Welcome to the t'pouch...

My post this week at The Scrappy Tree :)


Welcome to your weekend and the world of the t'pouch!  Last weekend I was lucky enough not only to attend a great class at the Stamp Attic with Hels Sheridan, but I also got to spend time with Stamp Attic owner Wendy.  What a lovely weekend! Lots of chat, plenty of coffee, and some inking to boot; who could ask for more!

As before I made cakes to take with me to the workshop, and once again I forgot to take pics LOL but I took a pic of the raspberry brownies before they ever left the baking tin (or the house!) and here they are...

I can't even tell you how gorgeous and gooey these were, I shall be making them again!  I also made a banana marble cake, but to be honest those brownies, oh the brownies!!

So I travelled up on Saturday afternoon and spent the evening with Wendy and her family, which was wonderful :) we ate, we chatted, we got vocal at the telly while The Voice and BGT were on: great fun!!  And I visited Wendy's craft room which is truly a cave of wonders!  Wendy's having a little revamp at the moment so no pics LOL

On Sunday we went to the Stamp Attic and met with Hels and the other ladies (and gent!) taking the workshop, charged ourselves up with plenty of coffee, cake and other goodies, and proceeded to ink and glue like our lives depended on it!

This was a tag class with a difference; tags on tags on tags in a pouch!  You can see Hels' blog post here for more information on how we made and embellished the tags and t'pouch (tag pouch), and Wendy has also blogged here with pics of all the tags made in class :)  And here's my effort!

Lately I am totally obsessed with tags and inking, so this class was right up my street!  (see, I did say on Friday I'd be right back on the tags after that card post LOL).  Was also really feeling the sunshiney colours this weekend, and at the time I didn't realise it but this is also Hels' Sunday stamper theme so it must be getting to that time of year :)

On a different note, in case you missed Julie's post last week you can see it here; it's important to us to make sure we can support causes that are near to our hearts.  We'd love to hear your comments :)

Happy scrapping!

Gayle xx

School days

So I was thinking about blog post ideas, and remembered that when I took Shimelle's Blogging For Scrapbookers class that one of the resources was a list of blog post ideas which can be made into scrapbook pages later on.  One of the ideas was to talk about your school days and find a picture to go with it, and it just so happens that an old school friend posted this picture of me on facebook (get that hair!)

I must have been between 7 and 9 in this picture; I always had trouble with that hair! No one knew what to do with it LOL
I had really happy memories of being at this school; we used to move house every few years because of my dad's job and it wasn't always easy trying to get to know a bunch of new people all the time, but this school was in a tiny little village and a lot of the kids came and went because of their parents' jobs so they were kind of used to it.
It was a great place to live as a kid, we would build dens in the hedges and ride packing boxes down the grass on the hillsides!

It's so funny now to think that we're all in our early thirties, many of us are married and some have children even!  Some of the class are no longer with us, which is something we'd never have foreseen.

Lots of good times :) most of the pictures are in my head  :)

Gayle xx

p.s. Di has posted some gorgeous binders at The Scrappy Tree, go see!

Inky cards

This is my post this week at The Scrappy Tree :)


So I'm giving you all a break from the tags this week.... cos I know I'll be back on them in next week's post!  lol!

I worked on a few cards this week, this first one in my favourite sunset colours uses Andy Skinner's Nature stamp set (been using this a lot lately, loving!!) and Distress Inks in mustard seed, spiced marmalade, fired brick and worn lipstick.  I went around the outside of the card with a black Posca pen to frame it.

The second card is a little more messy! I'm thinking of hanging this one on a string instead of mounting it onto a card blank so I can hang it up somewhere; the recent Friday 13th we had got me thinking about good luck and appreciating it when it comes your way :)
I stuck a scrap of card with white crackle on it across the bottom of the card and then stamped the background randomly with a Tim Holtz bingo stamp in poppy red Impress Ink and black StazOn.  I also stamped some Inkadinkado flourishes in red around the edges.  I added a small bottle cap from my stash with a small circle of red paper inside, which I sealed in with Glossy Accents and gold Stickles.

I added lots of small Prima flowers by folding them and shaping them around the bottle cap, and added some Crate Paper Random alphas from the February Scrapagogo kit.  I did a bit of doodling around the letters and the edge of the card with black and white Posca pens too :)

I'd just like to signpost you to yesterday's post by Julie if you missed it (you can see it here) - it's a great cause and certainly worth finding out more about :)

Thanks for visiting today!  Have a great weekend :)

Gayle xx

April twinchies

 So every month with a small group of scrappy friends, we swap inchies or twinchies on a certain theme.  April's theme is flowers, so I used this month's Craft Stamper stamp which was just the right size to fit on a twinchie!

 The background is stamped with flowers/branches from Andy Skinner's Nature stamp set.

I liked the idea of them being a little 3D so I curled the flower petals and stuck the flower down with Glossy Accents, and went over the centre of the flower with Glossy Accents as well before sticking it on with a big blob of glue to make it stand out a little.

Thanks for visiting!

Gayle xx

Inky layers

My post at The Scrappy Tree this week :)

This one took a while to dry between layers! LOL
Again I used my new favourite Distress Stains(!) for this tag, in broken china, fired brick and picket fence, but what I really loved about this tag was the top layer of stamped script in picket fence which I stamped on top of the other layers - the Distress Stains go onto stamps really easily to give a painty effect when you use them.  Bring those background stamps to the foreground!

I started by building up a really messy inky background, lots of layers of Distress Stains and spritzing with water and just generally making a lovely mess :) I added the central image (one of my faves! Steampunk Debutante by Graphic 45) and a few background images; Tim Holtz chequers stamped in fired brick Distress Ink and Tim Holtz grids stamped in saddle brown StazOn.  The script stamped in picket fence Distress Stain over the top is also a Tim Holtz stamp - love how it stands out against the dark background!  I went around the edges with vintage photo Distress Ink and voila!  Grungy inky mess with lots of layers :) the most fun!

I also wanted to share a tag made with leftover ink! lol!  The tag below is the sister tag to the one I blogged in last week's post here; after spraying vibrant turquoise Dylusions ink through the Creative Expressions compass mask, there was still ink left on the mask itself so I pressed it onto this manilla tag to get a fainter outline of the compass design.  I sprayed once or twice with the Dylusions ink to give some more colour, and outlined parts of the design in baby blue Stickles, which made the ink bleed a little - liked this effect!  I added some Tim Holtz tissue tape to the top and bottom and stamped a small Fancy Pants flourish in broken china Distress ink at the top, and then went round the edge of the tag with broken china to finish it off.

Thanks for visiting!  Stay scrappy :)

Gayle xx

Ten things on the 10th

So I'm not sure how we arrived at the 10th of April already, but here we are!  10 things on the 10th is something I've seen on Shimelle's blog quite a few times, and meant to join in but... you know, it's one of those things you think about, but don't get round to doing?   But not this month!  This month, here I am writing a post :)

Have to admit I'm developing an addiction for fluff TV, so this week as I'm on holiday from uni I'm going to share my top 10 current addictions!
In no particular order...

1. Supersize vs Superskinny
I am secretly (ok not so secretly) obsessed with food; having worked in mental health services it totally fascinates me how much and how little people can eat.

2.  Real Housewives of Beverley Hills
Ok, this is the only way I am going to be a housewife.  Needing to be loaded enough to just ignore the housewife part. LOL

3.  Come Dine With Me
This one is totally about the social dynamics - what fun to be the organiser putting 4 or 5 completely mismatched people together every night for dinner!!  And the narrator is genius :) if the narrator was the voice over for my life?  Amazing.  Every single thing I have thought and not said.

4.  Grey's Anatomy
Introduced to this by my American friends and now addicted.  Feel like it's filling the hole left by Ally McBeal and Lost.

5.  Holby City/Casualty
Horribly addicted to medical programs since starting nursing.  Now feeling a certain amount of pride when I know what they're talking about during a medical emergency :)

6.  The Apprentice (currently UK but also loving the US version when they show it here!)
Oh my GOSH I look forward to this every year!  I start singing the theme tune to my husband (in the style of doo be doo be doo be doo be doo be doo be doo beeee) every time I know it's due to come on LOL
My favourite thing is probably what bugs most viewers; the bonkers people!  Classic lines such as those expressed by wonderfully amusing Stuart Baggs :)

7.  Obese: A Year To Save My Life
This is a new find this year; initially I was watching the UK version with US trainer Jessie Pavelka, but when that finished I've carried on watching the US version on Sky.  Same addictive power as the next program (No. 8) - love a good weight loss story!

8.  Biggest Loser USA
I can't help it.  I love Jillian and Bob.  Even to the point where I sometimes watch repeats!

9.  The Good Wife
Again recenly discovered by accidentally watching episodes with my Mum! Now moved on to keeping up with episodes on playback :-o

10. Desperate Housewives
Another playback addiction!  I have dipped in and out of this program from time to time, but currently firmly addicted to catching the Sunday episode asap!  I hear this program is coming to an end soon *sob*


So there you go!  My first ten things on the tenth!  Fingers crossed I get this motivated next month ;) but if not, give me a nudge will you?  Thanks ;)

Gayle xx

More tags!!

My post today at The Scrappy Tree :)

Good afternoon and welcome to the weekend!  Today I have some tags to show you using distress stains and spray inks, both of which are fairly new to me but I love them! :)

This first tag uses broken china and fired brick Distress Stains (plus a bit of water sprayed on and some inky fingers!) for the background, with flourish stamps for the large flourish at the bottom and some Tim Holtz stamped script and chequers in the background (stamped with fired brick Distress Ink and brown StazOn).  The butterflies are plain die cuts that were coloured with fired brick Distress stains and stamped with flourishes, with the body coloured with black Posca pen. 

 The Distress Stains are delightfully messy and I can't wait to get some more colours!

For the tags below, I used Dylusions spray ink in vibrant turquoise for the tag on the left, and a broken china Distress Stain for the tag on the right, through masks to make the backgrounds for the tags.  The Dylusions ink works really well; I've tried a few spray inks but they haven't really worked the way I expected; well this one did! And the colours are awesome :)  The brick mask is a Prima one, and the compass mask is by Creative Expressions.
For the brick tag I stamped the birds, tree and rushes from Andy Skinner's 'Nature' stamp set using black StazOn and then added vintage photo Distress Stickles to the rushes.

For the compass tag, I added a strip of Tim Holtz tissue tape and then embellished with some eyelets, some vintage photo Distress Stickles and some die cut cogs which I painted using the techniques from Andy Skinner's class a few weeks ago (really enjoyed that!) - see here for the blog post.  I wish the sun would come out, those rusty brassy colours look great in the sunshine!

Andy is giving away some blog candy this weekend, so make sure you visit his blog to be in with a chance of some goodies!

Have a great weekend, stay scrappy! :)

Gayle xx

Happy birthday Terry!

A very happy 80th birthday to my step-grandfather Terry!

 Although it's not til next weekend, all the family travelled to Somerset today to spend the day and have a meal together (main course, four types of dessert and then the cake!

Terry's a cricket fan :)

It was lovely to spend the afternoon catching up with the family, some of whom we haven't seen since September!  There are lots of special times happening in this branch of our family at the moment, with two recent weddings, one wedding this summer, one baby born at the beginning of this year and another due this summer.  Hoping Terry enjoyed the rest of his day, and has a great day on his actual birthday too :) xx