Flying through October

I cannot believe how quickly October is flying by. The nights are really closing now but Mother Nature is looking beautiful.

 My walk down to Dotty's is always such a joy. The colours of the foliage at the moment is stunning.

I have been busy working on Daisy's 3rd birthday cake and also trying to keep up with some of my favourite challenges including the Funkie Junkie's 12 tags of Christmas. I have got up to week 3.
I was inspired by Linda's use of embossing paste through the TH music stencil, the black background and the gold snowflake.
If you would like to play along please check out her 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.
This is what I got up to with my #3 Christmas card;

I used silver embossing paste through my stencil.

Sorry about the blurry photo but I take all my studio photos with my old camera and in not such bright light.

The silver embossing paste gave such a cool effect. I cut this into 2 pieces as I want to use a piece on a couple of Christmas cards.

I used my holly stencil and Picket Fence DI to create a background on black card















and then using my Visible image snowflakes set I embossed a gold glitter layer

 I love this shine

Then I gathered the rest of my elements together and came up with this card design, another for selling at Dotty's Teahouse. My die cut snowflake is by MB. 

and a close up 

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

The Funkie Junkie's 12 tags of Christmas card 3

                                                            Card Mania  1/3 let it shine
                                                  Christmas card challenges #45 anything goes

The Artistic stamper 3/3 patterns
Winter Wonderland 1/3 frosty or well wrapped up
Crimbo crackers die cuts
Crafty Catz 1/3 anything goes with option of embossing
Noor UK CAS or fully loaded I've gone for fully loaded this time!

Thanks for visiting today and for the kind comments you take the time to leave. I would also like to extend a warm welcome to my newest follower. It's great to see you joining my creative journey here at Jane's Journal.

Have a lovely weekend.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

Putting on the Ritz

As promised I am back with some photos from my recent trip to The Ritz in London. My DD bought a voucher as a treat for my Mum's birthday last year and it has taken us all this time to co ordinate 3 generations of girls to get together.
We finally managed this a couple of Thursdays ago.
My Hb and I had dinner at the Ritz at few years ago for our wedding anniversary so we knew what to expect. Even so, the sight of the Palm Court, where afternoon tea is held is just splendid.

We were shown to our table and given the menu for the brands of tea on offer and of course it would have been rude not to have endulged in a glass of champagne.

We were served delicious sandwiches, cakes and of course scones with clotted cream and homemade jam.

In the most sumptuous surroundings 

Even the teapots have the Ritz logo

 It really was the most delightful afternoon.
My Mum and my daughter were on great form and we chatted for England.

So my card today I think is very apt. I used a Stamping Bella stamp which I coloured with Inktense Pencils and then paper pieced their dresses. The sentiment comes with this fun stamp I stamped and embossed it. I die cut the bottle of champers and added some pink  bling and hearts.

What a great sentiment....Us girls really did have fun ;0)

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

Stamping Bella colour inspiration I tried to get all the colours of the palette onto my focal.
Allsorts Pink
Sweet stampin spots/stripes..one of my girls is wearing a spotty floral dress.
Ribbon Girl 1/3 any image
Noor 2/3 fully loaded or CAS CAS or fully loaded this time I have gone for clean and simple.
Addicted to stamps and more anything goes
Simon says stamp Wednesday think pink
Artistic Inspirations anything goes

Thanks for visiting and for you kind comments that you take the time to leave.  I would also like to extend a warm welcome to my newest follower...thanks for joining me on my creative journey. The beautiful sunshine continues and the leaves on the trees are looking stunning in their autumnal glory.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x

Jane's Journal's card version of Tim's tags 2016, October

There are just 3 more tags left for this year in Tim's great 2016 "mixed up" challenge. This month again he used products which I don't own so again I really went off on my own jolly but used all his techniques. Here is Tim's tag.

I am still building up my stock to sell at Dotty's Teahouse this Christmas so again I have made a Jane's Journal Christmas card version of Tim's tag.

I used his rustic lantern die and added aluminium strip to make it look metallic.  I added my own "nuts" and "bolts"  too using some cake decorating tools and punches as embossing tools.

 I added black acrylic paint, which I removed most of, to give a rusted effect. I left out the centre of the lamp as I wanted more of the background to show through. I added vellum for a misty vintage feel. 

My collage background was made with snippets of Christmas paper. Everything was stuck down with and coated with Distress crazing medium.

Here is my background.

I don't own any distress crayons so I gave some depth to my background using black oil pastel which I smudged with my fingers.

It was then time to put my card together and this is what I came up with.
I added  some Cheery Lynn and MB die cuts. My sentiment is by Tim Holtz.

I added some DecoArt snow and Glamour Dust to give a snowy effect.

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

Tim Holtz 12 tags of 2016 October
Pixie's Snippets playground #251 I used lots snippets of paper for my collaged background, it's a great way for using them up. I also used snippets of card for my sentiment and die cuts and a snippet of leather for my bow ;0)
Noor UK CAS or fully loaded Mine is of course fully loaded ;0)
Card Mania  1/3 let it shine
Christmas card challenges #45 anything goes
Simon says stamp Monday explore the world my inspiration is from the North pole...the snow is deep and this little lamp would help with finding your way in an unknown land....


Thanks so much for visiting me here today and for the sweet comments you  take the time to leave. I really appreciate your blogging friendship and kindness.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x