MerryMade Crafts etc ...

I am going to miss you all but have decided to take February off from blogging and crafting. Just have to get a couple of things straightened out. I shall return. Take care.

This tag pretty well says it all. I discovered this wonderful blog where the owner, Alison, lists Free Digital Stamps she finds. Also Alison owns S tretch and Bubbles blog which sells wonderful digital stamps.

Stacie (Crafty_Princess) from over at All Things Crafty has passed this beautiful award on to me. Thanks so much for thinking of me Stacie. I am really enjoying watching your blog grow and getting to know you. Make sure you pop over at see Stacie's latest Valentines cards as they are lovely. Now for the rules...I am to tell you 10 things that make me happy and pass onto 10 friends and they are to do the same. My 10 things that make me happy in no particular order: 1. Family 2. Papercrafting 3. Catching up with friends. 4. Having the internet which brings the world so much closer. 5. Sitting back and looking at my garden once I have weeded and trimmed. 6. Watching our dog run like a looney after having a bath. 7. Driving through rainforest. 8. Looking back the end of the day and seeing how much I did really achieve. 9. When a cake comes out of it's tin cleanly. 10.Having a win on a Scratchie. 10 friends I am passing this award to (in no particular order) are: 1. Cathy 2. An...

Just had to show you our first ever pineapple that we have grown. It is only small, the base is 12cm high but it smells so yummy. We have had to wait for this. I am sure it was about 3 years ago that we planted the top of a pineapple. Mind you it was in a very shady area so that would slow things down. Next I have to show you the very clever cards my friend sent us. Lucky lady has an artistic gene and can sketch these images. She sent us four individual card. That...... joined together like this to form a bon bon shape. Then you flip them over with the zig zag join down the centre..... and you get the greeting inside. How clever is she.

Morning everyone, I managed to squeeze in a card for my friends birthday yesterday. Squeezed it in my tripping around the world with the OWOH blog hop. So many creative people out there. I love all the jewellery and sewing crafts and of course papercrafts. To make this card I have used this weeks sketch over at PaperTake Weekly Challenge #33. It was great fun to do. I started with SU Mellow Moss, then a layer of Black Leather Craft card, topped with a layer of SU Barely Banana which I ran through the cuttlebug with my Swiss Dots folder. Across the centre is a strip of Black Leather Craft card topped with a strip of SU Design Paper. Then I added the flower. The maroon coloured flower is one that I used to have in a vase in the house but decided to update and I pulled that flower apart and added it to my craft stash. The other flowers I bought from Blue Edge Crafts . Finished with the greeting which is a rub-on that I have had for a while and a sqaure red bling.

Sorry no creations from me today as I didn't get time with us having friends over for a BBQ. Which I might add was a lovely day even if it did rain most of the time. This morning my routine is changing back to normal after 6 weeks school holidays for our daughter. She is back to school this morning and ready to start Grade 9. Not sure if she is too interested in the learning side of things. However, I do know that she is keen to catch up with friends, wondering when the school photo is (normally around week 2) and saving money for roses (for herself) on valentines day. :-) That is what school is about isn't it. lol So, since I have no creations I thought I would share this link with you about the One World One Heart Blog Hop. (OWOH) Lisa started this Blog Hop up in 2007 as way for new bloggers to get to know other bloggers. Also for existing bloggers to make more friends. I discovered this last year when I was new to blogging and discovered so many amazing blogs aroun...

Morning everyone, well it is Tuesday, 26th January which means Australia Day. A day to celebrate living in Australia. We are joining a lot of other Aussies today with a few friends over and having a barbie. Now if you are vegetarian please skip the next sentence. On the BBQ we will be having beef sausages, lamb, kangaroo and crocodile. Ok.....start reading again now. :-) Dessert is a yummy mango and passionfruit cheesecake. Now the weather could have been a little better, it is a steady shower all day I think. Oh well, we have plenty of undercover area and because it's raining it means our seasonal creek is flowing enough for the kids to go for a swim. Now I have been very spoilt by the lovely Stacie (Crafty_Princess) over at All Things Crafty . I just had to share this wonderful surprise that I received in the mail yesterday from her. Just remembered there was even more. There are some lovely papers hidden in her cute watermelon seed spitting bunny card. :-) Yes, her package j...

I have seen lots of wonderful creations today using this terrific free digi image from The Greeting Farm. They have it on offer for one day only for people to participate in their TGF CHA Relay . Please click on their name for further details. This fantastic image is 'Merman Ian". I have used a pre-scored embossed card from Blue Edge Crafts . A layer of SU Blue Bayou. Then I was such a lucky lady as I received a small parcel of goodies from the wonderful Stacie over at All Things Crafty . One piece from this gift was the background paper which is perfect for this card. Thanks so much Stacie. I coloured Merman Ian with my watercolour pencils and aqua pen. Added some glitter to his beautiful tail. I pleated some mulberry paper for the side. Finished the card with some wonderful starfish shaped shapes I received in the Craftmad die shape and embossing swap last year.

Over the weekend my daughter was feeling a little bored...no friends to visit and raining. So I made up a batch of Cold Porcelain and here are our creations. This is only the second time we have used cold porcelain or rather first for me. As my daughter and her friend got in and used up the first batch last month. I made the little red creatures and the multi coloured buttons. My daughter is way more clever and created the cutest rabbit, alien with lots of eyes and a lollypop that will be added to a key chain. Great instructions and photos here at Craftstylish This is the recipe we use: 3/4 cup white glue (PVA) 1/2 cup water 1 teaspoon cold cream (I use Black and Gold Sorbelene Cream) 1 teaspoon glycerin 1 cup cornflour, plus additional for dusting your hands 1/2 teaspoon citric acid (apparently prevents mould) Before placing on heat combine all the ingredients in the saucepan I then cook this on the stove at a moderate heat. Stirring continuously until all the mixture combines ...

Morning everyone, it's just a tad wet here again today. We have Cyclone Olga (cat 2) off the coast heading towards Cooktown which is approx. 285 km north of us. It is meant to cross the coast at 4pm this arvo but hopefully as it get closer to the coast it peters out like most cyclones do. We are fine as we will just get rain. So yes we are wet. :-) On to my card now, I have created this as one of my swap cards in the January Swap over at Craftmad . We had to create two cards using the latest C raftmad Journal - Hot and Festive as our inspiration. For this card I have used Kaye's wonderful little origami holder that she gave directions for to use as a Lolly holder. I downsized it and added it to my card as a pot for my retro punched flowers. I have cut the petals in four places and curled them slightly....saw this on someones blog in my travels but can't remember where. Attach the flowers with a yellow bead on the end of some green wire. Which I twisted to form a...

Finally have found time to try out these two new challenges that Denise has set over at Stamping Vacation . I have decided to combine the two. Firstly, Denise has come up with this wonderful way to construct your very own sketch. Something I will be using in the future. The Monthly Build-a-Sketch challenge. Denise has given us a list of five shapes to cut out in various colours and these are what we used to create our sketch. As I read it.....each month Denise will add more shapes to our collection and suggest what shapes we used for that challenge. So above is the sketch I have come up with for this month. Below is the card I created using my very own sketch. Thanks so much Denise for the fun. Now the second challenge that Denise has started up is called Card Maze . Another fun challenge that had me digging through all my crafting supplies. Denise lists items to slowly build your card. Now trying to find heart patterned paper that did not have red on it was the challe...

Our challenge for the sewing swap over at Craftmad for this month was 'patchwork'. (Here is the link to our Swap Album for January ) Now, I did think this would be easy to start with but could not find a project to get me started. So while googling I saw a couple of Crazy Patchwork Quilts and remembered I had always liked them and wanted to have a try. So now was the perfect opportunity. Next, what to sew. A bit more surfing and I came across this wonderful Needle Case Tutorial at Wink Designs . So off I went and raided my materials. Nice to find a use for my scraps. The materials are just too pretty to throw out. This is my end result. Front view Back View Inside

Flat card ready to put in the envelope. Pull the tag and Tadah! a card base emerges. Yes, another card I had been seeing all over blogland and just had to try. This card is for my friends birthday next week. I have used the tutorial from over at Splitcoast Stampers ....great tutorial as per normal. I use SU Blush Blossom for the base of this card which I stamped with a dotty stamp from the Stamping Up stamp set Fun Filled. I used Versa Mark and Blush Blossom inkspot. I have added a beautiful 'Best Wishes' sticker from the Sticker Store . To create the tag I have used yet another image that was sent to me in an image swap over at Craftmad . So again, sorry I do not no the name.... mental note...we should write names on back of images . Anyways, I coloured the image with my watercolour pencils and aqua pen. Then layered this onto SU Perfect Plum. I really liked how the lady in her tutorial had the layered circles around the eyelet at the top of the tag. So out came my ...

What terrific surprise I received this morning when reading my emails. I have been picked in one of the T op 3 for this weeks Pick 3 Challenge over at Stamping Vacation. This was for my little gift bag . Thanks so much Denise a huge honour. I visited Splitcoast Stampers Tutorial section the other night to find something for my next project. Saw the tutorial here on this wonderful View Finder card and couldn't resist having a try. They are a little fiddly lining everything up but well worth the time. I throughly enjoyed creating this card and I am sure will do another one soon. I have created this card for my little sister's birthday this coming Saturday. Now the image I have used a little more sophisticated that my sis but the essence of the card is 'to spoil herself' . The base card is SU Summer Sun which I have rounded the right hand corners on. Then a layer of SU Pacific Point topped with a layer of Stampin Up design paper that I don't know the name of ...

Yes, this is me yesterday flying around the home straight bend. lol. Well I thought I was flying until I hopped out of the car and was informed that I was 1 sec slower than the 7-8yo boy that had been racing previously. It was such a fun day and I hope we do again real soon. We were up at Mareeba Mako Trac . Here is a card I created for my friends hubby whose birthday is a little later this month. I wanted to use the Papertake Weekly sketch as I was seeing some lovely cards created with it. Also I wanted a card for my weekly Inspiration Challenge over at Craftmad . This weeks theme is Blue and Green. Just remembering that old saying of 'Blue and Green should never be seen except with a colour in between'. I have used paper and card that I won last year, sorry I can't remember the name of the pack. I have used this wonderful free image from Talk to the Ham blog. This cat is so much fun to colour. I used my watercolour pencils and aqua pen. Finished the card with a...

Suddenly woke this morning and thought I have no birthday card for the teenage boy that we are meant to be catching up with today. So with coffee in hand I was straight into my card- making gear trying to find anything male. Something I don't have much of. I am quite happy with my results though. Thanks to the Papertake Weekly Sketch I had somewhere to start. I also received this wonderful image in a Craftmad Image Swap last year. Not sure where it is from but am thinking it is a Kassazz stamp. I have used SU Basic Grey for the base card. Layered all the SU Design Paper onto SU Baja Breeze. Sorry don't know the name of the design paper. I coloured the teenage boy with my watercolour pencils and aqua pen. Added a silver birthday sticker ( Sticker Store ) and found these wonderful sticker squares in my collection to finish the card up. I am tossing up whether to use my one an only copic pen on the boys skin or not. At the moment it is in my daughters room and she ...

Outside of Card Holder Front Cover Back Cover Inside Now this was such a simple project for me in my head. lol. I thought I would just take a sheet of this SU Groovy Guava as it is not a colour I use a lot on my cards and place some circles from scrap paper on the front. Yeah!!! Easier said than done. I started this project last night and finally finished this morning. I am happy with it now. I needed the card holder to send off some cards to a friend. So I used an A4 sheet of SU Groovy Guava folded up approx 5cm along the long edge. Then folded in half to create the folder. I then cut a 'v' shape from the centre of the folded up flap and a small triangle from each end of the flap...this makes it sit nicer. Next I cut lots of circles with my Nestabilities both Scalloped Edged and Plain Circles. I have used white card which I embossed through my 'Swiss Dots' folder in the cuttlebug. Also used papers from the "Once Upon a Time" paper pack I have. I m...

This is what Brenda had to say about this Challenge "On the 1st February there will be a very special ‘One Off Challenge’………with some rather special candy as the main prize. No ordinary candy I can tell you, but a really serious piece of equipment that all of us would love to have in our craft rooms." Are you intrigued ...... I am. So be sure to visit Brenda at Floral Fantasies

I saw this project/challenge over at Project Tuesday and of course had to have a go. I am really enjoying creating shapes out of card and paper lately. I have followed the instructions that they offered. Must admit I mustn't have quite embossed the lines in the right place as I had to do a little jiggling to get it to sit squarely. I used some of the lovely paper that I received from Thearica at the end of last year. It's from a Once Upon a Time paper pack. I added the gold ribbon bow to the top. Then dug out my 2" Just Rite Stampers and stamped the greeting and the border. To create the medallion I have used my nesties...circles and scalloped edge circles. Card is SU Close to Cocoa, SU Ruby Red and SU Cameo Coral. I have added a punched out butterfly which I have decorated with left over pieces from my gold word stickers....same as the edge of the scalloped circle. I have entered this gift bag into the Kaboodle Doodle Challange #22 - Anything but a card. (Than...

Our baby girl turns 14 today.....amazing!!!!! Melissa gave me a challenge to make her a Japanese card as she enjoys this subject so much at school. So here is what I came up with. This took me about four days to create as it is very hard to find time that Melissa is coming in and checking what I am doing but I did it. :-) I started with some lovely red leather craft card from Blue Edge Crafts for the base card. Then a layer of black ribbed card. The paper I have had for a long time and so glad to finally find a use for it. The image is a digital image from Softpencil which I coloured with my water colour pencils and aqua brush and gold metallic pen. For the wording I used an online translator. The top line says "Happy Birthday" and second line "Melissa" (rather 'Merisa" as they don't have 'l's) The origami butterfly took me two days to create and many tutorials but I found a great one last night at http://www.origami-fun.com/ I also c...

I told you I enjoyed that Easel card yesterday and couldn't resist to do another one. I have created this card for the December/January swap over at Craftmad. We had to used the latest Craftmad Journal (Hot and Festive see my sidebar) as inspiration. So I have created a using Kaye's techniques on page 15. This is also my first entry into the Stamping Vacation -Pick Three Challenge. I have picked -1. image of theme, 2. sentiment that uses the theme, 3. cardstock colour that compliments the theme. My base card is SU River Rock then a layer of SU Purely Pomegranate. I found and old card front that my Mum had saved years ago added to her collection of wonderful scrap pictures and passed to me when the kids were young. So this picture is at least 15yo .... how is that for vintage recycled. Anyways, I cut the image up into random shapes and then adhered it to a sheet of silver jak paper (jak paper is adhesive on one side). I then peeled off the backing sheet and adhered...

I have been eyeing these cards off on everyones blogs over Christmas and the New Year. They have looked rather involved so thought I had better wait until I had enough time to do one. Well this morning was the time and I was surprised at how much easier they are to do than what I thought. I have two other reasons for creating this card. One I needed a card for a new friend and secondly I needed to create a card using Orange for my the Inspiration Challenge that I set weekly over at Craftmad. Thought since I set them I should actually create something. So I started with SU Groovy Guava (such a great name) then a rectangle of SU River Rock which I ran through the cuttlebug using the Victoria embossing folder. I backed the gold embossed rose image with SU Always Artichoke. Sorry I don't know the name of the Rose image as the lovely Ruth from Stamping 4 fun with Ruth gave it to me as a birthday present a couple of years ago. Finished the front of the card with a gold "Fo...

Last night as I went to get the clothes off the line I was wondering why our dog stopped and looked up the tree. Had a closer look and spied these cheeky Lorikeets all hanging upside down and feeding on the palm flowers. So thought this could be my bit of warmth that I could send to Eileen over at Ikki's Cuttlebug Cupboard and anyone else who needs a little warmth at the moment. Yep, they were keeping a watchful eye on us too. I haven't got a complete card to share with you today. Instead a photo of two projects I am working on for our December/January Sewing and Card Swaps over at Craftmad . Even managed to blur the photo to make it more mysterious .... lol. Have a great day.

Happy Birthday Mike...here is a sneak preview of one of your cards. Yep, this card is late for my brothers birthday today. It is still sitting on my bench....how slack is that. Worse thing is he lives in the US so will still be a while before this snail makes it to his mailbox. To create the card I used the January Sketch Challeng e from over at Craftmad. I used a pre-scored blue card for the base card. A layer of brown textured paper. Next SU More Mustard and a piece of lovely striped paper I picked up somewhere in my tracks. I created the body of the snail with my circle nestabilities...inking all the edges. I hand cut the tail and the head and added a wobbly eye and wire antenna. The greeting I printed on the computer.

This card is for my niece Amber's 6th birthday this Friday. Time certainly does fly. I have used a pre-scored cream card for the base card. Then a layer of wonderful checkered paper from a magazine. Next a square layer of red which has been embossed. Discovered the Happy Birthday sticker in my collection which has also come from a magazine at some stage. This wonderful image I received from Josianne over at Card Making Galore last year. I have coloured it with water colour pencils and my aqua pen. Finished the card by using my Just Rite Stampers , small circle nestabilities and a no. 6 sticker.

Crafty Princess from over at All Things Crafty is offering a surprise candy (ends 11th January) to celebrate the New Year and all the other wonderful things in her life. Be sure to pop on over and check out her creations and become a follower but only if you sure you are going to continue following. Definitely worth your while as she is such a lovely person.

I created this box to match the card I gave to my friend Anita which I posted here. I have hidden a gift card inside....thought this added a little bit of a surprise. Below I have taken photos of how I made the flower topper. Fun and easy. This will probably be the end of my tutorials for a while.....can't get into a habit. :-) The box I used SU Pacific Point which I stamped with a flower and greeting from the SU Good Friend set. The papers I am sure are from the SU Good morning Sunshine Design Papers. I have added glitter to petals of each flower but that has shown in the photo. Also coloured Good Friend with yellow sakura pen which of course turned green. I cut five strips 8cm x 1.5cm. To create each petal place a little double sided tape on to the back of the top of the strip. Now pull the the top end down to meet the bottom end, overlap a little and adhere. One petal completed....four more to go. To create the flower - on the first petal at the base I place approx 1c...