Now I can Show you…

…..some of the projects that I completed in preparation for SIA last week.

It was wonderful to be able to play with papers and embellishments from the following companies:

* Prima

*Upsy Daisy Designs

* Scrap Within Reach

* Rouge de Garance

* Harmonie

Scrap Within Reach “Paper Boy” range.

Rouoge de Garance “Sylvestre” range.

Prima Mulberry papers.

Upsy Daisy Designs “Blossom” and “Alligator” ranges.

Prima Clear Acrylic stamps.

And of course, the Mini Book that was created using Rouge de Garance “Marie Antoinette” papers and embellishments, as well as Prima embies and stamps:

I hope something in there inspires you! I certainly had a great time creating with them all. Every single line of paper used is excellent in design and quality – and I LOVE how Addicted to Craft chooses to sponsor and sell the smaller, less mainstream scrapbook companies. It means that we always get to use products that are different, exciting and unique!

To see some of the other wonderful work created by the Addicted To Craft Design team, visit our Blog HERE - you will be blown away by our talented ladies!

Love to all and take care,

Sares x

Hi Ho Hi Ho…

…it’s off to SIA I go!

What a month! I have been practically nonexistent on here, for which I deeply apologise. It’s been bedlam, believe me.

I think we are long overdue for some serious scrapping tips – so here we go!

Tip: Tightly cropping photos can help you keep the focus on the “occasion” rather than the unneccessary details. It’s also good for getting the best out of some ordinary pics – even blurry or overexposed shots look oko when they are cropped.

TIP: Boy themed LO’s don’t need to be without little things like hearts and flowers – keeping the colours bright can help make the “look” a bit more masculine. If your son still complains, tell him “too bad” – you are doing these LO’s for you (at this stage) not him and I can bet he’ll be grateful for them later. Ok, much later, but still grateful! lol.

New Webster’s Pages papers – need I say more? LOVE THEM.

TIP: the new paper ranges out that have such incredible designs on them hardly need to be scrapped, let alone embellished. You could be forgiven for simply plonking your photo on the page and walking away. As you can see, I can’t do that. I would disintegrate into ash. Too hard! But this one is just kept to a minimum to allow the photo to shine.

I’m loving working with acetate at the moment. This page is clear with a Prima Mulberry paper cut out and laid around the outside edges.

TIP: Don’t be afraid to invest in an expensive paper and then chop it up. Reason 1: You only live once – why wait? Reason 2: You will always use the remainder of the paper on something else.

New papers from Scrap Within Reach. PERFECT for boy pages.

TIP: Cut out three large circles from co-ordinating papers and stick them to your cardstock base. Overstitch the edges with your sewing machine and then lift up some edges for a textured look.

First of all, can I say how much I LOVE the “Sylvester” range of papers from Rouge de Garance? Gorgeous quality, gorgeous colours and co-ordinate perfectly together.

TIP:  Try to mix up your LO shapes by introducing circles, ovals, triangles etc. I layered a transparency over the top of the circle in the background of this page, then stitched it into place. I also hand made the “Fir Tree” branch embellies – I couldn’t find any that didn’t look poxy, so I draw them on card with clear embossing pen, then covered in white embossing powder and heat gunned the lot. LOVE the effect.

Finally, this one for Mother’s Day:

This is the simplest card EVER. The new ranges of Prima stamps are fantastic to use as hand made embellishments.

TIP: For this card, I pulled out some co-ordinating Versacolour Ink blocks and double inked those Prima paisley shapes onto white cardstock. Then I simply cut them out and arranged them with some flowers on the front of the card. A few scraps of card later (with some bling of course) and VOILA! Happy Mother’s Day, Mum.

OK, that will hopefully give you all something to think about until I post again, which won’t be until after I return from SIA. I’ll hopefully have some happy snaps of some great girls and new friends made while I am there. I pomise I’ll only publish the nice ones, ladies! What is Photoshop for, anyway?

I’ll leave you with a few pics of my gorgeous tribe, taken while we were out for a drive last week. Let me say this about that drive – GPS DOES have it’s limitations, it seems. I found myself at the bottom of a mountain, on a dirt road surrounded by wild mushies and wallabies. LOL. On the plus side, I would never have seen this:

Clear, ice cold mountain stream. Complete with turtles and fishies. The kids went wild. And speaking of kids, the kidlets (aka “the 4 amigos”) let me take some pics of them during the day – LOVE these:

LOL, I love you, my four amigos. You light up my days.

Take care, everyone and I’ll see you when I getback!

Sares x

Bless the school holidays…

….for they are finally over LOL. I have played umpteen games of Wii, tether tennis, cricket, and scrabble. I’ve baked, cooked, cleaned and sorted until I was ready to fall down – but I had better not (fall) or the kids would think it was an invitation to play “Stacks On”, lol.

I apologise for not updating this Blog recently – I have to say it’s been bedlam around here. Notwithstanding the holiday highjinks, I have also been finalising the preparations for both SIA and the Scrapbook and Papercraft Convention in Brisbane in June. For those of you who are keen to get to the Brissy show, here is a link to the TIMETABLE OF CLASSES. I am teaching alongside such other lovely ladies as Jill Geraghty-Groves, Ngaire Bartlam and Petrina Macdonald – omg I am going to hug the stuffing out of all three ladies. We have been “online” buddies for a while now and I am looking forward to getting a chance to let our combined hair down and chillax a bit.

For those of you keen to do my “A Touch of Rouge” Class – sign up NOW as spaces are filling up fast. You will definitely NOT be disappointed by the cool new products we are using PLUS the amount of gimme’s in your Kits – you are getting almost DOUBLE the Kit value!

So, what else is new with everyone? Aside from the general “cheer” I heard when all the kids went back to school today, I think everyone has been just as busy as I have.

The SIA Kits are all packaged up and ready for the beginning of May – look out retailers!! Here are a few sneak peeks (above) of what you will see me doing or displaying at the SIA show.

So, what else have I been up to? Quite a few Photography jobs – the list of editing keeps getting longer, lol. I also have to say a belated Congratulations to my friends Tim and Mel on the arrival of baby Sophia – this little bundle is part of the reason why I have been so busy this month – isn’t she beautiful?

She had a sleepover with me the other night and we both had a lovely time. She managed to sleep over 5 hours between feeds late that night so I wasn’t even all that sleep deprived! Mind you, I only had to do it for one night and I was very glad to have a last cuddle and then hand her back, lol. As gorgeous as she is, after 4 of my own, I am a little bit past the baby stage and once you get some freedom back you don’t want to let it go! lol.

Another photo shoot down by the River for Ashleigh and Nick was this week’s project. The light was just divine but gee, without daylight saving it doesn’t take long for that sun to set, does it?

That’s all from me for now – I’m am going to hopefully sit down for 5 minutes with a cuppa before it’s time for the bath/tea/bed routine.

Don’t forget to book yourselves into the Brissy show classes!

Take care everyone,

Sares x

A Busy month…

I sat down and started writing  out my calendar today – just for the next few months. Before I had a heart attack I stopped and took a few deep breaths into a brown paper bag – sheesh!

It seems like every minute of every day is accounted for but I know that’s not true. In fact, as I get older, the less I stress about this stuff because it always happens that you have more time to do things than you think.

Having said that – could someone please send me the Tardis from Doctor Who?  Failing that, that Time Turner thingy that Hermione wore in Harry Potter? I need more hours in the day!

So, you might ask yourself, if you are so time poor, how do you manage to get LO’s done? Hmmmm?

Well, smarty pants, I work late, ok? I also work early and somewhere in the middle as well. I don’t eat. I don’t sleep. I don’t play. OK maybe I eat, because James told me tonight that I was “a little bit fat”. Noice. Thanks babe. Love you too. lol.

So here we go – layouts to share!

Yes, I know – all Hannah Banana LO’s. I am trying to catch up on some holiday pages, that’s all. Believe me, there are a ton of boy pages in here, too!

And one OTP as well:

I have been a productive little chook, haven’t I?

For those of you in my classes that are held here, at my studio, have a sticky at the side widgets for dates and materials lists for classes – they have been updated until April so I hope that helps.

For those of you who are in Sydney for the mid March CRAFT EXPO at Homebush, I will be teaching there on behalf of Scrapbooking Memories magazine! Three classes per day on March 11, 12, 13 and 14 – just come and see me at the Express Publications stand and I will be thrilled to catch up with anyone of you. Woot!

So it’s going to be a very busy year. Who am I kidding, it’s going to be hectic. But that’s pretty normal for me. You are a long time dead hey?

Take care all!

Sares xx

Some Studio Time…

Before I get into the meat of this post, let me start by saying a big THANKYOU to all those people who emailed or messaged me or left a comment here to congratulate me on winning one of the SM Masters spots. It’s been a fantastic week!

We are still in the school holidays here in Australia and the kids have been a pleasure (most of the time lol). Everyone has behaved themselves. Except for the time Hannah threw all of James’ undies down the stairs. And except for the boys fighting over who has shot down more zombies ono the DS. Oh and don’t forget sticking bubblegum to the underside of the coffeetable. And harrassinig the dog. And the cat. And………..oh, MOVING ON.

I have had a chance to move everything into my studio now and I have been able to take some pics of what it all looks like completed. Here is a collage of them all: (just click on the image for a larger version)

Yes, it’s girly. Yes, it’s moderately organised. Well, I cleaned it up for the photo – you should have seen it afterwards! lol. I LOVE IT. It’s mine. I can shut the door. I can escape. I can play music. I can even run away through the front doors! I am in a happy place.

I have also managed to do some real scrapping this week, too. I know! It’s been a while since I showed you some. I have been flat out, trust me. Here they are:

Using some left over Halloween papers for some grungy looking boy themed LO’s.

One of the Stamp sets I received as part of the Masters prize pack was Fancy Pants “On a Whimsy”. This is just my first attempt at having a little play with them.

Of course, there is probably a flood of Christmas pages around the forums and galleries at the moment. Here is one more LOL.

“Cherry Bomb” is a LO created t the end of a tutorial. If you’d like to create this page, or at least learn about the technique I used, click HERE.

Playing with my new camera and some light setting scored me this shot of Hannah in silhouette. I knew I had to scrap it immediately!

This LO was created using large sheets of rubber stanps from Darkroom Door. If you’d like to create this LO, or learn about the techniques I used to create it, click HERE.

For another lesson using my Tips and Techniques – Using GLIMMERMIST to Create Custom coloured flowers, click HERE.

The last thing to show you is this – the new Floating Frame from Twiddleybitz. I went down to Sydney to have a go at creating one with Sherry Mendoza and her class. Love it! Very easy and quick to put together – I did this in 1.5 hours.

I’m going to leave it there for now while I go sort out some more stuff in the studio. Apologies to those on dial up for this picture-rich Blog post but it had to be done! lol.

Right – I am back to creating and making a mess – that studio looks far too clean and it needs to be DIRTY.

Love to all and please keep safe on the roads these holidays!

Sares x