Handmade – H is for Holly

My outstanding occasion was one of my best friends birthday. I made Sophia this crazy cat card as she has a couple of fur babies herself and I know she would appreciate it. I thought I would kill two birds with one stone and make it my entry for the Lawn Fawnatics third challenge

To make my card I used the new meow you doin’ stamp and matching die set as well as the year two stamp and die set.

I started by stamping out all of my elements using memento black ink onto my Neenah white card stock including all the cats and there accessories. From the year two set I stamped out multiple copies of the presents and party hats.

I coloured the cats and there accessories according to cats both Sophia and I have had using my trusty NUVO alcohol markers. Then using there respective dies cut the images out using my bigshot.

I created the background by cutting a piece of flowery wrapping paper to the size of the card and attached it to the front face. I decided I wanted this to be the border so for my main party scene. I cut out a slightly smaller piece of card stock. Using a low tack tape I then marked off section of the bottom and blended together distress ink colours to form a rainbow band. I sprinkled this with water droplets to give a nice blotchy effect. I repeated this pattern for the flap of the envelope and added some paw prints to the top so it looked like a cat walked across it.

I then assembled the card by arranging the elements into a cat party scene adding them to the front of the rainbow bordered card piece using 3D foam tape. I stamped the sentiment in the colourful border using archival black ink and added a few paw prints and hearts as finishing touches before adding the scene to the card face. inside the card I stamped the sentiment wishing you a pawsome day! I really hope she likes it.

Don’t forget to check out my previous challenge posts here

Till next time make something with love

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Baking

Horse Cake

April 22, 2017April 30, 2017 hisforhollyblog

I’m horsey mad I had them growing up and have always been around them, so naturally I have a lot of horsey mad friends too. I Made this cake for one of them.

I found a recipe for a white chocolate and raspberry cake on the BBC good food website which I really wanted to try out so I doubled the mixture in order to make 2 sheet cakes. I also increased the mixture for the white chocolate ganache and instead of using it to sandwich the cakes, I crumb coated the whole cake with it after carving the shape. I decided to use seedless raspberry jam as the central filling to give an extra raspberry kick.

I cut out the shape of the horses eat free hand using the picture of my horse as a reference for the shape of its head. I modelled the colouring and markings of the horse and the head collar on cake recipients horse. So I mixed a brownie orange fondant and used that to cover the ganache covered cake. I used the same coloured fondant to make strips of hair by cutting 2/3rds the way up the strips to make a fringe which I attached to the head and neck. her horse has a white stripe which is slightly wonky around one eye so I copied that out of plain white fondant and I cut out darker brown fondant eyes and nostrils. Lastly I made the head collar out of a bright blue. I do have a confession to make though… I was running a bit short on time so instead of making and colouring my own fondant I just used store bought ready to roll fondant and mixed premade colours till I got what I wanted. It isn’t that bad right?

she loved it and it tasted awesome so I was really happy with how it turned out too. I really like making animal cakes as I think you can inject a lot of personality into them.

What is your Favourite type of cake to make?

Till Next time make something with love.

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Papercraft

Easter Treat!

April 15, 2017April 22, 2017 hisforhollyblog

I was so excited to go home to Morpeth in Northumberland for the Easter break. It’s a really lovely place. even if the weather isn’t always the greatest! I moved to surrey almost 4 years ago and I really miss living up north so I love it when I get the opportunity to go back and visit all my family and friends.

As we were all planning a big get together I thought I would make them all something for Easter. I made them all little cellophane pouches of Cadbury mini eggs tied with ribbon and a personalised Hoppy Easter tag to get the most out of the Lawn fawn stamp and die set I bought for another project (Check out the Hoppy Easter interactive card I made ).

I die cut the white and pale blue card using my stitched rectangle dies picking a larger and a smaller size so that they can be layered and still leave a border. I also die cut the grassy border out of green card . Using the same size stitched rectangle die as the one used for the pale blue card stock die cut out a piece of grass to continue the stitched border along the bottom and sizes as it appears on the sky.

Once the scenery was layered using 3D foam tape, I stamped the bunnies and eggs onto solar white Neenah Card stock using memento ink as I wanted to colour them in using my Nuvo alcohol marker pens. I coloured all bunnies and eggs different colours to personalise them for each of my friends. Then using the corresponding dies cut them out and added them to the tag.

Once complete I stamped out the hoppy Easter sentiment onto the back of the white stitched rectangle and added the scene to the front, hole punched the corner and added it to mini egg presents with white and gold ribbon.

Let me know if you are doing/did anything eggs-citing over your Easter break.

Happy Easter

Till next time make something with love!

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Baking

Tigger Birthday Cake

March 18, 2017March 18, 2017 hisforhollyblog

The wonderful thing about Tiggers, is Tiggers are wonderful things! Especially when they are made out of cake and icing instead of rubber and springs. I must confess, this isn’t a recent bake. I made it a couple of years ago for  my hubby’s birthday way back when we were dating and had totally forgotten about it. However, Timehop has a gift for reminding us about all sorts of things, so I thought I would share it with you guys now.

For the sponge I used one of my all time favourite go to chocolate cake recipes from Mary Berry ‘s Baking Bible, I love her recipe for very best chocolate fudge cake. It has a strong chocolate flavour making it really rich and indulgent. I used this to make 2 sheet cakes which I sandwiched with black cherry jam as I know its his favourite, Although the recipe makes enough icing that it could easily be used as filling as well.

Once assembled, I used a picture of Tigger  to trace around to get the basic shape. then covered the cake in a thin layer of the icing before decorating with fondant . I mixed the colours I needed to give Tigger his trademark look either by mixing 2 existing colours of fondant or by adding gel food colouring to white . I also used Black  to add extra detail to the face stomach, hands and feet and give Tigger his much loved stripes.

I’m pretty proud of how things turned out especially as he tasted as good as i think he looks. Although, i did feel bad when we started cutting bits off him. Let me know what you think or share your epic bakes in the comments.

Till next time make something with love .

Crochet

Iron Man

March 2, 2017March 18, 2017 hisforhollyblog

I made this version of Iron Man recently for a friend who loves all things super heroes. Like most of my Crochet projects it was a labour of love which inevitably took me a little longer than I was expecting! However, I’m the first to admit I’m a fair weather crocheter so for someone less rusty with more experience it wouldn’t be as long.

I found this metal buddy pattern free online. The design is part of a kids hero set by Mary Smith. It’s really easy to follow and the doll is made using the amigurumi technique of working in the round.

I used a combination of Cygnet Double Knitting Yarn in Red (1206) for the head, body, arms and legs and Cygnet Double Knitting Yarn in Sunshine (C100/184) for the mask and banding. I also used up some white and black wool scraps I had left over for a previous project. To stuff it I used an old synthetic pillow as a cheaper alternative to known brand soft toy filling but I feel it has done just as good a job and is also fire-retardant.

Although the pattern recommends a hook size of 2.25 mm, I used a 4.00mm one and it still turned out great my version is a little bigger than the 18 inches in the Patten standing at nearly 25 inches. However, this just means there’s more of it to love.

Have you had a project that has become larger than life? What are your Crochet achievements? Let me know in the comments I always love to here from you.

Till next time make something with love .

Useful links for this project:

Papercraft

Valentine’s Day Card 2017

February 14, 2017March 26, 2017 hisforhollyblog

My husband and I don’t really celebrate this holiday too much as even in England it has become really commercialised so this year we decided to just send cards which we personalised in some way. I wanted to share the card I made for my husband with you.

Its a simple Box card with embossed red and black panels. The die cut hearts are layered and decorated with ink, jewels and glitter and foil. To attach the hearts to the box I used strips of clear acetate which attached to card folded into a Z shape and suck to the inside the box . This allowed me to position the hearts at different heights and depths giving the allusion of the hearts bursting from the box and floating in mid air.

Overall I am really pleased with how this card turned out and I know Hubby was really impressed with it too. I hope you have a lovely valentines day whether you spent it with people you love or doing something you love.

Happy Valentines Day