Hoot

This is my one and only Rachelle Anne Miller stamp. It took almost two months to arrive from a pre-order... I had actually forgotten I had ordered it! It was worth the wait. Aren't these little owls just the sweetest?! It isn't a very big stamp but it still took me two hours to watercolour. I made this card for my sister for her birthday and chose these little guys because they are a stamp she wouldn't have seen yet. I subscribed her to my blog (hey Kel! hehe) so she sees pretty much everything I make whether she likes it or not so I wanted this to be a surprise.

Here is a close up pic... it is a pretty good photo but in real life I think they were still quite a bit more vibrant in colour than this. All thanks to the Twinkling H2O's.

Flower Power

This was my Christmas break project. I got the instructions from the Kaisercraft website and I had a great time folding these little flowers! It took me ALL day and took (from memory) six pieces of double sided, 12 x 12 pattern paper. I used Kaisercraft - Tudor. The flower ball is made from 12 origami flowers with 5 petals each so all up, I had to fold 60 flower petals! It was fun for the first hour! I'll admit, I am so happy with it though I would do it again too. I held it all together with little paperclips and bulldog clips while it dried then stuck a piece of painted dowel into the middle. The pot is just a $3 toothpaste cup from Big W and a bit of pretty ribbon!

Calendar

I had plans for the long weekend and I wanted to make five cards... it didn't happen! I made two cards but then I decided that it would probably be better to finish some of the projects I already had on the go. This is a Kaisercraft calendar that I started over the Christmas break. I stopped after I covered it because I wasn't too sure what to do next. It took me a day to cut all of the letters out using my Hippy Chick alpha through my Cuttlebug and ages to glue them all on (I glued pattern paper to a thin piece of chipboard first so that are a little raised).

I finished it yesterday by putting the huge amount of flowers on and I put some nice rubons on acetate and cut them out to stick out of the flowers too. I don't usually use so many flowers in one go but it sort of worked on this one. I am taking the calendar to work so I didn't want to personalise it too much. Oh, yeah, there was some sort of explosion of pearls too! I almost used two packets!

So here it is! Finally, the finished project... at least it is still in January!!

HAPPY AUSTRALIA DAY!

We have a full day planned today, sitting around home listening to the JJJ Hottest 100 songs of 2008! They are down to 95 already so there will be a few good solid hours of noise coming from our house! Have a great day Aussies!!

C'mon Baby Light my Fire

Challenge time! YAY! This week the High Hopes Challenge is being hosted by Janette and she would like us to use hearts! This is my my card for the week. I used Matchmakin' Maynard and C'mon Baby. Maynard is such a CUTIE! Pop on over to the High Hopes Blog for more information and if you put a link to your challenge card you go into the draw to win Maynard for your own stampin' stash!

Thanks a Tonne

I made this card for our vet and the nurses after our cat, Kitty was injured a while back. She got in a fight and was scratched in the eye and needed a special drop in it HOURLY! All day, all waking hours, for two and a half weeks!

Luckily for us, we didn't have to do it if we slept through but if we woke up during the night we had to go catch her. The nurses had such a tough job, anytime they went near Kitty, she would growl or attack them. She bit Matt so badly he had to go to the doctor to make sure it wouldn't get infected. She wasn't too bad after that initial vet visit after Matt had to shake her off is hand to get her to let go but that was only for us that she was nice. She HATED the vet nurses to the point where every day when we picked her up we had to go out the back and put her in her cage for them. I can't really blame her, imaging being bashed up and trying to rest a sore body and having someone come and wake you up every hour and put a freezing cold drop in your eye for two and a half weeks! Just a day of that would wear me thin!

Her eye is all better now, her sight was only compromised just a little and you can see a cloudy patch on it but at the beginning half of her cornea had collapsed and they were worried she would lose the eye.

She was sick the other day and we took her to a new vet because we were worried they would scream and run out of the surgery when they saw us coming (they know her as 'The Kitty' now). She had to stay overnight for tests and the next day they called me to say she could come home, she needed some medicine but they weren't going to give it to her until we arrived because "she has turned into a lion.... and we can't catch her"! Oh, the joy of being a vet!

Dude Card

This week for the High Hopes Challenge, Niki would like us to make a dude card! I spent a good lot of Saturday watercolouring mine! I used Roasting Marshmallows which is one of my all time favourite stamps! In my first High Hopes order I got about 8 or 9 stamps and this was one of them! I also used Tree Element which is the bigger of the two trees in the last release.

Swing on over to the High Hopes Blog and remember, if you join in, make sure you leave a link to your card so you can go in the draw to win some stamps from Tina!

Stamps For Sale

HAPPY SATURDAY!

I have added some new crafty stuff to my Stamps 2 Go blog! Click here to see them and I have also added some stamps and punches on ebay... they end on Monday so click here if you would like to be directed to ebay!

What's Up?

It's High Hopes Challenge time again! This week, Kimmie would like us to use dry embossing on our projects. This was a hard one for me! I have heaps of Cuttlebug folders but I never know how to incorporate them into a card so I usually just don't use them! This is the first time I have used Sm Monkey Mike and the Banana Tree so I had fun... even though I started the card at 8am yesterday morning and didn't finish it until 5pm!!

We are having some interesting weather here. There is a cyclone over "there" somewhere... it's not really affecting us but we are getting blasted with rain. If it was strong enough to cross land a bit further we might have been bothered as it would have hit us square on but it is supposed to turn off before it gets here. It has been raining constantly since Friday (it's now Monday for those in other time zones) I am not sure how I am going to go driving to work this morning. We had 160mm (6.2") of rain since midnight last night and its only 6:30am! Good thing I got Matt a weather station for Christmas... he can tell me exactly how much fell on our roof rather than just relying on the Bureau of Meterology website which measures the rain ages away!

A Special Request

I have been working on this card for a few days now. I do need to learn to watercolour faster! Tina, the amazingly generous owner of High Hopes Rubber Stamps asked a special request this week. Her grandpa is turning 88 on January 21 and seeing as she isn't able to visit him, she thought it would be a fantastic surprise if he gets hand-made cards from all over the world! Tina wrote the High Hopes Diva's an email earlier in the week... this is what it said:

"My Grandfather will be turning 88 on Jan. 21 and he has been a bit blue for the last several months. He is a widower and misses my Grandmother and had been dealing with being alone for several years now, however his health is starting to fail him (his mind is as sharp as a tack). He has arthritis in his knees that makes it difficult to walk now so only leaves the house on Wednesday nights to go to his adult writing group ....(a group of older writers...not porn writers...hehehe) ...and my uncle picks him up to take him to his house for Sunday Dinners. He has a pacemaker now, and has been slowing down quite a bit, due to other health complaints. As he told me my last call to him "Well honey, I do not buy anything with a long shelf life anymore but I still feel safe buying a green banana..." hehehe... God Bless Him..."

So, as all cardmakers know, we LOVE any reason to glue, stick and stamp! If you would like to join in and send him a card too, email me and I will be happy to send you his address! Make sure you leave a comment to your card if you post it on your blog so we can all go see it!!

I put this little treasure chest on the inside of the card.

Card Candy

I have some card candy to give away... do you want it? Leave a comment and it could be yours! You have until January 10 to put your name in the draw!

The winnder is Shannah - To Wander and to Wonder!

Thanks for visiting!

Hugs

This is my second card for this week's High Hopes Challenge using tearing. You may recognise Hugable Hank from my watercolouring tutorial. Has anyone tried my way of watercolouring yet? I would love to know how you went!

As you can probably see from the last couple if cards, I am desperately trying to break away from using wire and flowers. I got a bit excited with that idea in the lead up to Christmas so I am doing my best to think of other ideas. So far its not going to well!! I may need to do more blogging!

Leo the Lion

The High Hopes Challenges have started again! Crissy is hosting the first one for 2009 and she would like us to use paper tearing on a project. Pop on over to the High Hopes Challenge Blog for more information and if you do decide to join in, make sure you leave a comment with a link to your card on the HH blog to go in the draw for some rubbery goodness from Tina!

This is what I came up with this week, Leo the Lion. I watercoloured him using SU Classic ink and a Blender Pen and then wen't over him with some Twinkling H2O's to really make him look more interesting.

Product of the Month - January

Well, here it is! The stamps you see used here are this month's POTM from High Hopes Rubber Stamps which mean that when you purchase this set you get them at a whopping 25% off!

T-040 Candi Tooth Fairy 15.00

D-067 Tooth 5.30

E-062 Floss 6.00

F-091 Tooth brush 6.70

H-127 Tooth Fairy Saying 8.00

Purchased together these stamps would regularly be $41.00 CDN mounted but for January they are on sale for 25% off which works out to be $30.75 CDN mounted, $23.10 cling mounted or $15.40 unmounted!

Swing by the High Hopes Challenge Blog if you want to check out what some of the other Diva's have made with this set!

Juliet and Elmer in Print

How exciting! This is my first set of High Hopes cards officially in print! They are published in Australian Cardmaking, Stamping & Papercraft Vol 14 No 6 and it went on sale on Boxing Day 2008. I am so proud to see my cards over three pages I emailed this to my family and friends just to show everyone! So, it has been a long wait to see these babies in print but here they are... you can click on the pictures to see them better!