Almost Easter

If you are a regular visitor to my blog you will know that I have had some fun recently with the Everybunny stamp set in preparation for Easter.  This week Paper Lovin' Gals have another great challenge that screamed out for me to use this cute set once again.

What does this picture inspire you to create? Something with an Easter theme or using the colours like I have, or will something else in the picture take your fancy - a basket, ribbons and bows, just the bunny or something completely different?  That is the great thing about the PLG challenges it doesn't matter what in the photo inspires you, just create away and join in! 

Usually at Easter time as a family we do an Easter Egg hunt, but this year with two cats (one of which will get into anything) I was a bit worried about leaving chocolate eggs lying around - especially as we routinely don't find all the eggs on Easter Sunday!  I decided to make this little door hanger to get around the problem of leaving chocolates out overnight.  The base is made from the Fancy Favour die, and I have added a panel of cardstock to the inside of the box and punched out a circle using the large circle punch.  I have created a window in the front of the box so that the eggs will be visable once the Easter Bunny has visited.  The cute little mushroom stamped image is of course from the Everybunny stamp set, as is the sentiment which I inked up part of and punched out.  I just love the mini brads on this punch, they seem just the right size to give a bit of pop without being over the top.

I hope I have helped to inspire you to join in with us this week, if you need a bit of extra inspiration pop on er to Paper Lovin' Gals blog to see what the other design team members have made.

I am also entering this item in Hand Stamped Sentiments and 4 Crafty Chicks Easter challenges.

Happy Stamping

Easter Fun

Boy have I had fun this weekend, did very little off my jobs list but made some super cute items.  I bought the Everybunny stamp set recently and have just fallen in love with these cute little critters. I decided this year I wanted to make a couple of things to sell at work and these are what I came up with ...

I think this one might just be my favourite so she gets to go first.  I used the Everyday Enchantment DSP from Sale-A-Bration as well as the ribbon from SAB too. I just adore this DSP and will be so sad when it retires at the end of the month.  I am going to enter this card in Festive Friday Challenge this week.

This one I wanted to focus on the greens and blues as I haven't used this side of the DSP as much, and am really pleased with the finished card.

My final card using this layout, back to the reds and suede again!  All are stamped onto watercolour paper with Stazon ink and coloured with the Blender pens.  

This is a copy of the tutorial that Brenda from Qbee's Quest put up, it was too cute to try and improve on!  If you can believe it they are even more adorable in person.  The DSP I used for these boxes is one from a retired set from 2 years ago called Kaleidoscope.

These are the other 3D item I made, little bag toppers made with a range of DSP cut out with the new Framelits dies for the Big Shot.  I used stamps from Everybunny, again stamping them onto watercolour paper and colouring them with my blender pen, before punching them out and layering on the front. The two on the outside show the front of the bags, and the middle one shows the back.  A little secret ... I used a staple to keep the bags closed and the front and back images hide the staple!

I have 6 other Everybunny cards, but will post them up in a couple of days.  

Happy Stamping

Adding something extra

Just a little post today, I think my mojo has gone for a little vacation on me, so I thought I would pop up a post with something that I have been meaning to share.  Those of you who visit my blog on a semi regular basis might remember the Paper Lovin' Gals challenge from a couple of weeks ago and I made a purple scallop easel card, if not here is the card I made...

 While I did like the card I was thinking it needed something else. I was just saying this morning to my lovely friend Shirley McAvoy that I struggle with leaving open spaces on my cards (having forgotten about this one lol).  I decided I needed to set it aside for a while and wait for inspiration to hit, and that is exactly what happened when I came across some mini calendars I had in one of my many draws of bits!

It took a little shuffling of some of the brads and pearls, and I might have done the buttons slightly differently had I set out to make a calendar, but overall I was pretty pleased with the end result.  My daughter was certainly pleased too when I told her she could have it for her desk - like me she loves purple. What do you think? An improvement?

I have a few more 'random' bits and pieces to post up so until my mojo comes back I will post a few of those up for you to see. Some of my favourite things are some lovely cards and gifts from my ESAD Secret Sister, and later in the month I will share some of the lovely cards that are coming in from the ESAD Birthday Fairies - I haven't peeked yet even though I want to, my daughter is taking custody of the cards until my birthday at the end of the month!

Happy Stamping

Luck of the Irish ...

Here we are again with another challenge at Paper Lovin' Gals, and this week there is a touch of the Irish in the inspirational picture. As always you can take inspiration from anything about this picture at all, initially I was going to go down the path of four leaf clovers and green and white, but then I read the sign and saw the date March 17th and my card choice was clear.

17th of March is actually my sister-in-law's birthday so this week I made her a birthday card.  To keep that little touch of the Irish about the card I did use Wild Wasabi! I also used two of the new framelits that are coming to Australia and New Zealand in the next mini catalogue on 1st April, I just love these shapes these are the second and third biggest in the set of 6 - which means over the last week I have shown projects with almost all of them!  There is a nice set of stamps to go with them but I chose to use Elements of Style, cutting the bird out separately and adhering to the main image so it's wings were over the edge to give it more of a look of swooping into grab the nectar out of the flowers.  You can also see some of the very cute pleated ribbon that is also making an appearance in our next mini catalogue!

Don't forget to pop over to the Paper Lovin' Gals blog to see what the other Design Team members have created to inspire you to join in this week.

Happy Stamping

Easter Basket

I had some extra time on my hands this week so time to play along with the challenge at Friday Mashup.  This week the challenge was to make a basket and/or make a project using green and yellow.  I always like to try to do the mashup and this week was no exception.  I am also entering this in Crazy 4 Challenges blog - Easter or Spring themed; and SU Only challenge - "Its fun being green". 

I used my Fancy Favour to make the base of the box, I love this die, makes it so easy to produce a perfect little box.  I added a handle using the Lace Ribbon Border Punch which I threaded with Ice-cream Parlour. The image on the front of the box is from the Everybunny stamp set, isn't he cute?  I have cut him out using the Framelits Dies that will be coming in the new Autumn/Winter Mini, these two are the two smallest of the dies in the set.  This is the box we will be making at the Easter Card Class I will be holding, contact me if you live in the Canberra area and would like to come along.

Happy Stamping

Anybunny for Framelits?

Today I had a lovely surprise when I opened my front door to find a brown Stampin' Up! box on my doorstep.  It was my items from pre-order for the Autumn/Winter Mini Catalogue and I was sooo excited to start playing.  This next mini catalogue would have to be my favourite ever, so many beautiful things.  The great part about being a demonstrator is that I get to purchase them a month earlier than they are generally available. 

This is the second card I made today, a cute little easel card using the new Framelits Labels collection dies and the Everybunny stamp set from the main catalogue.   These little bunnies are just too darn cute!  On this card I have combined three of the stamps using masking techniques, the little girl bunny with the basket, the boy bunny with the egg, and the mushrooms.  I love how it has come together to create a little scene.  You can't see it so well in this photo but I cut the little girl bunny out and added her to the card using Dimensionals.

It wasn't until I went in search of a tag for my sentiment that I realised how well the Lots of Tags Sizzlet die matched the new Labels Framelits!  I can see me using these together quite a bit in the future.

I am entering this card into the Festive Friday challenge this week.  I haven't had chance to join in with the challenges there this year, and was very excited to see that the next few weeks will be Easter themed!  This week we had to choose a card that inspired us and then create our own version.  My inspiration was not a single card, rather all of the beautiful easel cards I have seen, most of which come from the very talented Bronwyn Eastley.

Happy Stamping

Panels of Art

I have to say this week the inspirational photo from Paper Lovin' Gals had be guessing for a while, then I knew exactly what I wanted to do.  Does the photo immediately inspire you or will this one take some thought?  Either way come and play along with us this week.

I loved the artistic shapes of the panels and once inspiration took hold I knew I wanted to replicate them with my punches.  I used the Itty Bitty Shapes punches and the small heart punch, I randomly punched shapes out of Pool Party, Calypso Coral and Poppy Parade card stock before mounting each on Whisper white and then framed each with Basic black.  The DSP layer is from Beau Château DSP collection.  I used Curly Cute for the sentiment, I am loving this set both for variety of sentiments and the font used.  I cut a strip of card stock just over 1" wide and put each end into the Decorative Label Punch to trim off the end to give it a fancy look, I then cut a slightly wider piece of Basic Black, mounted the sentiment on it and trimmed the ends using the same method. What do you think?

Pop on over to the Paper Lovin' Gals blog and check out what the other Design Team members have created to inspire you, then join in the fun.

Happy Stamping

Family Wedding

I don't often blog family stuff but when my baby brother gets married what is a girl to do but share it with the world?  The wedding was back on 28th January and even though the day was overcast and raining the radiance of their smiles never faded and they were truly a beautiful couple.  Welcome to the family Beth.

 I am also posting because I wanted to show off the wedding card I made for them.  I chose the layout I used before and it worked so well for this card.  I chose Blushing Bride (for obvious reasons lol), Basic Gray and Very Vanilla card stock, I spritzed most of the layers with a combination of Champagne Shimmer Paint and alcohol to give it that beautiful sparkle.  I printed out the monogram on the computer and mounted it in the scallopy circle from Pennant Parade die.  The Vintage Wallpaper gave it an embossed look similar to the wedding invitations which I took some inspiration from.

On the inside of the card I used Very Vanilla with a border in Blushing Bride, again spritzed with the Champagne Shimmer Mist.  I even managed to find a shimmery pink pen to write in.

I couldn't resist showing you one more photo of the happy couple, on their wedding day, in the rain!  I love these two photos, they really show that the weather wasn't a priority for either John or Beth.  Kellie and Sam of Kellie Blinco Photography did an amazing job using what light there was, and making the rain just another prop for some amazing photos.

Happy Stamping

Better Late Than Never ...

I was running so much behind last week I messed submitting my card for the Paper Lovin' Gals Design Team. But, better late than never, I made this one today!

I loved this inspirational photo as soon as I saw it, the colour is just awesome and I love the buttons, it reminded me to use more buttons on my projects.  What inspires you?  Have a go and join in this week.

I chose the round shape of the embroidery hoop and of course the colour and the buttons.  I made my first Scallop Circle easel card ... what do you think?  Easel cards are quite easy once you understand the basic mechanics of them.  I have made a rectangle one before and followed the same theory for making this one.  The original tutorial I got from SplitCoastStampers, a great resource.

Happy Stamping