So Mum phones up saying: "When you come over tomorrow, can you bring a baby shower card?". Me: "What? What for?". Mum: "I'm going to a baby shower and don't have a card".Me: "What? Why?".Mum: "I thought you'd have a card".Me: "What? Why would I have a card?!?"You get the drift. I spent an hour coming up with a card design that matched Mum's exacting specifications: 'not too big', 'not too small', 'no white', 'not for boy or girl' (?), 'a baby on the front' (I ignored this last one).
Postscript: Mum liked the card. I love the Threading Water hole punch!
I was - lucky /fortunate /in the right place at the right time /all of the above - to win a prize in a Hero Arts challenge. Titled ‘about me’, you had to present a page about yourself that featured Hero Arts stamps. This was my entry.
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I hardly ever win anything, so I was thrilled with this. Thank you, randomizer!
I've made a start on this year's Christmas cards! I'm at least 2 months ahead of schedule, so that gives me time to reminisce a little...
Here are some of my cards from Christmas past. At least, going back to when I started taking photos of them. Photos are good, because I usually make too few cards and forget someone and have to use my leftovers to give them a card and don't have any left after Christmas. Phew!
The polar bear card is a favorite because it is a shaker card filled with holographic glitter. The polar bear stamp was a gift from a dear late friend who brought it back from Spitzbergen in Norway.
This year, I may do an acetate card, maybe something like this. But hopefully better than this first attempt. Ask me in December.
It's been a productive weekend craftwise, because I finished these 2 pictures and also put them into frames (the finishing touch). They are chipboard trees and birds (Maya Road) and a strip of flowers (Buzz and Bloom) that I painted with chalk ink and acrylic paint or covered with patterned paper or stamped. They are mounted onto black cardstock and are hung, I like to think, so they add an air of 'class' to the upstairs landing.
I enjoy doing scrapbook pages that are smaller than the usual 12 inches because a) I can never think of what to put on such a large page and b) it allows me to cut those gorgeous patterned papers so that they can be used on more than one page.This is a mini album that I made using chipboard covers cut to size and a couple of pages strung together with jump rings. It is 17x17 cm and it was a lot of fun to do because I could experiment with different looks, including ripping off - sorry, 'scraplifting' - designs from magazines. I stopped when I ran out of ideas, which was after about 10 pages!The album covers our trips to Melbourne last year, so it's mainly of eating and shopping. I still have heaps of photos from these trips, so another album is in the wings...
I made this spring-inspired card using almost all Stampin' Up! products. The stamps are from the In the Spotlight set, on Whisper White, Certainly Celery (I think) and Kraft notecard and the green Palette o' Prints paper. The ribbon is my favourite, Old Olive. Ink is Versamark, Colorbox chalk queue and Tombow markers. The little squares are clear heat embossed (though I should have inked the stamps a bit darker...).
I am hoping that this burst of inspiration will be the start of my Christmas card preparations. Will have to wait and see if Xmas cards eventuate in the next few weeks or (as usual) about 2 days before Xmas.
Just the rest of the things I got at the designboom / young blood designers market:
This is actually a table centrepiece from Millicent and Frank, but looks good as a wall hanging, I think. It is made of black acrylic.
designboom marts are staged at design festivals around the world, in places such as New York, Tokyo and Seoul. This year, for the first time, there was a mart in Sydney at the Powerhouse Museum, as part of the 12th International Sydney Design Festival.
The marts are kind of like an upmarket market, showcasing the work of designers in the fields of lighting, furniture, ceramics, homewares, clothing and fabrics. Any shop at the end of an exhibition is a good shop, just point me in the right direction….
The range of goods for sale at the Sydney mart (promoted as Young Blood: Designers Market) was fantastic, quirky, beautifully designed and made. I picked up some things, and only my slender wallet stopped me from getting more.
My favourites included these adorable magnets from Korean designer Daniel Jo. The range (called ‘Promise’) includes salt and pepper shakers and candle holders.
Theory: That the relentless purchase of scrapbooking supplies has a positive effect on creativity.
Analysis: As the graph below shows, there is some correlation, but not in the anticipated direction.
Spend is trending in a positive direction while Creativity trend is slight negative with a tendency towards an indefinite plateau.
Action: Spend more. Creativity has to go up eventually…
It hasn’t all been bad, though. In a rare one-night window of artistic imagination, I made a page with a photo taken at the KISS concert. I tried to make it a little bit grungey and rough, in keeping with the event (or, rather, the crowd), but I couldn’t get away from being kind of naturally neat and structured.
The Craft and Quilt Fair is in town (well, it finished today)! I haven’t been for years, because last time, the bf said that it was the most worthless 1 hour he’d ever spent (or words to that effect). This year, however, we decided to have another go at it, and I’m glad I did. Normally, I just whiz through the exhibits going ho-hum, more stalls selling beads, thread, sewing machines and mysterious things I don’t know what to do with. But this year, with my newfound interest in stamping and scrapbooking, I was looking at things with new eyes – a set of ‘what can I buy, what can I buy’ eyes, that is.
So, yes, I did buy lots, and it’s all good stuff. Can’t wait to get craftily inspired, but in the meantime, I can just sit and stroke my new pretties.
With the AUD doing pretty well against all major currencies, it means that online shopping (ie. spending) is also the way to go. So, to allow me to use my Cuttlebug more often, here are some embossing folders and die cuts I bought from the US. And a Crop-a-dile, of course – just love the purple handle and storage case!
Postscript: Mum liked the card. I love the Threading Water hole punch!.JPG)
I hardly ever win anything, so I was thrilled with this. Thank you, randomizer!
My favourites included these adorable magnets from Korean designer Daniel Jo. The range (called ‘Promise’) includes salt and pepper shakers and candle holders.
I also got a length of owl fabric by Saffron Craig. Not sure what to do with it since I don’t sew much/at all, but it’s too cute to pass up. 
Other things I got: some of the moss pencils (lead pencils covered in green ‘moss’) and a black acrylic table centrepiece by Millicent and Frank – again not sure what to do with it, maybe use it as a wall hanging. Pictures later, when I put it up.
It hasn’t all been bad, though. In a rare one-night window of artistic imagination, I made a page with a photo taken at the KISS concert. I tried to make it a little bit grungey and rough, in keeping with the event (or, rather, the crowd), but I couldn’t get away from being kind of naturally neat and structured.
With the AUD doing pretty well against all major currencies, it means that online shopping (ie. spending) is also the way to go. So, to allow me to use my Cuttlebug more often, here are some embossing folders and die cuts I bought from the US. And a Crop-a-dile, of course – just love the purple handle and storage case!
