Fred She Said Christmas Blog Hop

Good morning and welcome to the fantastic Fred She Said Christmas Blog Hop!  If you've arrived here from Tracey-Lynn's blog you've reached the next stop on the hop, if not you're going to want to call back there and check out her project and, of course, pick up a word to complete the magical sentence.  Why would you want to do that?  Well...  how about TWO prizes to win:  a $25 gift certificate to the Fred She Said store or a $25 gift certificate to CropStop.  There is some awesome eye candy on this hop too, Tracey has come up with some cracking Christmas designs, both digi and pre-coloured. 

I've decided that, this Christmas, Fred is going to be my friend for getting simple but effective cards made using the pre-coloured designs and I've come up with a couple of cards that I plan to make several times with just small variations.

 The first card uses one of the pre-coloured Christmas wreath designs, cut out and with Stickles added to the berries.  It's mounted onto a Marianne Creatables die cut shape that's been run through a Cuttlebug folder.  The sentiment is gold embossed and the DP is Basic Grey Jovial.

I had great fun with the second card.  I found a fab Digital Faux Postage tutorial over on Crafter's Digital Art Centre, thank you Pat!  Each year it's fun to see what Christmas stamps are on sale and I thought that the FSS Christmas Birds Series would make some fab stamps.  I followed the tutorial and added them to my postage grid, then I masked out the margins and sponged some Distress Ink on to make a background colour.  Each stamp is less than 2" so the pre-coloured digis were just what I needed, my colouring skills are not up to miniature designs!  They are added to some card with script embossed onto it with a Cuttlebug folder, some Basic Grey Eskimo Kisses DP, a big bow and a few gems.  fitting my designs to the grid took a few minutes, but I now have the design ready to print off for as many cards as I want, another quick and easy card to make.


Thank you for looking at my cards, I hope they have given you some inspiration.  Before you move on to Carol's gorgeous blog you need to collect a word from me:  the word is THE.
Enjoy the hop, and while you're here please do enter my blog candy :)

Top Tip Tuesdays

Leanne has come up with a fab new blog - Top Tip Tuesdays - which is designed to share knowledge between crafters.  To launch it she is offering some yummy Tilda Candy.

What a great idea!

Here is what Leanne has to say about it:

"Top Tip Tuesday has been created to share knowledge and tips for fellow crafters - those that leave a tip can be in with a chance to win a prize.
Every fortnight a new tip and prize will be offered. To be eligible to win the prize you must create a new post on your blog (no old posts/backdating) with your tip, this can be either written, or pictorial tip or even a video. You will need to put a link back to Top Tip Tuesday on your post. Then you need to leave the direct link to your post on Mr Linky. A winner will be chosen by random.org - this person will win the prize. I will also choose one of the shared tips to be featured - this will not win a prize, but will have a write up done about their tip and their blog featured."

Be sure to check out this fabulous idea and be part of the tip team! Candy draw is 5 September.

Craft Barn Dreamweaver Candy

The Craft Barn has candy - here's what you can win:

Our brand new Dreamweaver Stencil and Pastes DVD

One jar of white embossing paste

One palette knife

One roll of magic tape

One Stampendous Glitter

One Cupcakes stencil

One Chrismas tree stencil

Check out their blog for the details - candy ends 30 July - good luck!

Two Great New Sets of Stamps Coming Up - Two Great Sets of Candy!

Whiff of Joy is celebrating their new Winter Stamp kit (on pre-order at Whiff of Joy now) with a wonderful blog candy of 2 sets of the kit plus some metal embellishments on offer. Check out Katharina's blog for more info.


Nikki Fairbairn and Lacey Stephens have joined forces from across the Atlantic Ocean to create our own Stamp Company called Wags ‘n Whiskers Rubber Stamps, with images based on their pets and children. This fun new set is due to launch on 9 October, check out their blog for more info.

Blog Candy Winner!

Sorry for the delay but goodness that was a complicated exercise! Followers with different names to their comment names, comments not mentioning that they are following, enthusiastic candy lovers who posted several times... that tested my logic to the hilt LOL! In the end, from the comments that were valid and including second entries for those who commented and followed, there were 105 entries and...

without more ado, the winner is....

Katarina!!!!!

Congratulations Katarina and if you would like to email me at anne.raypack@btinternet.com with your address I will get your Sugar Nellie stamps and your charms in the post to you :). If Katarina has not contacted me by Monday then I will draw another winner for the candy...

Blog Candy Update

Thank you all for entering my blog candy. I'm afraid I haven't yet done the draw, I've got bogged down in counting names, followers etc. as well as having a busy week. I did promise that if over 50 people entered there would be a bonus prize. Well I've ended up with 73 comments, though some are duplicates, so I've added in this cute set of owl charms, from Quixotic Paperie, just in time for those Hallowe'en cards :).

I'll be back later to announce the random winner - I hope :).

BLOG CANDY NOW CLOSED!My Blogaversary Candy - Sugar Nellie It's a Girl Thing

I realised that I have been blogging for a year now, my blogaversary is September, and I wanted to offer some special candy to those who are kind enough to follow my blog. I decided that the best candy I could think of was to order a set of Sugar Nellie's "It's a girl thing" stamps to offer. These beautiful stamps are limited edition stamps, the artwork and the rubber have been donated; 100% of their cost goes to Cancer Research. There is one stamp each from Leanne Ellis, Diane Duda and one from Sugar Nellie's Home Grown artist. As you can see I couldn't resist ordering a couple for myself and inking them up, aren't they lovely? I will add to the candy if I get more than 50 comments, watch this space...

What do you need to do? Link to my candy on your blog, either by sidebar or a posting. Edited 16 September to add: Please also add a photo if you're linking from today, thank you :). Leave a comment here and you will be entered into the draw. If you are a follower of my blog you get a second entry. Candy draw closes midnight on 30 September. Oh, I will ship worldwide, all are welcome to enter :)

Bev's blog candy - wow!

Bev's blog is one of the ones I check each day and drool over her lovely work. She's giving away an absolutely MEGA blog candy. Draw will be on Mon 17 August.

Something About Simon...

Simon Says is having an awesome blog giveaway of $100 of new products, yes that's $100, following their visit to CHA, the trade show in Orlando. There's a really interesting tool to make brads, using blanks that you can add your own papers too.

I was lucky enough to win Simon Says' challenge last week and I can tell you I had a LOT of fun filling my shopping basket and whittling it down to what I bought, they seem to stock everything under the sun that a crafter needs :)

Candy giveaway closes Friday 14 August, be sure to visit and enter!

Bizzy Becs Creatalicious Challenges - new challenge and candy alert

A new challenge blog is luanching on 15 August - Bizzy Becs Creatalicious Challenges. There's some great candy on offer and a sketch to use if you fancy joining their Design Team. Hop on over to the blog and check it out :)

Lucky weekend & heads-up WH Smith watercolour pencils

I've got a summer cold and feel quite miserable, though it's not the dreaded swine flu I'm sure :).
I've not been up to much, craft-wise, but I've had a real lift this weekend. I took part in Whiff of Joy's blog hop on Saturday, good thing it's virtual and all those lovely crafters couldn't hear me sniffing and sneezing :). The new release is lovely, as you expect from Whiff of Joy, but there was a real bonus at the end of the blog-hop at Planet Patchwork: long "chats" with the two very talented designers, Alison Acton and Elizabeth Bell. I was lucky enough to be one of three who won a new Christmas stamp from Elizabeth Bell, isn't he sweet? I'm a big admirer of Elizabeth Bell and even before I won I was excited to "talk" with her, this was a real bonus. The icing on the cake came this afternoon when I learnt that I've won one of the new release from Shirleys2Girls, one of my favourite companies. Their trademark is framed rectangle or square designs with a fun image and a saying. They've recently starting adding several appropriate sayings to each stamp, making them even more versatile to use. They're not anything like as well known as Whiff of Joy (yet!) but they deserve to be better known, their stamps are unusual and a little unexpected, a lot of fun.

Thank you to both Shirleys2Girls and Whiff of Joy for their lovely blog candy, it has cheered me up :).

Finally, when I looked at the magazines in Smiths today I found their watercolour pencils were half price - £7.49 for 36 lovely colours. I have some of their set of 24 left over from when the boys did art at school and they're really nice quality. They're different from my Derwent Inktense, of course, but as good as any watercolour pencils I've tried. So if you need any pencils, try WH Smith - and yes - I did buy them - did you need to ask ? :)

Whiff of Joy Blog Candy

Katherina at Whiff of Joy is giving away a very generous blog candy: the Elizabeth Bell Autumn Release stamp kit. Closing date is 26 July, if you haven't yet visited her be sure to look out for the anniversary blog hop tonight, from Katherina's blog.
See you there :)

Northern Papercraft Retreat Blog Candy

There's great blog candy on offer to publicise the Northern Papercraft Retreat: 36 Copic markers. Check out the blog, the retreat sounds great fun. Enter by 31 July.

Leslie's Blog Candy

My SBS "Sister" Leslie has some awesome blog candy to give away for her 42nd birthday. Check out Leslie's blog and her guidelines, the more entries there are, the more blog candy is up for grabs.

More Blog Candy!

Wow! There seems to be lots of Blog Candy around just now.

Denise is celebrating her blog's first anniversary with a lovely selection of Stampin Up goodies: http://denisesstampingpage.blogspot.com/2008/10/blogoversary-party.html

and Camilla in Sweden is also offering blog candy. She has some lovely cards using Magnolia stamps, take a look. http://pysselsidan.blogspot.com/2008/10/dt-julkort-2-och-blogg-candy-dt-card.html