Glasshouse Workshop

What a fabulous afternoon I had yesterday with some lovely ladies from Glasshouse Mountains and the surrounding areas. We did a fairly simple make and take, but I wanted to highlight the praticality of the Ornament Punch, showing that it is not only for punching out the shape of a Christmas ornament. We used that wonderful set Eastern Blooms and of course my current favourite, the Ornament Punch. Using Whisper White cardstock as the base of the card, the Pear Pizazz cardstock was then passed through the Big Shot using the Petals a Plenty embossing folder. Using the Riding Hood Red and the Pear Pizazz Stamp n Write Markers the stem of blooms from the Easter Bloom set of stamps were coloured and then stamped onto the Whisper White panel and mounted onto the Riding Hood Red cardstock. I then stamped the large bloom from this set onto a piece of Riding Hood Red Scrap and  Punched it out using the Ornament Punch, and snipped off the bottom to make the ornament shape a vase! It was then attached directly onto the White cardstock. The sentiment from the Level 3 Hostess Stamp set Occasional Quotes was stamped in Riding Hood Red Ink, punched out using the Large Oval Punch and then onto a Scallop Oval in Riding Hood Red, which in turn was mounted onto the cardfront using dimensionals. It was such a treat to make this with the ladies and they loved it! This workshop also gave me the opportunity to talk to the ladies about our wonderful products and of course the fabulous promotion we have at the moment with the various Bundles. I demo'ed the Fancy Favour Die at this workshop and made a couple of different gift bags with it. The first one I used Seasnon of Joy and Delightful Decorations Stamp Sets and also the Ornament Punch, The second box I made was using the So Swirly Jumbo Wheel. As I said, very quick and very simple but such a wonderful project for the ladies to see. I also embossed one of the fancy favour dies using the Petals a Plenty embossing folder, and what a difference that made! I could not believe how elegant it looked, it would lookbeautiful on a wedding breakfast table as a bonbomiere. One of the ladies snapped that up very quickly to take and show her daughter! Once again, thank you ladies for allowing me into your home to share what I love doing with you all. Those who ordered Big Shots..............I bet you cant wait to receive them, and remember any questions you may have, just give me a call on 0409874291 or send me an email at gwenbloomfield@ymail.com  and I will help you in any way that I am able.

Christmas Stamp A Stack

Held a Christmas Stamp A Stack at my daughters on Thursday and met some lovely ladies who came along to make the Christmas cards and also to be able to catch up with each other. Here are the cards that we made.

The first one using the stamp set Lovely as a Tree and Season of Joy for the sentiment,  is a blatent CASE from Kris McIntosh.  This was such a simple card to make and using Night of Navy and Whisper White Cardstock gave this card a beautiful clean and simple finish. It doesnt show up on here but I highlighted the centre pine with dazzling diamonds and also the mounds of earth at the bottom of the trees. Thank you Kris!

The others are of my own design, and the second card is made using the ever popular Lovely as a Tree set, but stamping them on an angle across the top of the cardstock, using Old Olive to give the impression of a Christmas tree. I then stamped the baubles from Delightful Decorations and I used Tempting Turquoise, Concord Crush and Melon Mambo. The sentiment has been taken from the Snow Swirled set and stamped in Cherry Cobbler, and just to finish it off the Melon Mambo bauble has a touch of Dazzling Diamonds in the centre to add a bit of 'bling.

Contempo Christmas was the set used here for this card, along with The small flower from Season of Joy, and the sentiment is from Heard from the Heart and of course the wonderful Ornament Punch. How easy does this punch make things?  The Garden Green cardstock was matted with Whisper White which was stamped in Garden Green and Cherry Cobbler both top and bottom edges. We then distressed a piece of Garden Green Cardstock and tore both edges, and seperated the cardstock so it turned into Faux Suede. The piece of Cherry Cobbler was punched along both edges with the Scallop Border Trim Punch and centred over the Faux Suede. Two ornaments were stamped and punched out (how I love that punch!!) and attached to the assembled card using dimensionals. The sentiment is just the word Christmas, which was inked using the Stamp n Write Marker Cherry Cobbler from the set Heard from the Heart, so not to include the rest of the sentiment which actually says 'Welcome Christmas into your heart'. This was stamped onto a piece of Whisper White cardstock that had been edged in Garden Green after it was cut using the Big Shot and the Lots of Tags Die. Next came the ribbon. I had a lot of fun with this. I took a length of 1/8" Whisper White Tafetta Ribbon and using the end of the Paper Piercer, to give even pressure I gently alternated between running it along the Cherry Cobbler and Garden Green Stampin Pads so I duo coloured ribbon to place on top of the baubles. The baubles were then finished off with a dash of Dazzling Diamonds.

After I had made this card, I decided that it needed something more, so when the ladies made it they embossed the Whisper White in the Big Shot using the Petals a Plenty embossing folder. It made such a difference and added some class to what was otherwise a fairly plain creation! The Real Red band across the front of the card was stamped using the holly branch from the Christmas Classics stamp set. The small flowers from the Season of Joy set and also the Jingle all the Way from the Christmas Classics were stamped on the main panel using Versamark Ink and then embossed with Gold Embossing Powder. It certainly had a WOW factor, and everyone loved it. The Stamp a Stack was so popular with the ladies I have been asked back to do another on the 26th of November, this time using the evergreen set Pick a Petal, which is actually the very first stamp set I ever used from Stampin' Up!.

Sorry I havent been in for a while..............

Here I am back again! It has been a busy few weeks with classes and workshops, not that I am complaining because I love what I do so much, and love to see the look on the faces of the ladies when they have created something that is so beautiful when at the beginning of the class they have invariably said 'I wont be any good at this, I dont have a creative bone in my body!' We had so much fun when the ladies did a punch art class where they made 24 cards using only one set of stamps (Teeny Tiny Sentiments) but heaps of punched shapes.The day was so much fun, there was lots of laughter and a lot of very proud ladies at the end of the day happily showing off their creations! For this class I purchased a tutorial from Jackie Topa and used a lot of her ideas, and some of my own to come up with the end result. One of the funniest moments of the day was when one of the ladies ended up with a decidely 'drunken' wine glass!

This is typical of the classes that we have together, the ladies have built friendships and there is such a comradie amongst them it is lovely to see. Everyone shares, helps the other and there are lots of anecdotes throughout the day that usually keep us all highly amused. We usually break half way through to share a cuppa and a snack, and this is where the ladies will bring out their own projects that they have completed since they last saw each other. I just love what I do! I love to see the happiness that this craft brings to each and every lady that comes to my classes, and for that I thank you all!

Money Wallets for our grandsons

In a very short space of time I have birthdays for 3 grandsons. I dont send presents these days, I tend to do money wallets or gift card holders for the boys and they can buy what they really want! The first one is for Owen who is too old for a kiddy card, but not old enough for an adult one! Using the stamp set Just Surfing, I combined Crumb Cake with Very Vanilla cardstock, and stamped using Crumb Cake, Mariner Mist, Rose Red and Night of Navy. I also used the aqua painter to blend the inks a little better.

 For Matthew's card I used Seaworthy Stamp Set, and just used the yacht. I also used my aqua painters on this card as well, The contrast strip on the front of this card was Marina Mist, and I think the  way that it has been 'faux sueded' adds to the water effect.    

Lastly for Harrison's card, I used the Loads of Love set, with him being the youngest of the three. I used Bashful Blue as the Contrast, and also attacked the Very Vanilla Strip in the centre that I had stamped with trucks with the Aqua Painter as well. I hope they like their cards. I love they way they turned out and because the boys are 'unfussy' I am hoping they will too.

Till Next time......Keep stampin'!

Sooting Technique

Here is the card that I created from looking at the shell I found the other day on Mooloolaba Beach when I went for my walk. Can you see why I thought of this technique? I think it must have been not only the colours in the shell but the mottling effect that it shows as well. I love the stamp set Just Believe and that is what I used for this card. It really is such an easy technique and my ladies will be learning this technique in a few weeks time. I think I would like to do something similar but in sepia tones, will have to give that some more thought.

This week my ladies are making 24 punch art cards, all worked around the swtamp set Teeny Tiny Sentiments. What I have done is remake some of the cards into full size cards, just to show that the images they will create are not only for the smaller version of the cards. Here is a sneak peak of what I have done.  

         They are so cute, and so easy to make. They will have a greeting card for every occasion after this!

Today's Find Reminds Me of Another Technique!

 This morning was  grey, wet, and overcast. It had rained heavily during the early hours of the morning, and it would have been so easy to pull the covers over my head and stay exactly where I was! It was still very warm so I decided that a bit of rain never hurt anyone and  set of for my morning walk upon the beach. Have I ever told you before that it rains differently in Queensland to other places in Australia and indeed some other parts of the world!

Yes its wet, like every where else, but even in driving rain, its warm and doesnt leave your body shivering and shaking with cold as it would, in say if you were in the Southern States of Australia or perhaps Britain. Because of the conditions I didnt have to share the beach with anyone else this morning except for a Council Worker picking up rubbish off the sand to keep our beaches beautiful!

 I found this shell this morning and it immediately set me to thinking of sooting. I love this technique. It is quite simple but always brings forth such  wonderful results. So once again I have photographed the shell, and then tried my hand at sooting and yes I love it! The rest of the creation will have to wait until tomorrow, as I have to spray it with some sealer so the soot doesnt smudge, and when it is dry I will make it up and pop it on here so you can see the end result. I think I will also do one with coloured sooting, I am thinking perhaps Soft Suede or Pear Pizazz, now you will have to wait and see! Till next time..............

The Beach

Hi, today I had a wonderful day, I took two of my lovely ladies with me to fellow Demonstrator Kris McIntosh's, where she was holding a class.

 

Before we left though I still made time for my daily walk along the beach. Today, I did not find anything to give me inspiration in the card making arena, but it was wonderful just to be able to meander along the waters edge. I dont think I will ever make Power Walker status, but I figure I am still walking, still moving and therefore there must be some exercising happening in there somwhere. 

We made Two beautiful books, one for colour combinations and the other an inventory of all our papers and cardstock, stamps etc etc. These are definitely projects that I will recreate and share with my other ladies. They will be so Jealous when they see wha they have missed out on!! Not only did we make these practical items, the just look so darn good too.  Kris also supplied us with a beautiful lunch (thanks Kris). Tomorrow its off to the beach again for a walk and a swim, then home into it to prep for a class that I am holding next week. Till next time......

Cajun Craze

After re-discovering the shell I found on the beach in my pocket this morning I couldnt get the the colour and indeed the shell out of my head (dont you just hate that?) This afternoon I was pondering the colours and bought out my Natures Nest Set of Stamps. I love this set, but dont use it nearly enough. I took the shell from it and stamped it heaps of times on some Very Vanilla cardstock. It looked too stark, so I took my Aqua Painters and just went over the images. The colour blended beautifully and without any drama's, and I was happy with the results. I then played with the images in my mind and still nothing came to me, then all of a sudden I thought, "they might be shells, but I can turn them into petals" which is what I did. I love the look they have created, beautiful big petalled flowers. I matted these onto Not Quite Navy Cardstock, and also More Mustard whilst the main body of the card is Cajun Craze, and I used scraps of Garden Green for the stems and the leaves I punched out 5 petal flower punch. The Not Quite Navy reminded me of the sea this morning and the More Mustard of the sand, because the sun had not risen high enough at the time to lighten it.The bow at the bottom is 1/8" white satin ribbon (not SU) which I have dyed with the more mustard Classic Stampin' Pad. I  love the beautiful golden hues that it has taken on.I used the Trio Flower Punch for the centres of the flowers in Cajunand then punched a 3/4" circle to lay that upon. It has been finsihed off with round rhinestone brads in the flower centre.

A walk on the beach

Hi everyone, My blog at this point of the day is not so much about card making and papercraft, but how it always seems to be lurking in the back of our mind. This morning I woke and decided to go for a walk along the beach. I havent been for so so long, and I think like everything we take its beauty for granted and that it will always be there. As everyone would be aware we have had some terrible erosion of our foreshores with the wild weather we have experienced over the last couple of years. Normally I am a person who believes that nature will eventually remedy erosion and climatic problems, but after looking at our beautiful beaches aftrer our last bout of wild weather I thought "Goodness old girl, you have your work cut out for you". I am so glad that the Sunshine Coast Regioanl Council decided to do some dredging to replace some of the sand that had been taken away.

 So this morning I stepped onto the beach and thought how beautiful this is, how peaceful even though the waves were pounding and dumping so close to the shore. I had not walked more than perhaps 30 metres along the beautiful Spit at Mooloolaba Beach and I looked down and came across this piece of shell. It is quite big, and my first reaction to seeing this part of what would have been a magnificent shell in its entirety was "This is exactly like Cajun Craze!" So I popped it into my pocket and bought it home with me. I forgot about if for a little while, and when I remembered it, I went to my card stock stash and grabbed a piece of Cajun Craze and photographed them. It is so so close in colour! I think now I have to put my thinking cap on to see what I can come up with, and still keep the beachy feeling. Keep tuned to see what I come up with. Thanks for reading even though it wasnt really stamp related.

Christmas is not too far away............

With thoughts of Christmas, gifts to make and buy, greeting cards and gift certificate holders, Christmas puddings and cakes to make, not to mention the ordering of the turkey and the ham! Every year we say "We're going to have a quiet one this year". Must be famous last words because each year seems to be bigger than the one before! I have decided that I am not going to say these words this year, and will see what happens! So with thoughts of being organised I began to play with Garden Green, Cherry Cobbler and Very Vanilla Cardstock. I love the look of the Garden Green and the Cherry Cobbler together. Last Christmas I couldnt seem to get on with Garden Green, it didnt seem to do 'it' for me. This year teaming it with Cherry Cobbler has made such a difference they sit together so nicely. I also use the faux suede technique for both the Gift Dertificate holder and the card, and I think they complement each other very well. The stamp sets I used on the card were Contempo Christmas, Season of Joy and the Christmas is from the set Heard from the Heart. I also used the decorative scallop border punch, the ornament punch and the die cut from Lots of Tags (which I retrieved out of my 'another day' box!) The ribbon on the bows is 1/8" wide white satin (non SU) that I have dyed in Garden Green and Cherry Cobbler in sections. If you look closely you will see that I have the green on the bows facing to the edges and the Cherry Cobbler is facing toward the centre of the card front. I finished the baubles off with a little Dazzling Diamonds, and used Mini Glue Dots to secure the ribbon to the baubles. The Gift card holder was done on the same principles, but I tore the edge of the card as well as the Faux Suede section. I used the swirl from Season of Joy and stamped out two baubles from the Delightful Decorations set. The baubles I have attched to the dyed ribbon using Linen Thread. The inside of the holder has 'Welcome Christmas into your heart' on the bottom section and "Christmas weaves a magic wand over this world, and behold everything is softer and more beautiful"  a quote by Norman Vincent Price. I cant wait to make some more of these little beauties, I think that I will be using quite a few of them this year. Hope you have enjoyed this post, and if you have any questions or would like to know how to make any of the things that I show on my blog, I am more than happy to help you.

I love it when there is rubbish on televison!

 

The reason I love it when there is rubbish on television of an evening is that it gives me the perfect excuse to sit at my table and play! I expect if I was really very truthful............I dont need an excuse at all!!!

Before I cleaned up my table yet again I thought I should have a little more creative time which was definitely better than watching the DVD Concerned Citizen.

I can sit there in my own little world and do as I wish, but also be able to pick up a phrase here and there or glance up and see a fleeting

moment of a scene, and when my husband talks to me about the movie I am at least able to make some 'intelligable" comment! Whew!!!

This time I thought that I would play with Dasher, Snow Swirled, Season of Joy and some more of my another day stash, as well as other stamps and I couldnt resist having a play with the set Baby Bundle. It is just so so cute.

My another day stash must sound as if it is huge! It isnt really, but when I get new embossing folders, or dies I just cant wait to try them out, and as a result I have a heap of Whisper white cut 10.5 vx 14.98 and the same in usually retired card stock, and when the pieces are embossed or cut they go into ther another day box. It does come in handy when you're in a hurry to make a card when you have all these embossed pieces of cardstock etc. I also did some cards using the Thoughts and Prayers stamp set, but becasuse I am such a terrible photograher they didnt turn out, which was disappointing because I really loved the combination that aI used. I used So Safron for the card, Always Artichoke (embossed using Petals a Plenty), stamped the flowers from Thoughts and Prayers onto a piece of Certain Celery, which was matted on So Safron. I then stamped the image twice, once in Always Artichoke and then in White Craft. The sentiment I stamped straight onto the So Safron card base. It really does look striking and I must try to take some more pics. When I had done that card I was so taken by it, I grabbed some scrap from my another day box and stamped some trees and flowers from this set using the same technique but in various colours. Those images have gone back into the box for re-use. I did make one other, but as yet I havent photographed it.

I have fallen in love with the Baby Bundle stamp set, it is so cute. One of my ladies rang the other night and said could I please make her a baby card, as her daughter had just given birth to a little boy, and this is what I came up with. I used Bashful Blue Cardstock, Perfect Polka Dots embossing folder, andthe Word Window Punch and the Modern Label Punch. The little duck is not SU.

I finished it all off with just a dash of Dazzling Diamonds in the heart, coloured the dots on the stroller and wheels with Baja Breeze Stamp and Write Marker pen, and used the black Marker pen to do the dashes in the pram hood. Because the Baby bundle set is in Clear Mount, I took all the small images and put them onto one of the clear stamp blocks and stamped all over the Whisper White to give the card a ;real; nursery feel to it. My lady was thrilled with the result, and I sort of got the picture right. I have made some other cards (or they re in the process of being made) and I will share them over the next couple of days as they are completed. So till next time, keep stampin'