Wonderful weekend!

Hello and Happy Monday everyone! I had such a fabulous weekend with Steph, Aimes and Caryn -I can't believe it's over already! We all met at Steph's on Friday evening, and from the very first second got on like a house on fire!

Friday evening we all stayed up late putting the finishing touches to the packages for Steph's Papertrey Make and Take - here's me, Aimes and Caryn doing some last minute stamping in Steph's AMAZING craft room!


Then Saturday morning came (after not much sleep lol!) and we were out the door early for some last minute food shopping for the afternoon, and on to the hall to prep for all our stamping guests!

There was 29 of us in total - here we all are raring to go!!


It was so fabulous to meet so many familiar faces from blogland!

Here's Claire:


Alex:


Judith:


Ally and Jeanette:


Kim (right) and my lovely friend Jo (a fellow West Country girl!), who I've had the pleasure of previously meeting and hope to meet up with again soon {hugs!}!


And finally Steph, Aimes and I with our lovely friend Dawn - poor Dawn has been ill for several weeks so it was fabulous she could make it!


I'm sorry we weren't able to get pics of everyone but we were running around so much and just didn't get around to it! Steph and Caryn both have lots more pictures on their blogs too!

Steph had prepared some fabulous projects using Papertrey Ink products for the Make and Take - here's what we made:







The afternoon went way too quickly and sadly we had to say goodbye to everyone - thank you so much to everyone who came, especially those who made long journeys, hopefully you all enjoyed your afternoon!

But for Steph, Caryn, Aimes and myself the weekend was still young! On Saturday evening we had a girls night in - PJs, chocolate, champagne and chatting into the early hours!


On Sunday we were up early again to head to Bluewater for breakfast, a touch of shopping and .... NEW MOON!!! We are all HUGE Twilight fans (although the girls don't seem to understand that Edward is ALL MINE lol!) having read the books very recently and had been bursting with excitement about it for weeks!

Here we are at breakfast:

(left to right: Aimes, Steph, Caryn and myself)

Aimes and myself!


Aimes, myself and Steph


Needless to say the film was amazing, and we all reverted to being hysterical teenage girls! It's team Edward for me all the way, and I had to have a stiff drink at the bar afterwards to calm my emotions lol!!!

Phew, what a wonderful weekend! Thank you so much Steph for being such a wonderful host and for all your hard work and generosity; and to Aimes and Caryn for being such wonderful company, I feel so blessed to have made three such wonderful friends thanks to this fabulous hobby of ours!

OK, slush fest over lol!

Kate xx

Typical...

Sod's law isn't it - the most exciting weekend of the autumn (a weekend with Steph and Aimes, and Steph's PTI make and take day) is two days away and I wake up this morning with a raging sore throat and feeling terrible... I will NOT be ill lol!

Here's a little card I made for a friend's two-year-old daughter - pink and yellow is still my go-to colour combo for girls!


Recipe:
Stamps - Gina K
Ink - Memento tuxedo black
Card - Pretty in Pink/So Saffron/So Saffron DSP
Other - Circle nesties/Copics/gingham ribbon

Thanks for stopping by, and if anyone can send me a miracle cold cure I'd really appreciate it!!
Kate x

Recipe Challenge

Happy Sunday! Time for another Stamp With Us challenge, and this week it's a recipe one:

-3 stamps
-2 papers
-1 stamp

I normally find the recipe challenges tough but this one came together quite quickly:



Recipe:
Stamps - Scandinavian Season
Ink - Real Red
Card - Very Vanilla/Old Olive/Chocolate Chip
Paper - Merry Moments
Other - Real Red ribbon/Real Red brads/square nestabilities/crafter's tool kit/scallop edge punch

Don't forget to check out the Stamp With Us blog for the other DT cards, details on how to enter the challenge, and also how to be considered for a place on the DT!

Thanks for visiting today!
Kate x

Fabulous Friends

When I started my blog and joined In Love With Stamping I could never begin to imagine that I would make such close friends - I doubted if anyone would ever even read my blog! But more than a year later I can't imagine life without two of my most cherished friends - Steph and Aimes; I met them through stamping but our friendship runs so much deeper.

I was having a hard time of things last week (hence no appetite for blogging) and these fabulous girls were there for me - listening to me, giving me a much-needed shoulder and cheering me up. Thank you girls, love you!

Speaking of fabulous friends, I also wanted to say a big hello to Emma - it was so great to chat on Sunday and can't wait to meet up hun!

I'm glad to say that I've my mojo has come back and I'm back on my Christmas card kick - another one using my favourite Medallion stamp from Stampin Up. I embossed the medallion with white e.p and dotted burgundy Stickles around the medallion - nice and sparkly IRL ;)


Recipe: Stamps - Medallion/Seasonal Wishes
Ink - Versamark/Bravo Burgundy
Card - Very Vanilla/Kraft/Bravo Burgundy
Other - Bravo Burgundy ribbon/burgundy Stickles/pearl/white embossing powder

Here's a bunch of cards I made for the challenge we set on A Passion for Papertrey on Monday, it's all about the bling!


A close up:


All card details, as well as details of the challenge are on A Passion for Papertrey.

Thanks for stopping by today!
Kate x

Addicted to vampires!

Morning! Well I'm very surprised that last night I didn't dream of vampires! Is anyone watching True Blood? Scary but as with all HBO series, great TV!! (Plus Stephen Moyer is veeery sexy!)

I watched last week's episode that I'd missed on the iPlayer then saw last night's eposide, and then spent an hour reading Twilight.... I know, I know, I'm way behind! Everybody else seems to have read the whole series and I'm only on the first one!

I'm totally addicted to it though and thought I could finish it last night but my eyelids had a different idea (isn't that annoying... needing to sleep lol!) So today I'm hoping to finish it then straight on to New Moon, yay!! I'd love to hear if you're into either series too!!

Onto cards.....another batch of Christmas numbers today using one of my favourite festive colour combos - gold and cream.




A nice, simple easy that's easy for mass producing! The tree (from Scandinavian Season) was embossed with gold E.P:


Recipe:

Stamps - Scandinavian Season (SU)
Card - Very Vanilla (SU)/Gold (PTI)
Ink - Versamark
Other - Gold Embossing Powder/Cuttlebug Swiss Dots Embossing Folder/ribbon/gold pearl/oval Nestabilities

Speaking of Christmas, this week the challenge we set on A Passion for Papertrey was also Christmas themed. Here's my sample:


All details of the card and the challenge are on the A Passion for Papertrey blog.

Thanks for visiting, I need to do some work but I want to get back to my fabulous vampires!!!

Kate x

Catching up..

Happy Monday everyone! I've just got back from a wonderful weekend in London staying with my best buddy - I had hoped to get online while I was away but it didn't work out and actually it was quite refreshing to be computer free for a few days! But I'm back with lots of things to share over the next few days :)

Did anyone do anything fun for Hallowe'en? We went out for dinner on Saturday and were possibly the only 'humans' out on the town! But I did carve a cute pumpkin which attracted lots of trick-or-treaters, isn't he cute!


I didn't make many Hallowe'en cards (although I think they're one of the most fun types of card to make!) but here are a few I made for my lovely buddy Steph's kids to accompany some scary chocolates - I love those glittered black alpha stickers but was cursing Steph for giving Jasmine such a long name lol! I squeezed them all on in the end though!:




Recipe:
Stamps - Witches Hat (Amuse)
Ink - Brilliance
Card - Basic Black/Pumpkin Pie/Amuse notecard
Other - Scallop Edge punch/White gel pen/Circle Nestabilities/Alphabet Thickers (American Crafts)

So yesterday saw a new challenge over at Stamp With Us and this time round it was a Christmas theme. I'm in mass-production gear now so every time I make a Christmas card I make four - after all it's the design that takes the time and once that's sussed, knocking out a few more doesn't take much time or effort :)

Here's my DT entry:


Recipe:
Stamps - Scandinavian Season
Ink - Night of Navy
Card - Night of Navy/Bashful Blue/Very Vanilla
Other - Silver cord/Fiskars border punch/Cuttlebug embossing folder

And multiplied by four:


Thanks for stopping by - once I've unpacked and got a bit more sorted out I'll be having a long blog hop later... can't wait to see what everyone's been up to!

Love Kate xx