Blog

Just a quick post tonight as I might possibly freeze if I stay at my desk any longer.  10pm and 6 degrees.  Honestly I drag myself through winter.

Anyway, I scrapped at the speed of lightening over the weekend.  Mostly today, and got the Kindy album done.  I have some pics to share and it doesn’t look like it, but that album had about 100 pages.  Around 50-60 done by me and about 40-50 given to me by kids and parents to include.  They were super super super simple but they still look a lot of time. 

It is A4 size – Actually bigger. That cover is 13 x 9 inches.  Huge!  I’m grateful I made that tag for Tarisota last month, it was perfect! I had covered the album with the papers, I looked around and it was sitting there and it matched perfectly.  I was rapt!  Even the sentiment was perfect.

Anyway, I’ll leave you with some images.  I’m SO glad it is done.  I’m incredibly busy working CHA booth work until about the 9th, thanks for checking in with me :o)

Laters

I love the whole figuring out the weather process.  I think it started in the early days of owning the building business when much of the days work depended on the weather.  If we needed to pour a concrete floor, for example, I'd be glued to the rain radar trying to figure out the rain patterns.  My fascination has just grown from there.  The past three days of hail, thunder, lightening, torrential rain, wind and forecast tornadoes have been a curse as I try and taxi the kids around Kindy and other after school activities but it sure made for exciting watching.  Does anyone else have Ken Ring's Predict the Weather for the whole year Almanac?  It was meant to be really good.  He predicted calm weather for yesterday.  It couldn't have been further from the truth. It's entertainment I guess.

Anyway – scrapbooking.  I created this layout for the Tarisota Sketch last month. I struggled with it and hated it when I completed it.  I guess I wanted more for the topic of the layout. It was something that was fairly personal and I wanted some sort of masterpiece to reflect it's importance.  I got over that fairly quickly and I like the layout now.  In fact it's probably becoming one of my favourites, probably more for the fact that I got over myself and got the story down rather than dwelling on the masterpiece I thought it deserved.  Did that make sense at all?  Now I just need to get to work on all those other 'really important' photos that I have put to one side.

I have used these pics before.  I wanted to use them again because they are my favourite pics of Jacob.

Here's a texture shot.

Patterned paper by BasicGrey & MME.  Transparency by Collections.  White letters are the backing from the new foam Heidi Swapp Alphas.  Alpha Stamps by Hero Arts.  Ink is Taken With Teal by Stampin' Up.  Border is the threading water punch.  Black alphas by delish – they came in brown but I inked them up. Layout created using the June Tarisota kit.

Another busy weekend for me, the house is being painted inside right now so I'm working around painters.  We'll be looking at more cars, I'll be starting and finishing the Kindy album, I'll share pics of that, I have BasicGrey CHA booth stuff to do AND a brand spanking new Tarisota kit to play with. 

But right now I'm just a little disappointed at the lack of thunder & lightening.  I love the cosiness of falling asleep to the rain.

Laters

Saturday.  Up early to the sound of the kittens beating each other up in the bath.  It's something they do if I leave them in the bathroom too long, normally I kick them out to play outside but it seems I was too late this morning.  The sound of 2 (large) kittens running up and down the bath, rolling and tumbling and playfighting is a delightful start to the day.  *note sarcasm*

Chatterbox.  It's had a good old revival it seems.  Take a look at the blog here.  They have new products that don't really look like chatterbox at all.  Scroll down, they are looking for DT members.  And apparently this includes those of us not in the U.S.A.  Alrighty then!  There seems to be a tonne of design team opportunities out there right now. Cosmo Cricket is another team looking to add more people.  There was more and I had them stored in the incredibly reliable part of my memory that stores things I want to put on my blog.  And then I forgot. As ya do.

OK just a quickie post this morning.  I have a busy day ahead.  I'm looking at new cars.  It seems a crazy time to be considering the purchase of a new car, albeit a larger-uses-more-petrol car, but Abby is about to come out of her carseat in the next 6 months or so and I don't want her in a lapbelt.  I want a vehicle with 3 diagonal belts in the back. Do you know anyone that wants to buy a totally reliable and loved Mistral?  Beautifully looked after, washed at least once a year, always taken the family where we need to go and I'll even scrub the moss off? Just wonderin'.

Hey be sure to check the Tarisota Blog today and all weekend, actually.  They have a massive sale on.  Tamar is also posting a project from one of the DT every hour for the 35 hours over the weekend.  She is up to about number 9.  Details are on the blog here but here is a little teaser.

Off to tip toe through the shower.  Things to do.  People to see.
laters.

The last 2 days have been full of random facts and unneccessary information.  Some of which is coming from my sons who beleive I need to know all the weird and entirely inappropriate things their peers are saying in the playground and some of which comes from me.  I find out some amazing things on the internet while avoiding working. 

Yesterday the 3 guys went to a 'Kick-a-thon'.  Brady completed 1000 kicks (not just any kicks but the real kind that you do when you are at karate , they have a name but I forget it right now) for the sum of $48 in sponsership.  I stayed at home with Abby and tried to catch up on paperwork.  Tax stuff.  Monthly PAYE and all those other things you have to do when you have a business and employees.

But instead of completing said paperwork I found out that a leap year is any year divisable by 4 but not by 100.  I passed this gem of info on to my friend Lucy, to which she mentioned she would sleep waaaaay better knowing that.  I also counted back my age in days from when I was born to my first date with Paul.  See I knew that information on leap years would come in handy and I then counted forward the date since then.  I then figured out that on September 9th 2009 will be the day that I will have been with Paul longer than I have been without him.  Which left me feeling 2 things. 1. Old.  2. Like I still need to get the tax done since it had to be at the tax dept by the 20th.  Really I need to focus more on the task at hand.

So anyway.  Today I have a list of things to do and so far I have managed to successfully avoid all of them.  Except for posting off the Stampin' Up! prizes.  That, I managed.  I have 4 classes waiting to be formulated and written up and step shots created.  None of which will happen while I'm typing on my laptop but somehow creating a blog post is a neccessary procrastinationery did I just make up a word step in the process.  Wish me luck.

I'll leave you today with another layout from the latest Tarisota kit.  This one is a blue teal colour, how'd that happen? ;o) ..this one is a whole bunch of pics from the first few days we had the kittens. 

Laters

Supplies: Patterned paper-My Mind's Eye & BasicGrey.  Film Strip – Rachel Greig.   Stamps – Hero Arts & DarkRoom Door.  

Do you remember the dreaded Kindy album I made about a term back?  Perhaps the end of March?  it was around 60 pages worth.  Nothing flash, just simple.  But a tonne of work and I just about lost the plot with the stress of it all.  Way back then it was Rebecca Cameron that helped me out with a few links to the Simple Scrapbook Gallery and with a lot of encouraging words from you guys, I got through it.

Well it's happening again.  There is another teacher leaving and since she has been teaching for 13 years, it calls for another scrapbook.  I have 2 weeks to do it and this is working around all the other commitments I have at this time of year.  Just quietly, I'm very scared. My hubby has always said that the tough part of being a builder is that he often gets asked "Can you just take a look at this?" with people's homes.  I find I often get the same kind of request.  "Could you just make a card for… could you just put together one of those albums for…"  Now we owe a lot to Kindy.  I don't do 'Mother help' as much as I should probably, and this teacher at Kindy is a special lady so when it comes down to it I'm really proud to be asked and to be able to help out and to have the honour of creating her album, but can I secretly be terrified as well?

Hometown Tourist, I'll admit.  I'm uninspired by my hometown right now.  It's dark, it's gloomy.  There are no leaves on a lot of the trees and everything is wet.  I can just imagune a dozen comments telling me I should find beautiful things in the gloomiest of places but I can't be bothered getting wet and cold to go look for them with a 4year old in tow!  I wonder if Kelly Goree takes a rain check on blog tags? Like, til summer?   

Ok.  I have things to do, sketches to create with.  I'll leave you with a Tarisota layout. 

laters

Today is the 12th, which means a few things but among the most important are that it is 10 days until the shortest day, always a landmark for me, and it is also my grandad's birthday tomorrow.  I'll celebrate Grandad's birthday but I don't know whether to celebrate the shortest day or not this year.  I've been in denial about it being winter, due to the fact that we are renovating and our fireplace is currently sitting under a painter's drop-sheet in the middle of a bare concrete floor somewhere.  Sometime in Autumn I told myself it was best that I pretend winter wasn't arriving just yet so as not to miss the roar of a hot wood fire in the mornings when you have to crack the ice off the window of the car before taking the kids to school.  Part of this denial might include ignoring the shortest day.  They say ignorance is bliss. 

I haven't scrapped since I finished Tarisota.  My mind is full of clutter and my house is trashed.  The mojo has been buried somewhere under piles of gib dust – it'll return but for now I'm filling the day with other stuff.  LIke accounts.  And a sick daughter,  and various other family stuff.

Jacob did flippin awesome at the speech contest.  He was thrilled to represent his school and he did amazing.  He didn't place, a speech about cellphones and why we should ban them won.  I admit the speaker was 100% faultless.  Jacob was relieved when it was over, although he had to repeat it to the whole school assembly the next morning. (600 kids).  He told me that was easy, he just got up and had fun.  I wish I had half his confidence.  I gotta say thanks to everyone that wished him well though!  Here he is accepting his certificate for being the finalist for his school.  Yes I love the gold curtains and red patterned carpet.  It matches closely with my crouching-in-the-aisle camera skills. Goooorgeous.

And I've just realised while posting this that I have forgotten about Kelly Goree's Hometown tourist challenge!  I tell you, my mind is complete mush.  I'll do that in the next week.

There's been talk of the threading water punch about and you all know how much I love it since I use it in every second project I do these days.  I thought I'd show you how I used to do scalloped edges though because I was thrilled when I discovered this method on Lianne's blog months and months ago.

You need a corner rounder, and you need one without 'guards' or 'guides' on it.  I have one with removable guides, which is perfect.

Flip the punch over and line it up so that it is straight on to the paper, punch.

Move the punch along and punch again.  At this point it is trial and error to learn where to punch the next one, so do this on a scrap piece of paper first.

There you go!  A easily scalloped edge.  if you want the hole, like in the threading water punch, just go ahead and punch a hole in each scallop.

I'll leave you to it… let me know if that helps for those of you that haven't got hold of the Fiskar's Threading Water Punch!

Oh – and I just have to add – I had a question about whether anyone knew a Dundein Stampin' Up! Demo – yes there is one – Sarah Gough is down that way

laters

Hands up those that watched that All Blacks game on Saturday night.  Far out those guys looked soooooooooooooo coold.  I think the thing that stuck in my mind most apart from the obvious – Dan Carter – was just how bitter cold those guys looked.  I know when you are a fan, you are a fan, but there isn't much that would have convinced me to brave that kind of cold and been there.   Hats off to those that were.

I saw the coolest thing on the news tonight with the All Blacks.  They have started this thing where every baby born on the same day as a home test game get a specially made All Blacks baby jersey.  They call it "All Black Birth Rights".  Imagine how amazingly cool it would be if one of those bubs grows up and actually became an All Black.  That especially gift wrapped jersey for each new baby is so special! I just thought that was so cool!  There is some cool stuff on the news sometimes!

Did you see the Tarisota Gallery on it's release yesterday?  LIke 275 images or something, and I will share some of mine in the next week or so, including that whole mini album, but I wanted to share these tonight because they were so different than what I normally do – aren't these little houses by Collections so cute?

I'll share more this week.  Anyway!  I have giveaways to do!  I pretty much asked the kids to tell me a number and I counted the posts to that number to pick the winners.  It's about as technical as it gets!

Winners are as follows, please email me and let me know where to send the Stampin' Up! prizes (and while we are at it, I better add my thanks to Stampin' Up!) – Phew, what a week. 

St of 3 Inks: Posted byJulie June 03 – 10.34am
Stampin Scrub – Michelle OKeefe June 04 1.42pm
Cardstock Pack – Diane June 05 9.26am
Glue sticks and Glue Dots Ann Ledehose June 06 9.57pm
Scallop Punch – Ann. June 07 11.41am
Roller – Beck – June 08 1.58pm
Catalog – Rachel June 08 8.13pm
Catalog – Lauren – June 08 5.13pm
Catalog – Brenda June 08 – 4.06pm

OH!  Edited to add – thanks for the encouraging comments for Jacob!  He has his speech competition tomorrow.  He is thrilled to be representing his school, they even have a notice on the school noticeboard that says GO JACOB GO!!  This is a school with about 600 kids?  I think? He is a getting a bit of teasing too, but most of it is encouragement – keep your fingers crossed!

laters

It's Sunday, which is the day after Saturday, which was the day I was supposed to update with the final Stampin' Up! post.  I was instead buried in copious amounts of patterned paper and glue with the occasional amount of ribbon attached.  I created a whole mini album yesterday, something that has never been done in Howard Scrapbooking history.  I was on a roll and didn't want to stop, so I didn't.  Here's a small peek, the rest will be shown in the Tarisota Gallery which will go up later today.

I used the BasicGrey Periphery and Recess papers as well as buckets of Clearsnap ink, and a little Glimmermist.  It was the first time I'd used the Glimmermist, and although I'm not bouncing around the room in awe of the actual glimmer effect, I am thrilled enough about the whole misting-colour-onto-a-project thing that I'll be bound to buy more colours.  I could have covered the bracket-frame with paper, or painted or inked it, but it took me 2 seconds to spray the glimmermist and it was coloured.  And so was my carpet.  Just a little though, and just under my desk a little where noone will see.

So today's giveaway.  I admit.  I had this roller thing and I had no idea what to do with it.  SO I left it til last.  I just now clicked it together and gave it a try.  And I'm pretty happy about what it does!  I even flipped the tag over and tried it on there – see how effective it would have been as the black on the tag we did last week!  Anyway, I have one Stampin' Around roller with a black ink pad that is built in so that when you roll it, it self inks and it's really that effortless, as well as a flower roller to giveaway.  I ALSO have 3 Stampin' Up! Catalogs to giveaway.  These are pretty much 160 page idea books.  So that is four giveaways today!  Leave your name and I'll draw four names tomorrow!

(What about this roller thing!  Wish I'd put more time into a project with this – if 3 kids on the couch and an Indiana Jones video weren't calling I'd be making another tag with this! lol)

Edited to add: Apparently we can see the roller used here and here and here

Wish me luck, I have a busy week coming up.  Jacob represents his school at the district speech competitions on Tuesday.  I'm a proud Mum but I'll be glad when I don't have to drag him through practicing anymore.  We are putting in some serious hours on this one, I hope it shows on the day.  I have to admit I love the comments from people "Wow you are so clever to be able to do that, I could never speak in front of people", for a kid that doesn't think he is very good at much, it speaks volumes.

I also have a scraproom to clean up, Paul actually took one of his Construction Site Hazard signs from work and put it across the doorway to my scraproom last night.  He listed "Open Scissors, unmanned punches, slips, trips and falls, bottomless paper pits and unpredicatable paper cuts" as the hazards.  I should have taken a pic.

Talking of taking a pic, I have been tagged by Kelly Goree to do a Hometown Tourist Challenge.  It started when she mentioned to her hubby that she was bored with her current pics so he sent her out to take 10 pics of her hometown.  I mentioned to Kelly that her hubby was indeed an amazing man with very cool ideas and that I wouldn't mind doing something similar.  So she tagged me.  And now that is on this week's list too.  Join me if you wish :o)

Alrighty, that's all.  Link me to any pics you have using that Stampin' Up! Roller, I'm really quite intrigued by it's possibilities.  Check back tomorrow night for a list of winners of the prizes I've listed throughout the week (feel free to go back and leave comments!).  And as per promised, I'll link soe Stampin' Up! demo's below.  Because I don't actually do that part. LOL

Have an awesome week.

Laters.

Edited to add: I promised I'd link any Stamp'Up! demonstrators if they wanted to be linked – here are the ones I know of.

Janine Rutherford – Auckland

 Delys Cram – Whakatane/East Coast

Jacque Stamphappy –(Check out this technique blog!)

Anne-Marie – Brown's Bay, North Shore

Karen – Waitakere

Keryn Campbell – Wellington

Megan Finer – New Plymouth

Louise Forsyth

Sharlene Meyer, Wellington

These posts are creeping later and later into the day.  It took me a while to get moving this morning.  The fact that the mercury hasn't gotten above about 12 degrees has slowed things down and I have an urge to make myself a lemon-honey drink. First blog post.  Then lemon-honey.

It's Friday and that means lots of things but one of the most important is America's Next Top Model and Project Runway.  I'll be dragging my scrapping stuff in front of the T.V. tonight as I have more Tarisota I want to do before the gallery goes up on Sunday.   It also means I get to enjoy the one evening per week that we have no extra-cirricular stuff going on.  Once the kids are home we are done.  I love Fridays.

Just quickly; I see the Prima Blog has a competition called "Easy to be Green" using their packaging and winning hundreds of dollars of stuff.  Gotta be a good thing.  I see it's open internationally too.  That's gotta be even better.

I have a new class on pre-order at Aussie Scrap Source.  It's called 'Cluster Embellishments' and it's based on one of my favourite pages ever, called "Whole World".  Tamar at Tarisota should be getting this in as a limited edition.  Or now that I've said that they will, she'll have to. lol.

Here is a sneak peek.

Scrapping – I threw together a page for Abby's kids album very quickly today.  I've had a few people tell me they've stalled on the kids album because they've run out of ideas … you can't run out of ideas when you are doing your kids album!  Just keep copying the same idea over and over and change the colours around or something!  This isn't about breaking the all time creativity in kids album scrapbooking record, it's about getting it done!  I'm only a few pages away from completion, I'm in the home straight and not far from giving to Abby …here is another page.  Very quick, not at all creative and the other little girl in the pic does really look better IRL but I didn't know her Mum so I thought I'd err on cautions side and leave her pic off the www.

And that paper that I had in the hint yesterday was Stampin' Up! patterned paper! It comes with the bird and swirls etc on it!  I've used it again here.  Othr supplies: Stampin' Up!  Rhinestone, pearl, patterned paper and card.  Little bit of Basicgrey there.  AND AND AND the most important thing?

This.

the hugely coveted and only-used-twice-by-myself-and-put-nicely-back-in-the-bag Scallop circle punch!!  And it could be yours, leave me a comment and I'll draw a name on Monday.

Just one more post to go over the weekend with 4 things to giveaway.  You came back now, ya hear? ;o)

Laters

Day 4.  Quick post today.  I've not created anything exciting today (well actually I have, but not specifically for this blog post!).  I had no tradesmen here today so it's been cleaning day, shopping day (I can put the groceries away since my kitchen isn't under tarps), a quick trip the doctors (strep throat diagnosis from an American doctor that was having a hard time writing a June date and seeing the frost on the ground out her window), and washing day!  I have a washing machine for the first time in over a week.  No more carrying dirty washing to the neighbours and bashfully asking if I can use their machine.  The day is good.

I've been listening to Layle Konkar on Scraphappy while I've been scrapping this afternoon.  It's interesting to here all about Scenic Route, the company, the policies, the inspiration behind the products etc.  It's a 40 minute podcast but time flew while I was scrapbooking. (As it always does?!!)  There are also other podcasts there too.

Not much else to say – running late with everything so I'll leave you this image as a hint of what I'm going to giveaway tomorrow.   (Those are all Stampin Up papers, BTW but it's not the papers I'm giving away)

As for today's giveaway – I've got 2 of the Stampin' Up anywhere glue sticks and a packet of glue dots as well.  Why do the glue sticks go anywhere?  Because they have rectangle sides.  One of those duh-why-didn't-I-think-about-that things.  Very clever.  So 2 of those and a pack of glue dots.  I personally pay for too much for adhesives so I'd be happy to win this one too.

OK I think that's it.  Not much from me today, things to do… people to see….

LAters