It's been a busy weekend craft wise. I'll start with the papercrafting. Regular readers of my "life" blog will know we keep in touch with the lady who adopted our beloved foster dog, Murgatroyd, and we met up with her before Christmas for a lovely day out and walk at Pembrey Country Park. We took lots of pics and I promised Rhian that I would send her copies. I uploaded the photos to Photobox, the photo website I use, and we had the prints back, in the early part of the New Year. I made a little wallet for the photos, just from a piece of A4 paper that I folded and then used some invisible tape on the sides. I also stuck a little sticker on the front. Just seems a lot better than sending them loose or in a plastic bag.

I kept back one of the photos and made it into a little calendar. All I did was layering up of card and paper with some pretty little fabric flowers stuck to the card by using brads and attaching a mini calendar pad to the front, over a strip of ribbon. On the top I affixed a ribbon loop for hanging.

Then I made a little card to go in with the goodies. Keeping the same palette of browns, yellows and orange, I used a peachy base card, with a strip of pearlescent textured card down the middle, topped with some patterned K & Co paper. Then I took another piece of tan card and stamped the image of the tree on it, which was then coloured in with Sakura pens, one Gelly Roll and one Metallic Gold glaze. This was then mounted on the top. Finally, I affixed some square gemstones in amber colouring.

Two more cards to share. One is a birthday card for my aunt. I took a K & Co patterned base card, then added a tag, ribbon, and some stick ons. On the bottom, a sticker. Very pleased with it. Also a similar card to say "Thanks, we're coming" for a lovely person we know who just invited us to her book launch (how exciting!!!!). Again, a printed K & Co base card, a sticker and a tag, with some pretty little stickers on the top plus a ribbon which I swiped with an ink pad to turn it an attractive pumpkin colour.

So, Tuesday is the birthday of a dear friend. I've already posted about the table topper I have made for her, and on Saturday we went into Cardiff and I bought some L'Occitane goodies for her. I am also stitching a sampler for her - this is not going to be ready for her birthday but I don't want to post it anyway, and will give it to her when she next visits. Attached are some pics of her birthday card.

I took a tall, narrow pink pearlescent base card and started by layering up some striped paper. Then on a piece of white card I stamped the image of the owl and the greeting in a dark blue ink and rounded the corners. Then I used colour from ink pads to gently smudge paler blues and violets around the card background, giving a sort of cloudy effect. Then I spritzed the picture with a blue glimmer spray and dried it with a heat gun to give a subtle blue shimmer. I used a Gelly Roll metallic pen to colour the little flower on the owl's head and ran a dark ink pad round the edges of the card before mounting it onto the card base. Below, I added a horizontal ribbon and then using my pokey tool made a hole for the yellow flower, and attached it using a small pearl centred brad. Finally, I used some crystal Stickles brushed over the petals to give a shimmery dewdrop effect to the flower. Once it was dry, I wrote in the card and posted it - yippee!

So, a few new things to post. First, the sympathy card. There isn't really a great deal to say about it; I've written before that these are definately the hardest and least pleasant cards to do. This one is for one of Andrew's colleagues who has recently lost her mum.

Below is a thank you card I made for my great aunt. I cross stitched a picture of a teapot as not only does she like drinking tea but she also makes the most wonderful hand knitted tea cosies. This is mounted in an aperture card. For the card front, I used some ink pads to swirl lots of blues and lilacs around (to pick up the colours of the pot) and finally finished off with an adhesive ribbon and a little message. I was very pleased with it - pretty colours.

And finally the birthday card in the top picture. This was for a friend's 19th birthday. It is an A4 card, so plenty of space to fill. I started by layering the card with a beautiful piece from a 12 x 12 stack from DCWV with a medieval theme. This piece has lots of gorgeous glittered paisleys on it,with a rather nice sort of timber framing. On top I cut a piece of A5 white card, which I then coloured gradually in misty layers using ink pads. I put a 10 pence piece on the top so as to leave a circle white, and then with the coin still in place, I spritzed the design with my shimmer sprays and then dried it with the heat gun, giving a beautiful glimmery finish. Lifting off the coin meant there was now a lovely moon in the top of the landscape. The design was completed by randomly stamping lovely vegetation images across the front in a charcoal shade. This was then mounted onto some gold card which was then in turn put on to the main card. Finally, I added a ribbon into the side, and twisted in some purple beads on gold wire as the recipient loves purple. I've subsequently heard the recipient likes it very much which is lovely.

I had so much fun making the little log cabin table topper that I decided almost immediately to have a go at the other little Honey Bun from the box. This is the "brights" roll and I love the zingy colours and happy prints. I decided as I was making it to give it to a friend of mine as a birthday present - I don't think she reads this blog, so I should be safe in posting details. As before, the little log cabins were great fun to put together. This time, I assembled and finished the whole thing in one afternoon - lovely. I have so enjoyed making these two - just the thing to get my mojo back after a hectic Christmas time. I attach some pics.

I have also been cross stitching two little motifs to go into cards, these will be mounted up tomorrow and I'll photograph them then. And tonight, I have started cross stitching a pretty sampler featuring handbags that I am going to make to give to the friend I made the table topper for. The sampler was always going to be the main present, but as she is such a good friend, I decided that an extra gift wouldn't be a problem. The design is one taken from The World of Cross Stitching - I will photograph it as it progresses and of course when it is finished.

Yes, it has been a long time. And no, it doesn't mean I haven't been crafting - quite the reverse! Somehow, running my other blog over at Hound Mistress, my Twitter feed, Facebook, PLUS life - all the stuff that happens before we write/blog/tweet about it - just meant something gave, and this was it. Anyway, as part of my New Year's resolutions, I've decided to restart this blog for craft related activities.

So, here is what I have been doing over the past couple of days. Some time before Christmas, I picked up a gorgeous little box of loveliness over at Busy Bees (my local quilting shop). It's a Moda box of little Honey Bun rolls - essentially like a jelly roll but the strips are 1.5" rather than 2.5". The little box is a sweet thing, and I loved the pretty fabrics. So, home it came. Then of course the tsunami of Christmas related activity overcame me and every time I went into the spare bedroom the little box would look at me, I'd look at it, and I'd say to myself - not yet.

Now that Christmas is over, I was in the mood to have fun and make something pretty for me/the house, not for anyone else. I'd also been looking again at log cabin quilt blocks as I had thought about maybe making another log cabin chicken. Anyway, I ended up making three little log cabin blocks from one little roll of fabric. For the traditional red hearth centre, I found a charm square I hadn't previously used that was a bright cherry red - perfect. For a novice quilter like me, log cabin blocks are great. They are not complicated, and also they are very good practice for sewing straight and ensuring nice, square blocks.

So yesterday, I made the blocks and today I used some of the strips for sashing. A dig around in my stash found a very pretty fabric for the backing. I quilted it in the ditch, then used the last few strips to make the binding. With these little boxes - you get two sets of fabric, usually one pastel and one bright. This one was a soft pastel - the "Aviary" range from Moda. I think that over the weekend, I might make up a similar runner in the bright fabrics as a birthday present for a friend - I think she'd like it. The pastel fabrics I used with soft blues and pinks work wonderfully in our guest bedroom - the walls are a sky blue, and we usually have white and blue (or white and lilac) bedding in there for guests. It has also become a bit of a repository for various craft items - there's a cross stitched coaster beside the bed for drinks, a pretty cushion I stitched then had made up sits on the bed and a stitched, framed sampler on the wall. This now joins them. Guest bedrooms don't tend to get as much wear and tear as other rooms, and I think having home made items in the room adds a welcoming feel.