As Promised...

...here is one of the cards I've made using the dies which came as freebies with my second magazine purchase and because these only need quite small scraps of card they are very apt for the Snippets challenge.  There are seemingly lots of possibilities for making a variety of 'critters' of one sort or another, mostly suitable for Christmas but I'm sure with a bit of imagination they will come in for other occasions too.  I sat down one evening with my lap tray, my little Sapphire machine and some of my 'bits' boxes and cut out quite a lot of pieces in various colours which I then built up into some seasonal characters including penguin, robin, gingerbread man, reindeer and a Santa which I wasn't happy with so will have to try again with him.

I've chosen to show you a penguin today and he has been popped onto an oval of white card which was just lying around waiting to be embossed with a snowy effect.  Background paper came from my seasonal stash and the wavy die cut was a stray left over from a previous project.  Another small snippet was used to die cut the greeting.

As usual there is another great card showcasing this week's prize on the challenge blog so why not take a look HERE and maybe make something to use up some of your snippets.

Penguin - using die set which came free with magazine
Snowy Oval - Stampin' Up embossing folder
Wavy Lines - Swirly Scribbles die set Stampin' Up
Sentiment - Britannia dies

Magazine Freebies

I've been quite good recently in avoiding going to near the craft magazines in the supermarket and/or newsagent but I'm afraid I succumbed to temptation during the week - not once but twice and both times with Christmas related dies.  I actually make very few Christmas cards and had told myself that I should use what I already have (ample supplies I assure you) but I was tempted by this woodland scene die.  I started by cutting it out using an offcut of Centura Pearl card, followed by cutting again with kraft card and green card (this time using scraps as I only needed the stag and tree).  The background was a piece of watercolour paper which I had coloured during a messy session with Brusho colours - always a good idea to make quite a few pieces of various colours suitable for backgrounds.  I had a frame left over from another project which just happened to fit the die cut which was really handy so the whole thing was assembled onto a piece of seasonal background paper which is actually a much better match to the 'sky' than it appears in the photo.

Pop back again tomorrow to see what tempted me to buy the second magazine!!  At least these purchases have spurred me on to make a few Christmas cards.

Background paper - from my stash bought some years ago
Frame - Sue Wilson Noble pierced squares dies
Image - die given away free with magazine
Sky behind stag - watercolour paper with Brusho

Playground Time

It is time to visit the playground again HERE to post another  card which this week is entirely made from snippets.  Background is a snippet of whitewash card which has been embossed and sponged with ink; the hexagons were cut from scraps of shabby vintage paper; centre one is a contrasting scrap of card with a sentiment stamped onto yet another small white hexagon; finally three flowers were punched from the remnants of shabby vintage card. ...and still my pile of scraps doesn't diminish!!

Embossing folder - Crafter's Companion
Dies - Crafter's Companion
Flowers - punch from Stampin' Up

An Ongoing Crochet Project

I've embarked on a crochet blanket project using Stylecraft Yarns and with instructions being available to download over a period of time.  You can see details HERE - part one was available a week ago with part two following yesterday; next instalment due 4 October.  My local store is featuring the colourful yarns shown on the promotional leaflet but of course this could be made in any number of versions depending on your colour preferences.  In fact there are quite a few variations appearing around the internet already.  I decided to go with the bright Carousel colours and immediately made the central motif which was the first instalment.  I've now started on the second section which is a series of segments which all have to be joined and attached to the central motif - photo shows just the first two sections laid out for the moment because these will take me a while to make  and join all sixteen of them.   I did have a spot of bother with their instructions for joining the sections together and eventually gave up and simply joined them in my own way with double crochet (single crochet for American viewers).

I'm already looking forward to seeing what the next set of  instructions brings!!

Christmas Snippets

It seems to be a case of 'great minds think alike' in the Playground this week because Di was reminding us of how many (or few) sleeps there are to the big day!!  Yesterday I was playing around with some quilling and these two baubles evolved and as the backgrounds were punched from snippets of white card I decided to pop them on here for the challenge this week.  Only the two snippets unless you count the pieces of quilling paper in which case there are more - I'm not counting though.

I punched the bauble shapes before embossing with a snowflake embossing folder.  I then made the holly leaves, berries and little gold bells for one and added a poinsettia for the other - all made using 2mm papers.  These would be handy for gift tags or they might well be incorporated into cards in due course.

There is some nifty paper piecing from Di and a lovely selection of picks from last week's entries so well worth taking a look at the Snippets blog - a great prize on offer too as usual.

Baubles - punch from Stampin' Up
Embossing - Cuttlebug snowflake folder
Quilling Designs - 2mm papers from my stash

Snowflake

It would appear that most crafters are well into thinking about Christmas by now and last weekend I spotted my friend Jill of Jill's Quills at a local show demonstrating some of her quilling.  She had a series of clear plastic baubles containing a variety of snowflakes so of course I had to treat myself to some of the empty baubles so that I could have a go and this is one of the ones I've made.  As you can imagine these are not the easiest things to photograph and I just couldn't get it to hang facing the right direction for the camera.  I resorted to standing it on a small flower pot and even that isn't the best of photos because of the reflections but hopefully you can see the general idea.  I might carefully take it out of the bauble later to get a picture of the actual snowflake to see the detail so watch this space!

EDITED:  I decided against removing this snowflake from its bauble but I've made another one of a different design using silver paper this time.  It is now ready to be inserted into another bauble.

Something Different for Pixie Snippets

I have something a bit different for the Pixie Snippets Playground this week and fortunately the lovely Di welcomes 'makes' which aren't always cards or other paper projects.  I like to have a bit of knitting or crochet on the go to pick up of an evening - mainly to stop me from falling asleep in front of the TV programmes which I must say are often less than riveting!!  I've been using up oddments (or snippets) of coloured yarns to make this small blanket but of course as is always the way I have had to buy an odd ball or two to supplement what I already had, thus making even more left overs - sigh!!!  A friend sends small quilts and crochet blankets/throws to a Children's Hospice so I will be passing this one on to her - the next one is about to be started with the current pile of leftover yarns.  The pattern for this 'wavy' design came from Attic 24 and is quite easy to make.

We've had thunder storms this morning and I think I can hear the odd rumble again so I hope your weather is better than it is here.