My First Blog Award!

Thank you to Sue Madex for awarding me a Brilliante Weblog award. It is nice to know that you think my humble little blog deserves an award and well done to you too. I check out your blog everyday.

Here are the details and rules for this one. The Brilliante Weblog is awarded to blogs on the basis of an excellent theme and/or design.
1. Upon receiving the award, post a link to the blog awarding it to you.

2. Name and post the links of 7 or more blogs that you believe are noteworthy for their theme and/or design. Notify the blog authors of their award.

3. Optional. You can choose to post the award on your blog.

Choosing who to pass this award onto was such a difficult task as I read so many blogs everyday and I think you all do such a great job. Here are the 7 people I finally decided upon:

1. Zarna's World - Zarna loves Stampin' Up! products as much as I do and her blog is full of her wonderful cards, scrapbook pages and off the page items. She is also my downline and friend. If you live in Parkes NSW and are interested in Stampin' Up's wonderful products, send her an email. She will be more than happy to help you.

2. Just give me Stamps - I have been checking out this blog since I first started Stamping. I love Laurie's style. Her cards are always so beautiful and elegant.

3. Teneale Williams - This is another new blogger but she has some fantastic things on her blog already. I just love her style. She is one talented person.

4. Freedom in Creating - Michelle Zindorf is an extremely talented lady. Her blog has wonderfully detailed tutorials for all of her artistic creations.

5. Dawns Stampin Studio - Dawn is a US Stampin' Up! Demonstrator. Her blog has some fantastic video tutorials. She is a very talented lady and I check out her blog everyday.

6. Chantelle's Stampin Space - This is another fantastic Australian Stampin' Up! demonstrator. Her cards, off the page items and scrapbook pages are just amazing.

7. K Werner Design - Kristina's blog is just amazing. It is another blog that I have visited regularily since I first started Stamping. She has great video tutorials and colour inspiration challenges. I love her cards.

Thanks to these 7 people and the 50 or so other blogs I read everyday for all your inspirational ideas. Thanks for sharing!

I will be posting two more cards soon. I just have to take the photo's and upload them to my blog but it is time for me to go to sleep so it will have to wait.

Sneak Peek Number 3!

This card has been made using three beautiful things from the new Spring Mini. The stamp is from Bloomin' with Beauty (I will have another sample card using one of the other stamps in this set soon). The Patterned paper is from the Holiday Harmony Designer Paper Pack which as you can see can be used for more than just Christmas Cards. Finally I have used the gorgeous wide Purely Pomegranate Satin Ribbon.
For the watercolouring I have stamped the image in Black Stazon Ink on watercolour paper then used the markers and also the pomegranate ink pad with the blender pen to put colour in the shadow parts of the flower. I then used my Aqua painter to blend the colour out. Finally I outlined the whole flower with the Going Grey Marker.

Stamps: Bloomin' with Beauty, Linen, Occasional Greetings
Paper: Holiday Harmony DSP, Water Colour Paper, Always Artichoke, Purely Pomegranate and Very Vanilla CS
Ink: Always Artichoke, Purely Pomegranate, Sahara Sand, black Stazon, going grey marker and Basic Black
Accessories: Aqua Painter, Markers, Blender Pen, Urban West Rub-Ons, Rich Regal Brads, Dimensionals, Snail, 1/16 handheld Circle Punch and Pomegranate Satin Ribbon

Sneak Peek Number 2!

Well this isn't really a peek, more a little bit of exciting information about the stamps in the New Spring Mini Catalogue. All the stamp sets are DIE CUT. How cool is that! This means no cutting which will make mounting your stamps that much easier and quicker!

Remember if you haven't got a copy of it yet all you need to do is let me know you want one and I will post it to you free of charge.

More Sneak Peeks to come.

Sneak Peek Number 1!

Ok here goes. This is the first card I have made using the beautiful new products in the Spring Mini Catalogue that starts on the 1st of August. Have I said yet how much I love it?

This card uses the new Summer Picnic designer paper which is just to die for. It matches perfectly with the Tart and Tangy Stamp set which I have used here as well. I first saw this stamp set in the US blogs that I read and I just loved it. I jumped for joy when I saw it in the Mini Catalogue and was so excited that I rang my downline in Parkes to tell her about it and forgot that it was early in the morning and I woke her up......whoops. Thankfully when she got her demo copy from the post office she forgave me because she was just as excited about the catalogue as I was. Any way back to the card. Here are the SU products that I have used:

Ink - So Saffron,

Markers - Real Red, Old Olive, Pumkin Pie and Close to Cocoa

Card Stock - Textured Old Olive, Whisper White and Real Red

DSP - Summer Picnic Designer Paper

Stamps - Tart and Tangy, So Many Sayings (hostess Set)

Punches - Word Window, 1 3/8 Circle and 1 1/4 Circle

Other - Snail Adhesive and Dimensionals

Well I hope you liked your first sneak peek and I am keen to hear what you think about it. I will hopefully have another card to show you tomorrow so stay tuned. Remember if you want your very own copy of the Spring Mini please email me with your name and address and I will post one out to you free of charge.

Two Baby Cards

I have had quite a few people I know having babies lately so I have had to get my act together and make some baby cards. This first one was for twins, a boy and a girl which mean't it had to have both girl and boy colours. I just had to use chocolate chip as the base as it seems to go with just about everything.
Here are the SU products that I used to make this card:
Ink - Purely Pomegranate, Ballet Blue and Chocolate Chip
Card Stock - Whisper White and Chocolate Chip
DSP - Close to Cocoa DS Prints
Stamps - Lovely Labels, So many Sayings and Warm Words
Markers - Chocolate Chip (for the little 2 above happiness and for the names of the twins)
Punches - Scallop Circle and 1 3/8 Circle
Other - Snail Adhesive and Dimensionals (to pop up the centre square)For this next card I ended up using the retired Wheel "Wash Day" so it is no longer available but I thought it was a good example of how you can use the outline Wheel Stamps with a black ink cartridge and then colour in the image using your markers. I have also used the crimper to crimp the Chocolate Chip cardstock for added dimension.
Here are the SU products I have used:
Ink - Chocolate Chip and a Basic Black Wheel Cartridge
Card Stock - Chocolate Chip, Ballet Blue, Bashful Blue and Whisper White
Markers - Night of Navy, Ballet Blue, Mellow Moss, Creamy Caramel, Close to Cocoa, Bashful Blue and Real Red
Stamps - Lovely Labels, Warm Words and Wash Day Wheel (retired)
Punches - Scallop Circle, 1 3/8 Circle and 1 1/4 Circle
Other - Crimper, Dimensionals (to pop up the Whisper White panel and the scalloped circle) and Snail Adhesive I still have more to make so I will post them when I have finished them. Stay tuned because the next post will be of a card I made using the goodies I got from my Spring Mini Pre-order!

I Have Been Busy

Before I show you the cards I have made using the stamps in the new Spring Mini Catalogue I thought I had better catch you up with some of the cards I have made lately.

The card on the left I made for my sister-in-laws birthday and uses the following SU products:
Ink - Elegant Eggplant, Perfect Plum, Always Artichoke, Purely Pomegranate and Sahara Sand
CS - Elegant Eggplant, Purely Pomegranate, Whisper White and Sahara Sand
Stamps - Natural Beauty and En Francais
Other - Distressing Tool (cutter kit), Black and Clear Embossing Powder, Heat Tool, Versmark, Sponge Daubers, Sponges, Dimentionals, Snail Adhesive and White Organdy Ribbon (retired).

The card on the right is for a friends 60th birthday and uses the same equipment only different colours:
Ink - Ballet Blue, Night of Navy, Bashful Blue, Whisper White and Sahara Sand
CS - Ballet Blue, Night of Navy, Whisper White and Sahara Sand
Stamps - Natural Beauty, Sincere Salutations and En Francais
This card I made for my mother-in-laws birthday and hopefully she has received it before she reads this blog. I used the layout from this card, http://www.alisatilsner.com/blog/?p=302. It uses the following products:
Ink - Chocolate Chip, Sahara Sand and Basic Black
Markers - Ruby Red, Old Olive and Summer Sun
CS - Chocolate Chip, Whisper White and Ruby Red
DP - Old Olive Prints
Stamps - So Lovely (hostess set), En Francais and Sincere Salutations
Other - Distressing Tool (cutter kit), Chocolate Chip Wide Grosgrain Ribbon, Sponge Daubers, Dimentionals and snail.
Well that's all for now as I am tired. Tomorrow I will have some baby cards to show and maybe some mini catalogue samples to show you.

NEW Spring Mini & Starter Kit Promo

There is a New Spring Mini Catalogue that begins on the 1st of August and all I can say is WOW I Love it. I have just ordered a heap of mini catalogues today so if you want a copy just send me an email or give me a call and I will post one out to you for FREE. I have also ordered heaps of goodies from the mini catalogue in my demonstrator pre-order so when I get those (hopefully at the end of this week) I will use them to make up a few samples and post them on this blog.

If you have been to the Stampin' Up! website (www.stampinup.com.au) lately you would have noticed that from the 1st of July till the 15th of August the Stampin' Up! Demonstrator Starter Kit is on special. During this time you will get $25 off the Starter Kit - Over $560 worth of Stamping and Business Supplies for only $299.

Here are a few pieces of information about joining up that you may not know:

1. You can be a hobby Demo. You don't have to hold workshops, you can simply sign up to get your products at a discount.

2. There are no yearly fees and no penalty for leaving SU. To remain active all you need is to have sales of $500 per quarter (3 months). These can be made up of your own purchases but if you have friends or family who love SU products that is an easy target to achieve.

3. If you sign up during July you don't need to make the $500 minimum until the end of your first full quarter which would be the end of December.

4. Your first order over $300 within 45 days of joining gets you a 30% discount.

5. You can tailor the Starter Kit to suit your style. You choose the stamps, colours and cardstock that are included in your kit, (as long as they are of equal or lesser value to the ones in the kit example). So if you have a wish list as long as your arm why not sign up and get great products at a discount.

If all this sounds interesting to you feel free to contact me for more information. digitalfox1975@hotmail.com