More?!

Well, I am back with yet another challenge! Just as well as the month is all but over! This time I have completed Stuck?! Sketches June 15 challenge, which is a sketch if you hadn't guessed!

And this is my interpretation:

This one is a little different for me, and I like it, but not sure that I love it, but it is growing on me! I decided to use up some of my hoard of 7Gypsies papers (and they have been sitting there a long time!), and I also experimented with a technique that I saw on Wilna Furstenberg's blog, where she did some water colour resist with glaze, masks and gelato's and now since I have all of those things it was time to try it out!

I have been playing with masking material in my Silhouette again. We have some front covers for document binding lying around so I thought I would give that a go. The packaging says it is 200 microns thick, which makes it of simialr thickness to the Tim Holtz masking material, just without the "sticky back", but that is what washi tape is for! It cut beautifully, on the same settings that I used before, but I upped the speed (speed 2, thickness 33 and blade 8 and double cut). I am really pleased with this material, and it is easy to get too! I think it is a little thicker than transparency material. So here are the two masks that I cut this time, both about 5" x 5" in size:

 So, that is all from me for now. Maybe I will try to get one more challenge in before June is out! Then when July hits I will be doing another Studio Calico class, called Inked! Can't wait for that one to start!!

Another Challenge completed!

Just tearing along this week! Really feeling quite inspired to create, not to mention having time to do so! I love school holidays!

I have been doing some more playing around with my Silhouette. I bought some sketch pens a while ago and haven't got around to trying them out until this week. Well, I have just ordered myself some more, so I think that might sum up my opinion on them! The set I bought was the metallic one with gold, silver, bronze and white. My thinking was some cool effects with white on dark, but wouldn't you know it, the white pen just doesn't work! I have tried and tried, and maybe I will try some more, but I don't think it is going to ever work. Oh well, the others do and look pretty fab!

So of course I have a picture of my "playing"! I have used the gold and bronze pens, and two project life style journalling cards from the Silhouette shop. The trick is to turn off the cut lines for the outside cuts while you write and then turn the writing off to cut the outside, oh and don't unload the cutting mat in between!

Looks pretty cool doesn't it?! The small writing is at about 12pt and is just Arial, the other I can't remember which font, but it is at something like 24pt. I think this can be a great way to add some details to project life!

So apart from that I have completed another challenge. This time for Kraft It Up, this months challange was to create a "project life" style page with at least three photos and journalling about the week in June from which you took the the photos. Not as easy as it sounds, even though I am doing this kind of project on a monthly basis! Anyway, this is what I came up with...

Playing with lots of things, like my new washi stash, stamps and of course the Silhouette!

This next page is one that came together really quickly, and I love it! I didn't think, or should I say over think things too much and it just all came together! I have used the triangle mask that I made and showed in the previous post together with some Mr Huey's shell coloured mist, a great neutral kind of colour. Loving the motex labeller too!

So, that is it for now. I just recieved an order of some new goodies and I am hoping to play with them today, so maybe I will be back soon with some more playing! Playing is fun!

Til next time,

Katie x

Playing and Creating

Well, it has been a nice relaxing start to the holidays so far. Sunday we took the kids to see Despicable Me 2 in Gold Class no less! Lucky they have some great family deals for early sessions. The kids loved the luxury, I just hope they don't expect that treatment every time we go to the movies!

The kids have also been hard at work in the garden helping to clean up one of our "problem" areas. The $10 per hour I am sure was the biggest incentive!! We have now got rid of most of the weeds in this area and we are just about ready to dig in an edging and then lay the weed mat so we can put down some pebbles. Still a lot of work to do, and I think I will be shelling out a few dollars, but still cheaper than getting someone else in to do the job!

Apart from that, I have even had time to sit at my desk and play! And I mean play too! I had some old Cricut stencil material laying around that I wanted to experiment with in my Silhouette to make some new masks. Well I did just that. The Cricut stencil material is quite thick and I wasn't sure that it would cut so I tried with a reasonably simple design of triangles. The result is pretty cool, even if I did have to manually "pop" each of the triangles out! So the moral of the story is it does cut and I may need to try with some other settings, but the thick material makes it a little hard. I also then remembered that I also had some Tim Holtz mask material laying around (so much stuff so little time!!) so I tried that too! I used the same settings (speed 1, thickness 33, blade 8 and double cut) and it cut beautifully! I knew the settings were perfect too as it only cut the mask material and not the backing sheet on the mask too. When I took it out it just peeled off the cutting mat, leaving the leftover bits and backing sheet behind!

 

This is the Cricut stencil material. The backing on this is very sticky, so you can see all the fibres through this from me trying to "de-stick" it a little! Otherwise it has turned out pretty well.

These two are the Tim Holtz mask material results. This cut so well, and I think I will be getting myself some more of this to make some more masks!

So now I needed to play with these new masks! So far I have only one finished layout to show the results of my masking experiment. But I do have another one in the works!

So I used the flower mask with some texture paste, then painted it with Mr Huey's mists. I also painted some gesso over the background and painted some gold Mr Huey's in random places and stamped and then layered some cool new text washi tape. A simple page, but it needed to be with all the colours and business in the photos. Loving my motex tape writer too!!

Well, that's it for now. I have been playing around with some other stuff so hopefully will be back soon with that!

Scrappy Catch-Up!

Well, here I am back again. School holidays have just begun, thank goodness! Everyone is just so tired and ready for a break, not to mention coughs, colds and other sniffles! We don't have any major plans these holidays other than catching some of the new movies coming out (and there are a few on our list!), and maybe some catch-ups with friends and family.

On the crafting front, Erin and I found our way to the Scrapbooking and Papercraft convention over the Queen's birthday long weekend. We were able to cover all that we wanted to in only a few hours. Disappointingly it seems to get smaller each year with less to offer. But aside from that I was still able to come home with a few goodies! Mainly a pile of new washi tape! Funnily enough, next door at the convention centre was the annual book fair, and I think we almost spent more there and had more fun in 45 minutes than the whole time we were at the show! Although Erin and I were very impressed with Jane Devenports drawings, they were wonderful!

But I did come away itching to create, so that is the positive! I spent last weekend creating while introducing myself to the series "Breaking Bad" that so many friends have recommended to me. Well I was not disappointed! And it gave me an excuse to just sit and play for a few hours! I haven't managed to do any challenges for a while with committments to classes and other business getting in the way, so I thought I would try and get some done for this month. I managed two challenges last weekend, and hopefully I will get some more done over the holidays. So lets get onto pictures!

Firstly, here are the Project Life spreads that I mostly completed while on my scrappy retreat a few weeks ago. I still had to finish of journaling and I added a few more photos too.

Working by month is really great for me, I have time to do this and the kids absolutely love having a little summary of our monthly activities to look back on! I think I "convinced" a few of the girls at the retreat that this might be a worthwhile venture too! I used Simple Stories Snap and Echo Park Photo Freedom kits for these pages making it really quick and easy to put together.

Next up are some pages that I created for the sake of creating! It is really nice to do that sometimes!

The Frodo page was inspired by one done by Marcy Penner that I have on one of my Pintrest boards, such a good way to collect ideas Pintrest! I am also enjoying scrapping some older photos. I think that might be because my kids won't let me photograph them quite so much any more and they are at school so much so I don't have a captive audience any more!! Oh well, holiday time, I will endeavour to pin them down and take photos!!

These next ones are my challenge ones. The first for Purple Pumpkins June Sketch and the second for White With One. Firstly here is the sketch:

And here is my interpretation:

Again, an older photo! I added in an orange heart button, butterfly flair and yellow ticket that are Purple Pumpkin products. I also had to play with the gorgeous gold glitter washi tape that I recently picked up from D'lish Scraps! Isn't it the best!!! That is also where I picked up the labeller that made the "cheeky grins" label/title.

So White With One June criteria was White + Coral + Decorative Edges, and I pulled out some of my border punches, which I admit have not seen the light of day in a little while, and had some fun!

I really love how the edges came out, tone on tone, detail without being too busy! And some more older photos. look how little and sweet my girls are! I can't believe how quickly they have grown!

Well, that is all from me today. Hopefully I willbe back with some more challenges soon!

June already!

Wow, I cannot believe it is June already! The best thing though is we are getting ready for a long weekend this coming weekend, due to the Queen's Birthday public holiday. I really feel like I need a long weekend!

Having said that last weekend was almost like a long weekend. I spent the weekend on a scrapping/crafting retreat with some of my beautiful crafty friends. I must say that I came away feeling a little refreshed and happy that I had so much time to just sit and create, and chat too of course! A lot of talking and laughing goes on at our retreats! So, I thought I would share some of my favourite creations from the weekend, all with a layering feel to them courtesy of the Pop Off the Page 2 class that has just wound up!

 OK, technically I finished this one before the retreat and I just haven't put it up yet!

 This one came out of a challenge put forward by Andrea. The background paper was where I demonstrated how to use mists to create a watercolour type of effect. My challenge was to use that demo page! Kind of pleased with how it came together!

Not too much else to report here. The world keeps turning and we keep going on with our busy lives!

Katie