I'm a Lollipop Lady!!!

I made a New Year Resolution to take the big plunge and just apply for DT jobs and guess what! I got the first two I applied for - I was so excited when I got onto the team at UnstampaBelles  BUT.....drum roll please, now I am a Lollipop Lady as well!

The first Challenge for Lollipops is for fairy bread! That is the bread with 100s and 1000s sprinkled onto the butter on it! Just like in the picture!

 An additional challenge is to add wings (fairies have them so the bread should too ;-))

I will enter this in the Southern Girls Challenge - #37 Magic and Mystery

In my childhood, white bread always had a creamy look, was from a high tin and had a thick crunchy crust. It was usually spread thickly with yellow butter, and the 100s and 1000s sort of melted into the butter and coloured it again. We only had fairy bread for birthday treats - and usually only for my birthday as the boys weren't into fairies!! So my colours are not so much pink and green and blue on white, as yellow and green and red all melted into a sort of creamy yellowish/white background!

The card used for this is Stampin'Up's Pool Party, and I combined it with DP from Bo Bunny's Ad Lib 6 x 6 pad. The image is a fairy from Lili of the Valley coloured up with Copics, and cut out with the trusty Cuttlebug and a label die from Spellbinder. The backgrounds are also cut out using different dies from Spellbinder.  The ribbon is SU's stitched Poppy Parade, the flourish is from a Cheery Lyn die, the sentiment is from Verve's Enjoy set and the sprinkles are from Annabelle's Stamps. I used Stickles on the wings and the fairy's hair and the flower.  I also inked around the top die cut with SU Poppy Parade. Hope you like it!!

This one doesn't have the inking! See the difference!

Whine or Wine?

There are so many lovely labels on wine bottles, and I have made use of many of these in my day - both the contents of the bottles and the labels!

However, I find it hard to remove some of the labels for my artwork - that's my whine! My hubby is a bit of an expert now, including filling the bottle with hot water and waiting, to applying (carefully) the heat from a hair dryer, to simply soaking in a sink of hot water.  Some lift off OK and some don't. Oh well, youse takes your chances, eh!

This card uses an image from a wine bottle that obviously came off but had to be trimmed a bit, so I put the image inside a frame and you cannot tell it is a little worse for wear! Can you?

This is an outside shot

This is an inside one

These are the products used to make it - the backing paper is from Out of Print, the top DPs are from Jenny  B's Studio, the frame is from Merci, the rub-on is a Kelly Panacci (Sandy Lion) which was worse for wear and had to be resurrected with black pen. The black ribbon (wide) is off a chocolate box, and the thin one is from clothing. The beads I made. The black and gold ribbon tape is from 7 Gypsies. You can just see another wine label (Annie's Lane) under the small papers pack, and I was contemplating using that instead of the one I did, as this card was made for my friend Annie's birthday! The black card base is a commercial blank. 

Beautiful Day

Yesterday was our wedding anniversary but I was teaching a Copic class in the afternoon so today my lovely husband took me to lunch at the beautiful winery Meadowbank, near Richmond today instead to celebrate. 

Here is a photo (taken from the web) of the winery and the view - its greener today than this photo indicates.

The sky was a clear brilliant blue today as well!

We had a fabulous meal and shared a beautiful bottle of Chardonnay.  The service was superb. Now, my hubby is sound asleep snoring on the couch upstairs with the TV on - it is 35 degrees outside,and although there is a sea breeze, we are tucked around the corner at our house and don't get it.  The sky is still a clear beautiful blue and I have been able to go to the workroom and make a lovely card! What more could you want!

Here is my card:

The card used is SU Whisper White, Lucky Limeaid and Cherry Cobbler.  The base card is Kraft from Papermania.  The ribbon is a rich burgundy from my stash, stamped with SU Kraft white ink - using a sentiment from WMS - Little Trees. The centre sentiment stamp is a freebie from Craft Stamper magazine, by Banana Frog stamped using Memento Tuxedo Black ink.  I coloured the centre of the circle with a Copic pen. The leaves are die cut using Sizzix Little Leaves from SU. I cut a circle using two Nestabilities (one inside the other) from the green card and then attached the leaves to it using glue to create the wreath.  I took some flowers from I Brake for Stamps (red ones on wire and wound them around the card) and Peterloo (white ones glued on). I have tied a bit of seam binding ribbon on the side.  I thought it looked quite pretty!

I had one leave set left over so added it to the inside of the card, which is layered in the red and then white card and stamped with a suitable sentiment from Stamp It.

Modem woes!

My modem died on Tuesday morning at 10.20 am. Vale, modem - you have been a good friend for many a year.  The Telstra technician who came laughed when he saw it and said it was one of the originals send out by Telstra when people first logged in with Broadband.

It took several calls to the Phillipines, and to mainland Australia, and then several more calls after the technician called to get up and running again with a new modem.  Wonder if this one will last for more than 10 years?

Anyway, I now have a slim silver modem blinking at me and email again, as well as access to blogland! I only have 58 emails to deal with and am now up-to-date with all internet duties! Back to crafting..........

SILs birthday card

Had to make a card for the SIL - he has a birthday later this week. It's busy in January!
I will enter it in the CES Challenge Blog - Vintage Darling! and in the Pattie's Creations Design Challenge - Fancy Fold.
Also for Aud Sentiments #45 Challenge - use scraps!

Base card is SU Crumb Cake (or Kraft) and SU Very Vanilla - my fold is a take on the Joy Fold. The brads are lovely vintage brads from SU and SU twine. The background papers are from the scrap stash. I just picked five papers that looked masculine and went together. The stamps are from Darkroom Door's Vintage Automobiles. The ink is Memento Rich Cocoa and Distress Antique Linen. 

Unwrap the linen thread and it opens up.......

.....to this! I distressed and inked the edges of the vanilla card but didn't add ink to anything else.  Keeps it a bit edgy I thought. 

Beautiful day today and I went out with the camera to take the photos of the card and ended up playing with the camera for 30 minutes in the sunshine, learning to take close ups and stuff.  They are not that good but better than I have done in the past. I must learn to use my camera better than I do.

Fern curl

Native bush - not sure of its name

Piece of the fence with old creeper root attached

Yet another one....

This card went together very quickly from a previously coloured image and some scraps from the scrap stash drawer, and another Penny Black stamp for the sentiment.  The image is an Annabelle Stamp image - Li'lle Monster. 

I was going to enter it into CR84FN Challenge #45 - blue, yellow and orange, but I was too late to enter (sigh)  but I am also entering it into Annabelle Stamps Challenge Anything Goes and the Card Crafters - Birthday Card challenge instead!

The die cut is a Spellbinders one in SU Marina Mist as is the ink. The orange card is SU Pumpkin Pie and the DP is from my stash and has no name on it so am unsure of maker. I coloured the image with Copics about six months ago and lost it in the mess of Christmas cards. The card is a commercial blank. 

Keeping it Simple

This is not as easy as it sounds.  Susan at Simplicity has challenged us to make a card using a single layer, and the colours of pink and red only, no others.  I have thought about this for a few days and yesterday I got a delivery from Stampin' Up with several new stamp sets.  I tried them out.

OWL#74

The little pink heart is crooked - deliberately? - sadly, no. The stamp set used is a new one from the Summer catalogue called You Are Loved and the little pink heart is from an older set called I (Heart) Hearts. The ink is Cherry Cobbler and the pearls are white Kaiser coloured up with a Copic pen to match. The card is a glossy white commercial blank and I rounded the corners.  

This is more than one layer but I like the simple look - again it is a stamp set from the mini called Pretty Postage and is punched out using the Postage Stamp Punch.  The ink is Cherry Cobbler and the card is a commercial blank. In both cards I tried to follow Susan's rule of thirds when positioning the images. 

More Maritime images

The DP from Stampin' Up was so lovely and I had to make a card for my brother's birthday next week, so I used an image from the paper and made his card before I tidied up.

The ink used is SU Not Quite Navy, and the sentiment is from Stamp It. The card is SU Not Quite Navy and the DP is the one mentioned below from SU's Summer mini. Couldn't resist tying a bit of twine s well here. It is all fussy cut, including the mount and the banner. Took me about 20 minutes!!!!

I will enter this in Card Crafter's Circle.  Their Challenge is for a Birthday Card.

Maritime Images

A male friend of ours turns 60 tomorrow so this is his card, made using the Stampin' Up  DP set in the new Summer Mini catalogue and the stamp set The Open Sea which matches it.  I have CASed this card.  Bakers twine also comes from this same mini - I used it a lot over Christmas on tags!

I will be entering this in the Annabelle Stamps - Anything Goes Challenge. Bye the way, Andrea has just launched five new clear stamp sets - very versatile and great for creating backgrounds as well as making great cards.

The sentiment stamp is from Penny Black and the ink used is SU Pacific Blue.  The frame is a SU punch and the die behind the world is  is from Spellbinders as is the circle.

Dandelion and Daisy

I acquired a stamp set for these two characters and while playing around made this - I used the MOJO Monday Sketch Challenge #223 to create this and will enter it in the Challenge.

I used Bazill card for the blank; and the papers from Pink Petticoat Vintage Rose Collection (freebie in Quick Cards Magazine) booklet. The image is from Dandelion and Daisy Clear Stamp 9071000.  I coloured it with Copics after stamping it out in Momento Close to Cocoa. The sentiment is in the same.  Some die cuts and ribbon and pearls and the hearts border is a Martha Stewart Punch.