...a wee gingerbread man

I love gingerbread men. Yesterday I thought I'd make one. - I cut a sizzix gingerbread man out of frosted shrink plastic and coloured him with the only brown ink pad I have. Then I baked him - he turned out really dinky.

I wanted to put him on a card. At this point I must tell you that I have very limited cardstock - I haven't managed to track down a good local supply yet - I'd love some PapertreyInk cardstock but shipping to Ireland is horrendous for this heavy item.

Sooooo... I spent 2 hours playing with what I do have and I have to tell you that the red and kraft combination was the best I have, no really - It was.

I'm looking forward to making this card again soon as I get a decent supply of cardstock.

I used:

Shrinkles Shrink plastic - frosted.
PTI Snowflake serenade stamps
PTI Holiday wishes stamp for the sentiment
PTI Holiday treats stamp for the snowflake B/G on the tag
Kraft card
Red ribbed card from The Paper Mill Shop
Nestabilities plain and scalloped squares
Plain white card
Versacolour Ink pad Paprika
Papermania medium brad

I'll get on to the halloween card soon as poss, and in answer to the lady who requested how to sign up to my blog - I'm not sure yet but I think there's a wee link at the bottom of the blog that says "subscribe to:posts". I was unable to contact you as there was no email to follow.

...breakfast

Woke up yesterday morning to a bunch of fabulous comments from PTI bloghoppers - Thank you ladies - my head is swelling nicely thanks! lol.

While having my morning cuppa, it was such a treat to see everyones blogs - If i didn't post a comment it was only cos I thought maybe I was too late - due to the timezone differences, I viewed the second half of the entries this morning after it was well and truly over.

I will be putting up a couple of instructions for my blog hop card hopefully in a few days - gotta make another one - I didn't take any pictures of this one in construction.

I'll be doing this in between trying out all of the other ideas that I saw on the blog hop - you folks are well used to this but I was amazed at the experience and can't wait for the next one!! Of course I now need to purchase plum cardstock - cuttlebug folders - bitty baby stamps...





Ps. the photo is a little lane that runs along part of the bay at Carna Co. Galway - One of the most beautiful and child friendly beaches in Ireland - you can walk out into the water for about a few hundred yards at high tide and the water doesn't get much higher than your knees! I often wish I was there.

... a card for the Blog Hop

Here is my card for the blog hop - hope you like it - I didn't do anything spectacular with the acetate but it is central to how the card works. It's meant to look as if you can see the tag through the window but when you pull the tag up the pumpkin stays put and out pops the ghost. As the acetate slides up the pumpkin gets a face.

My poor husband drove me 30 miles to purchase a £6 ($12) Stazon ink pad to stamp the one tiny pumpkin face image on the acetate!

I'm sorry it's not a very summery subject but I've only got Christmas and Halloween PTI stamps so far. I'm really looking forward to seeing all the other cards and hopefully learn how to handle acetate - I found it a bit of a nuisance, I feel like I have three thumbs when I'm stamping on it. Lol.

...a mess

All the ladies on the Pti forum have graciously shared their crafting spaces with everyone and I thought it was high time i "treated" you ladies to my 'crafting space' - here it is in all its glory - enjoy!! Lol - Of particular note is my ribbon storage system, free from the local grocery store, lol.

...instructions for trees

Here's a quick 'tutorial' on how to make the trees - Emily Davis very kindly flattered me by asking how these little trees were made - I was glowing after I read her request at the PTI website!! (hopefully if you click on the image it will get bigger)

To start with take your four largest square scallopped nestability dies and cut a green square of paper or card for each - then cut an extra one for the biggest die. - Paper and light card are better - heavy card can be harder to manipulate in this project.

Steps 1 and 2 Refer to the pictures to see where I scored each square - do them all in the same positions - first from corner to corner then I used the scallops as a guide to do two more scores on either side of the diagonals.

Steps 3 and 4 Then I made the folds, pinching the corners so's they folded inwards. After that I squashed the corners from front to back see pic 4.

Steps 5 and 6 I secured them with really strong double sided tape for the paper trees (I used eyelets on the card trees aswell).

Steps 7 and 8 I repeated this process on all of the squares and then attached little sticky pads to each tip of the tree sections and then stacked them all together.

If you are going to use eyelets stop at step 4 and punch holes as per the photo below - add the eyelets and proceed to step 6.

For some of my trees I didn't use tape or eyelets but left them open to make little shaggy trees - I think I might prefer them like this.

...An eylet tree

A development to the tree in my first post - I secured this tree with eyelets - OK so I know mine are big and ugly but prefect eyelets are only a shopping trip away...

and wouldn't they be the perfect place to put little beads for ornaments...

Waltzingmouse Makes... A Start.

Hello and Welcome to the first ever post on my first ever blog. I started this blog because I have been so inspired by all the creative ladies on the PapertreyInk Forum that I feel it's only fair that I share my cards. I've been making things all my life but i just got hooked on stamping in the last month or so and have started off with cards. Soon as I can get someone to go to America for me and fill a suitcase with all the other goodies such as egg boxes and sweet little tins, I'll be stamping those too.
Today I'm posting a couple of cards I made this week and finishing off with a little Christmas tree that any of you ladies who have the spellbinders Nestability square sets can whip up in a jiffy.

I'm planning to make a forest of these to sit among my cards on the dresser this year at Christmas. If anyone fancies making one let me know, I could do instructions in the next post. I think I've enabled comments but I'm new to this so bear with me.

Not having a vast array of ribbon, I used fabric to create little accents above and below the ribbon which was layered on top of a strip of stitched strip of Kraft card. Being an avid quilter I couldn't resist making a little patchwork heart for the white card stamped with sage snowflakes.
I'm sorry it's all Christmas cards at the moment but I'm a bit of a Christmas fanatic and bought everything they had to do with the Holiday at PTI. I'm waiting on my next order which will allow me to branch out a little. lol.