Designing for Tweety Jill Publications

You might have noticed the latest little link in my sidebar, but I want to make it official.
I was contacted by Lindsay over at Tweety Jill Publications to see if I would be interested in joining their design team.

I near did a cartwheel and not wanting to look TOO eager, waited ohhhh about 30 seconds before I replied with a definate YES!!!! You can read all about Jill and her fabulous publishing company HERE

I am very excited because not only does Tweety Jill offer excellent idea books, they also have a wonderful array of collage type rubber stamps. I plan to play with them this weekend and post a few samples for your viewing pleasure.

You can see my BEACH BABE Cards over on their Blog. The images are from SPF 50 the latest releases from Hanna Stamps.

A Huge Thanks to Lindsay Haglund for offering me this wonderful opportunity to work with a fabulous creative company.

Bloggers Challenge Week 47

This has to be one of my favourite images from the Hanna SPF 50 set. That is probably quite evident, given my last post featured this image as well.

This wonderful sketch was our Bloggers Challenge group Challenge this week. I combined it with the Hanna Stamps Design Team Challenge, which was to use a brayer.

I am not the most adept at brayering techniques, so this was truly a challenge for me. I chose to do the Crayon Resist technique

I stamped the shell images onto Glossy Cardstock with black Stayzon ink. After letting the ink set, I brayered over the images with Creamy Caramel Ink after using a white crayon to cover the areas that are showing as white on the background. Well the background looked pretty plain still, so I stamped dots in Creamy Caramel. The background was STILL not doing anything for me, so I added some more dots in Teal stayzon. The sentiment is a Rub on from Stampin' up!!!!! I used Taken with Teal Cardstock, combined with Prism's Medium Suede Brown.

Want to check out some beautiful designs made with this sketch?? Follow the Side Bar to see Bloggers Challenge group Creations. To see pretty brayer tecniques, visit the Hanna Stamps Member Forum HSC17.

Have a great weekend!!!!

If being a mother was all about building a sandcastle, we'd be laughing

or would we really? Building Sandcastles can be fun, but then it can also be quite a tedious task, like being a mother.

You need the right mix of sand and water to make a castle that will withstand the wind and tide. As a mother, you need the right mix of love, discipline, modelling........you need to be fun, but firm, know when to assist and when to let our children learn lessons the hard way.

When our children are small, their tragedies are often solved by a hug or a kiss, finding that blanket or stuffie or placing a bandaid on a barely visible boo boo!! We seem to be able to protect them quite easily. The mother is capable of being the strong form that molds and protects the wondrous creation as their personalities and characters develop.

As they get older, that becomes more difficult. We are no longer the only influence in their world. Problems become more complicated and real, others begin to have an impact on shaping our little ones points of view, attitudes and behaviours. The motherly mold begins to lose it's rigidity, allowing the little castles to shift their shape and transform into unique people, yet at the same time remains solid enough to provide a base that will withstand the storms that one has to endure.

I believe that part of the joy of being a mother is to have successfully worked through those difficult times, to process with your child the emotions behind the anger, to wipe the tears, to see the smiles on their faces when they have independently implemented a solution or completed a challenging task.

Building Sandcastles on a Sunny Day at the Beach can be such fun but there is the imminent threat of having all your hard work washed away over time. The work that we invest into our children however, withstands the tide, the wind, the rain and the form that we provide remains in a place deep in our childs heart.


Wishing all the Mother's who are reading this post a Wonderful Wonderful Day!



Card Recipe:

Stamps: Hanna Stamps
Paper: SU! Imaginisce
Markers Copics
Stickles, Brads, Ribbon

Created for Beate's weekend Sketch Challenge-Click Fresh and Fun on my Blog Roll.

While I should be out gardening.................

because it's a beautiful day and because the Flower beds need attention, instead I prefer to work with earth inside..............earth tones, that is!!!!

The truth be known, I am a horrible gardener, it is not something that I enjoy and quite frankly, plants ought to steer clear of me, I have a tendency to kill them........not intentional, but inevitable!!!!

So I created this card for the Design Team Challenge that is posted each Friday over on the Hanna Stamps member forum.

Shannon, our hostess for this week challenged the members to create a card using Creamy Caramel, Ruby Red and Always Artichoke. As you can see, I used all three on my card base. Panels of colour were embossed with the Cuttlebug embossing folder for extra texture.

The image comes from the Garden Stamp set that is now available over at Hanna Stamps. I coloured the main image with Copic markers. Ribbon is from Cosmo Cricket and the little metal "happy " embellishment is from the local $$ Store.

Enjoy yourself today and Play safe!!!!

Bloggers Challenge Week 46-Willows for Mother

I can hardly believe that my Friday Challenge will is up before Friday. Quite often, I actually challenge myself on Friday, so I don't get around to posting until Saturday, but this week I am ahead of the game.

Is it because of my wonderful organization skills you ask?? Definitely NOT!!! I always work well under pressure.

This week I am ahead of the game for a couple of reasons. Wednesday's Sketch challenge was SO inspiring to me that I decided I needed to use it for my Mother's Day card. Did you know that this sketch was designed by Lynn Mecurio, who is a member of our Bloggers Challenge Group?


Secondly, My Mother is wonderful (although we bicker sometimes and she continues to remind me that, in her opinion I am going through the change of life) and is deserving of a pretty card. She does so much for myself and my son and although she isn't so silent about it, she can be very selfless. A lot of the times in my life when I SO did not want her to be right, she WAS and as I grew older, I learned to value her opinion and her excellent ability to read people.




So here's to you Mom. You raised me well and you continue to nurture and love us as we are, albeit frustrating at times. Even though I don't tell you how I feel often enough, I love you, your strengths, quirks and even the faults that make up your persona. I hope that I am fortunate to celebrate many many Mother's days with you.

Love,

Me



Card Recipe:

Pussy Willow Stamp-Sunshine Design
Pallette Noir Ink-Burnt Umber
Signo gel Pen-White
Copic marker No 3 Gray
Basic Grey Sultry DP
Family Printed Cardstock-?
Stampin' Up! Pomegranite Ribbon and Chocolate Chip Twill Ribbon

Hanna Rides Again!

I KNOW that everytime a new Hanna comes out, I usually say that it is my absolute favourite, but I really think Biker Hanna has to be my all time fave!! (well, wait a minute, that beachy is so cute too!!!)

Anyway this image is such a fun one for me. How about the new Archaic line from Basic Grey. I just Love the earth tones and fun and funky patterns.

The little banner comes from the Airplane Riley Stamp. It works with all sorts of small sentiments and rub ons too!!!! I have had Sakura Glaze pens in my stash for a long long time and never used them. You can't really see, but you would be amazed at how the pens make the bike look like black metal. These are Super Pens and cover really really well.

What about the sketch??? You can find it on the Wednesday Sketch Challenge on SCS today. Just go to the Homepage and click on the Wednesday Sketch Challenge. There are some phenomenal cards over there!!!!

Marvellously Macabre

I have a fascination with Gothic Style and So these Stampotique Images appealed to my eye immediately!!!

As I had indicated in my earlier Post about Stampotique stamps, I was overtaken with glee to see these "beetle juice" type characters in all their glory at the Stampotique Booth in California. Once I mustered up enough nerve and with a lot of cheerleading from my good friend Kristi at Hanna stamps, I spoke to Carol and Jim about doing some design work for them. The lucky stars where shining upon me that day because they said Yes!!!!! And SO, a couple of weeks ago a package of these simply adorable characters arrived at my door. This is Gooseneck. She is just one of the many images available on the Stampotique Website. Go take a look, but be prepared to surf for awhile as there must be well over a thousand images over there! I stamped her on Patterned paper from Basic Grey (stamping on Designer Paper cuts down greatly on your colouring time), which meant that I only had to add a shading of marker to the greens to add dimension and highlights with my white gel pen. The DP in the background of the card is from Rusty Pickle. The sentiment from the elzybell collection. I used Stampin Up! Rub ons to embellish the metal star and some curled wire to ground the sentiment.
I am not the only one who thought these images were absolutely adorable. My New stash of stamps arrived just a day or too before my Victopia weekend. The girls were also very impressed with the images and quality of Rubber.

This card was made by Judy Workman, a fellow member of the Hanna stamps design team.

She used a background of Archaic paper to showcase this multi image friendship card.










Another Cool Creation!! This one is by Kim Pargeter, a dear friend from London Ontario














And last, but certainly not least, Moffia is featured here by friend and card artist Anne-Marie Bouthillette.

All of the girls were very impressed with the quality of the deep etched rubber stamps and I know of at least one who became equally addicted to the art of Daniel Torrente and who should be receiving her own package any time soon!!!!






To have a better look at what Stampotique has to offer, click HERE
Keep watching, I have more ideas to come!