Totally Gorjuss 168 - Flowers.

Good morning everyone. How did it get to be the last Saturday of January already? Is it an age thing or has anyone noticed how time passes very quickly?

I hope you're not having too much snow or rain wherever you are. We have been very, very lucky here in coastal Aberdeenshire but I know that even just a wee bit inland there has been a lot of snow and other parts of the country and England too have been badly affected. But now it's raining again so I suppose we're going to have floods again. Can't win can you?

But on a brighter note since it's Saturday it must be time for another challenge at Totally Gorjuss. Our challenge this week is "flowers." Now what could be easier. Most people like flowers and it's very easy to add flowers, or use flowery paper or use a floral image. So we're expecting a lot of entries this week. We have two sponsors this week - Ribbon Girl and Bugaboo Stamps so you have two chances to win! Bugaboo kindly offered all of the DT a digi image to use for this challenge, hope you like mine.

I used :-
Image :- Bugaboo stamps.
Colouring :- Promarkers.
DP :- LOTV.
Corners :- Whimsy.
Pearls :- Hobby House.
Flower and leaves :- Nellie Snell-en.
White gel pen for stitching.

I'm entering the following challenges :-

Pile it on :- Have a Heart.
Created with Love :-Anything Goes.
Creative Inspirations :- Anything Goes plus Flowers.
Passion for Promarkers :- Favourite colour combo.
Charisma :- Hearts and Flowers.
Fussy and Fancy :- Circles.
Stampin for the Weekend :- Girlie.
Ready Teddy Go :- Something new - new image.

After work today I'm going to my first crop this year. I haven't had time to sort out any card making ideas so I'm going to be knitting. I have a hat to knit for my WRI show and it would be good to have it made in plenty of time. It's to be any pattern and any ply so I've decided to do an Aran and I've dug out an old pattern. Well it must be because the needle sizes are the old sizes and the mm sizes are described as new. And apart from that the price is 12pence. Bargain!!

So I'll catch you up later when I get home.

Have a good weekend whatever you've got planned and stay warm in this cold weather.

Thanks for looking and I'd love to hear what you think of my card.

Totally Gorjuss 167 - K.I.S.S.

Good morning everyone. Hope you're managing to survive all this cold and snow. It's been very cold and windy here. We've been promised snow but I hope we're near enough the North Sea to not get too much. Yesterday we still had some ice left at our house and nearby roads and I could still see snow on the hills too. As I write this on Friday evening we don't have any more snow although we had showers during the day. So fingers crossed. If you do have snow I reckon the best thing to do is stay indoors, keep warm and craft!

This week at Totally Gorjuss our theme is K.I.S.S. Isn't that easy. Well actually maybe not! Sometimes you just want to add more lovely embellishments. But I've been a bit sneaky and made a male card and you all know that men like plain and simple cards. I thought this would be the ideal opportunity to make a birthday card for my son-in-law for next month.

We're sponsored by Crafter's Companion this week with £10 to spend in their online store. So what are you waiting for? Join us this week for your chance to win this great prize.

I used :-
Image :- Papermania.
Sentiment :- Hero Arts.
Pearls :- Hobby House.
Washi Tape.

I'm entering the challenge at Simon Says Stamp :- Use Washi Tape.

My son-in-law sells Audis for a living and he sometimes has exotic cards home. I think he had a Porsche last year and Oliver was so excited waiting to go for a drive in it with Daddy. Oliver loves wheels! Cars, bikes, tractors, trains - you name it.

I never used to make very simple cards but out of the ones I've made so far this year most of them have been fairly CAS. I think I'm liking CAS more and more. Think I may do more CAS cards this year.

Well as usual I'm at work this morning so I'll catch up with you all later. I've been quite good recently at doing my DT commenting and keeping up with my favourite blogs. Unfortunately I haven't been so good at actually making anything. I have been knitting now and again so if I finish my knitting entry for the WRI show (in March) before long I'll be happy since I'm usually at the last minute.

Thanks for looking and I love to hear what you think. Take care everyone and keep warm these cold days.

Does this count as sport?

Hi everyone, I think I've been very lazy since Christmas! All I've done is my DT cards so I thought I'd best try to get some more cards made. I have done some knitting so I haven't done absolutely nothing! I had a bit of a rake among my stamps to see if I had anything resembling sport and I found this lovely LOTV stamp. Maybe it'll be useful for making cards for Oliver and his friends. He started nursery last week and is loving it. The first morning Catriona said he went in without even a backward glance. I think she was hurt!
 But he's been used to going with Poppy when she was there and his older cousin and his best pal go too so no surprise he wasn't crying for Mummy.

I'm always a bit nervous about stamping straight onto my card. Probably I should try doing it more often. And then of course I'm even more nervous about colouring straight onto my card. I'm not very good at colouring at the best of times so I was glad to get it finished!

I used :-

Image :- LOTV.

Sentiment :- Hero Arts.

Colouring :- Promarkers.

I haven't entered the challenge at Less is More for ages so I really wanted to make the effort this week.

Thanks for looking, I'm off to make a coffee before bed now. Catch you all tomorrow, I hope! 

Totally Gorjuss 166 - Spotty.

Good morning everyone. I hope I've scheduled this ok as I couldn't get online on Friday evening till late. So I'll be quick. It's time for a new challenge at Totally Gorjuss. Another easy challenge for January, this time we'd like to see spots somewhere on your card. Edited to add :- Apologies to Nikki from Bunny Zoe's, I was in such a hurry to schedule this post that I forgot to mention that she is sponsoring us this week!

Here's mine. I've kept it quite simple again this week.

I used :-
Pram :- Marianne die.
DP :- Forever Friends.
Sentiment :- LOTV.
Heart border :- Martha Stewart punch.
Pearls :- Hobby House.
Spotty ribbon.

I'll add some challenges later.

Cupcake :- January Blues.
Pink Elephant :- Celebrate.
Papertake Weekly :- Happy New....
Crafty Creations :- Something New.
Cute Card Thursday :- Beat the Blues.
Totally Papercrafts :- Ribbon.
Crafty Ribbons :- New Beginnings.

Catch you all later after work and hope you have a nice weekend whatever you've got planned. I'm just hoping everyone's wrong about the weather. All week people have been telling me it's going to snow on Sunday so fingers crossed it doesn't!

I'd love to hear what you think if you have a minute to leave me a wee comment. But thanks for popping in anyway. I'd like to visit you too and see what you've been doing so don't be shy.

Totally Gorjuss 165 Anything Goes + Ribbon.

Good morning everyone. If you are back at work I hope none of you have been working too hard! Things are a lot better at work now that the Christmas rush is past. Next week pensions and allowances will be back to normal too so all the customers should be back to normal too.

This week at Totally Gorjuss our challenge is "Anything Goes plus Ribbon." We thought you'd like a nice simple challenge after all the busy times leading up to Christmas lol.

So here's my interpretation, hope you like. And yes I do know Christmas is past! But you can never start too soon, can you?

I used :-

Sentiment and DP :- LOTV.

Snowflakes and snowflake border :- Martha Stewart punches.

Pearls and gems :- Hobby House.

Challenges for this card :-

Sketch and Stash :- Sketch.
Papertake Weekly :- Anything Goes.
Crafty Creations :- Anything Goes.
Creative Inspirations :- Celebrations.
Paperplay:- Celebration.
Bunny Zoe :- Celebration.
Crafty Hazelnut :- A christmas card without Santa.
Charisma :- Monochrome.
Crafty Hazelnut's Extra Challenge :- Anything Goes.

So why not join us for our challenge this week. You don't get many challenges easier than this one and we are sponsored by J & C Creations this week. They're having a sale just now so it's worth popping over to check out their bargains.

Enjoy your weekend and I hope I can do some catching up with my favourite blogs, my DT work and anyone who leaves me a comment.

Favourite Cards July - December 2012.

Today I'd like to show you the rest of my favourite cards from 2012. Some months I have 2 cards. Not sure why it is but it seems to be easier to find cards you like from later in the year!

July.

 August.

September.

October.

November.

December.

As you can see I've chosen more fairly simple cards. More LOTV, Hero Arts, Penny Black, House Mouse Gruffies, and lots of lovely die cutting and embossing. And of course colouring with Promarkers.

I'll be back on Saturday with my DT card for Totally Gorjuss, which needless to say I still need to make!

Enjoy the rest  of your free time if you're still on holiday. Luckily this is my day off but I need to work tomorrow afternoon and Saturday morning. Having only worked on Monday this week I must say 3 days at work is this my sort of week!

Some Favourite cards from 2012

Happy New Year Everyone. I also want to say thank you to everyone who has visited me over the last year and left me lovely comments. I love to hear what you think of my efforts and it's really good to visit you all and be inspired by your amazing work.

At last I've got round to blogging some of my favourite cards from last year. I decided on them yesterday but didn't have time to do a post. On the 1st of January we always go out for a meal to our favourite Indian restaurant and yesterday was no exception. We had a lovely meal but needless to say I didn't feel like doing anything afterwards!

January.

February.

March.

April.

May.

June.

So what do you think? Mostly they're quite plain. Quite a lot of empty space and not too many embellishments. I've used 3 LOTV images, 1 Penny Black and 1 (well 4 really) Hero Arts and of course some die cutting and punching.

I'm going to schedule a post with the last 6 months of my favourites. We have to go to my daughters to stay overnight as we have a funeral in Lanarkshire tomorrow morning early. Needless to stay we don't want to leave from here as it takes over 3 hours to get there from here even if the traffic isn't too bad. My husband's cousin died on Christmas Eve so it'll be a sad day. She was only 66 but had suffered ill health for a number of years. She was a lovely caring person and always the first to offer hospitality or help to anyone. But I'm sure like most funerals there will also be lovely memories and laughter.