July's Crafting

Well I managed to get some craft done in July. Having challenges to do helps me focus & gives me some motivation to complete layouts as my mojo has been lacking of late. I have also joined two more craft forums....MysticalScrapbooks and ScrapTherapy and have done some of their classes and challenges.

I am still trying to do the WhiteWithOne challenge each month as that really makes me think. July's was Black with a home made embellishment & June's was Blue. I couldn't resist taking a photo of one of the banksia seed cones .... I have always loved their shape & texture. For June I had a photo of sunset over the caravan park at Lismore and used crackle medium for the frame.

This was a blind challenge I did with Scrap Therapy. I had never done one of these challenges before & found it very interesting. With no pagemap or photos to follow just instructions to place papers, photos and stamped images in certain places. It was really great to see how each person interpreted the instructions. The photo was taken in our back paddock a month or so ago about 8:30am. It is very unusual to still have mist hanging around at that time of day.

With Mystical Scrapbooks we made a lovely little album. It is basically one piece of cardstock which is cut and folded in a certain way. Then front & back covers added & the album decorated. I loved making the different tags too. The tags are for journalling and slip into pockets between some of the pages.



The LO & Card challenges for Blumars this month had Autumn tonings. Here is my card:-

And this the my layout. I found this wonderful paper which had beautiful leaves in browns printed on it and then I just added some punched and cut out leaves. Shadow loves "helping" when we rake. She watches the rake so intently that even when you put it aside for a while she will continue to guard it just in case it starts moving again.

The OTP challenge was to decorate a pot. This was very basic with just stenciled geckos that I cut out and glued into place on the pot and then varnished.

I managed to complete a couple of weekend workshops - one was Blumars where we had an Anniversary card to make and a LO to do titled "Having Fun".

I had these photos of my niece learning to play tennis waiting to be scrapped & this title just seemed to fit.

The OTP was another easy one - just to decorate a gift box. I actually prefer OTPs sometimes to doing layouts and cards.


The Quick Technique Challenge this month was a favourite of mine. We had to use the photo from the photography challenge a few months back. This is a photo of one of the ginger flowers on Dunk Island. By duplicating the photo and changing the one on top to black & white I was then able to erase the flower part leaving the coloured photo showing through from underneath.

I wasn't able to manage to do Scrap Therapy weekend challenge but was able to attempt Mystical Scrapbooks Mammoth one mid month. Of the 6 challenges I managed to complete 3 so was quite pleased with that effort.

This was following a page design. It is a photo of my sister & niece when they were on holidays in Melbourne earlier this year.


The layout above had a theme of time with three titles to choose from - I choose "How Time Flies" and a clock had to be included somewhere as well.

Then finally I did the challenge where we had to use different patterned papers - one of which was to be stripy. These photos are from when Graham & I did the trip to Cape York last year with of course Gunde' who travelled with us....LoL.

Not feeling the best

Haven't done any craft the past couple of weeks - the cold weather really doesn't agree with me & I've been stiff & sore all over plus just feeling so tired. Seem to have lost all motivation for doing anything or going anywhere.

Am finding though that my arms have been particularly irritated & am having to be careful as to how much I do on the computer. I have managed some graphics though - have done a couple of PI challenges & tutorials which are fun.

With this twisted tutorial we were given instructions to make the little sheep but then had to put our own slant on things. I think they are just so cute.

This challenge was to use plug-in filters to make a frame for around our photos. I love the misty one which was taken in our back paddock only a couple of weeks ago.
Another tutorial was learning to make frayed edges. I can see this coming in very useful for digital scrapping or for making tags.
This is a lacy flower which I did just for fun from another tutorial. This one was particularly fun to experiment with having so many patterns & colours to choose from.
Had more heavy rain early this week - over 2 inches again. We needed the rain again but I find the cold, wet days very depressing. However the last couple of days have been chilly with the south westerlies although the days themselves are beautiful. Clear blue skies & sunshine. Just need to find a spot in the sun out of the wind.

Today I am hoping to have a go at a layout and a pot which I need to finish decorating - will just see how things go.

Classes for June

We had two interesting classes this month. The first one was a layout using flower stacks & fluid chalk. It was a bit time consuming but I loved the way it turned out.

Then last weekend we made a beautiful box. I can think of so many uses for this.
This is the second one that I made - I think they are so lovely.

June Craft Challenges

Well I didn't think I was going to get anywhere with my craft this month. Seemed to be in a total uninspired muddle & finding that my arms have really been flaring up with the cold weather - don't like winter at all.

This is my card:-

My layout was of a layout of myself & our son.

The OTP was a decorated canvas for a housewarming present.The photographic challenge was to be an action shot taken using the burst setting on a camera. This is a photo of Russ who belongs to friends & we were looking after him for a few days. He loves jumping up for his frisbie.

The Quick Technique Challenge for this month was to do either a LO or Card using one embellishment & a verse.

Looking good at Mum & Dad's

Well after another two weekends spent at Mum & Dad's home we are starting to make progress. Hubby went up for the Saturday a week ago & then he & I went up again last weekend. So far there has been about 2 tonne of rubbish go to the tip as well as 2 loads of firewood to my brother's & 7 trailer loads of other items to store at our home in the meantime.

We were actually able to use the bar-b-que & eat under the house for the first time in over 15 years. So the house is now on the market & hopefully will sell fairly quickly. After living there for over 47 years it is going to be difficult for Mum & Dad to say goodbye but I am sure they will be happy in their new home.

June Weekend Workshop

The weekend workshop kept us busy too. With the usual Card, LO & OTP challenges we also had a quick LO challenge as well.

This is my contemporary card. I used some teabag folding for the centre.

The theme for the lay-out was 'That Look' and I couldn't resist using Amber in her Santa hat. She really has a 'look what they are doing to me' look on her face.
The OTP challenge was to decorate a door hanger - either one for the knob or to hang on the door so I decided to do one for the ensuite.

And finally the quick layout challenge was themed - 'My Favourite Thing' - so I chose to use sunrise photos.

Digital Scrapbook Page

Well I finally had a play around with digital scrapbooking. This is the page I put together for the Photo Impact June competition. Enjoyed mucking around with the placing of photos and objects and would like to do more pages in the future. Think I will always do the scrapbooking by old methods too as I like to actually be able to flick through an album.

Our early-morning visitor

Last Friday, hubby, DS & myself went to Mum & Dad's in Brissie to start helping them clean-up & throw out in preparation for listing their house & moving up our way. It is quite a mammoth task as they have been living at their current address for over 47 years so there is a lot of acumulated treasures - lol. Also dad had been a builder so there was an awful lot of left-overs from jobs.

Friday night (early Saturday morning) we were awoken by noises in the bathroom. Mum originally thought she had heard a tap dripping but when she walked into the bathroom everything was quiet and as she didn't turn on the light didn't notice anything amiss - however after hearing more banging we thought a possum might have made its way in through the window.

On investigating further - this is what mum found when turning on the light. Not what you expect to have greeting you.

What did we do???? - well at 3AM the best plan of attack was to close the door & leave it till the morning when dad made a snake noose & he & hubby bundled it into the laundry hamper in the bathroom & hubby then released it on the creek bank down the back of mum & dad's property. I felt a bit sorry for the poor creature - lol - moving it from a lovely warm bathroom & depositing it down the backyard in a shower or rain but after a few minutes it gathered its bearings and slowly moved to shelter. Needless to say that the window was closed tightly the next night - lol

I'VE GRADUATED - YAY !!!!!

Well it took a year and a half but I have finally completed my Photo Impact course. This is a graphics & photo editing programme which I can thoroughly recommend. It is so user friendly & has so many different tools & techniques available. I can't decide which part I enjoyed the most........loved animation.........loved digital painting & can't wait to try digital scrapbooking.

RAIN & MORE RAIN ................

Well we arrived home from holidays to find that there had been over 5 inches (162 ml) of rain in the previous couple of days - something that was badly needed. The dam actually backed up with the back paddock flooding a bit - something which hasn't happened for quite a few years so we will now have plenty of water for the winter. The tanks were full & overflowing & so was the pool which was great to see. We do have town water as well but try to not use that for anything other than laundry, kitchen & bathroom. We will have the washing machine connected to the tank water too soon which will drop our usage of town water even further.