Look What I Have Been Doing All Week

This is a similar version to one I did earlier that I received lots of lovely comments, so I decided to do it for my swap at our Regional Training day. I think I must be NUTS!!!! I did 50 swaps for Regionals - that is 100 embossed flowers and each flower had to be cut out by hand and coloured by hand. Then there are 50 bows to be tied. The ladies in my classes would be saying serve you right as I do love bows ( they do moan a bit when they see another card with a bow on it in class).

Each card had three layers on the card and the whisper white layer I used the 1/2" circle punch to cut the corners (that is 200 corners I had to line up) Then I scored with the bone folder in 1cm on the whisper white for a bit more interest (I really am nuts).

There are a fewer layers with dimensionsal (under the whisper white, under the top flower and under the greeting).

All in all a very time consuming card BUT I had a great day at Regionals and both Sue Madex and Angela Dickins from my team demonstrated different techniques despite both being nervous (who wouldn't being up on stage in front of hundreds of craft ladies). Well done girls...

Gift and Card in One

Well last night I was supposed to be doing my 50 swaps for the Regional Training day on Saturday but after about card 5 of 50 I had an idea for a Christmas Card and got a bit sidetracked. So at 1.00 am this morning I had this card made but still only 5 of my cards for Regionals. Guess who is going to be burning the midnight oil for the next two nights!!!!

I seem to be giving gift cards more lately especially to teenagers and I thought it is pretty boring just giving a card with a gift card inside, so I thought this looks like a real present from the outside and gives it more interest.

I must say though I do love this card as I have had trouble with coming up with ways to use this Christmas Ribbon so I was very happy with the way this turned out (even though the bow is a little bit fiddly).

This is the inside with a tag for the gift card and an insert to write on. The glitter and gold embossing don't show up all that well but the overall effect is great.

3D Tree Trimmings

I have been looking at this set and trying to do something different with it so I thought I would go 3D. I stamped and embossed with gold embossing powder 3 times and then scored each one and folded it in half and adhered each of them together. The gold looks great in real life and the 3D effect is something different. My daughter was worried about it going in an envelope, so we put it in an envelope and squashed it down a few times and then took it out and it came out as you see in the picture none the worse for wear.

Card: Old Olive Vanilla

Paper: Ski Slope

Stamps: Tree Trimmings Lovely as A Tree (yes that tiny litle pine cone) Short and Sweet

Ink: Riding Hood Red Old Olive Choc Chip marker

Big Thankyou

Thankyou to all the lovely ladies (and men even if it was my hubby) who came to say hello to us at Craftfest. Lots of ladies entered our prize draw, good luck to all of you - 2 lucky people will get some lovely stampin up goodies to play with.

A big thankyou to the lovely talented Stampin Up ladies Nikki and Ange who were on the Stampin Up stall with me and took me under their wings to teach me a few things about what we needed to do at the expo - I learnt heaps from them (I must admit I was a little worried about such a big event and these ladies were great to me).

This card today is such a quick and easy one, if you have some of this striped riding hood red grosgrain ribbon from the new mini catalogue you can make this bon bon card by just tying the ends and attaching it with some glue dots (just great for attaching things that come unstuck with just the normal tape). I did run the background sheet which is riding hood red card through the cuttlebug just to give it a bit more interest with the stars.

More Mosaic

I have to say all the ladies in the class so far have loved this technique and it is such an easy technique to do. This particular sample used the very popular Fifth Ave set and the lovely Urban Oasis - the colours are really effective together and with the black and white embossing it looks great in real life(the colours haven't photographed particularly well). There are still a couple of places in next weeks classes if you are interested just contact me

Its Craft Expo Time

I will be at Craftexpo on Saturday at the old Exhibition Buildings and would love for you to come and visit us on Stand 164. We have lots of specials, kits and plenty of beautiful cards, Scrapbooking and 3D items if you are looking for ideas.

For more information about the expo and details of how to get there visit the Craftexpo site

The show runs until Sunday and is open 10 - 4.30pm - Hope to see you all there

Mojo Monday Time Again

Its Mojo Monday time and another different layout for us to try. I thought as we are now into October and lots of my ladies are turning their thoughts to Christmas Cards (I don't want to know how many weeks are left until Christmas - whatever it is it won't be enough)

Lots of different things used in this card. I started off with Real Red Card Stock and stamped my Father Christmas from the Holly Jolly Christmas set. To make him stand out more I versamarked his coat and put a layer of clear embossing powder on it which looks great in real life but hasn't shown up one little bit in the photograph - I took several photos and the ones where it did show up made it look all patchy (lol, the bad photographer at work). The snow flakes are stamped from the Snow Swirled set in Real Red and Old Olive.

Behind that I cut one long strip of Old Olive cardstock punched it with the Scallop Punch and then ran it through the Crimper, I then eased it around the circle - it was just long enough.

Below that is a strip of real red run through the crimper.

Under that is Ski Slope DSP matted on real red card stock above and below the rectangles are three gold brads (they could be any colour the colour seems to be washed out in the photo)

The last layer is a piece of DSP paper from the Haiku set. I finished it off with Merry Christmas from the Best Yet set (level 1 Hostess) stamped with Real Red on Whisper white and punched with the oval punch and matted on real red punched with the scallop oval punch.

Faux Suede and Faux Alligator Purse Card

There's lots of faux in this post today. The first faux is the faux suede from Splitcoast Stamper Monday Tutorial. The purse is made of faux suede using this technique and chocolate chip card. The faux alligator skin is a technique that Jackie Topa did on her blog. It is so easy and so effective. The inside is lined with Bella Bleu paper and the front has a pearl from the pretties kit on it .

Hope you like my little purse and card

Another Mosaic Card

I have made another card using different DSP for the new technique we are doing this month. The Raspberry Tart paper is so lovely unfortunately you cant see the dazzling diamonds on the butterfly's wings (even though the picture was taken outside - I think it really must be the photographer) To learn this technique there are still spaces in the class this Thursday 8th of October and the following Thursday 15th October. Contact me if you are interested in doing this class - my details are under the contact details at the top of the page.

World Card Making October 1-31

In celebration of World Card Making Day, Stampin' Up! is offering the following promotion throughout the entire month of October: buy a Simply Sent Card Elements kit and get 20 percent off the coordinating stamp set--no limit!

Buy one of these sets:
Item112028 P140 Flower Power Card Elements - $30.95

Item 112021 P141 Rock Star Card Element - $30.95

And get the co-ordinating stamp set 20% off:

Item 116779 P 140 Wow Flowers stamp set - $24.95 Discount Price $19.96
Item 116777 P 141 Starring You stamp set - $24.95 Discount Price $19.96

These kits help you to put cards together quickly, they include everything you need to create at least nine cards. Photos and project instructions are included. These would make great Christmas presents.

Contact me if you would like to order these kits.

Classes for October

Classes start this week for October, and one of the first cards we will be making will be using the mosaic embossing which gives a lovely finish to your card and is a great way to use up those little left over bits and pieces. Times for the classes this month can be found by clicking the tab at the top of the page and the my contact details are there as well. I finally worked out(well actually it wasn't all me) how to do those tabs at the top of the page (thanks heaps to my friends son Jonno I couldn't quite get that last step to work).

As well as this card we will be doing 2 more lovely cards - a Christmas card with an acetate window and a lovely flower card.

So if you are interested contact me and come along to do this great technique and make some great cards and meet some of the lovely ladies that come to my classes.

Beautiful roses

Aren't these just the most beautiful arrangement of flowers? A friend of my sons gave me these flowers and the fragrance is just amazing. I just love flowers and if you have been looking at my blog lately nearly every card has been a flower card.

After receiving these I just had to make another flower card. I started off embossing the Fifth Avenue rose with white embossing powder but it looked a bit flat so I used my markers to colour in the back which is a technique we did in class last year but gives a lovely finish to the flower.(and so much quicker and easier than watercolouring if you are in a hurry).

I know I started out to make white roses and ended up with a very pink card and very pink roses, I did try purple ones but I liked the finished pink ones better. The top rose I layered to give a bit more depth. Hope you like it (Thanks Matt for the flowers that inspired this card)
Card: Regal Rose, Whisper White
DSP: Sweet Always
Ink: Regal Rose
Accessories: White embossing, powder punches, Regal rose ribbon, Vellum

Mojo Monday 106

This is the sketch for this weeks Mojo Monday I don't know how they keep coming up with all these different ideas, but I found it gives you a great starting point for your card. All you have to do is decide on the colours (and the bling if you are that way inclined which we all know that I am).

So this is my Mojo Monday card. I used the lovely Bella Rose paper and teamed it with Kiwi Kiss, Riding Hood Red and Whisper White card. The only stamp I used was the "So Glad we're friends" from the Best Yet set, which is a Hostess Level 1 set. This was stamped in Riding Hood Red. The flowers I cheated a little bit and just cut them out from the Bella Rose paper (very quick and easy). The last thing I added was some ribbon - and there is my Mojo Monday card (and it is only Thursday!!!)