Eternal City

Today sees us in the Eternal City, seeped in history where gladiators once fought to the death something Russel Crow knows a bit about. A few pennies into the famous fountain above will make sure you return, or so the saying goes.

Despite visiting this City many times there is always something new to see and I never tire or returning be it for a week or a day. It really is my favourite Capital City in the World.

On to challenges now, first Polkadoodles where the boss Nikky has set our challenge and wants us to make something generic that will work for a male or female. She also wants us to use at least two Polkadoodle products on our project.

So I have made a word book spelling BIRTHDAY which I created on the Cricut using the DS and Plantin Schoolbook cartridge. I selected coordinating papers from Candy Doodles CD.........I just love this lime and black combo. I stamped the ladybird trail from the unmounted stamp set several times, cut into strips and ran them across the bottom of each page.

The greeting on the front is from the new Paper Boutique Christmas CD, I used the Zutter to create a spine and tied it with cord and raffia.........I am really pleased with myself as I just knew this lovely lime coloured raffia from the wrapping on some flowers months ago would come in useful one day.

Next candy clue is tomorrow...........half way there now.

Alter It

Polkadoodle day again and this week Ruth would like us to Alter It.

Now before I go any further, I have to explain the odd picture and the fact my project looks a bit distant. Have you ever tried to photograph a long zigzag project ? Believe me it was difficult trying to show all of it and in the end I decided the only way it worked was to lay it over a dish, but it does fold down into a square when closed.

I have used the back card pages from a couple of old spiral notebooks, cut them into 6x6 squares and covered with a mixture of Bazzil cardstock and papers from the new All Around and Everywhere Polkadoodle CD. I pounced holes with the Zutter, used co-ordinating ribbons to tie it together and decorated with flowers and hearts from the CD, plus brads and punched borders.

Allsorts challenge 37

This post is all scheduled ahead as when it pops up on Saturday morning I should be in deepest Essex for the girls first bridesmaid dress fitting for the May wedding of our second eldest son which is taking place in France.

And I am so thrilled that this week I eventually got my dental work completed and now have three front teeth implants.........that might not sound too exciting, but some of you might remember back last summer and autumn I had lots of problems and a couple of ops on my mouth and they thought I would lose my front teeth. Since then eating has been a nightmare and it's sounded as though I had a serious speech impediment, but several months on, endless hours in the dentists chair and thanks to a wonderful consultant I am all sparking white again.

So on to the serious stuff of crafting and exciting happenings at Allsorts challenge this week. We were all sorry to see our team mate Gro leave us, she has been with us from the start and we will all miss her inspirational work. But this means we have a vacancy, so this weeks challenge is also a DT call, our very first one since the challenge started last May.

There is a sketch to follow this week and I have used it as an opportunity to ink up another of my new Hero stamps for the long overdue samples I am supposed to be making for Sir Stampalot.

I have used this lovely stamp Hero K5313 Silhouette Ivy which I stamped onto a piece of silk card using new Hero Chalk Inks Punch and Grass. The background panel is stamped with good old faithful Hero H2065 Old French Writing again with the grass ink. The DP used for the red panels is Doodlebug and the sentiment Hero CL273 Great Flourishes. I punched the edge of my stamped piece with the zutter and tied ribbons through the holes.

Before I go, have you entered your name for the candy in the post at the top of my blog........just one day to go until I announce the Special Challenge and Blog Hop and the fabby candy on offer.

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Wow wow you guys, did you come up with some wonderful projects for my theme last week at Allsorts. You are such a talented lot so thanks to one and all.

This week Debs is hosting the theme which is "Anything but a card", another one to get those creative juices flowing.

I am sharing a tag book I made in response to a request for a Birthday card for a secretary named DEB who has a fetish for Post It Notes. Inside the book I have made a little pocket that holds a pack of them. I cut the pages from a 300gsm cardstock on Cricut Plantin Schoolbook and Jasmin welding the elements together on the DS. I cut a replica of each page from Basic Grey DP's and stuck them together before punching the ends and inserting the wire binding using my Zutter.

More roses.......sorry if they are becoming monotonous, some punched leaves pearls and ribbons to decorate.

Allsorts challenge 2

All of us at Allsorts were thrilled by how many of you joined in our very first challenge. Thank you all and we hope to see you back this week where the new challenge is to create something with "No stamping".

This is my DT creation, initially it was shock horror, no stamping, but when I got my head round this alien idea I came up with this tag book, even then I stamped a sentiment to add then suddenly remembered not allowed.

I cut the book on the cricut welding the letters to each page. The name is Annie who is a young lady who loves purple and spots and has a birthday next month. I found it really difficult to photograph this project as the angles are difficult and fail to show the elements properly despite me spending hours trying to achieve a better perspective and I'm still far from happy with the outcome, so aplos all.

The DP is Doodlebug and Penny Lane and the pages were fixed together using the Zutter, then lots of ribbons and embellies to finish.

Crafty homework

One of my granddaughters who is twelve loves to craft and spends hours in my craft room and often finds ways to draw it into her school work.

For the last month or so she has been working on a history project based on Oliver Cromwell which seemed to be taking forever - and an awful lot of cardstock !

An inside page layout.

Although she need only have written an illustrated essay, she decided to create a book which she bound together with the Zutter. She also used the cricut to cut envelopes and other elements to build up the content.

But it's all been worthwhile because this week we saw the results of all her hard work as she received an amazing mark and comment from her teacher.

So naturally I had to share it ! Good works deserves reward, so looks like it's going to be a costly weekend !