Hi there, well my new blog style didn't get me posting did it!! Things have been a bit hectic and we have been away for a lovely snow skiing holiday so I haven't done a great deal of crafting - which is just plain criminal considering all the lovely new Caty product that I have in my house! Hoping for some more crafting time and a return of my mojo soon...in the meantime here are some pics of old projects for you. This first lot are some CD folders and pens that I sent to my downlines and friends from Convention.

This next one is a layout I put together for a class using the Sunny Day simply scrappin kit. You may also notice the decorated jar we made and some little acetate pillow boxes there as well.

Do you like my ribbon rack in the background? Rick made it for me and it's awesome. One day I'll take some photos and give you a proper look.

Convention Swaps

Kind of old news now, but here are the cards I made as swaps for Convention 2010 back in May. The first 3 are the same basic layout I just varied the colours, feature and sentiment:

I only made 10 of these last ones - basically just to use up some die cuts!! I really didn't like them and nearly didn't take them at all but surprisingly they were quite popular:

I received some awesome cards in exchange for mine, so if I swapped with you, thanks so much!!
My highlight was swapping with two stampers I really admire - Kirsty Brown & Teneale Williams - their cards have pride of place in my scrap room!

Happy New Year!!

Wow how time flies - I can't believe its been so long between posts!! I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas & and wish you all the best for the New Year.

So much has happened since my last post I don't know where to start...there has been highs and lows, a few adventures and a lot of creating. Sadly I lost my best bud for the last 14 years "Bear". We all miss him heaps but he was very old for a Staffordshire and unfortunately they cant live forever.

On the creative front ...I made quite a few Chrissie pressies this year, I decorated this ribbon box for my Mum...

Breanna had 5 Preschool teachers last year so I made each of them a covered notebook:

We packaged the notebooks and a small bag of chocs shown below (cased from the mega talented Karen Thomas) into these gift bags. They were all a hit with the teachers.

Oh yeah and on the 1 December we got a great new Summer Mini Caty - its awesome - check out the online copy on the right or email me if you would like one posted to you. Just a couple of the highlights are the Butterfly punch and the Circle Scissors - both featured on the notebooks above.

I had planned for this to be a much longer post but blogger is driving me insane (wont let me move the photos around) so I'll be back with another post shortly.

More Tree Trimmings...

My absolute favorite set from the current Spring Mini Catalogue would have to be Tree Trimmings. Its a fantastic set for making quick & easy Christmas cards. Here's a couple of cards to demonstrate...As you can see I'm also a fan of the wide striped ribbon too...

If you'd like details on any of these cards please email me or leave a comment.
The Spring mini finishes at the end of this month so times running out to contact me if you'd like to place an order.

Just a super quick post ...we have Breanna's first dance concert today! and as if that wasn't enough we are also off to see Kate Miller Heidke in concert tonight!!! So off I go to get everyone ready! I'll be back soon with photos...

Handmade Christmas Gift Ideas

As promised here are a couple of pics of some of the Christmas items I've made lately...The first one is a Christmas Stocking made using Lauren Meaders template using Ski Slope DSP - very cute:

Next is a coffee jar decorated with Ski Slope DSP and filled with Christmas Choccies:

This Bag-a-lope features Holiday treasures DSP and the Soft Holly wheel:

This acetate box also features the Holiday treasures DSP:

Please email me if you'd like more info on any of these projects. I'll be back soon with the Christmas cards...Have a great weekend everyone!

Tree Trimmings

I couple of weeks back I did another workshop for the Crafty Sisters (waving!) These are the projects we made. The first is a cute little matchbox...

Wouldn't you just love to get something nice and shiny in that for Chrissy! I'm thinking diamond earrings but some of girls thought they'd be ideal for Pandora beads! We used the holiday treasures DSP, Old Olive and Ruby Red cardstock, and the sentiment is from the Best Yet Hostess SS. Thanks very much to the extremely talented Karen Thomas for the poinsettia idea - I've been using them heaps - they are so effective!

The next project was a card using the very popular Tree Trimmings SS. This one is in the Spring Mini caty - so if you don't have this set yet you've only got until the end of November to get it.

The Holiday treasures DSP was used for the background, the card base is Sahara Sand and there is also some brushed gold on there. The holy was done using the Soft Holly wheel in Old Olive then going over the berries with a Ruby Red marker. Seasons greetings is from the Snow Swirled SS and has been gold embossed.

I've done dozens of Christmas cards and gifts lately so I'll be making an effort to get on here more frequently to show you all. Hope you like my first Christmas offering for 09!

Forest Friends

How cute are the animals in the Forest Friends set!! I love them, and couldn't resist using them for the Spring Mini swap that my gorgeous friend Mel Hanlon organised. Here's my swap:

I love receiving swap cards in the mail, they were all gorgeous - I may take a photo and show you them all...later.

I haven't been doing much creating lately - my mojo has been on holidays...too much other "stuff" happening at the moment. But I do have some exciting news (for me anyway) I've bought a new car- brand spanking new (a Jeep of course for those that know me!) I pick it up in a couple of weeks - so I'll show you a photo of my new baby when I get him...he's big and black...

Live Like You Mean It

Sorry for being such a slack blogger!! I have been SOOO busy!! I have just done 3 workshops in the past 6 days (as well as my day job) which is HUGE for me - I usually do one or two a month!!! Anyway, at one of those workshops (Hi Crafty Sisters!) I demonstrated how to make the cool circle flowers that Cassie taught me (see previous post) on this cool scrap page...

...I REALLY love this photo. I took it when we at the Gold Coast earlier this year and I was just learning to use my SLR. I wasn't trying to do anything fancy here, it was just an absolute fluke that I captured this perfect silhouette image of Rick & Breanna, and how is that shadow for an awesome leading line...

The colours are Basic Black, Riding Hood red, Basic Gray and Whisper White, The DSP is Urban Oasis, and I've used a Build-a-brad for the centre. The Stamps are Bella's Border wheel and Live Like You Mean it (hostess set).

Here's another sample with the layered circle flowers...this time made with Baja Breeze DSP. The Stamp sets used are Fifth Avenue Floral and Wonderful favourites. Colours are Baja breeze, Basic Gray and Whisper White.

How Awesome is Cassie!!

We had a Happy Stampers team get together for the local demos yesterday, Vicki, Cassie & I had a great time. Cassie is a new team member and she is an awesome scrapbooker...she designed this layout and taught us how to make these cool layered flowers using circle punches and the Circle Circus stamp set - here's a close up:

This is Cassie's layout design which I have CASED entirely (only the photo is different! - it's the first time I have wanted to completely copy a layout and not change a thing!!):

Thanks so much Cassie!!! I Looove this layout!!!

If you love it too leave some comment love for Cassie -which may help inspire her to get her blog up and running!! - no pressure Cassie ;)

My task for the get together was to demo using heat and stick powder. This is the card we made - My first Christmas card for 2009:

Simple but elegant, whisper white and riding hood red, the stamp set is Snow Swirled. It's stamped with versamark then riding hood red, then added heat and stick powder to apply dazzling diamonds to the whole stamped image (I hope you can see that beautiful bling in this photo).

Embossed Creations

A few weeks back I held a technique class on Embossing. We had a great time, my lovely customers enjoyed learning the cracked glass technique:

I cased one of Shelli's convention demonstrations using Rustic Rooster for this card then made the feature panel cracked glass - here's a close up...


Here's another example of the technique, this time using Fresh Cuts:


We also did the Josephs Coat technique which always gives the WOW factor...here I used the Its Beautiful wheel

And another (stepped up) version...

We didn't do this one in the class, but I just had to case Pam's emerging colour technique card from convention...

Embossing is not something I do a great deal of - I think thats mostly because I usually create in a hurry and don't take the time to get the gear out! But when I do I always love the result and vow to make more of an effort...

Shaving Cream Technique

Here's two of the cards we made at my shaving cream technique class a couple of weeks ago.

This first one uses the shaving cream technique piece as a background...

For this one the bird and flower have been done using the faux shaving cream technique, a great effect without the mess...I really love this card and of the three cards we made at the class this was every ones fave!

After the class I had a piece of pink and blue shaving cream technique coloured card and I needed to make a card for my friend Tanya who had just had twins (a boy & a girl). So this is what I made...its a joy fold card, I stamped the teddy and giraffe images onto the shaving cream peices and then cut them out. I also used some of the blue for a background peice. It didn't come out as good as it was in my head, oh well you get that! Tanya liked it anyway...

A Catch Up...

Busy Busy Busy...that's how its been round here lately. I've had a great time though! I held a class on the weekend with some lovely ladies - we had a great time playing with shaving cream!!! I'm yet to photograph our creations - so that will have to wait till next time. For now here's a couple of cards from earlier this month and the make & takes from convention...

I just had to have a go at these flower pot cards - they're everywhere right now and perfect for Mothers Day...

This was the card I made (twice!) for our twin nieces Jessica & Jade who celebrated their 6th Birthday...

These are the Make & Take projects we made at Convention (or at home after convention!):

Here's the inside of the scrapbook card...The lovely ladies in the top two photos are some of my super talented team members "The Happy Stampers", with my Upline Sharon and my roomies Leah & Julie. In the bottom left photo are the blogging legends Karen & Jean with Mel & I - It was awesome to catch up with these inspirational ladies!

Please email me if youd like any details on any of the above projects.

Convention Swap Cards

Better late than never...here are the pics of my convention swaps...The first one was my attempt at a masculine card...I liked this but wasn't sure anyone else would - turned out it was definitely the most popular of my swaps!!!. The colours are Baja Breeze, Close to Cocoa, Not Quite Navy and Very Vanilla:

These were my 3D swaps - Dreams Clippie - these were pretty popular too:

This one was my personal favorite...I just looove the Inspired by Nature set. You cant tell in this photo but I did some faux clouds with a punched out scallop circle in the background. The bulrushes are made using the slot punch and the butterfly is rock n rolled...Colours are Elegant Eggplant, Lavender lace, Old Olive, Bashful Blue & Whisper White:

Last but not least my "tricky" swap - this was done using the brayer to reverse one of the birds from the Always SS. I like the classic black and white and its something a little bit different. It was quite involved to make though, so I only made 10:

So all up I went with 80 swaps and I came home with 70 something awesome swaps in exchange (I gave a few away!!). I have used some of them for display and inspiration already! So if I swapped with you thank you so much!!!

I wont leave it so long till my next post - I have a scrapbook page I really want to show you, so until I photograph it - Have fun, Kaz x