Floriade 2011 A Feast of the Senses...

It's a busy week as I prepare to head off to Sydney for The Deadly Awards. However, I have 2 friends down from interstate who wanted to catch up with me at Floriade yesterday. So rushed off to my cleaning job first thing, got through that a bit quicker, got changed, chucked on some make-up and rushed to town. Realised I probably didn't have much cash for the parking meter, however, thought it will have to do. When I put the money through it just kept going straight through, & I would try and keep putting it through and it wouldn't stay put....great, what am I going to do....however, it was registering that it had gone through and so I printed up the ticket, collected my money and headed into the park!!

I got in, met up with my friends and had a coffee with them before they headed home. I managed to take a few photos, buy some earrings to wear tonight to the awards before having to leave. Again I only had my camera in my phone so had to make do but for anyone who hasn't been I am sure you will get the idea of how spectacular Floriade is.....and it's free!! So if you are planning a visit to our fair city, this is the time of year to come.

What a Grogeous Bride....

On Saturday we gate crashed an old friends daughter's wedding. We all have a real soft spot for Emma who was good friends with our Tam, plus I worked with her for some time in the cafe where I was cooking. She is great fun, and a great worker and a good person. Although we haven't seen Emma since she had her little boy a couple of years ago, we asked her sister if it would be ok if we popped out to see her married. She said it would be great. It was a cold, miserable kind of day (hot the day before!!) and on a beautiful homestead just on the outskirts of Canberra. Emma looked stunning and her bridesmaids (sister & sister-in-law) looked fabulous too in Fuchsia Pink. They were surrounded by family which was special.  I managed to get a few pics on my phone, so sorry about the quality.

Proud Ray bringing in his daughter

 Emma & Danny's little boy Andrew.....SO CUTE!!

It's started.....thoughts of Christmas!!

Yesterday I popped in to see my friend Ann Craig, our wonderful Stampin' Up Demonstrator and friend. It was good to catch up outside of the hustle and bustle of a scrapbooking night. She was busy preparing for the Christmas card workshop she does each month on a Wed and I saw what she was planning on doing that night. I immediately fell in love with them especially the colour combo and decided I would have to come along. Shaun is out on Wed nights so I had nothing to do so booked and paid for it there and then. Thanks Ann for your wonderful creativity which inspires and enables us to do it to.

So 7pm I was out the door and over to Ann's. Gay was the only other lady there so it meant we were able to work quite quickly with only the two of us sharing various product to produce the cards. Here are the final 3 styles although we did do 2 of each. I have decided to do all my Christmas cards this year this colour range even if I do various styles and layouts. The colour combo is :

Peach Parfait

Soft Suede

Rich Razzleberry

Very Vanilla

Here are the results of my efforts. 

Hope this gets you all thinking about what you are going to do this Christmas. We are looking forward to having our first Christmas in our new home with all our family there for breakfast, outside under the verandah with the barbecue but most importantly with our baby granddaughter....her first Christmas!!

Triplicate Trials Tuesday Challenge #9

The random winner from the blog hop, is Ann Craig. Her entry into our challenge and blog hop was amazing! Thanks for joining us Ann, hope you will join us this time too!!

It is with great excitement today I picked up my copic marker order from my friend Kim of PaperArtsy. I was able to get home get some lunch and then head off to the craft room to put together my card for Triple T challenge.

Purple is one of my favourite colours so was excited to have it as one of the colours this challenge. I used a 'My Favourite Things' stamps for the fairy, as well as the sentiment, which you too can purchase from Kim at PaperArtsy. The cardstock and paper were all just scraps again, so that was handy. The seam binding I got from Lovely Linda at Layers of Color Australia.

Other challenges this fitted with are:
Bows and Berries - Glitter
Crafty Boots - Wings
Die cut Dreams - Flowers
OLLCB - Punches & Dies
StampFairy - Glitter
stamps & fun = CREATIVITY - Shapes & diecuts
designedd2delight - Glitter & Girls

Ann's back!!

This week saw the return of our friend and inspiring teacher Ann Craig, and scrapbooking nights at her place. As she had been away the first week of the month she decided to squeeze all the scrapbooking nights into one week instead of two, (not knowing of course, that her daughter was going to give birth this week to Ann's granddaughter!!). I managed to get to 2 of the nights. Wed night I popped over to get a page done for myself as I had invited 3 friends to come along on Thursday night and thought being their very first time I could free myself to help them....but they did really well and after the initial help I was able to leave them with Ann & do another page myself. I did a page each for Tristan & Carissa's wedding album and another page for their engagement album. This was the layout we had to inspire us:

The engagement page has I think the only photo of our dear neighbours of 17 years who we will be leaving shortly as we move. We will continue to have a relationship with them for sure, but will have to be more intentional in our relationship. It has been always very handy catching up over the fence, popping in when we can for a catch up or a meal. It has been like having mum & dad next door and we will really miss them. They have been crying since we told them we were moving so I guess they will miss us too!!

So here is my page from the wedding. The photos are of a couple of the tables at the reception with our some of our family and friends on it. Although Ann used circles and buttons on her bottom left corner, I decided being a wedding pic it lent itself to flowers and of course the Tim Holtz flourish (which my friend Kim from PaperArtsy can get at a great price)

So the next night I just basically did the same thing again. Different papers and added butterflies and less flowers. The engagement party was in the autumn here & at a place called Lennox Gardens down near the lake here in Canberra. It was really lovely. So I thought the colours were appropriate for the season.

Challenges I thought I would enter are:
Crafty Ribbons - Anything Goes
Little Miss Miuffet - Things with wings
Creative craft World - New
The Emerald Faerie Garden - Pearls
HeidisHobbystuggu: Utforddringer - Autumn colours
Really Reasonable Ribbon's Ramblings - Autumn
Crafty Purple Frog - Fall into Fall
Flutterby Wednesdays - with wings (angel/fairy/butterfly etc)
Papercraft Star - Anything Goes

Specially STEAMPUNKED!!

My son and his partner Lani, both love Steampunk. What is that you say? Well check it out. Here is some images to show you
 http://www.google.com/search?q=steampunk&hl=en&safe=off&client=firefox-a&hs=q9H&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&prmd=ivns&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=-3FtTpjZEo3BiQfF_sXTBA&ved=0CEoQsAQ&biw=1842&bih=1131
 but according to Wikipediea the explanation is such:

Steampunk is a sub-genre of science fiction, fantasy, alternate history, and speculative fiction that came into prominence during the 1980s and early 1990s.^[1] Steampunk involves a setting where steam power is still widely used—usually Victorian era Britain—that incorporates elements of either science fiction or fantasy. Works of steampunk often feature anachronistic technology or futuristic innovations as Victorians may have envisioned them, based on a Victorian perspective on fashion, culture, architectural style, art, etc. This technology may include such fictional machines as those found in the works of H. G. Wells and Jules Verne.
Other examples of steampunk contain alternative history-style presentations of such technology as lighter-than-air airships, analog computers, or such digital mechanical computers as Charles Babbage and Ada Lovelace's Analytical engine.
Various modern utilitarian objects have been modded by individual artisans into a pseudo-Victorian mechanical "steampunk" style, and a number of visual and musical artists have been described as steampunk. Anyway, enough of that.

So when it came to her birthday I thought I would make Steampunk the theme of her card. So went over and bought a digi from Kenny K. I have only just put my order in for some copic markers so used my old markers and coloured pencils to colour the image. Wasn't at all happy with it, so decided to emboss over it. I also embossed the background patterned paper with Tim Holzt's steampunk embossing folder, & inked over it so the gadgets could stand out a bit more. Of course, I love to sponge the edges and did so with all if it including the main card. For embellishments I have punched out my own flowers from patterned papers and inked them. Added a flourish, again a Tim Holtz die cut. Of course, last touch, a Layers of Color butterfly. Anyway, I thought it came together in the end. I think at least Lani liked it!

Some challenges I have entered this into:
Crafting When We Can - Anything Goes
I Did it Creations - Anything Goes
Allsorts - Flowers & Swirls
Catch the Bug - Punches & Die Cuts
Sweet n' Sassy Digi - Sport
PaperWorks Co - Colour inspiration
Just for Fun - Vintage

Lovely Linda's Layers of Color Workshop 10/9/11

Another great time was had a Lovely Linda's yesterday. Linda & her husband Ron are now the Australian suppliers for 'Layers of Color' product. It is a range that Linda has been working with, demonstrating and using in her classes and own work for sometime now, and she really does them justice. It often comes easy though when we are passionate about something, & Linda is very passionate about 'Layers of Color'.

The workshop was TAGS, and she had 6 ready for us to create. It never ceases to impress me how we can all be doing the same thing and every body's looks so different. Since we had such a lot to get through in 3 - 31/2 hrs instead of stopping half way through for afternoon tea (Linda's wonderful Pavlova, and my Mexican 7 Layer Dip, tea / coffee etc) we had it at the start. I got all but the last tag done which I just had to put together at home. Here are my tags from the workshop which I put the finishing touches on last night. They all had some special technique involved in the making of each one, but because of Linda's wonderful kits none took very long at all. Thanks Linda for a special day again.

There are so many uses for these tags. I thought the Christmas ones would actually make great decorations. You could make a card with a pocket and put a smaller one inside it, for something really special. They can be a bookmark, a simple but special gift for a friend, family, a teacher etc.