Flower Sampler Frame/Class

Firstly, I've noticed I have a few new watchers so hello to you! Please feel free to leave me a comment and let me know who you are, I'd love to pop by your blog for a visit.

My friend, Amanda, invited me to attend a class at Kaisercraft Robina today. It was an epic day, scheduled to run from 9.30 to 2pm with breaks for morning tea and lunch. We ended up crafting from 9.30 to 2.30 with only a break for morning tea. Amanda and I were SO hungry by the end of it but I think it was worth it.

The class was described as a flower frame which would teach you different techniques for flower making. We didn't actually know what the finished product would look like but it sounded like fun.

Turns out the class involved creating a sampler with different flower types in each window of the Kaisercraft 12 card holder frame.

I already knew a lot of these techniques but hadn't actually tried to create some of them so I think it was worthwhile attending. The details were a bit hard to capture given all the petals are white, the background paper is actually a nice light brown to have the flowers pop a bit more. Here is an overview of the flowers and techniques.

First row: (1) Basic crumpled petals flower (not shown in close-up). I've made these heaps of times, though I prefer to spray them with water and scrunch while wet so they hold their shape a bit better. (2) Tim Holtz die-cut with self-embossing and brad. We used a stylus to self-emboss patterns into the petals before layering them. It was handing the see the different looks that could be created depending on which way you bent the petals. (3) Hand-cut rosette and display. I'd seen techniques of how to do this one but hadn't been game to try it myself before this class. Whilst they are quite fiddly, especially waiting for the glue to dry, I think the end result is quite good and I might be tempted to try this one again. (4) Punched circle petals. Another technique I knew but hadn't tried, I think this would look more effective with inked edges or double-sided paper. I had trouble getting the right amount of overlap so it formed a complete circle.

Second row: (1) Florish and mini blooms (not shown in close up). This was just to show how to create trailing vines which I learnt a few months ago and have used on a number of recent LOs. (2) Product sampler. I think this one was just to show-off the Kaisercraft mini-blooms, resin flowers and fabric roses. :) I've been tossing up buying some resin flowers and might go back to get some, I already love the other two products. (3) Scrunched hand-cut petals. We cut three concentric circles, made small cuts to create eight petals and then scrunched them, finished off with three small flowers in the centre. I quite like this effect and it is very easy to create, perfect for creating larger flowers I think. (4) Stamped and shaped. We stamped an Asian script onto five pieces of cardstock, tore them into concentric circles and then shaped the petals around the resin flower centrepiece. Another very easy way to create a flower to perfectly match a LO.

Third row: (1) Organza petals. I love organza/satin flowers however I've never made any of my own. We alternated organza and die-cuts on this flower. I struggled to get a nice shape with my first try which was the biggest piece at the back but I think I got better so I might try making my own in future rather than buying them. (2) Pleated rosette. I knew the theory behind this and had even tried making my own of these but it had failed miserably the first time so I'm very pleased with how this one turned out! (3) Gathered lace. A very simple technique that I once again knew but had never bothered to actually try out. It was much easier and quicker than I had expected and I have heaps of lace at home so I might be making more of these too. (4) Florish and die-cut rossettes (not shown in close up). The teacher wanted us to see the different between die-cut rosettes and hand-cut ones. I don't think there is much difference in the end result so I'll be happy to continue to hand-cut mine if I make future ones rather than fork out the money for a die.

Congratulations if you made it all the way to the end! Thanks for stopping by. :)

Our Vows

I've done quite a few 'pretty' LO's about my wedding but now I've decided it's time to get down to scrapping the details before I forget them. Ben and I made our own vows by picking our favourite bits from about 50 samples our celebrant gave us, I've included the vows in full on the photo. Most of the rest of the album is either purple (our wedding colour) or green/brown (due to the beautiful natural scenery at the venue), so this LO will stand out but I felt like a bit of a change.

The different colour choice was also inspired by the current Yummy Scrap challenge over at ScrapFriends. The pink/orange combo reminded of a paper range I'd picked up from Kaisercraft a while ago so I used that with some highlights from the Love Notes range as well.

ScrapFriends is an amazing online store and also has a blog filled with heaps of tips. Not only do they run a monthly sketch competition, they also have some other sketches up to inspire you at any time. I've entered both their sketch comps and loved working with their designs so I picked another sketch for this challenge.

Finally, Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge has weddings as their June 1 challenge theme. This is another fantastic challenge site that often comes up with very funky and interesting challenges, released on the 1st and 15 of each month. I'd highly encourage you to stop by and check them out if you haven't already.

Cupcake Birthday Card

Who doesn't love a cute birthday card? Challenge #48 over at The Lollipop Ladies this fortnight is inspired by some very yummy cupcakes. I didn't have any cupcake photos so I decided to go with a card rather than a LO for this fortnight. You can see both a new stamp and new border punch from my Stampin' Up party I hosted recently. First time I've used their stamps and I was pleasently suprised. I also think that border punch is adorable and have used it on a couple of things already.

Inspiration picture:

Additional challenges: A Recipe of Embellishments: 3 of one, 2 of another and 1 of another. I went with three cupcakes, two border punches and 1 rubber stamp.

Prizes available: Guest DT spots are able to be won each fortnight and our sponsor this fortnight is: Mad for Markers: A choice of 3 of her digi stamps.

Entries close midday next Tuesday so there is still lots of time to get your entry in. We have 7 entries so far so the prize will definately be given away. I'd love to see what you can create and don't forget that you can combine it with other challenges too if you want.

Bond Uni Graduation

Just to demonstrate How Times Change (the topic and title of my previous LO), here is one with my brother, sister and I in 2009 when I was graduating from University with a Masters of Criminology. Just a small step forward from graduating Grade 6! :) I wasn't happy with the professional photos taken on this day, however the casual ones taken before the ceremony were quite nice.

This LO was inspired by a few different challenges running this month. Firstly, I was inspired by the beautiful blue/tan of the bird at Show Us Your Stuff. It reminded me of the lovely Prairie Lane collection by Kaisercraft however it turns out I only had two sheets left from that range, hence the addition of the pink/orange version of the same patterns known as the Penny Royale collection. Their Try This technique for the month was book paper blooms and you can see I included a pink one in the right bottom corner. The bloom also counts as my handmade embellishment for Frosted Designs Fab Friday challenge. Oh, I also handmade the fabric covered button.

I figured since I was planning on using Kaisercraft papers I may as well use one of their fantastic Saturday Sketches as well. This LO is based on the #1 sketch for June. Kaisercraft papers, die cuts, brad and rubber stamp were used, mixture of Prairie Lane and Penny Royale collections. I've signed up to complete a full-day class at the Robina Kaisercraft outlet with a friend next weekend. I'm looking forward to learning a lot of new flower-making techniques and also getting a chance to hopefully pick up some of the newish Great Southern Land collection.

Lastly, the blue/pink/orange colour combo is perfect for the Scrapbook Kits With a Difference colour inspiration for this month.

How Times Change

I found this photo of my siblings and I a few years ago and just knew I had to scrapbook it! It's taken a while because I don't have any school themed products. It's funny to see how cute we were almost 20 years ago. This was the only year we all attended the same school together.  

Has anyone else had one of those LOs where they think it's finished but they're not quite happy with it? This was one of them for me. I thought I'd finished on Wednesday but it just didn't seem enough. You can see the original version below. I picked it up again this morning and decided to work it over a bit more. I think it pops a bit better now.

This LO was inpsired by the sketch over at ScrapFIT.

 

Bird is the Word has 'Change' as one of their current words.

June 123 has the following criteria - word: change; colour: blue; technique: washi tape. I've had to create my own washi tape again since I don't actually own any, but I think the masking tape with the blue number stamp looks really cute. :)

Sharing the Good Times

As my regular readers may know, I seem to have a habit of scrappiong birthday photos a year after they were taken. I just recently turned 28 and have a few photos I still need to print for these celebrations however the challenge for Once Upon a Sketch this month was birthdays and I didn't want to wait until my new photos were printed. I've ended up going back to a photo from my 25th in 2009! One of my best friends has her birthday three weeks after me so we've been celebrating together for a couple of years now. The photo was taken at the little Malaysian restaurant we went to and I love how happy we all look.

  Hidden journalling on the tag at the top with the purple twine.

Lots of Imaginarium Designs chipboard on this one. For the photo corner pieces I took a leaf out of Nadia Cannizzo and  Erin Blegan's book and daubbed on the white paint with my finger to keep a mix of painted and raw chippie. The peacock feather is covered in Opals which are a type of beautiful UTEE. I've also got a doily from The Chip Chop Shop, frog button from Lil Red Rocket and bottle cap from Ah Scrap. Very exciting for me is the addition of the leaves which I cut with my brand new Big Shot!!!

So as I was saying, this was inspired by the June challenge over at Once Upon a Sketch:

The theme of this challenge is BIRTHDAYS. We would like you to create a layout and interpret the theme "BIRTHDAYS" however you like based on the following sketch. You can journal as little or as much as you like, but your layout must incorporate this theme and the sketch below. Please make sure that we see some sort of journalling on your layouts and please tell us where your journalling is . Hidden journalling is perfectly fine.

I have rotated the sketch to match with me landscape photo but otherwise stuck pretty close to the original design, as I normally do.

Swimming with Seals

Ben purchased me the fantastic experience of swimming with seals for my birthday in 2010. It was FREEZING in the middle of winter but so very cool. You can see the original blog post I did about it here. Decided to do with a hand-written title on this one because none of my title stickers would fit. This then led to some extra doodling around the page. Because the paper themselves were so busy I kept the rest of the design pretty plain.

 

This LO was created for the Sketches with a Twist June challenge. They have the very funky sketch below with an added challenge of usig fabric. My little crab is actually stamped on fabric which I've cut out.

Shadow

It's my turn to reveal my Lollipop Ladies DT submission for Challenge 47. I've gone with a different take on my normal style by being a bit more arty. I really loved this photo of my husband and I taken during our pre-wedding shoot, we actually have an 8 x10 print of this up in our bedroom. I went looking for shadow/reflection quotes and fell in love with the one I used on this LO. I really do think the love I share with Ben helps give vibrancy to the rest of my life.

It's a bit hard to see in this photo, but I have actually masked the heart shapes and covered the rest of the cardstock in texture paste. The black doily is left over from when I used it as a mask on my Wedding Selfie LO, I found it on my desk and thought it would work perfectly. :)

Here is the inspiration picture:

I was inspired to use this photo because of the reflections. I've painted the hearts in similar colours to the jelly babies. I initially wasn't too keen on that colour selection but it actually looks pretty striking and it's good to use a colour palette I wouldn't normally choose. The added challenge was to use ribbon and I've got a couple of ribbon flowers in there.

There is still another 5 days to enter this fortnight's competition, so what are you waiting for?

UnstampaBelles also has a challenge to use ribbons, so I'll enter this LO in there too. It's an interesting new challenge blog I've found where you're not allowed to use any stamps in your entries. I thought this would be perfect for me since even though I have a heap of stamps I don't seem to use them that often. :)

Blog Giveaways

Today I came across a number of amazing blog giveaways that I just had to share with my followers:

First up is a fantastic giveaway that Nadia is having over at Just My Scrapping World.

It is 5 boxes FULL of stuff. I think you all deserve it after all the love and support I receive from all of you. Its my birthday , and I want to share the fortune I have had over the last couple of years through winning stuff and DT stuff etc. with you all. Now I need to make a point here that yes some of this stuff is half packets or some cut paper etc but most is untouched still in their packs. Please keep this in mind!

 

1. A pizza box FULL of current and past paper collections.

2. A pizza box FULL of mixed embellishments and tools

3. A pizza box full of alphas

4. A pizza box full of flowers

5. A pizza box FULL of ribbon, Webster's Pages unopened packets of flowers and trim etc.

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Erin, formerly of Scrappin' Sisters, has started her own blog at My Scrap Cabin. She has two giveaways going at the moment with more to come if she gets additional followers.

 

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I can never go past Sam's Eye Candy Magic monthly giveaways.

 

 

Rosser Park

It's been a while since I've sat down and created a LO but the weather this long weekend is miserable so it was perfect for staying in and creating in my PJs. :) The photos were just some random snaps during one of our multiple picnics at Rosser Park. This park's entry is located on a fairly busy road and doesn't look much when you're just driving past but if you actually going inside it's so lovely. I always try to talk Ben into going for picnics there and take my Mum and Dad each time they come to visit as well.

I also wanted to share a couple of detail shots to show all the different layers. I've used some masking tape which I've stamped on to create my own faux-washi tape. :) Doilies from The Chip Chop Shop, journal spot from Lil' Red Rocket, chipboard from Scrapmatts, most of the paper is from Kaisercraft.

On to the challenges which inspired this LO. ScrapFriends have another stunning sketch up this month that I simply couldn't pass up. I used the journal tag and chipboard tree instead of the third photo and moved the jouralling but otherwise I stayed pretty close to the design.

Frosted Designs fabulous Friday challenge was to incorporate stitching on the LO. I have stitching on the top and bottom of the LO and also on the photo mats. I left the edges rugged on the mats to make it look a bit more rustic.

Southern Girls Challenge has a 'Things with wings' theme for this fortnight. I've included two birds and a butterfly on this LO.

Lollipop Ladies Challenge #47 - Jelly Babies

Challenge #47 over at Lollipop Ladies went live yesterday. This fortnight our challenge is based on those cute little people, yes it's Jelly Babies! With the additional challenge of Ribbon.

Guest DT spots are able to be won each fortnight and our sponsor this fortnight is: Annabelle Stamps.

 

You can create any kind of papercraft project you like as long as its inspired by the image and they allow very broad interpretations of the challenge. You can also feel free to combine it with any other challenge you enter. I went with something a little bit different to my normal style for this fortnight. Here is my sneak peak in case you're interested:

I'd love to see some more scrapbookers enter so I hope you're feeling inspired.

Stampin' Up! Party

I hosted my first Stampin' Up! party today. The demonstrator (Tammy Gerrard if you're looking for one on the Gold Coast, QLD) was lovely. She brought in two samples cards for us to complete but was happy for us to put our own spin on the design and even made matching edible cupcakes for the party! There is no pressure for the sale at all.

I originally decided to host the party just as a way to catch up with friends and pick up one or two extra products. I really wasn't expecting my friends to spend much but they were all inspired by the demonstration and bought some supplies to start scrapbooking/card making on a regular basis. This resulted in me being able to purchase $400 worth of products for just about $160!!! I picked up a Sizzix Big Shot as my 50% off product and am looking forward to being able to start playing with this soon.

Here is what my card looked like. Photo is not up to normal quality as my friend took it. :)