Times a-changing

Something exciting to share that I have been working on behind the scenes – after all, sleep is over-rated no?….

Justsomestuffimade is on the move!
Yes, you heard it right… I have got a fabby new customised
blog design – come on over to see at
http://www.justsomestuffimade.com

Don’t forget to bookmark me there, or better still update your email feed/ RSS feed, so you can have my posts delivered straight to you!
No need to miss out… Lots of inspiration and fun things planned over there 😉

So would you Adam-and-Eve it, I’m back. Over in the new ‘crafty zone’ there anyway. You see, I haven’t completely dropped off the planet or deserted the bloggo after all!

I know that my crafting mojo seems to have pretty much vanished lately with not so many cards and ideas to share lately. And not much opportunity for getting around all your lovely blogs either.
Anxious times at work. But that’s another story for another day. Will share when I feel more like explaining!

And besides, bring a yummy new blog design to life has taken a bit of time and organising too, don’t you know?!

So what are you waiting for, head on over and I’ll see
you there from now on!!!
http://www.justsomestuffimade.com

Thanks for stopping by, hugs, Ruth xxx

Cute card for an Odd Challenge

Hi all. Today I have a card that I made to help use up a pile of scraps from my recent purge.

And I made it to enter in the challenge over at the Some Odd Girl blog – Use 2 complementary colours.
I chose orange & blue, see:

The background is made of 5 patterned paper scraps – I just dug out a bunch that would fit my colour scheme and arranged them in stripes. Amongst others there’s some Making Memories and My Mind’s Eye.
Can’t remember where the die-cut journaling shape came from (sorry) but it makes a good layering panel for my super-cute panda friend, no?

He is a Snag ’ems clear stamp by Imaginisce, heat embossed using WOW embossing *glitter* ‘Black Twinkle’. Yes folks, embossing GLITTER! Embossing *and* sparkle.
In one.
What’s not to like about that?

I like how the orange and sky blue colours make my monochrome (sparkly) panda stand out 😉

Have a good day everyone, and hope you fit in some crafty time!
Hugs, Rx

Sketch-On-Saturday: SOS22, Papertrey Ink idea

Hi all
Finally a spot of crafting time for me 😉
I have been feeling very mojo-less and really lacking in energy for being creative. Hard to believe, huh? Well, c’est la vie.
Life has been taking over in a big way, and offering its distractions. But enough of that.

A sketch came to the rescue for today – I was playing around this morning with a few ideas in my notebook, and wasn’t happy with any of them until I combined elements from a couple of options… Yay – that’s better!

And here’s my card. Another card for a guy today (I need a few of these right now!) so I ended up switching the ribbon for a paper strip:

It’s been a while since I got inky with my Papertrey Ink goodies (horror!) so I went for ‘Background Basics – Newsprint’ stamped in grey on a vellum piece that I found in my stash whilst flicking through some long-forgotten papers. A “new” discovery!
It has a feint stripe so the newspaper effect works well 😉

It’s stuck down with a couple of washi tape strips to the kraft card blank, and I kept with the monochrome feel with some antique style stickers of stationery items. (I scored the stickers at a museum gift shop in Madrid. Actually come to think of it, the washi tapes were from there too!!! Who knew?!! Ole!)

More kraft with the Jillibean Soup journaling sprout spot for the sentiment, with a bit of a journalism-themed pun. This card is for a journalist friend, so I hope he will like it. And a fancy square metal brad.

I’m entering this card into the latest challenge over at A Passion for Papertrey: One for the Boys. The newsprint stamps turned out to be perfect for my card.
Let me know if you play with my sketch – I’d love to see if you’re inspired to try it too 😉

Take care, hugs to all, Rx

image weirdness?

so I just got home from work and found that my post from this morning had not gone live. weird

tried to post it and now it has worked, but without any pics.
can’t get them to work. back soon when I manage to sort out the weirdness gremlins.

sorry, Rx

A card to share some news

Hi there
Just a quick card today. A ‘just because’ card. Will send this one to friends to share a spot of news we had this week re: hubby’s job. (He got a new one. At the same company, managing a new team. Great news!)

I made it for the Catered Crop – Follow The Recipe challenge FTR18. To mix up some/ all of these ingredients:

– Colours: primary colors like red, yellow, blue (and green), and a little brown for dirt
– Stamps and Stickers: anything that grows from a seed, gardening, back to school, worms!
– Patterns: circles, checked/gingham, notebook paper
– Colour Mediums: stamping ink, markers (ProMarker, Copics)
– Embellishments: buttons, ribbon, thread/twine
– Tools: border punch, die cut shapes, embossing plates
– Techniques: make a bookmark, mat your panels, tie ribbons through your buttons, machine sewing
– Theme: garden, back to school

Loads of options! Here’s my card:

So my colours aren’t so primary but I couldn’t make it work any other way. My mojo just must have been lacking as I couldn’t make any other colours look right 😉
But the yellows, greens and touch of brown are there!

No stamps or stickers, no marker pens but I went for it with the gingham background paper and inked the edges with Distress Ink ‘Tea Dye’.
And the buttons are threaded with twine – so that’s good for the embellishments ingredient and the technique.

I used a few die-cut pieces from a Jillibean Soup ‘Dutch Mustard Soup – Pea pod parts’ sheet – the butterflies (kind of gardeny for the theme huh?) and the speech bubble message and the hearts border strip.

Then to finish I added this fancy lacy gold ribbon as another border strip. Love the scallops! That’s my own little spice for the recipe 😉

Hope you like. Thanks for stopping by folks, Rx

Trend-Alert Tuesday – banner card

Hi again

Here’s an idea I had for a card on the on-trend bunting or banner theme… this time a masculine idea.
I need a card for the birthday of a dear friend’s hubby next week and thought it would be a good chance to get this ready for him.

Remembering my usual ‘techniques’ for guy cards…
CAS design… Keep the embellishments to a minimum… Stick to bold or monochrome colours…. Steer clear of flowers, bling and ribbons….

The banner stickers (Jenni Bowlin Studios ‘Flag Banners’) were great to add a personal touch with his name – I used Doodlebug Design rub-ons:

The strip of birthday paper across the bottom is trimmed from Jillibean Soup ‘Spotted Owl Soup – 3 Dancing Hats’.

Thanks for stopping by then folks, see you again soon, Rx

 

Missing in Action? And Lili of the Vally cuteness

Here I am folks, yes I think you may be forgiven for thinking that I had fallen off the planet. Many apologies for that.
Last week turned out to be rather a smack-in-the-face sort of a week, and I don’t know who thought it would be funny to turn up the dial on the treadmill of my life to ‘Max speed’ at the same time. Too much to think about and too much to do…
“If you think you might fit in some creative time and some such opportunities to feed the soul Ruth, then you’re really mistaken!!” is what is felt like round here.

But I managed to squeeze in a bit of crafting yesterday. Relief!
Just something that was not going to tax my mojo-less brain too much anyhoo 😉

I spotted the new challenge over at Lili of the Valley #109 – Thank you cards, so here’s a little something:

The cute bear image is by Lili of the Valley – an exclusive image that was free with
Papercraft inspirations magazine a couple of months ago.
I coloured and blended it with my watercolour pencils. Here’s a closeup:

Explains itself otherwise, I think.

I shall be attempting a normal blogging service this week. Fingers crossed folks, for all our sakes.
Take care, and thanks for your emails and kind wishes wondering where I’d got to – I’m touched by your thoughtfulness. (I’m in the process of replying to each of you personally!)
Rxx

Pink shabby card

Hi there
So I was feeling pretty directionless this morning – so many things to do, where to start? It was all feeling like a bit of a fog (and the weather has been equally damp and miserable!!).
Anyhoo, things have improved and we managed to get some chores ticked off the list today, with boring trips to the DIY store and the supermarket, and then fixing a new curtain rail in our (soon-to-be-finished!) bedroom…

Finally a bit of time to squeeze in a card idea before dinner. My brain was feeling pretty drained, but a bit of inspiration from The Shabby Tea Room #73 ‘Mix & Match’ challenge set things right.
-> To be inspired by this photo “and use {at least} THREE DIFFERENT PATTERNED PAPERS in your design”:

So having been delving in and purging my scraps box this past couple of days, trying to sort some “wheat from chaff”, this was a great opportunity to use some pretty pink left-overs 😉

Here’s my card:

I used up a few bands of patterned and embossed paper scraps (yay!) and did a spot of Distress Inking in ‘tea dye’ to help shabby things up.
I die-cut a Nestie circle and scalloped circle layer to make my focal point, adding a watercoloury sentiment greeting, pearls and a flowery cluster:

(sorry it’s a bit out of focus!)
The top flower is a die-cut piece by K&Company ‘Handmade’ collection, with coppery metallic accents (yum!) and the Prima flower is layered with a ruffly trim bow (which I think might be by May Arts?). It’s very reminiscent of the ruffles on the cushions in the inspiration photo and I also added a jewel brad inspired by the lovely display of mirrors there.
All very girly!

Have a good rest-of-weekend, though there’s not much left!
Rx

 

Sketch-On-Saturday; SOS20 card

Hi all
So crafting time has been a little thin on the ground this week – sad, but true.
Fun stuff that I have been doing though includes:
another zumba class…
fruit picking (yummy apples and plums – all on an impulsive whim, after zumba night. I was walking home with a pal and we decided to go for it and fill our bags before the goodness all gets snaffled by some other fruit-picking passers-by!)….
tidying up and purging of the craft zone (phew – that feels good! This week I will be sharing pics of some the fruits of this labour…)

But back to the crafting schedule, that is what you stopped by for, right?
A new sketch for today!

And I was inspired by the latest colour palette over at CR84FN #35:

Here’s my card:
I pulled this one together with some scraps – that had been trying to overtake my crafty zone. Hence the clear-up is a work-in-progress 😉
The scraps of patterned paper are by DCWV and My Mind’s Eye, and the border strip at the bottom is some scrunched vellum layered with a Jiilibean Soap border.

I stamped and heat embossed the label from Waltzing Mouse Stamps ‘Rescue Remedies’, dabbing off a little of the ink first to help with the antiquing look. It didn’t work quite as well as hoped except for the ‘Pow..’ of ‘Powders’  😉
Will need to experiment with this a bit more methinks.
It’s die-cut with coordinating  Nesties ‘Labels 4’.

The grey touch in the colour inspiration is a nice neutral and with the soft pearlescent vellum, grey-toned paper band and silver butterfly embellishment I think it works.

Have a good day folks, thanks for stopping by! Hugs, Rx

Trend-Alert Tuesday: Bunting for August

Hi! Hope you are well today

So it just a quickie from me this morning – I am running late and don’t want to miss the train!!
It’s time for a new Trend-Alert Tuesday theme… YAY, and this month we are going for bunting and banners 😉
What’s not to love? All summery and fun!

A few things then:
The cute bunting is made from scraps – folded over a bit of twine.
The branch and birdies are stamped from Hampton Arts clear set ‘Footlongs – Warm Fuzzies‘. Super cute set. (Enabler – I scored these from Emerald Crafts.)
Clouds are doodled in white gel pen, and the message is layered up patterned paper (more scrap usage!!) with flock stickers (Doodlebug Design) and some mini gems.

Got to be honest… I’m not altogether pleased with this card. The idea and design are good, but I was in a hurry last night to get it done before bed and it was late and I was tired.
All of which = a not very good level of finish for my card.

I think it shows, so I am not going to send this card.
It will be heading for the ‘recycle me’ pile. Ah well, you can’t win them all.

Sorry to have submitted you all to this sub-standard effort 😉
Normal service will be resumed when I am feeling more awake. (Which is not possible at this time of day, btw!)
Must dash, have a good one, Rx