Techno challenge

The challenge this week at Cute Card Thursday is technology. Well at first I scratched my head a lot, thought of space ships and robots, but then remembered this Kanban stamp of a little girl talking on the telephone - perhaps not the latest modern technological invention but fits the bill I thought. I've coloured with Copics and put the card together with magazine freebie papers using the sketch from the Everybody Art challenge blog turned sideways. The embellishments are created with Marianne diecut leaf sprays, punched butterflies and more of the sparkly flowers from my stash with little pearl centres.

here's my Copic colour list:
skin tones with E000, 00, 21 and R00 for blush
hair with YR20, 21 and 24
telephone, leggings and shoes with V000, 01, 12, 15 and 17
dress with RV00, 63 and 66
shadow with warm greys

I'm also going to enter my card into the Kreative Stamping Friends blog challenge for dots. I'm slowly getting back into the swing of things and catching up with my blogging friends, so hope to stop by your blogs very soon.

thank you again

All I have to share with you today is a couple more of the little 4" square thank you notes that I've been making. I did manage to colour a couple of images but haven't been able to put anything together with them yet .. ..

On the first card I used the sketch on the Less is More blog challenge but must admit I'm not feeling great about my creation, there's no pretty coloured image and my stamped thank you has blurred - bother! Not too many details to give you about it, the paper is a scrap from a magazine matted with lilac card, the ribbon is ancient from my stash, the flowers are a mix of Marianne diecuts for the green layer, punched lilac, glittered fabric then a white pearl on top. I've fixed them to the lilac panel with 3d foam to give a little more interest.

I'm happier with this one. I've embossed the front of the card with a Cuttlebug folder then inked the edges with Tea Leaves Versamagic chalk ink. Used the same ink to stamp the Hero Arts text and matted with green cardstock, cut a Marianne swirl then added the sparkly gem flowers with little pearls in the centres. Crafty Creations are looking for thank you creations this week so I'll enter this one with them.

Thank You

My Dad's funeral yesterday went well, the weather was dry and thankfully his grandkids didn't drop him on the way into the Chapel of Rest! I am home now as looking back I have really been overdoing it .. .. and now I've stopped I ache all over with the ME kick back. I am going to force myself to rest but I find it hard to do nothing and just sit and twiddle my thumbs all day, so I've been trying to do a little craft although my mojo obviously left the building whilst I was away and I am waiting for the return!

The cards I'm sharing with you today are the ones I made last week and took down to Mum. They are each just 4" square and I wanted simple designs. This first is my personal favourite but perhaps a bit modern, I know Mum likes the other two. The stamp is an old one from Hobby Art and I coloured with Copics using my new RV63 and RV66 pens - loving those raspberry pinks!

This one, and the one below, use old Penny Black stamps, again coloured with Copics and using those raspberry shades again. On this card and the one above I've used a square Nestie to emboss a frame for the image as well as cutting card mats, the texts are all from a clear Hero Arts set.

I am so out of touch I'm not sure if there are any challenges that I could enter with these cards. I did see that the Oldie but a Goodie challenge is an anything goes theme this week so will enter at least one of my cards with them.

Sweet Elin Candy

No cards to share with you just yet, I am working on some simple thank you ones for my Mum but so far have only finished two of them .. .. I need to get my finger out!

I was browsing my links just now and saw that Jannie has a couple of the new Nellie's Choice Sweet Elin stamps to give away and she has made some beautiful projects with lots of the other cute Nellie designs - I am just waiting for Cuddly Buddly to get the new Christmas Dawn stamps in the store - I've gotta have them!

I hope my link will take you to the English translation of Jannie's blog - but I'm sure you know how to tweak things if it's not quite right. Now I had better get back to making Mum's thank you cards.

a quick catch up

I had a call from the nursing home early evening last Wednesday to say that my Dad had passed away. Mum had been sitting with him just a few hours earlier and I was actually talking to her on the phone at the time he died. She said he had been very quiet that afternoon and hadn't been able to squeeze her hand, she had left thinking him asleep. The home had been trying to get hold of me so we could visit, but he went quickly and quietly in his sleep for which we are very thankful.

So I've been staying with Mum and doing all the things that have to be done and sorting through old photos. This picture was taken on my parents wedding day in September 1948, they had many very happy years together. I'm home now for a few days before going back again to prepare for the funeral on Monday afternoon. At the moment it's still all very surreal and my mind is deliberately not letting me think about it, when I do start to dwell I find myself thinking of things that need to be done, like bleaching the loo or cleaning out cupboards! (two men and two cocker spaniels left to their own devices for a week has left me with plenty of cleaning to catch up on). I'll be back to blogging again in a week or two, but hope I can find time over the weekend to do a little bit of colouring in.

Thank you for all your kind words of support and love.

Seize the Cucake!

I'm scheduling this so fingers crossed Mr Blogger does his bit. Yet another of my late night coloured images, this is Cupcakes by LOTV and I had to try out a couple of new Copic pen colours on it, Sketch pens RV63 and RV66 on her shoes and the hat flower as well as the little cupcakes at the back of the stand. I love this colour and it works so well with the chocolate browns too - now where can I buy those shoes!

Our challenge this week on Cute Card Thursday is birthstones, and with an April birthday mine is diamond .. .. not got too many of those however, but I do love pink gems and the pale amethyst stone called Rose de France is echoed in my colouring. Or it could be pink Sapphire, or perhaps Kunzite, Morganite, a deep Rose Quartz, all are my favourites! So in addition to punching out the Nellie Snellen poinsettia flowers and X-cut ivy leaves I've added lots of clear diamanté sparkle for my birthstone. I've also added a layer of clear glaze pen on the cup and saucer, the stamens in the centre of her hat flower, the decoration on the cupcakes and little bits on her shoes. The papers are by Designer Digitals and the stamped text is from a clear set in my stash, I think it might be Hero Arts but I've binned the packaging. Do pop over to the CCT blog to see what birthstones the rest of the DT have used on their creations.

The Copic colours I used:
skintones - E000, 00, 21, R00
hair and brown bits - E70, 71, 74
pinks - RV000, 00, 63, 66
hat, socks and cake stand doily - YR30, 31, 21
cupcake papers - E40, 81
shadow - Y0000 and Y00 to match the hint of yellow in the patterned paper

As well as CCT I can enter my card in the Sweet Stampin' challenge for food and at Totally Stampalicious where anything goes!

Coffee Time

I am streaming with cold and running a temp so Mum doesn't want me going down today - the last thing she wants is to catch my cold. I am really torn and want to be there to support her, but I don't want to make her ill either. Mark will go and take her to visit Dad tomorrow and I will just have to keep checking with the home - they will ring me first when there is a serious deterioration so I must try to rest and get rid of these cold bugs asap.

This card has taken me an age to put together, it's one of the late night colouring sessions without knowing exactly what papers I could use, consequently I've been tweaking and printing various digi designs to find something suitable - nothing was working so I stuck with a plainish brown for the background, used the retired pale plum card from SU! to mat and for the lace border together with a piece of purple satin ribbon, diecut and punched the twiddly bits from scraps of pink and purple card, and finished with the cream pearls made with my pearl maker pen.

The image is coffee time from LOTV and I've lost my list of Copic colours - I'm pretty sure that in addition to my usual skin tones I've used browns - E70, 71, 74, 77 with the pale warm E51, 53, 55 for hair and shading. Pinks - R81,R83, RV00. Plums - RV91, 93, 95. Purples - BV01, 02, 04. Cool greys for the table and stool legs and a little shading. I've finished the image with Magnolia Bud Versamagic chalk ink to tie it in with the cream mat and base card plus inked the edge with RV93 along with Stardust Stickles (ink the edge with the Copic before adding the chalk ink).

I've added a page to my blog with some ideas on pens to start you off colouring with Copics. I know there are lots of suggestions available, these are just my preferred choices and the majority of them are available as Ciaos to keep the cost down.

I got a bit stuck finding a challenge I could enter with my card - hopefully the Totally Gorjuss flower power theme might be ok, I have got quite a few flower embellishments after all. Stamp with Fun's challenge is for pearls and flowers so that should do too!

Oh Christmas Tree

I've managed to put a card together with one of my late night coloured images - this little cutie from LOTV is called decorating the tree and I got him in the recent sale. Now of course, this morning I had to do a little retail therapy and order some of the new little girls just out today! The current theme on the LOTV challenge blog is anything goes so I'll enter my rather plain and simple card. I've added punched gold stars, red gems and the red satin ribbon, but avoided frills and flowers as it's one for my local Christmas craft fair where I just get £1 a card. The papers are a couple pieces of Designer Digitals downloads, different collections and just sitting around in my box so in need of using up! I've stamped the LOTV circular greeting and added more gems, then matted everything with red textured card from my stash.

The Copics I used to colour this little chap were my usual skintones, E000, 00, 21 and R00 for blush, plus the E 30 shades for the browns with E55 for shading. The reds are R24, 27 and 29, his fur hat trim is E0000 and E40, and the tree is G12, 14 and 17. I wanted a paler green for his cardigan so went with G40 and 82. For the gold stars I used Y15 and 35, then finally for shadow I used the warm greys.

For the card layout I went with the simple SSS112 sketch from the Sweet Stop blog so I can enter with them too.

kitty in a box!

I'm rather late sharing this card with you today - after a pleasant afternoon with a couple of crafting friends I've had an evening of stressful phone calls .. .. but to be expected. It can't be long now and I'm busy doing laundry and getting my case packed ready to go and stay with Mum later this week. I have my suspicions that Father's Day this year is going to be remembered, for rather sad reasons.

Anyway, back to my card and an apology for the bright picture I've taken under my desk light this evening. This is Dawn with Kitten, a clear stamp by Nellie's Choice and coloured, as usual, with my Copics although the colours are looking washed out with the flash. The pretty patterned paper is a magazine freebie and the pale lavender card is a retired SU! colour. I've added the little flower organza ribbon strip on top of the MS punched lace layer, diecut various bits and bobs for embellishing and finished with pearls made with my cream pearl maker pen.

The Copics are my usual skin colours of E000, 00, and E21 with a touch of R00 for blush. Her hair, the kitty and other soft warm brown tones are E50, 51, 53 and E81 for shading the E50. E81 is a new Sketch pen colour called Ivory and works great to shadow the pale E40 and E50, although personally I would have called it stone - it's almost a perfect match for the pale beige Promarker. For the pinks I've used RV000, 00 and R81, then for the violets I went for V000, 01 and 15, but also added in a little BV 01 here and there as well. The shadow is a subtle cool grey mix of 0 and 1, then I've used my Magnolia Budd Versamagic chalk ink to edge the image and take off the stark white so it ties in with the cream base card and the cream background of the patterned paper.

As far as challenges go, I'm entering the Paper Sundaes theme of girly girls, the Stamp Something theme to have something punched, and the Totally Stampalicious theme of anything goes! I couldn't sleep last night so was up colouring until the wee small hours but have yet to put any cards together .. .. hopefully I may find time between chores tomorrow to finish a couple off and schedule them for later in the week. I suspect I will be missing soon and I'm not sure when I'll be back at my desk to catch up with you, but I would like to thank you for your kind words and prayers for my family, and especially for my Dad.

Picking Daisies

I have another scheduled card to share with you today - this is one of Kim's new digi designs over at Cuddly Buddly and is called Eliza's Daisy Chain, and of course I've coloured her in with my Copics. The papers are various digi designs from Cuddly Buddly with the white line and pricking faux stitching around the edge, matted with violet cardstock. I've added a pretty white lace border cut with a Marianne die then punched flowers and leaves from scraps to embellish, finishing off with lavender gems.

My Copic colours:
skintones - E000, 00, 21, R00
hair - E30, 31, 55
violets - V000, 01, 12, 15, 17
pinks - RV000, 00, 02, 32
green - G40, YG41
shadow and shading with warm grey 0, B0000 and B000

The Corrosive Challenge blog are looking for summer colours, Digital Tuesday's theme is outdoors or in the garden, and the Dutch Dare challenge is a recipe to use 3 patterned papers, 2 different types of embellishments (I used punches and gems) and one image.

Baby Boy

I made this card a couple of days ago and I had it scheduled here, just in case, but have come home briefly so will be able to link it up. I'm waiting for a phone call to go back though, my sister is on her way down and it wont be long now. Unfortunately I had a bird strike on the windscreen going across Bodmin Moor yesterday and pulled up sharp - the belt held my shoulder back but I snapped my neck and now I'm in agony, all for a little brown bird.

The image on my card is Lili of the Valley Baby Boy coloured with my Copics then cut out with a fancy Nestie. I've got a pack of scallop base cards but wasn't sure how to decorate so in the end settled for a pretty blue patterned paper and added the white line and pricking faux stitches around the edge. I was liking the fresh clean look so just diecut layers of Marianne daisy flowers to layer up and top off with a pretty blue gem - job done!

And here is the inside of the card. I don't usually do much inside, just stamp a greeting and perhaps a few swirls etc. As I was tidying up this scrap of paper refused to fall in the bin so I did the faux stitching around the edge then stamped out the LOTV circular greeting I just got in their sale, matted with a scallop circle embossed white card. I think it would make for a birth announcement and there's till space on the front fly flap for chatting.

The Papertake Weekly challenge is anything goes, but with an option to keep with white plus one other colour, in addition to skin and hair. Paperplay are looking for Dad or boy cards so I'll enter with them too.

I nearly forgot to tell you my Copic colours - in addition to my usual skin tones I used touches of E50 and E51 for his hair, the blues are B21, 23 and 45, and I've used the palest of the cool greys to shadow his white clothing and colour the dog.

Pins and Pearls

Hopefully this card will appear as if by magic! this week on Cute Card Thursday our theme is for pins and pearls on your creation - now pearls is an easy one for me but I'm still getting to grips with the pins as I worry they might prick someone's fingers, hence mine are well and truly buried beneath the flowery embellishments. My image is Dawn with Flowers by Nellie's Choice and I've also used Nellie's fancy circle dies for my mats and for the little button - they are all in the same set. I bravely cut up some of my new Stampin' Up! beautiful patterned paper from the Spring Time Vintage collection that's made to match the Baja Breeze seam binding and plain card I used. The flowers are Marianne mini poinsettia diecuts and I cut a large one out of the Baja card and two smaller ones out of Very Vanilla but added a little colour to the bottom layer with Aspen Mist Versamagic chalk ink, I think you can just about make it out, and the teeny tiny butterflies are thanks to my crafty friend Jacqueline.

Copic colours I used:
skintones - E000, 00, 21, R00
hair, parcels and bunny - E50, 51, 53
pinks - R81, 83, R0000
blue - B52
green - YG93, 95
dress - E50 kissed with E55
shadow in warm greys

As I wanted a very pale dress I kissed my E50 brush tip onto the E55 wedge to pick up a little of the darker colour for the shadow areas of the dress. It's not showing up well - but I think you can make it out just under her arm. I've done quite a bit of blending colours on this little lass mixing the blue with the creamy E51 and the very pale R0000 with R81.

There are a couple of challenges I can enter but will have to link up my card when I'm back at home again. Party Time Tuesdays are looking for summer birthdays, and A Spoonful of Sugar are also in a summery mood.

Pink and Green

I have another krafty C6 charity card to share with you today, and it's also for last Friday's Copic challenge to colour in pink and green on the Outlawz Forum, plus last Thursday's challenge on Cute Card Thursday was to embellish your image by adding a little something extra - I've added a couple of green gems to her headress as well as the glittery touch of Stardust Stickles to her frock. I didn't get around to making my DT card for the challenge but if you want to join in you have the rest of the day! I have been able to finish my DT card for this week and scheduled it for tomorrow so you should have something to look at while I'm away.

Back to my card, the image is by Lili of the Valley, coloured with Copics then I've inked the edges with Magnolia Bud and Sahara Sand Versamagic chalk ink. The dp is from K&Co and that's had the edges inked too, the same as yesterday's card. I've added a strip of lace, tied a bow from Stampin' Up! seam binding in Pear Pizazz, then finished with 3 little green gems - simply sweet I think and hopefully someone will like it enough to buy it.

Copic colours:
skintones - E000, 00, 21, R00
hair - E71, 74, 77
pinks - R0000, 000, 00, 81, 83, 85
greens (trying to match the Pear Pizazz) - YG03, YG25 (need a paler green to go with these - any ideas?)
shadow and shade - warm greys

I just realised, I can play in the Incy Wincy challenge too as I have the diagonal line on the tic tac toe chart to use lace, ribbon and Stickles. And the iCopic lover challenge is to colour brunette hair so I'll enter in my little lass with them too.

I rang Mum last night and she said Dad is now in his new room in his new electric bed complete with side bars. He was very sleepy again and is no longer interested in food or drink - so not long now. I'm going down tomorrow, unless I hear otherwise.

Glamourous Gardening

I ordered a pack of C6 kraft cards with matching envelopes from my friend Wynneth so I could make a few more charity cards. This kraft isn't so good for direct colouring, for that I much prefer the Stampin' Up! Crumb Cake and need to order some more of it, but this is a nice thick base card. I managed to punch a flower border with a Martha Stewart punch but when it came to my little punched oak leaves I had to use a scrap of Coredinations. The image is LOTV's stamp called Glamourous Gardening and I've coloured her with my Copics then inked the edges with Magnolia Bud and Sahara Sand Versamagic chalk ink to take off the stark white background and tie in a bit better. I've also inked the edges of almost everything else with Sahara Sand, all except for the flowers, especially as the kraft card has a white core and I didn't want it showing at the edges.

Copics I used to colour my image:
skintones - E000, 00, 21, R00
creamy-browns - E50, 51, 53, 55
greens - BG70, 72, 75
pinks - R81, 83, 85, E04
shadow with warm grey

The challenge this week at Lili of the Valley is to use punches - I've used lots for my embellishment. Copic Creations are looking for a vintage and distress ink look but of course with your Copics, Make it Colourful are wanting to see cast shadows, and I've used the sketch from the Sunday Sketch & Stamp blog for my card layout but with a little extra embellishment! The ribbon is Rose Red seam binding from Stampin' Up!, the pearls on the card and the centres of the flowers are sticky back ones from my stash, but for the pearls on her necklace I drew a line with my cream Waco pearl maker pen onto a scrap of paper, waited a little while for it to thicken slightly then dipped a fine ball embossing tool in to it to pick up enough to dab onto the little pearls.

I rang Mum last night after she had been to visit Dad. She had trouble waking him for treats, but he did seem less agitated so I guess they are keeping up with the pain meds, and getting sleepy is a sign that there's not much time left now. Hopefully today the sides of the bed will arrive and he can go back to the nicer room where it will be easier for the staff to keep an eye on him - instead of being stuck all alone at the back of the home next to the utility room. I'll ring tonight to find out what's happened and see if I need to go down tomorrow. If I disappear for more than a couple of days you will know what's happened.

June Roses

For today's card I've coloured a digi floral image from Pachela Studios at Cuddly Buddly with my Copics to create a card for my Wedding Anniversary later this month. I coloured the image some time ago so can't remember exactly which Copics I used, but I'm pretty sure the reds are in the R20 - R29 range and the greens look like YG 21, 23 and 25. As the card is half for me and half for hubby I wanted to keep things a little bit plainer as my other half doesn't go in for frills and fuss. So, I've just used a plainish red and a gingham red paper matted with red cardstock, a piece of red ribbon and the little red heart gems along with the stamped text.

And I found a couple of challenges I can enter - Paper Sundaes are looking for sentiments on your creation, Sketchy Colours are looking for red, green and white, and Daring Cardmakers have the June flower challenge to use Roses or Honeysuckle (or both) - no guessing which I chose!

I was very upset yesterday when visiting my Dad. His electric hospital bed arrived last Monday but not the sides to stop him falling out - so they are having to put him to bed back in the small 'temporary' room in the storage area of the home until the 'system' can find the sides. This means he doesn't get checked as often and when we visited he was half hanging out of the bed between the rails looking dreadful. My first thought was that he had suffered a seizure as he wasn't responding when Mum spoke to him and his eyes were flickering and rolling. When I went to the desk to call the nurse in charge she seemed to be reluctant to come take a look, but then had to go and get someone else to help lift him back into the bed which caused him a lot of pain. He enjoyed the raspberries in jelly I had taken in but kept complaining of pain in his neck so I tried to make him more comfortable and went and asked for some pain medicine for him .. .. it seemed to help and when I rearranged the pillows so his neck wasn't being pushed forward he fell asleep. I am not happy with the room he is in and the fact that he was promised a new room and the bed over a week ago and still isn't in it is a disgrace. The home seems to run on a skeleton staff at the weekends and being away from the main bedroom/lounge area I don't think he's being taken care of properly. Just because he is dying doesn't mean his needs shouldn't be taken care of but when I mentioned this to the nurse in charge I got a 'well what do you expect' response! I suspect they thought, as did we, that he was only going to be around for a week or so at most - but now as time passes he is becoming more of a demand on their meagre resources as his condition deteriorates. I'm waiting for Mum to get back from visiting this afternoon to see if there is any improvement today - and I have told the home I will be visiting on Thursday in order to speak to the doctor. Both Mum and I noticed that last Thursday he was dressed in his own matching pyjama top and bottoms and sat in his chair in the new room but now it seems suspiciously like the effort was made because the doctor was calling and we were going to be there to discuss his care.

aero fun

Just a simple little card to share with you today - I'm feeling quite exhausted and can't settle to anything much. I'm loving the colouring in, but the putting it all together with pretty stuff is just beyond me at the moment. This is the little aeroplane stamp from Lily of the Valley coloured with my Copics then matted with a kraft kind of card and a piece of Lilyboo digi paper that seemed perfect. I found a little red aeroplane button in my stash, glued down the last piece of red jumbo ric-rac, then stamped a circular text onto the kraft and poked a brad through the middle - job done! Actually, my grandson might like this card for his birthday in August .. .. he is aeroplane mad just at the moment as both his Dad and Granddad make and fly them - I say fly .. .. we take bets on whether or not they will crash on the maiden flight, and they quite often do!

Copics I used:
skintones - E000, 00, 21, R00
hair & jumper - E30, 31, 34
planes - E40, 41, 42, 43
shorts & shoes - E71, 74, 77
reds - R24, 27, 29
shadow with warm greys

Party Time Tuesday's have an anything goes theme running, while Charisma Cardz are looking for something that flies, so here's my card for both those challenges.

Pirate Captain

Ahoy there! Today's card is created with my new Pirate Captain stamp from Nellie's Choice, coloured with Copics of course. I found a piece of dotty paper in my stash along with the rusty cardstock that is years old and this is what came about. The star border is made with a Marianne die threaded with turquoise ribbon although I had to trim things a little to fit on my small 12cm square card base, and the yellow wheel is an old Nestie from ages ago - it is part of a create a snowflake set. There is a theme developing here - I've been having a tidy up and found all sorts of stuff I forgot I had! I've embellished with green jumbo brads (3 years old) to tie in with the green in the paper and on his clothes.

Copic colours:
skingtones - E000, 00, 21, R00
hair, shoes, cutlass etc - E11, 33, 39
turquoise - BG000, 01, 05, 09
greens - YG91, 93, 95, 97
yellow - Y13, 15, 17
map and shading - E40, 41, 42

The ABC challenge blog are up to the letter V and would like to see a variety of embellishments, at least 3 different kinds. I've got my diecut pieces, ribbon and brads. Stamptacular Sunday have a boys or bugs theme, the Dream Valley challenge is to stamp something, and over on the Fab 'n' Funky blog the challenge is 'whateva' along with a DT call too. I would love to apply, but with things the way they are at the moment I can't commit to anything just yet a while.

Silver Fairy

I hope Mr Blogger is on form today and my beautiful silver fairy appears .. .. can you see her?! This is another of Sylvia's new Wee digi designs availble at Cuddly Buddly and although she could be used for a winter festive creation, I think she would work for any time of year. I've coloured with my Copics and added Spring Pansy Versamagic chalk ink to the background after I'd finished with my Copic shadows. I've also stamped a lacy snowflake with Sea Breeze Versamagic chalk ink but it's not showing up, nor is the vast amount of Stardust Stickles I've used on the card - all of her wings, the pale aqua flowers and the diecut leaves as well as the edge of the image and pp are stickled. I must get some bigger square cards - this is 14cm and hasn't given me a lot of room for adding any extra layers but I have added lots of flowers and that little bit of veiling that just happened to fall on my desk!

these are the Copic colours I used to colour my fairy:
skintones - E000, 00, 21, R00
hair - E71, 74, 77, 79
leg and arm warmers - E40, 42, 43
violets - BV0000, 00, 11, V000, 01, 12, V91, 95
aqua shadow - B0000, 000, 00

Although I'm away today I'm going to link up to these challenges when I get home again:
Allsorts challenge for wings, Paper Sundaes for shabby chic, and Flutterby Wednesday with an open theme to include a fairy or butterfly on your creation. I'll be back later to link up and catch up with what's been hapening in blog land.

Less is More

I'm rather busy today with shopping for Mum and getting sorted ready to leave early in the morning. I have been finishing off a couple of cards that I'll program in with Mr Blogger, but for today all I have is a tiny gift card created from a strip of left over base card, a punched square from an embossed and inked bigger scrap matted with aqua cardstock, and a Martha Stewart butterfly punched from heavyweight pearl paper. The Less is More challenge is to pick a square - I've gone for the middle. I've added AB sticky back gems to the body of the butterfly and had to sit on my hands to stop adding more in the corners of the card! Perhaps next time I'll join in with something coloured in .. ..