Welcome


Hello, my name is Dionne and I have been crafting for a very long time. As a very young child my mother tried to teach me to knit, it was a disaster. However, it must have sparked an interest in making things and, partly to prove that I was not totally useless and partly because I really wanted to make things, I taught myself to crochet. Over the years I have developed a love of cross stitch and all types of paper craft ..... I eventually even taught myself to knit.


I am married to a very understanding man, thank goodness, because I spend all my time either crafting, thinking about crafting or talking about crafting. I am hopeless at housework and dinner is often late!


Thank you for visiting my blog.


Dionne

Tuesday 31 January 2012

Congratulations

It has been very exciting recently with celebrations all round, as two members of my family announced their engagements.

I have chosen one of my favourite Teddy Bo images for this card.


I coloured the image, which is called Love Swing, with my Promarkers and cut the shapes with my Nesties.  The roses are from Wild Orchid Crafts and the paper from DoveCraft.  If you look very carefully you should be able to see a tiny gem on her ring finger.

I am entering this card in the following challenges:

Craft Us Crazy - Love
Drunken Stampers Challenge - Something New (The flowers)
Hotshot Craft Challenge  - Flowers
Oldie but a Goodie Challenge - Have a Heart (Card, Nesties and Promarkers)
Simply Create Too, Love is in the Air
Teddy Bo Challenge, Anything Goes

Sunday 29 January 2012

Little Drummer Boy

I have a late addition to my cards that were Inspired by a Song Title for - the theme of the most recent Crafty Boots Challenge.  The Little Drummer Boy sung by Bing Crosby and David Bowie.

This stamp has been in my stash for about twenty years but I still love colouring it.  I mounted it on some card from C&C and I added some baker's twine and a button.


Click here to view the other cards I made for this Crafty Boots Challenge - Inspired by a Song Title.

I am entering this card in the following challenges:

The Cutie Pie Challenge Blog - Favourite Song - The Little Drummer Boy sung by Bing Crosby and David Bowie
Heart Song Inspirations - Buttons or Brads
Paper Pretties - Ribbon or Twine
Dionne

Liebster Blog Award

Hi Everyone and welcome to my blog.  I hope you are all well?

I was recently very surprised but also really delighted to have been given the Liebster Blog Award

 

 by my friend Faye over at Faye's Crafty Corner.  Faye makes beautiful cards and I urge you to pop over to her blog and take a look at some of her inspiring work.

Faye and I and I are both on the Design Team for Crafty Boots Challenges. This challenge blog only started in September of last year but it is already becoming quite well know in crafting circles and the design team members have become good friends.  I would like to say a big thank you to Faye for giving me this award, it is a great honour.

The idea of the Liebster Blog Award is to spread the love from one small blog (under 200 followers) to other small blogs. This helps to spread knowledge of these blogs and encourage others to become followers.

"Liebster" in German means "dearest", so as part of the Liebster Blog Award tradition, I am going to pass this award to 5 blogs that I value, and that have both inspired and motivated me.

To accept the award, you must:

1) Link back to the person who gave it and thank them for thinking of you.
2) Post the award to your blog.
3) Give the award to 5 bloggers (with less than 200 followers) that you appreciate and value.
4) Leave a comment on the blogs of the five people you have chosen to let them know.

Here are the 5 bloggers, in no particular order, I have chosen

1)  Dee at An Artist's Ramblings by Faux Painter.  Dee is an amazing card designer who, not surprisingly, is on several well know design teams.  Pop over to her blog and take a look at her incredible work.

2)  Jacqui at Jacqui's Cards, who has been very helpful to me - helping me find items I need and suggesting ways to improve my cards, a really lovely lady.  Please pop over to her blog and say hello.

3)  Katie at Handmade by Katie.  Katie is fairly new at all this and is very new to blogging.  Her colouring is quite amazing and I try to encourage her to blog more.  Pleased pop over to her blog and leave some words of encouragement, I know Katie will appreciate them.

4)  Michaela at Michaela's Blog.  Michaela is a very talented lady who has only been making cards since June of last year, I know it is hard to believe!  If you do not already know Michaela's work, pop over to her blog and take a look.

5) Last, but by no means least, my very good friend Stephanie-Emma over at Crafty Boots.  Stephanie-Emma encouraged me to take up blogging and had the courage to put me on her design team - even though she knew that I am severely hampered by IT.  On top of which, she is a pretty amazing card designer, go take a look for yourself.


Dionne x

Saturday 28 January 2012

I Love You Bearly Much!

Oh Teddy Bo how much do I love thee, let me count the ways.

This image is called Love Swing, I thought it would make a perfect wedding anniversary card for my friends, a better suited couple I have yet to meet!

I coloured the image with my Promarkers and cut out the shapes with my Nesties, a perfect match with the shaped card from the Crafty Boots shop.


The Dog Roses are No 5 Forever Flowers and the gems at their centre are from Kanban Crfats.  The card I printed the image on and the pearl stringss also came from Crafty Boots.  I made the sentiment on my PC and the card came from C&C.

Dolly Pip

I love Sugar Nellie's Sherbet Pips, I coloured Dolly Pip with my Promarkers to make a little thank you card.


The little embellishment was cut using a Marianne Creatable die, the sentiment is from  Craftwork Cards and the paper is by Brenda Walters.

Monday 23 January 2012

Going for a Song

Hi everyone

I trust you are well and in the mood for crafting.  We have a new challenge at Crafty Boots Challenges; Inspired by a Song Title.

I am so excited by this challenge, as soon as I found out what our next challenge was I could not help thinking about all of those songs my mother taught me when I was a child.  But which to choose, there were so many, Old MacDonald had a Farm, Ten Green Bottles, How Much is that Doggie in the Window, the list is endless.  My problem was picking one ......... I eventually decided on Nellie the Elephant.


I wanted a circus elephant for my design and found the perfect image at Mels Brushes, after colouring her with my Promarkers, I added a little bling form my stash.  I also found a circus tent on the internet, which I coloured with my trusty Promarkers and made a flag and attached it with a whittled down cocktail stick.  I placed the big top in the background as Nellie made her dash for freedom and headed for the heard, which were calling her from far, far away!

I made the luggage labels by colouring some plain white card with my Promarkers.  The backing paper is from Dovecraft and I printed my images on Crafty Boots fabulous Deluxe Crafters Card.

But there was no me stopping now, I was inspired to make a second card, The Animals Went in Two by Two:


I have had this Noah's Ark stamp in my stash for about fifteen, or maybe even twenty years, and I had great fun colouring it again after all this time.  I made the blue background by colouring some white Deluxe Crafters Card with my Powder Blue Promarker.  The other background paper is by Dovecraft.

And finally, I have a third offering to hopefully inspire you.  Puff the Magic Dragon, a particular favourite from my childhood.


This digital image by Sylvia Zet is so sweet I felt it did not need a lot of dressing up, so I kept this card very simple.  I just added a little cotton wool to represent the autumn mists of Honah Lee.  The backing card was from my stash and almost certainly came from C&C.

I hope this challenge inspires you as much as it has me.  Why not hop across to the Crafty Boots Challenge website and see the incredible designs the other Design Team Members have come up with.

Dionne

Sunday 22 January 2012

What a Jolly Present

I recently discovered Teddy Bo and all of his friends and I think that I am in love with these sweet little guys, they are adorable.  This image is Teddybobea 092.


I printed the image on the Crafty Boots Deluxe Crafters Card and coloured it with my Promarkers.  The paper is by Dovecraft and the sentiment from Kanban Crafts.

Monday 9 January 2012

New Beginnings

Hi and a very happy 2012 to everyone who has found there way here via the Crafty Boots Challenges site.

The latest challenge is 'New Beginnings', a perfect theme for this time of year when we are all thinking about the new year.  However, this challenge is not limited to the new year, it could also apply to weddings, engagements, births and new home.  So get your thinking caps on to see what you can come up with.

I decided to design a birth announcement card.  The image and background paper came from my favourite Forever Friends CD.  I cut the image out with my Nesties and added a sentiment, some ribbon and a few flat backed gems to finish it off.


Just in case it is a girl, I did another card.


Don't forget to pop across to the Crafty Boots Challenges site to check out the fabulous creations made by the rest of the very talented Design Team.

Dionne