Last week for Unstampabelles Challenge in January

Hello Peeps!

Happy Australia Day!

Swallowtail butterfly and Callistemon tree

Have a Safe and Happy Day

Now summer here seems to have stuck a toe in - we have had lovely sunshine and its been early 20's and best of all NO WIND, but it is not really a hot, hot summer here in Tasmania. Western Australia is experiencing the hottest weather recorded and it seems steamy elsewhere also, but we are about 26/7, cloudy and nice.......except for Thursday evening (about 8.30 pm) when we had rain, followed by this......

From driveway

From kitchen window

Well, on to the current Challenge #43 - Unstampabelles

This week's Thank You card (with a twist of using something from outside the window to inspire you) for you this week features a rainbow!

Prize is a Stampin' Up Gift Voucher of  up to $25 Au 

(which will include the cost of postage)

Donated by ME

 I was going to use this photo of the Portulaca's in the tub on the carport - seen outside the side window in the hall - and had planned out the flowers, when the rainbow appeared. It made a much better photo, don't you agree?

So, I went to the watercolour paper, and the TH Distress Inks and my silicon sheet

I laid the diecut top sheet (hugs and kisses by MFT) under the sheet to get an evenly spaced spread of ink on the top of the sheet, an smeared ink across in rows

I then sprayed it with water and laid the watercolour paper sheet over that and used my brayer to get a good even coating - it picked up some texture too from the diecut underneath

Then it was just the matter of putting it all together. I used the waste piece of painted card to die cut the words out and layered them onto blue card to make them show up more.

A black card blank to represent the night sky. I added some SU bling to the edges - just seven - to represent the seven colours of the rainbow.

There you have it - my current take on the challenge.

What's yours? 

You can go HERE and enter your card - it doesn't close until the 2nd February.

Been playing again......

Hello Peeps!

Sometime in the middle of the year, I got a freebie stamp set with a magazine, and I carefully tore out the 'Your Free Gift' section of the magazine and put it on the ever-growing pile of stuff on the desk.

Yesterday I wanted to make something, as life has been just so busy lately just doing that I have not actually made it to the standing desk to make something just for me, just to play around. I was not feeling particularity inspired so I decided to CASe something from the pile!   The top one was from Woodware, (that's all I wrote on the box). These three cards were the result - straight CASe re design!

Momento ink, SU sentiment, some Stickles and scraps of paper, paper pieced leaves

This card uses a sentiment from an MFT set called Sweet Little Memory

Coloured up with the SU alcohol markers, some ribbon and paper from stash (SU)

Stickles on the darker colours

This one has been paper pieced too, and the mushrooms are also, as well as lifted up.

Didn't measure a thing - can you tell? SU sentiment.

 Last Monday our SIL had a birthday - you can checkout the number on the card! As he is a musician, and loves beer, barracks for Collingwood  (yeah, we know!) and has just spend time painting the house, I added a few items to represent these aspects of his current life! Love pop-up box cards for their ability to load up the things you want to add! I added a dinosaur as well - as he is getting so old!!!!

Papers and beer label image from a magazine

Lots of diecuts!

That raven (black and white bird) is from a red wine bottle label - he likes a drop of red too!

Yep,that old!

A bit of fun.

Finally, that's my middle Grand-daughter Hettie in her NZ Army Band uniform, who is currently in Fuhlsbüttel, Hamburg, Germany for a Brass Band Competition with the Band. She has a singing gig with them this time as well as playing!

Thanks for looking!!

Another card for Unstampabelles Challenge

Well, we have just had a record (since records were first taken) downpour for Summer for a 24 hr period in Hobart, and the biggest since 1917 anyway! It rained! On the mountain it was over the 150 mm but we got 71mm around here - the temp was still about 20 though so it was muggy as well. 

Mosquito weather! Bugger - they like my blood! 

It stopped raining sometime last night, after drizzling all day yesterday after the downpour the night before, and the bay is a dirty brown colour from the runoff from all the dried up dirt etc. I can see some blue skies but only a little peeking through the clouds! It's supposed to be summer!! Our poor cherry growers have lost a lot of their crop and the stone fruit growers (yummy apricots and peaches) are also despondent but the apple growers say they can hear the apples growing! My tomatoes are not doing that well - only 4 so far! Enough grizzles! At least the flowers are enjoying the rain!

Begonias - the pink one is out but the yellow one is only just heading a flower.  The pink one has through out a leaf mould - not sure what to do about that!

 I am showcasing another card I made for the Challenge #43 at Unstampabelles for January.

The theme for January is

This is supposed to be Thanks! It is a die from SU and is raised up using dimentionals.

The twist is to showcase something out your window!

The prize is I will be offering a gift voucher to the value of $25 Aust on Stampin' Up products - please note this will include the postage to where-ever the winner lives as well!

Standing at my working desk  I look at this view all the time - that is the lamp in the middle!

When flicking through a magazine I purchased before Christmas and hadn't really studied, called Die Cutting Essentials from the stable of the papercraftmagazines.com, I came across an article called "5 quick tricks with ....... a tree die" by Jo Kill. (page 66) It inspired me to create the following in an attempt to recreate my view!

The layers of paper scraps are meant to represent the foreground, the water and then the hills in the background, in an arty type of way.......

I was going to stitch this all over the card but firstly it hid too much and secondly my hand held sewer purchased from the supermarket has a mind of its own and my hands cannot control its progress very well! So I cut off the left side and used it as a net curtain screen!

Why is my tree on the right not the left? It fell there! And picking it up and replacing it was not an option!! - so my view is sort of mirror imaged.

We get lots of birds in our garden - well, we did until the cats moved in next door - hopefully the birds will return soon in the numbers they were before - lots of little green finches!

All layered up onto some card to represent the curtains!

So, my picture outside my window number 3!

You too can look out and them make a card to represent what is outside the window

Enter it at Unstampabelles and remember

NO STAMPS please

Playing with some new stuff from SU - that arrived before Christmas!

Well, I don't know what has happened to Summer, but we are in a pattern or rain, sun, wind. cold - not necessarily in that order and often all at the same time! Bbbbrrrrr....

So took me to the workshop and crafted!

Played with inks and colouring in mostly......CASed most of  'em too!

WARNING: lots of photos 

Everything is Stampin' Up unless mentioned as not, when is it just mostly from my stash

This set is called Love is Kindness and I have used the newish SU alcohol ink pens to colour this one. Images stamped with Momento inks unless I say otherwise.

Primary colours are Raspberry Ripple and Old Olive.

Up-close of the image - see how the wrapper seems almost three dimensional?

Button and hemp ribbon

This one is from a set called A Happy Thing

Vintage style and various diecuts and sequins

Again coloured with the alcohol pens

Not as much control as the Copics give you but they are fine for quick work

Die cuts and sequins!

The lemons are from the same set - well, there is one lemon, and I masked to create three

Left a white streak for light

Old punch and some buttons from the stash

Colours are Hello Honey and Old Olive

Turned to the SU markers for a contrast - and a watercolour feel for this one

Background is stamped using Pumkin Pie  ink on Tangelo Twist.

Stamped with StayzOn ink onto watercolour card for bird image

Splattered with a paint brush 

Should have masked bird before splattering!

This one used the ink pads direct onto my Silicon sheet, sprayed with water mist and then my big brush from watercolour painting kit used to layer three colours into the card.

With the ink left I remisted and laid a piece of white card onto it, and swiped up the remaining ink to create a background sheet to use at another time - looks good too!

Stamped with Momento ink over the colours. A technique suitable for those who are not sure of their colouring skills or just for a slightly different look.

The tag top is punched out and the ribbon and button added - the whole tag is sitting up off the page, and could become a gift bookmark or tag to pass on.

I could have used Momento Navy for a sharper outline.

My background paper is just various washi tapes with a small gap between them

So, my time was not wasted I think - I enjoyed this little experiment with colour ways!

Hope you do too

I cannot enter these in anything 'cause I mostly CASed them from other very clever crafters.

Challenge #43 Unstampabelles - second card

Well. we are knee deep in January already. In Australia so far we have had fire, flood and fear.

Near Alice Springs

photo by Clair Ryan

 In the wider world, people are trying to threaten freedom of speech and liberty by also using fear. I am glad to see that the world is a little smarter than that!

Je suis Charlie!

Here, on our humble blogs, we will forge on with the daily humdrum of life and laugh where we can. We are not always happy - happiness is not something we should experience all the time else we will not know it when we do.

We can always be content however.

And occasionally we experience joy.

Today I am showcasing a card I made for the Challenge #43 at Unstampabelles for January.

The theme for January is

This is a rub on as is the corner

The twist for this challenge is to look out your window and incorporate something from there in your card, so I thought I would use a photo I took on New Year's Eve 2014 from balcony of the last sunset for the year.

It was a stunner!

I used the photo to print off onto some glossy paper from my computer and go this very muted, lacking detail but general idea image

I put it in a commercial photo card, and added some rub-ons and three bits of black bling

So, my card for Unstampabelles.

I will be back with some other work soon......housework upstairs is nearly completed!

My craft room now also needs a thorough cleanout and sort!

Any volunteers?

I will enter this in the following challenge(s):