Recycled Shopping Bags - dotcomgiftshop

Something a bit different today... groovy shopping bags.

Not just ordinary shopping bags...oh no...these bags are made from recycled plastic bottles and I got them from dotcomgiftshop.com.

There are several styles of bag to choose from in a fabulous range of colours and patterns. The bags I bought, in the designs above, are about 34cm wide, 15cm deep and 40cm high and were £2.95 or less (some were in a sale). 

If I can bear to part with any, I'm going to give some away as Christmas stocking fillers as we all need reusable bags these days and they are pretty darned stylish.

Some of the designs are also available on other products, so for example I've bought my geography-mad daughter (for Christmas...Shh...don't tell) a shopping bag, ring binder and a phone case to match in the World Map design. 

This is my favourite... the Flamingo and if you click here you will see all of the other products with this brilliant Flamingo pattern.

I just LOVE it!!

I really encourage you to check out dotcomgiftshop, they have some unique gift ideas from dog collars, tableware and bags to wrapping paper, garden accessories and toys. 

This watering-can is on my wishlist!!!!

I keep dropping subtle hints like 'oh.... (insert heavy sigh).... if only I had a flamingo watering can, my life would be sooooooo much easier' (subtle huh!?). Plus I think it'd look pretty cool on my kitchen windowsill.

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Birthday Tweetings

Greetings residents of Earth and welcome back to my wee bloglet.

Today I have a card to share featuring a whole heap of fabness from My Favorite Things.

I used 'Bold Blooms' and 'Tweet Friends' (stamps & dies) plus the 'Cheerful Cages' dies to match.

I stamped the flowers with Versacolor inks in Canary, Orange, Topaz & Paprika. I love these little inks because a) they're dead cheap, b) there are so many colours to choose from c) the colours are really rich and d) they always stamp perfectly without blotching.

I then die-cut the 2 cages from silver card, used an adhesive spray to add glue to the back of them and then adhered them, the die-cut flowers & birds to my card base. 

I coloured the birds with Mango & Mustard Promarkers.

Thanks to Seven Hills Crafts for the inspiration in my colour choice. They have a challenge going on until the 25th October to make something using products that they sell in their shop with at least 3 colours from one of the options below.

I've gone for the middle option. 

A few sequins and a white, heat embossed sentiment from the 'Tweet Friends' set... et voila! 

I really enjoyed making this card.

Gardener-a-holic

I think I mentioned before that this is probably my favouritist stamp set EVER. It's 'Garden Grow' from Altenew, I just think it sums me up perfectly.

I made this card for one of my clients, a fellow gardener-a-holic, who was celebrating her 80th birthday. I stamped her name first using Concord & 9th's beautiful 'Sophisticated Script' stamp set before creating a background of gardening, gorgeousness from Altenew. 

I coloured with my trusty Promarkers, added white highlights and a glittery shimmer with my Wink of Stella pen. I could sit here all day playing with these stamps...sigh.

Splat!

I made this card for a young lady who is often adorned in fluorescent colours, so it was only right n' proper that Hero Art's Neon ink pads saw the light of day for her birthday card.

Here they are in all their dazzling, garish glory.

I used one of the larger splatter stamps from MFT's Distressed Patterns set. I think you can tell which one I used as it's stained with neon yellow.

I used my MISTI to stamp the colours as these inks can be quite blotchy on the first stamping, so being able to re-ink and stamp in exactly the same place was vital. If you haven't got a MISTI but have been 'umming n' arrring' about whether or not you really need one then I can say I highly recommend it. Yes it's expensive but if I added up the amount of card I've binned because I've not stamped evenly or the ink has been blotchy then it's repaid itself already. I have the original sized version as all of my cards are 6x6 inch. 

Christmas is coming....put in on your list... I promise you won't regret it and it has so many other uses (please note, it doesn't do the ironing or make tea, it's brilliant but not that brilliant)

I had planned to just stamp the 3 central 'splats' but got carried away and ended up creating a whole background of razzle-dazzleness. The name was made using an alphabet die by Marianne Designs and the birthday message is from one of MFT's stamp sets. To finish I highlighted the sides of some of the splats with a black, fineliner pen.

A Blessing of Unicorns

Ahoy!

I made this card for my slightly (ahem!) crazy friend Beth.

I 'met' Beth several years ago online, she's a fellow gardener living on the other side of the pond, a daylily addict, painter and photographer (well at least as far as I know, she might actually be a tattooed truck driver called Dave from Birmingham with a penchant for ferrets...lol).

She (or he) is also rather fond of unicorns, so when I saw this stamp set from MFT I knew I had to have it.

I started by stamping the different unicorns on to full-sticky post-it notes and then fussy cut them to make masks. 

Here's the stamp set.....cute innit.

I simply stamped the unicorns, masking as I went along.

I stamped one unicorn onto a piece of card, fussy cut, coloured and then added that one with foam pads to make it stand out from the rest.

I hope Dave  (cough!) Beth liked her card. He / she is 'One of a kind'.

Edit. This card when missing en route between Stevenage UK and Senoia USA...Grrrr