Beddington lake back in all it's glory

Beddington Park is another very beautiful park local to me. Last year it received some Lottery Funding to dredge and improve the lake  and for many months the lake has been out of action. I decided to take an extended walk there at the weekend to see the outcome of all the work.

Wow it really does look stunning again.

This is how parts of it looked in the spring. The saddest thing was that all the wildlife had left

I was delighted to see the wildlife have returned.

There trees were showing off their autumnal foliage 

The gorgeous willows reach down to touch the surface of the water.

It is such a beautiful spot.

They have also rebuilt the heritage rockery area, I will share that in another post.

All these wonderful colours inspired my latest  Halloween tag.

I used Carved pumpkin, Cracked pistachio and Seedless preserves distress inks and Tim Holtz' pumpkin stencil to make the background. 

The pumpkin and spider stamps are also Tim's by Stampers Anonymous. The die cuts are a mix of Cheery Lynn, Memory box, Sizzix  and MFT and the paper snippet is Graphic 45.

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

Stamps and stencils 3/3 Spooky fun and or autumnal twist
Simon says stamp Monday halloween/spooky

A vintage journey 3/3 autumn splendour

Memory Box halloween or candy themed my spider's web is a MB die.

Try it on Tuesday 1/3 Trick or treat it's Halloween

Addicted to stamps 2/3 autumn colours

Dies R us 2/3 anything fall I have used several dies; Cheery Lynn and MFT leaves, Memory box spider's web and a Sizzix bat
Dragonfly dreams 1/3 autumnal colours
Pile it on 1/3 black /purple/orange/fantasy

I think this is likely to be the last week of our Indian Summer, rumour has it that an arctic blast is on its way next week!

Thanks for stopping by today.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

A golden October

Good morning, this is the first of 2 posts from me today.

We are really enjoying an Indian summer here with lots of lovely sunshine and warm temperatures. The trees are looking stunning and showing off shades of red, oranges and golden. Such a spectacular show from Mother Nature this autumn.

There are also some very interesting seed heads in my garden 

It is time for my Monday design team make for Visible Image. We are well into our monthly challenge over on our friends Facebook page where the theme is autumn colours. You can join in the fun here.  I am sharing my penultimate Visible Image Halloween tag.  I used the fab skull stencil 

Now those who know me well know that I am not a particularly "skull" devotee in my crafting but at Halloween even I love the fun of this imagery.

I wanted my skull to be peeping out from a spooky tree background and so I used 2 of the stamps from

Organics

and the tiny tree and leaves from 

Create it

I wanted my leaves to turn to birds....a spooky twist so I also used the birds in flight from 

Ahead of our time

For the base of my tag I used mustard seed and carved pumpkin distress inks

I then stencilled on my skull using black soot distress ink

I stamped my elements and added the quote from leave your fears behind 

which I cut up and distressed.

Here is my finished tag

with some close ups

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

Stamps and stencils 2/3 Spooky fun and or autumnal twist
A vintage journey 2/3 autumn splendour
Creative Inspirations 3/3 autumn glow
Stamping sensations 2/3 shades of autumn
Penny black and more 2/3 autumn splendour
Not just cards 3/5 anything goes
Try it on Tuesday 1/3 Trick or treat it's Halloween
Frilly and Funkie haunted halloween
Addicted to stamps 1/3 autumn colours
Craft stamper take it make it 2/3 anything goes

All the Visible Image links can be found here;

Visible Image group page on Facebook. Our friendly Group is here ...it would be lovely to see you. You can add work to the new challenge album where one randomly chosen winner each month wins a £40 coupon to spend on the website.

The main Visible Image Facebook page is here; there are weekly stamp giveaways...open world wide.

And the shop web site is here; where all their gorgeous stamps and stencils can be purchased. 

Remember to add your "autumn colours" Visible Image creations over on our Facebook page  here  , it will be great to see them all. 

Enjoy the October sunshine and the glorious colours that are surrounding us. Thanks for stopping by today and for the kind comments you take the time to leave me.

I am back again at 2pm with a festive post for STAMPlorations.

Bye for now,

Jane x

April mindfulness

Yesterday I was busy working on a project for a magazine with a very short dead line so I enjoyed a whole day, from 9am, creating. I have not yet got back to working in my garden studio, I am still working from the breakfast bar in my kitchen but I opened the back door as the sunshine was so beautifully warm. 

I was able to enjoy a cuppa outside and as I took a few mindful moments I revelled in seeing how far my garden has come along over the last couple of weeks. I could even hear the low buzzing of a bee,  looking for nectar.

I snapped these photos to share my few minutes of mindfulness. At this time of the year I just sit on my back door step.
 My magnolia is bursting into flower..it appears unscathed by the late snow we experienced.

 What is there not to love about a blue sky and blossom?

How good it was to see the shadows cast by the bright sunshine through my trellis.

I also felt such joy to see the bulbs I planted last autumn now flowering in glorious colour. I love the way daffodils turn their heads to face the sunshine.

and yes my tulips have flowered too.

For those few moments I was able to just still my thoughts and be mindful.  I recharged my internal batteries in that sunshine and appreciated how very lucky I am to be able to do what I do. 

I am going to share a tag I made using Tim Holtz products including a Distress oxide background. The dies are all by Tim and I think his chit chat words are brilliant.

Here are a couple of close ups.

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

Time out inspiration photo

Lil patch of craft friends 1/3 anything goes

Addicted to stamps and more 1/3 anything goes

Crafty catz 1/3 anything goes with optional spring

Emerald creek dares spring has sprung

The sky is not quite so blue out there today but it is still a wonderful spring morning, one to "stay simple".

Have a lovely weekend ahead...I have some very exciting things to look forward including flying...I jest not....and visiting the Stamping show at Ally Pally in London.
Enjoy yours whatever you do and I will try to fit my minutes of mindfulness in too.

I am back on Monday with my weekly Visible Image DT post. I am so looking forward to catching up with Helen and Mark Alexander, aka Mr and Mrs Visible Image at Ally Pally on Sunday. There will be lots of hugs from this delightful pair and a lot of catching up to do. If you happen to be going too I would love to say hello...give me a tap on the shoulder 😃

Bye for now,

Jane x

A little fishy zodiac stamping fun

Good morning, here we are in the last week of January. I hope you enjoyed your weekend? We had a lovely one and saw Ovo by Circe du Soleil at the Royal Albert Hall on Saturday. It was amazing and I will share some photos soon.  I took this photo of part of the Albert memorial opposite the Hall..I do love those fishy tails on the mermaids. This also links in nicely to my project today.

It is of course my weekly dose of inspiration for Visible Image stamps. Wow they really did take Creativation in the USA by storm last week and have come back with an order book which is bulging. I was thrilled to see some of my work on display, together with my talented design teamies.  Their stand was truly awesome. Here is a photo shared from their Facebook page. There are so many exciting adventures which lie ahead.

 Now if you look at the left wall of their stand you will spot the Pisces tag which I am sharing today.
Here it is in close up

I made an underwater inky background on my tag using salty ocean and broken china distress inks.I used the Pisces zodiac stamp set which you can now buy here It is one of the brilliant 12 new stamp sets from the Written in the stars zodiac collection. All the new release are currently in stock on the Visible Image website here. They will also be available to buy from your favourite stockist in the UK and internationally.

You will spot that I used another of the new stamps on my tag

I used the crack from How fragile which you can buy here
I stamped and embossed it onto heat resist acetate and had my distress inked fishes swimming out from it. I fussy cut my fish which were also inked with distress.I stamped and cut out 3 of the 5 words which also come with this great set. I linked everything up using the fun star constellations using red Versafine Clair. I die cut and added a snippet of inky mop up card too.
Here are a couple of close ups

and one last shot.

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

C.R.A.F.T 2/2  distress your project/vintage
The house that stamps built 2/3 anything goes
Creative Moments 3/3 anything goes
Simon says stamp Monday tag it
Penny Black and More 3/3 something new my new are my awesome new stamps!
Fussy and fancy 1/3 fussy and fancy
Allsorts 1/3 use your old favourites mine in this tag are my distress inks..they really are my go to inks when I am creating tags...or backgrounds.

You can also check out Visible Image via these links;

Visible Image group page on Facebook. Our friendly Group can be found here ...it would be lovely to see you. You can add work to the "Show and Tell" album where one randomly chosen winner each month wins a £25 coupon to spend on the website.

The main Visible Image Facebook page is here; there are weekly stamp giveaways...open world wide!

And the shop web site is here; where all these gorgeous stamps and stencils can be purchased. 

You can also follow via:

 Pinterest

Twitter

and

 Instagram

Have a super week ahead, it's turned mild here for a few days and I even dried washing outside yesterday.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x