Christmas Cards 2013

This is now our fourth Christmas back in Sydney. I have managed to make this year's Christmas Cards from my never ending stash of scrapbook papers and haven't bought anything new in that time. I think I'll still be able to make next year's as well.

Creative fun

Jean and I did a class with Lisa Oxley at the Spring Papercrafts Festival at Penrith on 3rd November.

It was messy inky fun and I was able to finish one layout ... loved it.

Art Journal Calendar - August 2013

From August until the end of the year is the busiest period in my work industry. Even though I had good intentions of doing one artistic thing a month, this ended up being the last thing I did until I went to a craft show or made my Christmas cards.

The focus of this layout is olives ... and what goes perfectly with olives ... wine!

Art Journal Calendar - July 2013

Following my trip overseas last year things got pretty busy in my life. Here is my art journal calendar page for July.

The colour scheme and theme relates to the highlight of this month being in The Netherlands visiting family and friends.

Art Journal Calendar - June 2013

Here is my Art Journaling Calendar page for June.  I started off with a painted background that I then covered with a series of napkins depicting green hills, water, lighthouses and what looks like nice but cool weather very typical of Europe. 

The colour scheme is based on the fact that we're travelling from Australia to Ireland on 13th June for a week and then I'll be in the UK for the last week of June. I've used Green, White & Orange depicting the Irish flag and Red, White & Blue for the English flag.  I'm not really sure all of these colours really go together, but I'm happy that the layout is finished and is based on the theme of our holiday.

Now to finish July before we depart on Thursday ...

My May calendar page also managed to feature as the Header of the Art Journaling Calendar Challenge group FaceBook page again this month ... it's quite an honour considering the talent of the group.

 

 



Calendar Challenge May ...

Hard to believe that we're in May already! Here's my Art Journaling Calender Challenge layout for this month.

The whole background is made from the inside of security envelopes - light blue ones for the sky, brown one's for the land and dark blue for the water.  Distress inks were added over the sky and land to highlight the colours a bit more.

I wanted to create a little village atmosphere with the houses, kites flying, birds and fish ... as there are no people it's more of a summer holiday village, but downunder it's Autumn and nearly winter so it's deserted!

The close up images show the security envelope patterns.

Art Journaling Calendar - April 2013

Here is my April Art Journal Calendar.  I'm determined to use the copious amounts of craft supplies I have accumulated so have used a couple of napkins with birds and eggs, scraps of patterned paper from scrapbooking for my squares, stickers, paints, stencils/stamps and ink and the washi tape I recently bought.  I even used Dimensional Magic to highlight the Bird, eggs and butterflies.

I'm having so much fun doing the calendar challenge this time around ... I'm not overthinking it, just going with the flow.

My layout managed to make it to the header of the Facebook Group again ... stoked!

Stitches & Craft Show

On Sunday 10th March, my friend Jean and I spent the day at the Stitches & Craft Show at Rosehill Racecourse. 

We registered for a Card Make and Take class with Azza Sedrak and it was loads of fun.  We made three fab cards:

 

 

I then stuck around at the end of the day to do a class called Native Animal Cut Out Cards with Skye Rogers, author of art book Paper Bliss.  Our cards ended up being larger than life and more of a art piece than a card ... crafting with Skye was a blast, she's quite the character.

 

Enjoy!

Calendar Challenge 3 months on ...

The last time I decided to join Kate Crane's calendar challenge in 2010, I managed to get to February!  Am very proud that I have this year managed to get March done.

March is my birthday month and I wanted this layout to reflect time out for me ... and there's nothing better than taking time out with a good strong cup of coffee.

I painted the pages with golden paints that matched a napkin I had with the coffee cups.  I then stuck a barcode sticker along the base and added the napkins in each corner.  I cut out the border from the napkins and glued it around the two pages to create a type of border.  I used some left over rubons, scrapbook cardstock as the squares, Making Memories sticker numbers on each square and for the year, then lastly some round stickers for the month which were black and white, so I coloured them in to blend in more with the coffee coloured layout. 

Kate Crane is running the Art Journaling Calendar Challenge again this year with a Facebook Group https://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/calendarchallenge/ and there are so many amazing and varied artists participating.

This month my calendar page was the feature page on the Facebook group header ... was very chuffed.

A little inspiration ...

I joined an Inspirational Card swap through the Boomerang Stampers Yahoo Group.

20 of us played, so we each ended up with 20 pieces of art with an inspiring quote.

Here is my card.

Art Journal Calendar - February

Here's my February calendar finished nice and early!  As I work full-time and start back to work tomorrow, thought I better get a little ahead just in case.

I've added a picture below of just the background as well. The white scallops around the edge are made with wax and the paint resisted it.  The stamped background was inspired by a technique/article by Kim Costello in the January 2013 Craft Stamper magazine. It's all different stamps and some hand doodling done one section at a time and masking. Took forever but once I started I couldn't stop ... it was fun.

There are two hearts this month as my husband and I not only celebrate Valentine's day, but also our wedding anniversary a few days earlier.

2013 Art Calendar

Have decided to join Kate Crane's Art Journalling Calendar Challenge 2013 through FaceBook.

I first had a go at doing the art calendar in 2010 and managed to get to February!!!

I don't do enough art & really want to get into the habit of doing something every week to ensure I have more balance in my life ... hopefully this challenge will be the ticket.

Here's my January page ready to go. Last year we moved house and it took me nearly that long to unpack the copious amounts of craft supplies that I own. My aim is to use my stash of scrapbooking papers, stickers, alphas, rubber stamps etc in this calendar.

December

All the christmas cards went out ... just in time for Australia but overseas will probably arrive after Christmas!

We hosted Christmas Eve Dinner this year and Ferg out did himself with a fantastic cooked turkey and ham ... it was all a little crazy with around 17 of us and the rain, but a great success overall.

 

 

 



Stamp Camp

It's taken over 2 years but finally I managed to attend Stamp Camp in the Hunter Valley this year from 7th - 9th September. It's always held on a weekend in September and as the majority of my family members birthdays occur during this month, I haven't been able to go ... until now!

I arrived on Friday night after working all day, just in time for dinner. I spent the weekend with a lovely group of ladies, some I'd met before and others I met through various online groups.

On Saturday, the lovely Rachel Greig from Darkroom Door (http://www.rachelgreig.typepad.com)
spent the day teaching us different techniques to make cards.  When we weren't in the classroom, our time was our own to finish off other projects.

All in all the weekend was just what I need to recharge and get back in balance with a little bit of creativity.

Below some photos of the cards made in Rachel's class, some ATC completed and a pic of my Stamp Camp buddies. From L to R Bev Charter, Therese Davis, Me, Dorothy Leach, Heather Askitis & Carolyn Passfield.

 

Keep smiling and keep creating!



Record of our trip ...

One of my Christmas presents this year from my beautiful husband was a Fuji Instant camera.  I really wanted one so that when we travel I can have photos straight away to use in my creative projects. As I don't get as much time to create art these days, while we were away I made a promise to spend at least an hour a day recording our trip in a travel journal.

If you haven't already seen some of the photos of our trip, feel free to visit the post here http://docobhthaigh.blogspot.com.au/2012/02/australian-travels.html. 

Last weekend my friend Jean came to visit and we got a little crafting in and I finally finished the mini album.

I was inspired by an article in the September 2011 issue of the Craft Stamper Magazine (www.craftstamper.com) by Katy Fox.  She used the Pink Paislee Daily Junque stamps to create a beautiful travel journal.  I didn't have all the Pink Paislee Daily Junque patterned papers, but loved the yellow / turquoise colour theme and raided my stash to put it all together. I already had the ring bound small album so was ready to go.  The maps are copies of the map we actually used on our trip, with pen highlighting some of the roads we took.