Swallowtail thumping

Everyone seems to love this beautiful swallowtail butterfly, as I do! When I want to try a new technique or a challenge I am often drawn to it as it is a large and bold image.

On my Internet tour this morning I came across a colour challenge at the Paper Players blog. Http://thepaperplayers.blogspot.com

The three colours to use are: Gumball Green, Midnight Muse, and Raspberry Ripple.

 I love this 3D effect of layering the wings over the stamped image. I've combined several ideas here. The wings have been "thumped" with my stampin' up! Marker pens to add the blue on red and green on blue colouring.

For further interest I have stamped clock works and French Folliage in the background and used  Sweet Essentials for the thinking of you sentiment.

Hostess special for May!

Did I mention that Stampin' Up has a Hostess special running until 30 May?
I think I did ... but just in case let me spell it out!
If you hostess a party, place a group order or customer order that comes to $400 before 30th may, you will receive not the usual $60 in free product but $120 worth of free product just for you!
That means if you have a little afternoon crafting party at your place and ten of your friends spend $40 each you get $120 to spend on anything you want from the Stampin up catalogue.
You could order a Big shot machine for only $29, or a whole suite of products from any of the current catalogues: specialty paper, ribbons, ink and punches.
Give me a call on 0468 877 125 if you'd like to have a Stampin' up! party at your place or you have a large order to put through for yourself and some friends!

Inchie squares gift box

This lovely gift box is so cool to make. It's called a one sheet wonder card box.

It will hold a whole stack of C6 envelopes and handmade cards.

Created from a piece of 12 x 12 " white cardboard (the backing piece that comes with a pack of patterned paper) and lots of squares of embossed paper.

 This idea comes from the lovely Tanya Bell at StampingT.com.au

She made hers with 20 x 1 1/4" squares of patterned paper.

 I have stepped it up by using the Natural Composition Specialty embossed paper and simply sponged all my squares with Elegant Eggplant ink.

 My embellished box uses the gorgeous two-tone grey ribbon in the seasonal catalogue, two different purple ribbons from Stampin' Up! and several blossom and flower punches.

I did a fair bit of scrunching and distressing of the flower (great stress release) and added three beautiful feathers.

Enjoy!!!

Simple butterfly - Papillon Potpourri

 See I can do simple cards!
This one is based on texture and just two colours: the Elegant Eggplant and Pool Party colours go very well together don't you think?
My textured cardstock is created with the ever faithful Big shot machine... that I can not do with out.
Behind the butterfly is: Cloudy Day and on the base of the card: Lacy Brocade.

My cute little butterfly is a stamp from "Papillon Potpourri" punched with the Bitty Butterfly punch.
Don't miss those pretty pearls ... I said I have them on everything!
We could make this card at your place - contact me to book your party during May and remember you will receive a FREE Classic INK PAD from me AND $60 extra product when your order reaches $400!!!
Using the $120 worth of free product you could have a Big shot machine for only $50!
Ask me how we can do this for you during May's Hostess special.

Fine Feathers and Papillon potpourri butterfly

 I love feathers... in a hat, on a hair clip, a feather bower, from a bird, or on a card...
There has been a real interest in all things feathered in the crafting style trends.
Stampin' Up is right up there with new styles and trend with the gorgeous stampset called Fine Feathers.
What do you think of my card?

 I have chosen a selection of greens and a touch of white and purple. Elegant Eggplant to be exact!
My gorgeous sister has a stash of feathers and shared some duck down with me to put on my card.
I think it's the same as the stamp I've used!

Fine Feathers (5 stamps) $22.95 clear mounted.

Wisteria Wonder and Pool Party... just thinking

Another Thinking of you card... changed the colours to the very in - colours: Pool party and Wisteria Wonder.
I think they look very cool together.
Just thinking was inked with my Wisteria Wonder Stampin' Write marker and stamped on a whisper white circle punched out.
The lovely flowers are inked in Wisteria Wonder and Elegant Eggplant markers, then punched with the blossom punch and the small scallop circle punch.

I have pearls on everything at the moment. Love how they come in so many different sizes for the centre of flowers and accents on words.   Enjoy!

Just thinking...

That's the name of this single A la carte stamp. "Just thinking..."
It says: Thinking of you - Friend.
Do you ever send cards to friends with a photo or letter inside?
This one fits beautifully in a circular punch or framelit.
To create the coloured words I inked up the stamp rubber with my coloured markers.
Midnight Muse, Gumball green, Raspberry Ripple, Summer Starfruit and Primrose petals.
Behind the sentiment I have cut strips of patterned paper from various papers and layered a Bitty butterfly punch with pearls on top.

A little "This and That" Specials in May!

It is May, the middle of Autumn and we are so fortunate here in Australia to have such fabulous weather at this time of year.
On our walk to school each morning we are able to smell and admire beautiful flowers: hibiscus, Mock orange, camellias, and purple tibuchina.
While on the other side of the fence: Autumn leaves colouring up from yellows to red and brown.
While on the stamping scene we have lots of fabulous new offers going on -

Firstly, continuing until 30th May is the amazing
 "May Hostess special"!!!!
That's right when you host a card making party you will RECEIVE AN EXTRA $60 of FREE PRODUCT This is on top of the usual hostess benefits.  What does this mean?

If you place an order for $400 you will receive $120 in free products!!

The extra $60 applies whether you hold an actual workshop, or you place a large order with a few of your friends. Ask me to come to your place and we can plan your extra $120 of free product and to sweeten the deal, the first person to book a party in May will receive a FREE Classic stamp pad from me.

Today Stampin' up! released  a new product line called "This and That" .
"This and That" will be available in the upcoming new Annual Catalogue due out on July 1st.
It has been released early so that we can play with it NOW.

The "This and that" product suite contains a journal and a variety of coordinating products:

•  Epic Day "This and That" Art Journal $18.95

• Epic Day "This and That" Designer Series Paper $18.95

• Remember "This and That" Rotary stamp!!! $9.95

• Epic Day This and That Designer Stickers $8.95

• Epic Day This and That Designer Washi Tape $8.95

As the list implies you can purchase these products singly, OR as a product bundle at 15% off.
The bundle is a perfect mother's day gift at: $55.88.
Check out the video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=kwg7yFG8KIo

During May there is a STARTER Kit SPECIAL. The fully customisable Stampin' Up! starter kit costs $169 and for that you can choose whatever you want to put in it, up to a total of $235
So whats the SPECIAL?  RIGHT NOW you will receive an additional $60 worth of product in your kit! That comes to $295 worth of product for only $169. This special is only available also until the 30th May.  Give me a call and ask me if this sounds like a good deal to you. Nerida: 0468 877 125

But that's not all for May... We also have a My Digital Studio Sale!!!
Don't forget the MDS Trial version is still available and it is completely FREE (for 30 days).
And, get 25% off select My Digital Studio content until June 15th. This includes all ensemble, calendar, photobook and swatch book digital content. If you have downloaded MDS this is a great opportunity to add to your library of  digital content. You can make cards, and scrapbook pages with digital content.

A new trifold card - Artistic Etchings

At crafters anonymous class on Monday night we created with a great new card fold.
I decorated mine with Artistic Etchings stamps and Fan Fair patterned paper.
Here is the front all decorated with stamps, punched butterflies, die cut sentiment, doilies and fussy cut  Eiffel tower (with pearls).

I felt so artisitic decorating the blank canvas with my favourite stamps and patterned paper.
It is made with just one piece of double sided patterned paper. Eight inches by 12 inches and cut diagonally in half. This card will be going to a very special friend... I think.

Card Recipe:
Stampset: Artistic Etchings, Memorable Moments.
Designer series paper: Fan Fair
Paper Doilies
Cardstock: Very Vanilla.
Ink: Basic Grey, Crumb cake, Versamark.
Embossing powder: Pool Party. Heat tool, Big shot, Labels collection framelit Die,
Elegant Butterfly and Itty butterfly punches, Pearls, Stampin' Trimmer, dimensionals.

And here it is from the back, showing the very vanilla stamped panel to write your message on the back. Here I added some scallop circles and an embossed Eiffel tower (avec pearl).

Have you tried My Digital Studio?

This is my first Digital scrapbook page.

It is very simple and very easy to do on MDS - the Stampin' Up! digital scrapbooking program.

Have you heard of MDS? (My digital Studio).

Would you like to try it for FREE?

You can download a free copy of the program ( and use it for 30 days) with no obligation.

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How simple is scrapbooking when you don't even have to print the photos, or cut any cardstock,  ribbon, or open a box of buttons. Just click the colours, stamps, background papers, ribbon, embellisments that you like. Layer them onto a page with your photos and admire your work all on the desk top of your computer.

For your FREE download of MDS click on this link: http://www3.stampinup.com/home/au

call Nerida on 0468 877 125 if you have any questions.

Enjoy!!!

A whitish Wedding card and Challenge 3 of the cyber stamp!

 The third challenge in the weekend's cyber-stamp on Angela's forum was to design a card inspired by a photo. The picture showed cakes with ribbon, roses, pearls and flowers for a wedding.

Perfect! I have just made a card that features almost all those things.

Jess' Teacher is getting married over the school holidays so together we made this lovely card for her.

 It features the Secret garden flower stamped in Elegant Eggplant and layered onto a couple of crunched Blossom punches. All on naturals white cardstock.

Did you notice the musical notes in the background?

This is a fabulous Specialty paper called... Naturals.

The crumb cake pattern is raised with glossy embossing and the backing paper can be sponged, stamped or brayered with any ink you choose.

For a wedding card I sponged and wiped it over with my white ink pad.

Then cut out an oval from another piece and sponged that in white too.

Well it is a wedding card... white and off white are very shabby chic.

Add some organza ribbon and flower trim, Pearls and another scrunched flower - It all says wedding to me.

 ....And then we had to decorate the inside, so, 

We used a new stampset (with matching Framelits) called "Hearts a flutter" and over stamped it with last season's "Affection collection" stamps.

And then,

we added this pop up wedding dress - tad dah!!!

 The lace dress is fashioned with a piece of lace from the Embellishment Kit,

on the dress dummy from the "Established Elegance" stamp set.

It may be a little over the top but we know Jess' teacher just loved it!

And since she likes a bit of purple we thought it was just right.

Cyber stamp Challenge 2

My second challenge attempt is the colour challenge.
The challenge is to use Raspberry Ripple, Pool Party, Sahara Sand and very Vanilla.
Plus use texture, texture, texture!
My card uses the "thinking of you" stamp inked up with markers in the challenge colours.
For texture - cloudy day embossing folder, sponged with pool party ink, and a piece of Sahara card stock embossed with the fancy fan folder.
I've added Stitched Raspberry ribbon and pool party Satin ribbon, a button and punched butterflies with pearls for more textures to touch and feel.
Lastly, I sprayed it with champagne shimmer mist. I think you can see the glitter in one of the photos where I asked jess to shine a torch on it while I took the photo.

Cyber-stamp-crop at Elite Stampers!

This weekend Angela Sergeant, and the Elite stamper's team are having a cyber - stamp - crop!
Angela sets 4 challenges: a Sketch, a colour, a photo inspiration and a product challenge.
We started playing on Sat morning and it goes till Monday pm.
This is my card for challenge one. The sketch challenge.
And then I had a go at scrapbooking using the sketch.
Both use the "Tea for two" patterned papers and lots of product from the Autumn seasonal mini.

Doily dresses

I found this idea on Pinterest yesterday and couldn't wait to try my own doily dress.
You can buy doilies in a pack of 24 from the seasonal catalogue (Autumn mini) for $4.95 it goes wonderfully well with the tea for two designer papers.

Fine Feathers on a postage stamp

 I bought this stampset purely because I like feathers... and I have been looking around the internet looking for ideas. I mean I could have just copied the beautiful card in the catalogue (and perhaps I will ) but in the meantime I have been inspired by a simple card on pinterest.

 It now looks almost nothing like the original card ... as I changed the punched squares to postage stamp punch and put the sentiment "Thank you" into another square of its own.
This is the card by Tamara Bertram that inspired me:

It is a lovely idea, simple yet striking.
Mine could have been a bit simpler ... and I had to add some black ribbon to the edge.

Watercolouring my Secret Garden

 It is such a long time since I watercoloured on  a card. Perhaps a year atleast. But it is one of the easiest ways to step up a line art stamp.
I have been featuring the same stampset "Secret Garden" all this week from the seasonal mini catalogue. It makes me happy to stamp, and cut, and stick a few flowers onto a textured card, so why stop at one?

 The centre of the flower is gently painted with Wisteria wonder ink on an aquapainter brush.
While the outside petals are painted with Rich Razzleberry ink. You can vary the depth of the colour depending how much ink is on your brush. And these stamps make it just a simple task of staying "almost" within the lines.

Keeping the purple theme going I have used some spotted Elegant Eggplant ribbon tied around the card.
And some Rich Razzleberry printed paper on the bottom third of the card.
The top third is filled with Honeycomb textured embossing on Naturals white cardstock which is very nice to watercolour on.

The Secret Garden in Wisteria wonder and Pool party

Today I am showing some more Secret Garden card ideas from the Seasonal catalogue - I just love how easy it is to stamp and cut out these flowers. I have scattered them across the card and stuck them down with dimensional adhesive to pop them out from the background.

Another new product on this card is the set of Oval framelits.
I have stamped the pool party oval, textured the Gumball Green oval and stamped the Happy Birthday on another white oval from this set of framelits. Loving these pretty colours together.

Colour Refresh and Stampin' Up! News

The Stampin' Up! team have made some very exciting decisions ... colour is such a huge part of our crafting experience so it is very important that we have colours that we love,that we want to use, are on trend and in style. I am so excited because we are keeping some of my favourite in-colours that I thought I would never see again after June... I have already been rejigging my colour coach, ink pads and cardstock.

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Several colours are retiring from the colour families with the return of some favourites and three new colours.

Bermuda Bay, Crushed Curry and Smoky Slate.

These colours will be retiring as of today:

Regal Rose

Pretty in Pink

Bashful Blue

Certainly Celery

Baja Breeze

Riding Hood Red

Bravo Burgundy

Not Quite Navy

More Mustard

River Rock

So, beginning immediately all retiring and discontinued colour products (i.e. ink, paper, ribbon, accessories) will only be available while supplies last. So if there is a discontinued colour you want contact me ASAP !!! This is particularly important if you want to get any re-inkers as they are running out fast.

Also I have just found out that our watercolour pencils & crayons are being discontinued due to problems with the supplier.

The following items are only available while supplies last.

101879: Watercolor Pencils

119802: Subtles Collection Watercolor Wonder Crayons

119803: Regals Collection Watercolor Wonder Crayons

119804: Brights Collection Watercolor Wonder Crayons

119805: Neutrals Collection Watercolor Wonder Crayons

ESAD Seasonal Catalogue Blog hop

What is ESAD?

ESAD stands for "Extra Special Australasian Demonstrators" and it is an on-line group just for Australian and New Zealand Stampin' Up! demonstrators.

We so love what we do and not only do we love to share it with our customers, friends, and wonderful blog visitors, but we share our love for what we do with each other as demonstrators. We run swaps, challenges, tutorials, product know-how, and cyberstamps, and we are always there to help and support each other when it is needed.

So if you are a Stampin' Up! demonstrator located in Australia or New Zealand, then please feel free to click here to join our wonderful group.

"http://www.facebook.com/groups/esadsu"

Let the blog hop begin ....
The Autumn seasonal catalogue has been out since the first of February.

In order to show you a wide selection of ideas, 25 Stampin' Up demonstrators will each feature a product from the Autumn Seasonal mini.

I have chosen to feature the

 "Needlepoint" Embossing folder

 on my bloghop projects.

 This first card is a very simple one. I have placed the embossing folders on the top and bottom of this white card before running it through the Big shot. It gives a crisp clean row of stitches. A trio of butterfly punches and a sentiment. It makes a smart any occasion card with a very taylored look.

 My second card shows that you can put the embossing folder through upside down and get a negative indentation. I have cut out a patterned paper swallow tail butterfly and added the cloud embossing for a little sky textured background.

 Here is the same idea again with a marker coloured butterfly, a few flags of patterned paper and the needlepoint (in negative).

Then I have used the needlebpoint as a border on the card below. It gives a scalloped edge, that is not over powering on this secret garden card.

Here it is in close up.

 The stitched needlepoint looks particularly nice on velum.

On top and bottom of this thinking of you senitment.

Another idea is to edge a framelit tag to give it a stitched, needlepoint edge.

The sentiment thinking of you is from curly cute and it fits perfectly on this Apothecary accent die.

It makes a lovely edging on a small tag, such as these mother's day note cards.

And here is the needlepoint on a vintage card, it just adds that special old worldy touch.

Now pop on over to Kelli's blog, the next hop on the list and see what she has created.

23. Kelli Gordon

www.kelliskards.blogspot.com.au

Parker's Patterns DSP

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24. Angie Jones

www.angiescraftfusion.blogspot.com.au

Thats the ticket

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25. Amity Knight

www.stampinamity.wordpress.com

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