Amour!

For Dragons Dream Tag It On this fortnight our very lovely team leader Elizabeth has chosen the letter A and for it not to be a traditional tag shape! 

I chose a heart shape and added Grungeboard wings and Grungepaper leaves. The wings had a layer of crackle paint that had seen better days so I need to remember to order some more! This is probably why the cracks are minute!

I know that Elizabeth asked that we make our tags a different shape than normal, but as I'm keeping all my alphabetic tags on a big ring, I popped mine on a tag to keep it safe. Hope no one minds! How will you interpret the theme this fortnight?

'Ouch' - Round 2!

My second Journal page about my accident - the first can be found here!

Well, the last few months have been in turn pretty tough and challenging and I suspect the next few months may be similar! As you may know I spectacularly hurt myself when I fell off my bike in May by breaking my humorous and shattering my elbow (this post explains more) and have taken, at the point of writing, nine months, to recover. It has been a r-e-a-l-l-y slow recovery as far as I am concerned but the family think it’s been quicker! I had nerve damage from the operation that meant I couldn’t use my wrist or hand for three months (the skin on my hand is still numb today!) and then I had the injury and subsequent surgery to recover from.

Whilst I am not back to ‘normal’ I have been able to start to drive again (hallelujah!) and do the blummin’ ironing (urgh!) amongst a host of other things! It was a really exciting day when I could use a knife and fork – who knew such a simple thing could bring such pleasure! There have been lots and lots of small successes along the way which has made the process easier to bear! 

I started this post by saying the last few months have been tough. That’s true, but they have also meant I have spent lots of really great quality time with my family and friends and have also discovered that I’m far more resilient and determined than I ever thought possible! Despite the whole process being really quite painful we have laughed so much – mainly at my initially pathetic efforts to do the smallest tasks! So tough it has been, but it’s given me a lot of joy too – who knew that shattering your elbow could have so many positive points?!?

Sadly the metalwork, or meccano as I like to call it, is causing me a problem. I’ll not go into details (you may thank me!) but far from being mine for life, it now has to come out. My operation is set for today (eek!) and so I’ll be out of action for a little while. I’ve been a busy bee and have lots of DT posts scheduled so I’ll look like I’m here even though I’m not! I’ve no doubt I’ll be tweeting/facebooking from my sofa when I start to feel better – I hope you’ll join me!

As always, thank you for your support – it really is most gratefully received xxx

 

ps: I've noticed that the colours I used for my first journal page about my accident are oranges and reds - really 'danger' colours. The pages I created for my update are much more subdued and softer - I think that says a lot about how my state of mind has changed over the last few months!

Fragrance of Flowers

Country View Crafts Challenges' theme this month is 'Painty Pleasures' and I used PaperArtsy Fresco paints combined with the truly wonderful Jofy stamps that have proved to be incredibly versatile! You just need a small dot of paint and water it down slightly and you get a really beautiful finish. If you've not tried the PaperArtsy Crackle Glaze then it really is worth a try - it's incredibly simple to use and produces a wonderful finish! For a fabulous tutorial you could watch this! I'm hoping you'll join in with us this month x

Crowning ATC

This fortnight at Crafty Boots it is my turn to choose the theme and I chose 'Crowns'. I made an ATC using Tim Holtz stamps (the background stamp is from Wendy Vecchi and is invaluable!). The ATC and little shelf my chap is perched on are Art Parts and there's some Glossy Accents and Treasure Gold as highlights! We hope you can join in with us this fortnight.

Love...

It is my turn on this romantic day over at the Country View Crafts blog - it may not be a surprise that a heart features on my project!

The birds are gathering

It's amazing how quickly a fortnight flies by and it's time, again, for another letter in the DragonsDream Tag It On alphabet challenge. I am really, really loving these! This time I had the pleasure of choosing and chose the letter 'G' (well, it is my initial!) and to use bird(s),  at least one stamp and a tag.

I used the back of a large 'G' I have in my studio as a stamp and clear embossed the letter. I then used Dylusion inks and stamps to decorate it. I really had no idea if I was going to use a word or not as I thought the 'G' was a pretty strong image but it suddenly looked like a gathering of birds so that became my word!

How will you use the letter 'G' this fortnight?! There is really nothing in the rules that says you have to use a word - you can just use a letter!

These our first five tags - they look pretty good so far and there's lots more coming too!

Bingo!

This fortnight at Crafty Boots, Stephanie-Emma challenged us to to 'Bingo'. If you're new to this then all you need to do is pick three elements in a row - I chose Star, White and Die Cut but added Pink as my highlight colour. I made a chunky ATC - be warned, there's a few photos to follow!

Pink	Buttons	Embossing
Glitter	Stamp	Heart
Star	White	Die Cut

Both sides have this design

The back

The top

We hope you'll join in with us this fortnight!

Painty Pleasures

It's the first of the month and there's a new theme at Country View Crafts Challenges... 'Painty Pleasures'. There is something really satisfying about paint. It can be used to cover large areas or to make delicate strokes. It's quite fabulous! For this Art Part panel I used PaperArtsy Fresco paint to cover the background and to highlight the flowers. I'm no painter by any means but painting a stamped image makes me look like I am! After making the crackled background I stamped my image and then painted it with watered down Fresco paints. Then I sanded it lightly to give a 'worn' look. Do pop over to see what the rest of the DT have made and hopefully feel inspired to join in!