ANYONE FOR GOLF

         My two sons have recently taken up golf, Guy started first as his knee has gradually given up on football so he wanted another activity and Greg has gradually joined him. They had a charity day not long ago and the lead up to that was quite competitive my son-in-law also plays so he joined in  the day. As both lads are now in their thirties it is nice to see them spending some time with each other. At the moment Greg and his fiancee are living with us while their new house is being built so I get to hear all about the game when he comes home. From what he says I do think they spend quite some time looking for the balls or even losing them completely. Certainly not contenders for the Open any time soon. 

      Anyway it is Greg's Birthday on July 27th so I decided to combine his card along with the theme for this month's challenge at  Claritystamps  which is  Days Out.  A game of golf is certainly a day out for the both of them.  I used lots of different stamps for this card and sometimes only part of one by masking off sections.  I will try to explain how I achieved the end result and I apologise now for the photo which is a bit pale. The card in reality looks a bit brighter. 

          I started by making a cloudy sky. I used the Clarity cloud mask for this and of course Cloudy blue Adirondack ink . I sponged the ink on i got a better effect that way.  










     I was quite pleased with the end result, my clouds do not usually turn out very well. It nearly always rains when they go off to play golf so this sky seemed appropriate. 



           Next I used the edge of the Clarity blending mat to tear a strip for hills. Useful piece of equipment if you can't tear a hill like Barbara Gray can. Mine usually end up a little ragged. 

         Using this torn strip I added a few small hills and a bunker, which if you look closely is where the lost ball is. Normally in the rough I believe.  I used Meadow green which is a bit light on the picture. Then I found out several tree stamps and added some trees, a few are stamped using second generation ink to give the feeling that they are in the background. Using the side of a tree I stamped in some grass around the trees and the bunker. This stops the trees looking as if they are levitating. 

         The figures were taken from the wee folk set, one of them I had to mask off a little boy and replace with a drawn in golf club. The flag post is drawn in as well and that folks is about the best of my ability as regards drawing. My grandaughter certainly does not follow me for her artistic talent. I found a little dot in a die and cut that out for the balls, one of which is in the bunker and the other by the golfer's foot. Difficult to spot --sorry. 

        
  
        Stamps used--
           Wee Folk set 1

          Wee trees
          Large tree
          Cloud Mask

      Hope you like this, fingers crossed Greg will. I also hope his present arrives in time. Hurry up Mr Postie.

        Thank-you for visiting. xxx 

Is it a Smurf or just MAGICAL

      No I have not quite lost my mind yet---if you are wondering about the title of this post. I have just completed my entry for the Calendar challenge at Claritystamp, I was just looking at the finished piece and I am sure there is a smurf in the top left corner waving at me. Well I hope he is Magical and helps me to success in the challenge. It is worth hoping as there is a £50 voucher at stake so if you have time pop over to the Calendar Challenge and have a go. 
Hopefully you might have a copy of the brilliant calendar but if you need more detail click on this Blog post where Barbara Gray explains how to create her masterpiece.

Original piece by Barbara Gray

       So now we need to look at my effort complete with  pink Smurf. Not quite a masterpiece but hey it is original. 

My little pink Smurf.

        Amazing what you find in the ink blobs, I know Barbara tells us to squint to find the hills etc but not sure she means little pink men as well. I had not got the word chain for Magical so used my lovely new Alphabet Stamp set. Very useful. 

     Thank-you for having a look at my blog xxx

                 

A SPECIAL BIRTHDAY

    A special week for our family as my grandaughter celebrated her 18th Birthday. We do love to all get together as a family on a Birthday, so we all piled into my daughter's house last night to give her presents and enjoy some cake. My poor son-in-law was trying very hard to watch France and Germany play in the Euro semi finals. He does love his football but was very patient, admittedly most of the men were trying to watch as well.As you can imagine there were a lot of football pundits in that room. 
   
     Anyway of course I made her a card and it needed to be a little different as she always finds some very trendy clothes to wear. I chose some lovely decoupage papers from House of Zandra  when I was at the NEC in March so decided to use one of them. The quality is wonderful and designs are fabulous.

      
                                                                             
            

          Added a lovely lace flower that I found amongst my stash, I have had this bit of lace for years was just waiting for the right moment to use it. 

       I always like to make the inside of a card interesting as well if I can so I saved one layer of the decoupage for that. 

    
      Finally of course we needed a cake and I made that as well. My daughter Yvonne will be the first to admit that she does not bake just likes to enjoy other peoples makes.


              

      So I hope you like the card and can say that the cake tasted fine as well. I am going to enter the card into the challenge at Fussy and Fancy  which for this fortnight is Flowers and Lace. 

     Thank-you for visiting and if you have time make a card for the challenge as well. xxx