Cards for Romania

Hello there!

Today I have a heap of cards bound for Romania.

Regular visitors may remember that earlier in the year my daughter Sophie set about fund raising, with 4 other girls from her university, for a charity that helps orphans in Romania. As well as the many kind donations from members of the public, Sophie and her friends also ran their own fundraising events from selling popcorn and donuts to packing bags in supermarkets and selling my handmade cards. Everyone's efforts raised about £5000, which is AMAZING!!!

Their next step was to go out to Romania to meet some of the children who would benefit from the money. They spent 3 weeks this summer living in an orphanage helping to rebuild parts of the building, organising and playing games with the children, painting nails and faces, listening to them read as well as lots of arts n' crafts and sports activities.

If she'd been able to, I don't think Sophie would have returned home, she built up such a close relationship with the children. On the day she got back we just sat talking about the children and their lives and had a big ol' cry together. It really is heartbreaking.

However, it didn't end there. Sophie has continued to keep in touch with the children online and she and the 4 girls from her university, that she went to Romania with, have clubbed together and bought Christmas presents for all of the children.

These are just some of the gifts they bought for them.

(Sorry about the blurry photo)

I've made personalised Christmas cards for them all using these cute little Polar Bears from My Favorite Things and the brilliant Calligraphy Alpha set from Altenew. I stamped lots of the bears onto white card, coloured them with Promarkers and fussy-cut them before adding them to the card fronts with their names stamped on.

There are some cards you make that just give you that warm, fuzzy feeling inside and there are some things our kids do that make our hearts almost burst with pride.

Mega Cheap Stamp Cleaner

There are lots of products out there for cleaning our stamps, like Wet Ones (other supermarket brands are available... lol) but I know a lot of people like me find that they leave tiny fibres on our stamps.

I have tried this, the Scrubber Pad from Hero Arts, along with ... 

... their Ultra Clean fluid, but after a while I find the pad is so full of ink that I still need paper towels and a further spray of the fluid directly onto my stamp to fully clean it.

I know there are 'official' Stamp Shammy cloths available but I have found a cheap alternative in the UK that you might be interested in.

This is a car chamois cloth from Poundland (UK), so costs £1.00. It's about 14" x 11" and I cut it into 4 pieces, each about 7" x 5.5" (so 25p per cloth!!!!!!). I ran one bit under the tap to dampen it and now keep it on my craft desk in a little box to stop it drying out. 

If it does dry out then it goes hard but that's no problem, run it under the tap again to soften it, I just keep it in a box so it's always available.

It cleans my stamps perfectly, first time, every time. The ink doesn't gunk up the cloth, it just absorbs it...no inky fingers, no inky build up and no fibres stuck to my stamps. 

Here's the piece I'm using at the mo', as mucky as it is, none of the ink transfers onto my fingers and it still cleans my stamps. 

I also tried this cloth from Wilkinsons (UK), another synthetic chamois cloth. It measures approx' 15" x 13", so can be cut into about 6 pieces and at £1.25, this is another bargain buy. It needs rinsing through before using as it has a 'soapy' feel to it, but just run it under the tap first and you're good to go.

Both cloths are brilliant for cleaning stamps. 

I hope you find this useful.

New - Translucent Nuvo Jewel Drops

Regular stalkers of my wee bloglet may recall my recent post on the must-have Nuvo Crystal Drops from Tonic. Well those lovely folk over at Tonic have released another 8 new bottles of fabness to feed our addiction.

Introducing Nuvo Jewel Drops....

...and oh my! These are beautiful!!!!

Just like the Crystal Drops, Jewel Drops form perfect domed embellishments but these dry translucent. The colours are so pretty. Trust me.... my photos do not do them justice.

As before, even if you don't want to create your own jewelled embellishments, just buy them for the bottle lids and make your own earrings...lol.

With Sympathy

Always the toughest cards to make... 🙁

Majestix Clear Peg Stamp Set - Early Spring Blooms

Versacolor inks

Clearly Besotted - Many Messages sentiment