ALBC - Clean and Simple winners!!!

Hiya everyone, 

Just a quick post to announce the winners of our last "Clean and Simple" challenge.

We  have some very generous sponsors who have donated some excellent prizes!!!

Winner #1 of 7 free bugaboo digis is Kbrandy4

 
Winner #2 of 4 free Delicious Doodles digis is Marianne
 

Winner #3 of a £10 voucher is Carol Gill

Our top 3 as chosen by moi!

Irene

Kat

Zora

Congratulations to you all!!! Please feel free to snatch our Top 3 blinkie!!!

 

 Also, our next Guest Designer is

Very Belle

Congratulations!!!  E-mail me for our next challenge info and your GDT blinkie!!!

Don't forget to check back tomorrow for our brand new challenge!!!

        

Watermarking your cards - do you?

Hiya everyone, 

As you may or may not know there are a lot of unscrupulous crafters that are not only posting and sharing unwatermarked black and white uncoloured images on pinterest/facebook etc but they are also stealing other crafters coloured in images and elements off their cards to digitally reproduce themselves.  Or they steal the piccie of your card and pass it off as their own.

 

Theft on various levels is becoming a massive problem within the crafting industry which is why it is important to watermark your creations to try and prevent your work from being stolen. 

Claire Keay from Jelly Park stamps has an offer on throughout October that for £2 she will produce a made to order watermark with all proceeds going to Breast Cancer Awareness.  It also includes instructions on how to add it to your creations.  For full details of this please see here.

 

To make it crystal clear, if you buy an image then it is for your own personal use only in accordance with that particular companies terms of use which vary from company to company.  Anybody who uploads these unwatermarked images to various sites such as pinterest etc is effectively stealing.  Any of these images that are pinned are then shared and distributed even more which makes this problem worse.  

 

Some pinterest users have 1000's of images from digi companies to stamped images such a LOTV, Tilda and Hanglar that have been stamped and scanned on.  A lot of people who are pinning these images do not realise it is a problem as they do not realise that they are sharing illegal images even further.  Images with watermarks are fine - it's the ones that can be saved and printed off that's the problem.  Stamped images that have been scanned on are not supposed to be reproduced mechanically.   

 

Just because these images are there does not make them free or fair game as it is completely against copyright to share them in this way.  A lot of people wrongly think that they are in the public domain but this is not the case.

 

I really feel for the artists involved as this is how they make their living so if people are using their images that haven't been paid for it is not fair on the honest crafters who do pay for the images.  If their income falls they may no longer be able to produce the fantastic images that we all love working with.

 

Thanks for listening - I know it's not nice but people need to be aware of what's happening!

 

 

 

  

Chocolate Birthday card

Hiya everyone, 

I have another card to share with you today - I told you I was going to try and blog a bit more didn't I?  So far so good eh?  It's just a quick card I made for my brother's girlfriend to give her Gran.  I was told that she likes chocolate buttons......and that's about it! Lol  

 

The papers are from my Bo Bunny crazy love paperstack and the wee chocolate monster is called "Hershey" and he is a rubber stamp from paper makeup stamps - I have had this little chap for ages but I've never inked it up till now.  I coloured him in with my promarkers and added glossy accents to all the chocolatey bit on his hands and face.  The round circles are supposed to represent the chocolate buttons.  I hope she gets it even if it's not obvious to everybody else!  You can get this little cutie here at Quixotic Paperie.

 

Thanks for looking!

 

 

 

Autumn criss cross card

 Hiya everyone,

Don't die of shock but I have a random card I made to share with you today.  I do need to try harder to update my blog more regularly!  I make lots but struggle to find the time to blog it too!  I do love Autumn although I am sad to see the warmer weather go.  I love buying a new hat, scarf and glove set and wrapping up warm.  I don't like the dark mornings and dark evenings but I do love hot vimto and warming soups and stews with crusty bread.  And I LOVE halloween!!! Before my babies were born I had several Halloween parties when I spent weeks decorating my WHOLE house in preparation.  With Nathan being born on 30th October I think we'll have plenty of Halloween themed birthday parties in the future!   This is me in my Victorian wedding dress, long red wig, fake fangs and scary contact lenses!  Did I tell you - I LOVE Halloween?!? lol

I have made a few of these criss cross cards recently and I was really pleased how this one turned out.  I made the actual blank/base out of Papermill ivory hammercard.  I bought a huge box ages ago and I have nearly ran out.  I love making my own bases and this card is fab for that as I hate a flimsy card blank!


The papers are from my Prima botanical paperstack and the leaves and sentiment stamp are from the Justrite Shabby chic Autumn leaves stamp set.  I love this set as the sentiment makes a great focal point and the leaves are really versatile.  I stamped them in brown ink directly onto patterned paper and cut them out leaving a very small border.  I then coloured them in roughly with different promarkers to vary the autumn tones. I got mine here with free P+P but they are out of stock at the moment

I also used my spellbinders floral oval die, spellbinder edgeabilities (as kraft card is too thick for my border punches), spellbinder fancy labels die and my favourite doo hickey swirl die that I use all the time!

Below is a piccie of the the criss cross card and the pocket separate.  I hope you like it.  They are really easy to make and they make a change from a standard square card. I think I need to get a card stand die so that I can make a matching card stand as they are awkward to photograph. I have been making rectangular cards again as some of the magazines I work with want to vary the shapes whilst others want me to stick to the square.  I personally prefer the square shape but variety is the spice of life they say!  I think, like others, I have fell into a square card rut as they still seem the most popular with the majority of crafters. 

Are you in a square card rut?  Maybe it's just me? lol 

 Thanks for looking!

Coffee and cream

Hiya everyone, 

I have to share with you my DT card for the new Joanna Sheen challenge that started today.  The theme is coffee and cream so I decided on these gorgeous papers from my new leaf first edition papers and used this cute little House Mouse off the JS House Mouse triple CD.  It's just a topper but I printed it out 4 times and cut out all the elements to decoupage it myself.  The CD has lots of decoupage on it as well as papers, digi stamps etc but nothing that suited the challenge so I made my own!  To check out the CD for yourself you can find it here.

 

My card is a little late as I have been super busy and planned to make it last night after finishing some magazine work but family unexpected dropped in and ended up staying till after 1am so I didn't get chance.  Hubby and the kids are off to the in-laws to watch the Man Utd game so I literally just made it now.  Better late than never I suppose.

 

I have virtually finished all my Christmas magazine design work so I'm now cracking on with ideas for the new year.  It's hard working so far in advance as some stuff isn't released till much nearer the time which is no good when you need to start Christmas stuff in June! Lol

 

I will have to try and update my much neglected blog but as I've said before there seriously aren't enough hours in a day.  I still have soooo many samples to share with you all.  I do appreciate you taking the time to look at my blog and I do love to read your comments, criticism, etc.  

To check out the new challenge which runs till Thursday 3rd Oct then please go here.

 

I look forward to seeing your entries!!!

Thanks for looking!

                 

ALBC - Clean and Simple - Midway reminder

Hello everyone, 

It's time for the midway reminder for the A little bit crafty "Clean and simple" challenge.   It runs till friday 27th September so there's still plenty of time to join in.  We have some fab sponsors for this challenge so we have a whopping 3 prizes up for grabs!!!

 
7 free digis

4 free digis
 
£10 voucher   Some of the DT have some creations to share with you!   Jane
Paula

Laura
Elaine
Susan
Jacqui  

To go to the actual challenge post to enter or to check out more DT inspiration you can find the original post here.

 

Hugs 

   

Hiya everyone, 

 

I've been a little absent recently as I've just gone back to work after almost a year off on maternity leave after having Nathan.  It's a bit tiring being on my feet all day so I think it's going to take a few weeks to get back into the swing of things.

I have so much work going on at the moment with Cardmaking and Papercraft, Making Cards and Crafts Beautiful magazines.  I'm working 3-4 months in advance so I've almost finished with Christmas and am now starting on stuff for the new year!  I have a few crafty things in the pipeline so watch this space! :)

Today I have a quick card that I made with the Delicious Doodles "Hydrangea" image that you can check out here.  Delicious Doodles are one of the 3 sponsors we have for this challenge.  I printed the image out 4 times and cut out a few different layers before colouring them in with promarkers and sticking them together with collall 3d glue gel.  The papers are are gingham printable that I've had for ages and the sentiment is a craftwork cards one.

 

Thanks for looking!

   

ALBC - Clean and Simple

Helllloooooo!

It's that time again for a brand new challenge and the theme this time is 

Clean & Simple

It isn't a theme I don't do particularly well as I always think that there's something missing! Lol  Don't forget, it doesn't have to be a card - it can be any handcrafted item!

We have some fab sponsors for the challenge so we have 3 FAB prizes up for grabs!!!

7 free digis

4 free digis
 
£10 voucher
As usual we have some amazing DT inspiration for you even though I know this theme fills most of the DT with dread!   Jane
Trish
Wendy
Sue
Lexie  
Lisa
Susan Paula

Jacqui
Hazel  
Lorraine
   Andrea GDT

Hugs