Garden friends

The weather over the weekend has been really was perfect...glorious warm sunny afternoons which we spent in the garden. My Hb and I spend as much time outside at this time of the year and at the weekend eat out lunch and if possible dinner outside ( as well as any tea breaks of course). Daisy and Co came to stay and we enjoyed some R+R in the garden. I have some lovely garden photos which I will share with you very soon.

Whilst we were sitting having lunch recently I spotted a garden friend...a lovely ladybird...on a journey around one of my pots.

 Do you think he/she realised they were going round in circle ;0)

Ladybirds really are our friends in the garden and will keep the greenfly numbers down for us.

I always have my best friend in the garden too....my sweet Billy...

and when it gets too warm in the sun I get the cushion out for the seat..

and he has a snooze.

I have enjoyed making some cards in my studio and the bright sunshine has brought out my glitter embossing powcer. I have seen my first butterflies too and hopefully on a day out will glimpse a dragonfly or 2.

The dragonfly stamp is by Visible Image. The background is glitter embossed using their butterfly stamp. The die cuts are Tim Holtz.

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

Pixie's snippets playground #231 I used tiny snippets of card for my flowers
Simon says stamp Wednesday 4/5 anything goes
Crafty friends 3/3 summer time
Crafting for all seasons 3/3 anything goes
Noor spring flowers
The Craft Barn weekly challenge 2 different papers I created my backing paper myself and used a second to die one of my flowers.
Mod Squad  2/3 use it or lose it  I used embossing powders a lot but I have not used this holographic one for years! I think it will get lots more use now.
Little Claire's 1/3 butterflies
Crafty boots 2/3  butterflies and/or bees

Thanks as always for your kind visits and sweet comments you take the time to leave.

I am back on Wednesday with my first DT post for Country View Challenges as unbelievably it will be 1st June.

Bye for now,

Jane x

A wedding day tag

Hello it's time for my 2nd DT piece for Country View Challenges. You only have 4 more days to enter our "Use a stencil" challenge and the amazing blog hop which has no less than a Sizzix Big shot as the prize. Good luck, I am so envious that I can't enter ;0) You do not need to enter the challenge to win the Sizzix machine on the blog hop, just make sure you leave a comment on each of the the May 1st DT posts.

My first DT piece was of course my stenciled wedding card. If you missed that post you can find it here. I wanted to use the same bright spring colours to make a tag to match.
I started with the same colours and added some stenciling and stamped and white embossed some Crafty Indiviuals daisies,

I stamped some extra Crafty Individuals daisies onto a snippet of mixed media paper and water coloured them with my distress pens and inks. I fussy cut them out.

I used another stencil to added some patches of crackle paste.

 I love watching those gorgeous crackles appear

And then it was time to put my tag together......here it is

I would also like to enter my tag into the following challenges;

Noor spring flowers
Anything but Cute celebrate my style
Simon Says stamp Monday 3/5  make a wish
We love to create 2/2 11 anything creative/ mixed media
Simon says stamp Wednesday 3/5 anything goes
Crafty friends 2/3summer time
Crafting for all seasons 2/3 anything goes
Deep Ocean shabby chic/vintage

Thanks for visiting me here today and for taking the time to leave your very kind comments.



Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

Late spring Daisy Days

We had such a wonderful long weekend looking after Daisy whilst her Mummy and Daddy attended a wedding in Edinburgh. My Hb and I felt we had been transported back 27 1/2 years when our daughter was 2 1/2. Daisy is such a clone of our girl, it's just the blond hair which gives her away.
We spent hours playing with water in the garden (the weather was very kind to us) and scooting up and down to the swings. It does not take much to entertain this little sweetheart. She loves blowing dandelions

and of course making Daisy chains.

We spent time each day in Nanna's studio. I was making up some distress ink on a block as she asked for some "paint" when she just picked up the whole thing and stamped with it. She has discovered monoprinting all by herself.

she added yellow in the same way and then some water. My newest Penny Black stamp, which had just arrived from my fried Di also got it's first inking.

She wanted some die cuts and glitter....

Daisy also played with some stencils which fascinated her and also added some brushos.

Here is her finished work

 I loved that she wanted to stamp a Daisy and Daisy words on this one. Bless her she loves crafting.

When she left on Monday afternoon the house did seem very quiet indeed. Roll on her next visit. 

My card challenge today uses one of my favourite vintage "child" digi images. It's a fairly CAS retro birthday card I made for Dotty's Tearooms. It reminds me of my sweet Daisy. The frame is Noor. The seaside dies are MB and the sentiment TH.

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

Allsorts  2/3 7th birthday challenge Happy birthday to one of my favourite and longest running challenges.
The Craft Barn weekly challenge 2 different papers I have used paper from 1 sheet to make the ship backing and also used another sheet ot die cut my crab and shell.
Simon Says work it Wednesday 1/3  sunshine
Deep Ocean shabby chic/vintage
Simon Says stamp Monday 2/5  make a wish
Crafty friends summer time
Paper Creator 2/3 anything goes
Simon says stamp Wednesday anything goes
Mod Squad  1/3 use it or lose it my product was the boat backing paper...I found a whole load of unused 12X12 papers when I spring cleaned my studio in April. This is one of them.
Crafting for all seasons 1/3 anything goes

I am back again tomorrow as it's time for my 2nd DT piece for Country View Crafts. I will be sharing a tag which matches the wedding card I made for my 1st inspiration piece. It would be lovely if you can stop by and take a peep.

And just to make you smile, look at this sweetie scooting to the park..yes in her wellies

Thanks as always for visiting and leaving such kind comments.

Back tomorrow,

Bye for now,

Jane x

Music from my garden

Hello, today I am delighted to be guest designing for the ladies over at Try it on Tuesday.

They have a new challenge up today. The theme is music. It would be lovely if you could join in with the fun which runs for the next fortnight.  I started to think of some musical ideas and then whilst sitting in the sunshine in my garden enjoying a cup of tea it came to me.....Mother Nature's music that I am hearing all around me.....yes birdsong. I decided to make a spring/early summer themed birthday card.

There is sadly no "sound" on photos but if there were you would be hearing sweet songs from the nesting birds and quacks from the ducks on the ponds.

For my Birdsong card base I used my wood grain embossing folder and added blues and brown inks to the embossed card.

 I die cut a bird on branch with my Tim Holtz die and added some musical notes using my Lili of the Valley music score stamp.

 He looks like he's singing now ;0)

 I used my Memory Box music stave for my die cuts and one of the 3 mosaic butterflies I made recently. If you would like to see how I made it the link is here.

 I also added some music stamping to some inky scraps

 to die cut some flowers.

Then it was time to put on my creative hat..............


and this is the birthday card I created.

and a few close ups.

and a last one of my singing birdie

Thanks ladies for inviting me to Guest Design for you today, it's been a pleasure. Thank you for popping over to see me here and I hope that you can hear the birds in my garden from where you are ;0)
This was my garden last week, I was busy working in my garden studio getting my cards ready for Dotty's Teahouse.

 Of course my helper was never far away..........

my sweetest Billy xxx

I would like to link up my birthday card with the following challenges;

Noor spring flowers
Anything but Cute celebrate my style I love making these Tim inspired cards...but adding my own touches makes them very much my style.
Allsorts 7th birthday challenge Happy birthday to one of my favourite and longest running challenges.
The Craft Barn weekly challenge 2 different papers I have used paper from 1 sheet to make the mosaic in my butterfly and a second sheet for my die cut flowers.
Fussy and Fancy  2/3 dies and/or punches
Bunny Zoe 3/3 lovely layers
Deep Ocean shabby chic/vintage
Simon Says stamp Monday 1/5  make a wish
Crafty Boots butterflies and/or bees
Artistic Inspirations anything goes/twist of flowers

I will be back to share some photos of our weekend with sweet Daisy really soon...and her artwork. Thanks for visiting me today and if you are a first time visitor, it's lovely to see you here.

Bye for now,

Jane x

A is for.........

Thank you so much for the wonderful supportive messages you left on my last post on the grand opening of Dotty's Tearoom and my card selling adventure. I have passed your good wishes on to Rebecca and I am delighted to say that I have had some early sales. If you would like to read about this here is the link.

Yes the alphabet challenge continues and we have the letter A this fortnight to play with over at the Craft Barn challenge. Luckily no dreaded twists this time like pink or dragonflies, just plain and simple A. I also like to combine these pages with other fun challenges running.

My walks and photos over the last week or so have shown Mother Nature at her very best. I have shared blossom, Hawthorn and new green sap rising in the leaves. I do adore the changing trees and their leaves.
Here are a few photos from the ponds, the green leaves are so full of vitality at this time of the year.

As I went through my vintage dictionary looking for an A to play with.... this word stuck out to me as perfect.

Yes I would create my own arboretum in my art journal! I wrote a post a couple of years ago about Winkworth Arboretum, if you are interested you can read it via the link here.

I went down to my garden studio and found that the only trees stamps I own are by Clarity. All my other tree stamps are Pine Trees for my Christmas cards. The Clarity trees are single and I needed a whole arboretum full so I stamped them in groups onto tissue paper using green and brown archival inks and then tore them out.

I wanted a focal for my page and decided a poem or quote would work well and I  found this lovely poem on the Internet.

I have always felt the living presence of trees

The forest that calls to me as deeply as I breathe,

As though the woods were marrow of my bone

As though I myself were a tree,

A breathing, reaching arc of the larger canopy

Beside a brook bubbling to foam

Like the one deep in these woods,

That calls that whispers home.

Michael S. Glaser

I added texture paste to my page through some TH stencils.

I used lots of different acrylics to build up my background, layering and layering.......


until I was happy.







and then I stuck on my trees to create my arboretum.

Leaves were made from snippets of inky card and some left over hessian paper from die cutting the frame for my poem.

Then it was time to put on my creative hat.

And here is Jane's Journal's arboretum.

with a few close ups

Complete with crackled TH die cut tree

I would like to enter my art journal into the following challenges;

The Craft Barn alphabet challenge A
Pixie's snippets playground #230
The Artistic stamper collage
Anything but Cute celebrate your style as everyone knows I love making AJ pages, so here is another of them!
Fussy and Fancy  1/3 dies and/or punches
Bunny Zoe lovely layers
Deep Ocean shabby chic/vintage
ABC H is for heavy embellies
We love to create 1/2 11 anything creative/ mixed media
The Craft Barn weekly challenge 2 different papers I have used tissue paper for my leaves and snippets of inky paper to die cut my leaves.

We have our darling Daisy staying with us this weekend whilst her Mummy and Daddy are at a wedding in Edinburgh....she such a delight and yes wanted to head straight to Nanna's studio when she arrived. The only bit I dislike is her dawn chorus at 6.00am on a Sunday morning! Bless.
She LOVES taking photos and my Hb took this hilarious shot of her taking a photo of me...

her artwork has been very colourful...she's been playing with bister and brushos in my studio.

 Giving it a quick spritz of water

 I'll share the finished piece when it's done. She is staying today and off home tomorrow after lunch.

Thanks as always for your kind visits and for the sweet comments you take the time to leave me. I would also like to give a warm welcome to my newest followers, it is lovely to see you join me on my creative journey.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x