Sunday, March 17, 2024

The Swing

The Outlawz Song and Rhyme challenge for 17th March, is based on the poem The Swing by Robert Louis Stevenson

How do you like to go up in a swing,
Up in the air so blue?
Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing
Ever a child can do!

Up in the air and over the wall,
Till I can see so wide,
Rivers and trees and cattle and all
Over the countryside—

Till I look down on the garden green,
Down on the roof so brown—
Up in the air I go flying again,
Up in the air and down!

The poem was written in the 1880's and is included in A Child's Garden of Verses (1885)

I choose to illustrate the first two lines with my card. I used the Tattered Lace die Summer Swing, cut several times to add coloured layers, with crystal flowers added too, mounted on a sky background from Crafts U Print.



I used another of Louis Stevenson's poems last year in my challenge, see Bedtime

The card also reminds me a bit of this picture stitched by my Grandma when she was 13, it now hangs on my bedroom wall.

Sunday, February 18, 2024

Leap Year

 The Sunday song and rhyme challenge poem for this time is chosen by me. This year is a leap year, so at the end of this month we get an extra day.

“Leap years are years where an extra day is added to the end of the shortest month, February. This so-called intercalary day, February 29, is commonly referred to as leap day.

Leap years have 366 days instead of the usual 365 days and occur almost every four years.” (https://www.timeanddate.com/date/leapyear.html)

I came across this rhyme by Brian Bilston, in his book Days Like These which rings very true;

Bilston is a modern poet born in 1970 and his rhymes are very relatable.

I chose this particular rhyme as my challenge falls over Feb 29th, I thought it very clever and so true, a whole 24 hours extra, it feels like we should be able to do so much with that time, but in fact it just becomes another day and we don’t feel any benefit to it.

When it actually came to creating something with a link to the rhyme I realised it was going to be harder than I had thought! I thought about a canoe, an Oscar, a Cello, but ended up taking the relatively easy option and using Bees.

The pattern is from Stitching cards, mounted on black card on Adorable Scorable Bee card depicting bees, honey comb and flowers.

My next challenge in mid May so already trying to find inspiration, so many songs and rhymes to chose from.

Friday, February 09, 2024

Snowdrops

 The Outlawz Sunday song and rhyme challenge starting February 4th is To the Thawing Wind, by appropriately named Robert Frost, published in 1913;

Come with rain, O loud Southwester!
Bring the singer, bring the nester;
Give the buried flower a dream;
Make the settled snowbank steam;
Find the brown beneath the white;
But whate’er you do tonight,
Bathe my window, make it flow,
Melt it as the ice will go;
Melt the glass and leave the sticks
Like a hermit’s crucifix;
Burst into my narrow stall;
Swing the picture on the wall;
Run the rattling pages o’er;
Scatter poems on the floor;
Turn the poet out of door.

On first reading the poem I thought of the snowdrops, poking through thawing snow inspired by the line “Give the buried flower a dream”, thawing snow is often accompanied by rain as in the the line “Come with rain” and you slowly begin to see the ground beneath the snow as in “Find the brown beneath the white” and “Melt the glass and leave the sticks.” I think this is more a memory of winters and snow when I was younger. We get very little snow now and what we get seems to come and go so fast. We has the first snow of winter yesterday and it has all gone by this morning.

In the card I tried to represent the wind and rain with the blue and grey background in a swirling pattern, with the paper behind that showing emerging brown and sticks. The snowdrop being the emerging flower. I always worry that I have misunderstood the rhyme, but as it is an interpretation, I believe there is no right or wrong and it is interesting to see how others interpret the same rhyme.

The snowdrop was cut on my Cricut Joy Extra, the wind and rain are printed papers, cut with a die and mounted on flower backing paper.

I have just joined another Outlawz challenge group and will be part of the design team for Tuesday colour from beginning of March. I enjoy making cards to a theme, so will be interesting to be part of the colour group.

The cards I make for these challenges are available to buy via my Facebook page

Thursday, November 30, 2023

Halloween

 Card for Outlawz No Stamp Challenge

Created using a printed background paper, source unknown. Wording and pumpkins created and drawn with Cricut Joy.

Colours of Fall

Wording created and drawn with Cricut Joy, mounted on background from Crafts u print

Thursday, November 02, 2023

Laughter is the best medicine

 Laughter is the best medicine, it is thought this quote originally came from the Bible, Proverbs 17 – 22. Many others have said similar things. Anyway I digress. The Outlawz challenge for Oct 29th is the rhyme/song Kookaburra.

Kookaburra sits on the old gum tree,
Merry merry king of the bush is he.
Laugh, Kookaburra, laugh, Kookaburra,
Gay your life must be!

Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree
Eating all the gumdrops he can see
Stop, Kookaburra, Stop, Kookaburra
Leave some there for me.

Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree,
Counting all the monkeys he can see
Stop, Kookaburra, Stop, Kookaburra,
That’s no monkey, that’s me.

The rhyme originates in Australia and was written in 1932. In the Uk we don’t have Kookaburras as they are only found in Australia and New Guinea. The closest we have in the UK is a Kingfisher. I toyed with making a card using a Kingfisher, but then found a great Kookaburra cut file at Craft with Sarah and knew I had to use it. It is cut using Cricut and has 26 layers! Having constructed the Kookaburra I decided it did not need much else, so just used a blue backing and added words “Hope your day is full of laughter” written on the Cricut. It was quite time consuming, but I love the finished card.

Tuesday, October 17, 2023

Sparkly wedding

 The current Outlawz challenge is based on a poem by Edgar Allen Poe called Eulalie a Song, it was first published in 1845. It is slightly different wording to the poem Eulalie.

I DWELT alone

In a world of moan,

And my soul was a stagnant tide,

Till the fair and gentle Eulalie became my blushing bride —

Till the yellow-haired young Eulalie became my smiling bride.

Ah, less — less bright

The stars of the night

Than the eyes of the radiant girl!

And never a flake

That the vapour can make

With the moon-tints of purple and pearl,

Can vie with the modest Eulalie’s most unregarded curl —

Can compare with the bright-eyed Eulalie’s most humble and careless curl.

Now Doubt — now Pain

Come never again,

For her soul gives me sigh for sigh,

And all day long

Shines, bright and strong,

Astarté within the sky,

While ever to her dear Eulalie upturns her matron eye —

While ever to her young Eulalie upturns her violet eye.

As with many poems it feels like it is written in a foreign language as it is not really the style we speak or write now. A quick google search leads to many analyses of the poem.

For my card inspiration I chose to go with “With the moon-tints of purple and pearl,” and “smiling bride” I printed a purple and pearl coloured moon and cut with a circular die, then used a sparkly purply card to cut out a bride and groom on my Cricut. Keeping with the purple theme as Violet is also mentioned in the last line, I used a purple circle and purple card with backing paper with purple flowers. Added the greeting Bride & Groom Congratulations

Card is available to purchase from me