Three Cards for St Patrick's Day

Happy St Patrick's Day! Again this year it's a very different St Patrick's Day here without the usual parades and celebrations. But we'll certainly enjoy the day off work and school anyway and have our own fun at home.

Today I just have a few more St Patrick's Day cards that I made this year.

The first card came together really quickly using the flip it die. The shamrock, made from hearts, was my way of using up a background that I made using acrylic paints. I didn't like the background I had created with the paints but it looked better cut into smaller pieces. The same background was also used for the shamrock on my third card.

Dies - Scallop Edge Circle Die Flip It (The Stamps of Life) & Heart Die, Embossing Folder - Shamrocks (Darice)

For the second card I made a background of patterned scraps and layered the squares on foam pads for some dimension. The little shamrock was again make using a heart die.

Dies - Scallop Squares (M&C Boutique The Works), heart die, Sentiment Stamp - Celebrate Everyday (Hero Arts)

For the third card I have the shamrock, cut out from the acrylic paint background I mentioned previously, as my focal point on the embossed background. I added the cross cut out of gold mirror card to celebrate St Patrick.

Dies - Framelits Hearts (Sizzix), Crosses Two (Spellbinders), Labels 10 (Spellbinders), Embossing Folder - Shamrocks (Darice), Stamp - Celebrate Everyday (Hero Arts)

It's such a beautiful, sunny day here today so I'm finally going to get a chance to enjoy pottering around and tidying up and getting things ready in the garden. Hope you enjoy your day whatever you do!

Happy St Patrick's Day

Happy St Patrick's Day from the Emerald Isle! I'm just popping in to post a card I sent to my good friend Linda for St Patrick's Day.

Last year Linda sent me some gorgeous shamrock die cuts so I wanted to use one on my card for her. I applied ink to a cream shamrock, added some lovely shimmery clear Wink of Stella and finished the shamrock off with a green gem.



Then I die cut a couple of flourishes from gold glitter card using a die from the beautiful Celtic Flourish set by Docrafts. The sentiment was stamped using the same ink I'd applied to the shamrock.

Dies - Fancy Shamrock (Impression Obsession) and Celtic Flourish (Docrafts)
Stamp - Celebrate Everyday (Hero Arts)

I'm submitting the card into Simon Says Stamp's Bit O' Green challenge.

Have a look here to see the fabulous St Patrick's Day card I received from Linda. Thanks again, Linda :) :)

St Patrick's Day is a public holiday here so no work or school for us today. We're hoping to spend a fair bit of our long weekend surrounded by green, including visiting one of our favourite places - Glendalough.

Hope you have a fun and relaxing weekend :)

Happy St Patrick's Day

Happy St Patrick's Day! I'm just popping in to post a quick St Patrick's Day card that I made this morning - talk about leaving it till the last minute!

Every St Patrick's Day I seem to make cards focusing on shamrocks, but this year I was thinking of some friends who just loved seeing lots of sheep when they were on holidays here in Ireland.

Moll's Gap, Co Kerry

I remember in particular one friend from Germany who got us to stop the car for photos nearly every time we came across sheep in the Wicklow Mountains. Needless to say there were a lot of stops that day! Of course I couldn't resist adding a little shamrock (made from mini punched hearts) to the card too:)



Stamps (Hero Arts) Missing You & Celebrate Everyday

Now it's back to the festivities for me:) Hope you have a fun St Patrick's Day!

Ardmore Beach, Co Waterford

Killarney, Co Kerry

Cliffs of Moher, Co Clare

Cliffs of Moher, Co Clare

Happy St Patrick's Day!

Happy St Patrick's Day! It's funny even though I'm Irish, I never made a St Patrick's Day card until I joined the Hero Arts Group over on Flickr.

As I don't have stamps of rainbows, crocks of gold, leprechauns etc., I inevitably end up making a card with a shamrock formed from hearts. This year I used one of my older Hero Arts stamps (Ancient Motif) as the pattern reminds me of carvings and floor tiles in some of the old monasteries and churches here in Ireland.



Stamps (Hero Arts) - Ancient Motif & Celebrate Everyday

The embossing folder I used for the background is an Xcut one by Docrafts called Swirls. Once the panel was embossed, I stamped the sentiment in mowed lawn distress ink.

Next it was on to making the shamrock. I stamped the Ancient Motif image using mowed lawn distress ink, die cut the hearts and also cut out a stem for the shamrock. Then I lightly applied some more of the same ink to my pieces.

After curling up the hearts at the edges, I stuck them to the card with foam pads. A little green heart gem was added to finish. I'm submitting this card into Simon Says Stamp's Lucky Challenge and the Die Cut Divas' Let's Emboss It Challenge.

After a very wet and windy winter, it finally feels like spring has sprung. We've mainly had lovely weather this week with temperatures even reaching the dizzying heights of 15C (59F);) It's great to see buds beginning to form on the trees and, of course, I just love the burst of sunshine that the daffodils have brought to the garden.

I can't wait for the last of the nighttime frosts to be finished with so we can plant some annuals out in the garden.

Toby recently had a hair cut and all his curls have disappeared - he looks like a little puppy again!

Anyway with it being St Patrick's Day and a bank holiday here, we're all off work/school and looking forward to a fun day ahead. Here's a photo of Toby ready to celebrate the day!

Hope you have a fun St Patrick's Day wherever you are:)

Carving possibly of St Patrick in the Cathedral at the Rock of Cashel

Double Rainbow Shamrock

Happy St Patrick's Day! This morning (I know I'm very late!), I decided to make a St Patrick's Day card to celebrate the day that's in it.

Of all the symbols associated with Ireland I think my favourite has to be the shamrock, because of how pretty it looks and the story of it and St Patrick. So I thought I'd do something a little different with the shamrock and play on another symbol associated with St Patrick's Day - rainbows.



Stamps (Hero Arts) - Magical Background & Celebrate Everyday

To make the shamrock I took scraps in a rainbow of colours and cut the bigger hearts using my Silhouette Cameo and punched out the smaller hearts. Then I layered them up and added some stitching. As I can't draw to save my life, I used the outline of one of the bigger hearts to make the stem of the shamrock. Then it was just a matter of stamping the sentiment and adding a background stamp.



After looking through my stamps, I picked the Magical Background stamp as it reminds me of the circular patterns often found carved into stone in historical places here including Newgrange, Knowth and Dowth in the Boyne Valley.



Carved stone at Knowth

The Tuesday Trigger: Elegant Emerald over at Moxie Fab World inspired the use of a number of different shades of green on the card and I added the layers and layers of hearts to represent the ruffles.



I'm also submitting the card into the Happy St Patrick's Day Challenge at Whimsical Designs.

Yikes I just looked out the window and it looks like we might have a bit of white to add to the green today - it's snowing lightly! Well I'm off to enjoy the day. Hope you have a fun St Patrick's Day!

Hugs and Kisses on St Patrick's Day

Well since it’s St Patrick’s Day and we haven't exactly had parade weather today here in Ireland, with more showers than sunny spells, I thought I’d grab some inky time and make a St Patrick’s Day card.



Stamps (Hero Arts) - Four Hearts and Celebrate Everyday

To make the shamrock, I white embossed the hearts and applied shabby shutters and tumbled glass distress ink. Since St Patrick is reputed to have explained the Holy Trinity by using a shamrock, I thought I’d add a little chiffon ribbon cross to the card by layering two bows. I topped this with a gem blossom (thanks again, Linda!) and single gem. I'm submitting this card into the Simon Says Stamp A Bit o' Green Challenge and the Pile It On #11 Challenge - St. Patrick's Day and/or Shades of Green.

Hope you're having a wonderful St Patrick's Day and if you celebrate it wherever you are I’d love to hear what you get up to! I'll just finish up with some photos of my favourite places in Ireland.