Off to the ATDML retreat!

I have made it to the end of Blogtoberfest!  Really pleased that Karen persuaded me to take part and I shall definitely be carrying some ideas forward - I have had a lot of fun with the Buy it & Use it, Out of the Drawer and Pin-spiration themes.  A big thanks to Michelle for running it.
Today I am off to the retreat run by A Trip Down Memory Lane in Suffolk - the journey is supposed to take 2 hours, but I have never managed it in that time!  Here is what I am taking with me, somehow my good intentions of packing light this time just didn't happen......

Looking forward to a weekend of crafting and catching up with everyone I know :-)

Christmas preparation: Mincemeat, part two

Oops!  I forgot that I had shown the first step, but not the finished jar!  When it's matured for a while, I will be using it to make Delia's Christmas Mincemeat cake.  The recipe from her original Christmas book does not appear to be online, the similarly-titled one on her website requires pre-soaking of fruit and has some different ingredients.  For this original version, you literally add mincemeat to the cake-y ingredients (flour etc), mix and bake.  If you can get hold of the book, I would recommend it highly just for this recipe - borrow it from a friend if you have to!

Just for good measure, I have started two more fruit vodkas - blueberry (left) and blackberry :-)

These should be ready to strain and drink just before Christmas.  That should give me enough time to find some nice bottles..... LOL

Cross stitch in progress 2

Here is the fortnightly update on my current cross stitch project.  I took the photo in the car, thinking that daylight would be helpful, but it was so dismal outside that those trees still look more black than green!

I do have a slight concern with this project - the instructions say the finished design is about 17" long, so I have used a 21" wide piece of fabric.  This should leave 2" at each end, right?  However the tree at the farthest left will fit, but with only half an inch to spare which could affect framing.  I haven't counted out the trees to the right hand side yet, and I do know that I started slightly left of the fabric centre ..... but not by that much!  The middle tree, incidentally, is the one which is currently showing as second from the right :-)

So I have started a few stitches for each of the tree trunks, to see what the spacing is.  I didn't quite get them all done this morning.  I don't think I can just take one tree out of the design, that would leave eight and odd numbers are more pleasing to the eye!  So I would have to take it down to seven, maybe doing the remaining two as separate pieces, thus making a tryptich to hang on the wall!  We shall see......

Birthday card - Butterflies

First, the good news - my Stampin' Up parcel has arrived and the contents are spread all over the dining room table!  Ten stamp sets, seven punches, two embossing folders and one die set - wow!  I have tested the punches and christened one of the stamps, so far :-)

Now for today's card.  I bought this Authentique paper pad because it looked really nice online, but I was really disappointed when it arrived, I didn't like it at all.  So I am trying to use it up on card-making! 

I embossed a plain sheet with a dotty embossing folder and cut a square to place an image on.  The Memory Box dies are recent purchases, Crafts U Love had the background die on their weekly special a while ago, then a couple of weeks ago the outline came on special too!  I cut the butterfly background from a spotty paper to echo the embossing and then the outline with a plain colour, using Stick It for the outline and this worked brilliantly.  The, ahem, unusual corners are due to the fact that I picked up a corner rounder rather than the intended inverted corner punch..... having made the mistake on the first corner, I went all the way round and then tried out the inverter on the rounded corner to see what happened.  It's not bad, but I don't plan to do it again LOL.

I am really pleased with this card even though I still don't like the paper!!   These butterfly dies are going to be very useful.

Beat the Christmas Rush - October

Oh my goodness ..... I haven't done this challenge since May!!
It also counts as a Buy it & Use it and an Out of the Drawer, so value for money today!

First, the cards - Two more cards with the Memory Box text die, but they also use something new .....

And two more which use an Impression Obsession die, bought sometime ago - these also use something new .....

The 'new' item is a sheet of adhesive developed especially for die-cutting, to enable the most intricate cuts to be self adhesive.  You may recall a while ago I had trouble with a delicate die here, well I think this will be the answer!  It's called Stick It, I bought mine from Craft Obsessions - who have made an instructional video here - but other retailers are stocking it too. So far, it is living up to the promise :-)

Now, this was not actually my planned blog post for today.  What I had hoped to share with you was my bumper parcel of Stampin Up goodies, which I was expecting on Friday or Saturday, so that I could spend a happy weekend playing .... unfortunately they haven't arrived yet!  Fingers crossed LOL.

Christmas preparation: Mincemeat, part one

I haven't made this mincemeat for a couple of years, because I have discovered that Waitrose's all-butter mince pies are much better than the ones I make :-)  I do also use it to make a Christmas cake, but last year I had enough left to be able to do that.  Now that I have finally run out, I need to make another batch!

This is Delia's mincemeat recipe, which you can find here.  I miss out the almonds because I don't like nuts and I also peel the apples - she says you don't have to, but I don't like the little bits of peel in my teeth LOL.  I also can't recommend her suggestion that veggie suet is just as good, because the result is just horrendous and I had to throw it away.  Other peoples' experience may differ, of course ...... :-)

Here are all the ingredients mixed up and ready for the oven:

 

It'll take some time to cool enough to pot up, so I'll share the finished result with you tomorrow.  In the meantime, my house smells wonderful :-)

Stamped background sheet

I made this at the crop a couple of months ago, but didn't get around to blogging it.  It started in the usual way, with distress inks smooshed over the base and a crackle stamp randomly applied.  Then I over-stamped with various medallions from a Stampin Up set and added some gold swirls from another stamp set which happened to be in my crop bag!

I am not sure what to do with it yet, but I don't think it needs cutting into smaller pieces for cards etc as the pattern is quite large and would be lost.  So I will probably use it as a whole sheet for the base of a layout.

Never smile at a Crocodile :-)

Yesterday, I won a charity raffle at work.  You know the sort of thing, pick the place where the croc comes from, at £1 a go.  The card of place names wasn't quite completely filled out, but the deadline was drawing near and it was very nearly full, so the lady organising it decided to go ahead with the draw.  She revealed the place name to be - fanfare! - Amersham!!!

Unfortunately, no one had picked Amersham, it was of the three place names left blank.  So she put everyone's names in a hat - well alright, a bowl - and the resulting place name was Cardiff, which I had picked because we have been three times and DH's native Hull had already been taken LOL.

Here is Colin the Celtic Croc from Cardiff:

Though sometimes, he dreams mysteriously of Amersham .......

Throwback Thursday

This layout was completed in 2010, but the photo itself was taken in 2009.  Myself, Sy and Karen are standing outside the Indian restaurant for our after-crop meal. 

The gold borders were done with a Nestie die, with the positive cut at the base of the layout and the negative cut at the top.  I used punches for the purple borders, both EK Success.  No idea what the background paper is, but I used an Artemio stamp set over the splotchy purple paper and also for the gold embossed elements.  The title is done with an alpha stamp from Banana Frog, not sure of the name.
All three of us have scrapped this photo, of course we came up with three different pages!  This is one of my favourite photos and although I still like this layout, I am thinking of scrapping the picture again, just as a bit of fun :-)

Out of the Drawer - simple Christmas card

I have so many Christmas stamps, it's about time I used more of them.  Out of the Drawer today is this sentiment from a Woodware holly-themed clear stamp set, I think it's about two or maybe even three years old.

This is a quick and simple card, I used some paper from a magazine freebie 6x6 paper pad (maybe Bo Bunny?) for the background mat.  The sentiment is stamped and embossed in silver with the leaves and berries coloured in, then the whole shape was hand-cut.  I attached the sentiment using 1mm foam near the top right corner and added a ribbon down the left side.  Shame I can't tie better knots, but there you go :-)

Buy it & Use It - Birthday and Thank you text dies

Last week, I shared this card, made using the Memory Box Christmas text die.  I have now bought the Happy Birthday and Thank You dies from the same range, they arrived in the post yesterday.  There is also a Best Wishes available, but that's something I would hardly use (if at all!), so I will refrain from getting that one :-)

The papers are from two different Authentique 6" paper pads.  I ran the Thank You through the Bigshot using a spotty embossing folder to see how it would turn out, but I left the Happy Birthday plain.
I really like these dies, I can see them being very useful :-)

More quotation cards

Oooh, I am late with my Blogtoberfest post today!
These cards were semi-prepped, with an inked/stamped background mat and an ATC blank given the same treatment and used as a topper.  I can't remember what brand the quotation stamp is.

I just needed to add a sentiment, so I went for two different birthday stamps (Stamping All Day) and a thank you (Tinchies).

Christmas preparation: Cranberry Vodka

Last year, Tesco had punnets of cranberries at a reduced price, down from £2 to 25p, so I bought six and popped them in the freezer.  Three months ago, I started this cranberry vodka off, so it would be ready for Christmas.  Although I have used other fruits in vodka before, I have never tried cranberries so only used two punnets - didn't want to waste too much vodka on an experiment!  I usually wing the amounts but this time used an actual recipe (!) from the Waitrose magazine, it doesn't appear to available on their website anymore, so I will type it out here.

Cranberry vodka - original recipe with my adaptations in italics

200g cranberries
1 orange
200g caster sugar
500ml gin - I used vodka

I doubled all quantities

• Prick the berries to allow the juice to run - I mashed them about a bit with a fork
• Divide between two 500ml sterilised bottles - I used two x 1 litre preserving jars
• Peel thin strips of zest from the orange and divide between bottles - I missed the orange out completely
• Mix vodka and caster sugar, stir until sugar is dissolved, then divide between the bottles.  Make sure to leave a 2 - 3cm gap at the top of each bottle
• Store bottles in a dark place for at least 2 weeks but not longer than 6 months, shaking them every couple days to infuse - I left mine for 3 months, so I have time to make more for Christmas if it turns out well
• The recipe ends with: Label before giving as a gift - I don't think it's a great idea to give people vodka with the berries still in it, so that's why I use preserving jars and this is how I continued the process. 
• Strain jars of vodka through a sieve into a large jug, in stages.  Discard cranberries.  Transfer vodka into a smaller jug for pouring into decorative bottles (washed and sterilised), don't fill the jug too full at a time so that pouring will be more controllable!  Place a muslin strainer or a tea strainer over the top of a small funnel and pour alcohol through this into the bottle.  You will need to rinse the muslin or strainer several times to get rid of sediment from the berries.

The jars:

The finished product:

We did taste a bit ..... well you have to ..... and it is a little tart but not too much so, it is absolutely gorgeous.  Tomorrow I will be buying more vodka :-)

Pin-spiration: colour block card

Another Pin-spired card today :-)  The original Pin is here and this is my take on it.

I had a rummage through the half-prepped cards box (now doesn't half-prepped sound better than half-done??) and there was this card with just the background done.  I found the rest of the 6" paper pad - possibly My Minds Eye? - the pad cover has become separated.  The three different yellow papers were cut into a square and two sets of two strips, then attached to a square piece of cardstock, which I then close-cut to fit the shape made by the blocks.  The sentiment stamp was free with a card making magazine recently, I believe it's Lily of the Valley and the border stamp is from an old (and mostly unused!) Inkadinkadoo set.

Chocolate birthday cards

No, not real chocolate ...... LOL

These were started off a while ago, I made an inked/stamped A4 background and cut it into mats for two A6 cards and one square one.  Then I stamped the quote(from Paperartsy) onto an ATC blank and inked/stamped around the edges.  After attaching the topper to the card, they were left in need of a sentiment, but instead have been in the semi-finished card box for a couple of months.  The sentiment on the square card is, I think, from Hobby Art, the other two are from Stamping All Day.  I also added the banners to the square card to 'balance' it more and because I had raised the topper on 1mm foam, it was easy to slide them underneath :-).

I really must have a good rummage through the semi-done cards box, to see if more inspiration strikes!  In the meantime, I am rather pleased with these :-)

Buy it & Use it - Christmas text die

I had umm'ed and ah'ed over this die for a while and finally gave in last week.  It's a Memory Box Grand Happy Christmas die.  I have made two cards with it so far and will be making several more!

The papers are from Craft Creations.  I think this die would be suited to masculine cards, depending on papers used.  Very pleased with this purchase - there is also a Merry Christmas and a Happy Birthday in the range ... roll on payday!

Snow 2013

I have a terrible habit of leaving things half finished .... you may have noticed :-)  With scrapbooking, I will usually start off a layout at a crop, then decided to finish at home - mostly it's the title and journalling which causes this procrastination.  I have dozens of such half-finished pages, so I need to make a bit of an effort and what better excuse than Blogtoberfest???

It seems strange to post another snowy page so soon after the Throwback Thursday one, but this was a quick one to finish, the title was actually already cut (hangs head in shame).  So all I needed to do was to die-cut the banner for the letters to sit upon and then punch the three little banners at the lower side, it doesn't really need any journalling.  Yes, that was it.  Really.

Luckily there was a piece of the paper with the manufacturer's strip still attached, so I am able to tell you that it is My Minds Eye "Lost & Found 3".  The fancy squares are done with an old Creative Memories punch, the large banner with a Die-namics die and the small banners with a Stampin Up punch.  The letters are silhouette-cut, I think the font is Polo.

One down ..... goodness know how many to go!

Out of the Drawer - gilding flakes

Out of the Drawer is where I will be attempting to use some previously bought item, never used and languishing unloved in a drawer!

Today's item is an Indigo Blu gilding flakes starter kit.  I had waited for a decent subscription gift for a magazine and this was suddenly advertised, so I thought "Ooooooh! Must have!"  But in spite of all that excitement, it has sat in the drawer for a couple of months.

The flakes are very easy to use - though they fly everywhere - the comprehensive instructions did recommend using tumble dryer sheets to combat the static, I can certainly endorse that!  The colour blend included in the kit was Autumn Dawn, mainly silver with a few other colour inclusions.  I had seen a demo table at The Glitter Pot (didn't have time to stay and watch the actual demo!) and this stamp was on the table there so I thought I would try it .... though I was a bit doubtful as it is very detailed.

It gives an amazing effect, all the detail is picked up.  DH did mutter something about couldn't I get that effect with embossing powder ..... to which Sy and I answered No!  LOL.

It's also very difficult to photograph as it changes with the light.  The two pics above are the same card, but it looks more gold than its real silver colour, the mat is actually blue-green :-)  I have now bought another six Indigo Blu colour mixes, plus a Cosmic Shimmer one called Mulled Wine, well how could I resist that??

Looking forward to trying all my new mixes :-)

Cross stitch disappointment!

A few months ago, I started stitching for 10 or 15 minutes every morning, sitting in my car before work.  I have already blogged the Sun Dragon made in this way here, but there was a piece before that, which turned out to be a bit of a disappointment :-(

It's quite simple, lots of squares in various colours - it was a chart from a very old issue of Cross Stitcher magazine, I think.  After I had finished it, I made the mistake of not taking it off the frame immediately and it was left in its carry bag for about three months.  When I came to take it off and frame it, I discovered two things.  One :- the frame had marked the fabric, quite close to the stitching.  Two :- the dimensions of the design would not fit into any standard sized frame.  You would think I could have noticed that whilst stitching, but there you go :-)

So my options were limited - I couldn't cut the whole piece of fabric to a standard size because of the frame marks on the fabric and I couldn't fit just the stitching with a narrow fabric border into a smaller frame because it wasn't a standard size.  I ended up cutting a piece of self adhesive mountboard to size, attached the stitching to it, then attached the whole thing onto another piece of standard frame sized mountboard covered with toning paper.  Then I put it into a frame so that it was protected under glass.

And ... I don't like it.  The design of squares is a nice idea, but I don't like the colours, I think the overall impression of them is too dark, even with some light colours in there - which I did notice whilst I was stitching but only towards the end when it all came together and I persuaded myself that it would be fine, really :-)  Then there is the size issue ......

I think that what I will do at some point, is re-chart the design, expanding it into a standard size and using different colours.  It's not going to be soon, though ......

In the meantime, Sy likes it, so she received an unexpected gift LOL.

Pin-spiration: Circle wall art

A few months ago, Sy showed me Pinterest and I have spent many many hours a bit of time browsing through the  many boards and pinning ideas for cards and other craft projects.  I decided that I should probably stop Pinning and start actually doing something with the ideas! 

Ok, I haven't stopped Pinning, but I have done my first completely Pin-spired project.  A few days ago, I blogged the decorated caddy for my work colleague here, and I did intend to hand it over on Monday.  But I thought I would also make her a surprise piece of wall art, which I started at the weekend crop, but didn't finish in time for Monday.  The original Pin is here, and this is my version of it:

Close up of some detail:

It was very easy to do, at the crop I brushed paint in three colours (two oranges, one yellow) randomly over a 12 x 12 sheet of white card, making sure that there were brush marks and random bits.  Then I used a Paperartsy splotches stamp and stamped/embossed in gold randomly over the whole sheet.  Then it was just a matter of punching circles which had really good bits of pattern on them.

I stuck 12 circles down on a piece of 10x8" card in as neat a grid as I could manage - thank goodness for my centering ruler! - and I think it looks fabulous.  I am definitely going to make more of these in different colours.

But I must be honest ...... this is my second painted sheet of card - the first one went horribly wrong!  I stamped a background pattern in white ink and dried with a heat gun before adding the gold embossed splotches.  It turned out to be not so dried as I had thought and the background pattern picked up the gold embossing powder as well!  Far too much gold for how I wanted the finished item to look ...... so I cut it into pieces and it will appear on a card soon :-)

This afternoon I handed over both the caddy and the artwork to my colleague and she absolutely loved them - what a relief :-)