Roller Coaster Year

Hello to my crafty pals and Thank You for continuing to encourage and support me. Your comments are keeping my little bit of sanity intact. I wonder what else life can throw at us this year. 
The latest on our roller coaster happenings is my  oldest brother, who is only 62, has had a stroke. The good news is that it was a mild one and physio should have him back to reasonable health. Hopefully he will take this as a warning to ease up on his horrendous work schedule and plane journeys. As always I am sat feeling useless when things happen to family so far away. He lives in Shetland so it's not a case of popping on a bus to see how he is faring.
It is also raining here most of the time which is posing a real problem with our renovations, I suppose I should feel glad I am not a farmer trying to make a living in this. I do think that the rain has swept away my mojo so this is a very simple get well card, but reflects the fact that I am so very pleased to hear his voice at the end of the phone. 
On a lighter note Ezra is on page3 having a long conversation with his robot, in between beating him up, lol. Hope you are all well or on the way to a good recovery and having a bit more sunshine than we are. 

Hugs to all, Flora.

I put the snowmen to bed

Hopefully I will not put my crafty pals to sleep with this post. I would miss you all terribly if I did, as I love reading your comments. I hope you are all well and that life is reasonably fair to you. Having achieved a good balance between drinking coffee and wood preserving, life here has been ticking along nicely, although I have been too tired to blog. 
The BIG tidy is a total mess with my bright decision to use stash as I went along. Everyone knows that this year is total bedlam here so I will be forgiven for these are my Christmas cards. I was tempted to just make sawdust shaker cards. Can I put them in the postbox yet!!!! OK Patricia I will wait a while, lol. Patricia from http://patricia-summerhousecrafts.blogspot.co.uk/ knows I am soooo impatient, I won't be buying anything on pre-order again. 
I felt the snowman decoupage lacked definition so I took out my pencils and pens and had a play. Added to that what do you do with backing papers that are a bit too much, so they became card fronts instead (I won't show these individually but you will get the gist). I may add a bit of glitter before I send them, so apart from some sheets of backing paper that is another empty box. Here come the snowmen plus 3.

Hugs to all, Flora.

finished card

Hello to all my crafty pals and another new and very welcome pal. I am so pleased you all enjoyed my chubby penguins. I was delighted to be reading your comments. Today's post is going to be short. I started this Christmas card last year so it was time to finish it. 
At the top of my blog I have a page "who is playing in my craftroom",  someone new - a clip of my grandson Ezra who is 3 months old tomorrow, fantastic concentration. I cannot believe how quickly the year is flying by. Anyway here is my Christmas card - 

 Hugs to all, Flora

It fell off the shelf

Hello my wonderful crafty pals and a warm welcome to my new pal, sorry I haven't been able to follow you yet but a mixture of blogger and broadband is conspiring against me. Blogger keeps coming up saying I am trying to log in from a different location and I need a verification code again. Last time this happened my blog turned into Portuguese, at least today that is still ok. Thank You all for your comments and I am happy with what I shall be doing on those cards. 
As my title says "it fell off the shelf" so I shall not keep you all in suspenders any longer, it being my Christmas snippets box and my card is heading for the playground. Now I thought I was being clever a year or two ago and bought this cuttlekids penguin die, but boy did I find my brain just wouldn't fix it together properly, so the bits got thrown in the box and here they are today. I think one penguin is missing a white bit. All my Christmas cards this year are going to be bits based, I'm off now to find that snowman decoupage I won years ago, don't remember how or why that came about. 

Paper  and card - card blank is 7 x 5 ,

 Dies used - Wplus9 birthday basics cut from little snippets  for the gifts,

the sleigh cut using my craftrobo (I think)

the cuttlekids penguins,

the backing paper from my scrap box cut using Sue Wilson Seville Die. 

Hugs to all, Flora.

I am entering this into the snippets playground where I love to have a browse

snippets-playground-week-124
and Winter Wonderland challenge "Winter Animals"
christmas blog challenge

Cala Lily

Hello to all my crafty pals and I hope you are all well and coping with whatever life is trowing at you these days. Thank you for looking and commenting on the shiny ones, I appreciate your doing so very much. Hopefully I am more careful with what I buy nowadays. There are a few non-repeats still lurking in the cupboard but I will use them a little at a time. 
Today's card is to meet the simplest request, simple sympathy cards/thinking of you, that can be sent to the families of the kennel customers when one of their pets have passed away. I have been told that my lily cards will be perfect, peel-offs are fine and the inserts are to be totally plain. I can make whatever I want so long as I keep them simple, so you will all have to keep me in line, lol. 
I am sorry that my commenting is very erratic, we are having trouble with the broadband in this area all of a sudden and spent hours without it yesterday. I will try to keep in touch with you all.

Image - Cala Lily by Joanna Sheen 

coloured with polychromus pencils,

Paper  and card - card blank is 6" square 

 Dies used - Spellbinders Radiant & Resplendant Rectangles. 

Hugs to all, Flora.
PS: Thank you Ang for the giggle, you were commenting as I was posting this.

Shiny and Blingy

Hello to my very ignored crafty pals, gosh I am naughty especially as you have been so wonderful about my de-stash and my good news of course. I hope you are all doing well and are seeing a bit more sunshine than we are having here. 
On the conveyor belt today, hee hee, we have the shiny and the bling. I wonder if anyone else has dufex in their drawers!! My oldest daughter did help with the wee bling and has a charity in mind for these. I would like to say that this latest effort has made a bit of a dent in the stash, maybe it will show up better when I have sorted the inserts, envelopes and bags. You will only get a gist of what the cards are like as they are almost impossible to photograph. 
All my doggy and simple sympathy cards have gone and I have been told more will be welcome so you will see some more of those in the following months. Also a selection of my male cards will be welcomed so I think I will be kept busy.
Well the BIG tidy will continue for some time to come so who knows what comes out of the cupboard next. Again I am so pleased that you all visit and comment as I do love reading those. Get ready for shiny photo overload.

                                     

 

Hugs to all, Flora