The Story of the Sparkly Horses

Munchy is quite a generous little character. She wants to give handmade cards out to just about everyone.
All the time.
For pretty much any occasion you can think of. I need to have a perpetual supply of these things.

Now I certainly can't begrudge her cards for birthdays though can I? So with 2 celebrations coming up this week she wanted to make some special requests. They simply just HAD to have horses Mum!

There's not a great deal of horse embellishments in my stash, but ta da... the Silhouette to the rescue once again and I cut out these cute Dear Lizzy designed equines.

Being short on time (as per usual) I turned to my Pinterest boards for inspiration for quick card designs. I loved this one by KellyRas from the Two Peas gallery, and used it to guide my paper placement. I kinda used it like a sketch really.

But in a joint effort, it was Munchy whom I allowed to suggest paper choices at me. Obviously with a 6-year-old though it helps if I limit her. "Do you want this red paper or this blue one?" And then she told me she wanted glitter and bling.......

well who can blame her for taking after her Mumma like that?!

Speaking of which.
If you're also a bit of a Glitter Girl then you'll want to check this out.

Flourish With a Bling are a great company to work for. The girls are very friendly and approachable, the team is fabulous and the products are second-to-none (and in very generous supply!). Find out all the details on the blog here.

Sharing the Love (FWAB winner announced)

A bit of a random posting today with a few items on my list of "things to share"....

Firstly, can you believe Mother's Day is around the corner already? I mean, I only recently just took down the Christmas tree (yes, yes.... in March... ahemm) I contemplated leaving it up until next December. Might have saved a bit of effort.

Someone who scored a few more organisational genes in our family was my sister. Since she started maternity leave she's opened up a Facebook store called Jasper Lane Designs, and in a couple of months she's already got more than 3500 'likers'. She sells the most gorgeous vintage-inspired kids clothing and jewellery. My girls have done some modelling for her recently and I was tempted to buy half the stuff myself!

What does this have to do with Mother's Day and the cards I'm showing you? Well...... this weekend she's hosting a "To Mum, With Love Showcase" where she's gathered a bunch of talented artists from around Australia to showcase some of their wares for sale. All of the products are handmade and would make great Mother's Day gifts. Because she's my sister and she asked me every so nicely (and because I love crafting so very much) I'm selling sets of these personalised cards as my contribution.

This is what is looks like up on the Showcase. I would love it if you checked them out. But it's not just me of course. There's 70 or so other sellers with everything from jewellery to aprons to wall art to maternity products.... the list goes on.

Alright... now the next thing that I couldn't help but scream from the rooftops was finding out that one of my recent layouts became a 'featured project' at Two Peas in a Bucket!! Super stoked!

Not only that but it's also hit the "Top 3 Projects by Views" which is just unbelievable to me. Here I am nestled in between projects by scrapping celebrities Waleska Neris and Celine Navarro, so forgive me for jumping up and down over here please?!

And lastly, it's time for me to announce the winner of the Flourish With a Bling Blog Hop. Congratulations Gillian - you've won the RAK from my blog! Shoot me an email with your address details and I'll have your prize in the mail as soon as I can.

xx

Champagne and Flowers

When I first laid eyes on the Out of Print collection from Basic Grey I knew straight away that I wanted to cut out all the flowers from this piece of paper....

and so I set about doing that very thing, without much plan in mind. I first used a few on the layout I shared here, but had many left over. So that's how this card came about.

I mixed in some lace stickers for added texture and interest, dabbing them with a little paint for a hint of colour. And the sentiment was easy - it's just one of the chipboard stickers.

And speaking of my card-making adventures, I just got published in the current edition of Cardmaking, Stamping and Papercraft. It even made it to the editorial page!

They always do such a great job of photographing the card and showing it off.

Oh, and look what I finally cracked.....

wooo hooo!

OUAS, TIDT and a Giveaway!!

I'm here, I'm here!! And I've got something to share! (in fact a lot, so maybe grab a cuppa)

The new sketch has gone up at Once Upon A Sketch and the challenge has began! And trust me when I say you need to go over and check this out because our Guest Designer has offered up a prize that's too good to resist! But firstly, here's my page.......

Journalling Criteria: Who is in the photo? Name the person in the photo and at least 1 fact about them. This can be personality, character, talent , achievement etc. but it must be at least 2 sentences long.
And of course, the sketch:

Now usually I'm on the side of the DT who submit pages for the 2nd sketch challenge every month, but this month I am super-duper-ly lucky to be the Guest Designer for Tidbitz in Time and I couldn't resist but use their amazingly fun July kit to whip up a page for this challenge.

This kit is amazing! The colours and textures here are right up my alley! The July kit is called 'Dream in Colour' and contains:
Five sheets 12 x 12 Girls' Paperie Patterned Paper - Jubilee Collection
Four sheets 12 x 12 Prima Marketing Patterned Paper - Melody Collection
Flocked Alphabet Stickers, Orange - Prima Marketing
Market Trims - Four yards - Girls' Paperie
Butterfly Kiss Melody - Two Pieces - Prima Marketing
Candy Gems (beads) - Two Pieces - Prima Marketing
Fabric Brads - Twelve Pieces - Girls' Paperie
Chipboard Pieces Melody - One 12 x 12 Sheet - Prima Marketing
Caboodles Flowers - 36 Pieces - Prima Marketing

So the only thing I've added to this page is the paper doily behind the photo because I needed something round to represent the circle in the sketch. I've journaled about my Mozzy Moo (as we regularly call Moodles) and how she remains quite a happy and joyful little toddler. She's always smiling, and of course, that means people are always happy around her in return.

So lots of wonderful goodies in this kit. And can you believe you will receive THIRTY-SIX gorgeous Prima flowers?! That's enough for me to sprinkle over every single one of my 4 or more projects that I plan on getting out of this kit. I'll be sharing the rest of my pages in the very near future, but in the meantime check out what the other Designers have done with it by looking in the gallery here, or blog here.

So I don't want to keep you in suspense any longer regarding our challenge prize........
Karola Witzcak is our very special Guest Designer at Once Upon a Sketch this month, and not only has she made a spectacular page for the challenge with some of her new papers, but she is sponsoring both the winner and a random participant to receive an entire collection!!! EeekkkkK!!!! I want to win!

Now if that hasn't given you enough to do already then just hold on a little bit longer.........................

As a way of making up for my recent abscences on my blog I'm offering my own GIVEAWAY too!! How about winning a $15 voucher to Two Peas in a Bucket?!! If you're interested then all you have to do is leave a comment on this post and I'll put your name into the draw.
If you're a follower of my blog leave a second comment for another chance to win, and if you blog about this giveaway I'll give you a third chance of winning :-)
I'll draw a winner next weekend on 9th or 10th.

Alrighty. Better hop to it!!

Tongue Twister

I got such a pleasant surprise one day when I popped over to Two Peas. I had Pea-Mail! It was from the amazingly talented Jen Gallacher asking if I would like to be a Guest Designer on her Stretch Your Sketch class for April :-) I was over-the-moon!!

Yes, that's right. I'm a Stretch Your Sketch Guest. Try saying that 3 times fast!

Now I won't lie, the sketch was a little challenging for me on first appearances. Mainly because I don't do circles very often on my layouts - and as you can see this sketch is all circles!!! *LOL*

I figured I had the perfect photos for it since we had just gone on a recent 10-pin bowling expedition (you know - circle sketch, bowling balls..... can you see where I was going with this?!)

And after I let my trusty Silhouette handle all the circle-work all I had to do was embellish. Easy done :-)

I used up more of my Studio Calico Candy Shoppe kit (I'm trying to become a kit-killer!) with a few other goodies thrown into the mix too.

So if you want to see my full layout and/or join in the challenge then check out all the details over here at Two Peas. Trust me, it's a lot of fun!