Okay who is ready for another week of Challenge fun? I hope you are!

This week we have a different image which can be taken so many ways, so I am sure we will see lots of diversity with this one. Even my creation is a little different too!

Here is the Inspiration image for you:

Here you can go with something earthy, an invitation, wine glasses…..just let your imagination run with it!

This is my creation for this one, like I said it is a little different….

Be sure to go and check out the Design Team members creations and give them some comment love!

Dawn

Cindy

Kirsty

Renee

Chantelle

Sarah-Jane

Anthonette Chavez - Guest Designer

Want to play along? - here are some guidelines.

If you would like to play along, all you need to do is follow the directions:

1. Make your creation following the challenge ie, sketch, colour, or inspiration image.

2. Load your creation up onto your blog or a public viewing forum like Splitcoast Stampers, with a direct link back to the post on this website, so that others viewing the post will know where the challenge has come from, and it is courtesy to do so.

3. Then come back to this post so that you can add your name and link in the Mr. Linky!

You have until the Thursday the 4th February midnight to get your entries linked.

I will be announcing the winner and honourable mention on Friday the 5th February in the afternoon.

Have fun with this one!

Hey everyone,

Well it was so very exciting to see so many fun entries to the colour challenge this past week. I know I am loving getting back into the swing of things, and it seems you all are too!

This week we have the whole DT getting on board and giving us their votes for the best creation and of course we have a prize for each category this week as well.

Getting all the votes together, and without further adiou here are your winners for this week!!!

Big drum roll please……..

This masterpiece was made by the very talented Kim Badelt! Look at those amazing hand made flowers, and those adorable buttons as well! Love all the ribbon and the stitching is a gorgeous touch as well! Congratulations Kim, the DT and myself have chosen your creation to be the Inkspiration Winner, and you have scored yourself $100 of Stampin’Up product for free. I will be in touch asap to arrange that for you.

This gorgeous scrap page is by the lovley Jen Picard! Isn’t that photo just adorable!!! I love the  pretty flowers, and the use of that new scallop punch! What a fabulous use of the challenge colours as well! Congrats Jen on being this weeks Honourable mention! You will receive the brand new Butterfly prints stamp set from the Australian Summer mini catalog! Please email me Jen and give me your address so I can get them out to you in the post asap!

Please Congratulate the girls on their amazing winning entries and give them some comment love!

Of course it was hard to pick the winning entries, and I am sure you are keen to see all the other creations as well. So be sure to check out the slide show below where all the entries are shown!

Thanks again for playing along, and I hope you can join us again this week!

Hey everyone,

Oh it feels so good to get the chance to sit down tonight and ramble on……well I hope I actually don’t drive you all a little nuts, but I just wanted to share with you some of the going on’s we have been up to this past week.

We certainly have hit the ground running here! So much to do, and well it has been a bit of a challenge too. We have never had to rent before, and boy oh boy that is a whole new world to us!!! We found a fabulous place close to the school, and nice and big with extra room for visitors, so we spent the better half a  day getting the application in. They want so much information just cutting short of which underwear you buy!!! Anyway after all that effort and being the first and only applicants, the real estate did a shifty on us and offered it to someone else!!! Talk about frustrating! Since then every house that would be suitable seems to be rented in a space of 5 hours!!! We are a little limited having 4 kids, as we need the space, and not to mention ALL that stamping paraphernalia too! We did look at another house yesterday, which is HUGE, and would you believe it has a complete separate office / craft room full of cuboards, drawers and shelves, and guess what???? It is all PINK!!!! Perfect for me no? I think so. I have been dreaming all day about loading up those shelves with my stuff,  &iPod and getting my fingers busy with some ink and paper……..OH fingers crossed we get it, and if we do I will promise to post a photo!

Yesterday was the first day of the School year for the kids here in Queensland, and so off the kids went to their brand new school! We enrolled them into Freshwater Christian College, which is on a beautiful premises right at the base of the mountains! They were anxious and excited to go, but poor Mali was a bundle of tears and very overwhelmed by the new faces, teacher and classroom! Hopefully it will pass. We of course had to take a few snapshots of them in their new uniforms, and I thought I would share with you:

Elijah, Tiarne, and Malakai

Don’t you just love those Certainly celery shirts with the night of navy collars?!  As you can see there is beautiful rainforest right behind them, and this is just a snippet of what you see everywhere! Cairns is a place where you really get to see God’s Handiwork all around amongst the creation! I am still getting used to all the new animals and insects though…… hearing all the gekko’s clucking at night, and seeing all the butterflies and lizards around as well. Apparently the holiday cabin we are staying in has had 3 snakes in there, so we are trying (as best as you can with 4 kids) to keep the doors closed at all times, as I definitely don’t want to see a snake slithering around. Elijah on the other hand is hoping one will appear, as he loves snakes and is a real Steve Irwin wannabe! I am sure we will soon get used to all the new surroundings!

So there you have  a little bit of news of what has been happening this week. I have really been wanting to blog more, and blog surf too, but here I am paying $3 an hour, and you know how fast one hour disappears on the computer!!! So I am having to behave myself and limit my time on the computer! I very much look forward to having my craft room set up, as well as my computer and having a routine as well!

Take care and I will be back tomorrow to announce the new winner of this weeks challenge……I am LOVING what I have seen so far that is for sure!

Have a great night,

Hey Everyone,

Well here is my very first post from the other side of the country! We arrived safely in Cairns at 4am on Wednesday morning and were met by my brother and sister in law, Matt and Claire, along with Claire’s Dad and sister! As soon as you land you can smell the humidity in the air, it is really different to what we are used to! We went back to their place for a morning cuppa, and a sleep as I didn’t sleep a wink on the flight - far too emotional from all our goodbye’s at the airport along with having Janaya sleeping in my arms as well.

Since arriving we have been super busy settling in, and looking for either a property to buy, or rent! It certainly is rather overwhelming, but hopefully we find something soon, or have a clear direction on which way to go. Yesterday we had an appointment at the kids new school to get their new uniforms, as well as get to see their classrooms. The kids really enjoyed that, and are excited about attending a new school, which is great!

With everything that has happened over the past 4 weeks, I haven’t had too much time to think about the actual move and what it will be like etc. But wow it really has come as a bit of a shock now that we are here, and have said all our goodbye’s! It is one of the hardest things I have ever had to do!!!! I know we will all see each other again, but I can’t deny the fact that I am feeling rather vunerable at the moment! I am sure it will pass once we are settled somewhere and have some resemblence of a routine, but for now I am feeling rather sad, but excited too, if that is even possible???  So there is a brief update on our arrival. I really need to pull out the camera and take pics for you!

After a most wonderful break it is now time to get geared up for the New Year of challenges! I am really excited about getting in and stamping again, as soon as my stamps arrive in our sea container from Perth which should be this week! YAY!

This week we have a Colour Challenge for you, but it is a contest as well! The Design Team are gathering together to judge the winning creation and honourable mention this week! The grand prize is a $100 gift voucher to spend on Stampin’Up product of your choice!!! The honourable mention will receive the Butterfly Prints stamp set (in the Australian Summer Mini)…….So get those colours out, and get creating! You can play along as many times as you like, and we look forward to viewing all your gorgeous creations!

Here are the colours to work with:

I know, I know, it has Cameo coral in it…….definitely not a colour favourite, but I am sure you will be suprised with how great it can actually all look together! So dig it out (probably from the very back of your cupboard, and dust it off :)  and get creating!)

Here is a sample with the colours ( I actually made these last year sometime) since I don’t have my stamps in arms reach!

For this creations I have used the Priceless stamp set along with the So swirly jumbo roller

Here is a wee scrap page of Mali using the same colours.

So here are all the deets you need to play along:

Be sure to go and check out the Design Team members creations and give them some comment love!

Dawn

Cindy

Kirsty

Renee

Chantelle

Sarah-Jane

Anthonette Chavez - Guest Designer

Want to play along? - here are some guidelines.

If you would like to play along, all you need to do is follow the directions:

1. Make your creation following the challenge ie, sketch, colour, or inspiration image.

2. Load your creation up onto your blog or a public viewing forum like Splitcoast Stampers, with a direct link back to the post on this website, so that others viewing the post will know where the challenge has come from, and it is courtesy to do so.

3. Then come back to this post so that you can add your name and link in the Mr. Linky!

You have until the Thursday the 28th January midnight to get your entries linked.

I will be announcing the winner and honourable mention on Friday the 29th January in the afternoon.

I hope you have lots of fun with this one, and I look forward to seeing your creations and picking the winner!!!!

Talk soon,

Howdy Folks,

I am super sure some of you were starting to think I had completley disappeared, and well I suppose in lots of ways I have! I can hardly believe that Christmas, and New Years have passed, and it has been just over four weeks since my last past!

I can’t even think of where to begin telling you of all that has happened lately, it really is mind boggling, but I am going to give it a go all the same

So my last post was just before Christmas…… We had a wonderful Christmas with both sides of the family, sitting back and enjoying the very warm weather. I think the kids were in the pool for 5 hours total, so they most definitely had a wonderful time! I didn’t quite don the swimming cozy, but enjoyed sitting back on the patio catching up with my grandparents, and rellies. Unfortunately I forgot to pack the camera, so I can’t share any pics from that day.

The following day we had Boxing Day breakfast here with Rod’s brother, wife and kids who live away from us, so it was wonderful to catch up with them. I did however receive an awful phone call that day to say that a dear friend died from heart failure on Christmas eve. She was the sweetest gal, who I had the pleasure of teaching scrapbooking, and stamping in the past few years as a demo. She leaves behind a lovely husband and a 19month old son. It is so very tragic for all of them, and it was such hard news to hear. Just another reminder to live each day as a gift, and make the most of it!!!!

After all the commotion of Christmas and New Years,  it has been time to get stuck into the packing, and planning for our move to Cairns in Far north Queensland! We also had two lots of International visitors, My brother;s and Rod’s brothers engagement parties, a trip to Adventure world, and oh so much more.

Rather than it being a boring post I thought I would share with you a couple of photos whilst I can, but unfortunately it won’t be stamping

First up, I have some pics of a fun girls night out I had just before Christmas, with my dear stamping buddies. We had a wonderful girls night out, eating at a lovely restaurant, and of course a visit to the chocolatier for dessert!

My gorgeous friend Louise…

The beautiful Monnie Moo…

dearest Charmaine….

Here we are enjoying our decadent drinks!!! - what fun

What a great night we had and it all seems soooooo long ago already!

A couple of days later we celebrated Bryn and Kate’s Engagement party! What a fun night that was too! I had the pleasure of making all their party Invitations a few weeks earlier, and also arranged the cake as well., Oh la la, what an amazing job Julie did of it too! Ever thought of drawing the Baroque Motifs stamp by hand, let alone on a cake? Too hard right? Well not for Julie from “The Queen of cakes”, she even managed to make the Baja breeze as well. Here is a wee piccie of the gorgeous cake….

Pretty amazing huh?

You can see more of Julie’s AMAZING work on her website, HERE……

I managed to have a snag a picture with my spunky brother on the night, but not with Kate, which was a shame as she looked amazing!

Oh how I am going to miss him and Kate when we move!

So back to the big move, I am sitting here and it is 17 minutes to midnight, and we fly out tomorrow night! One last night in this house, and in this state. I would have thought that I would be really emotional about moving from here, seeing as it is the first property we have had since we got married and brought four little bundles home from the hospital, but it hasn’t been bad at all, which is good. I am sure it will really hit me as we drive out of that long driveway for one last time!!!!

So far we have been really blessed with good preparations and nothing has gone wrong. Let’s just hope that the rest all falls into place. We have so many decisions yet to make in regards to where we will live, Rod’s work, etc…. all we know is where the kids will go to school at this stage, so lots more to happen yet. What a relief to know that it is all in control and that God will guide us along the way.

Here is a couple of pictures of what is sitting in my driveway at the moment…….

This is the big Sea container with all our earthly belongings!!!

Nearly packed to the brim!!!

So we are nearly all packed and ready to go. The kids are excited, we are nervous, and it will all be a very big change for us all. I will be sure to keep you posted on what all happens, and I hope you enjoy this new journey along with me as well.

Since we have been so very busy, my stamps haven’t seen a lick of ink at all! I had really hoped to get some in but inbetween appointments, packing, cleaning, and farwells, I just haven’t had time. But I am dying to get my hands on some, and will most definitely be stamping the very minute I can get those stamping boxes ripped open!!!

In regards to the Inkspiration Challenges, the team and I are all set to get into them this coming Friday…..we have a fun suprise planned, so be sure to come back and read all about it then!

I look forward to sharing with you all again very soon!

Take care my friends