I have been semi-busy in my craft room. Camelot are having a market on Sunday 2nd Feb at their shop and anyone can have a stall there selling their hand-crafted goods of excess supplies so I thought it would be a good time to go through my stash and get rid of anything I know I will not use. You know what they say one girls trash is another girls treasure. I have got about half way through and got sick of trying to decide what I want to keep and what I don't so diverted to decorating the cover of a book. I badly need a new recipe book so decided to decorate a book cover for this use. I did not want it too bulky as it has to stand up to some pretty rough handling so this is what I came up with.

I coated the cover with Gesso to start, then Luminarte silks in guatemalan green, snap dragon and sunflower. When that was dry I used Kaisercraft Leaves stencil and Matisse Iridescent Medium to create some texture. Next I stamped randomly (if there is such a thing) over the whole area with Kaisercraft Alphabet, Numbers and Grid clear stamps and Stayzon Black Ink. With my Mont Marte Yellow Pastel Glider (similar to Gelato) I added some yellow highlights around the edge if the cover. I then cut the cupcakes out of patterned paper and stuck them on. I added some detail and highlights and shading using my Faber-Castell pitt pens. The "sprinkles" on the cupcakes was made by painting some chipboard white and then using a punch to make the tiny circles. Although it does not show very well in the photos the "sprinkles" have a coat of Kindy Glitz for a bit of sparkle. The chipboard letters for the title were painted white then sprayed with Yellow Daisy Glimmermist. I then used a couple of yellow pitt pens for a bit of shading on them. All of that was topped off with a coat of Mod Podge.

With the temperature being in the 40's for the rest of the week I think I will have plenty of time in my craft room to sort through the rest of my stash, I don't plan on venturing too far outside.

Thanks for dropping by
Till next time
Cheers
Julie

Happy New Year to everyone who is reading this.

I have been very quiet on here for about 6 or so weeks as I have just not felt the urge to do any creative stuff.

I have made a card for my friend's birthday. It is an easel card and I quite enjoyed making it so hopefully the urge to make paper things will return in full force very soon.

I have set myself the task of cleaning out my scrapping room and getting rid of all the things in my stash that I will not use as part of the problem of getting into a project is being overwhelmed with the sheer bulk of supplies in my stash and wanting to use them all and then loosing interest when I can't decide what to use.

Last year on the 1/1/13 I took a photo of myself and posted it here on the blog and said I would take another photo on 1/1/14 so I could see what changes the year had made. This is the photo from this morning in Black and white and in colour

And this is the photo from 1/1/13.
I prefer my hair cut in 2013 photo so will have to talk to my hairdresser about that.

While I was having my shower yesterday morning I started thinking about the things that had happened in 2013. I turned 60, Charli started school, I had laser eye surgery to correct my long vision, We celebrated our Ruby wedding anniversary, I had a cancer removed from my nose. We spent 3 weeks in Port Douglas/Coolangatta. Cindy celebrated her 40th birthday.
The year was so busy and yet they are really the only things that happened. I guess living just fills in the rest of the time.

Thanks for dropping by
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Cheers
Julie

This layout was created for the Challenge at My Creative Scrapbooks using this sketch. Unfortunately I forgot that the challenge finishes on the 14th of the month and did not post it on their site in time.

I have used Iridescent Gel Medium with a Kaisercraft stencil on the background. The two patterned circles were cut with my Cricut and the Paper Lace Cartridge. The wooden arrows had a couple of light coats of white acrylic paint and both photos lift up to reveal more photos underneath

I have been very lucky this week. A knock at the door delivered these great books, a prize from Scrapbook Creations for a competition they had in their magazine last month. I have been doing some art journaling and I was keen to get the Journal It book.

Then on Thursday I got a call from Seriously Scrapbooking to say I had won a prize in their Ovarian Cancer fundraising raffles. There were 38 prizes up for grabs and I was lucky enough to get the La La Land prize valued at $250. 

Ray and I spent Monday and Tuesday in Clare with two of my sisters from Port Lincoln. It was very pleasant and a nice break away from the "routine" of everyday life. My sister from Whyalla joined us on Wednesday bringing my Mum with her so Mum could come and stay with us for a few days. She is with us now and is flying home on Monday.

Thanks for dropping by

Till next time

Cheers

Julie

I have finally got around to scrapping. I saw this great sketch over at Stuck?! Sketches and decided to play along.

This is the sketch

And this is my layout. I started with a white sheet of cardstock, sprayed it with some Glimmermist, applied some texture paste, that I had coloured yellow with some acrylic paint, through a TCW stencil. I used black Stayzon ink with a Kaisercraft numbers stamp and a Glitz curved chevron roller stamp next. I watered down some black and white acrylic paint and splattered that here and there. The chipboard chevrons are painted with acrylic paint and the 3 star cluster and the paper behind the photos was sprayed with Glimmermist and then I used Viva Pearl Pen in black to put a small dot of colour on the points. I have used black crystal on the centre of the stars and the banner. The banner was cut out using Spellbinders Nested Lacy Pennants die. The title was cut out on my Cricut using Mickey Mouse Font and Cuttin' Up cartridges.

Thanks for dropping by
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Cheers
Julie

Today is saturday... I am feeling a little lost today. I have had my class at Camelot this afternoon but that is about all I have done all day.

Ray is DJ'ing in Kadina tonight and I decided not to go with him as he is working alone and will be busy all night. I had great plans of getting into lots of scrapbooking and messy stuff but just can't seem to get into it. I sat down in front of the telly to eat my tea and ended up watching the kids movie that came on after the news and have only just got into my craft room. I have got lots of scrapbooking "stuff" out and sitting on my work table but just can't seem to work up the enthusiasm to make anything of it.

We had a great trip to Loxton/Berri/Renmark last weekend. We stayed at our friends house in Loxton and on Friday night we went to the Renmark hotel for the River Rockers 20th Anniversary celebrations which were held over the whole weekend. The band was Jam Train and Ray was the DJ. On Saturday afternoon after Ray had set is DJ stuff up in the Berri Town Hall ready for the saturday night function we went out to the Woolshed Brewery and had a couple of drinks with our friends sitting on the deck overlooking the Murray. A great spot, would recommend it if you are up that way.
The saturday night function had The Cruise Bothers as the band and it was packed as usual.
Sunday was the farewell breakfast at Martin Bend but I did not go as I had been up most of the night sitting on the toilet. When Ray got back from that we drove home and I spent the next 3 days as close as possible to a toilet. Was glad when wednesday arrived and I felt better.

So, as I have not been doing any crafty stuff, will share some thoughts with you tonight instead.....

outside my window... it is a really nice night. It is pitch black but the weather is fine.

I am thinking... why aren't I making the most of this great opportunity to get scrappy.

I am thankful for... my life. I am so lucky to be where I am. I do appreciate it but sometime ...

I am wearing... track pants and windcheater

I am going to... go to bed soon and hope that I wake up in a better frame of mind tomorrow.

I am currently reading ...Australian Scrapbooking Ideas

I am pondering... a few days away with a couple of my sisters.

I am hoping ... the weather is kind to us while we are away as we will be camping

I am creating... nothing???

On my mind ... anxiety about my lack of interest in things at the moment.

From the kitchen ... Ginger beer. My new favourite drink. I had a go at making some but I used recycled coke bottles and caps and the gas leaked out so the ginger beer was flat. Threw all that in the bin and need to start all over again. Am going to buy brown bottles and new caps and hope that works. I used to make ginger beer years ago and never had any problems with it but I did use glass bottles with crown caps and white sugar, this time I used raw sugar

Around the house... I need to do the dusting. I can write my name on the furniture

One of my favourite things ... the seaside

A few plans for the rest of the week... alter some trousers for me and fix a t-shirt for Charli. Buy some shorts. Tomorrow we are going to the Coast FM open day for a couple of hours.

One picture to share... Winchester Cathedral. Love the song and had to go and see it while I was in the UK last year.

Thanks for dropping by
Till next time
Cheers
Julie

Just a quick post today to show you what I have been doing.

I did a mixed media class at Paper Flourish on friday with Janine. These are the two techniques we learned.

These first two pages we covered roughly in texture paste then pushed the doilies into the paste to attach them to the page. We then used sprays, distress ink and stencils, stamps and gelato's to add colour and texture

This page we used Twinkling H2O's to colour 4 sheets of book paper which we then cut up and covered the page with the pieces. Then we applied texture paste that had been coloured with acrylic paint through a stencil to cover the page. We then stamped the girl image on plain book paper and some of the book paper we had coloured with the Twinkling H2O's and fussy cut and layered them onto the plain book paper image. Then we stamped and attached the saying and finished off with some stamping and black Gelato around the edges. Red is my favourite colour but this was just too red for me.

So on sunday I decided to do this same technique in a different colour and this is what I ended up with.
I have used the same techniques with the addition of some Perfect Pearls to the skirt. The effect of the perfect pearls was lost when I put a layer of Matte Mod Podge over the top.

Thanks for dropping by
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Cheers
Julie

I have been missing in action for a while now, I have been pretty busy and a little bit lazy.

Have been away to attend my nephew's wedding in Port Lincoln over the long weekend. It was great catching up with family and some friends that I have not seen for a couple of years.

I have been doing an online course with Christy Tomlinson. I actually purchased about 5 I think. I have done some but I have just started the She Art one. I have completed my first She Art girl on a canvas.

A mixture of techniques here using acrylic paint, paper, stencil, gel medium, patterned paper, rub-ons, stamps, ink, permanent pens and some die cuts. The skirt of the dress is paper pieced to give it a ruffled look.

I am quite happy with my first attempt. I have still got another one or two lessons in this series so will start on that next week. I have also enrolled in She Art 2 so wonder what that will entail.

I feel like doing a bit of scrapbooking now so will give the on-line course a rest for a week or so.

Off to a dancing workshop tonight so better get going.

Thanks for dropping by

Till next time

Cheers

Julie

A very lazy day today. I went to yogalaties and then did nothing much except create this very simple layout as a demo piece for saturdays class at Camelot.

I have painted the chipboard with acrylic paint and the stamped it with Victorian Velvet Distress Ink, which you can hardly see, and then applied a couple of coats of UTEE to give it a nice high gloss

The photo was taken at Birdwook Rock and Roll Rendezvous in April 20111

The bell has just gone off on the steamer so its time for tea

Thanks for dropping by
Till next time
Cheers
Julie

And so the closing of a chapter (album). This is the final double layout for my Switzerland 2009 album.
I am looking forward to doing some non travel related pages for a while but then it is back to my 2011 trip to the UK and Switzerland.

We did not go out last night. Ray was feeling a bit warn out and still stiff and sore in the back so we decided to stay home. We may go out tonight for a while, depends what is on.

I spent the last couple of days in Niederweningen (an outer suburb of Zurich) at the home of Anne and Will's friends Madeleine and Heini. These last pages show their home, the car we had while we were there and a photo of the 5 of us. In the pocket, made using a printed transparency, under the large photo are my diary pages for the last few days and my return travel documents.

The postcard shown here under the photo was sent to my by Madeleine and Heini after I returned to Adelaide. I have put it on a hinge so I can still read the message on it.

Off to my class at Camelot this afternoon.

Thanks for dropping by
Till next time
Cheers
Julie

Sharing some more of the layouts I have made for my Switzerland 2009 Album. I have only got 1 double page to go and the album will be complete.

Thanks for dropping by
Till next time
Cheers
Julie