Writing to Father Christmas

Thank you for all your good wishes for my sales at Dotty's Christmas market. It was a great success and although a few more customers would have been good, those who came liked and bought and it was an excellent advert for my handmade cards and jewellery.  It was also such a lovely festive atmosphere. I only had time to take a couple of photos, using my phone...here is my stall all set up for the day.

I do have some earring and bag charms stock left so I am selling my festive earrings on line reduced from £5.95 to £3.95. The ear wires are silver plated and the charms are lead and nickel free. 

My bag charms, made with one of a kind lamp work glass beads (below), are reduced from £7.95 to £6.95 until Christmas. In the new year I will be putting some more bag charms in my Etsy Shop. I have themes for knitters, sewers, gardeners, girlie handbags etc. I have put my bag charms into hand made crackers in the past and they are also excellent stocking fillers or secret Santa gifts for teenagers and women. 

Not all of these are in stock but if you email me (my email is on my side bar or contact me via Etsy) I can let you know what I have. They make fab stocking fillers. Post and packing to the UK is just £1. 

The earrings and bag charms come in a lovely snowflake organza gift bag.

Today I wanted to share when  Daisy came to stay last weekend, whilst her Mummy and Daddy had a few days away. My Hb and I adore having her all to ourselves and she really was an angel. She even slept in a "big bed" for the first time without any fuss at all. She looked so grown up there...bless her. Time really does fly and it is hard to appreciate that she is 3 already.

She loves crafting so much and it's the first thing that she asks to do when she arrives. It's too cold in my studio so I made up a corner of the kitchen for her crafting area. I also prepared a couple of little projects.

I thought that one important thing to do was to get that letter to Father Christmas written.
Daisy chose some very festive stamps.

She put this together on the back and then I wrote the letter, under her instruction

Yes seriously this is all that she asked for....
After she had gone home and everything had dried I put it into an envelope and posted it off to Father Christmas.

If you have youngsters this is Royal Mail's correct address, just put a stamp on the envelope and get it to Santa by 9 December and he will be able to reply.
My card to day has to be something with a little person waiting for Santa.

The stamp and tags are Lili of the Valley, coloured with Promarkers. My dies are Memory Box and J Sheen
I would like to enter my card into the following challenges.

Pixie's snippets playground #258 I used snippets for my die cuts
Moving along with the times 1/3 anything goes with Christmas
Simon Says Wednesday anything goes
Simon Says Work it Wednesday 2/3 use dies
The Artistic Stamper 2/3 Christmas
Noor sparkle..there is lots of sparkle on her furry outfit and the gold card and papers..hard to see in the photo!
Paper Creator 1/3 Christmas

Dies R Us Christmas

As you like it 1/3 favourite gold or silver mine is gold...so traditional for Christmas cards.

Memory Box marvellous metallics

Stamping sensations 1/3 floral fancies my paper is covered with Christmas roses

Thanks for visiting and for your kind comments,  Today is another important day and exciting day here ..the trees are going up...yes Old Choc is coming in for his annual holiday. Watch out for Billy's blog post soon. Enjoy your Sunday,

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

Sleeping trees

After the recent storms the trees are nearly stripped of their glorious autumnal foliage

 but there are still a few showing off their colours

 and some interesting ferns.

After  losing their leaves the silver birch reveal their gorgeous bark.

How wintry does that look?

Only a few weeks ago this avenue of trees was in  full leaf.

 Yes the trees are getting ready for the big sleep.

I managed to get my next Funkie Junkie card under my belt and I also took in a couple of other fun challenges too.
 If you would like to play along with the FJ Christmas challenge please check out Linda's post here which gives all the details of the challenge requirements. The challenge is sponsored by The Funkie Junkie Boutique and you could even win one of the prize vouchers if you complete all 12 weeks.

For week #9 I was inspired by the lovely deep green/burnished back ground she made, the foliage stamping, the red and white Baker's twine and the red stamped sentiment.
This is what I got up to.

I made an inky background using various Christmas green coloured distress paints.

I added a little water to get some distressed blending.










 I then added silver metallic distress stain.

I also wanted to add some crackle as AVJ are asking for this in their challenge and I wanted to add some rustic charm to for ATBC as well as a couple of other challenges. I added gold paint to crackle paint and pressed it through my TH foliage stencil.

When it had dried I added some distress ink to highlight the cracks and around the edge of my backing card.
So here is my finished card.

The sentiment is Visible Image which I managed to snap up in their amazing Black Friday sale. I added even more texture with distressed edges, torn corrugated card and a glittered snowflake chippie.

 I do love a bit of crackle ;0)

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

The Funkie Junkie 12 tags of Christmas #9
Pixie's Snippets Playground #257 I used a snippet of card for my sentiment and a tiny snippet of Baker's Twine!
A Vintage Journey cracking up
Anything but Cute rustic glam
That's Crafty All grungy
An inky mess anything mixed media
Time out Christmas with an optional twist of glitter/shimmer I added the twist with my silver metallic distress stain and the glittery snowflake
Winter Wonderland poinsettia or snow is falling I have gone for snow is falling with my embellished snowflake chippie.
Merry Monday 1/3 masculine Christmas card
Christmas card challenge anything goes #50
Addicted to stamps and More anything goes
Moving along with the times anything goes with Christmas

That's another card in the stock box for selling at Dotty's Christmas market which is now only 3 days away .....this  Friday..the details are on my side bar.
I promised another sneak peek...here are some of my bag charms I will be selling.

Strawberries and chocolate are always a good combination 😄

 All the beads I use are handmade glass made by my talented lamp worker friends. All one of a kind and totally unique.

I hope this little owl will fly off my stall to a new home.

Thanks for visiting and for your very kind comments. I must fly as I really need to get my very last bits of stock made.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

Getting the stock made

It's just 1 week today until I will be selling my cards and jewellery at Dotty's Teahouse Christmas market .  I have spent weeks beavering away making stock and I am nearly ready.

If you are in the Carshalton area next Friday do pop in and say hi . It would be lovely to see you .  If you have any friends or family please give me a shout out. I will been there from 11am til 9pm..yes a very long day.
I thought that I would share a couple of sneak peeks over my next few posts....the first one today is of the festive earrings I have made. The ear wires are silver plated so that there will be no metal allergies for customers .

There are a couple of non Christmas ones the keen eyed of you might have spotted....the white rabbit from Alice and some bunnies but mostly they are all ready for wearing in the run  up to Christmas. I have been wearing a pair of snowflakes myself.
I will share a photo of some of my bag charms in the coming days.

My card challenge today is a more CAS style for me. I try to create cards to cater for everyone who buys at Dotty's. This card has sold well .  I am having a giveaway at the fair in return for some feedback which will be very useful for info for my future makes.

I used a very old and retired Visible Image stamp which I stamped, clear embossed and then added a little touch of Glamour Dust. The sentiment is LOTV. The dies cuts are Tim H, MB and Marianne.
I would like to enter my card into the following challenges

The Ribbon Girl 3/3 use any image
Mod Squad 2/3 sparkle it up
Simon says stamp Monday 2/5 Triotastic ..3 of something I used 3 colours of card..black, white and Kraft
Noor UK Winter
Uniko Christmas
Fashionable Stamping 2/3 tis the season
Dutch Card lovers one colour
Addicted to stamps and More anything goes
Moving along with the times anything goes with Christmas
Time out Christmas with optional twist of glimmer/shimmer..I think you can just make out all the shimmer from my focal.
Simon Says stamp Monday Christmas to die for

Thanks for popping by today. Enjoy the weekend. We have a very special one coming up...our darling Daisy is coming to stay...and I have a plan for us to write to Father Christmas...ho ho ho!! It is exactly a month today that he will be delivering to all those good boys and girls...have you been good :0)

Back soon ,

Bye for now ,

Jane x

Swan pairing

Since early autumn there has been a lone swan on our ponds. I have shared some photos of him on my blog ( I just assumed he was a he!) and often wondered why he was alone as swans tend to pair for life.

 He seemed to be quite content with his duck and geese friends.

However a few weeks ago I spotted that  a lone cygnet had arrived

to join him 

and unbelievably last week....2 more cygnets arrived...

and yes with them his sweetheart arrived too! It's delightful to see this family of 5 reunited.

I wonder where his dear heart and the other 2 cygnets had been all this time? It's a shame they can't talk as I would love to find out. The swan family now seem quite happy spending the autumn days on the ponds.

My card today my #7 card for the Funkie Junkie challenge and a few other great challenges which are running at the moment. I decided to have lots of white in my card just like the beautiful swans on the pond.

 If you would like to play along with the FJ Christmas challenge please check out Linda's post here which gives all the details of the challenge requirements. The challenge is sponsored by The Funkie Junkie Boutique and you could even win one of the prize vouchers if you complete all 12 weeks.

For week 7 I was inspired by Linda's blue background, the deer and the gorgeous white and silver snowflake. For my card I wanted more white in my background rather than a solid blue so I used some blue Infusions.

and made this lovely inky background

I die cut and layered up a large Snowflake using MB and Tim H snowflake dies. I stamped and cut out my Merry Christmas sentiment and added some bling with some gems. Everything was matted with silver.

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

The Funkie Junkie 12 tags of Christmas #7
Sparkles 2/3 Christmas is coming
Let's craft and create 2/3 winter
ABC T for 3 I used 3 different dies to make up my snowflake stack and 3 different colour gems to add to the sides.
Christmas at sweet stampin 1/3 anything goes
Simon says stamp Wednesday Christmas critters
We love to create 2/2  anything mixed media #23
Cute card Thursday Christmas/holidays
Allsorts feature a creature
Emerald Creek Dares Heartfelt freedom and festivites, anything goes

This card (and many others) will be heading down to sell at Dotty's Christmas market on Friday 2 December....just over 2 weeks away now. The flyer below is also in my side bar. Please feel free to share this and tell your friends and family who may live nearby. Please spread the word!

The address is 108 High Street, Carshalton, Surrey, SM5 3AE

I will be there from 11am selling my cards and also some of my jewellery, including my glass lamp work bag charms. If you are nearby please pop in and say hi, it would be so lovely to see you there.

Today I am having a break from my card making and I am off to do some Christmas shopping with my best buddy Karen...yes I am making that list...and checking it twice ;0)

Thanks for stopping by today and for the kind comments you take the time to leave me. They are very appreciated.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x