Six for the Chix.

What a wild and wet day it was yesterday. I waited all morning for the rain to stop then legged it to Tesco and back before it started again. I got myself plenty of casserole type ingredients so i can top up the freezer for days like these.
I spent the morning in my den . At Christmas i like to give the girlies in the family ( including my 90 years young mother) a little stash of cards. Luckily i have quite a few already made for blog samples throughout this year but i still need to top them up a bit.

This little dress stamp is by Stamps Happen and it is perfect for paper piecing. The illustration on the front of the stamp makes it look like it's a solid colour stamp but it's not , it's an outline.

I used various scraps of paper from my growing mountain. It seems to manufacture itself in the box,lol.

I made 8 of these but 2 were repeats. The little hearts are from Hobbycraft and are made by Papercellar.The cards are 5"x5". The caption was done on the computer before i stamped the image beside it. I used to work in a posh wool shop years ago. We sold angora, cashmere, silk, alpaca and all sorts of lovely textured stuff. Not that "string" they sell these days. My boss always said, " Don't let them just look at it, put it in their hand. To see it is to want it, to touch it is fatal".  He was right and i often think of him now, even if it's only a bar of chocolate i've touched. He was a lovely bloke but he died of a heart attack at 68. These cards are a tribute to him.
 I must get off to work now but see you soon and thanks for visiting,  Di,xx

Target weight 9st 2lb.  todays weight 9st 0lb.

Little Christmas pouches.

Evening everyone. Uploading tonight as I've got to work an extra shift tomorrow. My boss is having a well deserved week off. It was his 23rd birthday on Monday, bless him so he's having a week of peace and quiet away from Joe Public.
So anyway, here are the little pouches, AKA diaper or nappy fold pouches.

I did some of these at Easter and HERE is the post with more details and a link to a tutorial. The father Christmases from Aldi  89p for 9 (ok I ate the spare one, lol). The papers are old stash and are 6"x6" square. I didn't have any double sided papers so I glued a contrasting triangle to the top and bottom of the inside before I started folding. The little characters on the front were free with Crafts Beautiful mag last year. They've come in handy for odds and ends and if they are free with any more this year, I'll snap them up. I got the little bags from Craft Creations. I secured the bag to the pouch with a bit of double sided tape. You could add a ribbon and hang these from the tree. They are so easy the kids could make them for teachers gifts.
 I think a little glass of wine is in order now.   Thanks for looking, see you soon. Di.xx

Hopefully the last.

I think (hope) this is my last Christmas card for this year apart from Speedy's and the 2 mums. Oh to make an Easter or spring card,lol. Something with flowers or rabbits on it. At least this one has spring colours.

I love this Little Clare's elephant, i sometimes paper piece the umbrella. The leaves are done with an X.Cut
Botanicals embossing punch. I will be spending my Christmas money on more of these. I've got some of the Woodware ones but they are a bit too big. The backing paper is DCWV.

Well, enough about cards for today because i need to go into town to get a frame for this.

Our grandson Michael at 3 months old. Sweet or what?

Note card Giftbag.

It took me almost as long to take these photos as it did to make the set yesterday as it was so dull again. I tried in the afternoon then I tried at night with these stupid low energy bulbs even the daylight bulb in my den made them look awful. So apologies again for more naff piccies but I had to do them yesterday as I'm taking the set to work for someone's birthday pressie today.

I did another post about this little bag with more details and a link to instructions HERE. It is made from one sheet of 12"x12" paper. I made my first folds half an inch rather than an inch to make the bag slightly taller I did say in that post that it fits a 5"x5" card but the envies dont fit so it's no good for set but ok as a gift bag with a 5" card and no envie, confused yet? HERE is another link then .

The little note cards are 4"x4". I made 2 of each design and put some envelopes and a little fancy pen with them. For the handles I like to stick some ribbon to strips of card. They need each other, lol. the card for a bit of stiffness and the ribbon for strength. I did the wording on the computer. I learned from Docrafts that if you do each word separately before adding to the page you can use different fonts and move them around , marvellous, there'll be no stopping me now! This is for an 84th birthday for a young lady who likes to frequent the pub opposite the shop i work at. She's about 4ft tall and is Scottish. I call her super gran, lol, she's got one of those hairstyles where they wind long wispy hair around their hand and pin it at he back of the head willy nilly, she makes me titter.
Well I'd best get a move on while I've still got a job to go to.   Love Di.xx

Target weight 9st 2lb, today's weight 9st 1lb. 1lb heavier than last week. The result of lots of lovely scrumpy on Wednesday.

Quick and easy Chistmas card.

Well what a dull dark day. Not good for colouring or taking photos, so i decided to go for a basic card today. Well i actually made 3 the same but when i tried to photograph them together they just cast shadows on each other,lol.

The stamp is by Penny Black and requires no colouring. The sentiment is Papermania, and i found the bauble embellies when i was sorting out some bits to send to a little girl at Docafts. I hope tomorrow is a better day as i need to make a couple of birthday cards.
I'm off to a beer festival tonight at the local pub. I dread to think what the scales will say on friday but i'm off tomorrow and won't be skimping on the old scrumpy,lol. Oh, and there's going to be food as well, oh dear.
I think i'll just hop on the treadmill for a couple of hours.........................

Lily of the valley Christmas card.

Hello all, i hope you're enjoying your weekend. Another dry day here in Chester so i think we'll be going for a walk into town later. I may be able to kick Speedy into action with his part of the Christmas shopping .Speaking of Christmas, i've made another card. I don't really enjoy making Christmas cards and it really shows in this one, it's sort of bunged together,lol.

The stamp is from Lily of the Valley and along with Papermania Deck the Halls papers and a Penny Black clear set, it is the only stash i've bough for Christmas cards this year as i bought quite a lot last year and need to use it up. The greeting is from a Papermania clear set. The matting and scalloped circle are done in a holly green  but it looks black in the photo. I need to count up my Christmas cards in the hope that i have enough and won't have to make any more and can just play around making gifts.

 Thanks for visiting, see you soon. Di.xx

A fowl stocking filler.

Back to the stocking fillers with one for the grown ups again. I'm really enjoying dreaming up these naughty ideas. I think this is the outcome of going to a strict all girls school,lol.

 These little bags began with a trawl of Google images where i found the turkey. You can get it HERE. I downloaded it to Picasa and added the text. These projects aren't really in need of great colouring efforts, in fact if you're short of time there's plenty of turkey clip art available already coloured in. My recipients aren't likely to actually use the stuffing mix so i bought Tesco basics at 15p for enough for 2 bags. I made 8 bags for the bargain price of 60p!

Here's a close up. The bags are the ones i use for my 6"x4" cards. I haven't made a 6"x4" card for ages as i'm much more comfortable with square ones for some reason. I can't wait to start dishing these out, child as i am,lol. The local butcher is getting one along with the chef from the local pub. The rest will go to friends  and family.
 Off to work now , see you soon.    Di.xx

Target weight 9st 2lb. Today's weight 9st.0lb.

Happy new home.

Speedy's eldest son Simon has given us the fantastic news that he's bought a house. He's been living with his ex girlfriend for about 7 years. They are still really good mates but when they decided to call it a day he wasn't earning enough money so they became housemates. Simon has since had quite a few promotions and now is the time to buy himself a few bricks.

Completion date is this weekend so as soon as we hear confirmation i'll put this card through his letterbox as i pass the house on the way to work. As you've probably guessed it needs a bit of DIY. The sandpaper effect backing paper is DCWV and i found a bit of K&CO "life's journey" ruler paper in my scraps.

The image is from the Papermania "it's a mans world" clear set. After taking the photo i chalked around him in grey as i decided he didn't look mucky enough. The sentiment is done on the computer.
I'm off today and tomorrow so it's a bit of housework, a bit of Christmas shopping and i've had a couple more stocking filler ideas to work on.     See you soon with the results.  Di.xx

Reindeer card.

No gifty things today but staying with the christmas theme. I bought a set of D'arcies stamps last year and when i was tidying some of my mess i found a sheet of these reindeer already coloured in. They were done with watercolour pencils as i didn't have my promarkers then. So i thought i'd better turn them into finished cards otherwise they'll hang around for another year. Here's the first one.

The larger backing paper is DCVW stack 6 and the smaller ones are either Papermania or Dovecraft. They are also from last year in the days before my blog when i could chuck the packaging away with gay abandon.

A couple of punched flowers (where would we be without these) added a bit of dimension and a bit of stickles sparkled it up a bit.
Well, there's plenty of sunlight shining into my living room so i'm giong to thread up a few beads while i can see the holes. Enjoy your sunday. Di.xx

In a jam.

Another gift for those awkward people, mainly men but also perhaps an elderly relative or neighbour. I was browsing the "posh" jars in M&S and there was lots of potential for this gift. Cooks ingredients like pesto etc, chutneys and even everyday redcurrant jelly and horseradish sauce.I chose these two jams but i'll be heading back there soon.

It was a bit of a fiddle getting the box the right size but i used cheap A4 paper till i got it right. I stood the jars on it and drew the base size then added two and a half inches to each side for the height. It still wasn't right first time but i got there in the end.

A word of advice, use the thickest card you can get your hands on for this size jar. Mine is medium to heavyweight but could do with being a bit stronger. Perhaps another card matting layer under the paper ( Papermania home for christmas) would be an idea for next time. I glued a piece of card inside the base too. Then i realised the jars needed to be wrapped together in cellophane to keep them inside the box, luckily i had some in. The tag stamp is from a Papermania clear set and the ribbon was from Abakhan.These boxes can be used for all sorts, two bubble baths, boxes of posh cookies as long as they're quite dumpy boxes, rolled up socks, in fact two of anything. once you've worked out the size they are quite simple. Leave a comment if you've any brainwaves for contents.
                Thanks for looking, see you soon . Di.xx

Target weight, 9st 2lb. Todays weight, 9st. (Sorry if this is boring but it's the only way i'll stay on track.)

More festive smut.

Hello everyone, i'm back with another smutty gift idea for the men.I saw these Tesco own brand chocolate baubles, and i thought "hmmm, smut opportunity". So i bought some and made up a little poem., which i printed out in Hello Sark font size 14.

I used the bags i use for my 4"x6" cards again. You get 8 chocs but 2 of them are bell shaped so i had to eat them,lol.

I hate photographing anything red. I've tried to tweek the saturation with picassa but without success. Never mind here's a close up of the poem.

These will go out just before Christmas when all the men are grumbling about having to help put the deccies up before they can go to the pub,lol. Bless 'em. I went to the docs this morning. There's a B &M next door and i had a quick look. They had smarties balls and Cadbury white chocolate ones but i was heading into town and didn't want to carry any extra shopping. Still, there's always tomorrow..........

EDIT, excuse me while i fiddle about with my blog, i didn't like that halloween background,it was too dark and my pics were too small. I may stop playing around eventually,lol.

Simple gift box.

I've been to The Papermill shop at Cheshire Oaks this morning. I read on the Docrafts forum that they were closing down so Speedy was roped into taking me there to stock up. There weren't many colours left in the card but at least I've got plenty of white now.
When i got back the sunshine had gone and it was dull as dull could be. I took 61 photos of this box and still couldn't get a decent one so had to settle for this one. It's made with ribbon and a gift tag from Wilkinson's. If you fancy making one I'd advise looking for better tags elsewhere as the glitter is very loose and got everywhere, you get what you pay for i suppose.

Here are the offending tags, the fact that the bag is full of glitter should have put me off, lol. The ribbon is fine though.

I punched a bigger hole and added another one opposite and threaded the ribbon through. I put a couple of 3d foam pads under the tag to keep it in place. I added a few peel off corners in gold to match the tag. I don't yet know what will go in it but the colour suggests something Cadbury's, perhaps a snowman soup kit. The box measures five and a half inches square and is one inch deep. I made the bottom with gold mirror card.    Thanks for visiting.  Di.xx

17p Stocking fillers!!

I've been out and about looking for bargains. I needed some beads so I went to Abakhan and got 3 packs of glass pearls, one packet of 3 toggle fasteners and a little storage box. It came to £16, not a bargain! Now I remember why I stopped the jewellery making, lol. Next I went to Primark and bought 3 long sleeved t-shirts and 2 vests for the same amount. Deffo a bargain. Then I went and mooched around Wilkinson's because I had a brainwave for some notebooks. These notepads were 17p each (29p in Tesco if you don't have a Wilkinson's), so i scuttled home to alter them.

I had the "Liszt" idea when i was sorting my den and unearthed the manuscript card I got from Payperbox months ago. Don't worry, there's loads of manuscript papers on google images. I printed the "shopping liszt" in curly cue font size 32 using My Craft Studio. They looked a bit bare so the peel offs came to the rescue. I thought these were all I had left but found more after taking the photo. As if these weren't enough of a bargain check out these for 11p!

Apologies for the not too brilliant photos but yesterday was so dull all day. (They look a bit clearer if you click on them). Still at least Blogger has made the uploading easier, must have had complaints.      Thanks for looking and see you soon. Di.xx

Target weight, 9st 2lb. todays weight 9st 0lb. Don't ask me how, I've not done anything different to the last couple of weeks. Yippee though, a couple of pound to play with at the weekend.

Well, someone had to lower the tone,lol.

I've been making these "poop" bags for the last 2 Christmas's but I've been using the original poop verse. This year I thought I'd do a grown ups version. I'm surprised it has taken me this long to come up with a bit of festive smut!! Well if you're gonna do it do it good style. This is one for the grown ups, or at least the teenagers.

I've erased the naughty word using picasa retouch in case there's any kids looking. I'm sure they'll be able to work it out but at least I'm off the hook, lol. The reason I've done these 2 so early is because the chocs are Cadbury crunchy rocks which are £1 per big bag in Tesco at the moment.  I wanted to show you them before they go back up in case any of you fancy a bit of festive smut giving. I've stocked up and will be making loads of these a bit nearer the time and will be dishing them out in the pub on Christmas eve afternoon when everyone has had a few drinks. I did the verse on the computer and the little reindeer is a D'arcies stamp but a reindeer sticker would work fine. The bags are what I use for 4"x6" cards. I stapled the green layer on before I added the other layers.

EDIT, just out of curiosity, is it easy or hard to leave a comment here, only I've noticed recently on some blogs I have to mess about choosing an ID and signing in etc. If this is the case here I'll try and find out how to alter it.   Di.xx

Finished box.

I finished the little box I started on Thursday. I can see a little scraggy bit on the top corner which needs to be snipped off, lol.

The paper is Papermania Home for Christmas. The stamp is also from a papermania clear set. I bought it from the Docrafts website a while ago for the princely sum of 75p and it has been so useful. The box is quite simple and masculine, deffo one for the boys. Just need to find something to put in it now.

 Another beautiful day here in Chester, I think a wander around town is "on the cards" later, lol.

                                See you soon .     Di.xx