Christmas Coffee Catch Up.....

Keeping it simple is the key when I haven't stamped awhile.  I dug out this coffee cup stamp

from Stampin' Up!.  I think it is retired though cannot be sure.  I stamped two images and cut out the coffee cup band from the second image.

I ran the coffee cup band through a corrugated embossing folder, then used gathered twigs distress ink, and a water bottle to ink up the raised corrugated lines.

I cut the holly out on the cameo silhouette, highlighted with a white gel pen, added a twine bow and coloured the cup with copic markers.

I used a piece of designer paper from lemoncraft 6 x6 paper pad.

A merry winter....

I made a card,  its been sooo long, but was feeling inspired by all the gorgeous stamps coming to market now.  How could you not.  Scroll to the second picture to see just how awesome this gorgeous tree is.

I took some inspiration from the Just Add Ink challenge this week.  Hop on over and have a look.

I had to google how to use my blog, it has literally been that long, I forgot how to find the dashboard, very amusing!

How stunning is this stamp and die, all the little leaves pop up - happy sigh.  I added some sparkles to the tree that came with the Hero Art October kit for some bling.

Stamp Set:  Hero Arts October Kit.  

Inks: distress ink Tim Holtz

cardstock:  Neenah white

Getting inky once more

Wow!  I have not picked up an ink pad in well over 6 months, but then so much has happened in that time.  In January we moved home, fully renovating the new home, that took us a crazy 6 weeks, walls came down, bathroom, toilet and kitchen were gutted and re done, tiled floors and carpets pulled up and replaced with floorboards throughout and a fresh coat of paint after that. It was just plain crazy.

Prior to that move though I was struggling with lots of things.  I needed to make some serious life changes, One major change I really wanted to was to downsize our home,  I felt it far too big for 3 of us, it was making me mad to have to spend all our free time and money looking after it.  So here I am today in my smaller home and am quite content.  It is all easy maintenance and takes me next to no time to look after.

Amongst this I was deciding whether to stamp again or not, I really was too tired and too bored to care.  So last October, when we put the house on the market, I packed all my stuff up and left it there until this past Sunday.  What changed? This month we took a trip to the USA.  It was my first 4 week holiday ever, and it was magnificent, but mostly it was needed, for me as a person, for me as a mum, and for me as a wife, to reconnect with my family and try and find what I felt my life was missing. We saved and saved like crazy, the idea for this trip came about a long, long 4 years ago,  and this trip was definitely going to be paid for in cash lol, so thats what we did.  We cut everything back, didn't go out much if at all, and saved saved saved saved.  While I was away, for the first time I actually felt like getting a little creative, and by the time we got home I was itching to, so hubby set me up a small space in our garage to use for now and today I thought I would get a start on my project life album of our California trip.

So I am rusty, I mean really rusty but I gave it a whirl,  I used the design over at Just Add Ink this week, coz seriously after 6 months where the hell does one start?  I guess the majority of my next posts will be about our trip, scrapbook pages, project life pages or inserts that sort of thing, but I want to use up a heap of stuff I have here already. Heres the sketch.

Well enough talk ha ha, thanks for taking the time to have a look.

We arrived in LA on the 21st April, wow what a massive and I mean massive airport, and we had our first sighting of a star, waiting outside was Jessie J looking all sorts of normal lol, almost blended in with the rest but not quite lol.

Items Used:

Tim Holtz : stencil, story stamp, fired brick distress ink
Stampin' Up: Back to basics alphabet and a rotary stamp, 13/4 circle punch
Avery Elle: Count on it number dies
Divine twine,
MME: 6x6 paper pad - wood
stonehenge watercolour paper

Happy birthday Harry

Wow....

My son Harry turns 10 today, I can't believe he is in double digits, wherever did that time go.

Before me is a young man now, and we are so very proud of the person he is turning into, he is kind and helpful, applies himself fully at school, and is a gentleman - for that I give credit to my hubby, he has taught Harry this by demonstrating it himself daily.

My Harry loves Harry Potter as we all do in my family, so when a friend made a card recently with Harry Potter style digi stamps,  I had to have them ha ha ha.

So I have very limited copic markers it seems (sigh) so don't mind my colouring too much, I now have another list of colours to buy lol.  I am sure my son won't know the difference.

I wanted the card to look like Harry Potter was making a '10' spell in the forest!

Scissors Paper Card Link is here

Bugaboo Digi Stamps is here

A Christmassy fancy fold....

I love this super cute stamp set - Its a hero arts set and it comes with 3 little elves and a die cut for them, very cute. I also spent some more time colouring with my copics for this card, added some cute little Christmas bells to add some festive detail.

How cute is this sentiment too?  It is a set from recollections.

Cardstock was Stampin' Up! real red, whisper white

Ink: Real Red, memento black, Old olive

Copics: various

Other:  Nuvo Gold, twine, mini bells

Nice until proven Naughty.......

Its been a long while since I created a card.  A friend put me onto Bugaboo Digital stamps, and I love them, they are fun and a little sassy, and completely wonderful to colour.   My colouring sucks a lot, I haven't coloured for years, so I have a lot of work to do to get it up to scratch but I know you won't really care lol.

I did use spellbinders nestabilitites dies in this card.

It was fun, I got to colour, and hopefully I will get to colour again, will be back with another card really soon, as I have another Christmas one to share with you.

Cheers

Melissa.

An exciting new addition to the.....

BIG SHOT!

Bet you thought I was going to say a baby!   I am so past those days ha ha, but I did receive my sizzix big shot tool caddy by courier today (yes on a Saturday)

I Love it.  It is perfect for me.

This is how it comes out of the box. I have added the front sizzix plate holder.

The plate holder is extendable

There is a tape dispenser which I keep my 3m micropore tape in now.

See the extension on the front to hold all those plates etc - LOVE IT.

It also holds my scissors, pick, roller for those fiddly dies, pens, fine precision glue and still have space left on the right side next to the tape dispenser.

Side view with how it looks, Have added the little foam mat for rolling over the dies, and the magnetic platform, precision base plate, and ca still fit in two spare clear plates if I wish.

So thats it from me for today, I have some exciting products just come in that I have stumbled across lately so hopefully will be back to share some of them really soon.

Have a wonderful day.