2012 Year in Reveiw - The Final Chapter

Hi again and thanks for coming back to the final post of my 2012 creations in review.  This post will cover September through to December.

January to April can be found here and May through to August can be seen here

September 2012 - First DT Post with iSpy Sketch Challenge

September was a hugely rewarding month for me.  I was invited to join not one but two design teams (iSpy sketch challenge and Aussie Scrap Source) this year and September saw my first post with iSpy as a DT member go up.  It has been an honour to say the least to be approached by the DT co-ordinators and invited onto the DT's - thank you so much!  This was the card I created.  The original post cam be found here

 

October 2012 - First Aussie Scrap Source DT post

My feelings of excitement, appreciation and joy continued into October with my first ASS DT post going up. I had the most amazing time playing with Prima for my first ASS post.  I love being part of this DT.  The team is filled with amazingly talented papercrafters who I have followed for years and now I was asked to join them - how truly lucky am I! You can see the original post on the ASS blog here 

 

November 2012 - Classes at Scrappy Hollow

My year has really been fun filled with not only having challenges to play along with, DT's to create for but I also had the most amazing time creating and teaching classes at Scrappy Hollow.  November saw the end of my classes for the year and we made a cute Christmas Tree together.  I am really looking forward to teaching again in 2013 and look forward to seeing all my regular class ladies and meeting some new card makers throughout 2013.

 

December 2012 - Creating for Christmas

One thing  that I absolutely look forward to is whenever I create something is the look that the recipient gives when they open one of my hand made gifts. I made a few Christmas Trees, washi tape baubles, decorated stars and hearts but I think the gift I had most fun creating was my jingling bauble.  Originally bright silver and very modern I took to it with crackle paint, distress ink, sand paper, embellishments and seam binding and this was what I created

 

You can see more of my gifts here

 

Well that's 2012 in a nutshell.  I am incredibly lucky to be working in an industry that I love, meet and get inspired by creative men and women around the world and share the things I do along the way with my blog visitors.  Thank you for your support in 2012 and I look forward to sharing more with you in 2013.  2013 is shaping up to be busy as I will continue to work and teach at Scrappy Hollow, create and play with the ASS on their DT using their amazing products and there will be a few guest DT spots for me too!!!!

 

I would also like to thank my lovely husband and daughter who are my most loyal supporters - from dealing with a neglected house, questionable meals through to  being asked to provide design feedback/opinions and creating photo booths the two of you are amazingly patient and understanding and I am so lucky to have you in my life - LOVE you both xxx xxx

 

Happy New Year!!!!

 

 

Aussie Scrap Source - Weekend Inspiration

Just dropped in to post a quick link to share some of the Weekend Inspiration posts which have gone up over at  the Aussie Scrap Source Blog.  I absolutely love working on this design team! In fact it's not really work when you have GREAT products to play with - thanks ASS!!!!!

Pebbles Inc

You can see the post and more pics here

My Minds Eye

You can see the post and more pics here

 

Thanks for stopping by!

 

 

Creating for Christmas

Just one final post before Christmas to share with you a few of the gifts I have created for work colleagues and friends.  For these projects I started with a pre made Christmas decoration and then altered it and added to it with handmade flower and embellishments.

 

 

I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has supported me by visiting my blog and also another thank you to those who commented along the way as well.  I love what I do and appreciate you sharing the creative journey with me!

 

Merry Christmas!!!!

 



Aussie Scrap Souce Creativity

Just wanted to drop by and share some of my creations that have posted on the Aussie Scrap Source Blog this week.

First up I had loads of fun creating some special Christmas cards using the My Minds Eye - All is Bright range.  Love the traditional feel and alternative colour combination of the collection.

Here is what I created and you can see the full post here

 

 

The second post was a Weekend Inspiration featuring Pebbles Inc's Walnut Grove.  Such a fun and colourful collection to play with!  Here is what I created and the full post can be viewed here

Thanks for dropping by!

Retro Sketch #40 - Brand New Challenge!

I am so excited this week.  I have been powering through my DT assignments and have finished and uploaded all but 1 of them so stay tuned to see what I have been up to over at the Aussie Scrap Source Blog in the coming weeks.

As a bit of a reward I decided to play along with a sketch challenge - I just love sketch challenges as they kick start your creativity but give you the freedom to create with whatever colours, products and embellishments you like.

The lovely Arielle, who is a fellow iSpy DT member, has an awesome sketch challenge blog.  Retro Sketches  gives you a sketch based on one of the DT's previous creations, they make a new card and then we all follow along.  I have favourite card layouts that I often go back to as I know they work well so I loved the idea of this challenge.

So here is the sketch they posted based on one of Arielle's cards:

And here is the card I created:

 

Each panel on the card was edge distressed and I gave it a faux stitched border as well.

 

 

I have been playing with my Martha punches of late and just love this branch punch for creating wreathes. I used a combination of red, green and blue papers to create it with and then added some pearls. . Instead of a fishtail embellishment I added a lace loop which I tied to a button before adding it to the card. I moved this element a little further out on the card.

 

 

Materials:

Paper: MME Be Merry

Punch: MS M230367 Branch

Other: Pearls by Portacraft, buttons, twine, lace (from the stash!) and mini Christmas sticker.

 

Thanks for stopping by!

 

 



ISSC43 - Doodlebug Wintery Christmas

Hello and welcome back for another installment of iSpy sketch challenge fun!

This week our sketch was inspired by Jean Martin  and is inspired by this card. 

Now this week I wanted to use some very cute Doodlebug papers and embellishments that my lovely hubby bought for me when he returned to Cleveland, OH in the US on business in October.  He is so wonderful - he popped in to the store where I used to work, Archivers, and got me a little surprise treat.  So in order to use these my new goodies I decided to flip the sketch upside down.  So here is my creation:

 



 

This was such a quick creation as the adorable snow men were pre-made embellishments and i just added their Santa hats which I free hand cut.  I also had some little snow flakes in my stash so I added them as well.

 

 

The main embellishment label was created with another pre-made snow man and I created a little banner of snow flakes for him to hold.

 

 

Materials Used:

 

Paper - Doodlebug North Pole 6x6 paper pad and matching snow buddies cardstock stickers (mini doodle pops!)

Dies - MFT die namics Oval Stax 1 and Designer Label Stax 4

Other - Martha Stewart Christmas ribbon, snowflakes, MFT white felt and white crochet twine

 

 

Now why not come and join in the fun at iSpy too - head over to our blog and see how here.

 

Thanks for stopping by!

 

 

 



Handmade Holiday ASS DT Post

I am so excited to share another DT project with everyone over at Aussie Scrap Source featuring the Simple Stories Handmade Holiday range.  The brief was to make "quick" Christmas cards and the Simple Stories range was just perfect for the projects!

Here are a few pics of the projects I created and you can read and see more over on the ASS blog here

 

 

ISSC42 - Be Merry

Another week has flown by and it's once again time for a new challenge over at iSpy.

This week we have been inspired by the creative Anya Schrier and the sketch is based on this card.

I love this sketch's simplicity as it allows you to make each element your own.  So ofter some punching, distressing, pleating and fussy cutting this is the card I created:

To start off the card I decided to add a decorative punched edge before I added the patterned paper pieces. The central panel of the card was with a combination of paper pleating, ribbon and lace. I began with three 1 1/2 inch x 6 inch ( 4cm x 15cm) strips of paper which I scored at 1/2inch intervals then pleated and held them in place with some quick machine stitching. 

 

The sentiment panel was die cut and then finished off with a rub on and some hand cut Christmas trees.

 

I added some dimension to the tree with foam tape.

Materials used:
Paper - MME Be Merry
Dies - MFT Well Worn Greetings
Other - Stampin Up antique button, ribbon by birch, Darice hemp twine, lace, MS eyelet lace around the page punch (border punch only) and a rub on from Pebbles Inc.

You can join in the fun too by heading over to the blog here

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog!

 

 

 

Cards Classes at Scrappy Hollow

Well it's Friday and it's been a really busy week for me at Scrappy Hollow this week.  My last cards class ran for 2012 last night.  I am so lucky to work in the store and have the opportunity to teach classes - being employed to do something you are passionate about and love is awesome!

As a thank you to all the ladies who regularly attend classes and support us at Scrappy Hollow we made this very cute hand punched and pieced Christmas Tree.

For this project we used a wooden spool which was topped with a foam cone.  Hand punched Marvy six petal flowers of varying sized were cut, scrunched and attached to the cone.  We then finished off the tree with some Kaisercraft pearls, a hand pieced star and some seam binding tied in a bow.

Merry Christmas and another huge THANK YOU to everyone who has attended my 2012 classes.  I am looking forward to 2013 and teaching classes at Scrappy Hollow again.

ISSC41 - Jingle all the Way

 

 

Hello and welcome to another weekly challenge post for the iSpy Sketch Challenge blog.  I love being on the iSpy DT as not only does the lovely Kim provide us with some awesome weekly sketches to play with but we meet some really talented card makers as we spotlight their cards that inspire our sketches.  I do hope you can join in the fun this week.  Just head over to the blog to learn more - here.

 

 

Now this weeks challenge was inspired by the creative and talented Chris Franco (allamericanstampers at SCS) and is based on this card. 

 

 

 

 

 

It's a great way to use up scraps of paper and cardstock, which is what I did with a left over paper pad from a class I ran at Scrappy Hollow back in September using the Kaisercraft Mint Twist range.  I love the Kaisercraft 6 1/2" paper pads as not only do they have miniaturised patterned paper but they also come with pre-made embellishments and borders which are just perfect for quick card making projects (you can see what I made with the ladies in class here).

 

 

So here is the card I created:

 

 

 

To begin with I cut a card front measuring 4 inches x 5 3/4 inches or 10cm x 14.5cm and used this as the base for constructing the star burst.  To create the star burst pieces I started with strips of paper measuring 4 inches x 1 1/2 inches or 10cm x 4cm and cut these diagonally in half.  I then decided where I wanted the star burst to be centred and how far down on the card I wanted it to go.  I then laid my first two pieces across the card.  From here I then kept adding pieces until the top section was full.  I then turned it over and trimmed the overhanging pieces off.  I then added all the other pieces and then stuck the whole thing to my folded card base at the end.

 

The "Jingle all the Way" embellishment centre was a pre made one from the paper pad.  I added some glitter with a gelly roll pen and some Kaiser bling. I also added glitter pen to the white spots an the red and white spotted paper.  I mounted the border, doily and circles embellishment with foam tape.

 

 

 

 

I had the bells and tinsel style trim in my stash and thought they worked well.  As you move the card it actually jingles which is kind of fun for the recipient too.  The border was cut with an MFT die-namics die.

 

 

 

 

A while back I had also made a similar card using the star burst design however the left hand section of piecing is different - here it is:

 

 

 

Materials Used:







 

Paper - Kaisercraft Mint Twist

Dies - MFT die-namics Triple Scallop border and Decorative Doily Duo

Other - Bells, tinsel trim, Kaisercraft red rhinestones, gelly roll pen and white twine

 

Thanks so much for stopping by.  Please leave a comment as I would so love to hear from you!