This is a card that I made for a friend for her 8th birthday.  We had a lovely day at Build-a-bear and then  ice-creams and cake . . .yummo!

I’ve used the Forest Friends stamp set and ‘Celebrate You’ from the Party Hearty set.  I thought the little rabbit peeping out from the foliage was just a little bit cute . . Now don’t ask me about the ribbon – -I have a huge box full of it and I have no idea where most of it came from! Unless it’s a Stampin’ Up! ribbon and buy them by the spool rather than the metre! 

I’ll have some stamp-a-stack goodies to show you soon, but till then ~ happy stamping,

Michelle

I haven’t done one of these for a while, but I just couldn’t resist this one . .  Hope you like it too!

 Till next time,

Michelle

I can’t believe that it’s suddenly November and I haven’t blogged for over a month. . . Sometimes life just gets a bit busy and some things have to be let loose . . . . . and as it seems the world doesn’t end if I don’t get around to blogging, it was the blog that missed out in October.

This is one of the reasons that I wasn’t blogging – I was in Western Australia – - and if you were enjoying this view from your bedroom, would you be inside on the computer? No, I didn’t think so!

The main reason I went way out west was to go to the wedding of a dear friend that I met half a lifetime ago, when we were girls in our early 20’s backpacking in Europe.  This is the card that I made for the happy couple.  The photo was taken with my phone about 5 minuets before I headed off to the wedding.  That’s my excuse for the poor quality! I used my favourite stamp set ~ “Always” ~ and ‘thumped’ it with my markers and then about 2 layers of clear embossing before cutting it out and mounting on Pumpkin Pie and Elegant Eggplant.  I really love the eyelet border punch to make the edges ‘frilly & pretty’. Not to mention the Hodgepodge Hardware and clear rhinestone. Yummy!

Time for some sleep now, but I shall return with other projects that kept me busy the last few weeks (hints: Christmas, Halloween and chocolate!)

Till next time,

Michelle

 This was another card that I made while I was away- Relaxation can be so inspiring! For this card I’ve used Kiwi Kiss, Bashful Blue, Riding Hood Red inks and used Holiday Treasures DSP and the wonderful eyelet punch. I think that this will feature at some card classes later in the month. It’s a little bit purdy, don’t you think?

It’s only 87 days till Christmas (check here) – Are you ready? I know it’s early, but you know and I know that before you know it, we’ll all be saying “I can’t believe it’s Christmas already!” Why don’t you book a Stamp-a-Stack today and we can all make some gorgeous Christmas Cards together! Drop me a line and we can organise a time.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you!

Michelle

I recently had a wonderfully relaxing weekend away in Daylesford – - *sigh* – - and took along my stamping bits so that I could have a play if the mood struck.  The mood did strike and this was one of the cards that I made -

It’s such a simple card, and think that the colours are the champions here. Night of Navy and Kiwi Kiss. I’ve used a stamp from the Seeing Spots set for the background and the large stamp from Circle Circus for the embellishment (plus the sparkly centre from a Rhinestone Brad). The ticket corners were done with my small circle punch – do you wanna know how?  First you need your cardstock and your circle punch – - so far so good

Then all you do is slide the corner of your card stock into the punch, like so, lining up the corner of the card stock  with the marks on your punch ~ ~ see?

Then punch! And then repeat on all the other corners.

Pretty easy huh? I’m sure you already knew how to do it, but thanks for sticking with me till the end

Till next time,

Michelle

Remember this post? Have you gone through your scraps yet? I had a bit of a punch fest on the weekend and ended up with this pile of goodies . . .

 . . .and that was only about 15 minutes worth of punching. These are now all on their way to Sydney for the girls to take into the Westmead Children’s Hospital for the kids.  If you have any scraps that you could punch and send on, please do! They can be sent to Jayne Mercer, 29 Hazelmead Road, Asquith, NSW 2077.

Thank you thank you thank you!

Michelle

The lovely, lovely Leonie shared her beautiful tri-fold shutter card and I just had to try it. . .

There are so many gorgeous versions of this card out there in crafting cyber-land, I wasn’t sure if I could make a decent version, so  not wanting to “waste” any of my new papers, I used scraps of retired paper and didn’t go too overboard with the decorations, but then realised how much I really liked this card.  As per usual, once I’d made one, I had to make another FOUR!. It would have been easier if I’d printed out Leonie’s instructions, complete with all measurements, before I started.  These are all made from memory (I wish it was more photographic!), and I was pretty happy with them.  So happy in fact that we will be doing them at my class at Chelsea Heights Community Centre on September 20th. Contact me if you would like to book in. Classes are $20 and include all materials & tools, all you need to bring along is your pretty little self!

and here’s one I made for a little angel who is turning one later this month (OMG, our baby is turning ONE already! It seems like it was only a minute ago she arrived)

So this is what it looks like all closed up – and it fits onto a C6 envelope ever so neatly (that’s one of my neat knots holding the bow on the side too!) 

Till next time,

Michelle

I’m not sure why this card is called a Joy Fold card . . perhaps someone called Joy thought of it originally? Or maybe because they are simply a joy to make ~

I’ve used the Good Friend stamp set, Good Morning Sunshine DSP and some chipboard covered with SuperNova glitter . .spangly! Here’s how it looks opened up a little . . .

and here’s how it looks opened all the way up . .

If you’d like to make one yourself, head over to Beates blog and you’ll find it here.  Once you’ve got the general gist of it, it’s easy enough to alter to make it any size you want.  If you make one, I’d love to see it – if you have a blog, please leave a comment with a link or if you don’t have a blog, email me a picture and I’ll post it, ok?

Hope you’re having a great weekend,

Michelle

Okay – I promised a tutorial to show you this quick knot. The thing I love about it is that no adhesive is required and it looks so neat on the inside that you don’t feel that you have to cover it up. So this is the ‘after’ shot.  Pretty cute huh?

To start, you will need your bland project that needs some brightening up – just like this one I have here (it’s a CD box)

and a length of ribbon that will wrap around your project with “some” (about 10-ish cm) spare to tie the knot

Punch a hole where you would like your knot located (a cropodile will only give you limited reach ~ use an anywhere punch to get a hole in the middle of your card)

Wrap the ribbon around the front of your card and then bring the ribbon through the hole. This is the first end going  through, do the same with the other end

Pull one end either side of the ribbon and then tie your knot over the main piece of ribbon. Okay – so how easy was that?

 And here’s how it looks on the back side of the card ~

Pretty neat huh? So why don’t you give it a try . . go on . . . .

 Here’s a couple of videos to give you some knot and bow tying know-how.

(Stamper dog is a favourite of mine – it’s nice to see other dogs like to ‘help’ their humans craft too!)

Till next time ~

Michelle