A.A. Milne is best known for writing Winnie the Pooh, but he also wrote several books of rhyme. This rhyme was first published in his When We Were Very Young collection in 1924. It was then published in a double collection, along with And Now We Are Six, in 1959 called The World of Christopher Robin. I still have my 1975 copy of the book.
It was difficult to know what to do for this challenge, my first thought was a Christmas staircase that I have a cutting die for, but someone else created a similar design. Then is discovered a quote by Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919), "Believe you can and you're halfway there." It's a very clever quote and fits well with the rhyme.
I found a cut file on Cricut Design Space, created by a user called Whizz Art and Craft and made this framed quote;
The lettering is cut on my Cricut Explore 4 in glitter card and mounted on card with crystal and fabric flowers added, then framed with a white mount in a black frame.
Due to issues with my webhosting, my website is moving, but the address will still be www.craftyjanes.co.uk. My craftyjane's email will change at some point.
I changed the colours to match the colour theme and cut on mixed card stock, including glitter card, on my Cricut Explore 4. The layered image is then mounted on yellow paper and a white card. The contents of the cauldron and the cats eyes and whiskers are glow in the dark card.
November's challenge will be the last in the current format, big changes are coming up on Outlawz in the new year.
The Sunday song and rhyme challenge was chosen by me this month. When I chose it last December I had in mind that it would be a time of change for us with Emily hopefully going to University and I had ideas in my head, which fast forward nine months had still not got made. It's been an overwhelming year, with many ups and downs. Now we have less than two weeks until Emily moves and it's getting harder by the minute. I don't know how I will survive the next two weeks let alone the three years she is away.
I remember the song One More Step Along the World I Go from primary school assemblies, we had it as a wedding hymn and at Emily's naming and I want it at my funeral.
For those of you who don't know or remember the song here it is;
The move to University is a big event and definitely a significant step along the world, literally for some. Emily is only moving 40 miles, but she knows of people coming from the US and the Seychelles. I can't imagine moving that far, especially at only 18, but it will be a great experience for the international students and the home students who get to mix with them. As a parent I feel as if I am on the journey too, in spirit and I am sure we will be updated with experiences and problems along the way.
So here is my card;
In my head it looked more impressive, but I do like it, I think!
The world and his suitcase it cut on Cricut Explore using a Cricut cut file, the map is an image bought on Etsy from EDL printable designs. Wording is created, written and cut on Cricut Explore, the font is called baby steps.
I am having issues with my website hosting at the moment so blog will be moved to Blogger for now.
Wow I can't believe it is now September, where did the summer go?
We had many plans for the Summer, but it all seems to have chaotically passed us by. Now we are counting down to my daughter moving to University. My craft space is full of her stuff and I don't know if I am coming or going.
Anyway on to the September colour challenge. It is my choice this month. The choices were made in December 2024 so that we can be organised. So of course I was rushing last minute as ever! I had thought about it well in advance and thought I had a plan, but it didn't work when I tried it, so I had to think up a plan B, then a plan C! So much for trying to be organised.
This is the image I gave everyone to take inspiration from.
The first issue was actually finding enough shades of orange. I have drawers and drawers of card, but never seem to have what I need for a project and for some reason there is not a lot of orange card around. There will probably be more now we are going into Autumn and people are making things for Autumn and Halloween. Orange is my favourite colour and it does work well for craft things.
The next issue was that I thought it would work better to display array of colours if I made a framed item rather than a card which is restricted by size.
This is what I came up with
The top photo is in the frame and bottom one out of frame as it photographs better.
The background is made up of 1 inch wide strips of card, overlapping to form a triangle, then the four triangles are spliced together. It took a little bit of working out how to manage the areas where the edges meet and then the centre. It is a bit like some of the techniques I have used in quilting. The letters are cut in black on my Gemini die cutter.
I am currently having issues with my website and blog so have reverted to Blogger until I can get sorted.
Spike Milligan (1918-2002) was well know for his crazy comedy and nonsense rhymes. Ironically he also suffered from severe depression.
For this rhyme I decided I would focus on one of the instruments mentioned and settled on guitar as I had a stitched card pattern that I could use, so went with the line my Brother plays guitar.
The pattern used is from Stitching cards, a beaded pattern, which I love making. The beads are tiny and get dropped all over, I’ll be finding them for weeks. The background paper is printed from my library of papers. The wording is drawn on the Cricut Joy Extra using LD Music font.
The Tuesday Colour challenge for June is based on this image
The image reminded me of these beach huts at Scarborough in North Yorkshire
Straight away I knew I had some stitching thread with those colours combined. I have a stitched pattern I have used before and considered using, it has a palm tree and a deckchair and I thought I could do the deckchair in the stripes, but then I saw a beach hut pattern at Form-a-lines stitched in the colours, perfect for this challenge.
I stitched the image with Trimits Jester metallic embroidery thread, the mounted on pink card (my last sheet), with yellow and blue backing. I couldn’t decide whether to add wording, like life’s a beach or I do like to be beside the seaside, but decided to leave it blank as wording would be easy to add if required.
Looking forward to the next challenge, it’s an interesting one.
The Sunday song and rhyme challenge for June 9th is based on the rhyme Where are the Fairies,
Written in the early 20th century by Cicely Mary Barker, who was unable to attend school due to epilepsy. She wrote the rhymes and did the illustrations. Fairies were popular at this time, due to Queen Mary having a known interest in Fairy art.
I chose the final lines “Where there are flowers, There fairies are”. Using and image drown with my Cricut Joy Extra. Mounted on floral green backing paper and then mounted on square card.
This and other similar designs are available to buy from me.
The song I have chosen for Sunday Song and Rhyme challenge for 12 to 25th May is Winner Takes It All by Abba. The song was released in 1980.
I don’t wanna talk About things we’ve gone through Though it’s hurting me Now it’s history
I’ve played all my cards And that’s what you’ve done too Nothing more to say No more ace to play
The winner takes it all The loser’s standing small Beside the victory That’s her destiny
I was in your arms Thinking I belonged there I figured it made sense Building me a fence
Building me a home Thinking I’d be strong there But I was a fool Playing by the rules
The gods may throw a dice Their minds as cold as ice And someone way down here Loses someone dear
The winner takes it all (takes it all) The loser has to fall (has to fall) It’s simple and it’s plain (it’s so plain) Why should I complain? (Why complain?)
But tell me, does she kiss Like I used to kiss you? Does it feel the same When she calls your name?
Somewhere deep inside You must know I miss you But what can I say? Rules must be obeyed
The judges will decide (will decide) The likes of me abide (me abide) Spectators of the show (of the show) Always staying low (staying low)
The game is on again (on again) A lover or a friend (or a friend) A big thing or a small (big or small) The winner takes it all (takes it all)
I don’t wanna talk If it makes you feel sad And I understand You’ve come to shake my hand
I apologize If it makes you feel bad Seeing me so tense No self-confidence But you see
The winner takes it all The winner takes it all
So the winner takes it all And the loser has to fall Throw the dice, cold as ice Way down here, someone dear Takes it all, has to fall And it’s plain, why complain?
It is one of my favourite Abba songs, but also one of the saddest. It is thought that the song was based on the real-life breakup between ABBA members Björn Ulvaeus and Agnetha Fältskog.
It isn’t easy to represent a song in a card, but I chose to be inspired by the references to gambling and game play. In particular the lines “I’ve played all my cards,” “No more ace to play,” “The gods may throw a dice” and “The game is on again.”
I used an image of playing cards, dice and gambling chips from Cricut, drawn and cut on my Cricut Joy Extra, layered with gold card (gold winner) and backing paper designed by Dot Creative Clipart.
It will be interesting to see how other interpret this song, I had other ideas, but am pleased with how this one has turned out.
Just as I have finished the blog Winner Takes it All played on the radio!!
Well what says black and white with stripes more than a zebra? Maybe not very imaginative?
I created my card with the zebra pattern from Stitching Cards Wild Animal pack, I have had the patterns for a while and not used the zebra before. I love the cheeky image and it reminds me of donkey from the Shrek movie. It could easily be made without the stripes and be a donkey.
The background is Adorable Scorable creatures great and small, an unusual collection of animals and I have been waiting for an opportunity to use some of them. The yellow gives me the extra colour required for the challenge.
It has been a fun card to make and I haven't made a stitched card for a while.
The latest Sunday Song and Rhyme challenge is based on the poem All the world's alive again by Jennifer Gunner
It is a pretty spring poem and I chose to focus on two of the lines; A rabbit hops it gentle step and White blossoms are in bloom.
Using a Sweet Dixie rabbit die with white flowers mounted on green vellum and then on a printed background of white blossom designed by Old Market. The wording Hoppy Birthday was created with my Cricut Joy using a Cricut font called blossom. Finally finished with googly eyes and a pompom tail.
This challenge runs form 28th April until 11th May. Spring runs from 20th March to 20th June, though those of us in the UK have no seen much evidence of it yet!
This month sees me on the design team in another Outlawz group challenge, Tuesday colour. The challenge changes monthly and always has a colour theme. For April the theme is a colour wheel.
The item created must use either 2 cool colours from top of wheel and 1 warm from bottom, or vice versa. I chose to use yellow, orange and green. I used a 6 layer mandala die and alternated the colours and mounted on a backing paper using same colours. The die is an Apple Blossom die
I did actually create two cards, but this was my favourite to share for the challenge inspiration.
This is the other one, which reminds me of Leeds United colours and may appeal to fans. I live in Leeds, but do not follow the team. This is made with another Apple Blossom die
The Outlawz challenge for this fortnight is Easter themed using the rhyme Happy Easter by Bill Hoeneveld
I used a Cricut image from Crafty Mama Studios. It has 12 layers to cut and stick together so is quite time consuming, it is also quite thick on the front of a card so not ideal for posting. Mounted on Easter themed backing paper, but could easily work as a stand alone card too.
I did make some other Easter cards, but as usual it was very last minute getting them made and sent off, so I forgot to take pictures! Except for this one, which is another Cricut image from Digital Gems, drawn and cut on the Cricut Joy and mounted on flowery backing paper.
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.
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.
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.
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
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. TheOutlawzchallenge 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.
The currentOutlawzchallenge 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.
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
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