Crafty As L

As we say goodbye to 2023, I thought I'd look back over the past 12 months and pick out my favourite makes and moments.   I finished off my crafting this year with these tree ornaments from patterns by mmmcrafts , which I made for Christmas gifts. A blingy Mrs Claus, from the 'Twas The Night series.  I made Santa Claus for my friend last year. The first day from the 12 Days of Christmas ornaments One of the highlights of my year has been my new, extended craft room.   I’ve been busy moving my stuff in the past couple of weeks.   I’ve had a good clear out; chucked some things away, re-found others I’d forgotten that I bought(!) and given a load of things to the charity shop.   Still some work to do but I’m about 90% there.   I’m really looking forward to getting creative in there. I love that I’ve now got an area to display things too, as well as lots of lovely storage! My year started with a high when I went up to Practical Publishing HQ to meet the magazine editors and

  Well, it’s Christmas Eve already!   Are you having a relaxing time or running around doing last minute jobs?   We’re working Christmas morning so we have no meal prep to do as we will go to my sister and brother-in-law’s house after work for dinner with my family.   I do have to drop off the turkey though.   My card this week is one I made for our friends.   We had a weekend away with them last month and Rowan (aged 2½”) is very much into dinosaurs and announced that ‘tri’ means 3, which he’d learned from a kid’s TV programme.   He loves the triceratops so, when I saw this Pretty Pink Posh Christmas Dinosaurs stamp set, it was a no-brainer for their card. For the background, I blended some Distress Oxide Salty Ocean ink over a sticky note mask then used Tim Holtz Ranger Distress Paste in Snowfall through Newton’s Nook Snowfall stencil, added white glitter and left to dry. The dinosaurs were stamped and coloured using Copic markers.   Unfortunately, the dies were out of stock

  Not long until Christmas now.   Are you all prepared or still panic crafting??   I thought I’d be making in my new craft room this weekend but not quite yet.   The furniture is built though, I’ve just got to start the mammoth task of moving my stuff back in.   Here’s a before and after of the room, the ‘after’ being the tidiest the room will ever be! It will obviously look a bit different once all my gear is installed but I’m hoping that, with all that lovely storage, it will be tidy(?!).   It’s also twice the size of the previous room with a lot more useable space due to the dormers and I absolutely LOVE it!  There's still a table to go in under the right window for my sewing area but that's a project for the New Year. My card this week is for one of our neighbours who keeps chickens.   I bought the Penny Black 12 Days of Christmas stamp set years ago but have rarely used it so this was the perfect opportunity.   To make the background, I stamped the other ‘days’ in