Scrapz.Biz Blog Hop

Hi and welcome to the the very first Scrapz.biz blog hop! I'm the first stop along your journey so I just want to wave a giant hello to everyone!!


Can I tell you how excited I am to be joining this Design Team? SUPER-EXCITED! I'm joining some other incredibly talented girls who you'll get to meet along the way. But just in case you don't even know who Scrapz.biz is then let me fill you in.....

We're an Australian online scrapbooking and craft store stocking all the latest ranges. See something you like? We'll ship it all to you for a flat rate of $5.95. Don't see what you're after? Then ask our friendly boss-lady Heike and she's sure to help you out.

We're also the home of the Ticklez kitz. Every month a new kit is released featuring a bunch of the newest papers and a huge assortment of gorgeous embellishments. And if it's inspiration you're after then look no further than our brimming gallery, or hang out in our friendly forum. We offer plenty of free tutorials for fun new techniques to try, or simply spend the day chatting away to our regulars.

At Scrapz.biz we love a good challenge, so not only do we have regular competitions but now we're pleased to offer you a new challenge every day of the week (well.... Monday to Friday at least!) Weekly challenges are something that have been around for a while, but we're shaking it up a bit by adding fresh and exciting new concepts and the chance to win even bigger prizes! Starting from October, everyone who enters one of our daily challenges will go into the draw to win a great big voucher (or two) at the end of the month. The more challenges you enter, the more chances you've got of winning. Simple right?

To get you in the mood, here's a little sneak of today's challenge that I've designed.

This is for the "What's Cooking" challenge where I give you a list of 'ingredients' that you need to include on your page. This week's challenge theme is "Driving Force" and for today's challenge the ingredients are:
* something travel themed (interpret that as you like!)
* part of your title or some journaling on a tag
* something fussy-cut (like my clouds in the sneak above)

To find out how to join this challenge and all the daily challenges, follow the link here.

Now onto the details of how you can win just for joining us on our blog hop. All you need to do is leave a comment on this blog post as well as the other blogs along the way. You'll also need to leave a comment on our Facebook page. We don't want to tire you out so we'll just be hopping along one stop a day to correspond with this week's daily challenges. Here's the schedule in case you get lost...

Monday 10th Natalie's blog with her "What's Cooking" challenge (you are here!)
Tuesday 11th Sheree's blog and her "Scrap a Rainbow" challenge
Wednesday 12th Aga's blog with her "Fetch a Sketch" challenge
Thursday 13th Shell's blog and her "Scrap Right Now" challenge
Friday 14th Chloe's blog and her "Noteworthy" challenge

So once you've finished the blog hop and left a comment on each stop along the way, make sure you go over and 'Like' us on Facebook and leave a comment there telling us what you thought of the journey. Then you'll automatically be entered into the drawing to win a $20 voucher to the store.

AND..... if you're a follower of my blog (or even if you just became one) please let me know, because I'll enter you into a separate draw to win some very yummy blog candy.

Tomorrow you'll be off to Sheree's blog to see her "Scrap a Rainbow" challenge. Happy hopping! 
The blog hop closes on Monday 17th October so don't forget to come back and check if you're a winner!

In the Beginning

I'm constantly amazed at the way my children's minds work. They surprise me with saying the funniest things as they try and figure out the way the world works.

I'm not sure if it's because Munchy thinks her Daddy is really old (!!) or if she was getting confused about the Creation stroy, or where she got this idea from, but out of nowhere she asks him, "When did God make you? Were you the first person God made?" What a funny little Munchkin she is :-)

I cracked open my Boardwork kit from Studio Calico and made this layout to document these crazy everyday moments. I made sure to add some book paper, fussy cutting and hand-stitching with embroidery thread because that's the criteria for this month's Scrap-it-Lah challenge.

You know I always add sewing to my layouts - if for nothing else I feel more confident that my pages will hold together! And whilst I love the look of hand-stitching on pages I'm generally too lazy to do it myself. So thanks to this challenge for pushing me in the right direction :-)

And I couldn't resist this happy smiling bright and fun photo of Munchy which captures her personality perfectly. Yes, I'm still working my way through a bunch of holiday snaps! More coming soon I promise.

Come back on Monday for a real treat. Scapz.biz is holding thier very first blog hop and I'm up first!! There'll be plenty of inspiration and a tonne of prizes along the way so make sure to mark it on your calander.

Mid-Week Sneak

I told you how we're starting to do daily challenges now at Scrapz.biz rather than weekly right? So today was my first day of setting the rules! Yeeeeee!!! And the first challenge for me was 'Fetch a Sketch' which of course involves supplying a sketch......

.... and a page to inspire you. I also get to choose added criteria to go along with the theme which is "On Your Bike" this week. This doesn't mean you have to scrap bike pictures though, and instead I've got some recent photos of Munchy's new scooter which she received for her birthday. My added criteria is to include something on your layout which has a sense of movement.

If you're a little confused, or just curious then you can check out my full challenge and page along with some ideas on what 'a sense of movement' means over here :-) Every challenge entry goes into the draw to win one of the monthly store vouchers. Whooop!

And speaking of sketches......
The October 1st challenge is up at Once Upon a Sketch. The journaling challenge is to WRITE  2 noteworthy (to you anyway) events of the past week. Your journalling can be as long as you wish. There is NO limit to how much journalling you include but in order to qualify as a winner for this challenge, we must see AT LEAST 1 SENTENCE of journalling on WHY each event was noteworthy. 
It's to go along with this sketch

And apart from just checking out the challenge you really need to go over to the blog and see everything that's happening. For a start we've got Julie Fei Fan Balzer as our Guest DT this month!!! EEeeekkkkK!!!! One of my all-time scrappy idols! Then there's all the new DT announcements! And of course, all the information about the prizes on offer this month, including this prize pack from Nikki Silvils (among many others!)

So plenty of things to keep you occupied right?

World Card Making Day

was yesterday as most of the scrapping world would already know, so of course I celebrated the occasion by whipping up a few cards.

This first one was just an interesting way of using up some odd bits and pieces in all the colours of the rainbow :-)

And then of course I couldn't help but play along with some of the fun WCMD challenges happening at Scrapz.biz this weekend. This one is for Heike's 3D challenge and I'm using the delightful Clementine collection by Cosmo Cricket (get ready to see more of this in the near future.... I loveit!!)

InLinkz.com

And this is for Kerryn's stamped tag challenge. I altered my tag with stamps, rubons, Glimmermist and Tim Holtz Distress Stains. I made a beautiful mess! But loved every step of it :-)

Did you make any cards this weekend?
Don't worry, you've still got time to enter the challenges at Scrapz.biz and be in the running to win some fabulous 6x6" paper pads. See all the details here.

Excitement.biz

I am super-excited to be able to announce that I am now a Design Team member for Scrapz.biz!! Wooo hoo! They're a fabulous online store with a great community on the forum, inspiring weekly challenges, monthly tutorials and a talented new Design Team (can I say that? Hhmmmmm)

Now I didn't have any newly created projects to show you to celebrate this occasion (don't panic, I've got lots up my sleeve, just none that I can show you yet!) so instead I'm sharing a bunch of older layouts which just haven't made it on my blog before.

And whilst you're browsing here let me tell you about some of the exciting things happening at Scrapz.biz so you can anticipate what's going to be popping up on my blog in the near future.

Right now as we speak we're celebrating World Card Making Day! There are 6 card-making challenges to inspire you with the chance to win some fabulous 6x6" paper pads by Crate Paper, My Mind's Eye and Fancy Pants. And to help you get in the mood, there's also 20% off all stamps, inks, embossing powders and acrylic blocks. You can find the coupon code for the sale by checking out The Buzz (which is our newsletter).

And starting on Monday we'll be hoping to inspire you with a different challenge every day of the week (Monday to Friday). A weekly challenge is nothing new to Scrapz.biz but the Design Team have decided to shake it up a bit and there's going to be fresh challenges and a different format which I'm really looking forward to. And everyone who completes a challenge will go into the draw for the monthly prizes of some very generous vouchers.

So much news hey? Why don't you sign up to the Scrapz.biz Facebook page to keep up-to-date?

PS. Did you notice how many of these pages I just shared incorporated the word 'Sunshine'? Ha!! I didn't realise how much I love and scrap this theme until I saw them all here like this! It seems I'm a little predictable hey? :-)

Good Dress Sense

Munchy keeps telling me ideas of what she wants to do when she grows up. Sometimes it's in relation to whatever TV show she just watched.... like the other day when she wanted to become an Octonaut. Or it's to do with her favourite products... like when she wanted to work in a Peanut Butter factory.

But on this day when I came home from work she was talking about persuing her interests in the hospital system. I said to her "perhaps you would like to do what Mummy does?" (she's always very interested in hearing my tales of 'helping ladies have babies')

"No" she said, "I don't want to be a doctor, I want to be a nurse". Ok, that's fine I thought. But what's the disctintion in her beautiful little mind I wondered?

"Because the nurses have a better uniform" she answered!!
Well! ..................... I can't argue with that :-)

So here's that discussion in layout-form using a mixture of Lawn Party and Into the Woods by Studio Calico. A bright rainbow of colours and some whimsical photos to complete the lighthearted theme of this page. Do you like to dedicate layouts to conversations held? I love the idea of capturing a disctint moment in time like this. Too precious to forget :-)

Things To Do on a Friday Afternoon

* Once Upon a Sketch
has mixed it up this month and are putting a twist on the normal process of picking a winner..... we want you to do it!! Just to remind you, the current challenge was to use this sketch:

 and to journal 2 lines directly onto your photo.
Make sure you pop over to the OUAS blog and check out the amazing 75(!!) entries and vote for your favourite. You've only got until midnight tonight to cast your vote :-)

* Kreatorville Kraft
are giving away this amazing truckload of goodies to one lucky winner. Or as Keandra puts it.... "It's like an extra loaded baked potato up in there!!!"

But again, you've only got the rest of the day to get your comments in to be in the draw. See all the details on the KK blog here.

* One Scrappy Doctor (that's me!)
will be coming back later today with another layout share, and returning again tomorrow with some exciting scrappy news!

Not to mention.... did you see this on the My Mind's Eye blog? Yay!!!

Septober GIVEAWAY!!

I don't know if you've tried to visit the Kreatorville blog in the last month but Keandra was having the hardest time trying to keep it online through a change of web-hosts. Anyway, the good news is that we are back up and running and to celebrate we are giving away a HUGE stash of goodies!!!

If you're the winner you'll receive over 200 sheets of patterned paper from brands like American Crafts, Basic Grey, Webster's Pages, Sassafras, Pink Paislee, Crate Paper, Fancy Pants, Making Memories and MANY more!  There's a BUNCH of alphas,rub ons, rubber stamps, ribbons and other scrap yummies inside:

All you have to do to be in the running for this amazing prize is go and leave a comment on this post, and sign up as a follower of the Kreatorville blog. Easy hey?

And whilst you're there just check out the other new surprises and announcements we've got too. Like the soon-to-be-revealed Septober kit. Yes I said Septober! It's going to be a mix of the September kit which unfortunately got missed while the blog was down (and let me tell you that this has been one of my most favourite kits to work with.... you will gasp when you see how beautiful it is!) plus some of the best bits of the upcoming October kit. Also we're about to release a new embellishment add-on for even more extra goodies to play with. And if that's not enough we've got the amazing Amy Kingsford guest designing this month so there'll be a tonne of eye-candy to inspire you :-) Well, what are you waiting for?!

An ever fixed mark

Monday, Monday.... can't trust that day.
Sometimes it's just so hard to get back into the swing of work again on a Monday isn't it? Especially if you've had a wonderful weekend off, scrapping to your heart's content.

And perhaps in my case it's made even that little bit more difficult because my work life and scrappy love-affair are quite different from one another. One is very black-and-white and governed by rules whilst the other is all about creative expression.

So I tried to convey that very feeling onto this layout, directly inspired by this pin which I'm sure you've seen if you've been around Pinterest for long enough!

I filled the right hand side of my page with the lovely bold and bright colours of my Candy Shoppe kit from Studio Calico, and generally got messy splashing around some paint and ink. This of course, represents my artistic side, my right-brain dominant personality. The other side of my page was left monochrome and I stamped on some numbers to represent my left-brain dominating. Not too sure which half of the page should be bigger?

Tell me, there must be more of you science/maths/engineering/physics type out there in the scrappy world? How do you balance the two? Is there an overlap in how you approach the two, or are they quite separate entities?

More thoughts later..... perhaps...
:-)

PS. If you want to win yourself a truck load of goodies then check this out!

True Story

Sometimes I'm a bit conservative when it comes to chosing new scrapbook supplies and I tend to stick to my tried-and-true brands - often buying large chunks of the same collection so I can be assured my layouts will be coordinated. 

But yay! I purchased and used two new-to-me brands on this page here. Both the Simple Stories 'Happy Day' collection and Bo Bunny's 'Et Cetera' have been on my radar since thier release at the last CHA and I'm pleased to see how well they work together.

The direct inspiration for the woodgrain design I painted onto the background came from this book cover I pinned on Pinterest. I love that place... so much eye-candy!

The journaling tickets I picked up from BubblyShnooks etsy store. Gorgeous hey?! And another great place to go for inspiration.

I'm so happy I managed to get another monthly layout done.... this is our June family photo, which we took whilst on holidays in Queensland.

So tell me, what are some of your favourite brands for scrapping with? Because I'm thinking maybe I need to expand my horizons a bit :-)

Spare a minute?

Another day..... another challenge blog entry! And this one was right up my alley (pun intended!!)

My fellow DT'er from Once Upon a Sketch Helen Tilbury is a Guest Designer at Scrap-It-Lah this month and she has issued the best challenge :-)

Create your own mixed media background, using printed paper as a base.  Be sure to include at least 3 different paint colours in whatever effects you fancy. Also ensure that you have at least twelve words on your layout, which can include the title, date and the journaling. How fun hey? The challenge ends September 30th and they have a gorgeous Studio Calico RAK up for grabs so I thought it was only fitting that I use up a few more of my old SC kit bits and pieces for this page.

Of course I just revelled in the idea of creating my own background and went to town with a whole rainbow of colours and a Pink Paislee stencil. Then added more drips and splats and....... general fun-ness!!

Then I cracked open the typewriter and started typing my thoughts until all the space was filled. I didn't really want to make this a page just about bowling - there's only so much you can write about that hey? So instead I made it a letter to Munchy about facing obstacles head on and such things.

I'm actually enjoying this page so much I'm thinking of scraplifting myself. Have you ever done that? I just picked up the Tim Holtz Picket Fence distress stain so I might try experimenting with that :-)

She Found Joy

I'm enjoying the time to create for challenge blogs again, and it's been absolutely ages since I joined in at Kraft It Up which is a shame. But when I saw that their challenge this month is to use a kraft base and then incorporate fabric and stitching I jumped at the chance to make a page for it!

Except.......
then I realised all my fabric is packed away in storage!

So I had to go hunting through the supplies I bought with me to find something, anything made with fabric that I could incorporate to meet the criteria. And this is what I came up with: a fabric word from Prima, lace stickers from Basic Grey, fabric paper from American Crafts, and some gauze (which may or may not have come from the hospital)! Hopefully that counts for something :-)

The stitching part of it was no trouble since I sew on all my pages anyway. In fact, it was so 'normal' to me that I had to go quite overboard with my sewing to make me feel like I was challenged!

The journaling is about Moodles lack of fear to experience new things which I think is a great quality (to some extent!!) On our recent beach holiday she just loved the novelty of all the places we went and things we saw. She loved the touch of the sand beneath her feet, and dipping her toes in the water and playing among the rock pools. Pure joy for her :-)

Photo Journaling

It was really hard to wait and show you the new Once Upon a Sketch challenge because it was just soooo much fun :-) But it's gone live and so now I can reveal the page I made for it....

 

As always the challenge comes with Journalling Criteria: This time you need to journal 2 lines directly on your photo. You can write on your photo, you can print your writing on your photo,  you can use journalling strips on your photo etc. There is no theme this time, just a journalling technique criteria. 

You must also use this sketch: 

 

 

I played around with adding my journaling to my photo on journaling stickers, or my old favourite of typewritten strips. But in the end I went with the raw and organic form of simply writing it on. I think it suits the style of my page much better. 

I stuck with the supplies out of my April Studio Calico kit 'Singing in the Rain' to make my paper and embellishment choices easier.... not to mention that I'm trying super-hard at the moment to kill some kits!! I have to admit, I still haven't succeeded with that, but I'm getting pretty close now with some ;-)

I interpreted all those horizontal strips into a set of wavy ones instead - attempting to make it look like the wavy sea that Munchy is overlooking in the photo. I have to say that girl is getting more creative every day. I was fiddling around with this layout and not very happy with it, and so I asked her what she thought I should do with it. That clever little just-turned-five-year-old of mine answered "well... just keep adding more things until it looks good........ how about some glitter?"

I didn't quite take her advice on the glitter, but I did keep going until I was satisfied.

Now..... let's talk prizes!!
The winner of this challenge will walk away with a newly released collection pack from our sponsor 3ndypapir. Here's a sneak peak of what that will look like:

And two more winners will win collection packs by Sassafras including 'Count Me In' and my absolute favourite 'Mix and Mend'.

Don't forget, this is an international challenge blog so anyone in the world can enter. Find out all the details over on the OUAS blog. I'll see you over there!