So proud

We are very proud of our oldest daughter Lauren who graduated today with a Bachelor of Science degree. It has been three long years of study but today made that all worthwhile. Well done Lauren! She now wants to go on and do her masters in physiotherapy.
To clear up any confusion (as per my discussion on Sunday when some dear friends and I had our Christmas lunch) Bachelor degrees - no hat, Masters - mortar board, Doctorate - a bonnet with red trim.

Feeling Krafty

I love the colour combo of kraft (crumb cake) and cherry cobbler. This card came together very quickly, with the help of a new stamp set Fabulous Florets and leaves from Paper trey ink.

The casing of Judy May

Judy made a beautiful card here, it was so stunning I just had to have a go at making one myself.
I have varied mine slightly by not having the sentiment on the bottom of the card
I was so happy with it that I just had to make more.
I substituted glitter paper with shimmery ones for this card.

Toolangi Castella festival

Last weekend was the Toolangi Castella festival, which started with a BBQ and a band playing and then the moonlight cinema. The film was Avatar and it was played outside on the local oval surrounded by bushland, which really couldn't have been a better setting. The day had been very warm. So as the sun went down, it cooled considerably and coats or blankets were the order of the day as well as the obligatory insect repellent.

Many months of planning and organising went in to make this such a successful event, it is part of my job to help with these community activities. Volunteers arrived on the Saturday to help erect all the marquees, man the BBQ, erect the stage and direct traffic and car parking. These types of local events, on very meagre budgets would never run without the enthusiastic help offered by such generous people.

The following day all the activities followed, there was the reptile tent where you could get up close and personal with snakes and crocs (not my cup of tea). The bush babies were a great draw for children and adults alike, with lots of aahhhh moments. The adorable little ( I say little, because he was only a few months old but weighed 20kgs) wombat, who was lapping up all the attention. The Toolangi Castella Youth Group had a great stall and were running apple bobbing, eating doughnuts on a string in the air with your hands behind your back, estimating the jelly beans in a jar games, lucky dip etc. There was a tethered hot air balloon, entertainment going on all day, dancing, singing, a velcro wall for those energetic souls who wish to don a non flattering suit and jump as high as they can and stick to the wall and jumping castles for the smaller adventurers. A horse drawn cart with seating brought festival goes from the assigned parking to the reserve as well as a small minivan for those who wanted to get to the action sooner. There were free massage sessions on offer all day as well as an array of craft stalls. I had my little card stall, selling cards (what else), gift bags, tags, bottle tags, decorated food bags etc. I had prepared a sampling of all my wares, to tempt passers by, in an orange and pink theme (pumpkin pie and rose red to my SU buddies). A friend had very kingly loaned me her pillow box die and scalloped envelope die ( which I used to make the sweet/lolly boxes), the pendant boxes I made from my own template. The weather was very kind to us on the day ( it had been raining for weeks prior) and only started to drizzle as the festival was winding down at 4pm and the raffle was being drawn. There were twenty fab prizes, including a bike, a weekend stay, cases of wine, meals at wineries, tickets to an event of your choice at Rochford winery, tickets to the Australian Ballet, hampers from delis and farms, I could go on and on, but I will spare you. I didn't win anything, (but then again I never do, I am a very unlucky person in that regard) but I knew plenty of those who did.

I sold many cards and a few bags and even some of my demo items from the tree. All in all it was a great weekend. I was completely pooped in the evening though, after moving tables and chairs, erecting and dismantling marquees and tiding up the oval, this lady was ready for her bed by 9.30pm.

Who's for wine?

Here are just a couple of the wine bottle tags I have been making for Christmas. I cut them on my trusty silhoutte. The ornament is also a silhoutte design. I have also been having fun making the rosettes, I have a die for these but have downloaded another design for one from the silhoutte library (much cheaper than the die)!! The rosettes are a great way of using up scraps of leftover DSP.

Birthday Card

Hi, long time no post! What's new I hear you cry. Sorry I am such a bad blogger.

I have a picture of a card a made recently for my good friend Judy's birthday. I can't take credit for the design which I copied( I varied it just a little) from Card Making and Papercrafts magazine. Judy's card benefitted from a trial run I had last month making it for another friend's birthday. I made sure this had no ends of paper showing and the table legs turned out a lot better this time too. I really love the design though and it wasn't nearly as fiddly as I had anticipated.

Here is something I made earlier.

Too long ago (we must do it again), my friends came for a stamp over, much laughter, food consumption ( chocolate, obviously) and to be honest very little creating, ensued! Christine however was very busy getting her convention swaps ready, punching up a storm and kindly bequeathed me all the bits she punched but didn't need, saying " I know you will make something with these". Well here they are. Flowers!
I have cased one of the cards in the new catalogue (page 10), sadly I didn't have all the items used because they are not available yet so I improvised with my trusty Papertrey Ink supplies.
With the addition of a few punches of my own, I came up with five flowers.

Doesn't the centre of the one above remind you of a Rowntrees pastille? These are new from Kaisercraft and come in a range of colours.
This last flower is my favourite, however it is a bit big for a card so I will have to save it for a scrapbook page. Dashing off to work now although I would rather be in my craft room, ahh, such is life, we do need to eat after all!