ATC Birthday card swap

Here are the last 2 cards that I have received for the birthday card swap from 2010.
Both ladies had been sick last year and had not been well enough to complete their cards on time for my birthday in September-but I have now received them.
The blue one is from Jo in the UK and the cream one with the stitched D on it is from Cobi in the Netherlands.

Thank you ladies for sending them to me-they were well worth waiting for.

Three more birthday ATC's

This week I received 3 more ATC's from the Birthday swap that Kate North has been running.
The first two have been on a little journey of their own and have been travelling for over a month and they only had to come from Victoria (Australia) and the other one is from the US.
I still have four to come--one I know for sure will arrive as the lady contacted me personally this week but I think that I will be lucky to get the last three which is very dissappointing seeing as these ladies had their birthdays earlier in the year and they have received all their cards.
I find it hard to understand why people enter into these swaps knowing fullwell that it is a year long committment and then don't follow through.
The problem is we haven't heard from several of these ladies for quite sometime now and it is not hard to figure out what they are up to.
Oh well I suppose it takes all types to make a world but at least I can look at myself in the mirror knowing I have played my part.

From Pauline B

From Joy

From Dove

That's my rant over and done with on this matter but I will think hard before I join something like this again.

Swap with Anne L

Recently I had another ATC swap with Anne from France which arrived in 2 envelopes.
Yesterday I received an envelope posted in France on the 4th June with this beautiful counted thread ATC in it.
I have many ATC's from Anne all in wonderful designs in Cross stitch but this one is amazing-such fine needlework has to be seen to be believed.

This is the one that I sent to Anne which is the last one I had left from a piece of machine embroidery that I had cut up to repurpose into cards.

Also there was another envelope from Anne which was posted on the 4th May.

These were the original ATC's that Anne had sent (0ne for me and one for Ebony).

When they hadn't arrived after 3 weeks Ann sent me another one (above) as a replacement.

Anne has ventured into paper ATC's as well and these are just as beautiful.

Now I am going to send Anne another ATC to make up for the extra one that I received.

Flowers ATC's

In the small ATC swaps group that I belong to the theme for this month was Debbi's and she chose flowers.
I decided that seeing as I have been experimenting with flower pounding I would use it as part of my cards.
Here are the four cards that I will be sending off to the other ladies.





I got a bunch of flowers at the supermarket and in it were some maroon coloured bell shaped flowers and I haven't a clue what they are called.
I know that I should have taken a photo of them to show you but when I remembered it was a bit late after I had pounder them past any recognition.
This is how the flower looked after pounding.
It has a lovely watercolour painted appearance to it.

I then decided to use a Hero Arts stamp that I had and I overstamped it onto the background using Dirtress inks.

I am very pleased with the outcome of these and I hope the ladies who will be receiving them will be as well.

Trades with Anne

Ebony and I have done another swap with Anne in France.
Below are the ATC's that Anne sent to us-the one on the left is mine and the other one is Ebonys.
If you click to enlarge the photo you will see the fine stitching that Anne has done with one strand of thread on the one for me.
I am always amazed at the beautiful work that Anne does.





Below are the cards that we sent to Anne.
Mine is made from a paper serviette and a cut out butterfly and Ebonys has a sticker and lots of glitter--she just loves all that glitter.

Thank you Anne for trading with us again.

Cards received

I received these ATC's this week --the top ones are from Anne in France-one is for Ebony and one for me.
I love the way that Anne does her cross stitch ATC's- they are so precise and each time I swap with her I am amazed at the designs that she embroiders.




This ATC comes from Heather in the UK .
Heather is new to trading ATC and I saw on her blog that she had made some and asked her to trade with me.





Heather also included this beautiful hand made card.

And guess what--it wasn't until I was uploading these photos that I realised that I hadn't taken a photo of any of the ATC's that I had posted out to these ladies--sorry about that.

ATC's from Claudia

Yesterday we received these two ATC's from Claudia who is Jo's daughter.

These are Claudia's drawings of her "crazy angels" which her mother transfered onto fabric and then stitched onto the ATC.

How clever is that---and now we have a piece of her creative drawing.

Ebony chose the one on the left which made me happy because I really wanted the one on the right but I always give her first choice so it worked out well.

Thank you for the swap Claudia.

I can't show you the cards that we sent to Claudia because somehow they were deleted from the folder that I had them in----Mr Nobody has been at it again.

Do you have a Mr. Nobody in your house ?---when things go missing "nobody" know what happened to them.

OK I have cheated I went to Jo's blog and copied the pictures that she had put on her blog.

Ebony's is the one on the right.

ATC's for Christmas

I received this ATC from Christine today and it is so beautiful.
The image of the child framed in a circle of lace is adorable



Christine also included one for Ebony which I will give to her when I next see her.
It has a tiny Christmas stocking charm on it.

This is the ATC that I sent to Christine --it is made from snippets of green fabric covered with a piece of red net and embellished with inbuilt machine stitches and a gold musical instrument.

Thank you Christine for 2 wonderful ATC's.

ATC's from France

These two lovely cross stitched ATC's are from Anne in France who does the most beautiful and delicate cross stitched ATC's that you could ever see.
I have received several of these cards from her each one is beautiful and a treasure to add to my collection.
The one on the left is mine and the one with Santa is Ebony's.
Anne doesn't have a blog which is a pity.



These are the ATC's that we sent Anne------
The one on the left is Ebony's it is mainly stickers with some braid along the bottom.
The red one is mine---it is made from Tyvek and scrim and machine stitched.

It is always a pleasure to swap with Anne--thank you Anne.

More ATC's

I received this ATC from Kate in a one on one swap that we had arranged.
The flowers are tiny flower brads that are arranged on fme stalks.
It is much nicer in colour that my photo shows.
Thank you Kate I love it.





This is the ATC that I sent to Kate and I had another senior moment and forgot to take a photo of it --but Kate kindly e-mailed me a photo--Thanks Kate.

ATC's and the yips

I received these two ATC's late last week and once again I have failed to post them here--I think I have had a touch of the yips lately and my brain has been on holidays.
Anyway these 2 beautiful cards arrived from Jan who is a new blogger and does amazing altered art pieces.
At present she is involved in swaps with altered jigsaw pieces-- drop over and have a look at what she has been doing--and while you are there you will be able to see the ATC that I sent her because---that's right I forgot to take a photo of it--as I said the yips again.
Thank you Jan and I am sorry for being so forgetful.

ATC's received

I received these Atc's from Eva several days ago and they are beautiful.
I traded with Eva for the bottom right hand one and she kindly sent me the other two as well.
You are too generous Eva.
I must apologise also because I forgot to rotate the picture--so just lean your head over to the left a bit and you will see what they should look like.

Thanks again Eva for trading with me.