owl birthday

we were invited to a birthday party this week for a little girl called chloe

i went with an owl theme thanks to miss 5's suggestions.

 the card is totally cased from the amazing miss tenille and was exactly what i wanted for a birthday card

 i even threw caution to the wind and used my stamp sets (owl occasions)and inks instead of doing this in punch art lmao....unusual for me :>

 next i made some earring for the birthday girl from shrinky dinks. shrinky dink is cool because you can stamp onto it, heat it with a heat tool and it shrinks and you can do cool stuff with it. stampin up DON'T sell it boohoo sob sob and i wish they did :<

 the box was made with a retired punch called the petal card double punch

 

 next the birthday girl got a name plaque with a cute pink owl on it

owl was made using scallop circle die and top note and framelits.

simple and easy to do. i cut out the letters by hand because i wanted them to be a bit funkier than the ones su currently have

cheers ears

book marks

i admit to being a bit of a bookaholic

especially anything sci-fi or fantasy based

and i always seem to be reading 5 books at once

1 by the bed

1 in the car

1 in the other car

1 in my handbag

1 in the toilet hehehehehe

and i am forever losing my place even though i turn the pages over

so i thought i had better get a book mark or 2...or 5...

and really let's face it tissues and parking tickets are just not as pretty as one you have made yourself :>

so a bit of embossing powder, 

some punched out butterflies, 

some brads, 

a label die cut, 

some beads, some ribbon,

and voila!!!

now i have some pretty book marks

cheers ears

tins tins tins tins

tins come in all shapes and sizes and i am particularly adept at keeping them and using them for 'stuff'-it's not a fetish

....just a tiny addiction :>

i also collect small potentially useful containers. i admit to collecting the big ones too but they are stored in my plastics cupboard in my kitchen but i keep the crafty ones with me until they 

can be 'clare-ified'

 perfect for tooth fairy donations

some containers just are perfect for doing stuff to

stampin up containers are perfect

so are mint tins

did i mention i ONLY buy my mints in tins now rofl

cheers ears

i just want to make pretty things

really

i honestly do

so i did!

long canvas

grey paint

alphabet letters die

butterflies

ribbon

and good adhesive

eeeeasy peeeasy!

happy birthday

my big brother turned 50 this year so i made him a photo album with some of his childhood photos

i used a kaisercraft album from connies

-a local scrapbook shop with great customer service

and decorated it using the fab new designer series papers from 

sale-a-bration from stampin up called everyday enchantment

i used the tags die to make journalling tags

and added buttons for embellishments(see the very cool large buttons!!)

i have punched out photo corners

and used the pretty su in-colours ribbon

and added some bling-not too much because this album is for a man :>

cheers ears

party in a jar!

woohoo! party in a jar! woohoo!

trying to reclaim my mojo which had gone and hidden in a dark corner of my craft space under a pile of scrap paper

i need to find it fast because the hummingbird craft markets are coming up quick and i have to be organised!!

so here is something you can come along and buy from me

it is a packet of 12 cupcake toppers and a small banner

and they all fit in nicely to a decorated jar

cheers ears

notebooks

here are some notebooks i covered recently. 

these make easy christmas gifts for teachers, friends or 

other people who have touched your life with their love

just get some patterned paper, ribbon, bling 

and some punched out bits and pieces and you are on your way!!!

i find this is a perfect way to use up those bits of your stash that is in the "iamnotsureiwanttothrowthisawaysoiwillkeepitforabitlonger" pile :>

 and i KNOW we allllll have one of those

hope you feel inspired

cheers ears

if you have ever seen me knit...

 you would just completely pee yourself!!

i am officially the world's worst knitter.

i am sooo bad that the scarf i started last winter got finished just in time for summer 

and it was in fact a triangle by the time i was finished with it...

so why oh sweet why would someone like me buy the hand knitted stamp set from stampin up???????

because the stamp set is cool...and it has a sheep in it

(and i am from nz and we love our sheep...bwahahahahahaha or should i say baaahaaahaaa)

and i have several knitty friends who desperately need cool tags and cards to go with their knitted items

 a box of small gift cards and tags

 a old storage container now used for a tag gift box

a gift box for small cards and tags

these are for sale at campbelltown craft cottage

pop on in and say hi!

cheers ears

christmas gift box

i thought i had already posted this but...my bad...oops i haven't lol

over at splitcoast stampers this month we had a challlenge using any holiday-themed DSP. 

and i made this little christmas box

i used the letters to santa designer series paper to make some christmas tags from the tag punch, ornament punch and the sock punch. also included in the set is a small mini album for passport size photos and a present list-perfect for christmas.

cheers ears

butterfly lantern

i bought this orange lantern at the local $2 the other day.

it has a small fake battery operated candle inside which lights up the lantern quite prettily

 so i added some butterflies to it!

i used the butterflies die cut from stampin up and embossed them.

then i added some fine supernova glitter to the wings

i stuck the butterflies to the lantern with mini glue dots

to finish it off i stuck some ribbon to the end and tied some ribbon to the handle

now i have a white one to play with as well...i am thinking pink butterflies for the girls' fairy room

what do you think?

cheers ears

timeless portrait creative crew

for the next few months you will see my work for the creative crew at split coast stampers

woohoo!!!

it is soooo exciting to be part of their design team!!!

check out their challenges for september

here is my design idea for the timeless portrait challenge

our challenge was to use the colours from the timeless portrait collection

river rock, basic black, cherry cobbler, very vanilla and island indigo

and keep it to a school based or children theme

 well here are my monkeys set in a frame (actually it is a mirror!) that i have transformed.

i have sanded down some of the edges and rubbed some indigo ink into the frame. 

i also rolled some musical notes over the frame which you can only see in a certain light-obviously NOT the one i took the photo in lol

 on the right hand side i added some cherry cobbler paper ribbon all rouged up

i added some basic black striped grosgrain ribbon 

and stamped some elements from the forever young set with 

some crystal effects on top of the cameo silhouette

the trees on the side are done with white embossing powder

(handy tip-if you are planning on doing this make sure you go over the frame extensively 

with your embossing buddy to really get rid of any static!!)

down the bottom left i added another littler copy of the main photo 

to some more ribbon and vintage brads.

i also coloured some retired christmas ribbon with a marker to add some indigo highlights 

looking forward to seeing what everyone else creates with this challenge

cheers ears

just add ink challenge

over at just add ink this week

the colour challenge is black and white

WOOT!

it was an excellent opportunity to make up some tatty old trays 

i have had lying around waiting for some love

i painted them black.

around the sides i used my embossing buddy to keep the static down. 

i stamped with versamark and added white embossing powder and heated it up.

then on a peice of white card stock i inked up some stampin up stamps 

(inspired by nature and elements of style) in black staz-on

then i laminated them and stuck them to the trays with sticky strip

now they look fab :>

gotta love recycling

cheers ears

orange bag

this weekend saw a lot of stampin up demos at convention in melbourne

sadly i was not one of those demos

so i stayed home and did a few challenges from the 

unconventional cybercrop over at the inklings forum

one of the challenges was to make our own convention bag 

highlighting a colour used by this years convention goers....orange!

template and inspiration comes from here

 

some close ups of the flowers and the handle

just got to make something to go inside now!

what do you think should go inside?

cheers ears

nothing like a good case-ing

this month in the stampin up impressions magazine 

i was inspired by a monogrammed frame that was on the cover.

i liked it

a lot

 so i made my own version :>

as you do

i glued some all-foil to some card and then put it through the big shot embossing folder.

i added some accents with my sale-a-bration bliss set

and blobbed some crystal effects around the place too

stampin up impressions magazine is ONLY available to demonstrators.

if you would like to get this monthly magazine by becoming a demonstrator

please contact me today 

cheers ears

pencil case

for a long long time i have had this wooden pencil case just sitting staring at me 

waiting patiently for me to do something with it. 

i picked up cheap from a chinese junk shop ages ago 

thinking that it would be cool for something one day

well that one day is today!!!

 i have covered it with some pretty retired dsp 

and added some ribbon, 

some hodgepodge 

and a butterfly

it fits a couple of pens/pencils,

my scissors,

glue

and various other things.

got to have beautiful things in our lives huh?!!

cheers ears

creative challenges

this year part of my creative goal was to start taking part in more challenges to get ye old mojo working and taking me out of my comfort zone.

you can check out the places i have found to find challenges here

this weeks challenge at just add ink

was to use the following colours:

and here is my creation!

 i have used an old plastic embellishments (buttons i suspect!) container

and otp'ed it!!! (is that even a phrase??)

i used a variety of circle punches and the xl fancy flower punch to make the flower on the top.

i stamped the large squiggley pattern from the bliss sale-a-bration set over them all with black and razzleberry and sponged the edges with old olive, razzleberry and crumb cake.

right plonk in the middle i have added a old olive rhinestone brad

 i added some pretty black 1/8" taffeta ribbon and a couple of pearls, diamantes and a button.

 on the side i added a couple of tiny tags tied on with a fine piece of linen thread.

now here's the tricky bit...

what do i use it for? what should go inside? 

any ideas?

cheers ears