Project Life 2013 - Week 29

Hello Week 29...a week of white, gold and Tiffany blue which is one of my very favourite colour combinations :)

The colours for this week were inspired by the Summer Stories collection by Teresa Collins. I used some full 3x4 journal cards straight from the paper sheet, and others I created myself with elements that I hand cut. The title card is the back of one of my old PL kit cards which I embossed with my Cuttlebug machine :) I decorated it with two hexagons from the Summer Stories sticker sheet, and the gold hexagon which i hand cut and embossed to match. The title is cut from plain Bazzill cardstock, and the date created with gold alpha stickers by Dear Lizzie for American Crafts...yum!

 I loved the chevron embossing so much that I gave all of my 4x6 backing cards the same treatment.



I punched a few smaller elements, like tiny hearts and paper dolls, from gold card to tie it all together.

And that was Week 29. Thanks so much for popping in, and for your lovely comments recently...I so love to read them ;)

TTFN xxx

Vintage High Tea

Yesterday I had the pleasure of attending a Vintage High Tea in honour of my dear friend Janelle's 40th birthday...and what a beautiful afternoon we had!

The food was divine...all manner of scrumptious treats presented on gorgeous fine china. Scones with jam and cream, florentines, slices, and an assortment of hot pastries...so glad I didn't eat lunch beforehand!

 The company was so lovely too. Janelle had invited many special friends to share the afternoon, and it was such a treat to hear how she had met each and every one of us. She had us in fits of giggles as she entertained us with all manner of details, as only Janelle can ;)

Then there were the gifts...

 ...beuatiful pieces from all over the world, selected with love for this very special friend. I couldn't help but take lots of photos ..she will probably unfriend me for the one above, but I think it captures her perfectly ;)

The card I made for her was always going to be inspired by her love of sewing...

 ...it is, after all, how I met her in the first place :) So I pulled out all my sewing themed collections and stamps, and ended up with this...

Happy happy 40th birthday Janelleybelly...and thank you for inviting me to share your special afternoon!

TTFN xxx

Project 2013 - Weeks 27 and 28

Hello Project Life Week 27...and hello Midnight Core Kit by Becky Higgins.

At first glance, I wasn't that excited by Midnight. The colours are a bit understated compared to what I'm used to working with lately, and I really only bought it on a whim. However, now that I've had a play, it could just be my favourite of all time :)

 I'm a sucker for a white background, and the neutral tones lend themselves really well to adding a splash of colour here and there...love that!

Speaking of colour, for Week 28 I delved back into my Honey Core Kit for a healthy dose of it :)
                                      

We had school holidays here in Western Australia last week, so there were lots of pyjama days and leisurely walks along the beach, crafty catchups and movie dates with the kids. Sigh....I love school holidays ;)

I put my washi tape collection to use on this spread (as if it needed more colour!) and used some plain pinkish red  backgrounds to some of the 4x6 photos to add even more pop! The photo collages were created on my iPhone using an app called Diptic...so easy to use, and perfect for adding extra photos!

So that gets me back on track with Project Life for now....WOOOHOOOO! I'm really loving the extra inspiration and variety that my two new core kits have given me, and have found my enthusiasm for photo taking and documenting once again...which is a bit of a relief ;)

So...how are you going with your Project Life these days? And have you checked out the new release goodies coming out from CHA? Wow...so much to get excited about, especially the Simple Stories collections...love love love them ;)

                                                                   Have a great Sunday!

TTFN xxx

Playing with pretty fabric.

Hello...and happy Saturday to you!

It would seem that my issues with blogger have finally rectified themselves (thank goodness!) and I can get back to normal blogging. My family and work have been keeping me quite busy lately, but I have managed to squeeze in some fabric fun too...I get a bit grumpy when I don't craft for a few days :)

Quite a few weeks ago now, I signed up for my first ever craft class on Craftsy...Pre-Cut Piecing Made Simple with Camille Roskelley. If you've been hanging out here for a while, you'll have noticed I have a bit of an obsession with Bonnie and Camille fabrics, and I have collected quite a few precuts over the last little while ;) My thoughts in signing up for the class were that I might learn a trick or two, but mainly to gain inspiration to use up some of those precuts.

Anyhoo, the class is aimed at beginners and while I did pick up a few tips here and there, I found the pattern for the first quilt a little too basic for my precious Marmalade fabric...it IS one of my very favourites.

So instead of making Piece of Cake 3, I made a quilt based on the postage stamp quilt block, with a few variations  thrown in as well. The pattern is available free over at the Moda Bake Shop. Of course, once I realised how much Marmalade I would have left over, I decided to double the size of the quilt to a single bed size, and now it's a bit too big for me to quilt myself...so it's off to the quilter for that one! I'll show you some pics when it returns ;)

I've  received the first instalment of the Fat Quarter Shop's Mystery Block of the Month for 2013, and can I just say... the fabrics are delicious!

I jumped right in and made up Block One called Strawberry Picking, by Joanna Figueroa of Fig Tree Quilts....who is also the designer of the fabric, Avalon.

Now I'm waiting very patiently for the next instalment to arrive in my letterbox :)

With a couple of finishes under my belt, I probably should be looking at finishing off a few other WIPs (works in progress) but the call of new and pretty fabrics is probably going to be too strong.

I know my weaknesses ;)

TTFN xxx

Project Life 2013 - Week 26

So, it would seem that my blogger issues are not as temporary as I had hoped :( I'm not quite sure what is going on, but hopefully I can work on it over the weekend.

Week 26 was completed using mostly my Honey core kit, with a few little extras thrown in. I wasn't as thrilled with Honey as I thought I would be...the colours are not as saturated as I would have liked, but I'm finding my groove with it now that I've started playing a bit more :)

Thankfully, Week 26 included a class assembly for Merryn, otherwise I would have REALLY struggled with filling that second page ;)

I have lots of crafty bits and pieces to show you over the next few days...YAY to finding my mojo again!

Have a lovely Saturday

TTFN xxx

Project Life Week 25...in pictures :)

Blogger is not playing nice with me lately, so it seems that "adding captions" to my photos is the only way to add text...frustrating much?

For my Week 25 layout, I used my brand new Project Life Honey Kit, which I thought I could resist, but obviously could not ;) I added an insert to include my photos of our friend, Caitlin's 21st on the Saturday night.

Confession...I also bought the new Midnight Edition as well. Restraint is not my strong point ;) Sorry this post is so incredibly disjointed, but I'm not able to edit anything once it's typed. Is anyone else having blogger issues? Hopefully I can come back later and fix this post! In the meantime, just enjoy the photos...and marvel that I have actually managed to post some sort of blog entry! TTFN xxx



Special friends and washi tape

We had the pleasure of attending the 21st birthday celebrations of a very special friend on the weekend...a girl that we have watched grow from a caring, beautiful teenager into a gorgeous young woman with a kind heart and generous spirit. Her parents should be so proud of her!

Making a card for her was always going to be a challenge...her Mum is a cardmaker! So I took a deep breath, pulled out my Cuttlebug, and went with white-on-white simplicity.

The rosette was from a pack by Amy Tangerine, but I altered it with a punched circle and chipboard numbers to refelect the occasion. The pearls and ribbon finished it off just nicely, without adding too much fuss!

With that pressure off, I fell straight back into my washi-tape comfort zone :) A friend had texted me earlier in the day with a photo of a washi tape card that she had been inspired to make from my blog (how cool is that?), which of course inspired me all over again...don't you love the way that works!

 This time though, I stepped it up a bit (LOL) and matched my washi tape to some pretty ribbons that I'd been hoarding.

Playing with the colour combinations really makes me happy...the inks, the enamel dots, the rolls of tape.  These cards are so ridiculously quick to put together, and provide instant gratification to a time-starved and usually uninspired cardmaker like me ;)

Have you given washi tape cards a whirl yet? If you haven't, you really should....the combinations are endless, and it's a great excuse to stock up!

TTFN xxx

12 Months of Christmas...the next instalment ;)

Hello, and happy Sunday to you!

I've had a few emails recently about the 12 Months of Christmas project, and thought I had better let you know what's next!

The project for June (for Linda, Tracey and I) was to finish off our Fat Quarter Shop Mystery Block of the Month, as we knew if we didn't schedule it...well, it may just not get done :) Thankfully, I put the last stitches on the quilt top earlier in the week, and have dropped it to the quilters....phew!  For you (if you don't have a MBOM to finish off) it was a free choice month...what did you go for?

For those papercrafters amongst you, you will be relieved to know that the next couple of months are all about paper!

At Linda's request, we are starting our Christmas cards in July...how is THAT for being super organised? If you're a papercrafter, that will mean making your prototype and starting the production line...or perhaps making those special one-of-a-kind cards...or preparing your Christmas card list at least :)

August is all about tags and wrappings...perhaps tying in with your Christmas card design to get a theme happening? Or coming up with different tags for different people? The choice is entirely yours, but I can't wait to see what you create :)

September is a catch-up month, since all three of us have holidays planned in this month :) If I have spare time, I'll be working on my advent calendar that was supposed to be made in May (oops!)

October is the month to create a Christmas gift for someone special, possibly inspired by something gorgeous you've pinned on Pinterest and have always wanted to make... paper, fabric or something totally different  ;) My plan is to prepare a photo album for my in-laws...I've been doing this for them for years, but they don't always receive it at Christmas...ooops again! (this year it was more an Easter gift LOL).

November is all about Christmas preparation, to ease the pressure in that busy month of December. It is the month to prepare your advent calendars (this will probably take Tracey the entire month LOL...she's a BIG advent calendar fan!), start preparing the bones of your December Daily album if that's your thing...or Journal Your Christmas album if that's more your thing (more details on both these projects closer to the time), and dig out all the fantastic Christmas goodies you've created through the year and start decorating!

December? Well, that's the time to eat, drink and be merry ;)

So there's your plan of action...will that keep you busy for the next few months, do you think? I know it will me!

TTFN xxx

Project Life 2013 - Weeks 21, 22 and 23

Hello again :)

Wow. Time really did get away from me, didn't it? Three weeks worth of Project Life to show you, plus another one that will be finished in the next couple of days...and an album almost full too ;)

For week 21, I used some pieces out of Echo Park's Here and Now collection...mainly because I LOVE those cute little multi-coloured cameras above ;)

I've been keeping up with putting the pages together fairly well this year, but my photo taking is still not quite up to speed...I don't take nearly as many as I want to. I do find though, that a lack of photos at the end of a week makes me look around and capture more details, even if there is no corresponding photo.

Week 22 was a bit like that...

 ...but that's ok because I had my son write out his exam schedule, and now I have a record of his handwriting in my album ;) I used bits and pieces from Simple Stories 24/Seven for this spread...I forgot how much I love the colours in that collection!

Week 23 is made up of all sorts of papers and embellishments!

 For this week I had my older daughter journal about her excursion to Perth Zoo, and got a little creative to fill up some of the other 3x4 pockets...more photos would have come in handy here ;)

So that gets us up to Week 24, which is sitting on my desk right now....wooohoooo!

I'm off to sit in front of the heater to warm up a bit...it's SO chilly in Perth today!

Have a great afternoon

TTFN xxx

Hello.

How are you? And what have you been up to?

 I have badly neglected popping in to share my crafty goings-on lately...and it's not like me to be quiet for so long ;)  There is no simple explanation... just the general busy-ness of life and the lack of time to gather my thoughts and put them in cohesive sentences, much less with photos!

I thought about doing a super-long post to show you everything I've been working on, but have opted for a simple catchup over the next couple of days...sound good?

Let's start with fabric :)

I received the last of my 2013 Fat Quarter Shop Mystery Block of the Month recently, and had a catchup on the blocks before attacking the finishing kit...just a little bit daunting :)

I put the final borders on earlier in the week, and it is heading off to the quilter tomorrow...YIPPPEEEE! I'll show you some detailed pictures after I sew the binding down...it's a very pretty quilt. I have really enjoyed receiving my package from the U.S. each month, and can't wait to start the 2014 program, featuring Avalon fabric by Fig Tree and Co...bring it on!

In a weak moment (when my sewing space was looking a bit empty) I signed up for Camille Roskelley's Craftsy class on piecing pre-cuts, thinking I would use some of my much-loved Bonnie and Camille fabrics.  Funnily enough, I totally balked when it came to cutting up my precious Marmalade layer cake to make the first quilt LOL...I just couldn't go through with it!

The class is aimed at beginners and I felt the first project, Piece of Cake 3, was just a bit too simple for my gorgeous Marmalade...so I started a different quilt which I've wanted to make for a while. I'm just stitching a little bit each day, and will show you when I get a bit more done...slow and steady :) Hopefully I won't have the same problem with the next quilt in the course...I'm hoping to use Happy-Go-Lucky!

Speaking of slow and steady, I finally have some progress to share on Scandinavian Rose...

...Block 4 is finally complete! Phew! This one took me a couple more months than anticipated, but my enthusiasm is now renewed, and I'm stitching madly away on Block 5. I'm using lots of my leftover MBOM Vintage Modern fabrics for the pieced sections, with some Bliss, Ruby and other favourites thrown in, and I LOVE how it's looking. If only I had more stitching hours in my day!

So that's what's been happening in fabric. I'll be back tomorrow with a Project Life catchup!

TTFN xxx