An Explanation and an Award!

Hi everyone.  As some of you may have noticed I haven't been posting as regularly as I used to nor have I been able to visit everyone's blogs as much as I would like to!  There is a valid reason for this and as some of you have been asking how I am I thought it was maybe about time that I let you know what is going on with me!

Basically for some time now I have been struggling due to having a poorly back.  I have had a 'naughty' back ever since childhood as I have a twisted spine.  Over the years my spine has become more twisted and this in turn has caused all sorts of other stuff - most of which I cannot even begin to spell the terminology let alone pronounce!!  Anyway without boring you all rigid it has meant that for the past few months in particular I have been in a lot of pain in my back, neck and leg which means I cannot sit for any length of time - hence me not doing much blogging or crafting!

Tomorrow I am off into hospital - (just for the day) to have a procedure done on my back which may or may not help, so if you can all keep your fingers crossed for me I'll be VERY grateful!!  It'll then depend on the outcome of this procedure as to whether anything more will need to be done.

Anyway enough of all that.........................has anyone been watching Dancing On Ice on ITV?  I just love this programme and tonight it is the final so you can all guess what I'll be doing tonight!!  I cannot make up my mind if I would like Sam or Laura to win - does anyone else have a preference?

I am so thrilled to have received a blog award from my friend Jo.  Thanks so much Jo - I cannot say just how much I appreciate receiving these awards!!

Now apparently I need to tell you 7 things about myself and pass it onto 7 people so here goes-

1) As you now all know I have got a 'naughty' back!

2) I absolutely adore milk chocolate but can't eat it so much now due to being allergic to dairy products although I think some may be called for this week!!

3) I'm allergic to fur so we have no pets.

4) My favourite colour is lilac.

5) I'm a natural blond but last year I got fed up with my hair colour and so went first a plummy/red colour then to a bright red and lastly to a brown with reddy undertones before going back to blond again!  It's amazing just how different you look with such a drastic change of hair colour!!

6) I probably have the biggest collection of jeans than anybody.  As far as I'm concerned you cannot have too many pairs of them!

7) I love all things Vampire especially the Twilight films and books and The Vampire Diaries!

Right now for the REALLY hard bit of passing this onto just 7 people-

Sharon - The Little Stamper
Tracy - Craftnut Designs
Sandra - Stamping For Pleasure
Louise - Just Love To Stamp
Mustavcoffee - Crafty Musings
Sarah - Sarah Wright Designs
Lisa - The Craft Garden

Hope eveyone is enjoying their weekend.

Shaped Card

Morning everyone.  Today I thought I'd share a card with you that I made using the Grand Nestabilities Labels One die and the Grand Calibur machine. (I must say that I am soooooooo pleased that I went ahead and bought the Grand Calibur!!  The only drawback is that it doesn't take thick dies but as I don't tend to use these very much anyway it isn't really a drawback for me.)

For this card I used the largest Labels One Grand die and then folded it in half to achieve my base card.  I was then able to emboss the top two thirds of the card using the Cuttlebug's Daisy Pattern folder by opening the card out flat and positioning the folder exactly where I wanted it and running it through the Grand Calibur - you just cannot do this with the Cuttlbug machine as it is too small.

Next I stamped a piece of teal bazzill cardstock using one of my flourish stamps (Fancy Flourishes) then used that same size Labels One die to cut it. I trimmed it down and stuck it to the base of the card and used one of the shaped bits (left over from die-cutting the panel) for the top of the card. 

The wording was stamped with black ink (taken from my Fancy Flourishes stamp sheet).  The girl is by Wild Rose Studio (Ava with Present) and was stamped with black Memento and coloured with Copics.

All materials used came from The Glitter Pot including the Grand Calibur.  Hope you like it!!

Springtime

Hi everyone.  Today the sun is shining and the spring flowers are peeping through the ground so I thought I'd share a spring like card with you today which I'd like to enter into the Anything For Spring Challenge over at the Belles 'n' Whistles Challenge blog.

There are some lovely bright pink tulips out near us at the moment so I took these as inspiration for my colour theme of pink and green.  The background paper is by Best Creations which came from The Craft Barn - as too did everything else that I used on this card apart from the flower punches.

I stamped my main image (Watering) onto smooth white Copic card with black Memento ink and coloured using Copics. The wording (from my Fancy Flourishes stamp sheet) was stamped with brown ink and the whole card was misted with a pearl glimmer spray.

I'm afraid that I forgot to make a note of what Copic colours I used but here is a closer look at the panel for you. I kept the colouring quite soft for this and as you can see she has got a pink tulip behind her!!

As I've already mentioned all the stamps and materials used here came from The Craft Barn and right now The Barn are getting lots of new yummy products in including the Tatty Button stamps and some of the Polka Doodles range too!!  And the new glitter card they are now stocking is just gorgeous! This card doesn't shed its glitter and comes in so many wonderful colours so if any of you are in the vicinity you might like to stop by and check out all the new yummyness for yourselves!!

Spring Flowers

Well it seems that spring is just around the corner so I thought I'd share this card with you today.

All the stamps on this card are by Denami Design (from Stamp Addicts).  Flowers were coloured using Polycolor Pencils - also from Stamp Addicts.

Have a great weekend everyone.