Parasols and swizzle sticks and other indulgent stuff

I'm joining in Amanda's April themed challenge at Scrap Boutique - "Indulgences".  So... I procrastinated a lot with this layout, because I have way too many indulgences to list - some of them I've already scrapped about, some I'm not ready to scrap about, and others I don't know how to approach on a scrapbook page.  After I narrowed it down a bit, I came up with this one:


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The photograph was taken at the Scrap Boutique Retreat in Coffs Harbour last year, so it really encompasses a few indulgences - uninterrupted scrap time, relaxing with friends, and delicious drinkies, not to mention my love of Bo Bunny 'Love Shack' and all kinds of fabric!!

I used up a lot of scraps for this one, as well as using one of my newest (indulgent?) toys ~ Tim Holtz 'Tattered Florals' diecut.  I was VERY impressed at how easily it cut through the felt.

More Easter layouts - Monday's LO

Another Easter layout; this is the one I finished on Monday, using some more of the delicious Little Yellow Bicycle 'Clothesline' collection from my Scrap Pile DT kit:

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# Design Dollies ~ Sketch challenge

More Easter layouts... Sunday's LO

Over the long weekend I made another two Easter layouts, using some delicious product that Gill sent me in my Scrap Pile DT kit this month.

I really wavered with the first one; I wasn't sure about it and nearly abandoned it, but now I've decided that I like it and I'm happy to share it:

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I got the chicken templates from Peninia - a talented Polish lady who shares some amazing sewing and papercraft projects on her blog. (If you don't read Polish, just use Google Translate like I do...)

I'm also entering this layout at:
# Simon Says ~ Things with wings
I cut up a waffle-weave tea towel to make the chickens.
# Just Us Girls ~ Challenge 30 ~ Template

Stay tuned for Monday's layout... when I get my camera batteries recharged.

Pink and girly

I made another card yesterday, and it's very pink and girly:



# Simon Says ~ Things with Wings
# The Town Scrapper ~ Girlie
# Stamp with Fun ~ Challenge 55 ~ Animals
# Paper Sundaes ~ Challenge 14 ~ No people

I used: Kaisercraft butterfly stamp (stamped on Little Yellow Bicycle 'Delightful' patterned paper, with Colorbox Queue 'maroon' and Ranger Distress Stickles 'Worn Lipstick); Bazzill cardstock; Basic Grey 'Lily Kate' patterned paper; Martha Stewart edge punch; lace and rosettes from my haby box.

No sentiment on this one; I think I'll leave it blank to add something when the occasion arises.

Mmm

I can't believe how many Easter layouts I've done so far... usually I'm lucky to do one a year, so far I've done four, including this one:

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I'm entering my layout at:
# Design Dollies ~ Colour challenge ~ brown, orange, teal
# Design Dollies ~ Elements challenge ~ 'non-traditional' item
# Scrap it Forward ~ Going Green

I used some bottle seals - the wax-lined foil seals that come on juice bottles:


I die-cut the flowers from the seals, then embossed with my Cuttlebug.  Here's a close-up:

From my front door

There's not a lot of scrap action here this week - which I kind of expected. I've been busy with work assignments and a few home challenges too.

So, I have no scrappy creations to share at the moment. I have been taking some photographs though, so I'll share this one, seen from my front door yesterday:

Two cards

This week none of my photos have been matching any of my patterned papers... what's wrong with me??  It's just not coming together. So... I've done some cards instead.  I grabbed my scraps folders and I've been determined to empty them all out so I have an excuse to go scrap shopping.  Maybe.  Or maybe I'll just pretend to be a cardmaker until my scrap mojo returns.

So... the first card:



# Some Odd Girl ~ Style Challenge ~ sketch
I used the April freebie - Mae's Bouquet
# ABC Challenge ~ S is for ~ sparkle
I used Stickles 'Crystal Ice' on the flowers and Mae's eyes and the embossed dots.
# Kaboodle ~ Challenge 28 ~ digi girl

Other products: MME and Basic Grey papers, Cuttlebug 'Swiss Dots' EF, Fiskars edge punch and Spellbinder Nestabilities dies, Brilliance ink (gold), Bazzill kraft cardstock

EDITED 24/4/10:
I got a shout-out at Some Odd Girl for my card!! And I get to display this awesome blinkie:



Bit of a story to the next one - I had a lovely scrappy night with this gorgeous girl and this gorgeous girl last night.  I took all night to make just two cards - we did a LOT of chatting and experimenting with some other "creative recipes" (*wink*) so it's no surprise we didn't actually do much scrapping...   But anyway, the Stickles glitter wasn't quite dry when it was time to go home, so I left the cards on the top of my scrapping box so they wouldn't smudge.   And it was raining... and on the way to the car the cards got sploshed... and I didn't notice till I got home that my pirate card got all smudged :(

The art critics here at home tried to placate me and said it still looks okay because pirates get wet all the time; it just looks a bit more distressed than intended.  I'm not so sure. I haven't decided yet if I'll reprint the image and colour again to replace that layer, or just leave it and wallow...   Hmmmm... for the moment, this is the warts-and-all version:



# Pollycraft ~ Challenge 39 ~ pink, brown and yellow
I used 'Ethan Pirate' -  a Friday Freebie from earlier this year
# Simon Says ~ Let's go to the movies
My theme is 'Pirates of the Caribbean'
# Allsorts ~ Week 48 ~ In Stitches

Digi stuff

I was playing around with some templates in Photoshop today and thought I'd put together a quick digi layout.  I create most of my sketches in Photoshop but I haven't done a full digital layout in over a year.  So,  about an hour later:


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Credits:
* Template: Jen Caputo (free with Creating Keepsakes, April 2008) - you can see it HERE but it is no longer available
* Digital kit: "A Little Birdie Told Me" by Kathryn Balint - exclusive for participants in ADSR Season 3.
* Font: CK Becky

Puzzled

April is Autism Awareness Month. Some of you know exactly how autism has touched my life, and how close to my heart the subject is. So I was thrilled to participate in some very special online challenges this week.



# The Town Scrapper ~ Some of the Scrapettes, starting with this gorgeous lady, are donating $1 per challenge entry
# Scrap it Forward ~ Raising funds for Autism Speaks (USA)

Please visit them to read more about what the very generous teams at these sites are doing.

I'm also entering my card at:
# Design Dollies ~ Colour challenge ~ black, yellow, pink
# Papertake Weekly ~ Cutie Pie ~ This is the cutest stamp I own (Snag 'Em 'Chick')

I also used: Coredinations cardstock, Basic Grey and Creative Imaginations papers, Stampin' Up! ribbon, Making Memories and Carolee's Creations alphabet stickers.  The puzzle pieces are from a children's craft kit.

Just grab it...

and scrap!!  Manon set a challenge over at Scrap Boutique ~ to pile up the stuff on your scrap desk (even if it's only scraps), and use that stuff to create a layout... 

This is what I started with on my desk:



The paper is a really, really old Sassafras Lass design; I used the other half of the sheet to make this card a few weeks back.  There is always orange ribbon of some description on my desk; I've used it on a few projects recently.  And then some twine, paper doiley, corrugated cardboard, and 3/4 of an old book page... floating around from a few different projects.  Flowers - just grabbed some of them that were stacked up in the corner ready to be put away, not too sure how well matched the colours are!  The dragonfly pin was pinned into a block of polystyrene foam, sitting on my desk with the others I made a few weeks ago.  The only things I added were the base cardstock (very old stash ~ Basic Grey 'Motifica') and some alphas (two different green foam Thickers - slightly mismatched but I think it still works) and Carolee's Creations mini alpha stickers. 

The other criteria was to use a photograph with some 'incidental' people in the background.

This is what I ended up with:


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And a couple of detail shots:






The second layout is another guinea pig layout. I pretty much used the same process - pushed some scraps into another corner of my desk and used what I had floating around.   It's based on a sketch by Em Straface at Scrap Boutique.  I personalised the sketch a bit (so I could use all of the last favourite piece of 'Origins' - good excuse, I think!); hopefully it's still close enough to the original to qualify! Em's other criteria was to use 'pop dots' - I used lots of those under the circles to add some dimension.


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Can you bear...

to see any more guinea pig pages??  I've got a few more photographs of our "guinea girls" and I've scrapped them in 8"x8".  Here's the first one:


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# Design Dollies ~ Elements challenge ~ showers and flowers
# Design Dollies ~ Sketch challenge
I flipped the sketch on its side

Thank you!

Thank you so much Maria for your lovely blog candy! Maria is one of the Scrapettes over at The Town Scrapper (formally Humble Pie Stamps), where I join in the challenges sometimes.  The Maggie stamp is a Humble Pie original and I'd been looking forward to trying it out. Not to mention those devine Primas!


This the first card I've made using Flower Maggie:



# Totally Papercrafts ~ Challenge 11 ~ Distressing
I distressed the Basic Grey patterned paper with an edge distressor.
# Quixotic Paperie ~ Challenge #20 ~ Joys of Spring
Lots of flowers
# PaperPlay Challenges ~ Week 14 ~ Shiny Happy People
I added KindyGlitz to her eyes, and bling flowers
# Stamp Something ~ Stitch Something
I stitched around the edge of the patterned paper

And next, a THANK YOU card:



# Design Dollies ~ Colour challenge ~ dark green, yellow, rusty orange
# The Pink Elephant ~ Challenge #61 ~ Nature

Easter Projects - Part 2

Sharing some more Easter layouts... these are some of my design projects for Scrap Pile.

The first one is very heavy on techniques - lots of heat embossing, layering, and a liberal dose of Distress Stickles:


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For the second layout I went with muted colours, cleaner lines, Kraft and lots of negative space:

I was inspired by Helen at Scrap a Little to use lyrics from 'My Wish' by Rascal Flatts ("Show the world the warmth of your smile"):

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Happy Easter

Happy Easter!

Way back in October I was lucky enough to win a sketch challenge over on the Bo Bunny blog, and this week I received the new Bo Bunny 'Jazmyne' papers as my prize.

Here's the layout that I made using some of my new goodies, and some close-ups that show how pretty the glittery paper is:

 
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I took the photographs today - first ever Easter egg hunt at our cottage. 

The layout is based on a Design Dollies sketch by the mega-talented Kristy.  Apart from the Bo Bunny goodies, I used one of the beaded dragonfly pins that I made a few weeks ago, and a few buttons from my stash, some lace oddments and a Glimmermist-ed doiley (thanks to my friend Leone who has a bigger Glimmermist collection than me).

Giggling Tilda

A little while ago I received some happy-mail, all the way from the Netherlands! Thank you to Riane for sending me the Magnolia stamp, Giggling Tilda.  She's so sweet, and so are you. xx

I played around with the stamp for a while, experimenting with some different colour combinations, and these are the first two cards I've made with her: 


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# Simon Says ~ Distressing
# Play Date Cafe ~ Creativity Challenge 23 ~ blue, navy, white
# Diecuts R Us  ~ Surprise Challenge ~ Use a stamped image and a daisy

The second card is 6" x 3" :


Click to enlarge 

And a detail shot of the charm:



# Simon Says ~ Distressing
# The Town Scrapper ~ Charmed
# Crafty Creations ~ Challenge 61 ~ Anything Goes

Meg

Meg at the Twisted Tree is one of my lovely blog followers... she's a "kinda crafty mama" who shares her thoughts, her creations and her fabulous collection of eclectica on her amazing blog. And most of all, it's a nice place to pop in and visit.



Meg is celebrating 100 followers with a fun giveaway, which you can read all about HERE.

Scrapping at Scrap Pile

It's my turn to set the Technique Challenge over at Scrap Pile. In April it's all about using ephemera, and this is my sample layout:



Keeping it simple and using up some old stash... gotta be happy with that :)