Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Shop Front Inspiration

While browsing on Pinterest recently I saw a photo of a shop front. The paint work was a dusky pink and the writing in turquoise - and that gave me some inspiration to try that colour combination on my card today.

I've used the totally gorgeous and soon-to-be-retiring Blushing Bride with some Tempting Turquoise embossing powder and I think they look rather stunning together. The delicate swirl from Creative Elements has to be one of my favourite stamps at the moment.


Materials used:

  • stamps - Bordering on Romance, Petite Pairs, Creative Elements
  • card - blushing bride, watercolour, in colours dsp
  • other - Versamark ink, heat tool, tempting turquoise embossing powder, Black StazOn ink, dimensionals, aqua painter, adhesive pearls, lace
  • non SU - nestabilities oval die

Thanks for calling in.

Cheers
Kez

Sunday, May 27, 2012

Swinging Birthday

Many thanks to all those who have enquired after my health. I took a turn for the worse on Friday when all the fluid hanging around my lungs got infected but thanks to the wonder of modern drugs, am now recovering.

Another swing card for you today as I did actually summon enough energy last week to get back into the craft room. I was going for something with a funkier look so chose this lovely paper from the Twitterpated series and teamed it with the Best of Everything set.



Cynthia asked for a tutorial on swing cards and I am happy to provide some links for the straight-cut rectangular type as follows:
  • Here is a link to a good video tutorial
  • Here is a link to a written tutorial 
  • Here is a pdf file with the measurements I used

As for the framelits shaped one like my sample above, there is a video tutorial here which is slightly different to mine, but it will give you the knowledge of how to cut the framelit shape. I hope you have lots of fun making these, they are great.

Thanks for calling in.

Cheers
Kez

Friday, May 25, 2012

Purse-onality

Yesterday I had another play with my petite purse die.

First up I tried a faux alligator skin purse and here's how that one turned out (sorry about the photos; it's a very overcast day - and do excuse the cobwebs on the window, lol!!!)



Materials used:
  • card - marina mist
  • other - Versamark, clear embossing powder, heat tool, rhinestone brad, Petite Purse die
  • non SU - silver stickers

Then I teamed tempting turquoise card up with melon mambo embossing powder - yowzah!



Materials used:
  • stamps - My Friend
  • card - tempting turquoise, melon mambo
  • other - melon mambo embossing powder, Versamark, heat tool, brights glimmer brad, brights brads, Petite Purse die
  • non SU - embossing tool

Next a simple black and white with an Asian influence:



Materials used:
  • card - basic black
  • other - Petite Purse die, pearl
  • non SU - stickers, white linen card

And lastly one of my all-time favourite colour combos, black and cream. I used some gorgeous flocked papers similar to the Mocha Morning dsp.



Materials used:
  • card - basic black
  • other - Petite Purse die
  • non SU - flocked paper

I really LOVE how simple this little cutie is to put together and I soooooooo hope we get it in our new catalogue so you can all have a play!

Thanks for dropping by.

Cheers
Kez



Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Just Swinging By

As I'm home sick this week (flu turned bronchitis) I thought it would be a good chance to catch up on some card making for upcoming classes. I took all the essentials with me into the craft room - heater, big glass of water, box of thick and thirsty tissues, lip balm, phone - but you know what they say about the best laid plans ... my mojo up and left along with my ability to breathe through my nose at night and although I gave it a valiant effort, I eventually gave up in disgust at what I had created.

Luckily, though, a couple of weeks back I had been practising some swing cards for this month's Sunday class and so I do have those to show you.

First up one I made ages ago under the tutelage of my mate Robyn:

 



Materials used:

  • stamps - The Open Sea, Word Play
  • card - cherry cobbler, whisper white, Nautical Expedition dsp
  • other - stripes E/F, dimensionals

A little touch of vintage for the next one:



Materials used:
  • stamps - Kindness Matters, Smarty Pants, Creative Elements
  • card - crumb cake, very vanilla, basic black, First Edition dsp
  • other - designer frames E/F, sponge dauber, blender pen, champagne shimmer mist
Then I got adventurous and wanted to try making one using the framelits labels die shape for the swing portion. Not completely happy with it as my sentiment keeps ending up crooked, but after trying about four times I decided to just go with what I had and be blowed to it! The bright colours are another departure from my norm.




Materials used:

  • stamps - Just Believe, Petite Pairs, polka dot background (retired)
  • card - melon mambo, basic black, whisper white
  • other - clear embossing powder, markers, small oval punch (retired), framelits, Big Shot, beautiful wings die

Hopefully my mojo will return in full swing (pardon the pun!) long before Sunday so I can come up with another version for my ladies. Till then, 

Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers
Kez


Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Craft Therapy

Hi everyone! Sorry I've been MIA - so much work, plus I was away at the weekend. I took a quick trip up to Brisbane to help my brother celebrate a Big-Ending-In-Zero Birthday! My other brother was over from NZ and we had a great time catching up.

It meant I wasn't home for the first half of Mother's Day, but my darling DD13 made the rest of it very special with flowers, dinner and a nice new pair of fluffy slippers! I hope all you mums out there had an equally pampered day.

And then back to the real world - after a particularly fraught day of teaching yesterday I was desperately in need of some craft therapy to soothe my frayed nerves. Well, it was that or alcohol, LOL!!!

I chose to case a gorgeous card made by Heather Telford, who is an expert with a sponge or two (the craft kind, not the cake kind!) and has made a number of lovely cards with the aptly named Lovely as a Tree stamp set. I haven't attempted a stamped reflection before so this is my inaugural effort:


Reasonable success for a first time, I thought, but I really want to have another go and try to get those reflections stamping more evenly.

Materials used:
  • stamps - Lovely as a Tree, Sincere Salutations
  • inks - Baja breeze, so saffron, more mustard, cajun craze, basic black
  • card - so saffron, cajun craze, whisper white
  • other - sponges, stamp-a-ma-jig, cotton bud

My second card uses no stamps whatsoever - something I don't do very often; I'll probably add a sentiment when I am giving the card. I was wanting to try out a couple of new dies and punches and ended up lumping them all together on the one card. Here tis:


Materials used:
  • card - crumb cake, old olive, so saffron dsp, vellum
  • non SU - white linen card, bought flowers, rose petal punch and embossing punch, window die, leaf die, brick wall embossing folder
  • other - dimensionals, crumb cake ink pad, Tombow multi glue

I do hope you manage to get some craft therapy in today too. Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers
Kez



Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Totally Non Craft Related Ramble

I love reading the ramblings of Lydia over at understandblue and this post in particular struck a chord with me. As someone who used to teach customer service to TAFE students, I always thought perhaps I am a little fussy about the service I receive, but after reading Lydia's blog post I have decided I am just a human that likes to be treated as such.

In the spirit of Lydia's post I thought I'd take a moment to praise places where I get good customer service. Unfortunately, there's not many that I can think of. One that comes to mind is our local pharmacist/chemist. The pharmacist (Philip) knows my name and what medications I take without me having to remind him; he knows that DD13 is a type 1 diabetic and he always asks how she is doing and shows interest in insulin pump therapy. He tells me about any new products that are available that might interest us and he even once gave us a free blood test monitor out of the blue. So I've made a point of getting to know a little about him and his family so I can ask after them too. We're all fellow humans after all, right?

The local Gloria Jeans used to be on my list before they changed hands. The staff knew me by sight and knew my regular order - they would have it rung up on the register as soon as they saw me come in! How could that not make you feel good?

Our local general store is pretty good too. If you are 20c or 50c short they will say don't worry, pay me next time. And I always do. You want to reward great service like that, it doesn't come around nearly often enough.

Enough rambling - nothing craft related today, I'm afraid, I've been snowed under with marking assessments again. And I'm off to Brisbane this weekend so it may be next week before I get to craft again. Aaaargh!

I hope you have some great places that offer customer service to make you smile or feel good - feel free to share and thanks for dropping by.

Cheers
Kez

Thursday, May 3, 2012

Cutie Patooties

Oh my goodness, it's May already! I've been rather inundated lately with marking and lesson preparation for my daytime job, classes and workshops too (more fun than the other!) and I have also been working my butt off getting everything finalised for the craft show this weekend. It's my very first time trying to sell my cards at a craft show and I am crossing my fingers that people buy them cos I sure don't want them all back again, lol!

Here's a photo of my stall all set up and ready for opening night (Friday).


So if you are heading up to the Blue Mountains at the weekend, make sure to call in to the Artfest and buy some of my cards, lol.

Now, if you are like me and you stalk the blogs of some of the US demos, you will have seen the ever-so-cute Petite Purse die that they are getting in their new catalogue, due out at the beginning of next month. I fell in love at first sight and just HAD to ask the rellies to buy me one and send it over. I couldn't possibly wait to see if we will get it in our new catty - shucks, that's MONTHS away! Who can wait that long?

Here are the adorable little purses I have made so far:


This one is in daffodil delight and basic black with a vintage brad and stamping with Elements of Style.


This one uses some gorgeous flocked Christmas papers from last year and I added a wooden corner piece from Melissa Frances.


Island Indigo with white and red - gorgeous colour combo. DSP is Twitterpated.


No little girl could resist this one - glitter card in pale pink with pearls and butterflies.



Embossed wisteria wonder paper from Sweet Shop dsp in the mini catty with a matching jelly bean brad.


Aren't they cutie patootie?

They are super easy and quick to make and some very clever peeps over in the States have made some wonderfully creative versions, so I'll be giving some of those a try real soon. Meanwhile, I'll just make you all jealous (LOL) and hope to goodness that this die comes to our shores in September.

Thanks for dropping by.

Cheers
Kez