Special February birthdays to leap for

Happy leap year day!
My son turned 27 last Wednesday and was away skiing with his friends. Bear (his dog) came to stay and of course our Billy took residence upstairs for the week. It works well, we have a stair gate which stops Bear going upstairs and our Billy thinks that it is such a treat to sleep on our bed! He really is such a good dog..just such a big boy. He is also celebrating his birthday. My Hb and I shared the walking and I certainly did my 10,000 steps (and more) every day.

We enjoyed exploring all the local parks and I ventured further than I usually do by myself. We found quite a few swans on the local lake and they hissed hilariously at Bear. He would have loved to jump in the water but I kept him on a short lead at that point.

Here are a few photos of our sunny but chilly walks over the week.

He was also a great crafting buddy, what is there not to love about this lovely boy :0)

Happy birthday sweet Bear.

This was my boy on his birthday.....

I love this photo......he and his friends skied in some pretty wild conditions but wow such freedom. Nature at its wildest but most exciting and exhilarating. They are all very experienced and competent skiers. They covered some huge distances during the week and reached max speeds of 86 kph (53mph) with sustained speeds averaging at 48kph (29mph)..that's pretty fast eh!

For my card today I thought I would share the birthday card I made my dear son. No it's not a Christmas card, it's a snowy birthday card instead.
I was sent this lovely snowman stamp with my recent Rubber Dance stamps win. Thank you Bibi x. I coloured him with distress inks and added some DecoArt snow. The trees inside are Visible Image and I made an acetate window embossed with snowflakes. The tiny silver stars are Cheery Lynn and the sentiment is Tim Holtz.

I die cut the window and the little tree scene is stamped inside the card.

I based it on a similar card using embossed acetate I made for my Hb's birthday. My son really admired that so I thought I would use a similar design.

I would like to enter my card into the following challenges;

Pixie's snippets playground #218 I used snippets of silver card to make my snowflakes and sentiment and a snippet of card for my snowman.
Simon says stamp Wednesday  2/5 anything goes
Penny Black and More 3/3 anything goes with a stamp and a die
Whimsy Stamps 1/3 anything goes
Simon says stamp Monday take a leap into the unknown this is the first time I have made a birthday card  with a snowy scene....I really hope my son would not thought that I had gone mad and thought it was Christmas. Luckily he saw the pun and really like it.
That craft Place 1/3 anything goes

The house is quite quiet now without our Big Bear but it's lovely to have our Billy reinstalled in his rightful place....yes he has his green chair back.

 Our pets are very special aren't they.

Thanks for visiting today and for the lovely comments you take the time to leave, I really appreciate them. It's still quite chilly but the sunshine today has been gorgeous and the daylight is increasing day by day....roll on spring. Nearly time to get my dancing shoes on ...it's week 3 of a waltz this week.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

Pre spring floral colour

The pre Spring flowers are looking beautiful at the moment especially the Primula, such bold bright colours.

 so many pretty colours

I also recently bought a most unusual Helebore

 It is so beautiful.

even on a dull day

I wanted to make something for some current fun challenges so looked up the rules and got some ideas.
Andy Skinner has a great challenge running where we need to use Decoart products to create a bold and bright painty (is that a word? It is to me) background.
Inspired by all the pre spring floral colours around me I decided to get out some of my Decoart paints to have a play and join the fun. Here are a few of them.

I had some scraps of book pages left over from a recent project (us crafters never waste anything do we?) to stick to my background. I then started dripping and spraying with water allowing my colours to run down and mix. I didn't have much of a plan but just enjoyed playing. I just wanted an impression of spring flowers,which I think I managed to achieve.

I also dribbled in some silver which gave a gorgeous shimmer (not shown very well in my photo, sorry!)

I wanted to use my Decoart crackle paste too so I chose my vines stencil and applied it.

I love watching the crackles appear.

With the background made it was then time to come up with a design for my card.


I used a Wendy Vecchi spring flower which I also stamped onto a book page and coloured with my Decoart paints and then fussy cut out.

I also used the Decoart metallic silver paint to cover a piece of card to make a flower pot with. I love this paint, it covers beautifully and gives a wonderful sheen irl.

I embossed a sentiment onto my little hand cut pot.

So here is my finished card.

 I added some Decoart Glamour Dust to my flower.

I would like to enter my card into the following fun challenges;

                                                   Andy Skinner Bold and bright
                                            Country View make your own background

Simon says stamp Monday Inspired by a song My song is one from my childhood at primary school...All things bright and beautiful....I'm still humming it now!

Simon says stamp Wednesday  2/5 anything goes

Simon Says work it Wednesdays 1/3 Floral

Natalie and Amy 2/3 hearts and flowers

The Craft barn non red heart

Mixed Media World love is in the air

The artistic stamper  HeArt art

Sweet Stamping  2/3 glitter and sparkle

There has been a lot of lovely sunshine around this week although it's been very chilly. This has been very welcomed as I have been doing lots of walking with Bear (My son's dog). I have taken my camera on our adventures which I will share with you over the next few posts. Monday is a very special day for Bear as he will be have his first birthday even though he will be 4.....now that will have you all foxed....can you work it out....*******clue he was born in 2012********* ;0) 

Thank you for your kind visits and comments. Another week has flown by. Keep warm and carry on crafting.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

Meeting Stick Man

Last Tuesday I was on half term from my silversmithing class so I was able to catch up with my DD and Daisy. As it was a most glorious (if very chilly) day we decided to go to meet Stick Man. For those of you who are not familiar with this wonderful children's book it is by the same author and illustrator of The Gruffalo; Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler.

The Forestry Commission are running a Stick Man activity trail until June all over England. Our nearest one is at Alice Holt Forest in Surrey and that is where we met.

We were greeted by glorious sunshine.

We met in the cafe first for a catch up over a warm drink.

There is a sweet activity bag to buy, but the trail is free

 I forgot to take a photo of the contents but there were colouring pages, and all sorts...even tree rubbing pages.

Daisy rode some of the trail in her buggy and walked the rest and yes...... 

she already has her own stick man, which was a late Christmas pressie. He got tucked up warm in her buggy.

The trail is very buggy friendly and it took us about an hour and a half to walk quite slowly whilst looking out for different signs.

 Lots of jumping took place

and sometimes Stick Man sat in the buggy and watched Daisy at play.

 Sometimes he joined in with the jumping.

We had a fabulous day together in such a beautiful forest setting.

When we reached the final spot

we met the huge Stick man.

When I got home I knew I had to make one of my Moment's for this visit.  Over at More than Words challenge their theme is Wonderful and Sparkle so I used this as the theme for my Moment.

I chose this lovely photo of Daisy with her Stick Man and die cut it with my MB stitched rectangle dies into 3 frames.

 I chose my bark and rays TH stencils to add lots of sparkly textures to represent our glorious sunny day.

 I used Wendy Vecchi's gold embossing paste for the bark and heated it to make it bubble for even more texture

 I added some yellow DP into Texture paste for the sun rays

and then I sprinkled glitter onto the rays (see later photos)

I chose some blue and green distress inks to create my "Forest" background.

I then put on my creative hat to make the following Moment.

I found a great Wendy Vecchi word stamp........

I tried to capture the sparkle of the sunshine with the glitter which as always is so difficult to photograph...irl it is very sparkly.

I coloured a Dusty Attic tree chippie and added glitter and Remnant rub words.

It was indeed a wonderful day

I would like to enter my Moment into the following fun challenges

More than words  Wonderful and Sparkle

Country View make your own background

Mixed media world  love is in the air

Sweet Stamping 1/3 glitter and sparkle I have stamped and embossed my magic words.

Country View make your own background

Creative Inspirations 2/3 anything goes with a sketch option

That Craft Place 2/3 anything goes

Simon says stamp Monday Inspired by a song Mine has to be the Beatles "Here comes the sun"...and yes I bet you can't stop humming that now ;0)

Simon says stamp Wednesday  1/5 anything goes

I love the times I share with my darling girlies and my Moment allows me to remember the 

glorious sunshine day we shared when we met Daisy's beloved Stick Man. Magical times indeed.

Thanks for stopping by.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x