Lift Challenge #64

I hope you all had a blessed Easter. I had all my sons and family round for dinner and that took quite some preparing but its all worth it to see everybody together. I just wanted to play with paper, glue and scissors this morning.

Thanks for all your lovely comments on my last post which won the challenge! What a lovely bunch of ladies in Craft land!

Now for a new challenge, something I've never tried before and got quite lost in the process. I don't think this chevron like pattern actually hits the perfect mark but I'm going to post it anyway because I love this paper and it was my last piece. I saw this Lift challenge on Lin's blog and thought I would give it a try.

This paper is from Prima. The little flowers have been cut out from Collage stamps from Hero Arts and the sentiment is HA too.

CAS(E) this sketch #72

I am joining in this challenge this week:

I have always loved the grid challenge and decided to use my solid square stamp from Hero Arts.

I wanted to represent Spring and feelings it brings. All stamps except for one, are Hero Arts. Thanks to my friend Betty K who alerted me to this challenge.

Virginia's View Challenge #2 - Card 3

This will be my last card for this challenge. It has given me another dimension to crafting, using stencils in such different ways. Once again I have used a paper die-cut.

I used Victorian velvet to distress the background with the diecut in place. I then used a distress marker 'Picked Raspberry' to ink up one of the flower stamps from the 'Remember' set AC028 from Hero Arts. I did not spray with water, that is not necessary with this set, it doesn't make the stamped image any nicer, but that is my opinion.
Then I gold embossed the sentiment (which is from Penny Black and I love it!) to finish it off. Oh yes, always love adding a couple of pearls from Hero Arts too.

I have thoroughly enjoyed this challenge and looking forward to the next one already.

Pictures of my garden

First one up is my Cherry tree, I have been enjoying this for two weeks already and now the weather is warm and sunny, the bees are enjoying it too!

Here is a close up of the beautifully formed flowers

This is my Fuschia next to the door in a hanging basket:

And then I have my chickens that are running around in the back garden, loving this weather:

 

After pruning the sage bush, I hung up several branches to dry in the kitchen. I use it to stuff in my chickens which are going to be roasted in the oven  (not my own, the shop bought ones), in teas and to line the Chicken's nests.

and this is a picture of a bouquet garni that I prepare from the garden to stuff my chickens with before they go into the oven to roast for an hour:

thyme/rosemary/sage/bay-leaf and a lemon (cut in half)

Adding a little card to the selection this afternoon:

As I was thinking of ways to use stencils, I suddenly thought of a Plastic Cuttlebug folder that I have never used simply because I have no Cuttlebug and some kind blogger had sent it to me.
So I used three different distress inks which I sponged over the plastic, sprayed with water, put the paper to the folder and this is the patterned result.

Virginia's View Chellenge #2 - second stencil card

I must have made a wrong movement because this post got posted without its content earlier today.
I am so enjoying trying out different cards with stencils, that I wanted to enter another card into Virginia's challenge. Again, I used a paper die-cut from Sue. If something works, I like experimenting with it :)

The Bible verse from Phil.4:8 is actually in stamp form and is from Penny Black. The butterflies, bees and flowers are Stampin' Up and the script SPRING stamp which I stamped around the edge is Hero Arts. I love using Nature themed stamps on my cards. At the moment I love watching all the bird life around me at this beautiful time of the year. The Cherry tree is blossoming and Rosemary bushes have such beautiful blue flowers. Pure enjoyment!

Virginia's View Challenge #2 - Stencils

Thank you for another challenge, Virginia. The challenge can be found by clicking here.

I don't have any stencils (not even one) or a die cutting machine, so I had to see what I had to use for this challenge, because I am determined to take part each month. I came across some ready cut paper-dies which Sue had sent me and used a circle with a fancy edge which I just distressed over the top with Antique Linen and it left the white space.

It is a very simple card. I used distress markers to ink up this Hero Arts Rose and thought it gave a vintage kind of look, so I added a French Bonjour sentiment. Once I had stamped the rose, I stamped over it again to get some movement.