Grungy Monday 30 - Tissue Tag

Hello Again Peeps

I know I said that yesterday's tag would be the last one for the year but I am female so am entitled to change my mind! So there!!  I also hadn't banked on making this tag until tomorrow but as there is a bit of a do tonight I decided that making a tag with a hangover may not be a good idea!!

The Lovely Linda has decreed that this week's Grungy Monday Challenge would be to use Tim's Tissue - either the new tissue paper or tape.  I don't have any of the tissue paper (sob sob!) so have had to use my tape.  In a fitting tribute to the fact that tomorrow is a New Year, I have made a tag for the occasion.....

This week the Challenge is being sponsored by the guys and gals of Simon Says Stamp and if you have not bought from these guys before they are well worth taking a look.  I have had a few orders from Simon and the last order took only a week to get here from USA!!  For the choice of stamps and other goods available, the carriage is worth it!!  One thing I truly love is the fact I can get Tim's stamps on wood (my favourite stamps!!), something you cannot always get in the UK.  In fact the flourish stamp I have used today (and quite frankly most days) came from Simon Says Stamp!

You must also go along to the lovely T!m Holtz's blog.  There you will find works of art and ideas which quite frankly, make your head spin!  Sometimes I come off his blog and don't know what I want to do first.

Here I have tried to show you the sparkle on this tag, something which you may not necessarily see looking head on in the photos.

Here's what I did....

I started the tag by stamping my favourite flourish stamp with clear embossing ink and sprinkling over clear embossing powder and heating with my heat gun.  Then I used my (only) two distress stains of Dusty Concord and Peeled Paint (sympathy aw here please!) and swooshed the inks over the tag.  I dried with the heat gun before spraying Cosmic Shimmer (Graphite) and then heated it to dry again.  Then I ironed the embossing powder off before stamping with Archival Ink in purple with the Crafty Individuals clock stamp.  A little distressing of the edges with the distress tool and Dusty Concord ink and then onto the embellishments. 

Here I made a rosette with the Sizzix die and made it the "T!m" way using a glue gun and tissue tape on the back.  I popped a circle of paper and added Distress Stickles (still wet when I took these photos!) to the middle.  I then used several tissue tapes and a washi tape and made gathered ribbon by attaching to strips of cardstock and ruffling it.  I trimmed the edges so that they had points and then stapled to the tag in various places.

I cut a die of the Reindeer (again Sizzix) and stamped it with a Crafty Individuals stamp and Dusty Concord DI and embossed with clear sparkly embossing powder.  Some black enamel for an eye and edged with DI and adhered using foam dots. 

The 2012 was made using my Quickutz dies and the ribbon was made with the Distress Stains - the reason why I bought them in the first place as I saw how they coloured ribbon beautifully.  A little elephant charm so I don't forget the friends I have made during my first blogging year of 2011  and Hey Presto - my tag is finished. 

I hope you like and don't forget to pop over to Linda's to see some of the other stunning work on show there.

Please do have a wonderful New Year wherever in the world you may be and please BE SAFE!!

See you in 2012 Folks!!

Love and Hugs

Hettie   

Mojo Monthly - Just in the Nick of Tin!! (Sorry about the pun!)

Well Hello there Peeps!

I spent a jolly lovely day in my Craft Room yesterday making my lickle piece for the MOJO Monthly with the lovely Sarah.  I know I am a little late but things were a little on the hectic side before Christmas and I would not have enjoyed doing anything.  This lickle project I did enjoy doing.  NO pressure, no deadline (well only until tomorrow at midnight) and no products you must use other than a tin!!

Well, here it is....

Yes!  How predictable of me.  A mini book.  BUT a mini book IN A TIN! That is not totally predictable ey!

My motivation for this little piece was to use the lovely 7 Gypsies stamps that I won a few months ago from Sarah with THIS piece.  I have been so engrossed lately with Christmas and Craft Fairs etc, that I didn't really have chance to "play" with these stamps.  Now that I have I Lurve them and they will be popping up in many other projects.

The tin?  It started life as one of those tins for ladies to carry their "lady things" in their handbags (Bodyform and please do not sing the awful song!).  I will admit that this particular brand is not one which I use regularly but like any good crafter, I knew the tin would come in handy at some point so I bought the packet complete with tin.  (In my best BBC voice, there are other brands available!)

Then I sanded it and painted it with alcohol inks (terracotta, picket fence, gold, cranberry (I think!)).  Then painted it a little more.  As I couldn't seem to get the felt to take inside (even without applicator) I used a gold pen to colour around the inside edges of the tin.

I cut out six squares which then needed trimming to rectangles as the tin is not quite square!  and I then made hinges using a Sizzix die and attached all the hinges with brads.  Then came the fun bit.  Making the stamped panels to go on the pages!

Then i had a not particularly fun job as I had to take all the brads back out and the hinges came off, then poke holes into the panels and then reattach the hinges with the brads.  Why wasn't it fun?  Firstly the little legs do not want to go back through the card and the panel and secondly, the little beggars go missing on the desk whilst you are attaching them!!  I did get my own back by hitting all the brads with my Timmy Holtz hammer!!  Haa Haa Haa!!

Here are some closeups of the individual panels for you to see.. (I am afraid no. 5 didn't save for some reason!)

Here it is in all it's glory standing how I actually want it to do!!



Well, this is probably my last posting this year and most certainly my last project for 2011.  I have spent a happy few hours today clearing, cleaning and disposing of unnecessary stuff from my room today.  Hubby did ask if I needed a lie down as I cleared out a Really Useful Box of scrap papers which have not been touched for sooo long!  Some of those papers were nearly 12 x 12"!  I did go through them and kept a few essential ones (mainly Basic Grey Christmas and plain green cardstock) back before bagging up the rest to go to the local Brownies group for their next crafting session!  Phew!  Feeling better now!! 

Don't forget to pop over to the lovely Sarah to see the other projects that have been entered for this challenge!

Well only one more thing to say to all my friends and followers and that is Happy New Year to you all and may 2012 be a Healthy, Prosperous and above all Crafty year for you all and may your mojo never fail you!

Keeeeeeeeep Crafting!!

Hettie

WOYWW - OMG is it Wednesday? Really?

Hello there Peeps

I cannot believe that it is Wednesday already.  This time last week I, as well as alot of you no doubt, were running around trying to get everything ready in time for Christmas and now it is all over and all the Christmas decorations are at half price at the Garden Centre!!

What does Wednesday mean? Well it means that a bunch of crazy crafters all show pictures of their craft desks on their blogs and link up with the wonderful Desk Jockey - Julia.  And this Wednesday is the last one of 2011!!  Yikes! 

I am not showing you my desk this week!  My head is hanging in shame because of the state of it, but all for a good cause.  1 , I was working until late Christmas Eve finishing pressies off and, 2, it is in bits as Hubby is working on installing a new set of drawers for me.

However, you may recall last week when I showed you my lovely Shrek hands which I had whilst attempting to decorate our Christmas Cake.  Well, here is the finished cake which alot of you lovely peeps asked me to show you......

I am pretty chuffed with the results and there was not too much swearing heard whilst putting it together except when I got a bit of wire down inside my thumb nail.  It still smarts a little today and I had to leave the cake for an hour as it bled like mad and I didn't want red icing!

My normal style of cake decorating is to roll out icing (ready made) and either put a large bow on the cake (think Christmas present) or I "plonk" Christmas Trees on it artistically.  I have never tried to cut out shapes and then wire and shape a design.  To say I was smug when I finished it is an understatement.  I think I will try and look for a sugarcraft class in my area in the New Year!

Some Christmas pics of my home for you to see, as some people did ask.......

(That cheeky Santa left his washing behind too!  That was because he went for a round on the Golf course with the Easter Bunny!!)

(Please excuse the firelighters stacked on the left hand side!)

I just want to wish you All a Happy, Healthy and Crafty New Year!  Thanks for reading this and a huge Thank You to all my Followers - you make blogging all the more worth it.  Bless you all!

Don't forget to drop by our lovely leader Julia's desk so you may see some of the other crafters' desks.

Hugs

Hettie

WOYWW 133 - It's Beginning to Look a Bit Like Christmas

Hello Peeps

I can hardly believe that this is the last WOYWW before Christmas and that we are only a few days from Christmas Day, the biggest event we Crafters tend to work for!!  And before you ask me YES I do still have some pressies on my desk needing completion!! Eeeeek!

My workdesk this week has been temporarily been moved downstairs between the kitchen worktop and the lounge.  Take a peek at what I am working on......

and........

The top pic are my hands yesterday evening after I had been playing with Sugarflair colouring in a bid to decorate our Christmas cake a little more than I usually do. My normal decorating is to roll out icing and then places something on the top with a large ribbon and bow round the side.  Hubby said it may be food colouring but I am not happy unless my fingers are coloured with something!!  LOL!!  They had hair dye on them a short while later!!

This year I have the idea of a Holly and Ivy theme.  Oops!!!  I will show you next week if it is good enough to share!!

Today I am working on my Christmas decorating which is a little later than usual but hey-ho.  I now have a lovely Dining Room to eat Christmas Dinner in this year - complete with curtains (the whole reason why I NEEDED the dining room decorated)!!!  As Bing Crosby is saying in White Christmas, which is playing (second time today!) - gotta have an angle!!

Right! Gotta do some more decorating including the dining room so I will be pouring myself a glass of something while I finish then I will pop over to see you later!

Don't forget to call by at the Desk Jockey Julia's blog to see the other desks of bloggers who reveal their desks on a Wednesday. 

I would like to wish you all a Very Happy Christmas and a huge Thank You to all my Followers and People who pop by to see me now and again.  I always appreciate your comments.  Thank you all for encouraging me with my blog in it's first year!!

See ya all around in 2012!!

MWAH!!

Hettie

WOYWW - Shhhh! Top Secret

Hello there!  Who has hit FF on December?  I cannot believe that we are on 14 December already – nearly half way through!!!!  Yikes!!

Well, today is Wednesday and as usual a bunch of us are joined together by the lovely Julia who runs the WOYWW phenomonomonom!!  So without further ado here is my desk…….

As you can see, I am not showing much of my desk today. This is because it has the makings of a Christmas present on there for my lovely friend Mandy’s daughter and I don’t want Mandy to see it if she wombles over here!!  The stamp you see there is left over from my tag I made the other day from Tim Holtz’s 12 Tags of Christmas.  Did you see his tags?  They were wonderful I thought.  I managed 4 but will aim to do the balance in whatever shape or form (yes I know they will be “tag” shaped!) before the end of the year!!  Note I only say “aim”!!!

I can show you this though…….

It is the floor of my craft room and nearly clean except for the white dot out of my “_________” die!  I have been having a bit of a move around in my room in order to free up some drawers which will hopefully clear some space on the shelves and then I will be able to find things!  I live in hope!  This is all due to Ikea stopping selling the drawers I was buying and changing them – again! They stopped the first set in the middle of my buying them!!  I refuse to buy the new version as they are yet a different size and shape!!

Right, enough waffling!  Don’t forget to click on the button on the side and join Julia and the rest of the motley crew who are part of this WOYWW thing!!

See ya soon and please leave me a comment so that I know you have been and I will pop over to see you!

Hettie

Tim's Tags - Day 11 - Grungy Monday

Good Evening Peeps

I hope you have had or are having a great weekend.  Today has found me in my Crafting Room making Christmas cards, the majority of which I have made using Tim Holtz's stamping technique from Tag 3.

Have you been following any of Tim's Tags?  If not, then why not go over to his blog HERE and take a look at  all the tags he has made.  They are truly awesome.  It is such a shame that tomorrow is his last one for 2011.

Before I go on, "Hello" to Lou and thanks for following me and also "Hello" to my other followers too!

The Lovely Linda of Grungy Monday fame gave us two weeks in order to complete the current challenge in order that we could incorporate one or more of Tim's Tags as our challenge.  I have decided to use this one...........Tag 11

As you can see it is not a Christmassey tag, but I could not resist using shrink plastic and alcohol inks with one of my favourite dies and stamp sets, and also the other passion in my life - sewing.   I have made the tag and rosettes using one of my favourite cardstocks by MME.  I bought absolutely loads of sheets of this particular design as I love it sooooo much.  I have also used shrinkplastic, wild plum and espresso alcohol inks, acrylic dabber, walnut stain DI and embossing powder, peeled paint distress stain on the lace and brown bazzill.

I love how this rosette has a beautiful glittered swirl in it.  I know for a fact that I could not get this to happen again!!

Hope you like it and please do not forget to leave me a comment.  Please do not say that the cotton reel looks like a doggy bone - Hubby has already said that!!!  He is DEFINATELY on the Naughty list!!!!!!

TTFN

Hettie

Tim's Tags 8 - I don't do Steampunk - or maybe just a little bit!

Good Evening Peeps

As the title suggests I don't do Steampunk.  Not because I don't like it as some of it I do, but I am not sure if I would be able to "do" it"".  However, after seeing Tim's Tag 8 today I could not resist in giving it a go and try to do something a little manly and steampunkeyish!!

You see, I don't have the dies, stamps or most of the other bits that Tim Holtz has used on his tag today, but if I don't dip my toe in the water, I will never know whether I like it or not so here goes........

I love my Umbrella Man die and could not resist making him look just a little bit Christmassey waiting under the streetlight and under a little mistletoe, waiting for his sweetheart!!!

The background stamps are part of my Darkroom Door Prague set and as you may know by now I love Prague and the reason I bought the street light die was that I love the street lights on Charles Bridge and so I could use this die aplenty on my scrapbook layouts and mini albums.   I popped the grungeboard out of the light part and inked them with Mustard Seed DI and the light with black paint dabber before popping them back in to emboss the whole light with clear embossing ink and powder.

The Umbrellaman was painted with black dabber and then embossed but the umbrella was embossed with sparkly embossing powder!  I put a little bit of tinsel on the umbrella handle and attached them all on to the tag.

I do hope you like what I have done.  I think this would make a great card for a man don't you?

TTFN

Hettie

WOYWW 131 - Yey I am back!! And it is a Mess!!

Hi Peeps

I am back!! 

Unfortunately I was AWOL last week due to things getting pretty hairy last week and life getting in the way.  I hope that the DJ Julia does not punish me severely but I just knew I would not be able to get round the desks so apologies.

This week sees me in a bit of a pickle making cards and my desk has returned to a messy state, but I assure you this is all one project and I blame it all on Mr Tim Holtz!

You see, I am trying my best to follow Mr Holtz's 12 Tags of Christmas but unfortunately I have only actually succeeded in making two.  However, as a result of making the second of my tags I got a bit carried out with the printing of stamps in colour and kinda kept going on pieces of paper – 21 times!!!  I just kept going until I ran out of space on the desk, floor, printer and any other place I could put them to dry!!  Yesterday evening I then added the Perfect Pearls (again having to let them dry) and cutting holly leaves and berries, trimming the printed designs, punching the corners, inking the edges and then I started putting the cards together!  Also in amongst the stamped cards are some of the other designs I had started last week so I should have a good pile of hand made cards to send out.

As you can see, I even have an untidy floor as a result of rifling through my ribbon tin to try to use up as much ribbon out of there before I start on using the rolls!!! 

Hey ho!  Hopefully by tomorrow they will all be finished in time for me to get in the post.  I even managed to rope Hubby into the cards thing this year by asking him to type up the addresses onto the computer so that I can print out labels!  Usually he leaves the whole process to me and he only buys, writes and gives one card – MINE!!!!   

I am at dancing tonight so will be round to see your desks via the WOYWWnet later today or maybe tomorrow.

Have fun and Keeeeeeeep Crafting!!

Hettie

Well I Wish it Could Be Christmas Every Day!!

Hi Peeps

Sorry about the title but I have one of my Christmas CDs playing in my room and this track is on as I type!! 

Well, earlier this evening I asked my Hubby to pick a number from 1, 3, 4 or 5 as these are the numbers of Tim Holtz's tags which I have not yet done.  He picked 3.  Click HERE to see Tim's original tag 3.

Had to have a good think about this tag and the techniques as I do not have the stamps or the embossing folder which Mr Holtz has used (though if Santa is reading this I would be a very happy girl if you could pop the stamps and folder into my stocking!! Oh! And if you can put Harry in ooo-la-lah!!)

Then I had a eureka moment as I do have the Christmas tree stamp and embossing folder so I set to work.  I used Archival ink to stamp on the foam, then Peeled Paint on the top parts of the trees and Forest Moss for the lower part with Walnut Stain for the trunks (and my fingers but we won't go into that except that I know I will get funny looks tomorrow in work!).  We artists sure do suffer for our passion don't we!!

Here it is then......

I stamped several copies of this design so that I could make some Christmas cards before I stamped the tag.   Then I went on to emboss the cards and tag but on embossing the first one I realised that the folder and stamp are not a perfect match.  It is as if the folder image is slightly bigger.  Hmmmn!  How can I resolve this I asked myself and Hubby.  Then I had a thought (owch that hurt!).  I got my brayer out and the embossing pad and lightly went over the top of the trees and then added Perfect Pearl Pearls to give the image of snow on the trees.  Love it!!! 

On to the rest of the tag, I tried several versions of printing on the folder before I settled for Fired Brick and my lovely Flourish Stamp before I took knife to folder (eek!) and run the tag through.   Distressed the edge, added the Perfect Pearls, placed the canvas Reindeer into place.  (Have you guessed I like this die yet?).  Some Juniper and Pine Cones which Hubby helped me make the other night (gotta love my Hubby!).  I added some acrylic dabber on the cones before spraying some spray glue and sprinkling with glitter.  Adhered these to the tag using hot glue (ouch! told you we suffer!) and added some ribbons, a bell (from Czech - my favourite place to go at Christmas or any other time of the year to be truthful), fibres and hey presto - one tag. 

I am now very inkey, and just about ready for bed. 

Before I go, in the middle of creating this tag I had a surprise telephone call from my lovely friend Sandra of Stamping for Pleasure.  If you are reading this Sandra, thanks for the call it was great talking to you and this is what I was up to when you called. 

Night Night or Nos Dda to my Welsh friends!

Don't forget to leave me a comment and pop over to see Tim's lovely tags he is creating for us all. 

TTFN

Hettie

Ingredients:  Ranger - Flourish stamp, Tag die, Reindeer die, Pine cones die, DIs Antique Linen, Fired Brick, Reinkers Walnut Stain, Peeled Paint, Forest Moss, Perfect Pearls Perfect Pearl, Stamps Reindeer Flight; Cardstock - Cordinations, Papermania; Bell from Czech, Ribbon, Fibres

Yey! Tim is Back with his Christmas Tags!!

Hello Peeps!

I am sure you all know by now that the Wonderful Tim Holtz is back with his lovely Tags for Christmas!!  To save you looking just click HERE and you will be whizzed over there by Holtz Magic! 

Due to being up to my eyeballs in preparations for the first Craft Fair (today) I didn't get chance to have a got at yesterday's but so that I don't end up permanently behind I have decided to have a go at today's (I also adore the Deer die so any ole excuse!!).  I will do yesterday's tomorrow and hopefully (ironing permitting!) I will to do tomorrow's tomorrow too!!  Confused?  Don't worry.  So am I!!

Here it is (sorry it is on the wonk a bit but I am currently using Hubby's camera as I have lost the charger for mine - eek!).....

I have to confess that I did not have the Distress Stain, Distress Inks, Perfect Pearl mist, canvas, pine stem, paint,hessian or start to make Tim's exactly but as the Great Man himself tells us, I improvised.   To be truthful I could have had a rummage and looked for some hessian but I could not resist using this ribbon, especially as I manged (by luck honest) to get the wording on the ribbon perfick (sorta).  And the red bell may look a little big but I lurve them!!

In order to get the "resist" I used the Claudine Hellmuth matt adhesive and stamped the Merry Christmas and then let it dry.  I then painted over the whole tag with acrylic dabber. 

Right, now I am going to have a lookie round at some of my buddies' blogs and then hit the road that leads to beddieland as I am shattered!

TTFN and Sweet Dreams.

Hettie

Ingredients:

Ranger: Tag die, Cardstock, Matt adhesive, DIs Forest Moss, Vintage Photo, Walnut Stain, Fired Brick, distresser, grungboard, muse token, glossy accents,  trinket pin;  Holly Stamp, Kraft Cardstock, ribbon, string, bell, fibre.

Are we nearly there yet? Recipe Book

Hello Crafters

The question is for the Christmas Craft Fairs.  I feel I have been making things for these Fairs forever and yet keep thinking that I do not have enough stuff yet, nor have I finished some of the projects I intended to have done.  Then to top it all off I suddenly realised that I had yet to make a sign for my stall!!!! Eeeeeeek!!  I left my Hubby this morning painting a canvas, varnishing 4 cork coasters (had planned to do more and even bought a  new ink pad to do purples ones!), as well as making a display board (your fault LLJ!), and if he had time after going to Cardiff to register his car (had to have "different" number plates transferred) he was to carry on decorating the dining room!  Poor thing. 

However, one of the projects that has been on my desk for what seems like an eternity is this one......

I wanted to make a Recipe book using my Cupcake die as the front decoration. 

As you can see it has glitter and glimmer mist.....

And I could not resist using the mini Cupcakes on the reverse of the book.

Inside I have put pockets in there to act as dividers and also any snippets of paper can be held in there.

If it doesn't sell on the weekend, I know just who I will probably give it to for Christmas.  I must just hope she doesn't see this post, but as I know she doesn't go on a computer other than for work, then chances are she won't!!  Even the base of the cupcake is recycled... Thanks Coffee #1.  They are the corrugated card sleeves that go round your cup so you don't burn your fingers.  Perfick for this project!!

Off to play with some candles, cards and price tickets now.  I might even see if there are any chocolates left over after I have finished filling the tree boxes!  For quality purposes you know!!

See ya soon!

Hettie

Something non-Christmassey

Hello Peeps

Well today is the first Sunday in Advent.  Wow!  Where did that last 11 months go?!  It will be time for the Advent Calendar on Thursday but does anyone remember a time when they did not contain chocolate?  I used to love opening the windows on my Advent Calendar and getting excited as to what picture was in there but not these days.  Kids wouldn't get excited about Advent Calendars which did not contain chocolate in them.  I do still have the last one I had as a child (I am still a child I know!!).  It is a little delicate now but I still get it out and hark back to the days when toys and gadgets were not run from electricity!

Right! Rant over.  Here is why I am posting tonight.

My Buddy Rachel is expecting her second child next month and she left work on Friday on maternity leave.  As we know that she is having a second daughter, I set about making her a small album in which she can either put photos of the new baby in or of both girls. 

This is a Sizzix die which I bought some time ago when Sizzix had a sale (and when even with the postage it was worth ordering).  I cannot for the life of me work out why it has taken so long for me to use this die.  I love it. 

As Rachel's little girl was poorly on Friday we did not get to go for lunch with Rachel so a few of us are meeting up tomorrow for lunch and I will give her this album.  It has become a tradition now that I make small albums for new babies that are born.  I have punched out a few spare butterflies so that she can pop them in once she has put the photos in.

I hope Rachel and Hubby like it. 

Thanks for looking and please feel free to leave me a comment.

Have a great week and Keep Crafting!!! (Can't believe they booted Anita out tonight! :-()

TTFN

Hettie

Ingredients:-

Die Sizzix; Cardstock Bazzil; Patterned paper, DI Vintage Photo, Walnut Stain; Stamps - Tim Holtz; Punches Martha Stewart; Ribbon Hobbycraft; Embossing Powders.

Grungy Monday 28 - It's a Cracker!!

Sorry Guys - I couldn't resist the title!

Well, here we are today on a miserable windy day in November and the race towards Christmas is galloping away.  Scrary thought for today is that it is now less than a month to Christmas!! Yikes!!

After having a few days to think about this week's Grungy Monday Challenge set by the Lovely Linda over at 3Ls and having gone to the post on the Tantalising Tim Holtz's blog, I woke up this morning with the intention of completing the challenge before I set out to my Scottish Dancing class this afternoon (and before I was even dressed for some of it but we won't go into that!) and here it is.  I hope you like it!

Those of you who have visited before will have seen some crackers that I have made using my Silhouette.  Well each Christmas Hubby and I buy each other a small gift, both in value and size, which will fit in a cracker which we open at the Dinner table on Christmas Day.  We don't buy those expensive crackers as the gifts are usually a bit naff and end up in the bin and so I usually  make some sort of crackers.  When I was making the other crackers I thought that these would be great for our table. 

With this challenge were were to cover something with the foil tape and then alcohol ink.  Tim used a fab pumpkin, I have used a cracker. 

I cut out the cracker on the Silhouette with bazzill (twice as the first one went walkabout as it was cutting - grrr!), then cut the foil to size and run it through the Big Shot with an embossing folder (my neighbour's daughter bought me this one as this is the one she and I used to make her Wedding Stationary - isn't it gorgeous!).  I stamped the diamond stamp up the edges and embossed with a white sparkly embossing powder then masked with post-it notes and stamped my lovely flourish stamp and embossed with silver embossing powder. 

Then I inked up the foil with a mixture of Wild Plum, Espresso, Snow Cap, Cool Peri and Rich Black alcohol inks and a little blender.  I carefully peeled off the backing from the foil and adhered it to the cracker.  Then I cut out the leaves using foil tape and card (stupidly I cut the leaves out of the foil before I had adhered it to the card!! Doh!!).  Then I used Clover, Juniper and Citrus alcohol inks to colour the leaves. Hubby and I spent yesterday evening making pine cones (and swearing! Those glue guns hurt!) so I used one of those and adhered them on with glossy accents.

A little black and white ribbon and glimmer mist on the pine cone and hey presto one cracker.  Now I just have to make another one in a colour more suited to Hubby for the Dinner table!  I might even make another two more so that they actually match the Christmas table!!  I may put a gift voucher in this one for my Mum :-)

Right, off to shower and get ready for my dancing lesson.  I am lucky enough to have a friend picking me up so I don't even need to drive. 

Stay warm and healthy and in this wind, upright!!

Please leave me a comment.  Love comments.  When I come back I shall have a look at the other Grungy Monday entrants to see what inspiration I may get.  It truly is worth going and seeing what the other participants do in these challenges.  There are alot of talented peeps amongst them!

TTFN

Hettie

P.S.  Alcohol ink on your PJs is not the "In" look - trust me on this one!!