about the Old Testament, one on the New Testament, one on The Book Of Mormon, and one of Church History. Anyway, this year they are studying The Book of Mormon, so I though it would be funny to send in Book of Mormon cupcakes! I didn't intend for the icing to be quite so lurid, but at 10.30pm I wasn't starting again!

I used some cleaned rubber stamps for the 'B M'!

Some of the products used:


   

New Sizzix Releases from Stephanie Barnard, and a Stand-Ups card!

I was super excited to receive 'Sizzix post' this week... some dies from Stephanie Barnard's new Flip-its and Stand-ups collection!

I enjoy working with her Flip-its dies, and she has some lovely new shapes out, including the Fancy Flip-its and the Ornate Flip-its, along with their accompanying Framelit sets.

I also received another of the new A2 (or UK A6) Framelit Flip-it sets - this time the Fancy Frame one, and finally, one of Stephanie's new Stand-ups card dies.

The top two Flip-its dies in the picture and the Stand-ups die are all 'Movers and Shapers', meaning they have an opening in them allowing you to put smaller magnetic Movers and Shapers dies inside!

Eeek! Thank you Stephanie!

I didn't have a great deal of time to play with my new dies when they arrived, but quickly put this card together using the Square Stand-ups die. It uses a single layer of double sided card stock (this is from October Afternoon), and I just added some simple layers, Tim Holtz Bird & Cage Movers and Shapers die cuts, and a cute little tag from the Fancy Frame Framelit Flip-its set. (Try saying that fast!)

The stamped sentiment is from this 'The Stamps of Life' set.

 The Stand-ups dies puts all the cuts and fold lines in, and also make a little notch, to stop your card front slipping forwards, and it all folds flat for easily putting in an envelope. Fun!

Some of the products shown:


   

Pop 'n Cuts Feathers Male Birthday Card

A card I made today for my brother-in-law who lives in Estonia. I needed it to be able to fold nice and flat so kept embellishments simple.

I used the A2 Pop 'n Cuts card, with Funky Label insert, and I stamped the sentiment onto card stock cut with a Funky Label Framelit die.

For my background card, I layered strips of self-adhesive linen textured card stock onto some background card, then die cut it with the Pop 'n Cuts insert in the base die.

I then cut about 1/4 inch off all the way round the edges in my trimmer, and rounded the edges with a Zutter Cutter, and it then fit nicely onto the background card, cut with the A2 Card base die, with no insert in place.

 I added die cut feathers and letters, both from My Favourite Things, a banner from Karen Burniston's Banner & Brders Thinlits set, and hearts cut with Sizzix Bigz Owl#2 die.

Some of the products used:


   

New Dies being released at The Stamps of Life!

Three new die sets are being released today at The Stamps of Life: Ticket Dies (which you will have already received at the beginning of the month, if you are a member of the Die Hard Club!), Bubble Gum Dies, and Pinwheel Dies.

I just wanted to show you some cards I made with the Pinwheel dies...

I really love this set!! Not only can you cut out a whole outside shape of a pinwheel (like on my second card), but you get dies for the smaller sail shapes too. They co-ordinate with the pinwheels2stamp set.

 I stuck the larger sails on with foam pads, so they pop out.

For my second card, I cut a window using a Labels, Fancy #5 Framelit, and put embossed card behind. I used the outline pinwheel die, and also the separate sail dies too. I love how clean and neat it all looks when you combine the stamps and dies!

For my third card, I used the Square Flip-its card, and some papers from First Edition's 'Floral Pavilion' pad.

I also used a Karen Burniston Bigz 'Label, Frame and Bracket' die for the blue polka dot frame.

Did you know that The Stamps of Life also makes personalised stamps?

It was a lovely surprise to be sent this one!

And one last card, using the pinwheels2stamp set, pinwheel dies, and formalwords2stamp set.

Penny Black Pop 'n Cuts Birthday Card

I finally got out my birthday calendar, and realised I have loads of birthdays coming up in the next few weeks. This card is for one of my little nieces, Emma.

I used a Penny Black stamp, which I coloured with Copics, cut out and added to the Sassy Label insert from Karen Burniston's fab new 'Snippets' range. 

I used the insert in the A2 Pop 'n Cuts card base die. I also added an extra layer of bright pink card stock to the whole card.

The top and bottom of the inner card layer was shaped using the largest of the 'Sassy Labels and Stitched Frames' Framelits, and I added the row of stitching using the same set. The pink gingham label was also cut and given a stitching effect using the same set.

 I added clouds from Papertrey Ink, and a sun from Lil' Inkers, plus various blobs of Stickles and Liquid pearls to the stamped picture.

 I cut the balloons by hand, and added one to the back of the card on foam pads, and the other two balloons I added by gluing them onto one end of a clear acetate strip, and gluing the other end to behind the scooter. You can see it better in the picture below. I got the idea of the transparent strip from Caz Counsell's cute Bee card, which was featured in Karen Burniston's post on the Sizzix Blog yesterday. I wanted the balloons to kind of be bobbing along behind her.

The banner and 'Happy Birthday' stamp are from Papertrey Ink, and the alphabet dies are from Die-namics.

I just inked the edges of everything, and added them with foam pads.

Some of products used: