PLAYING CONKERS

RULES OF THE GAME

If a player misses hitting his/her opponents conker they are allowed 2 more goes.
If the strings get all tangled, the first player to call "strings" gets another go.
If a player hits his/her opponents conker in such a way that it completes a whole circle after being hit (this is called ‘around the world’ that player gets another go.
If a player drops his conker, or it is knocked out of his hand the other player can shout 'stamps' and jump on it; but should its owner first cry 'no stamps' then the conker, hopefully, remains intact.
The game goes on in turns until one or other of the two conkers is completely destroyed.

Another game sadly now banned in most schools in the UK.
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8"X 3 1/2" card covered in my "Conkers" Paper (Included in download below)
I then covered the bottom half in green Gingham vellum rounded off the corners and inked around the whole card first with Chestnut Brown and then Black ink pads.

I then applied a piece of ribbon (a Chestnut Brown colour - but Black or Dark Green looked good too) to cover the vellum edge.

After cutting out the picture I run a Black felt tip pen around it's edge to hide any White still showing.
I mounted the picture using foam pads, printed off "Remember when" on my computer, mounted it on black card and used foam pads to attached this too.

DOWNLOAD "PLAYING CONKERS" PDF FILE HERE.

SCHOOL GIRL GAMES

As a kid growing up in the 1960s-70s I loved playing all the usual boys games, football, rugby, run outs, British Bulldog, Marbles, climbing trees, Knock down Ginger ... etc.

But I was always fascinated when the girls at school sang little rhymes (usually dirty ones) as they skipped in groups or played "ball" against the school walls.

Fab was ill yesterday I had a bit of time on my hands so I used some sketches I had drawn recently and made some cards from them.

I used 5"X7" white card for both.

The "Skipping" card was backed with Burgundy paper, over laid with a strip of green and pink patterned paper and edged top and bottom with white card cut with decorative scissors.

I then printed out on pink card one of the rhymes the girls would sing (the "clean" version of course) while skipping, then cut the base of it with the same scissors this was then attached to the card and edged with thin pale green and burgundy ribbon.

I decoupaged the picture to give it a bit of dimension and backed it with a white oval cut with the same scissors before using foam pads to adhere it.

Two "Kanban" pearls were backed with the same punched burgundy paper and glued in place.


For the "Leap frog" card I first decoupaged the girls (a bit fiddly at first but easier as the parts get smaller)

I punched the lace edge then backed the card with the same green and pink paper as in the card above leaving some of the white card showing on the right, the edge was covered with a very thin green ribbon.

A thicker piece of Ribbon (luckily the same hue) was added to the "center" of the paper and topped with the decoupage.

Finishing touches were a few die cut flowers around the topper, a few pink gems and a strip of pink paper inside the card to show off the lace.


CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD - coloured and uncoloured "Leap frog, Skippers and Marbles"

Vince x

MARBLE PLAYERS

I used to love playing Marbles as a kid, I was quite a dab hand at it too and had a HUGE bag of marbles that had all sorts of silly names. You "had to" use the "lingo" while playing and use equal or slightly better quality Marbles to the ones you were trying to win.

This is my little homage 5"X7" card to all men of a certain age that remember playing this game as a kid.

The card was covered in my Marble paper (Included on the download) and covered with a strip of Sage green card that had been run through a "ribber" and backed with black card.

I then used a template to cut out the words, aged them with a brown ink pad and backed them with black card.

After backing the picture and foam padding it to left of the card , I then added the words and dotted some clear round gel stickers to some of the marbles to give it a bit of interest.

I think this is my favourite card so far (it bought back a lot of fond memories for me)

I have a few ideas for more of these type of cards which I'll try to get done in the near future.

CLICK HERE to download "Marble Players" PDF file.

Don't Dream It - Be It

This card I did a while ago using a random butterfly stamp and a "House Mouse" Halloween stamp all mounted on foam pads. it's a pretty basic layout but I do like simple cards. I tried to keep it all the same hue.

It was made it as an inspirational card for our little Niece.

"HELLO" Little Monster

My first attempt at using "Coloursoft" pencils, Fab uses them often but I usually prefer water colour pencils (each to his own) Still it didn't come out too bad.

The snail and it's trail are high lighted with "stardust" Sakura pen (but you can't tell from this picture) and the ribbon looks much brighter here than it really is.
The paper is from "Hot off the Press" Birthday pad and edged with a blue ink pad.


To download 6 uncoloured "Little monsters" click on the link below.

DOWNLOAD "LITTLE MONSTERS" HERE

vince x

A VERY QUICK CARD - THE GARDENER

I wanted to do a birthday card for a friend of ours who is a "no fuss" sort of guy, and a keen gardener to boot.
I didn't have much time as he and his wife were coming over that night, so I drew this funny little man dressed in his straw hat and gardening apron , printed him on white card and decoupaged him.

I covered a 6X6 card with chocolate brown card then embossed a slightly smaller piece of mid blue (white core) which I had embossed on one side and sanded to show the white core.
A piece of "Hot Off The Press" Dotty paper was matted with brown then I used a CLEAR Sakura pen to highlight the dots.
I glued this to the left hand side of the card and stuck on the "Gardener", I then stuck small plastic flowers onto the stems using foam pads.
The Happy Birthday was printed and backed with the same brown as the rest of the card.

I wouldn't usually use flowers on a man's card but he IS a gardener so it was either that or vegetables.

Download the "GARDENER" decoupage here

Vince x

Love Birds Card

I've been experimenting with Fab's new "Personal impressions" stamps.
Fab stuck on the "Love" bling (but ... Hhhmmm I'm not sure now )

Fairy Monster Card

I printed off my "Fairly Fairy Monster" onto white card and cut corners with corner punch, stuck it to silver Mirror card and cut the corners again.
I then went over the wand and wings with a "Stardust" Sakura pen (which doesn't show well in the photo)

The card itself was covered with pastel squared K&Co paper, I then tied a loose knot in a length of matching pink ribbon adding a small piece of yellow ribbon into the knot before tightening it.
I glued the ribbon on. stamped and die cut the message, using Fab's fantastic "Stamping up" punches.

Then die cut stars of all sizes in pink and yellow dotting them out all over he card.

Would make a good card for any little fairy princess that can be a bit of a monster sometimes !

Download the "Fairly Fairy"  Coloured & Uncoloured

Vince x

Strips Scraps Card

A quick and effective way to use up all those spare bits of paper you have left that are too precious to throw away also a great plain card for a man.
Black 7 1/2" X 4 1/2" card. strips of spare paper any thickness you like and a white font rub on message (or as in this case a stick on)

I think the bright colours on the plain black background are very eye catching.

HELLO

I was BORED ! so sketched and coloured a few of these little monsters thinking they might make a cute card.

This is a quick and easy card I made today as an example, the "black" jagged edge is actually silver mirror card ( but that never scans well does it )
Can't wait till Fab's new corner Chomper comes, our one never cuts corners properly.

I've added PDF files of the coloured and uncoloured monster in case anyone wants to print and use him/her.

I'll upload some more of the little monsters later.

Download the "Hello" Uncoloured Monster PDF file here
Download the "Hello" Coloured Monster PDF file here

Vince x

INSIDE CARD SAYS - "But at least I'm faithful"

I think the butterfly card was made by "Kanban"(?) the footprints ("House-Mouse") were stamped on white card and backed with green.
The butterflies were stamped and coloured with water colours and mounted with foam pads as was the "House Mouse" Halloween stamp.
As the antennae on the butterflies were so fiddly I just drew them in afterwards with a fine tipped black pen.

Owl's it going

As Owl's are the bird du jour I thought I'd have a go at an Owl card, this was the result.
This was my first attempt at braying (behind the owl) and I didn't have a scolloped edged oval so I had to cut one from black card freehand which I think gives it a more "handmade" look.
The Owl and branch stamp are from "The Angel Company" and although you can't see it from this picture are mounted on foam pads.

The "Owl's it going?" stamp is also from "The Angel Company".
It went a bit off center when I stamped it ... but hey, no-ones perfect!

Animal Crackers Card

I wanted to make an "old fashioned" card for my brother's birthday.

like a 1930s card, rather plain, simple and aged. ( just like me - tee hee )
I found some old children's paper with a great animal print but couldn't enlarge the image because it was saved (yonks ago) at a low resolution.

So I copied the animals I needed and made them into a topper.
I then printed out the whole sheet and dabbed a soggy teabag over it all and left it to dry.(making sure NOT to leave any white paper showing through the design)
When dry I cut and glued the backing sheet to a 4"X 8" card then edged with a brown ink pad.
Using wavy decorative edged scissors I cut a thin strip of muted red cardstock top and bottom and backed it with brown card also cut with the scissors so that a thin border of brown showed top and bottom, This was then glued along the center of the card.

Two more thin strips of cut muted red cardstock were added near to the top and bottom of the card with the wavy edge facing inwards.
The easiest way to get them the same is to cut the wavy edge first then trim the straight edges to equal sizes

I left a thin border on the toppers and mounted them on Bronze cardstock, drew round the animals black outline with a CLEAR Sakura pen then positioned the toppers using thick foam pads.

Download the PDF file Animal Cracker

Vince x

Fairy Dance Card

This is my first blog, I'll be posting cards and other stuff I made as I go along. Come back and check every so often, thanks for following this blog. I hope this will give you ideas for your own crafting. Hugs Vince !

The cards was made using Smarty Pants stamps and the fairies were handcut by myself from black cardstock. Edges were inked.