Saturday again...

Well how did we get to the weekend so fast? I've had a week full of everything...cooking, walking the dogs,  cleaning, walking the dogs, washing, walking the dogs, ironing, walking the dogs. Then there was the LCI business bit which I can't tell you about .... just yet lol. But it's been VERY time consuming and I KNOW you will be happy happy happy because it's all for YOU! No crafting but last weekend I managed a few cards one of which I'm showing you today.

First I've got a little project I made for all the Ladybugs for their Christmas...well it was supposed to be for Christmas but only managed to get them made and mailed the other week! I couldn't show it to you as I was waiting for MPto receive hers as she's across the pond and I didn't want her thinking she'd been missed out.

You've seen this on my blog before but I think it's a great present because a) it's hand crafted with love b) it lasts a long long time...a whole year in fact! Here it is...

It's a calendar and notebook tin. As I was already late sending them it needed to be quick so no colouring. There's a commercial over here listing things and the price of them and I thought it would be perfect for the lid of the tin...I just adapted it to the crafting world. I found the Basic Grey pp in a drawer and after blowing off the dust cut it up and put it together with some SU! Tempting Turquoise cs, a strip of TT run through the Cuttlebug with an embossing folder, rounding the corners and sewing the pieces together. I had the perfect colour of felt in Carribean Blue to match TT to make the fabulicious Loopy Bloom.

The last time I made the tin I couldn't find a suitable sized pen so cut a pencil to fit but this time I managed to find these pens that are a perfect fit. The original idea for these tins came from here. Andrea has some fantastic project kits she puts together and sells.

I loved Julie's 'New Stash' Challenge card which you can see here and I wanted to have a try. I also wanted to use LCI images I haven't used in a while and Scaredy Cat Magnum caught my eye.

I'm quite pleased with the way it turned out. Especially the doodling! I love seeing doodling on cards but I'm always afraid of making a hash of it and ruining a couple of hours of work but I was determined I was going to have a go. I took a deep breath and proceeded to dot and dash my way around the card and breathed a huge sigh of relief (I think I was starting to go blue!) when I was done without any mishaps...go Kerry go Kerry lol!!!

I cut out the aperature with my nesties and cut out another smaller circle with red cs for an edge then stitched around the circle (holding my breath again!) I stamped, coloured and cut out Magnum and Lily and mounted Magnum on a piece of embossed cs on the inside and stuck Lily to the outside using a foam pad

It looks like Lily is flashing Magnum but I can assure you she's not lololol

I got out my Whimsey Ticket stamps and die set...it's a bit tricky lining them up but I just love how these tickets add something a bit different to a card

I'd love to enter the following challenges:

Crafty Purple Frog - Anything Goes

Digi Doodle Shop - Blues and Brown

Shelly's Images - Anything Goes

Alphabet Challenge - Y You can choose (Anything Goes)

Chocolate, Coffee & Cards - Glitter (Magnum's stool)

Crafty Ann's Challenge - What's New Pussycat (ticket die and stamp set)

Stampin with the Dragon - Anything Goes

CES Challenge - Anything But A Card

Little Claire's Designs - Anything But A Card
The Spotted Chick - That's Krafty

You can find Scaredy Cat Magnum here in the January 1/2 price sale along with all LCI cling stamps.

Ok...I've a deadline for Monday and I haven't even started. Want to know what it is? Sorry...{tapping nose} you're just going to have to wait lol!

Have a great Saturday :-D

Catch ya later x

TLT - Sue's Challenge - Bows!

Well howdy fellow Bloggers! Hope you've had a great two weeks since our Anything Goes -  New Stash challenge. You were obviously deprived of crafting over the holidays because there were a gazillion entries lol. To see if you were the overall challenge winner or one of the Top 3 head on over to the Challenge Blog.

At this point I'd like to apologise to any of you that didn't receive a comment from one of the Ladybugs. You may or may not be aware that there have been issues with Blogger and it has been frustrating to say the least trying to get onto some of your blogs. Please be assured we did all we could to leave a comment and we're hoping MR Blogger sorts himself out soon!

Now onto this fortnight's challenge. It comes from the lovely Sue who has chosen Bows! To most people this will involve ribbon but I'm sure there's plenty of  creative crafters that might come up with something a bit different! I'm NOT one of those people lol.

This card was made for a lovely friend of mine...we've never met but we clicked through the miracle of cyber space. Sadly she lost someone very special to her on her birthday but I couldn't not make her a card. This is what I came up with...

You like? I LOVE  lol. It's not often I say that about one of my cards...like yes...love no. I wanted to use pp that hadn't seen the light of day in a while and I came across this fabulicious Bo Bunny pp. Because the colours were not exactly bright I knew I could bring in colour with the ribbon and Copics. I chose the Magnum & Lily digi Cupcake Surprise because it always makes me smile seeing Lily get one over on Magnum and hoped it would do the same for my friend.

Is that a bow or is that a bow lol???!!! I pulled out the big guns and used my favourite SU! ribbon

Notice anything new on my photos? Isn't my new watermark megamazing! Ladybug Laurie went all out and made us all one...thanks Laurie ... oh to be so talented AND clever lol.

The Ladybugs have got some fabulicious inspiration for you so make sure you check them out and fingers crossed leave some Ladybug Love.

On a side note Steven is pounding the pavement in Milan. He's been to dozens of castings but it seems his height (6' 6 1/4") is proving to be a stumbling block. He says all the models are skinny and weird looking!! We had a bit of excitement last week when he was told that Armani had optioned him which is a huge priviledge. He waited with over 300 other models for almost two hours to walk by Mr Armani himself (wearing a tracksuit and trainers!) Unfortunately they decided he was too tall and broad. Here's a picture he sent ... this was only about 1/5 of the models who went to the casting.

There must be designers that need tall models and he's determined to stick out the month or so his agency want him there for. He saw a Hamburg agency yesterday who said he'd be perfect for the German market so we'll wait and see. It's very quiet here without him and I am starting to really miss him :-(

Nicole and I have a busy day today...we're going for her first dress fitting, to look at veils and see the bridesmaids dresses that have finally arrived! I think I've found my outfit but there might be a tiny glitch ... they don't have my size. Fingers crossed they'll track it down and I'll be able to tick another box! It's the first thing I've seen that I LOVE and is totally ME! I've designed the invitations and the supplies arrived last week. Yesterday I spent a couple of hours cutting and cutting and cutting some more lol. I figure if I get a bit done every day it won't seem like a chore.

Thanks for stopping by

Catch ya later x

**I did try the blogging comment solution below and so far it works! Spread the news and add it in a post on your blog. The sooner everyone knows the sooner we can get back to normal commenting. It's YOUR blog you have to change the settings on**

Blogger Commenting Solution???

I saw this comment on Diane's blog from Susan with a possible cure for our blogging blues!!!

The easy fix is:

 

Settings

Comments

Comment Placement - You have to untick the radio button next to Embedded Comments and select 'Pop Up' instead.

This will fix it and will allow people to see your blog properly and leave comments. Hope this helps anyone having the same problems. However, this will only fix the issue on your own blog, you can't change what you see on others blogs obviously, and this could affect quite a few blogs.

Try this Diane it's from Chrissy's blog, hopefully it will work xx

I've changed the settings on my blog so if anyone has been having issues trying to leave a comment, hopefully this will solve it!

Happy Birthday Beth!

It's my lovely Ladybug Lisa's daughter Beth's 18th birthday today (phew that was a mouthful lol)! Beth isn't a girly girl or into cutesy but the first image that came to my mind was Upside Down Robyn. I'm sure you're thinking....but UDR is cutesy. Well doh, of course it is!!! I was concentrating so hard on not doing girly I missed that one lol and on hindsight wish I had of used Hightops which is more Beth but then there's always her 21st ;-D

I'm hoping the card arrives today...I'm sure you're shocked since you'll be aware my track record ain't too good when it comes to getting birthday cards to their recipients on time lol. I've been known to be {cough} a couple of months late but you KNOW my motto is better late than never lol.

Anywho, this is what I came up with....

Yeah...it's cutesy {sigh}....

I hope Beth can look past the cuteness lol

You'll have noticed that I've been MIA these past few weeks...not through choice but I've got a few things up my sleeve that I'm working on and it's incredibly time consuming but I'm so excited!! I did manage to take a bit of time at the weekend to craft and it felt GOOD!!! You'll see the fruits of my efforts throughout the week :-D

Although I've been busy I have tried to catch up on my commenting but to say it's been a nightmare is the understatement of the year! Has anyone else had problems lately? Clicking on the comment box or even the blog and a white screen comes up? Some of the Ladybugs have been having problems too but none of us have been able to come up with a solution. If anyone has experienced this as well and has some advice I would be forever greatful :-D

Just a reminder that you still have a couple of weeks to take advantage of the January 1/2 price sale. Everyone loves a bargain and there's plenty for you to choose from :-D

I have an ironing that would bring a tear to a Chinese Laundry so I'm gonna love you and leave you. Thanks for taking the time to visit today...tomorrow is TLT so make sure you come back...you won't want to miss it!!

Catch ya later x

Busy week

The chances of 2012 being a bit slower than 2011 are slim to nil! This first week has raced by and all my NY's resolutions have fallen at the first fence lol. It did start off promising though...I got my card made for TLT...it posted on time and I sat down to comment. I was partway through when all heck broke loose and fast forward to today and I'm no further forward!

My sale discount didn't activate so had to wait till the offices opened. My sale flyer wouldn't send so spent 4 hours on Tuesday sorting that out. I took the dogs to CB and was slapped by sleet and whipped by the wind. We were invited to friends for an afternoon get together with the neighbors...I was 2 hours late!!! I came hope tipsy (I had one Jack Daniel's with cranberry juice and lemonade and I swear they poured the whole bottle of JD in!)...I don't drink much ... in fact that was my first drink since October when we were at our niece's 21st... and have never cooked when enebriated but I must say I enjoyed prancing round the kitchen lol. At least I didn't knock myself out or give myself 3rd degree burns (that was #2 incident of Baking Is Dangerous - It's official!!) so maybe the key is to have a drink or 3 BEFORE cooking a meal lol.

As Steven was going to Milan on Friday, Wednesday night he presented me with a load of washing he NEEDED to take with him! Well that put paid to any crafting I was wanting to do. I have mixed feelings about him going...on the one hand he's my baby (21 next month!) but is quite self sufficient so I wasn't worried about him looking after himself. The fact we didn't have much information on where he was going/staying/working etc was the bothersome bit. Then on the other hand I was thinking...that's one less person to cook for, clean up after, wash/dry/iron clothes for AND I might just have some food in the fridge for a change!!! I finally heard from him last night. He managed to get to the agency who then took him to the apartment he was to live in. I asked him what his apartment was like and if he was living by himself or sharing. He messaged back saying he was sharing a bedroom with 3 others and 2 boys were sleeping in the kitchen! Oh my...the life of a model lol. He  sent me a picture of his bed...

I really do hope that all 6' 6 1/4" of him fits on that bed lol. Knowing he was living with other guys gave me peace of mind and he says they're all really nice. He might have a casting for Calvin Klein tomorrow so fingers crossed he'll get the job. The agency asked if he had any restrictions on the length of time he could stay and when they heard there wasn't they said 'good....you might be here longer than a month then!' so who knows how long he'll be away.

I haven't managed a card but I do have something to show you. We all have our storage problems when it comes to Copics...especially as they're always introducing new colours so we're always having to add or alter what we're using. When I was demoing for Craft World in September, another demonstrator had fabulicous storage for her Copics but unfortunately the company that used to supply them are having problems getting them in. I decided I would get one by hell or by high water and guess what? I did!!! It's not the one Caz has but one I had made. It's a bit big and heavy but I love it and it's exactly what I wanted...except for the size lol. Have a look....

{squeal} isn't it magnifilcious!!!!! I have it sitting on one of the windowsills in my workroom (I have a bay window) and on hindsight I think 12 cubby holes would have been suffice but I can always put other pens in the other holes. As you can see I LOVE my E's!!! All I'll say to Copic is....bring it on...make as many colours as you want cuz I have the space to put them lol.

Nicole has turned into Bridezilla and is chomping at the bit for the wedding invitations. She wanted them to go out at the end of this month (the wedding is May 26th) but I said no way so we have sort of compromised (I'm actually humouring her but don't tell her please!!) that they'll go out mid February...still far to early as far as I'm concerned... but when she starts asking for them I'll kind of just keep saying they're 'almost' finished ;-D

I've some projects I want to get finished this weekend and mailed on Monday so I'm gonna say Ciao (isn't my Italian amazing heehee)

Hope you're having a good weekend.

Catch ya later x

TLT is back - Use Your New Stash!

Helloooooooo! It's great to be back to Totally Ladybug Tuesday...I hope you all had fabulicous Christmas and New Year celebrations. I don't think I really sat down and enjoyed the holiday. I didn't watch any tv to speak of and I'm almost positive I was in the kitchen cooking 98% of the time! I cooked most of NYE only to take a break to drive Steven and his girlfriend into town for the celebrations (taxi's were on double time...mom's taxi...usual rates hmph!). Managed to wish hubby HNY at the bells then went back to the kitchen lol.

We're having a small change to the challenges....we're going fortnightly!! It gives all of us a bit more time as life just seems to get in the way of crafting these days lol.

Thank you to everyone who joined in our Bingo Challenge over the holidays....we loved looking at them all. Make sure you pop over the the Challenge Blog to see if you're the winner or one of the Top 3.

We are easing you in gently for our first challenge of 2012 which is Anything Goes Using Your New Stash. Santa did bring you all the craft goodies on your wish list didn't he?? Whether Santa brought it or a friend or you bought it for yourself as a treat we want to see you use it on your card/project/scrapbook page. We still have our fabulicous Guest Designers, Diane, Sally and Catherine so we have a lot of inspiration for you :-D

It was my friend Karen's 50th birthday in October (you know what's coming next right?) and I'm afraid I forgot and then every time I attempted to make her card life got in the way! I'm seeing her tomorrow so I was determined I wasn't showing up without her card so today's challenge was the perfect opportunity to make it!

Looking through my stamps and digi's I hummed and hawwed and finally chose the only stamp for the job...Buttercup .. In the Doghouse lololololol (I hope I'm not!). This is what I came up with...

Some of the Ladybugs held a Secret Santa and I decided to use my gift of these gorgeous Dovecraft papers as my New Stash. My SS also cut out lots of dies of buttons, mini envelopes, buckles and butterflies in coordinating colours...it must have taken SS forever lol. I know I didn't get them for Christmas but they are new to my stash and that is my Whimsy Ticket die and stamp set and also my Dienamics Mix & Match Banner set which I got for my you-know-what! Oh yeah...also my Cheery Lynn Fanciful Flourish die lol. I borrowed a LO from a you-know-what card I received from one of my Lovely Ladybugs (thanks Laurie) to help kickstart my mojo

I hope that's not me in there lol! I used my grass die instead of colouring in the grass with my Copics.

This gorgeous butterfly was from my SS. I added pale amethyst Swarovski crystals to the body and wings for a bit of bling. I've been looking at butterfly punches for a while and can't make up my mind as they're all gorgeous. This one is particularly pretty...not to frou frou IYKWIM.

This is one of 4 of the mix and match banner dies

{sigh} Loopy Flower

Whimsey Ticket die and stamp...still buttering (get it...buttering...Buttercup lmao) Karen up :-D

I went a bit overboard with the inside too lol...do you think she'll forgive me?? I hope Karen likes her card...I've decided I'm going to start her card now for this year ... I might just get it done in time lol.

I'd love to enter the following challenges:

Bearly-Mine - Anything Goes

Craft-room Challenge - Anything Goes

Party Time Tuesdays - Something New

Top Tip Tuesday - Anything GoesMake It Monday - Anything Goes

Make It Monday with Kraft Journal - Anything Goes

Stamps R Us - What you got for Christmas or Anything Goes

 

Now if you haven't heard LCI have a massive 1/2 price cling stamp sale going on for the month of January. There is a slight hiccup in that the discount isn't working! I know I know..only I could have a sale like that lol. I was talked through the set up from the web people so I'm not accepting all the blame especially as this is the 3rd time it's happened. I'm hoping the offices will be open today or tomorrow to help me get it working and for those that have placed orders, thank you for your patience. I haven't left the country with your money lol. I will get your refunds sorted over the next couple of days.

Ok, I think I've taken up enough of your time. There is plenty of inspiration from the rest of the Ladybugs so make sure you check them our. Oh...and how about leaving some Ladybug Love?

Thanks for stopping by

Catch ya later xx

***EDIT The discount in the store is now working yayyyy!!!***

Welcome 2012!!

****There is a slight hiccup at the checkout on the website...it's not taking off the discount. I am trying to fix it but I think it's got the new year glich!! Don't worry if you've placed an order, I will refund the discounted amount asap. I might have to wait until Tuesday/Wednesday for when the website people are back at work to get the discount working. Either that or manually change the prices hmph! Happy New Year lol****