A most wanted bookmark

What lovely weather we are having at the moment. I do not want to be back at work, but doing the garden and the allotment instead! However, work is necessary unfortunately - I just need a job where I at least have windows lol.

Anyway, I decided to have a go at making some corner bookmarks. Rather than make one I made a collection using some Kanban toppers I have had for a little while and really love to look at. I think these will make really unusual gifts for people.

As you can see there is a matching set of four. To make these a square 4x4" was cut from white cardstock and marked halfway along three of the sides. The card was scored between the centre mark and the two side marks to make two triangular folds, which were folded to the back of the card. Two squares of 2 3/4" were cut from two different patterned papers, and each of these cut in half along the diagonal. This was used on the front top triangle, and also to cover the flaps on the reverse, and give them strength. This is the part that goes over the book pages. Pink patterned papermania paper was used on the bottom section of the front for all four bookmarks, and different ribbons/patterned paper strips used across these. A panel was die-cut from gold mirror card, and the toppers attached to this, and finally coloured gems were used to finish the bookmarks.

This collection is being entered for the following challenges:

MMM Springtime Inspiration Picture - Colours and birds

Anything Goes @ papertake weekly - crafty catz - catch the bug - glitter n sparkle - crafting by designs

SSW #49  (Turned and cut into shape)!

Creative Corner Animal fun

polkadoodle - use a die

Art Impressions #156 Spring Colours

Creative Moments #65 Anything but a card

CCM #136 Wings

I also have an audiobook review for you today - I know it has been a while!

A Most Wanted Man by John Le Carre

This is a book about an illegal immigrant – all totally fictional with no basis in real life as far as I know. It looks at the different views of people who meet the immigrant compared to those who have never met him and go purely off his history. The lad is from a not well regarded sub-population in Russia, whose members are often used as scapegoats for many crimes. He was tortured in his own country before escaping with help from one of his father’s friends. He runs to Germany, where he hopes that with his inheritance he can become a doctor.

The Banker who owns the bank in which the inheritance is stored, and the lawyer of the lad are both used by different branches of the secret service from several different branches within the government. For most of the book it would seem that the service branches have the same, or similar, goals but just rub against each other, however there is a cruel twist at the end of the book, which makes it very real to life. You never really find out if any of the claims against the ‘persons of interest’ are substantiated though, which is slightly annoying. This is a reasonable book to listen to, and I think it is easier to listen to than it would be to read.

Bears and Beads

No card for today's craft creations, but a cross stitched Bear and a beaded choker. We went out to pick up a new cage for our baby red-rump today as her cage mate started attacking her, and whilst we were in the area we visited Tropical Bird Garden, and Sydney and Harbour in particular. Check out some of the photos below :D.

Firstly here is my little bear flying through the air on a kite, from the Joan Elliott desk calender. She took 14 and a half hours - which is quite good considering the previous two have take 17 hours each! I am not doing Aprils, but am going to do a small part of it as a card.

 I would like this little bear to be considered for the following Anything Goes challenges:

simply create too #82; craftycatz and 613 avenue create

 This is a triple stranded choker, created especially for the Facebook Crafting Techniques Jewellery Making Month. It is not a brilliant picture against the grey background unfortunately!

And here are some of the birdies visited today! It was extremely busy so I couldn't get many pictures on the parrot path, but these guys were pleased to sit pretty anyway.

Sydney and Harbour (on his back)

Thank you for looking and I shall hopefully have something new for you tomorrow - off to play now :)

Hugz Tinz

Extra Large for Christmas

Hi there,

I don't think it has actually stopped raining yet today! Typical bank holiday weekend weather for the UK :).

Today I managed to break the cat litter tray - not necessarily the best time to decide on this being a good idea - but luckily we managed to find a suitable new tray - although it is not covered or colour matched to the kitchen :(. We have also had to fix the fence as the wind decided to completely destroy two of the fence panels. They have now been replaced with some green netting which I will grow sweet peas, runner beans, french beans and peas up. Not the ideal solution, but when you are short on money you make do and mend. I will have to get a picture once the weather dries up so that I can show you how it looks now, and then how it looks in Summer once it is all planted up - and hopefully there will be a large improvement in the Summer.

I also managed to use one of the A4 Anita's card blanks that I have had in my stash for a couple of years, but never known what to use them for, to make a Christmas card from one of my many finished cross stitch pieces.

The gingham background paper was from a card making magazine from a few years ago, which I topped with printed scandi-style vellum, from a craft pad that I got from my mum. Red mirror card was adhered to the right side of the card blank, and the gold 'Happy Christmas' ribbon layered over the crosses on the vellum. The Lickle Ted cross stitch and mount was layered onto the mirror card, once white backing paper was placed behind the stitching to prevent the colour bleeding through the aida. This whole panel was then layered onto the card base and Christmas sequins added to finish.

This card is being entered into the following challenges:

Vs sweet ideas #33 Anything Goes

Quirky Crafts #7 Quirky Sketch with hats

simply create too #82 Anything Goes

TPE292 Anything Goes

creative corner Animal Fun

winter wonderland Let it snow

Finally, for those of you who have been following my progress on the fish tank - it is now at 90 hours!

Thank you for taking the time to look at my blog.

Hugz Tinz

Waterfalls and fishes

Well a theme to match the weather - wet, wet and wet. My monthly challenge group (https://www.facebook.com/groups/145548232316573/?fref=nf) has an inspiration picture this month -

...so I decided to use a Waterfall technique for my latest ATC collection. 

 These were easter themed, with food items such as Easter eggs and cupcakes. The waterfall mechanism was made using blue card stock and attached with brads. Peel offs were used and coloured using Promarker pens.

This collection is inspired by:

TPE292 Anything Goes

Passion for Promarkers 290 Blue Skies

613avenue create Anything Goes

glitter n sparkle 130 Easter

CCM #135 Spring has Sprung
ooh-la-la #177 Easter/Spring
open-minded crafting fun #33 Food Related
crafting by designs Anything Goes

And here is my update for my fishes - approximately 87/88 hours:

Thank you for taking the time to look, and possibly comment.

Hugz Tinz

Easter Treats

Hello everybody,

I am very disappointed with the weather this morning! It has done nothing but rain, so no allotmenting for me! However I have created this Easter card:

The Smirk bunnies were stamped directly onto a patterned card blank and coloured using promarkers. The Tatty Teddy topper and sentiment finish the card with a pearlescent sheen. A quick and easy card to make.

I wish to enter this card for the following challenges:

The Stamping Boutique Easter challenge

Hanna and Friends #218 Easter

alphabet challenge C for Cute and Cuddly

Deep Ocean #100 Easter/Spring

aud sentiments 128 Anything Goes

glitter n sparkle #130 Easter
C4C279 Think Spring
modsquad Easter challenge
allsorts feature a creature
cute card Thursday #366 Easter
ilovepromarkers 262 Easter/Springtime

Thank you for stopping by to look at my creation.

Hugz Tinz

Colour Twist

OK so I decided to make a Christmas card but taking inspiration from TPE291 photo challenge: . Therefore I chose to use the colours from this cookie basket to create an unusual Christmas card.

I dry embossed a piece of orange coredinations card, but did not rub the raised areas. A floral embossing folder was used as I could not find my snowflake folder, but I think that it works quite well as a snowflake idea. This panel was wrapped with snowflake ribbon from papermania and added to a pastel green card blank. The image is an Anita's christmas stamp which I had been struggling to use, but I thought it would look good with the colour scheme, so used a pretty colour pink inkpen. Finally I spelt out YULE on separate pieces of Papermania 12 days of Christmas music themed paper (music scale and drummers) and attached these over the join. Two felt snowflake finish the card off nicely.

The other challenges that inspired this card are:

Winter Wonderland Embossing challenge

craftyhazelnut 222 Stick it anyway you like

abc christmas F is for Frosty challenge (snowflakes)

AI Spring Colour challenge

jingle belles Fa-la-la-la-la (musical paper for sentiment)

simply create too #82 Anything Goes

I did manage to get down the allotment during my week off, although we did also visit relatives. So here are some allotment pictures:

Frog Spawn in pond

Gooseberry bushes

Non-existent Garlic

 The Garlic was planted back in Autumn and so should have fresh growth coming through now - but as you can see from the picture there are only a few weeds!!

Fruiting area

Potato Bed after planting

Thank you for looking.

Hugz Tinz

Bugs in Turquoise

Well the weather has deteriorated again today. I did manage to get to the allotment for a little bit though and planted a new redcurrant bush, whilst getting the grass out from around some of the existing fruit bushes. Couch grass is a nightmare to get up when it is that close to plants!!

I have made a card for my monthly themes for crafting Facebook group, which is themed Turquoise and one other colour.

This was a simple card to create, but I like the affect the two colours have on one another along with the geometric backing paper used. The paper was layered onto mirror card straight onto a white base. Nested dies were used to cut the sentiment layer using mirror card and plain white card. The sentiment was stamped onto the white layer using papermania ink (to which I had to add water to get it to ink the stamp!). Quickcutz dies were used to cut the bug parts first out of turquoise card and then out of tin foil, which were swapped to create the contrast.

This was made in accordance with the following challenge themes:

crafting by designs - Anything Goes

crafty calendar - Add some metal (tin foil)

CCM #135 Spring has Sprung

crafting by designs Masculine Project

creativecorner - For a Boy

Sweet stampin' - Sentiment as Focus

Here is also an update for my fish tank - 84 hours:

I will hopefully be doing some more on this later today - but first I have to do some work in the front garden!!! I thought holidays were for doing what I wanted to do :(.  Ok I may have wanted to do the front garden if the sun was shining nicely - but it is not  *sulking*.

Oh and another update - here is the start of the bathroom make-over!

I know it is not perfectly straight, but as it is sea-themed I do not think it really has to be. There will be some sea horses added in between, but I want a darker and more turquoise paint before I do those. Unfortunately it would seem that this paint is not water-proof so I also need to 'seal' these shells. But it is a start!

Thank you for looking.

Hugz Tinz