Now's the time!

Have you been thinking of becoming a Stampin'UpDemonstrator or maybe you would just like to take advantage of the wonderful starter kit and use the amazing resources available to demonstrators such as the special web site full of ideas and templates, not to mention the 20% off everything you would like to add to your stamping collection. There is a fantastic oppotunity until the 15th of August 08, for anyone joining the Stampin'Up! family. From the first of July through to the 15th of August, when you become a demonstrator, you'll recieve $25.00 off the already low priced Starter kit! That means you'll start out with over $560. of Stampin'Up!'s high quality, one of a kind stamping products and business supplies for just $299! So what are you waiting for? contact me today to get Super Starter Kit Savings! I would be happy to tell you about all the different ways you can take advantage of this promotion without ever having to do a party or hold a workshop, if you just want to have the discounts and use the products for your own hobby you can do that too. Just e-mail me for more info any time : charmaineblck@yahoo.com.au Don't leave it too late! :-)

Water colour class

Hello All, Here's a picture of one of the cards that were made in my water colour technique class, we made three cards using different mediums and this one used the Stampin'Up! ® Wonder water colour crayons. I really love using these crayons as they are so easy to blend with and very forgiving if you want to add or take colour away. I was a Lyra crayon girl for many years and never thought I would take to any other water colour crayon untill I was introduced to these, their pigment is really strong and of course they match all the SU colour families with card stock, ribbons, brads etc. which makes them even nicer to use. The set used is called "Natural Beauty" it's one of my favourites. The backgound stamp is called "En Frances" I used Certainly celery, Choc chip and very vanilla card stock. I will post the other two cards soon. Inspiration for this one came from SCS. Thanks for looking and visit again soon. :-)

Move over T!m Holtz!

You'll never believe who did this one. All day while we were playing with our paint and making a mess all over the family room table my DH Grant would occasionally come in and see what we were all up to, he seemed interested in the creations we were making and would make little comments about them. He printed out some weird and wonderful pictures for us to use but we obviously just weren't ARTY enough to put them to good use and found them a bit strange! Anyhooo, after a hard morning of creating we became very hungry so we hightailed it up to Araluen for some lunch and a glass of wine or two in some cases "I won't mention any names". Grant stayed at home in the mess which I had promised to clean up on my return. But he had decide to have a play with some of the left over bits and pieces, and created this little master piece! He even sharpied (is that a word?) all the edges and found a bit of bling from my embellishment box as well as the left over bits of German scrap. I am sooooo impressed and I just had to show you all what he did. So if ever you want a lesson on the rinse aid technique you know where to come. I knew he couldn't resist having a play forever!

More ATC's

These very beautiful creations below were made by my talented friends except for the first one on the left which was one of mine. but wait till you see whats coming up next............

Non SU

Hi All, I just can't wait to tell you all what a wonderful day I've had today. First my very good friends arrived for coffee and a play day, so we got out some paints, canvas and some rinse aid. Yes rinse aid! this was a technique which I had learnt from the very uba talented Kelsey last year and it was made famous by another uba talented lady Claudine Hellmuth. You take a canvas and paint it with thin or runny acrylic paint, while it's still wet you swoosh some rinse aid over it. We chose to do this part with a tooth brush dipped into the bottle of rinse aid then splatter it over the canvas. Then we dried that layer and with a damp rag we then wiped"or scrubbed" away untill the area with the rinse aid came up lightened. Then we applied another coat of paint in a complementing colour and repeated the first process. When all this was looking rather yummy we then stamped some images onto our gorgeous backgrounds, after which we then added some printed images or some very beautiful pictures from the Collections pack which I got out of my stash.."no of course I hadn't been hoarding it". We found some nice bits of German scrap and other embellishments to finish of our wonderful little works of art.

Pull treat

Hi All, Well I've just completed my swap cards for tomorrow's meeting at my uplines house. I must admit I'm not in love with them but I have one of my nasty headaches on it's way so they're as good as they are going to get I'm afraid. I'll post them up here soon. This is photo of the pull treat box that a couple of my clases are going to be making along with a matching card and a gift bag designed to hold a gift card from Myers or Target etc. I've stamped my fav. Baroque Motifs with some Chocolate Chip ink onto some Very Vanilla card stock, I used the corner rounder for the scallop edging under the belly band and attached the embellishment with a choc coloured brad. These are great to give as a small gift to thank you etc. and they really surprise people when they see how they work. You pull the ribbon bow and it pulls up the choc bar, how cool is that! I love doing anything 3D and this was shown to me by my very talented upline after her return from this years convention, where she won the "Heart of Stampin' Up! " award. What can I say I'm learning from the best! I have a class to prepare for and a big night out tomorrow so I better get some sleep. Inky hugs :-)

A piece of cake!

Here is my "Book To Look" cake, inside each piece of cake is a piece of paper with a different prize on it, so ten prizes including things like packs of card stock, ink pads, punches, gel pen, two way glue pen, packs of designer paper etc. If you book a party then you can choose a piece of calorie free cake to see what gift is inside. When your party order goes in I will add to your usual hostess benefits and gifts with the prize you chose from the cake, I hope that makes sense. I saw the idea on ....Of course SCS. I intend to put the same little embellishment from the middle on each piece of cake "when I get time!" I used the Baroque Motifs set with Chocolate Chip and Pretty in pink ink. The centre image was done with Regal Rose. I love cake and this ones OK to have in the house because it's fat free!

Circle of Friendship cards

Hello visitors, I know I said I might put some more posts on the other night but time ran away with me and due to open days, classes and meetings things got a little hectic around here to say the least! I had a wonderful weekend, on Sat. I taught a lovely group of ladies three diferent water colour techniques and they all did a wonderful job of their cards. On Sunday afternoon I had my second open day to promote the eScape bundle, we had a lovely time and many laughs, we all made little 3x3 cards using the bundle and a few extras. We played the island game and K won a little container which I had put some in-colour ribbons and an assortment of brads, eylets and bling into. One of my visitors couldn't resist a peak into one of the slices of cake which make up my "Book to Look" cake, she won a gel pen and an classic ink pad of her choice when her party order goes in. I made these two cards after seeing them on SCS using different stamp sets, so thank you to whoever it was that posted them up for inspiration. I used the Circle of friendship set which comes with the eScape bundle and Artfully Asian, the script is the beautiful background stamp called "En Frances". I used Sage shadow for one and Purely Pomagranate on pretty in pink on the other. I gave one to one of my guests as it was her birthday.

Ribbon jar

I altered this little glass jar with some more of the "Brocade background" double sided designer paper from SU, I also put a piece of " Mellow moss ribbon around the lid to finish it off. Inside is a whole bunch of different SU ribbons cut into lengths for a prize at one of my open days. I love seeing coloured ribbons all together like that, they look so yummy! I'm about to hold a ribbon swap with some of my dear customers so that should be fun, if you would like to join us or want to know more about what it involves then please don't hesitate to contact me : charmaineblck@yahoo.com.au Thanks for visting with me. :0)

Mini clip boards

Hi All, well I survived today, but only just! I had a wonderful morning with all my friends who came to visit and make cards with the eScape bundle. We played a game called the island where you had to draw an island and things that you might find on or near an island. But you had to do it with your eyes shut, congratulations to Angela who won and took home one of these cute mini clip boards. I got the idea from Angie of Chic-n-scratch fame, so thanks Angie. I used the beautiful "Brocade background"double sided designer paper, I really love the colours. I think everyone enjoyed making their cute little 3x3 cards with matching envelopes and they all did a fantastic job too. It always amazes me how differently they all turn out, some used the wheels to decorate their cards and others used different coloured cardstock to look like ribbons and of course the scallop and circle punches got a very good work out too. After everyone left I did a quick tidy up before leaving to have a bite to eat with my daughter who had generously helped out this morning with making teas and coffees, heating up pies and sausage rolls etc. THANK YOU LORI! When we finished lunch I hightailed it to the city to start studying for my last exam....YAY! That's where things went sour, I got a phone call from my youngest daughter's boyfriend saying that she had calapsed at work and was being rushed to the nearest Dr's. A very long ten to fifteen minutes later I was informed she was doing ok and her big sister would pick her up and take her back to her place till I could get there. Long story short, I took my last assessment and picked up youngest and we got home safely to a really warm and cosy house. My boys ( dogs) were snuggled up in the warm and looked up at me as if to say " what on earth were you thinking, going out in the cold like that". Oh well, I've babled enough tonight....Sorry! I'll post some more pictures soon. :-)

Last one for tonight, here is one of the prizes for the open days, inside the basket is a free stamp set, a pamper yourself gift box,a candle, a cup, some pens, a jar full of ribbons, some card stock samples, a mini clipboard with post it notes and a technique book. All the items have been altered with stamping or designer papers from the current Stampin'Up! catalogue.

eScape! cards.

Here is a sample of some cards made with the eScape bundle, I'll get some better photos up tomorrow night or Wed. One can only do so much at midnight! take my word for it though, they are really cute! I'm loving making these little cards at the moment and using the punches to embellish them is so much fun. :-)

Hi All, I promised that I might put up a sneak peak of tomorrow's open day, well it's now a 12.15 so it's already tomorrow! I have to get some sleep soon but here's some little pouches with chocies in for you, I've used the eScape bundle to make the embellishments, which includes the "Circle of friendship" stampset and the 1 and a quarter inch circle punch. I also used my favourite punch at the moment which is the scallop punch, I also used the half inch and the 1 and three eights circle punch. I must admit I really love the Stampin'Up! punches, they go through card stock like a knife through butter.
The paper is from the Palett o'prints book of designer papers which was a special offer last month.

Hi All, well I think I've totally broken my counter, I just tried to upload a new one and I've obviously done something wrong but I'll fix it when I have more time. I was going to upload my pictures of all the prizes I have prepared for you wonderful people who have registered to come to my open days. I am having a little celebration for the eScape bundle and have made some gorgeous or should I say (Gorgus) little 3x3 card kits for you all to make as well as lots of door prizes and games etc. I have put together one big door prize which has lots of Stampin'Up!® goodies in it, including a free stamp set, in-colour ribbons and much more. I decide to wait till tonight or tomorrow, I might give you a sneak peak at some of the prizes tonight:-). This card was made with the "Time well spent" set which again my wonderful upline had loaned me a while ago to make some samples. I made this one to go with the little flower pot which I posted a while ago. I used SU markers to colour in the images and some Pretty in pink ribbon to embellish the card. I sponged the edges and the card stock used was barely banana, pretty in pink and whisper white. The background was done using the "Scribble" wheel. I never thought I would ever use a wheel, but I'm loving them now and I can't wait to show you all what I did with one last night! Oh well, come and visit again tonight and maybe you'll see a few snipits.

Hi All, I'm trying to keep up with my posting this week. I have a few oldies which I hadn't shown you so I thought I'd post those ones before my latest ones. I made this set for a hostess and so many people liked it that I decided to do it as a class. It worked beautifully and everyone was happy with thier finished projects. The wow factor was the candle, I must admit it's always one of my favourites too. I used the Stampin'Up!® set called 'wild rose" along with Bravo Burgundy and Always Artichoke ink on the gift box, candle and scrap page, the card has old olive instead of Always Artichoke. The card stock used was Very Vanilla and Bravo Burgundy, the card has Old Olive as well. The photo is of DH's great Grand Mother. The stamping method used for this set was the two step and because I only used the two colours I stamped off first for the background stamp and didn't for the outline stamp. I used that wonderful gadget called the Stamp-a-ma-jig to aline the roses on the card and the candle but did it by eye for a different effect on the other items.
Unfortunately my counter seems to be on the blink and I was just about to celebrate the five hundredth visitor too, oh well maybe I'll have to start all over again. Thanks for looking, take care and stay inky. If you have any questions about the technique used or the tools etc. please feel free to contact me via e-mail: charmaineblck@yahoo.com.au :-)

Something fishy 'round here!

Hi there fellow blog surfers, I am truly on a roll this week for posting some cards for you all to see. This is one I made the week I joined Stampin'Up!®. My wonderful upline lent me some sets to make up some samples as I only owned one set back then, wow how times have changed..I now own over forty. Any way this set is called "Fishy friends" and the background has been through the cuttle bug with the dots and spots embossing folder. I swiped it over with some white ink to highlight the raised edges. I have just ordered this set for myself and I can't wait to make some more creations with it. I hope you enjoy this visit with me and I have managed to inspire you to put some ink on your rubber!

Jemma's Christening

I know...TWO postings in one night! I thought I'd show you a picture of the card I made for our dear friend's daughter's Christening. No points for guessing her name. She is so gorgeous, like a little doll and she never even made a murmur when the priest swooshed a whole heap of water all over her face.It was a really beautiful day and wonderful to catch up lots of our dear friends. I made this card using my precious Cuttle bug, I put some white card stock through in the stylised flower plate and then swiped it over with some SU pretty in pink ink, then I put some more white card stock through in the "Swiss dotts" plate{ this is my favourite plate at the moment} I cut the letters out with paper and chip board using the Olivia alphabet, I matted that all on to a piece of Pretty in pink CS and finished it all off with a paper flower embellished with some kindy glitz and a punched out image from the "little pieces" set and a pretty in pink brad. A gingham ribbon. Of course I wrote insde using my caligraphy to wish her a life full of love and happiness. :-)

Scrap swap

Hi All, well I never thought you would see me posting any scrapbooking but here goes..I did a swap with some of my fellow SU demonstrators who are in the same team as me and this is what I came up with. It's a 6x6 page so not too daunting for me to start with, I used a photo from our holiday snaps in Canada. This picture is from the very beautiful Buchart gardens where there are many gardens with plants and settings from all over the world, this particular one is from the Japanese garden. I used Ruby red, Basic black and Perfect plum card stock. Ruby red ink to stamp up the background with the leaves and versa mark ink to emboss with silver for the writing. A white gel pen was used for the dots around the scallop shapes and of course I used that marvelous tool the Crop-a-dile to put the silver eyelets in place, the stamp set I used was called "Artfully Asian" and it was the first time I had Christened it with ink. I hope you like it, I must admit I was quite pleased with it myself! :-)