Slice class pictures

Thought I would put up the whole picture from the Slice class I took back in Feb. In the class we created a layout and a card with idea of getting everyone to not just look at the shapes you cut as one dimensional but think outside the square at the non-obvious ways to use them. It ended up being a successful class and I am now coming up with another one! I used these cards: Wedding, Basics 2, Noteworthy, Studio Essentials and I think Basics 1. Then lots of layering, inking, rub-ons, gems and kindy glitz or dimensional magic!

Out of the Hat - March

Well, I have finished my layout for the Out of the Hat blog and posted it up over there. I had fund with this one. As I have been playing with distressing inks for some upcoming classes at Scrapbook City I thought I could use these techniques on some calico for the "use fabric" requirement of the challenge. I ended up cutting some tags out of the calico and then distressed them and stamped flourishes onto them. I was quite happy with how they turned out and they became a nice design feature without being overwhelming. I have also finished a layout using new My Minds Eye Quite Contrary and almost finished a MME Lush one too, so I will be back soon to update with those. Catch you later!

New CHA stuff starting to arrive!

Well, the Winter CHA 2010 stuff has started to arrive and I am having all kinds of fun with new product to play with! Also I can share the Kaiser Craft creations since they have been officially posted now. You can see the KC post here. It is still pretty amazing to see myself and my work up over there. So, we were asked to create a layout and a card for each of the Devonshire and La Di Da collections, which I did and since then I have created another layout with each collection and I am sure there will be more as I have so much left! The paper pads are just perfect for cards too.

The Devonshire collection

La Di Da Collection

The Devonshire layout and card are now up at Scrapbook City on display if you live locally and would like to see them in real life. Here are the other two pages I created using these collections. Both are so easy to use and have lots of themes they can go with too. As for the other new product I have been playing with... I have "for the first time" I might add, played with some Sassafrass Lass (Nerdy Bird) and Websters Pages (Garden Gala) and had a bit of fun too. I have never been really drawn to these manufacturers before and was just a little apprehensive when I got these home. But after a lot of thinking and procrastinating I came up with a couple of pages that I am quite pleased with, and I am quite taken with the Nerdy Bird range!

Websters Pages - Garden Gala Sassafrass Lass - Nerdy Bird

Aside from these pages, I have been playing with some 7 Gypsies. This is another manufacturer that I have not used much of and another one I am starting to love! This is another page with the monthly summary photo collage, or in this case two months. Slowly but surely I am getting through last year! Sitting on my desk I now have some new My Minds Eye Lush (in black and red, just divine!) and a collection from the Quite Contrary range, Little Boy Blue - That's My Boy. I have printed photos and now I just have to get there with some time to spare! Also the new criteria is up over at the Out of the Hat Challenge blog. This month this is what you need to include:

1. Include fabric 2. Include flowers of three different sizes 3. Include chipboard

All should be relatively easy to do, I think! I just need to drop into Spotlight to get some "specific" fabric for something that I have in mind. I just hope it comes together the way I have it in my mind! Catch you next time.

Been creating....

Well, I got my pack of goodies from Kaiser Craft just days after they announced the guest designers. All I can say is WOW! It was just like Christmas! Mind you, I don't think anyone else in the house quite understood just why I was so excited, but you get that! I was so lucky to receive one of everything from the Devonshire and La Di Da collections, and just between you and me, I was already hanging out for the Devonshire collection anyway! Both are just beautiful and some of the new trims are to die for. I have now completed a page and card with each collection and have sent them off to KC, so I will wait until they are up on the blog before I reveal them here. I have also managed to do another couple of sketch challenges from the KC blog. Admittedly they were from a couple of weeks ago, but time flies, weekends are busy! I had fun creating them and I even used the first of my month in review photos from last year. We are also in the middle of birthday month here, with Niamh just having had her eleventh birthday and Erin about to have her ninth. Which reminds me I must get some birthday photos done! We have had low key celebrations this year, with each of the girls inviting a couple of friends to come out to dinner at Sizzer with us. A lot of fun all round. Andrew and I also celebrated 15 years married at the beginning of the month (not that we did anything too exciting on the night!), and we plan to have a weekend away, by ourselves, later in the year to celebrate. So we are looking forward to that. Otherwise, we are all back into the school routine and the year is moving ahead with great pace already. Thanks for stopping by and catch you soon.

Exciting News

Well, you could have knocked me down with a feather this morning! I was checking my email and there was one from the lovely AnneP congratulating me on my Guest DT spot over at Kaiser Craft! I hadn't checked the blog for a little while so hadn't seen this update! Well I can tell you this is a great way to start the weekend that is for sure! I can't wait until I get my goodies to start creating! Talking about creating, I have just finished the February challenge for Out of the Hat. This months criteria are:

Include a butterfly Buttons and Bows 4 word title

Now I can tell you I have been mulling over this criteria for a day or two, butterflies cool, buttons and bows cool, but four word title, that had me a little stumped. So, to get over this block I pulled out some photos and tried starting with the title first (not my usual process), and ended up having about 4 possibilities of photos and four word titles! Once I was over that hump the rest came quickly! I did use a beautiful layout in an old Scrapbook Trends as my starting point for this layout and I got to try some of the new 7Gypsies papers that I just recently bought! So here it is: If you haven't already, head over to the blog and try your hand at the challenge, there are some cool prizes too! Remember last time I mentioned some new Basic Grey papers? Well I have put together my page using these. This is basically a scraplift of a page by Layle Koncar from Basic Grey. I just loved the colours and the design is very similar to my style too. I can't wait until these papers are in store, they are just divine to work with, and isn't that owl just the cutest??!! Well, I think that about covers it for now. Thanks for dropping by and catch you next time!

Back to School

Well, the kids have finished their first week (a very short week mind you!) back at school for the new year. My baby Liam is now a big school boy too, and I have to say it was a little hard to think of him as being big enough to go to school. He is my baby and always will be I guess regardless of how big he gets! This coming week will be the real test, five full days at school! I think there will be at least one very tired child by the end of the week. I have been busy playing again with my scrapbooking, particularly making more flowers. I found this design on the well known Tim Holtz's blog and they were pretty simple to put together and they look sensational! For my flowers I have used my Slice to cut out the basic flower shape (3" for the larger one and 2" for the smaller one), one flower was from the Wedding card and the other from Basics 2. The trick that I did learn is that you really need to start with a flower shape with 6 petals. My larger one had only 5 petals and the smaller 8. This obviously didn't ruin the flower but means I had to ad-lib a little to make it work! Both flowers have been sprayed with glimmer mist to liven them up. I haven't yet worked out where to use them, but I know they are sitting there waiting to be used on something! And I can create more if I need the "perfect" flower accent. I have also done a little scrapbooking too. Again using up older stash (although I did splurge on some 7 Gypsies papers the other day!) and playing with my Slice. The journal frame and title backing were both cut using the Slice, and I have used one of my favourite border punches for the scallop border. I really love this particular punch and I have seen that EK Success have a few more coming that were released at CHA Winter and I can't wait!! This was done for the KasierCraft blog Saturday sketch. I used the Slice to cut the patterned hearts and the little tag and the EK Success postage stamp border punch to create the pages edge. One thing I have done and is sitting waiting to be scrapped is started putting together some 6x8 photo proof type sheets summarising a month or two from last year. Then I can put together a little summary of the entire year in a handful of pages! Now to find the time to scrap (actually I think it has been the motivation lately, so hot and humid recently). I have just got my hands on some new Basic Grey (yes the just released from CHA Winter!!). More precisely I have some of my favourite release, Green at Heart, to play with! Can't wait to put that together. Talking about CHA I am now hanging out for the new hands free for the Slice to be available! This looks wonderful! Also dying for the new Pink Paisley releases, loved these a lot!! Ok I can see some spending happening soon, so I had better start saving (or earning lol!!). Well, that about sums things up for now. Thanks for stopping by, catch you soon!

January in Full Swing

Well, January is definitely in full swing and things are all underway for preparing the kids to return to school. New shoes, new lunch boxes and drink bottles, new haircuts and books being labelled and covered. No wonder the days are flying past (not to mention the money flying out of the wallet!). The girls got themselves proper style cuts for the first time and they are both so proud of themselves! I will take some photos of them soon to show you their new "do's". I have been playing a lot with my Slice the last week or so, partly because it is probably my favourite tool and partly because I am teaching a class on getting the most from your Slice at Scrapbook City in February. I have some sneak peeks of the class for you, if you are in Brisbane and are interested in the class head over to the Scrapbook City website and click on the classes link to find the details. I have also managed to do some scrapping for myself. Just one page for now, but more are in the works. This one has used the Slice, with the Big Kids card for the dinosaurs (which I think are just so cute in pink!), and the Vintage Findings card for the title. I have also just ordered myself a new lens, the 85mm f1.8 lens to be precise and I am really hanging out for this to arrive. I think it will become my most used portrait lens. I have been using the older Tamron 90mm which is really nice, but because it is an older lens it doesn't hold its focus to allow you to reframe the shot, and this really wasn't very helpful! So, a new lens it was, can't wait for that. I have a shoot in a couple of weeks and I am really hoping it will be here before then. Fingers crossed. Last week I took the kids (with G-Ma aka my Mum) in tow to see the new exhibits at GOMA (Gallery of Modern Art). It was all really interesting and the kids really enjoyed the exhibits too. I think I may need to go back with my big camera next time (only had the G10 with me) to really capture some of the fantastic exhibits. One of the most strange exhibits was an interactive one which involved pegboard on the ceiling with strings of different lengths hanging from each hole. The idea is you enter the space where the strings hang and walk through. Well, the kids loved it, me and mum on the other hand felt disoriented and a bit motion sick! A strange feeling indeed. Here are a couple of shots to try and give you an idea. Again, all I can say was this was strange! But I guess that is what art is all about! Until next time, thanks for stopping by!