A sneak peek ..... Maybe?

Ok ok ... I know there is something missing on my card LOL .... yes the stamps ... there is a reason for that which I will explain in a minute.

This Friday 4th January Hanna Stamps will be releasing a new stamp set ... this one is a Valentines Day set. I am sure you will love this set just like you have loved all the previous Hanna sets in the past. Besides having the Hanna image which btw will be suitable for any occasion not just Valentines, this set has a cute verse and some wonderful accessory stamps.

Unfortunately for some reason my stamps haven't made it across the seas to me as yet ... I am hoping they arrive soon ... but I didn't want to miss out on the sneak peek and as I had one idea for a card already I thought it would be fun to make the card and post it even without the images. When I finally receive my stamps I will stamp the lips (seen above) in the circle area of this card using rose red ink and the verse (also above) along the bottom of the card just above the paper piercing.

The layout of this card is the same as one I posted here on Saturday .... Shiver Me Timbers! .... you can find it here. I did mention then that I liked the layout and planned to use it again ..... didn't necessarily expect it to be this soon ... but I thought it would work nicely with this set.

When my stamps arrive I will be sure to post the finished card for you all to see :)

Recipe:
Stamps: Valentines Set - Hanna Stamps
Papers: Pretty in Pink & Rose Red - Stampin' Up; White
Other: Black Ink; Pretty in Pink & Rose Red SU Ink; Burgundy Grosgrain Ribbon; Paper Piercing Mat & Tool; Circle Nestabilities; Corner Rounder; Foam Tape

Happy Cupcake Day!

First up some exciting news about me! I was recently asked by Kim of My Favorite Stamps to join her design team ..... of course I am very excited and said yes! I am looking forward to working with everyone on the design team ... I already know a few of them and can't wait to get to know the others.

This card is for this weeks featured stamp on SCS. This week the honor goes to Danielle aka dlounds ...... it was so hard trying to find just one card for me to CASE today as Danielle has some lovely cards in there .... I did however finally decide on one to CASE which you can find here.

I decided to use my cupcake and part of a verse from the MFT "Icing on the Cake" Set I purchased recently. I thought the cupcake verse would work well with the Happy in "Happy Everything". I liked the colors Danielle used for her card so more or less kept with those colors, but as per the rules I did change more then 2 things:

• Substituted Happy from Happy Everything instead of Celebrate Everything
• Substituted Cupcake day instead of your day
• Used a different DP
• Added brads & sponging to my white rectangle card
• Used two narrow ribbons instead of the one ribbon
• Substituted the cupcake on the scallop circles instead of the flower.

Recipe:
Stamps: Icing on the Cake - MFT; Happy Everything - SU
Papers: White; Rose Red; Creamy Caramel; Blush Blossom & Rose Red DP - SU
Other: Black Ink; Rose Red SU Ink; Brads; Circle Nestabilities; Pink Narrow Grosgrain Ribbon; Foam Tape

Shiver Me Timbers!

Here is another of the cards I created the other day using some of my stamps I got for Christmas. This one is a sketch I found on Captain Crafter's blog a few weeks again and have been waiting for some time to be able to use it ... I thought it was perfect to use with my new pirate stamps from The Cat's Pajamas.

The circles are created using my circle nestabilities. The scallop edge along the bottom of the navy card was created using my corner punch .... this is done by removing the guide from the punch and then punching across the length of the card. I also added two rows of piercing along the bottom of the card, not sure how well you can see that in this photo.

I like this sketch and think I will be using it in the future!

Recipe: Stamps: Pirate & verse - The Cat's Pajamas
Paper: White; Real Red & Night of Navy - Stampin' Up; Striped DP - My Mind's Eye
Other: Black Ink; Red Brads; Circle Nestabilities; Paper Piercing Mat & Tool; Corner Punch; Foam Tape

Hoo's Having a Birthday!

Here is another card I made yesterday ... I ended up making 3 yesterday using various sketches ... I have already posted one to my blog and I will post the other tomorrow. This one was made using the mojo monday sketch#17 from Poetic Artistry's blog.

For this one I did get to use mostly new toys ... the owl and tree comes from the Pretty Birds set from CHF .... I really liked this owl ..... I even went outside my "box" and colored it in blue ... I am starting to like blue owls LOL! I wanted to make this one a birthday card so I used the verse from that goes with the Owl from the Carolyn King Collection from Gina K Designs. The DP is also from the stack pack I got for Christmas called retro prints .... I am loving this DP.

Recipe:
Stamps: Pretty Birds Set - Cornish Heritage Farms; Verse - Gina K Designs; Weave Backgrounder - CHF
Papers: White; Chocolate Chip, Cool Caribbean & Wild Washabi - SU; Retro Prints DP Stack - DCWV
Other: Black Ink; Cool Caribbean & Wild Washabi SU Inks; Circle Nestabilities; Circle Punches; Word Window Punch; Brown Brads; Foam Tape

Relax .... Pamper Yourself!

Here's a card I made for this week's MFT sketch challenge over at the member forums of SCS. I used one of my older MFT stamps for this card .... I did get to use my new DP I got for Christmas and the background stamp is also a newer one from CHF.

I wanted to use my scallop nestabilities for this card ... the rectangles were not long enough for the image I was using so I got one of my square ones and cut that out twice from the chocolate chip card and then overlapped it to create the size I needed ... this works sooo well and you can't see any of the joins.

The background on the base card was created using CHF's scratched grid backgrounder ... I stamped it first all over in cool caribbean and then again using chocolate chip... I also sponged around the edge of the card using chocolate chip.

Recipe:
Stamps: Time for Bubbly - My Favorite Things; Scratched Grid - Cornish Heritage Farms
Paper: White; Cool Caribbean; Soft Sky & Chocolate Chip - SU; Retro Prints Stack - DCWV
Other: Black Ink; Cool Caribbean & Chocolate Chip SU Inks; Square & Rectangle Nestabilities; White Gel Pen; Brown Brads; Blue Grosgrain Ribbon; Foam Tape

I'm Behind You 100%

This card was created using some more of the stamps I ordered from Rubbernecker Stamps recently. I just love sooo many of their images. This was was created using Poetic Artistry's Mojo Monday's Sketch #16.

I used my craft knife to cut around the newspaper and part of the hand so that I could raise it up over the diamond shape the verse is in.

Recipe:
Stamps: Ralph & Verse - Rubbernecker Stamps; Texture Cube - Lucy's Stamps
Paper: White; Black; Red; Ballet Blue - SU; Confetti DP - My Minds Eye
Other: Black Ink; Ballet Blue SU Ink; Blue Brads; Photo Corner Punch

If Friends Were Flowers!

Even though it was Christmas Day in the US, Roxie still managed to post the sketch challenge on SCS. Thanks Roxie .... what better excuse to play with some of my new stamps that I got for Christmas yesterday. I decided to play with some of my Lizzie Anne stamps as these seemed to suit the challenge quite well!

The circles were created using my circle nestabilities, the smaller flowers were stamped directly onto the white circle and the large flower was stamp twice on scrap and cut out.

Recipe:
Stamps: Jolies Fleurs & Simply Sentiments - Lizzie Anne Designs
Paper: White; Pretty In Pink & Regal Rose - Stampin' Up
Other: Black Ink; Regal Rose SU Ink; Circle Nestabilities; Pink Brads; Pink Grosgrain Ribbon

Merry Christmas Everyone!!!!!!!

Just a very quick post to wish all my blogging friends a very Merry Christmas! I hope you all have a wonderful day. Thank you for the support you have shown to me throughout the past year. To any of you who are traveling anywhere today or during this holiday season .... have a safe journey.

Here in Australia it is summer which means our Christmas is normally a very hot day ... no snow or log fires for us! Some people spend Christmas Day at the beach ... although I am not one of those people! I am looking forward to sharing today with my family and my daughters family. We will have a wonderful lunch of seafood, ham, turkey and salads.

Obviously I won't be stamping today .... but I am hoping to get the chance to play with a few of my new toys tomorrow .... so I hope I have something to share with you then!

Merry Christmas Everyone!!!!!!!

Did I Really Need to Make Another Christmas Card!

Ok did I really need to make another Christmas card this year .... to be truthful the answer has to be a big NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Mine have all been posted for this year .... and besides Christmas is only 1 day away now LOL, today is Christmas Eve downunder in Australia! However when I saw the sketch for this weeks sketch challenge that Iheart2stamp has on her blog .... I just couldn't help myself but to use this new image I received from Rubbernecker Stamps on Friday.

Even though I ordered this stamp earlier in the month I didn't intend to use it this year as I knew my stamps wouldn't get here to around this time .... but it was one of those stamps that when you see it you just have to have ... I first saw it on Jeanne's of Inky Paws blog and thought it would be a great stamp to use for my daughters next year.

I stamped the main image onto white card using black ink and layered this onto red card .... I used my ticket corner punch to do the top corners of the red layer only and then layered this to olive card. I used my paper piercing mat & tool to create the piercing to the top corners.

The background was created using the star background from MFT's Icing on the cake set .... I used my markers on the stamp so I could get there red & green stars .. this is a little tedious but was worth it to get the multi color effect.

I also used my markers to my verse which is from Gina K's punch word set ..... I used my nestabilities to cut the layers for the verse.

I decided I wanted two colors of ribbon on my card so I used my thin olive grosgrain ribbon and my wider red grosgrain across the top of the card.

Recipe:
Stamps: Miss Holly - Stamp Oasis(Rubbernecker); Verse - Gina K Designs; Icing on the Cake - MFT
Paper: White; Real Red & Old Olive - SU
Other: Black Ink; Marvy Brush Marker #96; Tombow #856; Paper Piercing Mat & Tool; Circle Nestabilities; Red & Olive Grosgrain Ribbon; Foam Tape

Who's #1

I was excited today when I checked out the featured stamper challenge to discover that the featured stamper today was Crissy aka #1artist4highhopes. Crissy has a gallery full of cards created using High Hopes images and is one of the culprits for getting me hooked on High Hopes stamps. Of course even before I checked out her gallery I knew I would have to play these stamps ... an easy decision.

Trying to decide which card of hers to CASE was very hard ... she has some wonderful cards in there. In the end I decided up this recent one that she created. Don't look at her gallery if you don't wanna fall in love with these stamps! As per always I had to make at least 2 changes to her card ... this is what I did

• changed the images used
• changed the colors
• changed the theme of the card
• added brads

I don't have that pig stamp or the chocolate ones yet or I might have been tempted to CASE her card totally resorting to changing colors etc LOL ....

Recipe:
Stamps: Girl & Verse - High Hopes Stamps; Single flower (B/G) - Lucy's Stamps; Scratched Grid - CHF
Paper: White; Pale Violet & Olive
Other: Black Ink; Dark Moss Fluid Chalk; Purple Brads

Merry Christmas in Blue!

Here is one more of the Christmas cards that I sent out this year .... this was another sketch challenge hosted on SCS earlier this year .... which I loved so had to use it for some Christmas cards.

Recipe:
Stamps: Village - Posh Impressions; Snowflakes - PSX; Sentiment - Unknown
Papers: White; Royal Blue & Silver
Other: Blue Iris Fluid Chalk; White Brilliance Ink; Ribbon; CM Circle Cutter

Merry & Bright Bears!

This card was inspired by Michelle Zindorf's "brayered sky tutorial" over on SCS which was featured in this week's SCS newsletter. I just loved the effect of her card and had to give it a go. The techniques used here are masking and brayering.

I wanted to make mine a snowy scene so fished out these cute Penny Black bears I have had for years. The tree stamps are also ones I have had for a very long time ... it always feels good getting out old stamps to play with ... sometimes they can get neglected with all the new and exciting stamps that come out all the time .... but the oldies still have their place too!

Recipe:
Stamps: Bears - Penny Black; Winter Forest - Posh; Trees - Art Impressions; Verse - Papertrey Ink
Papers: White; Black; Red
Other: Black Ink; So Saffron, More Mustard & Really Rust SU Inks; Brayer; White Gel Pen; Black Brads

Rain or Shine!

I received my My Favorite Things order earlier in the week and have been wanting to play with this set .... well I finally got around to playing! The sketch for this card is this weeks MFT sketch challenge which can be found in the Members Forums of SCS.

I finally used my rectangle nestabilities on this card too ... I have had them for a few weeks now. The scallop rectangle wasn't exactly the right size for the image ... so I just cut across the rectangle at the end of one of the scallops and then joined it up again so that one of the scallops is overlapping the other ... I know it is joined and I can't see the join :)

I used the same DP as I used for my cupcake card I created last night ... I thought it would make a nice coat so just had to use it again ... I paper pieced the coat on the girl and also the dog ... but it is harder to see the pattern on the dogs coat.

Recipe:
Stamps: Rain or Shine & Let's go for a Walk - My Favorite Things
Paper: White; Only Orange & Summer Sun - SU; DP - Imaginisce
Other: Black Ink; Bisque Fluid Chalk; Rectangle Nestabilities; Spots & Dots Cuttlebug Embossing Folder; Oval Punch; Photo Corner Punch; Orange Grosgrain Ribbon; Orange Brads

You're a Hoot!

Well as you can see I just had to make another card using this week's sketch challenge. These stamps from Cornish Heritage Farms were just calling out to me sooo how could I resist. Thanks to all those enablers out there .... you know who you are ;) .... I finally had to order the "pretty bird" set so I could get the owl!

For this card I used my circle punches to create my circles and used my distressing tool to distress all the edges of the card. I also used my paper piercing mat & tool to create some piercing along the top & bottom edges of the sentiment.

Recipe:
Stamps: Pretty Bird Set, Abstract Leaves & Weathered Wood - Cornish Heritage Farms
Papers: Creamy Caramel, Chocolate Chip - SU; White; Caramel XL Card
Other: Black Ink; Chocolate Chip & Really Rust SU Inks; Paper Piercing Mat & Tool; Circle Punches; Brown Brads; Foam Tape; Distressing Tool

Cupcake Day!

I am not sure if I like this card or not, but here it is .... this one is for this week's sketch challenge on SCS ..... I wanted to play with my cupcake stamps I received this week from My Favorite Things. It's a pretty bright card ... so I guess it would be great for a kids birthday or something like that.

I created the circles using my circle nestabilities and also a circle punch for the blue circles .... I thought adding a brad to the centre of the blue circles made it a little different .... you know I love adding brads somehow or other to my card.

Recipe:
Stamps: Icing on the Cake - My Favorite Things; Scratch Grid B/G - CHF
Papers: White; Red; Turquoise; DP - Imaginisce
Other: Black Ink; Real Red SU Ink; Circle Nestabilities; Circle Punch; Oval Punches; Yellow Brads; Blue Grosgrain Ribbon

Rebus - Body Parts!

This is my final rebus card for 2007, it is for our November swap and the theme was "body parts".

For those of you who are enjoying playing along here are the solutions to last months "Halloween" rebus which can be found here.

• Candycorn
• Trick or Treat
• Spooky
• Jack O Lantern
• Witches
  
• Skeleton

We don't do any rebus swaps for December .... so there won't be anymore posted here till February 2008!

Louie the Fly!

Louie the fly,oh Louie the fly ... straight from rubbish tip to you .......... oops sorry singing again!

This card is for a challenge I do with my CCEE friends on SCS .... this week our challenge was to create a card inspired by your favorite TV commercial or if we didn't have a favorite one by any TV commercial. Most of the TV I watch ... I pre - record using my IQ (Australia's version of TVO) so when commercials are on I just fast forward so I don't get to watch many commercials these days ;)

When I first saw this challenge I knew what I was going to do ... as I had just ordered a stamp from Whipper Snapper of a puppy with toilet paper all over him ... but when the stamp arrived I had to use it straight away LOL ... I guess I could have still used that stamp ... but it wasn't a challenge to me anymore kwim. Then I got my toilet set from Gina K ... and stamped that with a duck in it as it reminded me of toilet duck cleaner .... once I uploaded one of my CCEE friends said it was perfect for this challenge ........ arghhhhhhh so it was LOL! So after that it took me a while to figure out what I would do .

This card is inspired by a classic Australian commercial ..... for a fly spray called Mortein .... the main character in this commercial is a fly named Louie .... there have been various different commercials through the years all about Louie.

While I was doing some research yesterday looking for the words for this commercial I came across the particular commercial on You Tube .... if you would like to see the commercial that inspired my card you will find it here.

As this card was inspired by a TV commercial I couldn't resist using my large TV for my images ... it seemed a perfect time to use that stamp.


Recipe:
Stamps: TV - Judikins; Fly - Sunday International; Garbage Bin - Lindy's Stamp Gang; Spray bottle and Spritz - Third Coast Rubber Stamps; Weave Background - Cornish Heritage Farms; Words - Karen Foster Snap Stamps
Paper: White; Black & Red
Other: Black Ink; Real Red SU Ink; Black Micro Brads; Photo Corner Punch; Designer Label Punch; Foam Tape

Love You More .... 35 Years!

It has been a busy few days here and I haven't had any time to stamp for 3 days ... last night I decided I had to make a card to give to my DH this morning to celebrate our 35th wedding anniversary. I always make him a card for our anniversary but for some reason I left it a little late this year ... and the other cards I might have been able to use seemed to girly so I bit the bullet and made one after my friends left last night. I must admit it was soooooooooo nice to be finally able to get some stamping done.

I decided to use my new text message set from Gina K ... I love that you have a variety of messages to use with the phone. I found this sketch in amongst some I had printed off recently ... I am pretty sure it is a sketch challenge from MFT that they do on the Member companies forum on SCS.


Recipe:
Stamps: Text Message Set - Gina K Designs; Verse - My Favorite Things
Paper: White; Black; Real Red - SU; DP - Sandylion
Other: Black Ink; Red Brads; Foam Tape

Christmas Crackers!

Well it is now only 10 days till Christmas .... I still have a few things I need to do but I am getting there now ... I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel! My cards are all made and sent out, my presents purchased and wrapped and now my Christmas Crackers are made.

My eldest daughter and I made these last Saturday ..... I have been making my own Christmas crackers every year for over 30 years .... I used to make with with my Mother but these days my DD comes to help me. As we were making so many we kept it fairly simple this year .... I normally use wrapping paper but this year I decided to use Christmas DP and I think I will go with that every year from now on .... just need to remember to look earlier next year.

As we put different things inside to suit different groups of people we needed a way to distinguish between each one that is why you can see three different trees on the front of the crackers below ... one tree for the men, one for the women and another for the 2 young girls we made crackers for. I used my cricut to create my trees.


Recipe:
Paper: Ornamentation DP - Karen Foster Designs; Green Bazzill Card
Other: Celebrations & Christmas Cheer Cricut Cartridges; Star Punch; Ribbon; Cranberry Crisp SU Ink

A Christmas File Folder!

Here is another one of my Christmas cards I made to send out this year. This one is based on one of Beate's weekend sketch challenges that I participated in earlier in the year. While I was playing around creating some for the challenge I also decided to make some for Christmas cards ... this one I haven't posted anywhere until now.

Recipe:
Stamps: Holiday Wishes - Stampin' Up
Paper: White; Real Red & Old Olive - SU; Fruitcake DP - Basic Grey
Other: Black Ink; Olive Pastel Fluid Chalk; Tab Punch; Red Brads; Red Spiral Clip

Gift Giving ... Sneak Peek 4

I had to make a 3 x 3 card for a challenge with my fab/sassy friends today .... as this was the theme for our challenge that we do every week. I thought it would be fun to make mine using the little present from the gift giving set by Hanna Stamps which will be released on Friday 14th December .... not very long to wait now!

I used my nestabilities square dies to create most of the layers on this card ... I wanted the base card to also be scalloped. I know I can fold the card before placing it on the die ... but I wanted the scallops to all around the edge on the card not just on 3 edges ... so I die cut to red pieces separately and then scored the piece which was going to the back of the card approx 1cm down from the top of the card and then attached this to the card.

Recipe: Stamps: Gift Giving Set - Hanna Stamps
Paper: White; Garden Green & Real Red - SU; DP - Christmas Stack DCWV
Other: Black Ink; Square Nestabilities

I've Been Elfed!

A couple of weeks ago I received a message on SCS that I had been elfed! This meant that someone had chosen me to send a surprise gift to ... what fun .... well my gift arrived today and this a photo of all the goodies I got ... lots of fun things to play with.

I have no idea as yet who sent this ... hopefully I will find this out eventually ... but either way ... if you are reading this ..... thank you very much you made my day!

Happy Hanna Birthday

I am a little later than normal today in posting my card for this week's sketch challenge ... as I had a couple of friend over today for a fun Christmas party ... I know I had a great day!

I decided to use my new Hanna Gift Giving set from Hanna Stamps .... I am having so much fun with her and today I decided to make it a birthday card .... I think I need a few birthday cards to give to my daughters in the card pack I give each of them every Christmas .... I am pretty sure they both will love Hanna ... they look very like her.

For this card I paper pieced the box to match the DP I used for the background layers. I paper pierced the top corners of the card. The verse is one from Papertrey which fits perfectly into the smallest oval punch from SU and was then layered onto the larger oval punched piece. To finish it off I added ribbon to the right side and brads to the top left side.

Recipe:
Stamps: Gift Giving Set - Hanna Stamps; Verse - Papertrey Ink
Papers: Pretty In Pink; Rose Red - SU; White; Text Prints Stack - DCWV
Other: Black Ink; Brads; Oval Punches; Pink Grosgrain Ribbon

Gift Giving .... Sneak Peek 3

Here is another card using the new Hanna Gift Giving Set which is to be released this Friday 14th December by Hanna Stamps. I just had to make one with Hanna wrapping her presents to put under the Christmas tree. We have seen Hanna shop and trim her Christmas tree so why wouldn't she be wrapping her presents as well!

I really am in love with this set as it is soooo versatile ... here I have made it into a Christmas card seeing that Christmas is just around the corner ... but Hanna could just as easily be wrapping any present or unwrapping for that matter for any occasion you want.

On this card I have used many of the smaller stamps which are also included in this set ... the small parcel, gift bag, bow, scissors and tape dispenser. If you take a look at the cranberry base of this card you can also see I used the background stamp from this set also.

After stamping Hanna on my white card, I masked her by stamping on a piece of paper and trimming slightly inside the lines and using this to cover my original Hanna so I could stamp my tree so it appears as if it was behind her. The tree is from "Tis the Season" also by Hanna Stamps.

I used a variety of DP to paper piece the gift boxes, gift bag and Hanna's top. I used my paper piercing mat and tool to pierce around the sides and top of the card. I also decided on 'happy' rather then 'merry' for the sentiment as Hanna looks so happy here!

Recipe: Stamps: Gift Giving & Tis the Season - Hanna Stamps; Sentiment - Stampendous
Paper: White; Black; Cranberry Crisp & Holiday Thyme DP - Stampin' Up
Other: Black Ink; Cranberry Crisp SU Ink; Paper Piercing Mat & Tool; Cranberry Brads

Sneak Peek - Gift Giving 2

Here is another card using some of the stamps in the Gift Giving Set from Hanna Stamps ... I have combined them with two Darcies stamps I already had on hand as I thought both worked well together. Yesterday my card was one that could be used for all sorts of occasions today I thought I would create a Christmas card with this set.

Last Wednesday when Roxie posted the sketch challenge for the week she also posted a bonus sketch challenge ... which I wouldn't have even known about except that my friend Kim mentioned it to me a few days ago ... the sketch is designed to look like a parcel. When I first saw this sketch I immediately thought of my ribbon border & bow stamps by Darcies Rubber Stamps and I knew I had to make one of these cards soon. Then I received my new Gift Giving set on Thursday and I thought how perfect the tag in the set would be on this card. Here I have decided to use the verse from the set on the tag .... I so love that verse! I can see the tag being a very useful stamp in this set ... I may need to stamp a few to make some quick tags for my Christmas gifts this year. I used the little present that is also included with this set to stamp the background on the old olive base card.

Although this is a Christmas card, by changing the colors it could just as easy be a card for any occasion you wanted.


Recipe: Stamps: Gift Giving Set - Hanna Stamps; Long Ribbon Border & Lge Ribbon Package - Darcies Rubber Stamps
Paper: White; Old Olive & Real Red - SU
Other: Black Ink; Old Moss Fluid Chalk; Foam Tape.

Not so Lazy Lizards!

The 2nd Monday of the month has become the week my CCEE friends and I create a card for a fellow SCSer that has a fun or catchy name ..... can you guess whose name we chose this week LOL!


Yes you guessed it .... Lazy Lizard!!!!!!!!!!!! Hi Liz .... hope you like the card I created for you!

Now this time round adding "lazy" to our card was optional ... I decided not to include it cause addy lazy to a card seems a bit ... well you kwim! Apparently when I uploaded the group snow cards to my SCS gallery that all the CCEE girls made for me ... Liz commented that she too does not see snow very often..... and she wondered if because of that, she would be getting cards from all of us .... well I guess the answer to that this time round is ..... YES!!!!!!!!! However because of this comment ... this also gave someone who seems to have something about snowflakes the idea that we had to include one snowflake on our cards ............ arghhhhhhhhh!

Anyway .... I decided that I wanted to play with my alcohol inks for this card .... I used terracotta, butterscotch, ginger and gold to create the background on gloss card. I decided to go with a lizard stamp that I have had for years and years ... it wouldn't be my oldest stamp but it definitely is one of the earlier stamps I purchased way back when. After stamping all my images, I added the black brads around each edge. I thought the ideal place for my "snowflake" was on one of my circle images ... I used my going places cricut cartridge to create mine using black card .... I guess the snow got a little dirty ... hehehehe! This was then layered to black card and onto a bigger piece of really rust card that I had stamped the bottom and right edge with a border stamp.

This was a fun card to create ... wonder who we will be creating cards for next month ... if you are on SCS and have a fun name ..... it just might be you ;)
Recipe: Stamps: Lizard & Squiggle Border - Print Blocks (Aust); Medallion - My Stamps (Aust)
Papers: White Gloss; Black; Really Rust - SU
Other: Black Archival Ink; Terracotta, Butterscotch, Ginger & Gold Alcohol Inks; Black Brads; Going Places Cricut Cartridge

Gift Giving .... a Sneak Peek!

This coming Friday the 14th December, Hanna Stamps will be releasing 2 more great sets. This time round it is another Hanna set ... called Gift Giving which I think is perfect for many occasions including Christmas and Birthdays! The other set being released will be the sentiment set that Kristi so generously allowed us to use for blog candy on Thanksgiving weekend. Both sets are in my opinion great additions to your stamping supplies.

I used my circle nestabilities to create the circle pieces of this card and stamped Hanna and the verse also included in this set on the white circle. I stamped Hanna again on a scrap of the DP & also on a scrap of white card so that I could paper piece the present ... which meant I had to paper piece the ribbon that passes over the present.

Recipe:
Stamps: Gift Giving - Hanna Stamps
Papers: Regal Rose, Certainly Celery & Pretty In Pink - SU; White; Kids Glitter Stack - DCWV
Other: Black Ink; Circle Nestabilities; Certainly Celery Grosgrain Ribbon; Green Brads; Foam Tape

Tagged Again!!

I was tagged today by one of my fellow Hanna Stamps Design Team members ... Bev Gerard aka Tex from Savor the Journey blog.

The rules of the game:

• Link to the person that tagged you and post the rules on your blog.
• Share 7 random and/or weird facts about yourself on your blog, we all want to know them.
• Tag 7 random people at the end of your post and include links to their blogs.
• Let each person know that they’ve been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

7 things about me:

• I used to love eating ice cream with potato chips .... don't knock it till you have tried it LOL!

• I only cook because I have to (my family likes to eat occasionally) ... not because I want to cook.

• Christmas is one of my favorite holidays.

• I don't drink tea or coffee!

• I once got the souls of my feet burnt when I was walking up a long road on a very hot day .... everyone thought I was complaining for no reason until they saw the blisters on my feet!

• I once had the horse I was riding gallop after a horse in front of me when I was learning to ride ... luckily the riding instructor was with me to control my horse .... yikes!

• I have stamped more owl cards this year then I have in all my years of stamping .... even though I own many owls stamps!

Tag 7 other people:

This is always the hardest part of all these tagging games ... well except for having to come up with 7 random facts .... arghhhhh

• Amber of Amber's Antics
• Barb of Barb's Art & Travel Diary
• Cammie of Cammie's Blog
• Kimme of The Life of a Princess
• Dawn of Dawn ... A New Day
  
• Kristi of Kreations by Krissy
  
• and You!
  

Unwanted Help!

I was taking my photos of my featured stamper card and a few other cards I will be uploading tomorrow when I got a little unwanted help! My cat had been wanting to jump on this table for a while this afternoon but I had kept her off as I was setting up for my photos .... well it seemed she had finally had enough and was going to go where she wanted to ... even if my card was sitting where she was going. Of course I couldn't resist ... I had to take some photos!

Friendship ... the Sweetest Flower

It is always exciting when a friend is chosen as the featured stamper and today is no exception ... I am sooooo excited for my friend Charlene aka LilLuvsStampin on SCS! Charlene is one of my friends that I do the CCEE challenges with every Monday and is such a very nice person .... congratulations Charlene.

It was hard to decide what of her cards to CASE but I finally went with this one. I love that flower stamp so it wasn't hard to chose that one ... the hard part was finding at least 2 things to change as per the rules, here is what I ended up changing:

• changed the colors slightly ... I kept the black but I used a different color pink
• changed the color ink used to stamp my flowers
• used a different verse
• stamped my verse of a second piece of colored card and punched it out using an oval punched and layered onto black ovals.
• used a different black ribbon.

I used the same technique as Charlene to create the color on my white gloss card ... this was done by applying rose red ink onto a baby wipe and swiping this across the gloss card. this made the card look closer to regal rose which is what used for my base card. The flowers are stamped using bravo burgundy ink.

Recipe:
Stamps: Blush - Penny Black; Verse Papertrey Ink
Paper: White Gloss; Black; Regal Rose - SU
Other: Black Ink; Rose Red & Bravo Burgundy SU Ink; Oval Punch; Black Brads; Black Grosgrain Ribbon; Baby Wipes

A Christmas Card

Most of my Christmas cards are now finished and in the hands of the people I planned to send them to... there are a few exceptions ... but I think it is pretty safe to post the remainder of my cards I made for this year, that I haven't already posted to my blog.

This card is based on a sketch I found on Di Hickman's blog way back in September. The colors of this card are all taken from the colors in the DP I used for this one ... I think this was the first time I actually used true thyme which worked well for the base of this card. It is a fairly simple design which is good when you need to make soooo many cards.

I have a few more cards I haven't shown you yet which I will post in the next week or two, when I haven't got anything else to share with you.

Recipe:
Stamps: Seasons of Joy - Stampin' Up
Paper: True Thyme, Real Red & Garden Green - SU; White; DP - unknown
Other: Black Ink; Warm Green Fluid Chalk; Star Eyelet.

A Quick December ATC Calendar

Here is a quick ATC calendar I did for December on Monday night. Most of you won't know that every year I run a calendar swap down here in Australia ... there are several different calendar themes one of them being an ATC calendar.... unfortunately each year I also get at least one no show.... this year was no exception ... so rather than sending the ATC calendar back to everyone without December in it I quickly put together this one on Monday night as I had a friend coming over on the Tuesday to sort them all.

The background was created by using two colors of adirondack colorwash spray ... I used the closest I had to Christmas colors which was lettuce and Cranberry ... I then stamped the santa image on top using black ink.

The calendar was created using my computer and printed onto white card, as you can see I also spritzed the calendar part a little as I didn't want it to be tooo white.


Recipe:
Stamps: Santa's Wish - Tim Holtz Collection Stampers Anonymous
Paper: White; Black
Other: Black Ink; Lettuce & Cranberry Adirondack Color Wash

Playing the VSN Mini Challenges!

Well today is the last of the VSN mini challenges before the big event which will be held 18 - 19 January 2008. As with the previous mini challenges this round there are 4 challenges which you can find in the VSN forum of SCS.

So far I have on managed to complete two of the challenges ... but I do have 2 weeks to complete them in so I might be able to get one or two more done ... we will see.

The first card above is for the sketch challenge, I used a stamp by Rubber Romance ... I think it fits the theme of VSN quite well (Girl's Night Out). I stamped the image on white card using black ink, paper piercing the top corners of the card and layering onto black & red card. The centre panel is black layered on red with brads attached to the top & bottom of the panel. I used basic grey's scarlet letter DP which is layered to black card. A piece of red card is attached to the top section and then the black ribbon layered over the top of this ... Finally this was all layered to the folded red card.



This one is for the Inspiration challenge ... I guess this is the first inspiration challenge I have ever done ... our inspiration was a dress .... I selected colors that looked similar to the dress and tried to achieve a similar pattern. I used the flower and stem from Spiral Bouquet to decorate my cream panel and also the base Blue Bayou card. I cut strips of not quite navy, added the brads and layered these to the top and bottom of the card. Finally I stamped "Enjoy" to a piece of cream card, punched out using my oval punch and attached to the card using foam tape.
Recipe: Sketch Challenge: Stamps: Samantha - Rubber Romance
Papers: Red - Stampin' Up; Black; White; Scarlet Letter DP - Basic Grey
Other: Black Ink; Red Brads; Black Grosgrain Ribbon; Paper Piercing Mat & Tool; Foam Tape

Inspiration Challenge: Stamps: Spiral Bouquet - Papertrey Ink Paper: Blue Bayou, Not Quite Navy & Vanilla - Stampin' Up Other: Not Quite Navy & Blue Bayou SU Ink; Blue Brads; Oval Punch; Foam Tape

Black & White with a Splash of Red!

It's time for another challenge with my fab/sassy friends on SCS! This week we were to create a black & white card with a splash of color ... I recently created a card for a similar challenge that Jeanne & Sherry were running for their JBWW challenge .... this one for my fab/sassy friends was one that we had already thought up way before then ... but it was fun having a change to do a trial run of our challenge LOL.

The image here is one I found in a local craft shop the other week, I really didn't need any more Christmas stamps but as it was sooo cheap I couldn't pass it up! I stamped the image on white card using black ink and then colored the baubles red, I used some epoxy stickers to cover the baubles. This was then layered onto black and then white card.

I wanted to use some of my black DP from the DCWV Glitter Stack Pack as I now have two of these book and there is an awful lot of black DP in them .... but some of the other DP in the books I have come to love using so I had to get my 2nd book when I saw one recently.

I also added paper piercing to the right side of the card ... it is hard to tell by the photo but it run from the DP along the bottom .... up the right side and then back along the top to the DP
Recipe: Stamps: Ho Ho Ho - Unknown Paper: Black; White; DCWV Glitter Stack DP
Other: Black Ink; Epoxy Circle Stickers; Black Brads; White Brads; Black Grosgrain Ribbon; Paper Piercing Mat & Tool; Foam Tape

From Our Home To Yours

This card is for today's sketch challenge on SCS, as you can see I am still playing with my Cat's Pajama's stamps!

This is really a very quick and easy sketch, I would have had it finished a lot earlier if I didn't keep getting sidetracked ... some my fault and some my DH who needed some help with stuff outside. I used my square nestabilities to create my main panel for this one ... turning them to make a diamond shape. The double panels under it are DP from SU's Holiday Thyme, layered on cranberry and cool caribbean. This was finally layered onto a folded old olive card.

Recipe:
Stamps: Kittys Christmas - The Cat's Pajamas
Paper: Cranberry, Cool Caribbean, Old Olive, Holiday Thyme DP - Stampin' Up; White
Other: Black Ink; Square Nestabilities; Cranberry Brads; Oval Punch; Foam Tape

Time For Another VSN Mini

Tomorrow (Wednesday) night at 7pm, (10am EST if you live in Australia) is the kick off for the last VSN Mini for this round. Won't you come join the fun, stamp a little, and maybe learn some new things. Remember, you have 2 weeks to upload your creations, and no time limit to create! If you have any questions about VSN, leave me a comment here or ask in the VSN forum of SCS

Dec 5th VSN Mini begins at 7pm EST

Oh Christmas Tree!

Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree how beautiful your branches ....... oops yes sorry that is me singing again .... I love singing the Christmas Carols even if I don't sing them very well hehe!

A few weeks ago SCS posted a number of Christmas themed tutorials, one of these tutorials was how to create these Paper Trees. As these seemed like something fun to do I decided to purchase a foam cone shape and create one myself.

I used the Holiday Thyme DP which may be last years DP in the US & Canada but to all the Aussie stampers down here it is the latest release ... go figure ha!

I found the gold embellishment at the top of my tree in my craft cupboard ... these decorated my Christmas crackers last year and I managed to rescue a few other everyone pulled them so at least one has now been recycled! I created the star using my George cricut cartridge.
Recipe: Papers: Cranberry Crisp & Holiday Thyme DP - Stampin' Up
Other: George Cricut Cartridge; Gold Embellishment

Baby It's Cold Outside!

Well it is Monday again .... they are coming around even quicker than normal lately!!! So of course that means another challenge with my CCEE friends on SCS .... this week is another supply challenge ... we normally do these at the end of the month but due to Christmas (we are taking a break) we changed this challenge to the beginning of the month this time round instead.

Our supplies for this challenge were sent to us by Cindy Haffner, you can see what she sent us all in the photo below (yes I finally remembered to take a photo before I started creating my card LOL!) Cindy's instructions were that we had to use the stamped images, the striped paper and two of the other items. All our cards had to be red & white .... and we could add black if we wanted to. We were allowed to add other colors to the stamped image.

The images Cindy supplied are from the soon to be released " Baby it's cold outside" set from My Favorite Things, on 5th December I believe. We were also lucky enough to be sent the actual stamp set ... so I was able to re stamp the main image and the verse .... I stamped the dress on DP so I could paper piece it ... the verse verse I masked so I could stamp it in two lines and use my oval punch to punch it out rather then keep it in a straight line.

I used my snowflake cuttlebug embossing folder to emboss the white part of my base card and layered the red striped card to the bottom of this. I selected the glitter strip and three of the snowflakes as the extra items for my card.

Recipe:
Stamps: Baby It's Cold Outside - My Favorite Things
Paper: White, Red
Other: Black Ink; Real Red SU Ink; Red Brads (Lge & sml); White brads (sml & mirco); Oval Punch; Snowflake Cuttlebug Embossing Folder; Foam Tape