Fundraiser for Brandon's family

One of my favourite blogs have started a fundraiser for a family in true need. If you are able to help somehow, please do! There are a bunch of e-bay listings starting at 99c kindly donated from all parts of the world. I have listed a couple of items in my etsy store, where all the money raised will go to this family of a grandmother with cancer and four little boys:

MY ETSY

You can read the whole story on Claudia's blog.

Winter (whiff of) joy

I'm making the last of my Christmascards this weekend so my table is in a total mayhem again. Good thing I had a couple of coloured images left from last year. Most of them were already matched up with papers so I had half the job done. I didn't make any advanced layouts although I think this one turned out really well. I did use a sketch for it and thankfully it came together without any hassle (which is unusual)

I used papers from prima (North country) and a Martha Stewart punch for the lace. The image is coloured with promarkers.

Challenges:
Alphabet challenge - W for white Christmas
Crafts and me - Snowflakes
Crafty catz - Anything
Cute card thursday - anything
Papertake weekly - Anything goes
Sketch and stash - Sketch
Secret crafter - Creatures big and small
Stamptacular - Blue/brown/tan
Totally gorjuss - Let it snow
Winter wonderland - Let it snow

Sweetpea Christmas bloghop

Hello and welcome to sweetpea's Christmas bloghop. If you've come from the very talented Karina's blog then you're on the right way. If not, start at the beginning at the sweetpea blog and find out how you can win a $20 sweetpea candy. The idea for this hop is to get you superinspired to use your favourite sweetpea stamps for your Christmasprojects. With the right colours, papers and sentiments you can make a card for any occasion no matter what it looks like. I even went all out and used non-Christmas papers. I like living on the wild side :)

The image I have used is from my favourite illustrator ching chou kuik (shhh, don't tell anyone). I've had a soft spot for her images since the beginning and always go back to them. This one is called fluttering butterflies from plate 38 (and it's actually on sale now for only $2!) I really wanted to work with this image as it has a lantern that I wanted to emphasize. Didn't know if I could pull it off, but I must say it really looks like it's glowing. The colouringmedium I used are oilpencils as I know they are able to give this glowing look.

You are almost at the end of the hop. Please leave a comment before you go to our next very talented DT member  Sharon.

Santa with penguins

Somehow I'm panicky about my Christmas cards. How did this happen?! AGAIN!? I even had one card left from last year and made one or two earlier this year. I need about 7 more. Whaaa, and I only have until next week. Oh well, there's always next year :)

For this card I have used a stamp from Whipper snapper (thought it was a high hopes, but it's not) It's coloured with oilpencils. I'm really starting to love this colouring medium. I'm superpleased with how it turned out. I added some distressglue to the white parts of the image. The papers are from a prima paperpack called north country. I just love these papers as they are super cheap, a lot of papers in every pack (48) and the quality is perfect for edge-distressing.

Challenges:
Color create - Red, white, green
Creatalicious - Christmas and sparkle
Crafty catz - Christmas + optional sparkle
Cute card thursday - Numbers
Everybody art - Sketch
Paper sundaes - Red and stripes
Papertake weekly - Anything
Pile it on - Bling it up
Secret crafter - Photo inspiration

A fairy happy Christmas

Today I have a Christmascard in non-traditional colors. The image is called fluffie fairy and it's from sweetpea stamps. It is coloured with promarkers and a white shimmery twinkling H2O for the white parts of her outfit. Papers are from papermania I think - not sure as I had it for a couple of years. The dark blue/green panel is dryembossed with a cuttlebug folder.

How are your Christmas cards looking this year? I love mixing traditional with funky. The styles are scattered allover :)

Challenges:
ABC - E is for embossing
By the cute and girly - Let it snow
Pollycraft - Christmas fun
Passion for promarkers - Sketch
Simon says stamp - Anything
Totally paper crafts - Let it snow
Winter wonderland - Christmas

Snowmen love

I've had so much fun playing with this image. I don't have that many Christmasstamps and every year I want to get some new ones I realize I still have some that haven't seen ink yet. So I promise myself that if there is a sale on Christmasstamps after the holidays I will get some. Somehow there never is...

This stamp from whiff of joy was still in its packaging and I must have had it for ages. Sorting through my stamps really helped as I have a better view of what I have and from which companies. No more doubles :)

The image is colored with promarkers and I used papers from prima. The sentiment/reindeer stamp is a freebie stamp from craft stamper. I only colored the image partially leaving the space between the snowmen white as if their love was glowing. I just love how adorable this stamp is. It's drawn by Elisabeth Bell for whiff of joy.

Below you can see a better pic of some glitterglue I used to create a frosty effect on the top and bottom of the brown paper (got the idea from Claudia) Looks like icicles and snow.

Challenges:

Belles n whistles - Christmas
Bunny Zoe's - Anything Christmas with pearls
Crafty catz - Snowmen
Everybody art - Christmas card
I love promarkers - Anything goes
Midnight madness - Sketch
Paper sundaes - Winter wonderland
Papertake weekly - Christmas crackers
Simon says stamp - Tag you're it
Stampin for the weekend - Friends
Stamptacular - Anything Christmas
Totally papercrafts - Christmas
Whiff of joy - Pins and lace

Enchantment from sweetpea stamps

Nice of you to stop by my blog today. I have taken a little break in my Christmascards, or at least in the planning of my Christmascards, and played with this beautiful image by Meredith Dillman plate 98 (which is currently on sale at sweetpea stamps, wohoo) Besides ching chou this is one of my favorite illustrators so I was happy to ink this image that I haven't played with before. I still have so many images that haven't seen ink yet, poor things.

Good thing is that I have totally cleaned up my crafttable. It's so big and spacious I can sleep on it :D Before I just had a 30x30cm space (if that) to do my cards on. The rest was filled with mountains of paper and stuff. I actually found a couple of Christmaspapers in there from last year. HU! It is so inspirin gto sit there now. I've been having so much fun colouring which I haven't enjoyed for ages. Still the rest of the corner to do, but the most imoprtant things are done and I'm so glad. Even got almost all my unmounted stamps sorted in binders. You can see how HERE, but will try to show you the rest some other time.

I'm so superpleased with how this card turned out, especially the coloring. I used oilpencils and a rubbing medium. I've struggled long to get the glow in my images, so I was over the moon of finally succeeding.

The sentiment is from ching chou kuik's plate 38, also by sweetpea stamps. It is stamped with distress ink as is the image and the edges of the image. Papers are from prima.

Challenges:

Crafts and me - vintage/shabby

Elisabeth Bell at sweetpea stamps

I hope you haven't missed that sweetpea stamps are carrying stamps drawn by Elisabeth Bell? Right now we have three new images. They can be used for Christmas and New Year's cards, but can also be used all year around. Don't you just love those kind of stamps? And as an extra bonus, if you preorder all three of them by nov 24:th (today) you will be entered in a drawing for sheet #31 that goes beautifully with these stamps.

I also want to let you know about the huge 40% off sale. All sheets from 1-126 are on sale! Time to get those Christmasgifts for your crafting friends or why not a gift for yourself? I always buy myself a craftinggift for Christmas as my family can't find their way around all the stuff that are out there :) A good way to spoil myself

And don't forget about the 20 stamps grab bags for $22.50. Visit the blog for more details and inspiration or go straight to the shop.

Dreamy bookmark

As Christmas is approaching I've been thinking about quick and easy gifts to make as going away presents. I think a pretty bookmark is always appreciated, because who doesn't like to read once in a while at least? I often find bookmarks too bulky with flowers and decorations. They look very pretty, but are not very practical.

So for my project today I used Meredith Dillman's Peridot from plate 137 by sweetpea stamps. The image is stamped off two times before stamping on the paper to give that invisible edge look. I coloured the image with copics (which I can't figure out, but I guess I need to practice more. My promarkers weren't cooperating with me in the beginning either). I used a die to cut out the pretty shapes, added a ribbon in between two pieces of cardstock and glued them together. The pink parts on this bookmark have beautiful dryembossed swirls that I accentuated with a glitterpen. I like when things look pretty from all sides.

I added a rhinestone on the hanging flower as I imagine it to be hanging out of the book. I also added glitter to parts of the image and around the biggest shape.

Challenges:
ABC challenge - D is for dazzle
Pile it on - Anything with P (pink/purple)
Totally Gorjuss - swirly whirly

Season's greetings

Welcome to my weekly post of sweetpea stamps. This week we are focusing on the images of Conie Fong. This one is called Buttercup and looks very much like a summerstamp, especially as it comes with a little butterfly hovering around the girl's head. I decided to cut the image out instead making it a Christmas one. Doesn't she look like she's waiting for Santa?

I coloured her with oilpencils and used basic grey papers. The big piece with flowers is from the jovial collection and the smaller one is also BG, but I can't remember the name of it. All I know is that it's from a very old collection as I bought it years ago.

Challenges:
Basic Grey - mix'n'match
Everybody art - advent
Papertake weekly - first Christmas
Simon says stamp - red/green/blue
Stamptacular - sketch
Totally gorjuss - Christmas traditions
Wags n whiskers - Christmas themed