Crafter's Retreat #5

Good morning all,

Well the time for me flying out is fast approaching and I am DESPERATELY trying to organise posts amongst planned menu's for the family, working out who is going which way and where for the 10 days I am away...and to tell you the truth, I have contemplated a couple of times not going. However...I AM off to Singapore for 10 days to see my bestie and partake in her new life...as well as take in some World Cup Netball.

I hope you are not over all my posts on the Crafter's Retreat...but you were warned that I DID get a LOT done. Now the lovely lass who organised the camp this year was Connie (Facebook link....she has a store front in Campbelltown - Sydney). Upon arrival she gave us a wee goodie bag that contained some DP, ric-rac and paper flowers. She challenged us to make something with the stuff from the bag.

I got out my swatches and matched some of her papers. I was SHOCKED to find out that one of the colours was one that I had (purposely) NEVER used...Groovy Guava (SU 2008/09). It was also paired with Sage Shadow...a fave of mine that has sadly gone via the wayside too!!

Here are my 2 attempts....

#1

Now sorry bout the glarey sun...but this is prob better IRL. I was so very surprised that these colours worked so v v well together.



The bottom layer of the butterfly is vellum that I embossed, then the smaller one is the paper from Connie's goodie bag. It was Bestie's idea to put the pearls as the antennae....and it worked out well. A couple of dimensionals...and there you go!!

#2

This one came together a LOT easier than the first...perhaps I had past the initial shock of the colour combo...LOL!! I had a minor hiccup with the embosslit die in that I had the DP the wrong way....so I used the debossed side!! The tag was done by trimming off the top and bottom of the Designer Label Punch. I think it gave a really nice shape.

 

Again, thanks for enduring another wordy post. I am going to endeavour to get another handful of posts done, but if I disappear for a while....you know where I am...and that I'll back real soon. 2 more sleeps to go!!

Stuff used:

CS: (SU) Sage Shadow, Groovy Guava, Whisper White, DP - Foof-a-la (item 47090 - Savannah: Ambrosia), Vellum

Ink: (SU) Sage Shadow

Stamps (SU): Best Yet, Teeny Tiny Sentiments

Punches: (SU) Modern Label Punch, Designer Label Punch, Word Window Punch

Dies: (SU) Bigz Beautiful Butterfly, Beautiful Wings Embosslit die, Nesties Classic Circles

Other Bits: SU Tulip Embossing frame, Cuttlebug Devine Swirls Embossing Folder, Dimensionals, Metallic Silver Gel Pen, Rhinestones and Half Pearls fm stash

Lynda xx

Crafter's Retreat #4

Sorry guys n gals...not even half way yet!!!! Told you I got a lot done!!

Now anyone with a boy around the age 5-10 will know of Ben 10. He is a HUGE hit in this house and I know my Bestie's youngest is a massive fan too. He is soon to turn 6. A long while back I saw this card by the Super-talented Christie Kunkel. I wrote to her to see if it was OK to CASE it and she also helped me out with the size of the circles she used. This is my version of her Ben 10 card.....

She very cleverly used the Spiral Punch to do the wrist band....GENIUS!!!! Then it was a matter of using the concentric circles I had to do the rest. I ended up using my Nestabilities Circles to do the large ones. For the other punches used, see the "Stuff Used" at the bottom.



Needless to say...a pretty big happy dance was done when I finished this. There were a couple of other crafter's who took a great deal of interest in this too....loving everything Ben 10. Thanks so very much Christie for making such a great card to CASE.

Stuff Used:

CS: Whisper White, Basic Black and Stardream Shimmer Silver, CM Green (sorry do not know the name!!)

Ink: Basic Black

Stamps: (SU) Birthday Wish

Punches: (SU) 1 3/4" Circle Punch, Horizontal Slot Punch, Spiral Punch, Carla Craft 1/2" Circle Punch, Nestabilities Classic Circles

Lynda xx

Crafter's Retreat 2011 #3

The following cards are expamples of how bits come together to make real an idea bouncing around a brain. At the last Craft Expo at Rosehill Racecourse, I stumbled upon some magical DP that had giant clocks all over it. I was immediately reminded of the stamp set "Sense of Time". Only thing was...I do not own it....but Bestie did. So a few e mails later...she promised to bring it to camp with her, so I could have a play. I wanted to have a play with all things vintage again....so here's the results.....

                                                                                 #1

I left the sentiments off some of the cards...so I could decide later. The clocks on #1 and #2 are matted on a piece of Early Espresso to show a v v thin 1mm border.

                                                                             #2

and #3

As you can see I stamped off the ink and continued the "cog" motif around the edge of the card and the DP. I also popped up the clock on a dimensional.

I am really loving playing with the Tim Holtz inks. They sponge on so v v easily and evenly...and you gotta love that!!!!

Stuff Used:
CS: (SU) Very Vanilla, Early Espresso and Kaisercraft "Timeless Collection" ~ P657 - World map...flip side is the clocks!!) and P656 - Script
Ink: Tim Holtz Distress Inks in Frayed Burlap, Vintage Photo, Tea Dye and Black Soot
Stamps: (SU) Sense of Time
Other Bits: Dimensionals

Lynda xx

Crafter's Retreat 2011 #2

Another thing on my 'to do' list was a couple of Male Cards (collective groan of frustration!!!!) 2 men in my life are turning 40. One is my hubby and the other is my Bestie's partner. I had his pressie in the car at camp, so I kinda HAD to do it....cause Bestie was running it back to Singapore for me!!! Now I DID make the same card for both boys, I just aqua painted them slightly differently.

I had found some FANTASTIC DP in a bin for 60c a sheet (12 x 12 no less) and I loved the colours in it immediately. This shaped the colour scheme for the card....and the stamp was a cinch...Lovely As A Tree. This is what I came up with.....

Isn't the DP fantastic?? It is real Autumnal tones. I used the Nestabilities Deckled Rectangles to get the rough edges.....again...to bloke it up a bit!!

The tree was stamped is Basic Brown and the aqua painted over, the same way as I had done here. Just gives it that bit of lift don't you think??

I then kept the age basic....cause male cards are not fussy right. I used some gold Upkit Numbers I have had for ages...and then used 2 full stops to fill the space.

I really do love the way this turned out, and by all accounts "Mr" Bestie did too.

Tonnes more to show.....thanks for popping by.

Stuff used:
CS: (SU) Always Artichoke, Soft Suede, Very Vanilla and 2001 Anna Griffin DP (AG052)
Ink: (SU) Basic Brown, Always Artichoke and Soft suede with the aqua painter
Stamps: (SU) Lovely As A Tree
Punches: (SU) Designer Label Punch, Carla Craft 1" circle punch
Other bits: Aqua Painter, Nestabilities Deckled Rectangles, Upkit Gold Numbers

Lynda xx

Crafter's Retreat 2011 #1

Hi there.

I guess I shoud get off my keester and show you what I made at craft camp....given that it WAS 2 weekends ago!!! Once again, it was at the idyllic Collaroy, where we have been all the previous times. One of the BEST things about camp was that my bestie came out all the way from Singapore...JUST for camp!!! We had some "us" time...and even better...US CREATIVE time. Could not have asked for more.

This year I went with specific goals in mind...with a glut of birthdays and things coming up, I wanted to get ahead (or at least dare to dream anyhow). I also had some new toys to play with and I wanted to give them a good going over.

First task was to fill some orders I had been give. One of the doctors at work was about to become an Uncle for the first time, but he did not know the sex of the baby, so he wanted one of each. He also wanted traditional colours...ie pink and blue. my "go to" baby set is Wild About You. I also had purchased some time back some beautiful Christina Re double sided A4 paper. With all these factors in mind, here is the boy card....

And the girl card.....



I kept the design fairly basic as I wanted the paper to be the centre of attention. I just made a simple matt...

...and because I (still) can't bear to do 2 identical cards....slightly changed the sentiment up a little...

Even side by side I think they looked pretty speccy together....

Isn't the paper just too cute?? The doc was really happy with them too. Turns out the timing was perfect. I gave them to him at work on the Tuesday and his new NIECE was born on the Wednesday....and he was all organised. Gotta love that. You still can't wipe the smile off his face.

Thanks for dropping by. Rest assured, I have A LOT more to share!!!

Stuff used:
CS: (SU) Pretty In Pink, Bashful Blue, Whisper White and Cristina Re paper (sorry unsure of name)
Ink: (SU) Pretty in Pink, Bashful Blue
Stamps: (SU) Wild About You, Short and Sweet
Punches: (SU) Word Window Punch, Large Oval Punch, Scallop Oval Punch, Modern Label Punch
Other Bits: Dimensionals, Pink and Blue 3mm craft ribbon, 3mm pink and blue rhinestones fm stash

Lynda xx



For a friend......

One of the magical things that exist in the world of blogging is the fact that you have so many friends....and most of them you will never meet. Yet somehow, through creativity and inspiration you connect on a level and run with it. Comments on their blogs turn to chats via e mail....texts and the odd call. You become a part of their lives as they do yours, sharing highs, lows and all in between.

Sadly, one of my beautiful friends has had the ultimate roller coaster ride of late, so, I thought I'd send her something to let her know that I cherish her friendship and I think her strength is amazing with all that she was going through.

Small digression...

I got the idea for this bookmark from the amazing Dawn Griffiths here. I used the logic that one Bigz Die would be similar to another and I went from there.

Back to the story....

This person has a very strong faith, so I thought that the bookmark may be able to be used in her Bible, which I know is very special to her. This is the bookmark I made...

Since this was the very first one of these I had made (using the logic principle) I was so very happy with the way it turned out. The ribbon marks the page and the butterfly sits on the front cover of whatever book you are reading. The beautiful thing about this is that I could combine it with Elements of Style. Here is the detail close up...

I teamed this up with a card in the same set.

I felt the sentiment reflected perfectly what I wanted to convey to her at the time. For me this was co-ordination on a massive scale as everything was all in the same colours. Here is what she received all together......

Since making this initial bookmark, I have made MANY more. The girls at work have really taken to them and they are going like hot cakes. I will show you the other colour combinations later on.

Stuff used:
CS: (SU) Very Vanilla, Rich Razzleberry
Ink: (SU) Rich Razzleberry
Stamps: (SU) Elements of Style, Warm Words
Other bits: (SU) Square Lattice Embossing Folder, Sizzix Bigz Butterfly Die, Very Vanilla Grosgrain Ribbon, Ivory half pearls from stash

Lynda xx



Fly Free.....

I recently took part in a blog hop featuring a new release from a US company The Craft's Meow. I was blown away by these sets and felt an instant connection to a couple of the. The first set I played with was Fly Free which is featured in this post. I guess this was the start of my newly acquired butterfly fetish....LOL!!!

I wanted my first cards to look like they looked like they had come from an old glory chest or similar...you know that old vintage tea stained look. Here's what I came up with....

Black Soot

Early Espresso

I dragged out the Tim Holtz Distress Inks and teamed it up with SU's Early Espresso and some DP. I also busted out a new KaiserCraft Clear Stamp called Sheet Music. I used this on the background. The sentiments are from Fly Free.

I changed it up a little and offset a shape the same as the one stamped to give a shadowed effect.....I really liked the look. The background was stamped off in the Espresso and Black Soot to add interest.

Don't you just love the feeling the butterflies leaving the cage gives.... or perhaps I am over thinking it too much??

I have more butterflies to show....but I think you have had enough for one post. Hope to see you soon.

Stuff used:

CS: (SU) Very Vanilla, Early Espresso.

DP: Legacy Collage # 0554 - Diamonds

Ink: (SU) Early Espresso, Tim Holtz Distress inks in: Tea Dye, Antique Linen, Black Soot

Stamps: TCM - Fly Free, KaiserCraft Clear Acrylic Stamp - Sheet Music

Punches: (SU) Scallop Oval Punch, Curly Label Punch

Lynda xx



Growing too fast......

Morning all....I hope you are all enjoying the start of this long weekend here is Australia.

Now I did mention that life has been very much ffwd of late. One thing that happened is that my little girl turned 7!!! She is the biggest girly-girl (and yes I guess Mummy is slowly adjusting to this phenomenon), so I wanted her birthday card to reflect this.

Like most girls her age....she LOVES PINK, fairies, dancing, make believe and any combination of the aforementioned. She loves my Fairy Chloe image from The Greeting Farm (TGF), so I went with that. This is her card....

Now (sadly) this is the first gate fold card I have ever attempted. The cards were a thank you gift from a nursing student we had at the beginning of the year. Somehow...she got the feeling I was into craft....wonder how huh???

Now IRL, this card really sparkles. After painting the skin and hair with aqua crayons and pencils, I KindyGlitzed the wings. I also managed to cut Fairy Chloe out with Nesties so that her wings stuck out beyond the circle. I also paper pierced the dress in some of the paper.

On the inside I continued the circle and sparkle theme with a "7". Needless to say hen she opened the card...the squeals were very high pitched and I am sure some dogs ran yelping from the area....hee hee hee.

So what do you do to top it all off....hmmmmm make 36 mini cup cakes for school on the day too. And yes...they were very PINK...and strawberry flavoured. To keep the boys happy, I left some spares plain!!! Now please bear in mind I am no Martha Stewart when it comes to cakes etc, but it is what Miss 7 wanted!! So easy to serve up, all they had to do was lift one off the board and pop in in their mouths!!

Thanks so much for enduring a long post. Hope to see you again soon.

Stuff Used:

CS: The Paper Mill Textured Gate Fold Cards, PaperCraft - "Sweet Party" paper (fm Big W)

Ink: Stazon & Water colour Crayons and Pencils

Stamps: The Greeting Farm - Fairy Chloe

Other Bits: Nestabilities Circles and Scallop Circles, Glitter #'s fm Hot Dollar, KindyGlitz - Crystalline

Lynda xx

A Card on the FLY!!!!

Before I went to Craft Camp, I actually made a (very vague) list of what I wanted to make/try whilst away. As mentioned recently, I attended a Cards for the Troops session organised by the "Owl Queen" Kerry Bunting. Now at that stage, because of my neck, I was on restricted crafting capabilities, but still helped create these beautiful cards seen here. One of my jobs was cranking through the Big Shot 50 (yes count them my friends) of the butterflies used in the 3rd card (the blue toned one). Now I had not seen or used the Butterfly Embosslit die at that stage, but by the end I was very familiar with it. At the end, I still very much enjoyed what it produced and put it on my mental wish list.

Well that came to fruition before craft camp (with a couple of other goodies). I had to make a card for a 10yo little girl....and in a HURRY. I thought it would be nice to make a card with 10 butterflies on it (cause you can't go wrong with butterflies...can you Andrea??? hee hee hee). I got out my scraps and cranked my Cuttlebug (which the die works with brilliantly) and came up with this......

Now for all the smarty-pants folk and purists out there....yes I know there are actually 11 butterflies on the card....but I have counted the double layed one as ONE!!!! I also used my (much neglected) So Swirly Wheel, which I took off the wheel and use now as a flat stamp. Should have done it YEARS ago!! I love the fact that the Embosslit die cuts and embosses at the same time....yes...and you can layer them up too!!! They have beautiful detail on them as well. for something different, I popped the wings of some of them up on dimensionals as well.



Now in all seriousness...the longest part of this card was sticking all the butterflies down!!!! The numbers were obtained from the local "Hot Dollar" shop...a big bag of glittery #'s in blue, red, dark and light pink for only $2...gotta love that!!!

Be warned...you will be seeing a LOT more butterflies in the posts to come......seems to be a lot of them around here of late.

Stuff used:

CS: (SU) Whisper White, scraps of Baja Breeze, Bashful Blue, Pretty in Pink, Pink Pirouette, Perfect Plum, Pale Plum (ret), Lavender Lace (ret) and Rose Red

Ink: (SU) Pretty in Pink

Stamps: (SU) So Swirly Wheel

Die: (SU) Beautiful Wings Embosslit Die

Other Bits: Dimensionals, Glitter numbers

Lynda xx

Shock and Awwwwwwwwwww.......

Hi there all!!

Firstly, my sincere apologies for having not posted often recently. In a nutshell....things have taken on a MASSIVE full forward thrust here....and sadly, blogging was very much low on the list of priorities. I hope to remedy that today. I have so much to show you all. I have had many birthdays, been to craft camp this weekend just gone and have remained creating in the interim.

I cannot go any further without saying a MASSIVE THANK YOU to all my followers, readers and "poppers by" for helping me reach over 5,200 blog hits. I am gobsmacked and so very shocked to say the least. I hope you will continue to enjoy the cards and projects I share with you.

Onto the "AWWWWWWW" of today's title.

Now as you all may know, I am an avid sporty and netballer. One of the gals on the team recently got engaged, so I volunteerds to make the card for the happy couple. I was inspired by this card I saw on SCS. I did however wish for a splash of colour as opposed to the monochrome palate use on the SCS card. This is what I came up with.....

I must admit...I had a heck of a lot of fun making this card. I stuck to 3 colours.....Riding Hood Red, Choc Chip and Old Olive.....and Whisper White of course!! I was struggling with a main colour that wld suit both a boy and a gal, because the boy is getting the card too of course, then I stumbled across the DP that I received as a gift from the (lifesaving) Kerry Bunting. I attended one of her Cards for the Troops sessions and received this DP as part of a thank you gift for participating.

I also love the little details on the owls, being the small beaks (which PS I am really glad I do not cut for all the owls I do....LOL!!) and her small hair bow. The leaves are from the XL Bird Punch and sentiment is from "So Happy For You" which was one of the SAB SU sets this year.

Thanks for popping by. I have a MOUNTAIN of projects to sort thru and post, so pop by again soon please....you know that you are more than welcome.

Stuff Used:
CS: (SU) Whisper White, Chocolate Chip, Riding Hood Red, Old Olive, Pumpkin Pie (beaks), Riding Hood Red DP
Ink: (SU) Riding Hood Red
Stamps: (SU) So Happy For You (SAB '11)
Punches: (SU) Owl Punch, Bird Punch
Other Bits: Dimensionals, White Gel Pen

Lynda xx