All that glitters - Big blog candy mountain

There's some great blog candy up for grabs on Kath's All that glitters blog. No cards to make or challenges to undertake, just leave a comment.

Art Journal Journey

Another week another Art Journal Card. This time the theme was 'Get someone else to contribute' so I got my DS1 to do one of his doodle drawings and I did the rest.

DCM Distress

Hi it's Keryn here and it's my turn to Distress you all, or at least your cards with this weeks dare. You can make a card for any season, any holiday, any occaision but you need to use either a fingernail, curled edges, sandpaper, tearing, anything you like really as long as looks like it's had a fair bit or wear and tear.

Paper is Dovecraft, blooms from BF swap, chipboard from BF, stamp from Studio G, Clear stamps.

Art Journal Card

This is one of my Art Journal cards based on the Emily Falconbridge idea of using a pack of cards and making a card every week for 52 weeks. The theme over on Bubbly Funk Forum this/last week was 'my parents'. I've always loved this photograph of my Mum and Dad dressed as the White Rabbit and the Mad March Hare from Alice in Wonderland. I think it kind of sums up them up, always involved in the community, for the local festival, plays and pantomimes. My Mum made the costumes and did the stage makeup at which she is proficient.

The images on the reverse are the original John Tenniel drawings from Alice in Wonderland. Mum had a book from her childhood of Alice and these were the drawings that I remember. I found these images HERE

and the greatest of these is love

This is an LO for a 'Spiritual' Challenge on Bubbly Funk Forum. I am not a member of an organised religion but I was at a funeral today and this came to my mind. Joni Mitchell made a beautiful job of interpreting this verse from the Bible, if you would like to listen to it, it is on her Wild Things Run Free CD, which also has some other great tracks on it. I had forgotten how good it was, I don't listen to the later albums as often as I should.

Kits used: Scrapgirls- Eternal Love, Carena from Digital Scrap Girls - Template torn paper, Franziska from Sunshine Girls - Love Actually.

Wild World

This young buzzard, was hanging round in our back garden tonight. I had to take this through the window and it was after 6pm hence the not so great quality of the picture. Incredible looking bird though.

It was a nice night so we went for a walk and a caught this lamb having his supper. There is another one on the other side!

The blackthorn is starting to bloom now at last. This is the 'May' of the saying 'Ne'er cast a clout till May be oot' or my version which is more like 'don't take your vest off till June and put it back on in September' hee hee ha ha.

On a slightly lighter note...

My other cat is an accountant!
I'd left my box file open on the chair while I was doing something and Jenny came along and sat in it! Look how unrepentant she is as well, cheeky minx.

You can just spot the corner of a Bubbly Funk pizza box in this picture - that's the one from my April Kit, not the one that arrived today full of the new goodies that Caroline has added to the shoppie. Hee hee hee

Sympathy Cards

I had a phone call at work yesterday from my DH, to say that his cousin, who was more like an aunt, had died. She was 83 and had been in a nursing home for a few years now, but there was no final illness, she just passed away peacefully. I made these two cards last night to send to family members. The stamp on the top one came from the rubber stamp image swap hosted by Karen on Bubbly Funk, I thought it was such a beautiful and peaceful image that it would work well for a sympathy card for a man. The second one is made with K&Co paper and a Lakeland fabric flower.

Blog Candy Winner!

Congratulations to Kaz! She is the winner of my blog candy handbag. Kaz has chosen the green handbag and it will be winging it's way to her shortly. Thanks to those who took part.

Rustic Cabin LO x 2

When we visited our friends in California last summer, they took us to their cabin in the lower Sierra Nevada, on the River Tule. This is the cabin nestling in the trees, there were quite a few cabins round about but they are all passed down through families and the area had a wonderful calm and peace about it.

The top picture is me on the veranda at the back of the cabin, putting my feet up after a 4 hour hike up the river to the waterfall (we didn't know it was going to be four hours when we set off!), the photo on the right was taken on the way up to the waterfall, looking out over the river valley.

The picture on the left, inside the fireplace, was actually an indoor barbeque, built with it's own chimney inside the cabin. Given our unpredictable weather, I don't know why we don't have this kind of barbie, seems like a much more sensible idea!

The kit is Rustic Cabin by Lisa from Digital Craft Cottage and was the March Designer Gift-a-Day. In other words it was free, you download a piece of the kit each day. I felt that it was so right for these photographs and as soon as I saw the stone fireplace (part of the kit) I knew that the ribs on the barbie had to go in there. I made the star motifs myself using the papers in the kit and my new found skills!

DCM Hot & Spicy!

This week's Dare theme is a team effort rather than a challenge just thought up by just one of us.
We'd like you to take the phrase"Hot and Spicy" and make of it what you will.
It could be colour themed, food themed or maybe have just a hint of saucy spicy-ness

Don't think you can get much hotter than that! Image is from a CD 'Over 500
Vintage Advertisements' which I got off ebay. Paper is Basic Grey 6x6 scrapbook designer papers I won in the draw on 'Crafts by Carolyn' Forum, I think the ribbon came with that prize too and the little flowers I got years ago in a Lakeland sale, still have tons of them.

Ratty Tatty's Paper Ravings Dovecraft Competition

Here is my entry for the Laura Ashley Competition on Ratty Tatty's Paper Raving Blog. The papers and the brad are Dovecraft. I made this card for my friend's birthday.

DCC challenge

This is my LO for the Raspberry Streudel Kit by Laura Boetto on Digital Craft Cottage. Yes, it's James again, we had to make an LO of our 'fur babies' using this kit, so as this is one of my favourite pictures of my spoiled boy I had to use it.

HS:MS - Puddle

This is the big puddle over our road. Not today, fortunately, but when I saw the prompt, I remembered these pictures that were taken to show the drainage contractor where the problems were. We have to get our neighbours to agree to have the drains through two fields replaced to stop this problem as it is quite costly for all the work.

Blog Candy Reminder

Just bumping this up in case anyone missed it. The post about blog candy is HERE

HS:MS - SOS and SEPS

A final couple of pictures for my Her Space: My Space week. Here is my 'Show off Sunday' picture of Sweetheart Abbey. I mentioned last week that we had taken DS2 and his girlfriend to visit the Abbey and the Cornmill. I was really pleased with this shot of the ruined Abbey.

And here is my Saturday picture, either 'Self-portrait Saturday' or 'Someone Else's Portrait Saturday' - well that's not me! Another picture from Sweetheart Abbey, this time it's my DH.

Our Beautiful Planet

The April theme for digital LOs on the Digital Scrap Girls Forum is 'Our Beautiful Planet'. I am fortunate enough to live in a very beautiful part of the world and during my holiday week, took some pictures in the woods that are not far from my home. I made the background by using a photograph of the river stones converting it to chalk and charcoal, increasing the transparency and putting a photograph of green moss underneath it. I hope you like the effect.

Blog Candy - 5000 visitors!

I promised you some blog candy when my Neo-counter reached 5000. Well it's gone right over 5000 overnight! This is perhaps not the usual sort of blog candy that crafters expect, but then I am not the usual sort of crafter.

What I am offering is one of these felt handbags, handmade by me. You can have EITHER the moss one OR the lilac one, I am giving you a choice because you may be a 'cool' or a 'warm' colour person. So what do you have to do to get this?

I would like you to make a card or an LO or an altered item that features felt OR handbags, post it on your blog or somewhere that you can link to so that I can see it, then post a comment. All entries to be posted by Saturday 19th April at 4pm. All being well I will announce the winner next Sunday.

For more details of the size of the bags visit my website Original Felt Designs
PS the little Raspberry Ripple Bag on the website is sold - oops need to update my website.

DCM Butterflies

Jo said: I seem to like butterflies at the mo. This week therefore I would like you to put some butterflies on cards. Stitched, felt, shiny, bright, plain, paper pieced, stamped, drawn... you get the idea :) any theme of card but it must have a butterfly somewhere on the card!

Here is my butterfly card, it's for my sister's birthday next week. I used my cuttlebug Birthday embossing folder, the paper is Glenda Waterworth, Elusive Images from the Seasons Greetings CD, the butterflies are from a pad of miniatures from Crafty Individuals and the little tag came as part of my January Kit from Bubbly Funk.

Speaking of my January Kit from Bubbly Funk, here is the album I have made for my friend who is getting married at the end of May. We are all going on a girly weekend to the Lake District in the middle of May and I'm going to put the pictures from that weekend into the album. I'm pretty pleased with this, so thanks to Di Oliver and the BF Design Team for their fantastic project and easy to follow instructions, not to mention the gorgeous papers. I still got tons left.

Blog Candy coming soon!

Woo hoo! I see my Neo-counter is registering 4969 visitors to my blog, so I'm going to be posting some blog candy when it hits the 5000 mark. Keep watching this space.

HS:MS - Recycle

Recycle
Covert waste into reusable materials. Find something to recycle in your space today.

We recycle our bottles errr...obviously we have to collect them over LONG period of time, NOT!

This is an old milk sieve, when I moved to the farm with DH in 1985 we still had some cows that we milked, with a machine, to feed young calves, but we kept a bucket of milk for the house. You put a piece of muslin in the bottom of this sieve and poured the milk through to get rid of any dirt. We never came to any harm from it, but I'm glad my milk comes in nice convenient containers now! Anyway, when we stopped having a milking cow I 'recycled' it into a plant pot, it is looking a bit 'distressed' now, maybe I should repaint it.

We also recycle all our compostable material from the garden and kitchen. Here are my delightful compost bins lurking behind a shed out of the way. They are near enough the kitchen door to be practical and far enough away not to attract the flies

HS:MS - Secure

Secure
Something that is fixed or fastened so as not to give way. Find something secure in your space today. The padlock on the 'cart-shed' door is secure - although the door is not in great shape!

The calves feeding gate is 'secured' by a chain - nosy calves!

My DH secures some of our dodgy old gates with those black strip thingies.

And we even go back to the old methods of securing things with binder twine, this is the plastic sort, but we have some of the sisal twine too.

More posts!

Went out for a walk while the sun was out and found some more interesting posts!

HS:MS - Post

Plenty of 'posts' here at the Corn Mill at New Abbey in Dumfries & Galloway. We visited there on Sunday with my DS2 and his girlfriend, it was a glorious day. Have lots of great pictures of the mill and Sweetheart Abbey, which I promise I will blog soon.

HS:MS Lever and a flying bear

I'm trying to do my Her Space: My Space photos this week and it is always better to get them in fairly early. The prompt today is 'Lever', well no shortage of levers round about a farm! I thought an old lever might be more interesting, so this is one on our old horse-drawn hay rake.

What do you do with a wet bear? I am having a big spring clean this week and did out my youngest son's room (he is 19 and doesn't live here anymore) his bears still live here though and Paddington was a bit dusty, so I thought I would wash him. He had a lovely time in the washing machine, but when he came out I was not sure how to dry him. It was pretty frosty here this morning without much wind, so he wouldn't dry on the line outside. Having just taken down the jumpers from the pulley, I decided to see if I could lodge him somehow in the hangers. When I looked at the finished article, I thought he definitely looked like he was trying out some hang gliding or should that be hanger-gliding hee hee hee.

On the 'street' where I live

Here is a double LO I did for the March Collaboration Station Challenge over on Digital Craft Cottage. You had to use the March kit prepared by members of the cottage and include at least two papers, a frame, a border and as many embellishments as you wanted! There had to be three photographs and they had to include at least one from your front window.

The photo on the first page is from the side window taken standing at the back kitchen sink, the other two are from the front window looking straight ahead down the road and to the left at the hay shed. Not the usual colours I would choose, so it was interesting to try this and they worked with the photos.

HS:MS Moss

I was just blog-hopping to Crafty Hazelnut's blog and saw that the HS:MS was for moss. I took this picture on Saturday as I hope to use it in my digital scrapbook creations, it is not brilliantly clear but, hey ho, it will have to do. Anyway, as I am on holiday this week, I will try to do the HS:MS challenge each day, see how it goes anyway.