Its Up and Running....

The Magical Crafts Challenge Blog is up and running....the challenges are set fortnightly and the first one starts today....so click on the logo opposite and get creating....

An Award...

What a surprise when I logged on this morning to see I had recieved this lovely award from Cindybee. The 'rules' are that I have to post five things about myself and then pass on to five people.
Five things about myself:

1. I am amazingly lax at doing my housework and feeding my family...who needs this when you could be crafting...

2. I collect fabric, all sorts, I love all the old patterns , vintage stuff and everything else...I trawl charity shops for curtains and sheets..whatever...I have 4 unfinished quilts...one day!!

3. I have an unhealthy obsession with "whodunnits"...really good ones like Daziel and Pascoe or the not so good like Diagnosis murder or Murder she wrote...the kids call it my Naff tv...

4. I still think I am 18 years old and am going to be a rock star when I grow up....unfortunately I am days away from being 40 and I can't sing...but who knows!!!

5. I try very hard to treat people how I would like to be treated but my major flaw is I am very unforgiving and can hold a grudge for years...not my best characteristic....

I will now pass this award onto Jackie, Tiggertastic, Angel , Max and Kirsty...

hugs

Rachelxxx

A Blue and Purple evening..

Some fantastic news, I have been chosen to join the Design Team for a new challenge blog - Magical Crafts Fortnightly Challenge Blog...really pleased, very excited and slighlty nervous... if you would like to join in, please click on the logo opposite....come and join in the fun..

Spent the evening shut in my own little world last night and this is what I came up with....a decidedly blue and purple evening ....the stamped images were sent to me from some lovely people on the cb forum, some of the papers used are from the very talented Kirsty Wiseman and the others are from Mily designs ....I think..lol.... I hope you like them and thankyou for looking..xx

Thanks for looking..xxx

Crispy October Air....beautiful...

I have had a busy crafting week, as I explained before, number two daughter has a halloween disco to got and decided to go as "A Corpse bride"..Tim Burton of course....so a wedding outfit and veil is required...I just need to sew on the arms and glue some flowers to the veil and it will all be done..not bad on short notice I think...
A couple of Christmas cards to start with, I am having a good run at these at the moment, I may be finished in time for Easter..lol..

My October fat pages, I have made one as Halloween and one as Autumn....I love the colours at this time of year..

My entry into the October cb bookmark swap, as you can probably guess the theme this month was Halloween..

This is my Halloween wallhanging, I made this for a very good friend of mine and it is winging its way to her now...if the postal strike allows of course...I do love these decoupage fairys but they can be quite fiddly to cut out...

Christmas cards at last!!!!

I know I am late starting, these are the first 4 cards I have made for christmas...I really have to crack on and make some more....I have spent the day sorting through all of my stuff, hoping to get some sort of order and make a start.....and then of course, my little darling Becky wanders in and tells me that next thursday is the school halloween disco and can she please have a costume by then, she wants to go as The Corpse Bride...Tim Burton.... out comes the sewing machine then and here I go....will post a picture as soon as its done...

This is a christmas decoration, its made with thick card and stencil, the images are pin pricked and then stitched and layered...it is double sided with a tassel and a hanging loop in the middle..

only 8 more to go...help!!

I'm Back and ready to Go...

I haven't been around at all over the summer, mostly due to work commitments and school holidays...children are back in school tomorrow and work has evened out for a while....so I am sorry if I haven't visited your blog for a while but I will make an extra huge effort from now on...
My mojo has risen back up to 100% and I will be posting some new makes very shortly...

take care...Rachel.x

Wire flower and Butterfly

This is a hairslide I made for the Highfliers challenge over on the cb forum...I made the body out of a single piece of wire bound together at the top with thinner wire...then I wove seed beads around the bottom to form the body....the wings are made out of a single piece of wire,shaped and then attatched to the body...The wings are made with beads and thin wire woven between them...

This is the underneath of the slide....the attatchment part..

The front of the hairslide ...

This is what I ended up with after I sat down for the afternoon to play with my beads....I made the flower by threading on a single bead and then twisting the wire around it to form the flower..The flower was then attatched to the chain with thinner wire, all the beads around the flower are made with head pins and then attatched to the chain...

It hangs nicely when wearing....

This is a necklace and earrings I made for a swap over on the cb forum, I used two strands of tiger tail for the bracelet, seed beads and the larger beads are shells. The seed beads are threaded onto each wire and then joined together by one bead...The earrings are shell beads on head pins joined onto a silver plate ....


Thanks for looking.....Rachel x

June Swaps for CB..

Today I have been catching up on all the swaps for this month on the cb forum, jewellery next...well I have to do something while watching the tennis...
The theme for the June Tag swap was "thinking of you, visions in blue"...and this is what I came up with....hopefully whoever gets them will like them..

This is my fat page for the June swap on the cb forum, the theme was summer and I thought the Sugar Nellie Daisy stamp covered this in one...she is a gorgeous stamp to work with...

The theme for this months card swap was "Summer Holiday", I know at a glance this doesn't look anything to do with holidays but my thinking on this was country walks , cows in the field, picnics , all equal holidays...I thought so anyway..

These are my oriental atcs for the atc swap on the cb forum, I love oriental images and I haven't used them enough recently, will have to remedy that....

Two Challenge Cards

Haven't done a lot of crafting this week, mainly due to the suffering of hayfever...I hate it, makes me want to rip my head off in frustration...I can't see due to runny eyes ,I can't breathe due to snotty nose and then to top it all everyone decides to mow their lawns..inconsiderate so and so's...thats my winge over for today...I need to find stronger drugs I think, to banish this hayfever forever..
This is my entry for the picnic challenge over on the cb forum, this is my picnic in Mr McGregor's garden....it is a cross between a card and wall hanging, Rebecca made me add ribbon to hang it up when finished with...I think it was a hint to pinch it for her room..

This is my entry for the male card with a twist challenge over on the cb forum, the twist was to put a flower on there somewhere...and I added some pink just incase...

All Jewellery Today...

Today I had a jewellery day, I managed to enter a few challenges on the CB forum ,I made a ring for Rebecca and the rest I made to sell.....
This necklace is made with wooden and glass beads , added in a cluster at the bottom of a chain...I made this for Tiggertastics Jewellery challenge blog, I used the colours from the butterfly...

I made this necklace for a challenge on the cb forum, I made the heart pendant out of a thicker wire and then wound a thinner wire around the heart shape and added beads....

I used some thin wire on these hoops and I think they look like spider webs....really pleased with the way they turned out...

I received these beads from a rak from a friend on the cb forum, I added some green beads I had and used some tigertail wire...

A silver and black cluster ring...I made this for a challenge on the cb forum...I used a pewter ring base and added beads and headpins....

A couple of handbag charms, made with beads I had from a rak over on the cb forum...

This is a ring I made for Rebecca, she chose the bead and told me what she wanted...and this is what I came up with...she was very pleased with it...

Challenge cards..

This is the first time I hav entered challenge blogs so I am a bit nervous and I hope I have done alright.
This is my entry for the Just Magnolia challenge blog, I have used butterfly Tilda....

This is my entry for the Basic Grey challenge blog..this weeks challenge was to doodle on your card..I have used the basic grey sugared collection and the basic grey butterfly stamp...my doodle is on the side..

Meet George.....also tags and bookmarks...

This is George, he is a baby Tawny Owl....he is one of two and his brother is called Fred....(children are big fans of Harry Potter hence Fred and George)...unfortunately they were found in a barn and their mother was dead...so we were called and went to pick them up....they are living in the kitchen at the moment but will move outside when they are bigger....Tawny owls are nocturnal so when I am off to bed,they are up , wanting to be fed....needless to say not a lot of sleep is happening for me at the moment...but they are so gorgeous!!!

These are my entries for the bookmark swap...the theme was fashion so this is what I came up with...the winter design is my new Sugar Nellie stamp, its probably best used for christmas but I couldn't resist giving it an airing..

These are my tags for the tag swap over on the cb forum....I have used basic grey papers and sugar nellie stamps, the one on the left is a new stamp for me....it is gorgeous I think...

Fat pages and atc...

This is my entry for the fat page swap on the cb forum,the theme this month is Love,Romance and Hearts.....I used basic grey papers , tilda and edwin stamps and the wall stamp...

A flower atc, I made this for a friend over on the cb forum...I used basic grey papers and basic grey butterfly stamp with a stamped image from a swap ....

And lastly, this is a covered notebook , I made this for a challenge over on the cb forum...I used basic grey papers , and my favourite stamp this week ,Daisy from Sugar Nellie...and a mixture of ribbon offcuts..

Wedding Anniversary Weekend...

My mum and dad, married for 40 years on the 16th of May...I did tell her that she could have shot him and been out by now...lol..we had a lovely bbq in the kitchen as the weather was dreadful,good fun was had by all,lots to eat and drink...and they liked the scrapbooking album , have to do another one now about the party...

My brother nathan and his wife Catrin,laughing at something obscure...

My brother and hubby waiting for the food to arrive...lol..

Beth doing what she does best,smiling at the camera...

This is Rebecca our youngest daughter doing her I am the bride of chucky look across the table at me...angellic isn't she?..lol...

This is what happens when you get older, can't stick the pace after drinking and eating all afternoon....notice there are no women asleep here..

My dear hubby taking a nap after a hard days eating and drinking...