Oh Dear ..........

I've been MIA for so long, I'm sure all my readlers have moved on. Never the less, I have made a New Years Resolution to blog frequently again. Life has been quite busy since I last posted - we have visited friends in Sydney, went for a camping holiday on the beach & I've generally been busy chasing around kids & working. We were also lucky enough to spend Christmas with my parents on the Gold Coast, which was lovely.

Although I haven't had alot of time to do much stamping, I did make these frames for the kids Grandmother & Great Grandparents using some of the fun Double Sided Papers from the new Summer Mini Catalogue.

Sam's frame uses the new Tall Tales DSP - I kept it very simple & just cut out a couple of trees, added his name using the Jumbo Outline Alpha & the year using a retired numbers set.

For Josie's frame I cut out some flowers from the new Kaleidoscope DSP - the colours matched her pink shirt perfectly. Once again I used the Jumbo Outline Alpha for her name & a retired numbers set for the year, I also added a rhinestone brad on top of the "i"

Thanks for stopping by, I promise it won't be another 3 months before I post again.

Toolboxes for Dad!

While at Camp Cypress the clever Kerryl taught us how to make these gorgeous toolboxes & matching card using the Totally Tools stampset. Here is everyones toolboxes after the class

Closeup of one of the great toolboxes

& here is my card! If you check out the top picture you can see that everyone made thier cards a little different - depending on what sentiment they wanted to use. I had seen this idea on SCS using the tape measure from Totally Tools to spell out 'dad' & just had to use it (especially since it was the main reason I bought the stamp set!!)

Flowerpot Card

Last Thursday I hosted the INKlings Cyberstamp & one of the challenges I set was to make a flowerpot card. I've seen afew of these around the place & they are lots of fun to make. There were some other great flowerpot cards made by Ryn, Ariane & Karen, thanks for playing along :-)

I used the Petal Pizazz stamp set to make my flowers & buttons from Button Bouquet & Button Latte for the centres

I have also used the gorgeous new Riding Hood Red Striped Grosgrain ribbon & used some Hemp Twine to tie on another button.

I also taught this as a class at Camp Cypress - here are everyones gorgeous flowerpots, don't they look gorgeous!

Marelle's Sevens Box

How cute are these boxes! You can find a great tutorial on how to make them on Marelle's blog. I made these for my Mini Catalogue Launch last weekend - everyone who attended got one containing a sample of In Colour Stitched Ribbon.

Stampset: Great Friend

Cardstock: Pink Pirouette, Whisper White

Ink: Riding Hood Red

Accessories: Pink Pirouette Stitched Grosgrain, Rhinestone Brad, Scallop Oval Punch

Ribbon Tags

I first saw these cute little ribbon embellishments here. I have posted a card using them before, but thought I'd give them a rerun & add some of the gorgeous new corduroy buttons A fun thing to do is dye your corduroy buttons. I used a sponge dauber & then touched up the buttons using my markers. You will need to make sure the button you want to dye is lighter than the colour you want to change it to - I have dyed a gray button Choc Chip & a Baja Breeze button Rose Red.

Stampsets: On Your Birthday, Trendy Trees, Fresh Cuts

Cardstock: Whisper White

Inks: Choc Chip, Baja Breeze, Rose Red

Accessories: 1" Stitched Grosgrain, Hemp Twine, Corduroy Buttons

Card Organiser

If you live in my area, you can come along next Friday to one of my Year Of Cards Organiser class & I will show you how to make this great organiser to keep your cards in. I have used one of my favourite stamp sets from the Summer Mini called Live Your Dream, which is one of the sets that Stampin' Up! will be donating money from the sales of to the Red Cross Victorian Bushfires 2009 Appeal - you can read more about how Stampin' Up! are helping here. There is a page for each month with a pocket to keep your cards in along with a handy calendar to remind you when everyone's birthday is

Stampset: Live Your Dream

Cardstock: Groovy Guava, Soft Sky, Choc Chip, Afternoon Tea DSP

Inks: Groovy Guava, Soft Sky, Choc Chip

Accessories: Guava Double Stitched Ribbon, Bind-It-All

I will post a pic & the info on the cards that are inside my pockets tomorrow :-)

Bold images on coloured cardstock ........

Bold images on coloured cardstock do not stamp properly! YOu can test it out if you like, but no matter what you do, the image will never be as clear & crisp as when you stamp on Stampin' Up! Whisper White or Very Vanilla Cardstock. Do not despair, as you can see below, there is a way to get around this problem.

Simply stamp your solid image onto Whisper White cardstock, wait a short while for the ink to completly dry & then use a brayer to dye the card whatever colour your like. You can see the difference above - the image on the right has been stamped using Basic Black ink onto Groovy Guava cardstock & is not very clear, while the image on the left has been stamped in Basic Black ink onto Whisper White cardstock & brayered over in Groovy Guava ink. I had never thought to do this - I actually saw it the other day on Georgina's blog while doing a little blog surfing.

Here is the finished project that I attached the tag to - I've been trying to use up some of my rub-ons so have removed the labels off some handwash & decorated it with Urban West rub ons.

Custom Baubles

My sister recently bought me some clear glass baubles from Spotlight - they are so much fun because you can decorate them however you like!
For the one above I have stamped the crab, from the stamp set Crab & Co, onto acetate using Black Staz On & then coloured it using some Sharpie pens from Woolworths. I love Staz On ink - it gives such a crisp clear image & can be stamped onto glass or plastic & when dry it won't rub off. Once the image was coloured, I rolled it up to fit through the hole at the top of the bauble - the acetate will unroll once it is inside the bauble & you will be able to see the image. I've also added abit of sand from the kids sandpit in the bottom - I would have loved to add afew shells as well, but the ones we brought home from our last trip to the coast are too big, so I had to make do with afew rocks instead.

For the next one I have rolled up some 1/2" x 6" pieces of scrap Bali Breeze Double Sided paper & put inside. I also adhered a Rub On onto the other side. I'm hoping to find some time to try our afew more ideas for my custom made baubles in the next few days.

Goodbye Holiday Harmony

The Spring Mini has now finished & I will be sad to see Holiday Harmony double sided papers gone - I made this project to enter in Shelli's Happy Holiday Creative Challenge. I'm not really sure what you would call it, but I will be adding some pics of the kids & using it on the centre of my table over Christmas. As it folds flat you can also mail it, so I may even make one to send to my Grandma. Here it is closed & folded flat.

You untie the ribbon to open.

& can retie the ribbon to keep it opened out. There are four sections, so you can add lots of photo's, I also think it would look cute with a small nativity scene in each section - ETA I found a cute little nativity that fits perfectly, you can see it here!

Stampset: Party Punch (hostess set)

Papers: Purely Pomegranite, Always Artichoke, Holiday Harmony DSP

Ink: Purely Pomegranite, Encore Silver

Accessories: Hand Selected Accents & Elements, Styled Silver Hodgepodge, Rub Ons, Theater Ribbon Originals, Double Stitched Pomegranite

Secret Garden Mini Calendar

Here is another Mini Calendar - this one is made using papers & die cut stickers from the Secret Garden Simply Scrappin' Kit stuck onto a wooden coaster. Afew people have asked, so here is the info - if you are in Australia you can purchase these mini calendars from Educational Experience, I can't post a link, but I'm sure if you google the name you can find them :-)

Stationary giftset

There's been afew swaps going around, so I challenged myself to join another one. This time a 'gift' swap - I made a stationary set using the beautiful Recollections Designer Series Paper. It included a pencil tin, bookmark, post-it note holder & another of my covered notebooks.

Here's abit of a closer look at each item.The tin was a soup can (I think) & I used my fabulous tupperware can opener to open it. I am not affiliated with them at all, but do love how it opens the can without leaving any sharp edges on either the can, or the lid. After washing, I covered the can in some DSP, added abit of ribbon & stuck on a flower from the Wild Rose stamp set.This bookmark is one of my new favourite things to make. It was really easy too, I just used my 1 1/4 & 1 3/8 circle punches to punch out some cardstock & stuck them together using afew pop-up glue dots. Make sure that you have one glue dot above the top of the paperclip & one below, to keep it in place. The little rosebud is also from the Wild Rose stamp set.

The post-it note holder was also fun to make. I covered a chipboard square, once again with the Recollections DSP, tied on some ribbon & added another flower from the Wild Rose set. As you can probably see, the Wild Rose stamp set is designed to match the Recollections DSP - I just love it! I also covered a fold back clip that I got from our local newsagents, to hold the post-it notes in place.
More DSP for the notebook & some wide grosgrain ribbon stapled on for the pages tabs. I also used the Typeset Lower Alphabet for the lettering on the front. If you missed my tutorial on how to cover these notebooks using the Stampin' Up! spiral punch, then click here!

Thanks for checking out my giftset, if you have anyother questions on how anything was made, or the products I have used, please send me an email & I will get back to you - alana@aussiebroadband.com.au

Stampin' on candles

I have seen these around alot so thought I'd have a go - & they were sooooooo easy. I only bought a couple of candles at first to see if I could make them (I was prepared to fail!!) but have gone back today to get some more :).

I am going to run a class on these in the new year - so keep a look out for more info or send me an email to find out more - alana@aussiebroadband.com.au