My New Stampin' Up! Website!

I'm so pleased to announce that I have a new Stampin' Up! website for your viewing pleasure. It has news, new project ideas, a way to subscribe to my newsletter, and even a way for Aussie readers to become demonstrators on my Team. It's also linked to PaperCraftCentral through the Craft Store (Shopping) link.

Let me know what you think if you check it out, and yes, it is fine to link me to your own blog/site :)

(PS: There's a new mini Summer catalogue coming out Dec 1st - check back on that date to see it here first!)

Swap cards

What a fun time I had this afternoon! Tomorrow is a Stampin' Up! Regional Training Day and I am going to go. We all like to swap card fronts so I made a couple today to be ready :) Actually there are 23 of these. They went together pretty quickly once I figured out what I was doing! Lol! I gave my punches a workout too. There's a circle punch or two, a scallop punch and a spiral paper punch involved in the making of these. I used Baha Breeze designer papers and the stamp sets were Itty Bitty Backgrounds, Occasional Greetings and Tart & Tangy. I used both Rose Red Taffeta ribbon and stitched ribbon too.

Anniversay layouts

I made a couple of layouts of our anniversary photos. This one was done according to a sketch by Tanyah. Which reminds me - I need to upload this to her gallery! Lol! It was a lot of fun to make this. I liked swiping the ink on and doing the borders with ink pads. The little embellishment was made from twisted paper and a large brad (thank you for the brad, Carla! I save them for special occasions as you can tell!) and I cut down some webbing and twisted it to make the other part of it. Oh and i made the leaves form cardstock and ink.

It was a beautiful place.

Scrapping from Lexie's Stash

On the weekend I attended a wonderful retreat with a bunch of girls I've gotten to know online and have become friends with in real life :) It was a lot of fun! I loved catching up with everyone.

One of the best things about a scrapping retreat is that you get hours of uninterrupted time to scrap! I took part in a challenge run by Lexie - it was to make a layout from 'scraps' she had in a huge box. I made this layout with only a little help from my own stash - a rubon, some multi coloured flowers, some stitching, a little gold ink...and of course the photo. This sunset happened while my dear husband and I were celebrating our recent anniversary :) so it is a special one.

Lexie just now notified me that I won her challenge! I am so amazed and delighted! Thank you for the fun challenge, Lexie. I really enjoyed it!

Pearl's Sketch Challenge

I've been scrapping this weekend! I went away on a Scrapping Retreat and managed to get a few layouts done. I took one of the sketches I got from Pearl's inspiring blog with me and made a double layout with it. I was happy with how it turned out - thank you Pearl!

My husband Colin is currently taking part in a fundraising venture to raise money for research into men's health issues. I had to scrap about that! He is growing a Mo for the entire month of November - hence the name Mo-vember as my page title. He has a page where people can follow the progress of the growth of his Mo, and also for people to donate to the cause if they so wish. I am so proud of him for wanting to do this.

I'll be back soon with more scrapping done on the weekend!

Natural Skincare Recipe Book

I don't know about you but I have been on the hunt for natural skin care recipes that didn't cost me a fortune to make. I found this wonderful book of them on the web and just had to share them with you! They are so easy and quick to make and I had most of the ingredients in my pantry anyway :) (I just love sharing good stuff with you all!) My online friend Sue Dolan wrote the book and she has it available as an e-book as well as a hard copy if you would prefer that.

I also love that Sue is giving away some free 'recipe' cards with the book right now. It gave me ideas for hand crafted Christmas presents - why not make some of the recipes from the book, then dress up the containers as only we know how? They would make sensational (oops - SKINsational! Lol!) gifts!

Embellish This Week 3 Entry

Week 3 of Embellish This! had lots of criteria - we had to use teal, hot pink, black and white, three different textured backgrounds, lots of bling, a feather and a handmade embellishment. While I met all the criteria with this layout of a horse the family used to look after (the inspiration for the challenge was the Melbourne Cup logo so I thought a horse would fit in!) I didn't get through to round 4. The competition was pretty wonderful though so I am happy :)

If you want to see the other entries and follow along, head on over to this gallery. The competition involves eliminations every week of the registered participants so no one else can join in (unless they upload to a general member's area as unofficial participants)

Decorate It! A brooch decoration is born!

Week 2 of the Scrap N Craft With T challenge is underway and I had to come up with a present decoration that was red, green and white and incorporated wire in it somehow. I chose felt to make this little heart brooch. It has a few beads and stitching and there is a wire centre (made from industrial wire!) I cut the petals out freehand and they are basically heart shapes. I gathered the centres and sewed them together, then curled the wire and threaded it through the centre to form a pin base at the back. Beads have been threaded together and sewn around the centre. There is some contrast stitching around some of the petals. I used my Paper Crimper to make a cardstock belly band for the present.

You can take the heart flower off the present and wear it as a brooch afterwards, just in time for the Christmas party season!

My First Copic Coloured Image!

This week was a red letter week for me ;) I received a wonderful package in the mail containing my very first Copic markers!!! After I ripped open the package I dashed in to my craft desk and quickly shuffled through some wonderful images I received in a swap to find this little guy. He was so black and white! He neeeeeded colouring!

So here is my very first attempt at using Copic markers for your viewing pleasure (before I know enough to be too embarrassed by my inexpertise! Lol!)

PS: Carla, if you are reading this (and I just know you are - he he) please feel free to email me about how I can improve!

My Girl

This layout took me awhile because I made all the flowers and beaded them. Some of them were made with paper punched shapes, stamping and inking as well. A flower shaping tool was used to get the cupped effect. Felt, velvet and a paper doiley found their way onto the page.

I loved this picture of my DD when I first saw it and have been thinking about how to scrap it for awhile :)

Bonus Challenge 2

It's about time I scrapped again, huh?

Thanks to Scrapchat's Girls' Night In Cybercrop, I got the chance to :) Our challenge was to use a particular kit to scrap a page about anything, and we had to use all the kit up. I managed to use all the items except a few scraps of pink paper. Oh and I am not sure if I cheated but the whole thing is mounted on a piece of white bazzil, which was also in the pack. They sent a piece of string that I plaited into a heart shape, and I made some 3-d objects like the accordion butterfly and some layered flowers. I used a lot of Stampin' Up! punches (the scallop border punch, the scallop circle punch, the curly label punch, one of the circle punches) and I had a ball.

I hope you like it too :)

Shh! It's a secret card!

Don't you love secrets? I have one this week. It's our anniversary soon and I fond time to make a card for hubby without him knowing. I made the flower on the card out of layers of thin paper (thank you for the lesson Tracey!) stamps and ink, and the stem out of twisted cardstock.

This year our anniversary symbol is lace. How do you give a guy lace? You grunge it up, of course! Lol!

I think he'll laugh about this one. Hope so anyway :)

Candy Thank You Treats

I used my Curly Label Punch Bundle to make a whole bunch of these little treats to say 'thank you' to a group of special ladies this week. They all belong to my Stamp Club! They were so easy to make and i was able to create quite a few in a short time. I thought they would be good for other occasions as well - just change up the card stock, inks and embellishments for Birthdays, Christmas, weddings, or any other special event you can think of.

If you would like to see how they are made, I have a little show and tell on PaperCraftCentral for you :)

Inspirational

Thanks to an occasional reader (Tom) I started off my morning by watching an inspirational video. If you haven't heard about William Kamkwamba, he's the boy from Malawi who built a windmill from a tractor fan and some bicycle parts. Now it powers his family compound and he has plans to harness the wind for others. His ideas came from a library book picture. See for yourself.

New Stampin Up! Policy

Just a little note today to say that Stampin' Up! has a new policy thus:

"The changes restrict you from providing purchasing information, referrals to catalogues or publications, links to web sites, or other similar material, of directly competitive companies, or locations where a customer may purchase directly competitive products."

So I apologise to anyone who I have been linking to as a favour. I have had to take your links off my site in order to remain a Stampin' Up! demonstrator.

I wish you all success in the future. Hugs and loves XX

Come and Join In the Fun!

My friend Tanyah is having a great scrapping event in October. Come on over to her blog and read about it! I'd love to see some of you there. The word is that there will be many interesting challenges and you won't want to miss them :)

Dust Storm Update: We're still dusty - lol. It isn't anywhere near as bad as it was on Wednesday. I am finding the accumulative effect rather daunting though. Everything is covered in a thick layer of fine, talc-like reddish orange dust...as soon as the dust settles we are going to have a great time cleaning it all off!

More Dust and a Wedding Card

We're having our second dust storm this week. Some photos taken near where I live show you the extent of it. We've closed up the house again and the dust is still sneaking in though to a lesser extent than it would if we had all the doors and windows open. I realise other parts of the world get dust storms but the east coast of Australia hasn't had such a week in over 70 years, so it is a bit of a novelty to us younger than 75 or so.

Maybe a wedding card will provide a nice contrast to the thought of all that dust. I made this one for a wedding I attended last week. I should have made it more dramatic - the bride wore black, high black boots, black strapless dress and a long flowing wide white scarf that reached below her knees. She carried the most beautiful black/red roses. The groom was in a black suit, white shirt and red tie. I hadn't been to a wedding where the bride wore black before...

Gift Card

While in Far North Qld I met up with some crafting friends (which was great!) and showed them how to make the Father's Day gift card I made a few weeks ago. Here's the one I made. This time, I used paper punches to decorate the card and blinged them up a little with metallic and black pens. It was a very quick way to make the card!

This is a "Life in Australia" post

Australia's east coast has been experiencing some pretty huge and dramatic dust storms in the last 24 hours. In Sydney it is the worst (they say on the news it was last like this over 70 years ago) but this video of life in Broken Hill yesterday shows just how bad it can get. We live in Qld where we had an eerie windy and orange day but it never got as bad as this video. Today we have almost clear skies but they are telling us on the news that we should expect more dust tomorrow. We're checking the air filter on our car and absolutely everything inside is covered in a fine film of dust - it is going to take a long time to get the dust out of our clothes and houses.

Jozzi

I'm visiting my wonderful daughter today and we intend to go check out the Bat Hospital soon. My daughter has a lovely big boxer dog named Jozzi who has such a great memory! She remembers me no matter how long it has been between visits.

The Bat Hospital looks out for the Spectacled Flying Foxes. I'm looking forward to finding out more about them and what the volunteers at the hospital are doing for them. The live in such big colonies. Their calls are unmistable once you have heard them!