Dared to Sing!

Ha! Have you heard me sing? Well its a good job I don't have a mic for the sake of your eardrums. Im an enthusiastic singer but thas about it! Kel set this fab new Dare, which was to make a card incorporating song lyrics.

Now I don't know if I should be worried but all my favourite songs are either protest songs (a la Joni Mitchell, Marvin Gaye,) Have really depressing lyrics (Prince, Nina Simone, Dido) or don't have many words at all. My boyfriend has loads and loads of house records from the late 90's early 00's and it was great fun giving them an airing, including the fabby Fix my Sink, great to have a boogie to but try getting that on a card!

I really really wanted to do a card with Everybody Loves the Sunshine. There have been so many great remixes using this vocal and its a proper smiley song, but inspiration wasn't on my side with that one even though I listened to several versions over and over. It did make me grin though!

So, well you can't go wrong with the wise words of John Lennon can you,


Paper is from Basic Grey, the background is an Urban Couture and letters and alpha stickers are from the Lilykate Collection Pack. I handcut the big love, several times to get it right! I was green with envy at those lucky people who have craft robo's to do this for them.


This second one was more challenging from me. Its a song from back in the day when we (me and my boyfriend) used to go out every weekend dancing. I never know how to describe music but its here if you fancy a 20 second snippet. The tune is called Transition by Underground Resistance. Its great to remember those city years but it just makes me realise even more how much I like being out here in the sticks.


DCWV cardstock, Sassafrass Lass paper which Ive had for ages and only just now used, ribbon printed on the pc, gorgeous Angel Kisses from LCC. I would never have normally put this sunny yellow with the pale pink flowers and brads but the paper just got it perfect and looked like it was meant to be!

Im just in the door from teaching the teachers, will write about that later though as I need this cuppa sitting in front of me!

How will you be defined in the dictionary?

Rhi -- [noun]: A person who is a master of making ravioli 'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

Always good to know!

A simple doodle

I've had a busy day today preparing for classes, and Im still not finished all my organising. I have learnt how to print a mirror image in word though, thanks for your help Jo and Tracie.

I was looking through my card gallery at the cards I was making earlier this year, and found this, its a really simple doodled card, so I thought I'd share it incase it inspired you to have a go at Jo's fab doodle dare!

Bee Happy! Rhi x

ps Vingt is 20 in french *blush* thanks Kel, I'm really going to be in a right pickle when I go to my friends wedding in france next year!

Douze points

Douze points, is douze french for 20? Well thats what Im up to now on UKS, yep, I managed one LO in a whole scrapping weekend, I must be the slowest scrapper in history! Its Debbie's bewitched class and here is my take. Its a pic of me and Matt at a party years and years ago, about 4 maybe..., in the days when we could hold our drink and stay up all night! The title's from the words of a tune from those times that both of us remember but neither of us can remember the title. Its a funky house tune, if you know it please leave a message and put us out of our trying to remember misery!
Theres so many inspirational classes to do, it going to keep me inspired for ages. Thanks to everyone who made it happen.

One other little thing Ive achieved today is getting the Daring cardmakers a domain name. Now if you want to tell your friends about daring cardmakers you can use the web address www.daringcardmakers.com, much easier to remember than all that http dot slash stuff!

Right, need to get the roast chicken in the oven if we're going to eat any time soon.

Playing with Paisley

Ive been playing with paisley, great fun! Ive had a go at making the paper I intended to do for this dare but mucked up! This time I took my scanned paisley doodle, printed onto basic Grey Sublime and coloured in with pencils and chalks. Its a simple little card, curled up flowers influenced by the fantastic Carole Jansen who just does the most amazing 3D scrapping. Actually now that Ive seen the photo I think Im going to glossy accent the middle of those flowers...

Thats all for today, my face has swolen up something rotten (see dentist post below) so Im off out to see some good friends now its dark enough to leave the house without scaring children!

Doodley Doo Dare

Ive wanted to have a go at doodling for ages but as one of my mates Lynne is the doodling queen I was always a bit scared to have a go! But this weeks Daring Cardmakers Challege by Jo was the motivational kick in the right direction that I needed.

I have to admit, I tried on a piece of patterned paper and mucked it up completely (basic grey sublime, may it rest forever in its ruined state, sob). I I think I was just scared of ruining such a lovely piece of paper and forgot to relax. So I tried again in front of the telley with a plain piece and dahhdahh! Result! Its messy and not perfect but thats the point and it works! Before I chalked and coloured it for this card I scanned it into the pc to print onto the lovely patterned paper and that worked too, so if you get the fear of ruining scrummy paper thats my top tip! Plus you can muck about in photo editing programs and change the colours and stuff.


Apart from my doodled background I used...
Chalks and watercolour pencils
Big Brad from Gail, Its actually one of the spotty christmas dovecraft ones heated with a heat gun and dunked in some pearlustre Embossing powder then heated again. Hold your brad with pliers though, they get very hot!
Bloom from Sarah
Ribbon and ric rac from Carolyn

Home safe from the dentist

Yes I made it through. It wasn't as bad as it could have been, although bloomin 'eck the dentist needs sewing lessons, the stitches are really not prettily done. I was kind of hoping he'd do some sort of arty pattern!

Plus I'm under strict orders not to do anything strenuous, what a shame there goes the housework again, at least pc surfing and playing with paper are allowed!

Eeeeek!

Good morning blog readers, I still find it amazing that anyone reads my drivel at all but obviously you do! So thank you for stopping by. I'm having a bit of a nervous day as Ive got the dentist this afternoon. OK, I'd better give a warning here....


Nasty dentist story coming up!!! Feel free to go and read something more fun!


Personally I blame the marketing bods at cadburys. It all started when Finger of Fudge (remember them?) had a save up your packets promotion in the 80's. Of course I had to get 50 wrappers for a state of the art calculator ruler which was the Daddy of all giveaways. It took so long to collect them! It broke within a week by the way, theres a lesson to be learned there.

Anyway that meant I had to have fillings and one of the filled teeth had to get removed recently but it didn't want to come out, so half of the darn thing is left in there and he's going to take it out today.

Now I worked as a dental nurse for a while and the first time I saw this done I nearly fainted, so I know exactly what it is theyre going to do, and although i do trust my dentist (hes good and Ive had some bad ones!) he keeps doing the oh its simple and you'll be fine thing... but I know what theyre going to do. Im not going to tell you though cause some things its really better not to know.

So if I'm not back this afternoon then you know whats happened...

Be Yourself

This weeks LCC challenge was to
...create a project based on any theme but it had to contain the word BE in the title or greeting. Extra points if you used 2 or more patterned papers, fabric and more than one photo.

And heres what I did! In the nick of time as always! Papers from K & Co Studio K stack, cotton fabric stamped with a lovely stamp in coffee bean brilliance ink. I can remember the name of the stamp company but its a uk manufacturer and I'm sure I have the leaflet from the fair somewhere so I can find out if anyones interested! The rest was from my stash, how gorgeous are these paper flowers. I've just noticed on this pic theres a tiny sliver of the base card visible, Ive now sorted that on the card but I'll never get another halfway decent pic now its dark so you'll have to trust me, Ive fixed it.

The car has broken down twice in the past week, the first cost us £140 for the starter motor and the second which wasn't a real break down more of a won't start cost £60 for new glow plugs. All of its unplanned expense so it means Im on a stash diet til at least Christmas, boohoo. How am I going to cope, don't get me wrong, I have plenty of stuff to play with but there's always more wonderful tempting things out there, like chipboard, all mines homemade and I'd love an alpha to play with and LCC is having a 25% off everything sale so Im missing out on some gorgeous bargains as Tracie has oodles and oodles of gorgeous papers.

Such is life and priorities though, at least the poor little red fiat is well again, even if she is getting on a bit old.

Ive just had a thought, do you think Santa reads blogs? Maybe I should put my Christmas list up here incase he does!

Its been bloomin freezing today and right now I have a date with the sofa and a hot cup of earl grey and whatever rubbish telley I can find to watch.

Vaguely Human

Thats how I'm feeling! The cold seems to have past its worse and I'm feeling much much better. I think the worst thing about colds, apart from the physical yuckiness, is that they can make you feel so very down, which is not a nice thing at the best of times but when you are trying to stay out of the dark pit of depression it can be a bit too much like teetering on the edge for comfort. But hey ho, Ive got through this one, with a bit of help from my friends, my pharmacist and Lidl's fake Mars bars. Theyre like Mars bars but not so sickly and much yummier, and I read somewhere that chocolates very good for a sore throat. Thats my excuse anyway.

Thank you all for all your lovely comments about my cards. Sabine, the playstation controller is a QK die, and Gillian, I used ranger alcohol inks on my plastic milk bottle embellies, but try what you've got cause Ive heard there are better ones out there although I can't remember what theyre called right now, Pinyatas or something like that?

I hope I can fit in some of the craft time Ive missed and that I'll have something to share before too long.

Ribbon for men!

Thats the theme of this weeks dare by the Daring Cardmakers. This one was great fun, and with so many cool ribbons out there to choose from it was a great excuse to aquire a few more to add to my collection. Mens cards can be really difficult so I hope you find this challenge inspiring and make some fab cards for the men in your lives too. Rather embarassingly, all the ric rac for the happy birthday card and more was from my stash. Now why do I have 6 different colours of blue ric-rac. Not sure how that happened but it must have been for a very good reason!


The playstation one is made partly with ribbons already in my stash with a few extra from Little Silver Hat. the controllers and screen are glossy accented which is fast becoming my new favourite thing, well after ribbons and patterned papers anyway. I'm really looking forward to seeing your creations, remember you can still join in if you dont have a blog by emailing us, details are all on the dare blog at the top.

Other exciting news today, our very own Daring Cardmaker Jo Kill is up for Cardmaker of the Year in Simply Cards and Papercraft mag. If you havent placed your vote yet you can find the form on the SC&P link. Congratulations Jo and best of luck, not that I think you need it, your work is stunning!

Teaching the teachers

Have you ever wondered what teachers get up to on those In service training days? Well the answer appears to be having a great time learning how to make cards with me! Its quite daunting as its going to be a huge group, (minimum of 25-30!) for 2 hours and Im sure theyre going to be naughty! Ive seen teachers when theyre off duty, lol! A huge thanks to the lovely Gail from Craftspirations who made this possible for me. And also for being an excellent enabler and having wonderful American Crafts ribbons by the meter especially for me, ok not really especially for me, but it does mean I can get some of the wonderful gorgeousness without spending a whopping amount on those big packs they come in.

Other that that, Im rattling like a pillbox with all the things the chemist gave me to fight off these darned cold symptoms, yuck. So rest and recuperation for me, but I'll still be up bright an early tomorrow as its Dare Day, and I can't wait to see your reaction to this one! Its a corker!

Wendnesday's Little Extra

For this weeks Little Extra we were challenged to use 1 tag, 2 different ribbons or fibres and 3 different patterned papers on a card and dahdah... here's mine... Cant't wait to see what you do.Papers are K'Ology Peabody again, I just love them! Fibres are wool from a charity shop, I just cant walk past a charity shop wool box without a good rummage to see what they have and Ive had some great finds.

Its been one of those funny weeks so far, the car broke down, its fine now its back from the garage (how much! argh!!!) but the poor things feeling her age, I can feel myself coming down with a lurgy so I'm dosing up on Satusmas for the vitamin C to give my body the best chance to fight it and it was the last week of teaching pottery as their funding has run out. I've managed not to let it get me down though which is good.

And on a positive note, Ive been asked to do some more papercraft teaching so they obviously like what I do, fabby. I get paid for doing what I love, I can't imagine anything better.

Off for an early night now!
Rhi x

More cards

Busy busy busy! Ive signed up to the UKS Cyber Crop and Im a Hufflepuff. Not sure how I'm going to keep up as its humungous but I have a very friendly 3rd Year Jay looking after me, thank you Jay, Im sure I shall be asking lots more silly questions very soon.

Managed to make another card for this weeks Dare using some long neglected stamps. the background text is a Purple Onion stamp and its so versatile it's probably my most used stamp, stamped in versamark for that watermark effect. It's olde worlde writing that you can't read, or I cant anyway! The main image is a beautiful stamp from a Sunday International UM sheet of botanical images, stamped onto chalked shrink plastic and coloured with watercolour pencils. I tried to take a fancy close up pic to show you the Latin text it has on it...but my photography skills are lacking and they all came out blurry. You'll just have to trust me on this one, its got Latin botanical words on it. Well I'm assuming their botanical... they could be really rude and I'd never know!

And a couple of leaving cards I've been asked to make. Thanks Lythan for your help with the wording when I had card makers block. You're a star!

Ive been looking at other peoples pics they take of their cards and trying to take inspiration for different angles. Im no photographer, I just use my cameras auto or macro and hope for the best but these have come out alright seeing as the light's pretty bad today. Happy Cardmaking, Scrapping, Crafting or whatever you're up to today!

It's Friday and it's Dare day!

Bonjour! Ok my grasp of french is pretty poor, I could ask you where the swimming pool was in theory but thats no good for a card! Tracie set a great dare this week, telling us it was easy, well I was stumped for ages, trying to remember the Welsh, Gaelic and French I learned in school. I dont think moving from Welsh Wales to Gaelic Scotland aged 10 helped me much with my languages!

In the end after a lot of humming and haaing, a few attempts in the bin, and a deadline looming, I decided to go with that most stylish of nations, France... And heres my card...
The border round the edge is printed from the pc and says 'Haute Couture' and 'La Mode' and the little tag says Joyeux Anniversaire. The papers are the gorgeous K'Ology Peabody that I got from the SECC and Im so pleased I managed to use some of them (theres 3 of each sheet so that helps!). I also used bablefish to check my spelling, a very useful site for this challenge! I cant wait to see what you come up with for this fantastic dare.

Meet the Chavix's

These are sizzix dolls I made ages ago for a laugh in a moment of boredom and then put out of the way never to see the light of day. As I was chatting with some friends on MSN about the merits (or not as the case may be) of these little sizzix people, I thought I'd dig them out of their rubbish life stuffed in a pocket on a wallhanger with other things like card mag freebies I'll probably never use and give them their moment of fame. So here they are, teehee! Mrs Chavix's earrings are much more sparky in real life by the way, thats because theyre genuine diamond-ish!

Dare day tomorrow, I love fridays!

The song that named my blog

Is finally being released, hooray! I heard it on Jo Whiley's show on Radio 1 ages and ages ago and just loved the words, and its a really upbeat tune that makes me want to sing along every time. I love that piano! Anyway I remembered the lyrics but not the band or title but luckily its just been on Zane Lowe's show as the hottest record in the world, so now I can share.

Click here to listen to a bit of it, its out november 13th. And lyrics here. Unfortunately this version cuts after 60 seconds but hey they have to make their money somehow!

Whoohooo...Prizewinner!

Remember I won a prize a wee while ago for a Card I made for the LCC Cyber Crop! Well its here, so I thought I'd share. I got some yummy tall thin card blanks with envies and a whole bag of pretty goodies that match, arent they scrumptious. Theres so many lovely blossoms and blooms in there that I havent seen in the flesh before, I can tell you now, most of them will be used for scrapping so I can keep them, teehee. Thank you so much to Tracie for running the most fantastically fun creative event, and to everyone who worked so hard to make such wonderful classes, you're all so talented. The Cyber Crop was completely inspirational and was the push I needed to start me scrapping after years of just thinking about it! Crafting's so much fun!

Look!

I have a proper banner! Whoohoo! Can you tell Im chuffed, its a complicated and scary thing this html stuff but I did it with a little, ok a lot of help from my friends and a wonderful link to a fabby tutorial from Claire which can be found here. I need to sort out the text colours and links and stuff properly as some of it dissapeared when I edited (as Claire said it would) and I did save an html copy somewhere but forgot to give it a name that I'd recognise... There's a lesson in there if you're going to try it!

I thought I'd make the most of the sun we had here this afternoon and given my new love of scrapping took my camera on my walk too. The new banner is made with a pic taken today about 10 minutes walk from my house and this particular track just leads to fields so the only traffic to worry about is the occasional tractor. I just love the light and the beautiful golden colours of autumn on days like today. Im so lucky to have all this beautiful space on my doorstep, and now I can remind myself of it when its fog as thick pea soup outside too. Glad I had my hat scarf and gloves on today, its getting chilly, brrrrr.

Did I mention Im chuffed about my banner *wink*

B&W with the only colour being ribbon

It was a hard challenge but this is what I came up with. I think it needs more ribbon somewhere but not sure where yet. I didn't have any black or white buttons so I die cut them from card and glossy accented them. *note to self -buy more buttons*

Its a bad pic, when the sun moves round a bit I'll try again.

Sunday Sunday

Managed to get my spring bulbs planted this morning, yay! Come spring I'll have some Iris' and Tulips among my daffs and snowdrops. Blooming freezing out though. I really fancied a long walk but the cloud hung around all day threatening to rain and didn't so I got on with cooking a scrummy roast dinner.

I really got in to this stitching malarkey this week, and its been great to see all the cards inspired by the stitching dare too. Heres a couple more from me on the Christmas theme...


Off to snuggle up on the sofa now and watch a film , winters not all bad!

Happy Stitching... Dare 3

When Kathy announced the dare for this week was Stitching I though great, I have those stitching stamps I haven't used in a while, I'll have a play with them... but then she added, it has to be real stitches...eek!

Actually It's been something Ive wanted to have a go at for a while, but getting round to it, finding space on my craft desk to put the sewing machine , and remembering at a reasonable time of day rather than 2am when all the worlds asleep and doesn't want to listen to my machine rattling away. Add to that that I'm an expert procrastinator and you can see whay I never managed to play!

No matter how big my desk is it always seems to get covered instantly, does that happen to you? So after a big clear-up out came the machine, the threads and as usual I made a huge mess again with lots of noise too. Its great fun and definately worth giving it a go. Here's what I came up withPaper from the DCWV 12x12 Christmas Stack, machine stitched and letters cut using Ellison's Block Party Alphabet. My top tip is leave the long ends hanging and you can thread them through to the back by hand to keep it neat.The background here is made on the sewing machine just using a straight stitch in pink on dark brown card and zooming back and forth in a wobbly manner. I found it frayed a bit when I cut it to size but as I'd used (cheap) nylon thread, a quick blast of the heat gun round the edges melts the ends of the thread and stops it unravelling. A lighter works too, but dont use a candle, it leaves horrid sooty marks! Gorgeous ribbon from Little Silver Hat and the die for the cute cupcake is from Bosscuts.

Have fun sewing this week and if you do get round to it, we'd love to see what you make.

Potty potter

I had a busy day today teaching my pottery class. Its great fun and always very messy, especially on the wheel. Even though I wear an apron I still seem to come out covered in specks and blobs of dried clay. I get some funny looks when I pop into Asda on the way home. Luckily my crocs just need a wipe and theyre clean again, I love my Crocs! Im always so chuffed when my students do better than they think they can do, its so great to see their confidence building as they realise they CAN do it and its FUN!

Stayed up late last night doing my Friday night challenge for LCC. Yes I know it was Tuesday yesterday but the deadline was tonight so I had to get it done. Life's responsibilities can play havoc with your crafting time so I didn't get it done at the weekend. I was pleased with how it turned out. Papers from the DCWV 12x12 paper stack which is gorgeous and has so many ones that can be used for non Christmas stuff - well thats how I justified buying even more paper anyway *blush* Die Cut Quickutz snowflake and gretting printed on Inkjet acetate. Its the first time Ive printed my own acetate and it's a great technique.

Only 2 days til the next Dare!

Be happy and stay crafty.