Shop til you drop

Well with only 4 hours to spare I am about to put my entry in for week 3 of the Glitter Geeks Blog Challenge. I've had issues with my camera for a few days but it's all sorted now phew. So here it is the theme this week is Handbags and Gladrags. At first I was going to use one of my lovely rubber stamps of a very elegant woman in all of her finery but then I started playing around with different images and that is where this card grew from. I started out making the little shopping bag and then I thought it would be fun to have the items springing out from the bag.

Mel x

Just pottering around

I tidied up my craft room the other day, no mean feat I can tell you, when I finished it looked fabulous. A few days later and a fair bit of crafting it's back to it's messy state. I'm not sure what to do about it other than become a less messy crafter, but here's the thing I'm a realist so I know that will never happen. Maybe schedule an hour or so each week to tidy up, but that would eat into crafting time. I reckon I'll just have to learn to close the door every time I leave and become quite blinkered when I walk in, I've become very adept at working on a clear surface area 10cm sq lol :o)

Not quite a Royal Wedding but pretty special to me

My last blog post was about the hat I made for my daughter to celebrate Kate and Williams marriage.

This post is all about my best friends wedding and the very crafty part I had to play in it. My best friend rang me one night to tell me they had set a date for the wedding and to ask if my children would like to be flower girl and page boy, she then went on to ask whether I would do her invitations. As you can imagine it was a big YES to both requests. After spending a fair bit of time over in America and buying every wedding magazine available to her whilst there, she was spoilt for choice with ideas, we discussed colour schemes, venues all the usual things, finally she decided on a black and white theme.

My turn to go off and see what I could come up with for the invitations.

I tried a few different design ideas, made some samples up and these are the ones she chose.

We decided on a square design and that it would be in a postcard style.

We found some lovely co-ordinating black and white textured paper which I lined the inside of the envelopes with.

After I finished the invites, my friend started to really struggle to source items that she wanted for her venue. She was having a marquee set up in her local cricket club, she would phone me and say "I'm having no luck finding" whatever it was and I would find myself saying, I'll make them don't worry. Before long I had a huge to do list.

Number 1. Make 48 tissue boxes from scratch, I have the measurements for the boxes forever embedded in my brain, I had to decorate them and then make the tissue flowers for the tops.

Voila

2. Place setting cards I liked the dual layer look of the invitations so I used the same format for them. I love this font I call it my wedding font.

3. Menus one for each guest, again I wanted the dual layer effect, they were made with ribbon tabs as they sat inside a napkin pocket. I liked the layout of the menu and the Harrington font I used really made them look special. My printer broke shortly after I printed the last one, lol overworked.

4. She bought 2 huge rolls of co-ordinating material and I cut and stitched 12 large table cover/runners

5. We sat one day and made the welcome bags for the children's table, she opted for the cellophane wrapped type.
6. Various little miscellaneous things, voile flowers, butterflies etc. 

7. Not a make this time, but a do, we turned up the day before the wedding to help put it all together.

This is how the marquee looked when we first arrived.

This is the view, we watched a cricket match the day of the wedding :o)

This is how it looked when we finished, all the hard work was well worth it, boy I slept well that night.I wasn't even bothered that it all went in the bin afterwards, I was just pleased that her vision had been recognised and that I had been able to play a part in that. It turned out so well considering it was a D.I.Y job.

This is the kids table, it didn't look like this for very long.

I really enjoyed playing such a major role in the wedding. Oh boy I enjoyed a few glasses of champagne that day, well I'd earned it :o). Mel x

The Royal Wedding Hat

Like most schools in the country/world my childrens school held a royal wedding hat competition. I worked very hard on my daughters hat but credit where credit's due, at 6 she knew exactly what she wanted, no chance of fobbing her off with a little Union Jack tiara (I tried my best). I'm pleased to say that my efforts paid off and she was the overall winner, yikes. The school kept the hat to put it on display. I got it back today as they are starting to clear out for the end of term in a few weeks.
 I didn't get a chance to blog about it back in May as the glue was still drying as she went to school that day.
She asked for a wedding cake hat with a bride and groom and birds, I think I ticked all the boxes, she seemed happy enough with it, she's certainly a hard taskmaster lol.

Yo Ho Yo Ho It's a Pirates Life For Me

This little fella has been on the craft table all week, I don't know why but every time I design a card in my head, I can never find any of the elements I need to actually make it. I hunted high and low for a treasure map and a bit like the knight card last week I eventually gave in and made my own. On the upside  making my own meant that I could place everything where I wanted :o) The image is another corker from Claire Keay of Jellypark, I am loving her images at the moment (can you tell lol). I made a backing paper with a faux rope frame and then I decoupaged the box so that I could easily incorporate the little Jolly Roger flag. I made a little aged paper quote using my favourite pirate tune, finally I put gold gems in the corners to represent treasure.
Okay so now he's finished I'm off to link this post to the Glitter Geek 2nd blog challenge and others I've been lucky enough to find. :o)
Mel xx

Entered into:-

http://glittergeeks.blogspot.com/2011/06/week-2-challenge-malefathers-day.html

http://wagsnwhiskersrubberstamps.blogspot.com/2011/06/challenge-56-one-for-boys.html

http://craftuscrazy.blogspot.com/

http://mamidoodles.blogspot.com/2011/06/challenge-2827th-card-for-boy-or-man.html

Sneak peak

I should hopefully be in a position to show a sneak peak of some new cards which I have been working away like a busy bee on over the last few days. What fun, I love being a papercrafter whoop :o)

OMG I won!!!

Wow just found out that I won the glittergeeks blog challenge, how cool is that!!! I'm quite a bit happy, can you tell lol :o) :o) :o)

Thank you ladies for a cracking challenge now I've got to get busy on next weeks,  which is a male card/birthday or Fathers Day.
Week-2-challenge-malefathers-day Glittergeeks blog Challenge

Mel x

GlitterGeeks blog challenge

Well this week has certainly been challenging, I've never entered into a blog challenge before but couldn't possible let this one pass me by. Week 1 Glitter Geeks Blog Challenge. The theme for this challenge is glitz and glamour, so I decided to use this gorgeous image from Claire Keay of Jellypark as I felt that a Knight in shining Armour sweeping you off your feet is pretty glamorous and the glitz element is represented by the silver glitter which I have used on his armour, it was calling out for it really :o) I have coloured and embossed his shield to make it extra shiny and having searched unsuccessfully for some grey brick paper for the castle I had to give in and make some of my own.

I'm pretty happy with the result, let's just hope I can manage to link it now lol.

I had loads of fun though so thanks glitter geek girls!!!! Mel

and Now for something a bit different....

A couple of years ago, I harrassed the living daylights out of my OH until he bought me a fire pit for the garden. To this day I have no idea why I felt I had to have one. No surprise, given the british weather it's been used once to keep guests warm during my mums 60th Birthday party. What a night that was, The Proclaimers 500 miles is still ringing in my ears after all our neighbours who were sitting in their gardens decided to sing along at full pelt. Due to my inability to consume vodka but my determination that mixing vodka with peach schnapps would make it okay I spent the night asleep on the bathroom floor, the toilet became my best friend.    I digress :o)..... so back to the subject in hand, what was I talking about.........Oh yeah the unused fire pit. Anyhoo it's had a 60 minute makeover. Marvel at the delights of my new herb garden, had to put my tomato plants in but that's only a temporary measure they will be replaced with my grown from seed, window ledge herbs when they are big enough to survive the great outdoors.
Go me! I am so not green fingered but am really quite chuffed with myself, the pot next to it is full of red onions to, we'll be self sufficient in no time as long as we live on salsa. Mel xx

What a fab card making day

I've finished one of the cards made using the digi stamps from Claire Keay of Jellypark and here it is, had so much fun making it :o)