And a Partidge in a Pear Tree!

Here is a very simple card, which took me 8mins 30 second to make (I was timing after my last 10 minute craft dash challenge!). I used the waltzingmouse Teeny trees set (my absolute favourite!).

I used the smallest petal shape as my pear and stamped each one twice, once in a pearlised green, and then in a darker green over the top.

I finished it by outlining the card with a fine liner.

60,000 views and my Christmas Cards

This week was quite momentous, as I reached 60,000 views on my blog! I am astonished that in the past 2 years I have had anything like that number of visitors, but I know its primarily down to two posts! One with a cupcake wrapper template, and one with a Union Jack template I created about the time of the Royal Wedding, which was also really popular this summer for the Olympics and Queens Jubilee. I'm hoping to add some extra templates to the cupcake wrapper page soon with printable wrappers I have designed, so hopefully it will continue to be popular.

This week I have mostly been getting sorted for Christmas, baking Christmas cakes, making cards, planning church events. I have to say that I only ever make handmade Christmas cards for immediate family and very close friends. This year I have made 11. I buy a box of cards for all my other cards and try to personalise them a bit with a verse of scripture, but that's my limit for the other 50 or so cards!

I have been so excited to use the wonderful Papertrey Ink set, Star of Wonder, which I got for Christmas last year and I have not been disappointed. The set has 3 main circular images, and I chose the manger scene for this years cards (I can save the other two for future years!). I wanted a verse of Scripture, and recently bought some Nina B Layers of Colour Christmas verses. I chose a suitable verse and stamped directly onto the kraft card base.

I stamped my circular image onto white cardstock using, then used distress inks (antique linen, tea dye and walnut stain) to add some colour to the image. I cut it using my spellbinders circles and layered onto a sun style die cut from Nellies dies - Multi frame Die Star #2, cut from bronze cardstock. I then layered this on to a labels 1 or labels 4 die cut, both stamped with a music background and heat embossed with gold embossing powder. Some gorgeous brown ribbon from Fantastic Ribbons finished it off really well.

I'm entering these cards into the Addicted to Stamping Bingo

This qualifies for the middle row, Ribbon, FREE (Sponging) and Embossing.

Its also being entered into Young Crafters Unite Challenge #16 - Happy Holidays

and Charisma Cardz Challenge #49 Christmas makes

Fantastic Ribbons Design Team Christmas Home Decor Project

Welcome to this months design team project on Christmas Home Decor.

I decided to make a Christmas card holder to hang in my hall.

You will need: Ribbons  and twine, needle and thread (sewing machine would be good too), a lolly stick, some thick wire (I used 0.6mm), wire cutters and round nosed pliers.

I started by stitching the top of the two ribbons I had chosen to create a gap for the wooden stick. I took the stick out when I was using the sewing machine, but you can see the amount of space I left, about 1 inch.

Next I needed to make 7 paper clip like swirls to attach to the holder which would display the cards. To do this I cut a 3 inch length of wire, wrapped it around a smooth sided pen, then took it off, flattened it back and using the pliers bent the top into a loop I could stitch through. (I know you can buy these fancy paper clips some places, in fact I'm convinced Ikea had some recently, but I can't see them on their website, but if you can't be bothered making them even normal paper clips would do!)

Using a standard card as a way of measuring I went along the length of the ribbon and attached the clips by stiching through the ribbon at approx 20cm intervals.

At the top of the holder I wanted to use a pokey tool to make a hole in the stick but I soon realised it was just going to split the wood, so instead I used a pen knife and created little channels on either side of the stick which would stop the twine from slipping off.

Next I made the main bow. There are loads of tutorials on youtube how to make bows, but I watched this one, which was specifically for making bows with ribbon which was patterned on one side.  I had stitched the gingham ribbon onto the red side of this satin ribbon (which is a gorgeous brown on the other side), so this was important for me. The ribbon was about 1m long to make this bow. I had a box of paperchase jingle bells which I have hoarded for about 4 years and use very sparingly. I added 3 to the centre just to finish it off.

Here's what the holder looks like without cards. Its about 2m long.

And here it is with cards.

I hope you have enjoyed my little tutorial. I think these make a lovely change to just putting cards on the mantle piece and they are pretty easy to make, and with the ridiculous price of this ribbon at the moment you could make this for about 50p, I kid you not! 

Make sure to check out what the rest of the design team has made over at the Fantastic Ribbons blog!

First Christmas Cake

Well today I made an unfamiliar cake, a Christmas cake. I'll be honest, my baking is quick and easy, not something that can be said about Christmas cake (it took 3 1/2 hours just to cook it!), but when I saw a BARGAIN in Sainsburys I couldn't resist. They had a Christmas cake kit reduced from £12.99 to.... £2!!!! It had everything you needed to make the cake (flour, fruit, nuts etc) amd you only had to add butter and eggs, and decorations, but those were things I already had.
So today I had the time set aside to make it, and another Ann Pickard inspired idea for the decoration. I even found a tutorial on Youtube to show you how to make the snowmen if you haven't seen her before. Its here.

Anyway, here it is, in all its glory! I added some coal to their bellies, but unfortunately the food colouring ran a little bit. Think I was a little too liberal with it!
As this may be my last post before Christmas I'd like to wish you all a very blessed Christmas time, and I pray you would know the joy of Christ this season.
Happy Christmas!
Bethan x

Candle Stamping Part 2

If you haven't already, you have a little time left to enter this weeks candy here.


Earlier this year I saw a great idea of stamping candles for presents, you can take a look at my first attempt and also a tutorial here.
I have made a few recently and thought I'd share them!

The first one was for a friend who's my age, and I used some of my new Minds Eye stamps Bloom and Grow stamps. They're a lovely selection of leaves, flowers, birds and sentiments. I started by stamping all the images I wanted to have on the candle onto tissue in Forest Moss distress inks. Here they are all laid out ready to attach.

Next is the finished candle, with its matching tag.

And finally it all wrapped up. I think the tag was a little big for the size of the candle perhaps!

Next was a present for my friends daughter who was turning 16. I wanted this to be a little bit trendy, and wanted her name on it. I used a whole variety of stamps for this, so there are Waltzingmouse polka dots around the top and bottom (Offbeat backgrounds), a Banana frog frame for the name plate (can't remember which set!) and then just some cheapie alphabet stamps for the name.

The name plate is being held on either side by a Kirsty Wiseman Lila Bug, and the hearts are from a freebie set I got with a magazine. I think it looks good in black ink, more trendy!

 At the back I have indulged and put a little Stampendous bee!

Finally is a little candle I made for myself. Its very simple, but I wanted it for Christmas. The sentiment is from Papermania Christmas sentiments A Silent Night. The lovely vine like top and bottom are from the Minds Eye Bloom and Grow set. This was very quick to make as I kept it simple, and would make a lovely advent gift for a friend.

Why not try some candle stamping with your favourite stamps this Christmas, you can even make coordinating packaging and cards!

Waltzingmouse blog waltz - Winter/Christmas

If you'd like to have a chance to win some blog candy ribbon leave a comment over on my bloggiversary post here.

Welcome to this months waltz!


The theme this month is winter/Christmas, and what better set to use than the ever versatile teeny trees. I remembered seeing someone on the gallery use the teeny tree trunks to make a snowflake shape and I knew thats what I wanted to do. As I'm a little short of time at the moment I decided to combine a few challenges, and also to keep it simple. I decided to do a kraft tag with white embossed stamping.
Its all pretty self explanatory, I used the smallest of the tree trunks, but all of them would make a snowflake shape. I used versamark to stamp with, and white Wow embossing powder. To finish it off I used some antique linen distress ink around the edges and some gingham ribbon!

This is also being entered into Speedy Cats Friends challenge - Favourite technique (stamping!) and Casual fridays Tags challenge

Star of wonder - LIM challenge #39

Here's a very quick card for this weeks Less is More challenge. The theme is stars, and what better way to start getting some Christmas cards done that with a Christmas star?!
I bought this stamp this weekend, its a lovely Stampendous one called Travelling Far. I also bought some Kraft card blanks this weekend which I am obsessed with now as you'll see in the next few posts.
So onto this card. Not a great deal to say really its so easy! I stamped the image with archival ink, went around the edge of card with a black Promarker and then used my quickie glue pen to go over the main star image and used some cosmic shimmer mica powder to make the star stand out without embossing.
I hope you like my super easy card, this is definitely in the running for this years Christmas card!

CAS Christmas 2

I was still in the zone after World Card Making Day, and the following evening got down to some more crafting! I was so excited to try for the first time my new Martha Stewart border stamps. I'd bought these from QVC when they were the TSV and they were my treat for doing the half marathon. I resisted using them before the race, but then since running it hadn't had an opportunity to sit down and give them a try. My two favourite designs from the 4 had been the snowflakes and the leaf trails, and so these were the two I tried out.

Here is the little stampy setup to line up your stamps.

 It allows you to stamp corner pieces and then the middle pieces. Your paper needs to be multiples of 2 inches for it to marry up, so my first try was 4"x6". Unfortunately I musn't have been exactly right, because you can see a gap in the bottom left corner!

It didn't help that I was stamping this in clear versamark as I was then using my cosmic shimmer mica powders, so I couldn't see where I had stamped very easily!

 Next I went to 4"x4" and this worked much better, and I wasn't paranoid about the ink drying before the mica powder went on. I used a lovely pewter colour which works well. I stamped a Hero Arts Christmas sentiment in the middle to finish it off and then layered onto some navy card and used some straight silver peel offs to finish.

 Next I tried the leaf stamps using forest moss distress inks. I kind of find that distress inks are too watery and pool on some stamps, and sometimes it irritates me, but I think it actually gives a nice effect for these, a little vintage!

I used the same Hero Arts sentiment on this card too as I think it really suits the stamp. I then used my quickie glue pen and some super fine red glitter to make it look like holly. I think it would look really cute with some pearl ones too to look like mistletoe. 

I finished it off by simply sponging the edges with more forest moss and then adding to a cream square card base.

I hope you like my CAS Christmas cards, I'm very tempted to make a batch of these holly leaf ones!!

I'm entering the leaf one into the Less is More eye colour challenge (what with me having green eyes) and both into the Stampendous CAS Christmas card challenge.

World Card Making Day fun!

Ok, so yesterday was World Card Making Day, and I was able to set aside a couple of hours to craft in the evening when my dear husband was out, and my little monkey was in bed. I tell you, I had such a great time! It's the first time in a long time I have sat down and made 4 cards, now admittedly two are very similar, but even so, 3 unique designs is pretty good! I'm going to share one now, and the rest over the coming days.
At the moment I'm loving going back to my CAS roots, and although its sometimes a challenge not to sponge to death my cards, I'm restraining myself!

Here is a card which is for a few challenges. First of all I spotted the sketch over at Card Patterns and knew it was something I'd like to have a go with, and secondly this months Stampendous challenge is to do a CAS Christmas card.


I searched through my stampendous stamps for something Christmassy, but couldn't find anything, plus I'd already got something in mind for the sketch which used a snowflake stamp.

I embossed my cardstock with my cuttlebug embossing folder snowflakes, then used two types of ribbon and stamped and heat embossed some small silver snowflakes onto some circles I'd die cut. This would be a perfect batch card for Christmas, as it comes together very quickly.
I hope you had as much fun as me for World Card Making Day!

Christmas leftover Recipes 2: Mincemeat muffins

The thing I often have left over at Christmas is a jar of mincemeat, or more annoyingly ½ a jar! So what better way to make good use of it than making some muffins! You’ll be very popular if you present these at work(although all my work colleagues seem to be dieting!), or when visiting friends, and they don’t taste TOO Christmassy.  The great thing about this recipe is that its very quick and very easy to make, plus the ingredients are all store cupboard staples. This makes 12 small cakes, but can easily be doubled(or trebled!).

Ingredients

120g (5oz)  Self raising flour

¼ tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

1 large egg

50g (2oz) butter (melted and slightly cooled)

40g (1 ½ oz) Caster sugar

75ml (3 fl oz) milk

Approx 175g (6 ½ oz) Mincemeat

Method

1.Preheat the oven to 200°C (gas mark 6, 400°F), To start, sift (If you can be bothered, I never do!) the flour into a large bowl and add the sugar, salt and baking powder.

2. In a separate bowl/jug beat the egg and add the milk and butter, when you’ve mixed this add the mincemeat and give a thorough stir. (The mincemeat will sink and not want to mix, but this will make more even muffins if you do this)

3. Add the mincemeat mix to the flour bowl and with a large metal spoon (if you have one!) combine loosely (about 15 seconds). The mixture shouldn’t look like a sponge cake mixture, all nice and smooth, only stir a few times until most of the mixture is combined, there should still be some clumps of flour.

4. Spoon the mixture into your muffin tins and put in top of oven for 15-20 minutes. When they’re nicely browned and risen take them out of the oven and then after 5 more minutes take out of tin and move to a wire rack so they don’t sweat in the tin.

Just before eating dust with icing sugar! Yum yum!

Christmas Leftover recipes -1. Nigellas Christmas Pudding Truffles

Well as someone has requested recipes, I thought I'd start with a series on using those Christmas leftovers. I don't know about you, but I always seem to end up with a spare Christmas pudding, 1/2 a jar of mincemeat (no, I don't make my own!) and various chocolates, so heres recipes 1.

Ingredients

• 125g best-quality dark chocolate, finely chopped
• 350g leftover, or freshly cooked and cooled, Christmas pudding
• 60ml sherry
• 2 x 15ml tablespoons golden syrup

      FOR DECORATION:

• 100g white chocolate, finely chopped
• 6 red glacé cherries
• 6 green glacé cherries

1 Line a baking sheet (that will fit in the fridge) with clingfilm, baking parchment, or  foil and set it to one side while you make the bonbons.
2 Melt the dark chocolate in a heatproof bowl suspended above a pan of simmering water, or in the microwave according to the manufacturer's guidelines.

3 Crumble the cold Christmas pudding into a bowl, add the sherry and golden syrup and stir till all is incorporated.

4 Pour in the melted dark chocolate and stir again: this will make the mixture much more sticky.

5 To make this step easier you could use those disposable gloves, but a little vegetable oil on your hands works too, pinch out small lumps of mixture and roll so that you have little rounds about the size of a chocolate truffle. You should get about 30 out of this mixture; fight the impatient urge to make these balls larger as you go.

6 Cover with clingfilm and slot into the fridge to firm up.

You don’t need to decorate these, especially if at this time of the year Christmas seems a distant memory, but they are super cute when decorated.

7 To decorate, melt the white chocolate either in a heatproof bowl suspended over a pan of simmering water, or in the microwave, then let it cool for about 5 minutes, to make it easier to work with, while you chop the red cherries into small pieces (like berries), and snip the green cherries, to represent leaves.

8 Using a teaspoon, drip a little of the melted but slightly cooled white chocolate on each truffle, then arrange the sticky pieces of cherry on top (a cocktail stick helps stop getting your fingers sticky when doing this).

9 Eat!

Next time: Mincemeat Muffins.

Flannel Cupcake

Heres my first attempt at a cupcake gift. I wasn't sure whether to try socks, or flannels, but as a last minute decision to make them, I figured that flannels were easier.

I watched a video on youtube, and it was suprisingly easy to do. I downloaded a template for the cupcake case, not sure where from now, and then printed it on some Christmas 12x12 paper. I used my nestabilities labels 4 to cut out the label, and stamped a Christmas sentiment. It looked a little sparce on the top, so I cut some green felt into holly leaves - freehand! - and then made berries using a red pipe cleaner.

The cupcakes looked very cute, but to be honest, didn't hold together that well, maybe a pin in the side would have helped? I was also at a loss as to how to give them, to wrap or not to wrap??? I decided in the end to just give them as they were. Heres the template if you're interested.

More Christmas presents!

Oh the excitement!!!!!

This year is the first I've been very specific about what I wanted for Christmas, and although it spoils the suprise its actually quite exciting knowing whats coming next!
Heres my Christmas day stash:
an embossing folder - stars
2 Xcut impresses folders (christmas tree and sunflower)
2 Xcut impress border folders
2 Xcut stencils - Hopefully when I get my No more Shims mat I'll be able to emboss these too!
A  stack of Funky Vintage paper.
Not in the picture, but also received were a set of Promarkers, and 3 distress ink pads (tea dye, forest moss and sapphire). I'm so excited to have a go with them all!!!

My presents!!!!

Now before you say anything, they're not Christmas presents, these are my birthday presents!!! This is the start of my craft haul which will continue on Christmas day. Honey was given the task of organising everyone with what to get me, and so far, so good!!!!
The centre piece was my gorgeous cuttlebug! All the other bits kind of revolve around it!! I got 5 embossing folders (Baby, snowflakes, stylised flowers, divine swirl and another I can't remember!), 3 sets of nestabilities (large circles, labels 1 and labels 4), cuttlebug square frame dies and a cuttlebug man shaped die.
I've had lots of fun playing around with them - especially as we had a snow day on my birthday which gave me an excellent opportunity to have a play whilst monkey was at nursery- and had put them to good use already making tags for christmas and I'm so excited for after Christmas when I can have a really good play around!These first tags are based on the ikea wrapping paper I bought, its great as its reversible, and has this lovely stripe on the back which I've attached to some black card. The larger tag also has a glitter snowflake, which I got a pack of 8 from Home Bargains.

These next tags are all based on some really cheap asda wrapping paper. I attached it to cream card, used a gold ink pad to edge it and then used a variety of my smallest nestabilities dies and stamped christmas words on them. The bottom one has a digital stamp which I made on DSA2 and printed. It was much harder than I thought getting the die to cut exactly round the circle! I then stamped a postmark in gold and embossed.

The next tags are all backed with burgundy cardstock. The top two have the digital stamps and then I've stamped with christmas images and embossed. The bottom tag is just some gold paper embossed with the Divine swirls folder.

Below we have various snowflake tags. I was just playing around with what I liked best. Using only a quarter means they go much further, but I'm still undecided which looks best. The top left had a gap along the side where the embossing folder (cuttlebug snowflakes) finished, so I stamped the sentiment and embossed. The cardstock is electric blue pearlised card.

Unfortunately I can't figure out how to rotate this next image, I should have rotated it before posting! oh well. It shows two tags, both made from a little embossing folder which I got free with a magazine recently - I wish I could remember which one actually, because it came with some really nice Christmas stamps aswell, the sentiment on the card was included! I did two different sizes just by using the top of the tree image. It looks good though any size. I then used a gold pen to go over parts of the embossing. I layered the image onto cream card which I had embossed the edges of with gold embossing powder.

I don't think any of the 40 tags I made where the same, but it keeps it interesting that way!

Next thing I was to do is some snowball gifts and cupcake flannels, so keep watching!!