hey again,

who is all up and ready for a new challenge? It has been so hot here in Australia this past week, and I know that it is rather hard to sit and stamp when you are hot and sweaty, that is unless of course you have an air conditioner blowing right in your face! Maybe we will get lots of players from the other side of the continent where it is so cold right now, that snuggling up in the craft space it nice and cozy.

Anyway no matter where you are in this wide world, we would love to you to join in and play along this week. We have a sketch for you this week, and these are usually the most popular…..is that cuz they are easier? who knows, but I do hope you like this one!

Here is the sketch for you:

The image in the centre is something you can stamp and make pop in the square

Now I have my sample all ready to go for you, but would you believe that this afternoon (when i got back from the swimming carnival, i went to take a photo of it, and what do you know?….the camera battery is dead!) so I have that charging right now, and at first light in the morning I will pop it up for you,

ETA: Hey again, here is my sample for you! I wanted to get it up first thing this morning when the battery for my camera was charged, but I have been up most the night with a nasty ear infection! So I had to head out to the doctors to get antibiotics and drops first thing. Man’0 man ear infections are painful. The doc tells me it is that time of year in the tropics and that they are really common during the wet season…..hmm now that is something i didn’t know! So whilst I would love to be stamping today, I think I will be catching up on some sleep instead.

I made this card for my new hair dresser here in Cairns. This week i actually had my hair straightened! (now that is a whole other post!) But I wanted to send her a little thank you card, because she asked me to come in a few days later to have it washed and blow dried for free……..a girl can always do with a bit of pampering and how much nicer when it is FREE too! so yeah, just a little thank you card. The image is from Stampingbella, and the greeting, that being the word Diva came with it, I hand wrote the word Hair (hope it isn’t too noticeable!) The dsp that I used is from, My mind’s eye. Good fun….

Check out the DT’s creations and be inspired!

here are the links to their creations:

Cindy

Kirsty

Renee

Chantelle

Sarah-Jane

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 11th March midnight to get your entries linked.

I will be announcing the winner and honourable mention on Friday the 12th March in the afternoon.

I have lots more to share with you too, so hope to be back with that tomorrow, after our 3:30am trip to the airport to pick up Rod’s parents who are coming for a visit.

have a goodie!

Hey peeps,

WOW has this week gone fast or what!!! I think it zoomed by. i managed to get lots of those yucky jobs, like paper work, paying bills, cleaning and the biggest basket of ironing done this week, but not a whole lot of stamping unfortunately. I kept thinking, “oh when I get this done, I will start to stamp, and when i get that finished etc, but instead those things just too so much time. A good feeling though to have it all done.

Today it was the kids school Swimming Carnival, and I was a volunteer for the day and i am feeling rather knackered now after being in the sun the whole day. I had a great time and it was nice to get to know some of the teachers. I was a time keeper, so had my hand on the pulse all day! I can’t believe that i forgot the camera again, and didn’t get any snap shots of the kids, which is such a shame!

Anyway onto the winning entries for the challenge this week! Lots of fun girly butterfly creations this week, which was great!

Again picking a winner is hard, but I was really blown away by this gorgeous creation from Helen! I loved this the second I saw it, with the large knotted ribbon, the framed butterfly and the scored cardstock at the top! Just gorgeous Helen and a well deserved winner!

Next up is this weeks honourable mention and I chose this creation by Karen Beazley. I am loving the three butterflies in a row, and how they are on the frame, and of course with the pearls it really tops them off! Wonderful creation Karen!

Of course there was plenty of other amazing creations as well, so be sure to sit by and view them all on the Slide show.

Thanks again to everyone who played along, and I hope you will join us all again next week!

Take care my friends,

YAY!

I have this computer working,….I tell ya I am doing a very big happy dance in my swivel chair, which actually does amazing slides across the tiled floor as I have some great tunes from Florence and the machine (a band) cranking on my iPod!!!! Sooooo very excited that I have this blogging all sorted now…..hope you can visualize it

Anyhooooo, even though most of you have seen this post on the wonderful (and I really mean WONDERFUL, DT crew’s blogs this past week) Heck you prolly had your creations made days ago and have been waiting (very patiently) for me to post the Mr Linky! If you are, well your wait is over cuz here it is for ya!

Oh and I have a wee little creation to share too! I have to tell ya though, my stamping was soooooo rusty after not stamping for, oh about 6 weeks! I made SO many mistakes on this card it was not funny! Good thing you can pretty much hide all sorts of boo-boo’s when it comes to stamping!! Not all, but most. Anyhoo, here is the said card full of boo boo’s.

I don’t know if you can spot them, but I sure can! LOL! This is a gorgeous Magnolia stamp that I coloured in with my Copic markers. I used some Basic grey dsp, and the ribbon and greeting along with button are all from Stampin’Up.

I took my inspiration from the following image, which you need to use as your inspiration piece for the challenge:

Gorgeous girly bedroom….

So for those of you who haven’t seen the DT’s creations yet, you can view them all here along with the instructions on how to play along!

Dawn

Cindy

Kirsty

Renee

Chantelle

Sarah-Jane

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 March midnight to get your entries linked.

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

HEY GANG!

WHOA, what a week it has been!!! This post is like 24 hours late, thanks to me not setting the post date correctly, and not having internet access to fix it! My sincerest apologies. I haven’t quite got to view all the challenge entries for this past week either yet, so I will do that asap, and get the challenge winners up for you!

You know I hate being unorganized, and letting people down, but with this whole move to the other side of the country, and not having my computer, stamps or anything else at my fingertips makes doing this all so hard! Anyway I am sure you can handle Keesh not putting in 100% for a couple of weeks, because I know you are all gorgeous and caring people!

So just a quick update before I give you the next challenge. We are still doing okay over here in the very beautiful Cairns. It is really warm this week, and hotter than usual here, but it isn’t bothering us too much, until you have to start doing some hard work

This week we were finally able to obtain a rental property, after much searching, an applications etc…..the only thing is that it is not available until the15th of February! ARGH, I am going to have to wait another 10 days of so till I see those rubber stamps!!! So seeing as we can’t move in just yet, we needed to find new temporary accommodation until then, as where we were staying is booked out. Thankfully we found a new house, a little more out of town, but it is a beautiful Holiday home with the works, so the kids are enjoying that.

All things are falling into place it is just taking time, and I have to say that it is testing my patience. Since selling in the middle of December everything has been all out of whack! Being a routine person, I struggle with things being all over the place. It is a good lesson in learning how to chill out, that is for sure. But having said that, I look forward to being back into it all! I am sure you are looking forward to that too, and seeing some regular inspiration!!!

The kids are doing really well, and Janaya had her first day of kindergarten this week which was exciting. I will have to share photos really soon, as they are sooooo super cute. I can hardly believe that my youngest is now in school!!! I don’t think it has really hit me yet because Rod is still not working so I have always got someone around, but once he is gone and I am out on my own, it certainly will be different!!!

Okay so onto this weeks new challenge! You may have seen all the DT inspiration already, and I don’t doubt that it is amazing….Me I haven’t quite got a sample for you this week, as I still don’t have my stamps ( which is such a shame!) SO please be sure to see the DT gals for inspiration!

Okay so this week we have a Sketch challenge for you:

 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 11th February midnight to get your entries linked.

I will be announcing the winner and honourable mention on Friday the 12th February in the afternoon.

Have fun with this one!

Hey again!

Oh it has been fun doing all these new announcements the past few days! I feel like I have had all these secrets, and now I get to finally share them with you.

Along with our new Design Team member we have a new Guest Designer for the month of December and January. This past month we had the very talented and wonderful Tracey Old as our Guest Designer, and i want to say a very BIG thank you to Tracey for her efforts on the DT. I think Tracey had fun, as she said in an email to me this week, that if I was ever in need of a new DT member, she would certainly put her hand up! LOL! Thanks for that Tracey, and for inspiring us all each week in the month of November.

So like I said we have a new Guest Designer for Dec/Jan…..which also brings me to let you know that the DT and myself will be taking a wee break over Christmas from the Challenges. One more week after this one! I am sure you are happy about that too, as it really is the silly season, and whilst I am sure we would love to be stashed away in our stamping studios, the likely-hood of getting that time at Christmas is definitely going to be slim! There is so much fun activities at Christmas time, and I always love all the festivities!

I am very excited to introduce you to our Guest DT, the UBER talented Anthonette Chavezfrom California! You may have seen lots of Anthonette’s work whilst playing with Kristina Werner’s colour challenges, as I think she participated in every single one, often winning a place in the top ten picks each week! I have always LOVED Anthonette’s amazing creations, as she has an amazing ability to think outside the box!

Her is a little photo of Anthonette and her Bio:

My name is AnthonetteChavez. My blog is Chavez Designs. I live in the heart of Silicon Valley in California about 1 hour south of San Francisco. I’m originally from Taos, New Mexico. I moved to California after graduation from college. I”vebeen married to Enrique, a very sweet, creative, super technical engineer, for over 8 years. We have a 6-year old son, Kalino, who is the greatest gift ever. He loves everything related to robots. I’m a former Software Technical Writer. I worked for a large mainframe computer company for almost 14 years. I’m currently a full-time mom. I volunteer at Kalino’s school several days a week. I work in the school’s library once a week. I’ve been stamping for over 12 years. Rubber stamping became my true hobby when one of my best friends showed me a PSX rubber stamp catalog. I fell in love with all the stamps and the samples. Shortly after that, one of my coworkers became a Stampin’ Up demonstrator. We started going to craft shows and free demonstrations at stores. I was hooked. I love this hobby! Thanks for this fun opportunity, Keesh.

Please be sure to welcome Anthonette to the DT!

Okay so now all the announcements are done it is time to get to business with this weeks Challenge! This week we have a lovely Inspiration image to work with. If you love your girly colours, I am sure you will LOVE this one!

Here is the Inspiration image for you:

Isn’t this bedroom adorable?

Here is my inspired creation:

I actually skipped a lot of the green on this one, and used the flower with the love heart centre on the end of the bed spread as my inspiration. The product deets will be at the end of the post.

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 - Is on holidays, but will still try to play along!

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 10th December midnight to get your entries linked.

I will be announcing the winner and honourable mention on Friday the 11th December in the afternoon.

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