Curtain Call Colour Challenge Act 1

If you haven't been over to check out Stacey's Stamping Stage recently, head on over! She's recently had a blog makeover and it looks FABULOUS! Unfortunately, the makeover also heralded the end of her Jewellery Coloour Inspiration Challenges, but these have been replaced with the Curtain Call Colour Challenge.

What a great colour combo to start with! So crisp and fresh. I decided to team these colours with the latest Sweet Sunday Sketch.

Circles! I cringe a bit when I see circles (especially larger ones) in sketches because I only have 2 circle punches. I need a circle cutting system; hand cut ones with distressed edges just don't work for all projects!

This big flower is great for layering in different layers and the Boho Blossoms punch was fantastic for the smaller flowers - not so much fiddly cutting! Clear rhinstone brads finished off the flowers nicely, and some paper piercing completed the card.

Thanks again girls!

Stamps: One of a Kind

Card: Night of Navy, Not Quite Navy, Whisper White

Paper: Urban Garden

Ink: Night of Navy, Not Quite Navy

Other: Boho Blossoms punch, clear rhinestone brads, paper piercer

Another Masculine Birthday Offering

I hope you have been having a great week, mine seems to have flown. We were up in Darwin over the weekend, which always puts a different spin on the week following, but I was also home with a not-100% little person on Monday so had an ever shorter working week than usual. This weekend is a long one for us too; we have a wedding on Saturday and the circus is in town so we'll see if we get to that - Luana's not all that keen to go at the moment.

This week Makeesha's Inskpiration Challenge is an Inspiration one and my intial instinct was masculine and stripes. I do love the colours in this bedding set too - I reckon I could get Paul to agree to that for our room!!

True to my intial instincts, I decided to make a card for my cousin who celebrates his 22nd birthday next week. I've gone with the stripes, but have also drawn inspiration from the diamond shape in the doona cover, the layered pillows, the black pillow and the silver handles of the wardrobe, and of course the lovely colours - I used Basic Grey, Basic Black, So Saffron, Whisper White, Close to Cocoa and Tempting Turquoise.

The stripe across the card reflects quite closely the stripe across the bottom of the doona cover; I've used the small 'happy birthday' from Big Bold Birthday for the thin black stripe. I decided to slightly layer the diamonds over the stripe to emulate the pile of pillows on the bed, and I kept the black diamonds plain, just like the little black pillow in the middle of the pile. The present reflects the small turquoise pillow with white detail and the silver bow links in with the silver on the wardrobe.

A bit different to what I had originally thought, but I think my cousin will like it!

Stamps: Big Bold Birthday

Card: Basic Grey, So Saffron, Basic Black, Whisper White, Close to Cocoa, Tempting Turquoise

Paper: Basic Grey Patterns (Level 1 Hostess Set)

Ink: Basic Black, Tempting Turquoise

Other: 1 1/4" square punch, 1 3/8" square punch, silver cord (retired)

Be Prepared for Chistmas Workshop Projects

Sounds a little but like a workshop for Cubs or Scouts! As promised, here are the projects we made at my Christmas workshop last Friday. We had a great night with lots of laughs, gossip and creating.

We made three projects, and I'm thinking I maybe should have called the workshop Glitterati or something similar as I didn't realise I used Dazzling Diamonds in every project until I was getting together all the supplies. I ended up covered! But did look rather 'Dazzling' for the evening!!

Our first project was gift tags. I love the combo of blue and silver for Christmas, so used this as my starting point. The rectangle tags are 1 1/2" X 2 1/2". The star punches were used for the first two, punching Ballet Blue and Brushed Silver. The second two tags used the oval punches as the tag with the smaller 'joy' circle and three of the flower petals stamped a second time, cut out and attached with dimensionals. You can't see in in this (the-best-I-could-do) photo, but I've also added a bit of detail with a silver gel pen - dots on the 'joy' tag and the centre dots on the flower one. Last but not least, I stamped the tree from Season of Joy directly into the tag and Dazzled the star, and stamped off the swirl from Spotlight on Christmas before stamping directly onto the tag. The large star punch was used to punch out the star from the same set, which had also been Dazzled.

This second card was inspired by two swaps I received at Adelaide regionals last year from Kerrie Rootsey and Tamara Conroy - thank you ladies! I'm sorry but I don't have any blog links for them.
I inked the words square from Season of Joy in Almost Amethyst, removed the ink off one word (in this one 'joy') with a blender pen, then inked it with a Lovely Lilac marker. I inked and stamped 'joy' a second time, this time cutting out the 'o' and adding some sparkle before attaching it with a dimensional. So Swirly Jumbo wheel was inked in Almost Amethyst and wheeled on one half of the base card, with the spots being highlighted by a white gel pen.

Last but not least we made this traditional card. Scroll down to my next post for the details.

I will be holding my next workshop for the Spring Mini Catalogue Launch on Saturday August 8th at 2pm. If you would like to join us for a fun afternoon, e-mail me.

Gift Tags

Stamps: Season of Joy, Spotlight in Christmas
Card: Ballet Blue, Whisper White, Brushed Silver
Ink: Ballet Blue
Other: Large star punch, small star punch, small oval punch, large oval punch, Dazzling Diamonds, silver gel pen (non-SU!)




Swirls of the Season Card
Stamps: Season of Joy, So Swirly Jumbo Wheel
Card: Almost Amethyst, Lovely Lilac, Whisper White
Ink: Almost Amethyst, Lovely Lilac
Other: white gel pen, Dazzling Diamonds

Joy Shared Flower Card:

Stamps: Spotlight on Christmas, Many Merry Messages

Card: Rose Red, Mellow Moss, Always Artichoke, Very Vanilla

Ink: Rose Red, Always Artichoke

Other: 5 petal flower punch, Dazzling Diamonds, paper piercer

Christmas Inspiration Already?!

Gee, we're almost at the end of July, and before we know it, it will be Christmas. It's a time of year that always seems to sneak up on me; must be because there seems to be a lot of conferences and professional development sessions around this time of year, so I'm not spending quite as much time in the office... We also don't have any public holidays in the NT after Picnic Day in August until Christmas.

In an effort (!) to be a bit organised this year, and to help other people like myself who have Christmas sneak up on them, I am holding a Christmas card workshop Friday night. The colours in Makeesha's latest Inkspiration colour combo were perfect inspiration for such an occasion!

I wanted to keep the card quite simple so that it would be easy enough to make 50 or so of them without too much stress if need be , but still pretty. Spotlight on Christmas is an awesome set where every stamp coordinates with a punch (even the swirl) - no cutting!! I haven't stretched the imagination too much, but layered the flowers and leaves punched with the 5 petal punch. I stamped the flower in Always Artichoke on Mellow Moss so it wasn't quite so heavy. The flower in the bottom right hand corner is popped up from the leaves, then popped up from the other two flowers with dimensionals. A little bit of Dazzling Diamonds and some paper piercing and that's about it!

I am working on the other two projects for the workshop tonight, so will post them after the workshop.

Have a great weekend!

Stamps: Spotlight on Christmas, Many Merry Messages
Card: Rose Red, Always Artichoke, Mellow Moss, Very Vanilla
Ink: Rose Red, Always Artichoke
Other: 5 petal flower punch, Dazzling Diamonds, paper piercer

Rock'n Roll Burgandy Butterfly

You've gotta give it to Dawn, she puts forward wonderful photos as inspiration for her Raspberry Suite Colour Challenges, and this week was no exception. The most gorgeous colour combinations occur in nature that I know I would never usually think to put together (like the last Pink and Red one!!).

This weeks colour combo coupled with Karen's latest Sweet Sunday Sketch Challenge provided some fabulous inspiration. BTW, I was the winner of the the SSSC #26!!! Thanks Karen!

I was so tempted not to stamp tonight, but instead curl up on the couch and watch Supersize vs Superskinny, but I really wanted to give these challenges a go... so I watched from the table instead of the couch.

Not a bad result! This colour combo and the sketch really are lovely - I'll be pulling them out again.

I stamped the big butterfly from Garden Whimsy in Pink Passion, then rock'n rolled it in Bravo Burgandy. I normally put Dazzling Diamonds on the wings, but thought I would give it a miss this time. The edges of the circles were distressed (great way to hide hand cutting!) and I inked up a small section of the Scribble Jumbo wheel with my Certainly Celery marker so I didn't get a 'straight' line of image across the circle. I also used this wheel on the Bravo Burgandy card base. A little bit of scalloping on the edge of the Pink Passion adds a bit of interest, as do the folds on the ribbon. I don't own a sewing machine, so glue dots make do!

Thanks again ladies - love your work!

Stamps: Garden Whimsy, A Little Birthday Cheer, Scribble Junbo Wheel

Card: Bravo Burgandy, Pink Passion, Certainly Celery, Very Vanilla

Ink: Bravo Burgandy, Pink Passion, Certainly Celery

Other: Scallop edge punch, Very Vanilla grosgrain ribbon

Colour Throwdown Commotion

The girls over at Color Throwdown have put together yet another great combo - it's been a while since I've been organised enough to play along.
I thinks it's always interesting what comes to mind when you first see colour combos. For this one, my thoughts were along the lines of using the a-little-challenging-to-use set Ocean Commotion. I must admit, I've pulled it out a little bit lately...

I am really happy with how this turned out. No fancy techniques, just a little bit of stamping off , a little bit of tearing (for the sand) and fussy cutting, but the colours just work so well.

Thanks for the inspiration!

Stamps: Ocean Commotion, Short & Sweet

Card: Garden Green, Lavendar Lace, So Saffron, Whisper White

Paper: So Saffron Patterns

Ink: Garden Green, So Saffron, Lavendar Lace

Other: Small oval punch

Live Life

This is my last post for today - honest. I'm about to head to bed...

It feels like a while since I've played along with Kristina's Colour Challenge, and boy, did working with 5 colours plus white test the ol' brain a bit!

I FINALLY inked up the Level 1 Hostess set Live Like You Mean It. I think it's a great set, but just haven't found the right project to use it until now. I quite like the lots of layers in this card. A little bit different to what I normally work with. Each of the flowers was stamped in So Saffron, had the outline stamped in Pumpkin Pie, were fussy cut, had a bit of Dazzling Diamonds added to the centre and were mounted with dimensionals.

I'll take a better photo tomorrow in daylight.
ETA: New photo uploaded as promised

Hope you're having a great weekend.


Stamps: Live Like You Mean It (Level 1 Hostess)
Card: Ballet Blue, Pumpkin Pie, So Saffron, Certainly Celery, Whisper White
Paper: So Saffron Patterns
Ink: Certainly Celery, So Saffronm Pumpkin Pie, Ballet Blue
Other: Rose Red double stitched ribbon, Dazzling Diamonds, 1 1/4" circle punch, 1 3/8" circle punch, paper piercer, Styled Silver Hodgepodge Hardware

Rubies, Plums and Lavendar (no amethysts)

Stacey's Jewellery Colour Inspiration this week featured purples once again - yay!! But alas, I don't have Rich Razzleberry so substituted Perfect Plum as another reddish-purple, like in the last challenge I posted today. I don't pull out Lavendar Lace a lot either, in fact, I'm yet to purchase the large ink pad...

Stacey chose yet another gorgeous piece to inspire us.



I thought and thought about what I could do with this colour combo and eventually came up with a one sheet wonder type solution. I actually only stamped a 1/4 of a sheet of card, and still have the left over bit waiting to be made into another card. I wanted to get this one up and posted though. I'm quite happy with how the sheet turned out. For accents, I inked the butterfly with Lavendar Lace (Stampin' Write markers are so versatile!) and rock 'n rolled it in Perfect Plum - lovely effect, and added it with dimensionals on the edge of a piece of Styled Silver Hodgepodge so it's wings 'flutter'. The strip of Ruby Red has also been pierced along the edges to link in with the dots in the Priceless stamps.

Thanks for another great combo Stacey!

Stamps: Priceless, Big Bold Birthday
Card: Lavendar Lace, Perfect Plum, Ruby Red, Whisper White
Ink: Lavendar Lace, Perfect Plum, Ruby Red
Other: paper piercer, Whisper White grosgrain ribbon, Styled Silver Hodgepodge Hardware, small oval punch

One for Birthday and One for a Best Friend

Luana's sleeping, Paul's been trying to figure out the Wii and is now watching footy, so that leaves me just to potter - don't you love lazy weekend days like this?! We have a long weekend here for this one; we had Show Day yesterday which was quite long (I'm glad it's only here once a year!) but a really good day. Luana's now at that age where she's really gets excited about things, but doesn't quite get the whole commercial aspect. I know that will come all too soon. Luana was lucky enough to have her face painted (twice! she rubbed the first one off):


This is the second one. The first was pink - of course! We also had the opportunity to go up in a helicopter for a quick ride. This was both Paul and Luana's first time in one and I'm not sure who was more excited! They even gave Luana little purple ear muffs to wear! We were lucky enough to see our house while we were up too:

It's in there! We live in a block of units.

Anyway, enough of our Show experience, onto a couple of the cards I have been making this week. I haven't had the time to play along with Karen's Sweet Sunday Sketch much lately, but made the time for this one - it's great! I thought it would be just the layout for a little girl's birthday coming up.

I've rotated the sketch, and moved the brads a bit...

The centre of the flower is from Time to Party - such a cool set! I used the retired 1/4" circle punch to punch out a 3 stamped and edged in Apricot Appeal and attached it with a bit of a dimensional to make it stand our a little bit more. The 1 3/8" circle punch fits the large circle just right! A little bit of Certainly Celery card punched with the scallop edge punch provided the grass (and linked in with the scallop circle flower!). The Almost Amethyst DSP is the retired Prints from last year. So Swirly was wheeled in the background, and the ice rhinestone brads finished the sketch - albeit down the bottom instead of the top.

As I adjusted the sketch a little bit, I thought I'd make another card that fit it better, this time using the latest Scrapmaster's Paradise Colour Combo.

What great colours, but we don't have Rich Razzleberry (am SO hoping it will be released to us in a Mini or something - I think it's GORGEOUS and will be really disappointed if we miss out!), so I substituted Perfect Plum as another reddish-purple.

Quite a straight forward card, but I think we often forget about the versatility of wheels. Scatter Sunshine was wheeled in Baja Breeze and mounted in Perfect Plum. The greeting comes from Garden Whimsy, and I stamped the spiky flower from Simply Said across the diagonal for a bit of a background. A little bit of Chocolate Chip taffeta ribbon and a couple of layered Baja Breeze felt flowers from Flower Fusion Too with pewter brads added the finishing touches.

Now, Luana's still sleeping, so I'm off to make some more cards!

Third Birthday Card

Stamps: Time to Party, So Swirly Jumbo Wheel

Card: Almost Amethyst, Certainly Celery, Whisper White

Paper: Apricot Appeal Patterns, Almost Amethyst Prints (retired)

Ink: Certainly Celery, Apricot Appeal, Almost Amethyst

Other: 1/4" circle punch (retired), 1 3/8" circle punch, scallop circle punch, scallop edge punch, Certainly Celery grosgrain ribbon, Ice Rhinestone brads

Best Friends Listen card

Stamps: Simply Said, Garden Whimsy, Scatter Sunshine Jumbo Wheel

Card: Kiwi Kiss, Perfect Plum, Whisper White

Ink: Baja Breeze, Perfect Plum

Other: Chocolate Chip taffeta ribbon, Flower Fusion Too, pewter brads

BRIGHT Fifth Avenue

I wasn't sure if I was going to post this card just yet as I made it for a very special person who celebrates a special birthday very soon.. oh well, lets just hope she's a bit busy for the next few weeks and doesn't have time to blog surf!

I found this funky card on SCS last week and thought 'yep, that adds just the special something I want for this persons card'. Teamed with Makeesha's latest sketch (again!) I'm really happy with how it turned out. I chose the BRIGHT Pink Flamingo DSP because this person leans towards brighter colour choices and it suited her to a 't'. Plus, I could use the fabulous Fifth Avenue Floral lily - again.

The card itself it quite self-explanatory, lots of panels of colour!!

I triple layered the lily again - see detailed photo below - after white embossing it. I also clear embossed the stamen before fussy cutting them and adding a little bit of chunky glitter on the very ends (you know the bits that get EVERYWHERE in real lilies!!). For the back circle, I layered a few circles of Tempting Turquoise that had been inked around the edge. I fussy cut a daisy from the DSP to attache onto the greeting and added some more sparkle with chunky glitter. When I set the card up, I realised the large flower on the back left hand panel was looking a bit... white, so used my blender pen with Summer Sun to colour in the center dots of it. Much better!!

Back view - I used my blender pen and Cameo Coral for the outside flowers, and my good ol' Real Red Stampin' Write marker for the inside one.

Back view closed.

Just a bit if detail for you!

Thanks Keesh for helping make this special card what it is!

Stamps: Fifth Avenue Floral, A Little Birthday Cheer

Card: Cameo Coral, Tempting Turquoise, Summer Sun, Real Red, Whisper White

Paper: Pink Flamingo
Ink: Versamark, Cameo Coral, Tempting Turquoise, Real Red, Summer Sun
Other: white embossing powder, clear embossing powder, 1 1/4" circle punch, word window punch, chunky glitter, Real Red 5/8" grosgrain ribbon

Just Because in Summer Sun

The card I put together last night for Kelly Jo's latest Colour Chef Challenge was in complete contrast to the other card I made - very simple and straight forward compared to embossing, fussy cutting and colouring...

The challenge this week was to use Black, White and Yellow. I used some Summer Sun DSP from the Pink Flamingo pack as that's what I already had out and thought it would work. Add a little bit of ribbon, a bit of bling and a sentiment and I was done! Gotta love the ones that come together without too much playing around!

I added a strip of black ribbon across the Basic Black card underneath the greeting and bow to add a bit of dimension.

I will post the other card I made last night soon too - watch this space!

Stamps: Best Yet (Level 1 Hostess Set)

Card: Basic Black, Whisper White

Paper: Pink Flamingo

Ink: Summer Sun

Other: Basic Black grosgrain ribbon, Large Oval punch, Clear Rhinestone brad

Two in One

Isn't is great when you can combine two challenges in one project, and it works out?! Plus, with this card I'm getting in my entry for Makeesha's sketch challenge well before cut off (lately I've been scraping it in by the skin of my teeth - thank goodness for time differences!), but Stacey's Jewellery Colour Inspiration entry will be true to form and cutting it a bit fine...

I was SO stoked to see Perfect Plum in Stacey's inspiration this week. It seems AGES since I've used it - Perfect Plum was the very first ink pad I bought!! I never would have thought to pair it with Really Rust and More Mustard, but I think they look great together. And when I saw Makeesha's latest sketch, I just knew I had to use the two challenges together.

This sketch is fabulous! I have a few more ideas floating around, so I may get another card or two made with it this week.

I made a few wedding cards for a friend last week, and have a couple I need to make for myself for weddings in the next few weeks, so Always is living upstairs for the moment. I just stamped the heart three times in Perfect Plum - one for the base, one I used pastels with sponge daubers to colour the middle part with More Mustard and Really Rust, and the third I cut out the little flowers (that are still vanilla in the middle). I attached the coloured heart tothe base with dimensionals, and the whole heart was eventually popped up with dimensionals too. The More Mustard flower with the half pearl added just a little something extra. Keesh's sketch had quite a few rows, so I tried to have each one different, but the top one didn't look right without the Always in Bloom like the bottom panel. Both those panels had their edges swiped in Perfect Plum to soften them. I also sponged the edges of the base card with Perfect Plum. A few more pearls from the Pretties Kit were added to finish.

Close up of the coloured heart, daubed with More Mustard and Really Rust. I quite like the effect. I don't use pastels anywhere near as much as I do my other toys!

We have a lovely relaxing weekend planned, before the busy-ness that comes with show weekend. Hope you have a great one too!

Stamps: Always, Always in Bloom wheel

Card: Perfect Plum, Really Rust, More Mustard, Very Vanilla

Ink: Perfect Plum

Other: Stampin' Pastels, Pretties Kit, Scallop edge punch, Very Vanilla grosgrain ribbon

Water.... Inspiration

Once again, Makeesha's Inspiration Challenge this week is a doozy - where do you find them Keesh?! They definitely get the old grey matter working a bit! Isn't this painting gorgeous though? It takes me back to the days of Year 10 Art where I defaulted to watercolour paintings (only twice, but too much according to my teacher - I needed to expand my repertoire!)... Have no idea where those 'masterpieces' have ended up!

What I do love about Inspiration Challenges is the complete liberty you can take with them - it all depends on how you're inspired! With this one, I really wanted to scrap Luana's first babycino experience taking inspiration from the teapot (they're all hot beverages), but do you think I could find the photos? That one will have to wait. Instead, I drew on the water aspect and the colours and scrapped a photo of 3 generations on a Sunset Cruise on Darwin Harbour:

I mounted the photo with a very thin border of Regal Rose, then the thicker border of Pretty in Pink. It really works with the pinks in the sunset (it was just stunning that evening; if you come up to the Top End definitely go on a harbour cruise, even if it's a bit cloudy). To link in with the Inspiration, I've used Pumpkin Pie as well. A little bit of faux stitching on the Regal Rose spot DSP from Sweet Always and some extra flowers with clear rhinestone brads just added that little something. The layout was based on this weeks Mojo Monday sketch, just mirrored:
Someone (I think it was Nerine) once said that you should make a card whenever you do a scrapbook page. Well, I did that this time around too:

Using the sketch as is this time, but still with most of the same aspects as the scrapbook page. I've used watercolour paper for the panel and created the background with the Regal Rose watercolour crayon and an aquapainter. While it was still wet, I stamped the image from Upsy Daisy in Pumpkin Pie - am thinking I maybe should have stamped it off first though.... Not a bad little card though that came together quite quickly.

Have a great weekend!

Scrapbook Page:

Stamps: Scribble Alphabet (retired)

Card: Pumpkin Pie 12"x12", Regal Rose, Pretty in Pink, Chocolate Chip, Whisper White

Paper: Sweets Always, Bella Rose

Ink: Chocolate Chip, Pumpkin Pie, Regal Rose

Other: Blooms Die Cuts, Flower Fusion, Flower Fusion Too, Pretties Kit, Chocolate Chip Double Stitched grosgrain ribbon, 1 1/4" circle punch, 1 3/8" circle punch, white gel pen

Card:

Stamps: Best Yet (Level 1 Hostess), Upsy Daisy

Card: Pumpkin Pie, Regal Rose, Pretty in Pink, Watercolour

Paper: Sweet Always, Bella Rose

Ink: Regal Rose, Pumpkin Pie

Other: Regal Rose watercolour crayon, aqua painter, scallop edge punch, 1 1/4" circle punch, 1 3/8" circle punch, Chocolate Chip grosgrain ribbon

Red and Pink - It does work!

Looking at Dawn's latest Raspberry Suite Colour Challenge I wondered how to make Bright Pink and Bright Red work together - after all they clash, don't they?! This photo is just stunning though, and these colours work so well in nature, so it shouldn't be too hard to translate it to paper, right?

I took inspiration from the beautiful flowers in the photo, and the stone work and made another flower pot card (which I saw on SCS a few months ago) - this time in a 'cement' pot.

I tried to recreate a cement look by using the Sanded background stamp with Versamark on Going Grey. As most of the cement pots I've seen are square, I just trimmed a little bit off the edge rather than on an angle. I used Circle Circus for the flowers, punching out the biggest part of the flowers with the scallop circle punch, the middle part with the 1 1/4" circle punch and then cutting and layering the little centre bit, and the leaves are courtesy of the 5 petal flower punch.

The actual card part!

Such a beautiful photo Dawn - thanks for the inspiration!

Stamps: Circle Circus, Sanded

Card: Going Grey, Garden Green, Real Red, Whisper White

Ink: Pink Passion, Real Red, Versamark

Other: Basic Black Grosgrain Ribbon, Scallop Circle Punch, 1 1/4" CirclePunch, 5 Petal Flower Punch

Retired Offerings

The colour combo this week over at Colour Throwdown was using some gorgeous retired colours, gee I miss them!

This is such a lovely colour combo and matches in PERFECTLY with the retired Afternoon Tea DSP. I had made a birthday card previously for my friend Grace, but thinking about it, it wasn't really right for her - she LOVES DSP, but not so keen on the ribbons and frilly stuff, so I thought using Afternoon Tea DSP as the main feature would be perfect for her.

Quite straight forward - the hardest part was figuring our how to place the squares. The DSP squares are 1 1/8" and the Chocolate Chip backing squares are 1 1/4" (all cut with trimmer - I don't have the punch yet!).

Much better for you Grace!!

Stamps: One of a Kind
Card: Groovy Guava (retired), Chocolate Chip, Soft Sky (retired), Whisper White
Paper: Afternoon Tea (retired)
Ink: Groovy Guava (retired)
Other: 1 1/4" Circle Punch, 1 3/8" Circle Punch

Red Dragonfly Kisses

The Colour Chef Challenge this week was a tribute to American Independence Day - red, white and blue. These colours scream masculine card to me, so I thought I'd try really hard to not make a masculine card!

One of the things I love about being up here is the dragonflies - they herald the arrival of Dry Season, and some of the colours are amazing. There are a few around that are BRIGHT red, and on our trip to the Douglas Daly I was able to capture a not too bad photo of one with my little not-flash camera, but his wings are a bit hard to see.

I thought I'd use this little fella for inspiration for my red, white and blue card.

I've used Pacific Point and Real Red (Riding Hood Red just didn't cut it!) and added a bit of sparkle to the dragonfly wings with Dazzling Diamonds. For a bit of a fun touch, I added the ladybirds walking around the edge of the card!

To those of you in America - I hope you've had a fantastic 4th of July!

Stamps: Bugs & Kisses

Card: Pacific Point, Real Red, Whisper White

Paper: Good Morning Sunshine

Ink: Real Red

Other: Dazzling Diamonds, Oval Punch, paper piercer

Pink Pirouette Poppy

Firstly, I need to say thank you very much to Stacey for choosing this card that I submitted for last weeks Jewellery Colour Inspiration Challenge as the winner! It was such a buzz to get your e-mail. Thank you!!


Now this weeks challenge was a bit of a tough one for me. Remember how I feel about orange? Well, yellow isn't too far behind that, and just to add a bit more spice to the colour choice, Stacey picked Kiwi Kiss and Pink Pirouette as the coordinating colours from this picture:


I love Pink Pirouette and Kiwi Kiss together, and I'm quite happy to work with Yoyo Yellow with other bright colours, but together? After a bit of pondering and trying to get this colour combo to work with Heartfelt Thanks (without having markers) to no satisfaction, this is what eventuated:

Not too bad in the end! Silver was just perfect to link in with the bracelet too. I was working with this in landscape until I thought I'd finished and then placed it upright just to see what it would look like, and it looked better and I could find the right spot to add a sentiment then too! I think the flower in this ended up looking a bit like a poppy. I'll have to remember this for when I finally scrap some ANZAC Day and Rememberence Day photos. I stamped two of the large flowers from Eastern Blooms and layered them on top of each other. I've just lifted the petals of the top flower up a bit for a bit of dimension and added some Dazzling Diamonds for sparkle.

Luana moved up rooms at child care a few weeks ago (a bit quicker then expected, so I didn't have anything prepared for her main carer) so this will be heading into child care with her on Monday for Jess to say thank you for taking such good care of my precious girl.

Thanks too Stacey for really pushing me out of my comfort zone this week!!

Stamps: Eastern Blooms, Fresh Cuts, Short & Sweet
Card: Pink Pirouette, Kiwi Kiss, Yoyo Yellow, Very Vanilla
Paper: Urban Garden
Ink: Pink Pirouette, Kiwi Kiss, Yoyo Yellow
Other: Dazzling Diamonds, Styled Silver Hodgepodge Hardware, paper piercer