A bit of Christmas

Merry Christmas everyone, I hope it was a good one for you, spent the way that you had hoped.   

This year we did it a bit different.  Our daughter stayed in Brisbane and spent the day with friends as work at this time of year for a Uni student is too good to pass up.  We travelled by car four hours south to Townsville to spend the day with our son who had to work Christmas Eve and Boxing Day (we travelled those days) and his girlfriend was spending the day with her Mum in England. We took along our dog and my Mum for the journey.  Our dog enjoy the security of someone touching him throughout the trip, not the best traveller.

Santa found us. :-) I quickly sewed up a stocking for my Mum - second from left - and with fabric paint added here name,  Mum, Nan and Great Nan to the front…..she like that.  Mine is the white stocking and that has seen at the least 40 Christmas's and still going strong.

Presents were unwrapped and through the wonders of technology our sons girlfriend was part of the whole event.  So much so that she asked that her presents be unwrapped….that is her stash beside our dog.

We had a feast of ham, turkey and salads followed by this yum pavlova.  First time for us but I plan on it being a tradition for the family….and next year plan on making my own pavlova base instead of the shop bought one.

I received some crafting goodies from my Secret Santa.  This has become something we do each year with the members of Craftmad who I swap cards with each month. Can't wait to use all these items.

We made it home and our dog is so much more relaxed at home.  He did not really settle the whole time we were away, so now catching up on some zzzz's.

October, I took over my daughters bedroom and converted it into my craft room.  It has been a slow process but I think I finally have everything in the right spot.  This is all my fabric that I have collected and pulled it out to sort through.  My plan for 2018 is to sew it all up into different items to be used for various charities.  I found a wonderful Facebook group - Sewing for Charities Australia.  It fit the bill perfectly.  A wonderful lady in Brisbane organises an item for a particular charity to be sewn each month collects them and sends them out.  I've jumped right in and have been sewing kangaroo and koala joey pouches which I will send off next week.  It is so nice to have the flannelette and fleecy fabric offcuts put to good use.


Well that is me, for 2017.  It has been a good one and can't wait until the new one rolls in.  Wishing you all a fantastic New Years Eve and wonderful adventures in 2018.

My plans for 2018….. more crafting, sewing all that fabric up and posting on my blog more often….possibly just checking out what photos I have taken each week and sharing at least one. 

The Christmas Cards keeping coming :-)

I had a day at home to create a couple more Christmas cards to put in the mail yesterday.  Now I only have a handful of cards left to make for family here.  If I have forgotten anyone they will be getting a New Years Card.  I was given this wonderful laser cut frame from Blue Edge Crafts.  I traced around the edge and cut a gold piece of paper to go behind it.  Then I diecut a piece of green glitter card to place behind the holly leaves and added red sequins for the berries.  Finished with stickers from the Sticker Store. I really like the way the holly turned out on this card.

I started with the sticker for this card from Sticker Store.  Layered it on to some acetate and cut around the oval.  Decided to have a purple card with a black layer then used another of Blue Edge Crafts laser cut backgrounds.  I attached some black glitter card stock to the rear of the laser cut snowflakes.  Then finished the card with sticker stars. 

I really like this card.  The stockings are laser cut outs from Blue Edge Crafts which I trimmed with pearls and bling.  Then I used my Merry die cut for the first time ever and teamed it with a Christmas die from another set.

These clear glitter bauble stickers (Sticker Store) are so pretty.  I will have to play with them on some more cards.  I'm not entirely happy with the card so will have to keep trying. :-)

Happy Wednesday everyone.  I'm off to pull out some weeds from my Mums yard then we are heading to the Cairns Art Gallery to check out an exhibition which one of the art teachers from the local high school has some of his works displayed.

Christmas in July - Craftmad Christmas All Year Round Sketches

I just saw this post as a draft.  So much for my plan to complete these sketches each month and then even to post this in July. lol.  Oh well, I'm guessing December is an even better time to post these cards. :-)

Craftmad Christmas All Year Round Sketches - Pinterest Board here of everyone's take on these sketches.  I have been doing these each month but decided I would make a Christmas in July post with all that I have completed.  It's just strange posting Christmas cards early in the year. :-)

I have used all Stampin Up papers on mine, a mixture of years I think.  The reindeer Christmas sticker I received from a friend.  I coloured him with my copic pens and the stars and bells with my Wink of Stell - Gold pen.  Finished with some bling on his antlers.

Christmas Cards

 Morning everyone, I got busy yesterday and made a couple more Christmas cards.  My plan this year is to use a lot of my stash so that next year I can have lots of new papers. :-)  I bought some Christmas pre-cut 3D Paper Tole from Blue Edge Crafts as toppers for my cards which gave me a starting point when making the cards.

Guess I have to work on the lighting for photos in my new craft room.  :-)
I love these cute puppy paper tole images.  I have teamed it with a a glitter  die cut Best Wishes that I have had in my stash for a few years but has always been too big for any card I have made.

Isn't he the cutest.  Puppy and holly, you can't go wrong.  I have used the December Sketch from Craftmad to create this card.

Found some great Stampin Up papers for this one.  Love double sided paper as you can trust that the reverse will look wonderful with the front pattern.

More Stampin Up papers but these are last, I can buy new next year.  Sticker sentiment from Sticker Store.

These christmas bird stickers from Sticker Store are so pretty. I had fun - I think the term is collaging - small piece of paper to the back of the sticker.  Green for the holly leaves, the wonderful taupe snowflake paper for the bird.  I coloured the berries with my Pink Wink of Stella Pen. Teamed the sticker with Blue Edges Laser cut background.

Similar card, bird facing opposite way.

I love all the gold on this card, this is the very last of the beautiful holly papers.

Well today is a day for me to start and finish my christmas present shopping.  Fingers crossed.  Have a good one everyone.

Zentagle Christmas and Unstampabelles Challenge

Hi everyone, I am on holidays as of this week and have found some time to make some cards and loving it.  Before I forget, I would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas.  I'm saying this as I have no idea when I will be back on in blogland, I'm just going with the flow.

I received an email this morning that was sent in error to me but it led me to a card challenge blog - Unstampabelles that I originated many years ago and handed the reins over to a lovely lady Susan.  So glad I did as the challenges are going strong.  I loved the idea for their December challenge 'Entangling all the way' and the two entries inspired me to have a try myself.  This is the result.  I used my holly die cut on white board then grabbed my fine tipped black pen and starting doodling……so relaxing.  I have attached the holly to  a layer of black glitter card and white card.  The sentiment is a 'Merry Christmas' sticker from the Sticker Store.

November so far in photos

Hi everyone, I am still around and very well.  My life is very full and seems blogging has been pushed to a side for just a little bit. I think of you all on the blogs that I love to visit, I steel a quick peek time to time.  After being on a computer all day at work I do find it hard to be on one again at the end of the day other than for my word games.  Four weeks and I'm on holidays so will be catching up then.  Meanwhile, I wanted to share the past couple weeks of my November.

Click on the photos for a larger version.

A view on my walk early Saturday morning.  Walsh's Pyramid.

My hammock buddy where we have spent a couple of cooler afternoons lately.

A view from the hammock that I love.

A card I made for the Craftmad November Card swap (then another ten because I loved the design and ease) Theme of the swap Ribbon, Twine or String.  A great way to use up my left over and smaller pieces of ribbon.  Machine stitching around the edge and to create the tree and layered on wonderful green glitter card.

I really enjoyed making this card and used all three Ribbon and Twine across the centre of the card and made these wonderful string flowers with this tutorial. http://reasonableribbon.blogspot.com.au/2013/06/twine-flower-tutorial-and-fathers-day.html Backed the flowers with die cut fabric.  Papers and card are old from Stampin Up. I coloured a white Happy Birthday brown with my Copic pens as it just needed a little something more on the card.

Following are a couple of my flowers out at the moment in the garden.  They make me smile when I walk out each morning on the way to work.  

The Olive Back Sunbirds love this Ixora and such fun watching them hover  around collecting the nectar.

A few of my friends and myself attended a trivia night recently  it was a travel theme and we went with France.  I made these card eiffel towers for our table, we all wore black striped shirts black bottoms, berets and a red neckerchief.  Another lady made placemats using the french flag, I also made little moustaches on sticks for us to hold up to our faces, other people brought a cheese platter and french stick (bread roll) and wine bottles with french logos.  We didn't place not even last.  :-)  But we won best dressed table.  So much fun.

This tea for myself when my husband went out one night, this was followed by a night of crafting on the Christmas cards above.  Such fun. :-)  I have started following the Keto recipes mainly because I try and stay clear of sugar in any form and  I find these recipes suit me, are easy to put together and are so yum.  Oh and I lost the 3kg that had crept on. Happy with my body again.

The Olive Backed Sunbirds are back nesting again.  They have built their nest on a power cord hanging down from a light we have in the carport.  They had built a nest on our verandah in July and we got to watch two little sunbirds emerge.

I have to share even though this happened back in September but it is the reason why I have been back into crafting.  I finally made the decision to move my craft area from this room above to my daughters room.  Yes, now I have a whole room to me. :-) Very spoilt.

I can leave my sewing machine up all the time and I have since realise  I can also leave my pins and scissors out also. No packing up at the end of crafting time.  Just close the door.

I have a new craft table which gives me a lot more area and the room is much brighter.  I love that I can keep out my rulers, pens, tape, glue and its just there for me to start where I finished off last time.

Well thanks for all visiting and as my life gets more and more organised I know I will be back blogging.
Happy crafting.

My morning, just beautiful

Craftmad May Card Swap - Handmade Flowers

This month over at Craftmad (Pinterest Album here) we are swapping two cards with Handmade Flowers.  I took my inspiration from the card I made on our NZ cruise.  I just love the way that vellum looked when used as a backer for a die cut and cut into flower shapes and layered up. I don't have the ornate dies that were used in the card that inspired be so I only layered one panel with vellum the others I added embossed white card stock.  The die I used was 

Nestabilities Majestic Elements Marvelous Squares Die.

My second card I saw some torn papers flowers and really like the effect.  So dragged out random scraps of paper and using water and paint brush drew circles on the papers then tore them out.  Layered them up and added a button to centre of each.  I found this perfect piece of flower patterned paper in my stash also.

Thanks for dropping on by.

Craftmad May Sketch Challenge

I'm having fun catching up on all the sketches over at Craftmad. I found this year tear bear image in my stash. I made these many years ago and a friend copied them and sold sheets of the innate in her craft shop. So it was from the colour of the bear that the papers were chosen.

Visit our Pinterest album to see what other people have come up with. 

A couple of links to cards I made with my Tear Bears years ago…… 7 years….wow…doesn't feel that long.

Tear Bear in a box with instructions….I had much more time 7 years ago. :-)

http://merrymadecardscrafts.blogspot.com.au/2010/09/homemade-with-hop-stamping-vacation.html

An Interesting Challenge - Tear Bear - and a challenge prize

http://merrymadecardscrafts.blogspot.com.au/2010/09/less-than-hour-left-of-homemade-with.html

Thanks for visiting. 

Mother's Day

At the beginning of the year one of our Craftmad members sent to everyone her unfinished cards. (Pinterest album here for Finish a Card challenge) This is one I received, so made it up into a card for my mother in law.

The end result.  I found the lovely daisy patterned paper for the background.  Again put vellum behind the die cut and then layered that on purple card stock which I hand cut to shape.  I punched out plain vellum flowers and then coloured wiht copic pens to match the papers.  I am really happy with the end result and it was fun working with something that some else started and getting a good result.  I was on such a high that I tried the next unfinished card I was given but it was a lost cause.  The more I added to it the worse it got so it's in the bin with no photos taken.  Not all cards can be rescued. :-)

I used this Craftmad February sketch for my Mum's Mother's Day card. I also thought  this a good opportunity to try a pop up diorama card, tutorial here. 

The inside of the pop up diorama card.  This card lays flat when closed, so great for mailing.