Elite challenge - Sketch challenge 28.

It is more than half way through December and I have only just created my Elite Challenges card for the month. But I have actually entered three challenges: The Sketch challenge (SC28) The colour challenge called Sugar plum fairy AND the stampset challenge (SSC - Hello Again).  

The colours to use in the colour challenge were: Perfect Plum, Pale plum, Pink Piruouette and Kraft.

I have used the Hello Again stampset from the Summer mini, using the starburst randomly as a background, and the butterflies, flower and heart as elements to meet the sketch challenge. Which comes from the sketch layout on page 19 of the summer mini catalogue.

The button used is from the Designer Buttons (the pink pirouette one) I think I attached it upside down with a dimensional so that the shiny side was upwards. The butterflies, heart and flower centre are coated in Crystal effects and then raised on dimensionals.

I have punched  the circle out of the Bella Rose Designer Series Paper with the 1 3/4" circle punch. Layering the Hello again flower on top with dimensionals for height. Enjoy!!!

So you thought you had finished your Christmas shopping?

Stampin' Up! have just announced a huge Inventory Clearance Sale!
It runs from December 15th until January 24th.
There's some fantastic stamp sets and accessories from 25 to 50% off.
Have a look at these:
Jumbo Outline Alphabet: p.121 was $77.95, now $38.98!
Stem sayings: p.96 was $39.95, now $19.98
Silver Hodgepodge Hardware: p.149 was $57.95, now $43.46
Life definitions: p.123 was $90.95, now $68.21
p92 Sprinkles stamp set was $24.95 NOW $18.71
p97 Daisy Dash jumbo Stampin’ Around wheel was $15.95 NOW $11.96

p100 Seeing Spots stamp set was $29.95 NOW $22.46
p106 It’s Maori, Mate stamp set was $45.95 NOW $22.98
p107 Wanted stamp set was $43.95 NOW $32.96
p107 Boho Backgrounds stamp set was $29.95 NOW $22.46
p114 Warm Words stamp set was $39.95 NOW $29.96
p115 Wonderful Favourites stamp set was $39.95 NOW $29.96
p120 A Little Birthday Cheer stamp set was $26.95 NOW $20.21
p121 Big Deal Alphabet stamp set was $77.95 NOW $38.98
p121 Jumbo Outline Alphabet stamp set was $77.95 NOW $38.98

p122 Wild West Alphabet stamp set was $77.95 NOW $38.98
p123 Life Definitions stamp set was $90.95 NOW $68.21

p132 Pink Flamingo Designer Series paper was $16.95 NOW $12.71
p144 Blooms die cuts was $16.50 NOW $12.38
p145 Chunky Sprinkles Stampin’ Glitter was $31.95 NOW $23.96
p149 Styled Silver Hodgepodge Hardware® was $57.95 NOW $43.46
p150 Rose Red 1″ (2.5 cm) Double-Stitched grosgrain ribbon was $19.95 NOW $14.96
p150 Chocolate Chip 1″ (2.5 cm) Double-Stitched grosgrain ribbon was $19.95 NOW $14.96

Happy Christmas Mate stamp set p.26 was $37.95 NOW $28.46
Occasionally stamp set p.30 was $69.95 NOW $34.98
Voilà a la Carte stamp set p.40 was $29.95 NOW $22.46
Voilà stamp set was $45.95 NOW $34.46
Great Grads stamp set p56 was $45.95 NOW $22.98
Family Favourites stamp set p62 was $33.95 NOW $25.46
Life’s a Breeze stamp set p64 was $56.95 NOW $42.71
Just Netball stamp set p68 was $24.95 NOW $18.71
Just Rugby stamp set was $24.95 NOW $18.71
Just Cricket stamp set was $24.95 NOW $18.71
Just Riding stamp set was $24.95 NOW $18.71
Have a good long look over a coffee and let me know if you'd like to order something, remember these special prices are only available until January 24th, or while stocks last... I think I might be buying myself a few special christmas presents too!
Enjoy!!! Nerida

Last Christmas orders

On Monday I will be placing my last stampin up order before Christmas so if there is anything you need from the Inventory sale or as a last minute gift for someone this week. Please let me know. You can email me at nerida_carter@hotmail.com

Today's card is another variation of my launch project cards. I have used Riding hood red and pink pirouette with whisper white and basic black cardstock. The ribbon is tied in a knot behind the black grommet, which turns any old knot into a neat bow.
The dragon fly is from Natures nest stampset. I have rock and rolled the fly in pink pirouette and riding hood red then used the chocolate chip marker direct to the rubber on his feet and body for definition.
The Happy birthday is a single stamp "sweet birthday" stamped in basic black ink and punched out with my word window punch, and raised on dimensionals.

Enjoy!!!

Old Olive Season of Joy with snow swirls

Christmas is fast approaching ... which means we only have another week to share our Christmas card creations. This one combines Season of Joy with the gorgous snow swirled set.

Here you can see I have first stamped the old olive card with the snow flakes from the snow swirled set then placed a sheet of acetate (aka clear transparency) on top holding it in place with four silver brads.

The bow is Old olive wide grosgrain tied and placed on the transparency with a few mini glue dots. And the oval scallop is also stuck down with the glue dots. They wont come off the transparency I've tried.

Clear "window sheets" as they are also known are a bit tricky to photograph ... too much reflection. So I have taken this one outside into the shade, propped up on one of my very dry and tired out cacti plants. I think it's flowering as a last attempt at survival in this cruel hot weather.

Products used to make this card:

Stampsets: Snow swirled, Season of Joy.

Cardstock: Old Olive, clear window sheets (acetate), whisper white.

Ink: Cotton white stazon, Old olive Classic ink.

Accessories: silver brads, oval scallop punch, Old olive wide grosgrain ribbon,

Mini glue dots.
Enjoy...

Sweet birthday Animal stories

Ahh, now is the time of children's birthdays and school holidays ... the days are longer and our girls need something to keep them occupied. I may not be able to post on my blog so often, or I will have to do so at night... Any way I wanted to share this cute card I made for my daughter's friend. It features 3 of the 4 animals in the Animal Stories stampset.

There is the pink elephant, blowing love hearts from his trunk.

The taken with Teal Whale balancing his love hearts on his tail.

And the white owl with his wobbly eyes. He is just so cute!Inside the card I took direction from my 6 (almost 7) year old expert as to where to stamp the animals and what to say...

What I used to make this card:
Stampsets: Animal stories, sweet birthday, Best yet.
Cardstock: Taken with teal, whisper white.

Ink: taken with teal, Pink passion, whisper white.

Markers: so saffron, taken with teal, rose red, bordering blue.

Punches and tools: 1 3/4 " circle, word window punch, eyelet border punch.

Mini Glue dots (stampin' Up), gold hearts and wobbly eyes (generic).

Handmade cards for Christmas

I have to show you some of the gorgous Handmade Christmas cards I have received this week, I am so awed by the creativity of my friends and the beautiful thoughts behind them. I thought the best way to show case them is with a slide show... so here it goes:

Pumpkin pie sweet cup card

I have several cards to upload over the next couple of days. I promised to upload photos of the cards I demonstrated at our Summer mini launch, I'm nearly done ... just let me know when you've had enough. This card uses the new sweet cups with the 1 3/4" circle punch, plus the Animal stories stamp and the Stem sayings set (This is one of the half price stampsets on offer until 25 January $19.95).

Don't you just love wobbly googly eyes? I dont know how I survived before mini glue dots were invented ... I have used them to adhere the eyes and they wont fall off and the glue dries instantly. No moving around while you wait for any liquid glue to dry!

The trick to this card is the smaller circle cut out behind the sweet cup and the tag that slips in behind to create a sliding door to get your jelly beans out.

And when you eat all the jelly beans you still have a birthday cake showing from the front of the card. The basket of the Hot air balloon is made with the large tag punch (turned upside down and a centimetre cut off the top). The strings on the balloon are stamped using the curving words of the stem sayings stampset.
On the sliding tag I have punched the round tag, folded it in half and glued it to the white corner rounded square. Here is the tag removed (I forgot to photograph the pumpkin one, so this one is from the kiwi kiss sample that I have shown you earlier).
Products used to make this card:

Stampsets: Animal stories, stem sayings, Sweet birthday.

Cardstock: whisper white, pumpkin pie.
Ink: pumpkin pie, riding hood red.
Tools: 1 3/4" circle punch, corner rounder, hole punch, pumpkin pie grosgrain ribbon, large square tag punch, round tag punch.
Any questions on how I constructed the card or the products used, please leave me a comment just below this post....

Butterfly prints in a sweet cup card

This is one of my favourites from the new Summer mini catalogue. There are three different butterfly stamps and they fit perfectly into the butterfly punch. They make interesting shadows on the cardstock when raised off the surface.

I have punche out a "shadow" in black cardstock and then stamped the images on Passionate pink cardstock with black ink. The centres are just a very thin strip of cardstock wrapped around both pieces and attached behind with adhesive. This allows the wings to flutter above the card.

Inside the sweet cup is a velum butterfly punched out with my new butterfly punch. Then I have touched all the edges of the velum with the 2-way-glue pen and covered it with pink superfine glitter. For extra sparkle I have placed loose blue chunky glitter in the cup.

The word stamp that comes with this set says:

I have stamped this on the Taken with Teal cardstock in black Stazon ink.
Products used to make this card:

Stampset: Butterfly prints (Summer mini catalogue) $25.95

Butterfly punch $30.95

Sweet cups (12) $6.50

1 3/4" circle punch $30.95

Cardstock: Taken with Teal, Basic black, Kiwi Kiss, Pink Passion.

Ink: Black stazon.

Velum cardstock, 2 way glue pen, superfine and chunky glitters.

Gift card holder

A friend of mine came back from a trip to Japan recently and she gave me a large packet of Japanese Origami papers as a gift. Some of them are hand painted and textured. Not sure what I could make with them at first so I thought I would make some gift card holders, or theatre ticket holders or something with a pocket to tuck a cash gift into. I have used the Real red cardstock with Basic black and whisper white accents. This pocket is just made by folding the cardstock over and gluing with adhesive at the base. The scallop square will hold the ticket or gift card neatly behind it.
I have used the scallop square punch to act as a faux lock on the edge of the card. On the first card I folded the square diagonally and on the other lengthwise. The sentiment "for you" I have mounted on basic black cardstock cut out with the scalloped oval punch. (This is still available to order through me, if you thought you had missed out).

The card is cut from half a piece of A4 cardstock, cut lengthwise and folded in thirds.
The third fold of the card is cut diagonally to form the pocket and a square of patterned paper placed behind. They would also be useful to give a chocolate in, or a fancy flavoured t-bag, or ask me to make one for you with a special stamping Joy gift certificate that your family could give to you.
Enjoy!!

Tuesday night Launch party

A few of the photos from Tuesday night's Summer mini launch Party -

Thanks to Melissa, Mel, Tracy, and Bettina for making it such a great night!
***** If you would like to test my comments and see if they are working properly just click on the word "Comments" under this post. ****

Launch night a success!!!

What a great night we had launching the Summer mini catalogue last night. I enjoyed myself and I hope you all enjoyed your lucky door prizes and the projects that we made.

For those of you who couldn't make it - Here are the projects using new products from the Summer mini catalogue:

Animal stories in a sweet cup balloon.
Colours used: whisper white cardstock, pumpkin pie cardstock and ink. Riding hood red ink (for the words). New Circle punch 1 3/4" circle that is exactly the right size to hold the sweet cup.

I love the fact that our cardstock comes in so many colours that you can match it to the jelly beans in the cup.

The Animal stories stampset comes with matching double sided paper and 4 different animals in this stampset. Lots of variations for children's birthday cards and scenes.The tag at the top opens the sliding door to allow you access to your lollies with out tearing the card and when you have finished the jelly beans you still can see the happy birthday greeting through the window.

Magnetic Book mark : I made several different colour combinations of these and experimented a lot with magnets and paper clips. Finally, they seemed to work with a bit of sticky strip and good metal placement.I am using mine to mark the pages in my catalogues that I keep coming back to. The magnet keeps it from falling out even if I turn it upside down. A nice Christmas gift too for a reader in your family.

If you guessed I like butterflies you would be right and since this one comes with a matching butterfly punch I know I will get a lot of use from it. It also fits the flight of the butterfly stampset in the main catalogue... Baja breeze seems to go with everything especially butterflies I think. I have lots of different projects in mind for this stampset and punch.

Our third project was the dragon fly card featuring the beautiful large grommets that hold the ribbon neatly together. A very tailored look. Strong metal claws keep your bow neatly in place. There are 4 colours in a pack: Five each of white, black, silver and cream.The dragon fly comes from the new Nature's nest stampset and the happy birthday stamp is a single stamp which comes with a cake too. These colours are Elegant eggplant, more mustard and Old Olive and I have inked the stamp using markers direct to the rubber stamp.

I will have a few more photos of the night to show you tomorrow ... off to make a slideshow.

Products still available from the Spring mini -

How good is this?
A few of the popular products from the Spring Mini Catalogue are still available for purchase even though the mini is now over. My two favourite products top the list. I was wondering how I was going to survive without them for the next 10 months ... but now I don't have to.
These products will also be available in next year's Idea Book & Catalogue (due for release in September 2010).
Here is a list of the still-available products:

• 114889 Scallop Oval punch $30.95
• 106960 StazOn ink pad (White pad and refill) $22.95
• 109196 StazOn Cleaner $9.95
• 112534 Jumbo brads 5/16" Neutrals Assortment $15.50
• 112533 Jumbo brads 5/8" Neutrals Assortment $13.50

Other catalogue write ins : Corner rounder punch (not listed in the current Idea book and Catalogue).

Kiwi Kiss and Baja breeze snow swirl...

Baja breeze and kiwi kiss for Christmas?
I just like these two colours together.

It has a window punched out on the right hand side to show my snow swirled Christmas tree through. I do like this idea, kind of gives a 3D dimension and you dont need glasses.

I really got into the punches with this card.

Six different punches ... 2 circles, 2 scallops, and oval and a square.

Plus you can't see it but the large snow flake has an acetate layer to make it shiny and special.

It needs something else? mmmm, ribbon - what do you think?

Christmas photo cards

Twenty two days left until Christmas ... I haven't posted all the cards out yet! And I was promising to get it all done by last month. Well, atleast I have sent the overseas cards off...

There is very little stamping on this card ... a few punches, scoring and drawing the lines for the baubles but otherwise not too tricky and not too many steps to complete a mass of cards for the friends and relatives who want a Christmas photo.

You can see from the side that I have layered the photo collage between the two layers of the card and punched a hole with my crop a dile through all three layers then tied it with some real red ribbon.You open the card to see the full sheet of photos - my collage of pictures is from different months throughout the year. (You have to love digital photos for this and the program I use is very easy - I did this in less than 20 minutes, promise).

On the first card I did I use a jumbo eyelet to tie the ribbon through, but figured this was an extra step I could do with out. Under the hole I have scored the cardstock so that it folds up neatly to show the photos and the sentiment inside.I have used several sized circle punches: 1 1/4 ", 1 3/8" and 1 3/4" ... why are they in inches? so hard to remember which is larger, and by how much larger.

Any way then I used the cut out red circle as a bauble and placed another white circle on top with the sentiment, layered on a dimensional. All of the cards were differently punched showing different photos, so if the cousins and aunties share notes, they all get a different card... hee hee!

Products I used:
Stampset: Best yet. Ink: Real Red Classic.
Real red cardstock, whisper white cardstock, Real red polka dot ribbon, circle punches, white signo gel pen, crop-a-dile.
Scoring: I used my bone-folder and ruler.

Enjoy!!!