Weekend Cyber Crop Layouts

Hi everyone
I did something new and extremely fun this weekend... I participated in a Cyber Crop at Wicked Princesses, as you may have gathered from my last post. It was super fun and I can't wait until the next one.

For the first challenge, we had a time limit and had to complete a party themed layout with the words Celebrate good times or happy birthday to you. It also had to have a landscape photo. This was a tough one as I'm such a slow scrapper but I got it done. Its my hen's party so sort of wedding related still but not as directly.

For the next challenge, we had to have a number somewhere in our layout, and it needed to be in the colours you would have for balloons at your dream birthday party, with more than one photo. So for this layout I scrapped my niece's 18th birthday party from last Friday night. This was the brightest layout I think I have ever done and I am really happy with how it turned out. I'm not sure if the photo is clear but I stuck an extra photo of the cake over where my niece was cutting her cake in the last pic, as most of the photo cut the cake out. I like the 3D affect it has.

The final challenge had to be of 2 photos of either different people at the same age or the same person at different birthday's. It had to include a birthday embellishment and circles. Mine is of my niece and nephew who are almost a year apart, with birthday's only day's apart, so always celebrated together. I love the candles. Not sure if it shows up on the photo but I embossed paper with a candy stripe design then rolled them around foam to create 3D candles.

Overall, a productive scrappy weekend and a nice relaxing one as I don't think I have one of those again for a long while. Also, it must be a nice change for everyone to see something that isn't related to my wedding hehe

Stylish Blogger Award

Hi everyone,
Well its been a fun Friday night and Saturday morning already this weekend. I participated in my very first cyber crop last night at Wicked Princesses. It kicked off at 7PM last night with 2 hours to complete the first mystery layout. It was quite the challenge as I'm a pretty slow scrapper, and spend wayyyyy too long thinking everything through since I'm still learning. But it was heaps of fun. I did a layout for my hen's party, so still kind of wedding related, but not as directly ;-)

The second crop challenge was had to be using a number somewhere on your page, in the colours you'd want your dream birthday party, with embellishments. I did a super bright layout for my niece's 18th birthday. I'm very proud of myself because its way brighter than I usually scrap and it came together very quickly. The third challenge will be posted some time today. Can't wait.

Then this mornings very lovely news, I have received a stylish blogger award from the lovely Brenda from Butler's Abroad. Be sure to go check out her blog and see what a lovely card maker and talented crafter she is.


So now it is my duty to share seven random facts with you, then pass this award on to seven talented bloggers:

1. My favourite flowers are oriental lillies. I had white ones for my wedding.
2. I am a massive chocoholic. A bad habit I inherited from my mother. My favourite chocolate fix is Arnott's TV Snacks, which is a great chocolate covered biscuit available in Australia.
3. I drive a bright green Mazda 2, which is the same colour as the standard Cuttlebug green,which also happens to be my favourite colour... however I have a driving phobia. I only drive to work and few other places lol
4. I work as a psychologist in a men's correctional facility. Its a challenging and interesting career path, but of course, like any full time job, it totally gets in the way of my scrapping time hehe Oh and you'd think that would encourage me to fix the driving phobia... but no.
5. My current favourite television show is GLEE. It's awesome!
6. I am a total organisation freak, and plan things in great detail... however I'm certainly not a clean freak... so unfortunately those things don't go hand in hand.
7. My favourite way to relax is a bubble bath, with a good book and a box of TV Snacks.

I now nominate the following talented bloggers for a Stylish Blog Award:

Rachael - I love your scrapbooking style. Your layouts are always so bright and beautiful.

Dale - A fabulous scrapper and card maker.

Julia - A favourite place to visit every Wednesday. The person who created WOYWW!

Karen - A great place to visit for inspiration on scrapbooking but also her amazing weigh loss journey. Something to be proud of.

Kate - Amazing scrapper and the one I can thank for introducing me to the fun world of cyber cropping!

Voodoo Vixen - Always a great place to visit as there is always something new and exciting happening on this desk.

Mary Pat - And last, but not least, another talented scrapper and card maker I love to visit.

Thank you all for providing inspiration and lovely places for me to visit online. Play along if you wish too :-)

Sketchy Thursday... On A Wednesday

Hi everyone,
I am feeling a bit under the weather today. Body aches and exhausted... possibly building into a cold or flu. Hope not but everyone around me has been sick so it would be a miracle otherwise. So I came home from work a bit earlier and decided to work on a challenge while having some relaxation time.

I only just saw this weeks Sketchy Thursday's sketch... which is due in tonight. I thought it was great and decided to give it a go. Its another wedding layout (surprise!) and its got a lot of me on it! I will do something similar with photos of my hubby from the big day when I find another great sketch so they can go together as a double layout.

On this layout I have included my very first hand made flower, which I made a few weeks ago. It was really just a practice one but I decided it might be nice to include it on a layout. The colour scheme worked well. I also have a couple of silver heart 3D embellishments and some cardstock stickers. The shape behind the central photo is actually two Tim Holtz sizzix dies... Baroque... stuck together to create a bigger shape. It was one of the items in my latest Scrapbooking Haven purchase.

On this layout I have included my very first hand made flower, which I made a few weeks ago. It was really just a practice one but I decided it might be nice to include it on a layout. The colour scheme worked well. I also have a couple of silver heart 3D embellishments and some cardstock stickers. The shape behind the central photo is actually two Tim Holtz sizzix dies... Baroque... stuck together to create a bigger shape. It was one of the items in my latest Scrapbooking Haven purchase.

Whenever I finish a layout, I always go show my husband and he always says something typically male like 'It's good'. Today he asked where all the layouts are going to go. I thought that was kind of obvious since he's seen me working on travel albums in the past... but obviously not lol I asked him if he wanted them all over the wall and he didn't say no LOL I think the basketball was distracting him though. One of these days I should do a layout based on his extremely time consuming and sometimes expensive hobby... his band. I bet he'll have more to say about that one.

Thanks for visiting :-)

WOYWW #90

So here we are, another Wednesday. I would like to thank everyone who visited me last week for all your lovely birthday comments. Many of you will be happy to know I did not end up doing house work afterall. I decided it could wait... and unfortunately most of it is still waiting lol

Today there is not a huge amount going on at my desk, however I am keen to start a new challenge or two. There is a great one at Sketchy Thursday that is due in ASAP so I'll see how I go with that deadline. Otherwise I am still in my state of chaos.

My photos this week are shocking as they were done in a dark room with my phone. Feeling a bit under the weather so the photos look a bit that way too lol

I did get another parcel of goodies from Scrapbooking Haven. I seem to have become quite addicted to this great online store. I placed another order last night and then extra today too. Lots of Sizzix dies and embellishments. Oooops. Need to stop spending.

Scrap with V has a current how to and competition for a heap of Flourish with a bling. Be sure to stop by and check it out. I know I love the way this looks as I am yet to try, but have plans for bling in the future!

Don't forget to visit Julia to find out all about WOYWW.

"With This Ring" Layout

Hi all,
Another new layout for the weekend. 3 in one weekend is a pretty good achievement. I must admit I procrastinate a lot and sometimes over think my layouts way too much but I'm happy with the simplicity of this current one.

It's for the Get Picky sketch # 5. It was a nice simple sketch so it was an appropriate one to represent another moment in our wedding album. This time, the exchange of wedding rings. I like these close up photos of us putting the rings on each other's fingers and they were good photos to have at the smaller size.

I stuck pretty close to the original sketch with a few little extras added on. The flowers are hand made with button centres and some Cuttlebug flourishes. There is a vellum sticker "With this ring" and a 3D rings embellishment. Green was our wedding theme colour and most of the layouts for the wedding I have done so far have not been in green, so this was a great chance to get back to basics.

Sorry the photos aren't great. Its 8pm here in Brisbane so no natural light and I'm back at work tomorrow so no time to photograph in the morning.

2nd Layout For Today - Engagement

Hi all,
I'm on a roll today. Two layouts in one day so far... but since we didn't make it to my brother in laws 21st due to hubby being incredibly sick with a gastro bug, I have a lot more free time on my hands than anticipated today.

I really like the way this layout turned out. Simple again, but bold. It is themed around our engagement from 2009. Our engagement story is actually a little crazy. On the day, I probably wasn't totally oblivious to what might happen that day, but after waiting 8 and a half years, who knew if that would be the day either. My now husband Simon took me on a picnic to Mt Coot-tha which is a look out and national park area in Brisbane, here in Australia. Its really high up so you can pretty much see all of Brisbane from up there. Stunning views at night. Its also the home of all our major television networks around the mountain.

So anyway, on this particular day we went to a place we often picnicked early in our relationship. We were enjoying our lunch, with some spectators nearby... a couple of kookaburras. Well it was a bit of a windy day so when one tried to fly down and steal a piece of my sandwich, it was blown off path by the wind and ended up flying straight into my head. It was a massive shock as it felt a bit like someone kicked a football at my head. So we laughed it off and headed on our way for a bit of a drive, as it was a pretty busy area with lots of people walking by. On our drive downhill around a part of the mountain, a motorcyclist sped past us. Not an extreme speed but enough to know he was going over the limit. We went around another corner, only to see the same motorcycle loose control and fly off into the buses, through a guard rail. OMG! Never been more frightened in my life. He just bounced off his bike and into the bush.

So we jumped out, and Simon was already on the phone to the emergency services. By this time the guy from the motorbike had started moving about (phew) and trying to sit up. Simon was great. Telling him to stay still, don't move, help is on its way. Calm, collected and really in control of the situation. By this time a few other people had pulled up, including a channel 9 news van on their way back from a story. They helped with directions for the emergency services. Soon after, a fire truck arrived and they took over, pulling out their medical kit and doing what needed to be done. The ambulance soon followed and people began to disperse. The good thing was, by this stage, the bike rider had been alert enough to talk a bit and he had been telling Simon how he'd only got his leathers the day before (a bit devostating when they cut them off him) but they probably saved him. Turned out he only broke 1 rib after all that. The police phoned later to get our story and told us the good news.

So after this, we are both pretty shaken up but make our way to the Mt Coot-tha botanical gardens, with chocolate and wine to sit on our picnic rug in a secluded area of the gardens. We talked for ages about what happened and then suddenly Simon pulls me upright, rolls onto one knee and fumbles in his pocket. His proposal started along the lines of 'I can't stop thinking about that guy...' LOL But he then said the most romantic things ever, telling me how much he loved me and wanted to spend his life with me, and putting the most perfect diamond ring on my finger. I cried... and we enjoyed the moment for about an hour before ringing family and friends then heading to my parents place to surprise them in person with our news.

So overall, a pretty crazy engagement story. Its definitely memorable... and was still incredibly romantic once my man saved the day. It gave me just another reason to know why I wanted to marry him.

There's a bit of sharing for you all... more than you probably bargained for if you popped in for a look at my layout. This particular photo is actually from our 'engagement' photo shoot which is an extra shoot included in our photography package to get comfortable with the camera before the wedding. I love this photo. We used it for our wedding day signature frame for guests to sign. It now hangs on our wall surrounded by kind messages.

The layout itself has a bit of hidden journalling. Its not too easy to read, but it has a brief detail on the date and location of our engagement and when the photo was taken. The butterflies flip up and there are 2 layers of journalling. The idea for the big heart came from the current From Screen to Scrap challenge which is the film poster for 'Valentines Day'. Great challenge!

The Boys - Colour Inspired Challenge Layout

Hi Everyone,
Well this layout has been a few days in the making as I simly have not had time to scrapbook. We had my niece's 18th birthday party last night and unfortunately my husband spent the entire night on a bed due to coming down with a very sudden stomach bug. He's not much better today which is awful because we have his brother's 21st tonight but it doesn't look like he'll be up for it. He must be feeling so disappointed :-(

This layout I have created has a double inspiration. I decided to give the Scrapbooking Haven Valentine Colour Challenge a go, as they were colours I did not really imagine mixing myself. However I still needed a bit of extra inspiration on how to work the colours, so I worked from the Sketchabilities sketch #41, which is a great sketch. What I love is that the colours are kind of romantic colours with pinks and reds, but its still a masculine layout of my husband and his groomsmen goofing around on our wedding day. These pics are great as they look like they are having fun rather than acting up for the camera.

Its a very simple layout, with a lot of empty space. That's something I tend to struggle with so while I do not embellish a lot on many of my layouts, I tend to avoid large blank areas. It seems to work with this one, so hopefully you will agree.

Here's a picture of the birthday girl and her gigantic cake. She is not one to pose for photos so its a rare occassion that there is an intentional smile into the camera. Perhaps alcohol helped.... LOL

It's a WOYWW Birthday

Hi all,
Thankyou for taking the time to visit my space on this particuarly special day... my 28th birthday. I've taken the day off work so I could sleep in and relax. It was all going well until my phone started going crazy with messages, but its a nice thing to wake up to.

So today's work desk, isn't quite the usual... its more focused on preparing for my niece's 18th birthday on Friday and my brother in laws 21st (which is actually today, but party on Saturday). The youngens have far more exciting birthdays than myself this year.

We ended up getting them a signature frame each, which everyone can sign at the parties. So for Shannon's we are using a lovely photo of her from our wedding morning. For Sebastian, its a funny photo from our engaegment party. His mother picked that one over the serious one, and I tend to agree, its more his style. We have already been around there to put together a mammoth photo board for his party, but I am hoping to put together a smaller one for Shannon too. She is very shy and will be horrified but thankfully I have none of the really embarrassing photos of her extreme chubby baby stage.

Otherwise I will probably work on making her a card today and then perhaps get into some scrapbooking layouts. Today is the offical day that I can use my Cuttlebug... not that it matters, as I've already given it a good workout :-) I have also been trying to come up with storage solutions but will keep working on that. The best idea would probably be to clean out all my psychology notes from the filing cabinent. I haven't referred to them in years so they are probably ready for a different storage location.

OMG my house is a mess. I may have to do some birthday housework. How depressing lol You just have to look at my craft/computer room to see how bad it is!

Ahh well... be sure to check out everyone else's space at Stamping-Ground.
Anyway, Happy WOYWW everyone!

Happy Valentines Day and a Love Layout

So its that day of the year most of us either love or hate... Valentine' Day. A day filled with love, romance and possible gifts. Personally I enjoy the extra chance to do something romantic with my husband... and this will be our first Valentine's day as a married couple so certainly a signficant one. We tend not to make a huge deal out of it, but always try to go out to dinner and get each other at least a card. For us, its off to an Indian resturant for dinner this time around. My husband has actually never been to one so its something different.

I completed a layout last night for the Scrap Our Stash 'LOVE' challenge so its perfect to share on this particular day of the year. I'm not really a pink fan so it has been something new to be using a bit of it in my last couple of layouts, but it suits the romantic wedding theme.

Of course, its another wedding layout. I absolutely love the photo in this one. I softened it using an online editing software, which only made the photo even better. I think its just a very simple and romantic photo and I especially like the way we are looking into each others eyes, as the wedding day is a bit of a blur but those simple moments we shared have been captured on film.

The journalling is actually our first reading from our wedding ceremony, which was Corinthians 13:4-7 "Love is patient, love is kind.... etc". At our wedding, we had this reading read by each of our mothers. My husband's mother read it in Polish and my mother read it in English, as a representation of a joining of cultural backgrounds.

The layout also shows a few of my early experiments with my cuttlebug, such as those flowers, created with a sizzix flower die and my favourite cuttlebug embossing folder - stylised flowers, to create some extra depth to the strip of white card down the side. There are also chipboard and metal embellishments added, a vellum sticker and a love rub on.

Here's wishing you all a very happy and romantic Valentine's Day!

Lots of New Goodies For My Cuttlebug

Just wanted to share some fun purchases with you all. Today was a fun day of mail, which is nice after an ouchie blood test. I got my parcel ordered from http://www.scrapbookinghaven.com.au/ which consisted of 2 sets of sizzix texturz...12 designs plus the rubber mats. Also 4 tim holtz texture fades embossing folders & a sizzix bigz flower die & a sizzix storage case. It came with free gifts - several Kaisercraft magazines & some buttons & a lollipop.



Last week I also subscribed to their monthly $10 embellishment & stamping kits which are below. Very happy with the goodies that were included.




Then more ebay goodies...more stamps, some chipboard letters & 2 sizzix flourish dies. No pics of these ones but what a fun night I'll be having. Just have to work out how everything works in my cuttlebug and I'll be set.

Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.7

WOYWW

So not a lot happening mid week this week. Got busy on the weekend & ran out of energy. I am trying to work out an 18th birthday card for my neice. Yep, with my early birthday present...Cuttlebug!

Can anyone suggest ideas for an 18th birthday present for my neice & a 21st present for my brother in law. We are having trouble with ideas for both so suggestions welcome.

My workdesk this week moved to the loungeroom floor. Oops. I've been putting wedding proofs in an album & its a big job with over 1300. But also experimenting with my bug.

I also have some new stamps, rub ons & embossing folder from ebay. Lots more goodies expected this week too.

Happy woyww and pop over to http://stamping-ground.blogspot.com/ to see what this is all about ;-)

Next time round, it'll be my birthday!

Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.7

Something Old, Something New

It has been a busy weekend, with me pretty much shut up indoors (far too hot outside during a Queensland summer anyway). My main focus has been on a couple of challenges I decided to play a long with. I find the challenges give me good inspiration when I'm not really sure what I want to create. This one is Sketchabilities #40.

I had a bit of an idea on show casing my preparations for my wedding day, so the two layouts I've done this weekend sort of go together, but are not really match.

For this one I hand cut out a background shape, similar to that in the original sketch. Its hard to see, but its done using a pale green patterned paper, then with a distressed border in pink. I have also included a distressed border around the main photo in the same pink. The background paper has a script pattern, which is subtle so as not to distract from the photos. Its hard to see but there is also a tag sticking out under the main photo. I have done my journalling on the back of the tag, which references my something old, new, borrowed, blue... as there are not photos of each of the items so that way I have the memory of what items I did choose. The tag slides in and out. I have also folded down the top left corner of the layout and backed it with a piece of pink cardstock, which has been embossed using my new Cuttlebug in a similar script pattern as the paper.

I never use pink but was trying for a real feminine style with these two layouts, with a bit of blue and green thrown in to keep it soft but more interesting.

Thanks for taking a look and be sure to check out the second layout of the weekend... "Something Borrowed, Something Blue".

Something Borrowed, Something Blue

Hi everyone,
This is the second challenge layout I have completed this weekend. Unfortunately the photographs are terrible. I have no idea how everyone else manages to photograph their layouts so well. Mine turn out terrible and this is with my 10 mega pixel camera... barely any better than with my phone :-( But hopefully you can still get the idea.

This layout was completed for The Studio Challenges current challenge. The sketch for this month was just perfect for showcasing my wedding day accessories. There was an extra challenge within the challenge, to include a hand made embellishment. As you can see in the close up photo, I have hand made a flower accent. This is centred with a metal heart. I have also used my Cuttlebug a bit with this layout, by embossing the paper beneath the photos, as well as the cardstock under the sentiment. This was a vellum sticker which I stuck to a piece of embossed card and then bordered in the matching pink used for the other boarders and flower.

Although on this page you cannot see anything blue, it represents my accessories. Unfortunately my photographer never took a photo of my garter, which was my something blue. Nor did he take a photo of my something old, which was a necklace hung from my bouquet that my father gave my mother on their 40th wedding anniversary. They just celebrated their 40th! That's got to be good luck.

This layout goes together, despite not being very matching, with my other layout of the weekend, "Something Old, Something New".

Thanks for stopping by and I'd love to hear some feedback :-)