Thanks A Latte

I've been enjoying a fantastic luxury for the last few weeks, I've been working four-day weeks. This is the life, I'll tell you. I had managed to not use all my annual leave days so I decided to use the last few to just take Fridays off. I wish I could keep doing this indefinitely as I have been enjoying really slow Fridays at home, reading a book for a few hours in the morning while drinking big cups of coffee on the sofa, then moving upstairs to my craft room to spend the rest of the day there. I genuinely meant to spend these days cleaning the house and clearing things off my to-do list, but let's just call these my mental health days and ignore all that dust in the corners, right? 

My card is inspired by the inspiration image over at Daring Cardmakers. My choice of patterned paper was inspired by the blankets in the inspiration photo and I was also inspired by the leaves and the colours scheme of oranges, reds and teal. I was also inspired by the sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches, the Awesome Autumn theme over at Lawn Fawnatics and the Thank you theme over at CAS on Friday.

Card and patterned paper: Teal 250 gsm card, Hobbycraft 160 gsm white card, watercolour card, scrap of red card, Lawn Fawn Perfectly Plaid Fall, Knit Picky

Stamps: Lawn Fawn Love You a Latte and matching dies, Claire's ABCs

Ink and Colouring: Distress Inks, Tsukineko Memento Tuxedo Black, Copics

Dies: Lawn Fawn Stitched Leaves, Scripty Thanks

Twofer Leaves

Last month when I played along with the Twofer challenge I got it wrong and didn't follow all the rules so let's try again. The idea is to use the same stamp or dies to make two cards. This time I used the Lawn Fawn Leaf dies for two different cards. For my coffee card I used the dies to die cut some card I had inked up by smooshing Distress Oxides. For my other card I used the dies to create a stencil which I inked Distress Oxides through. Hopefully this is in line with the rules!

This card was also inspired by the sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches and I'm also linking up over at Just Add Ink where the theme is Just add K (in my case kraft card)

My second card was inspired by the image over at Just Us Girls. As I added some adhesive gems from my stash, I'm also linking it up over at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge where the theme is Bling It On.

Card: White 250 gsm card, watercolour card, Lawn Fawn Perfectly Plaid and Perfectly Plaid fall, scrap of kraft card

Stamps: Lawn Fawn Love You a Latte, Sending Hedgehugs and matching dies

Ink and colouring: Tsukineko Memento Tuxedo Black, Distress Oxide, Copics

Dies: Lawn Fawn Stitched Leaves
Other: Burlap twine from my stash, adhesive gems from my stash

Cozy Autumn Cuppa

Today was the first morning this season I had to scrape the windscreen of my car. Or to be perfectly honest, the boo did it for me. I'm a feminist, but I have to say I love it when the boo does the stuff that involves getting cold hands... And what a heart-warming gesture to realise when you get your car that the windscreen has been scraped! He has his moments.

We need a hot cup or two when the weather turns icy, don't we? I had to wait for a train for quite a long while out in the cold this morning, and would not have managed without my huge vat of hot latte to keep me warm. Today's card was inspired by that steaming mug of comfort as well as the cozy image over at Inspired by All The Little Things and the sketch over at Fusion Card Challenge. I'm also linking up over at Shopping Our Stash where the theme is to use a sketch and Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge where Anything Goes this week.

Card and paper: 250 gsm brown card, Lawn Fawn Perfectly Plaid Christmas, Perfectly Plaid Chill, Knock on Wood, Neenah Solar white card

Stamps: Lawn Fawn Love You a Latte and matching dies

Ink and colouring: Tim Holtz Distress marker, Tim Holtz Distress Inks

Dies: Lawn Fawn Stitched Rectangle Nesting dies, Stitched Leaves, Tag You're It, Big Scripty Words, Everyday Banners

Smile A Latte

All good things must come to an end, including my lovely autumn annual leave. Many pairs of socks have been knitted, many cards made and even more lettering practice has been done. But now it's over and I have to face going back to the coal mines... 

Before that, I wanted to link up one more card over at the Fall Coffee Lover's Blog Hop - it's already the last day of the hop! Time goes so quickly. I'm also linking up with the new fall inspiration board challenge over at Lawn Fawnatics. I was inspired by the sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches. I'm also linking up with the "Autumn Colours" challenge over at Make My Monday and the "Pop It Up"challenge over at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge (the tag is attached using 3D foam dots).

Card: kraft card, scraps of yellow, orange and red card, Neenah Solar white card

Stamps: Lawn Fawn Love You A Latte and matching dies

Patterned Paper: Lawn Fawn Perfectly Plaid

Ink and colouring: Tim Holtz Distress Ink Barn Door, Spiced Marmalade, Vintage Photo, Tsukineko Memento Tuxedo Black, Copics

Dies: Lawn Fawn Tag You're It, Stitched Leaves

Love You a Latte, Foxy

How many adulting points to I get for defrosting the freezer and descaling the kettle? I'd say at least enough to not do anything but eat cake and craft for the rest of the weekend!

I can't believe I almost missed out on the current Lawn Fawnatics challenge where the theme is Create a Scene. And what better than a fall scene with a little bit of coffee for the Fall Coffee Lovers Blog Hop as well! Last, but not least I'm also linking up with Daring Cardmakers, where the theme is 4 Of Something (4 trees and 4 leaves). 

Card: 250 gsm white card, Neenah Solar White card, scrap of dark brown card
Patterned Paper: Lawn Fawn Perfectly Plaid Fall, Let's Polka, Let's Polka in the Dark, Watercolour Wishes
Stamps: Lawn Fawn Party Animal and matching dies, Holiday Party Animal, Love You A Latte
Ink and Colouring: Tsukineko Memento Tuxedo Black, Copics
Dies: Lawn Fawn Stitched Tree Border Dies, Scalloped Rectangle Stackables, Stitched Rectangle Stackables, Grassy Border, Stitched Hillside Border, Spring Showers, Stitched Leaves

Minimalism

I've been listening to The Minimalists podcast (which I discovered though the amazing Tracy from Shutterbean, a blog I can warmly recommend if you don't follow it already!). I love the idea of cutting down on the clutter in our lives - that we have been brain washed to think that success and happiness is defined by owning more things when instead we can be much happier when we let go (I'm excluding the craft stash from this line of thought). But to be completely serious, I think there is a point in being mindful about what we own and evaluating whether the things we surround us with add value to our lives. And I have to admit I have a lot of crafty stash which I don't use. I just feel like I can't get rid of it because I paid a lot of money for it. I have some stuff I love and use, and I see no point in getting rid of those. But the other stuff - the stamps I haven't touched for years (or maybe not even used once)? Maybe I could try to sell them on eBay or even donate them to somewhere where they would add value to someone else's life? Does anyone know of any good places that would accept unloved crafty stash? Anyhow, I warmly recommend the podcast and also the Minimalism documentary on Netflix. It certainly gave me lots to think about. Maybe I could finally get rid of all my DVDs (I haven't watched a single one of them during the four years we have lived in this house, still I have loads and loads). I'm also really keen on doing a capsule warderobe type of thing. To be fair, I kind of already do that as I only use a small subset of all the clothes I own, so why do I hang on to clothes I never wear "just because"? I would love to hear your thoughts! One side note about the documentary - seems like a lot of minimalists are extremely good looking men. Just saying...

Talking about minimalism, today's crafty project turned out to be rather minimalist also. I was inspired by the current Tag You're It challenge and the colour challenge over at Color Throwdown. I think this tag would be perfect with a Starbucks or Costa gift card as a thank you for something or other. I just adore the cute little Lawn Fawn mug of hot chocolate with marshmallows (again, going off on a tangent, I bought some raspberry white hot chocolate last weekend, and it's soooo good!). And that adorable little cupcake. Who could resist. Now I'm actually craving hot chocolate and cupcakes. Dang.

Card: 250 gsm white card
Stamps: Lawn Fawn Love You a Latte, Baked With Love and matching dies
Ink and colouring: Stampin' Up Early Espresso, Tsukineko Memento Tuxedo Black, Copics
Other: Lawn Fawn Tag You're It dies, Let's Polka in the Dark patterned paper, ribbon and twine from my stash

Warm Wishes in Red

What's your favourite hot winter drink? As much as I like a good cup of coffee, I have to admit my favourite is hot chocolate. With full fat milk and lots of good quality hot chocolate. Maybe a marshmallow or two as well. Now I'm really starting to crave a hot cuppa... maybe a slice of cake too? Or a cookie? 

The first inspiration for today's card was the wintery inspiration image and sketch over at Fusion Card Challenge. I was inspired by the colour scheme, the red mugs and the snow. It's also Fusion's third birthday, Happy Birthday Fusion and thank you for all the inspiration so far and here's to many more. The DT has as usual provided incredible inspiration and there are some stellar guest designers as well, so worth hopping over to see. The background was inspired by the All Over Stamping challenge over at Just Us Girls. I'm also linking up over at Time Out where the theme is Winter (this is my second card for the challenge, and again I chose not to take the optional twist of white on white).

Card: 250 gsm white card, Hobbycraft 160 gsm white card, scrap of red car, 300 gsm Daler&Rowney watercolour paper

Stamps: Lawn Fawn Love You a Latte and matching dies, Winter Alpaca and Toboggan Together

Ink and colouring: Tsukineko Versafine Onyx Black, Stampin' Up Soft Sky, Gansai Tambi watercolours

Other: Lawn Fawn Stitched Circle nesting dies, Lawn Fawn Let's Polka Mon Amie paper

Warm Christmas Wishes

I had a huge bunch of Lawn Fawn stash on backorder and then they all arrived all at once. The weird thing is that my work has been taking everything out of me lately, so I haven't been able to create anything - and all that stash has just been hanging around on my desk. That is, until I saw the inspiration images over at Curtain Call and House of Cards. I knew exactly what I wanted to create based on the sketch over at Just Add Ink. I'm also linking up over at CAS on Sunday where the theme is Christmas and Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge where Anything Goes.

Card: 250 gsm white card

Stamps: Lawn Fawn Argyle Backdrops, Holiday Party Animal, Love You a Latte and matching dies

Paper: Lawn Fawn Perfectly Plaid Christmas, Let's Bokeh in the Snow

Ink and Colouring: Tsukineko Memento Tuxedo Black, Copics

Other: Lawn Fawn Scalloped Rectangle Stackables