In recent weeks the projects I have been showing on here have been more complicated - lots of steps and quite a bit of time spent and you could be thinking, "Yes lovely, but I just want to be able to whip up a few birthday cards to get me through the next month or two . . . "

Perfect! Today I have two really simple, quick and easy cards to show you, one for boys and one for girls!

This card is SO simple!  It consist of the Cajun Craze card base, one piece of striped paper from the Frightful Sight Designer Series Paper and one stamped greeting on a co-ordinating scrap of card.  The very cute spider on this card is actually part of the patterned paper.

I've chosen Cajun Craze for the background layer for the greeting, but you could use black, grey or Old Olive to co-ordinate with the DSP too.

My card for girls uses the same very simple supplies and sketch,with an added layer, a butterfly, and a pretty edge on the inside.

This double sided patterned paper comes from the hostess set Cheerful Treat - I love those stripes and the pretty floral pattern!

The great thing about these bright cheery, simple cards is that you can churn out quite a few in a short time.  I think they're terrific!  What do you think?

Welcome to another little hop around stampin' land, to see the inspiring work of my lovely creative friends. All our projects today feature products from the Summer Mini Catalogue which are available to purchase right now, and all orders over $100 can receive free Sale-a-bration goodies.

There are seven ladies involved in today's blog hop - a nice little journey. You may have just come from my lovely friend Alisha Watson's blog, or you may be starting here, welcome! It's easy to join in the blog hop, just follow the link at the bottom of each post, to take you to the next one.

Anyway, what have I been making?  I have fallen in love with the gorgeous designer series paper Spice Cake which is on page 10 of the Summer Mini, and have created a 12" x 12" layout and a mini tag book with these gorgeous prints and the amazingly large co-ordinating Spice Cake buttons which are also in the mini.

The tags are cut from Very Vanilla Textured card stock, punched with the corner rounder punch.  The round tab punch was used to cut Spice Cake DSP scraps for the tag tops, and Stampin' Up! Seam Binding Ribbon added as a final touch to each one.

My 12" x 12" layout is my second creation for my journey in the on-line scrapbooking class "Twelve" which consists of 12 colours, 12 categories, and 12 months of layouts for 2012.  This layout falls into the category "Personalities" where I had listed this very cute little boy.  He has so much personality right now, although the photos I have used are a couple of years old, but they certainly add to the story.

This layout is very much inspired by the sample in the Mini Catalogue. I love all the texture that is created by weaving the strips of DSP and it's a great way to show off both sides of the gorgeous patterned papers.

The buttons are fantabulous!  At first I was shocked at the size, but I love them for their simple, uncluttered look - and how you can rustic them up with a bit of linen thread.

The shiny chipboard letters came out of my stash from about 5 years ago - I knew they'd come in use one day! And I am glad I remembered them for this layout.  In TWELVE, the online class I am doing, I have matched "personalities" with the colour Rich Razzleberry, and there is a requirement to put a splash of this awesome bold colour onto every layout you complete for this category. 

When I was putting the finishing touches to this layout, I suddenly remembered this and rolled my eyes in horror at the thought of Rich Razzleberry trying to blend with River Rock, Pear Pizzazz, Pool Party, Soft Suede and More Mustard.  Then I spotted a scrap of Rich Razzleberry Seam Binding Ribbon and noticed how closely it matched with some of the shades in the old non-Stampin' Up! chip board letters!  Pheww! Not such a clash as I had expected after all!

Well, that's an awful lot of photos and hopefully a good bit of inspiration for you!  So now I must send you on your way to the next blogger in our blog hop.  But before I do, please, please, please leave a comment for each of the ladies - there's usually a comments tab right at the bottom of the post - we SO love to hear what you think of our creations, or of the products themselves!  Thanks so much.

Now off you pop to visit Di Dunk, who never ceases to amaze us with how much amazing work she always puts into these projects! Enjoy the journey and have a nice day!

Congratulations to all our "New Australians" who receive their Citizenship Certificates in Australia Day ceremonies across the country today.  We had the pleasure of attending such a ceremony in our nation's capital, Canberra, in 2009 - it was such a buzz!  (or maybe that was the 21 canon salute, or the FA-18 flyover!!).

To celebrate today, I have gone hunting through some OLD photos and dug up a favourite project I did in 2005.  I was working on lots of Altered Book projects at the time, and this one had the theme favourite places.  The month's project had to include "windows" in the page, so I embedded acetate sheets between several pages and created some windows which I stamped one of our favourite national emblems onto - yes, the kangaroo!

Anyway, here's what it looked like!

The words are just a couple of verses from the very moving Dorothea Mackellar Poem, My Country, one of my all-time favourites.

Don't you love that last line . . . I know to which brown country my homing thoughts will fly . . . ?

It's like when you walk down those long corridors at Heathrow after a month in Europe and suddenly you see row upon row of flying kangaroos - yes the tails of dozens of Qantas jets, and with tears in your eyes, you realise . . . you're going HOME!!  Home to the best country on earth! 

Have a great day - enjoy this beautiful fresh air and sunshine and I hope your day is blessed with beautiful happy family memories!

ESAD Blog Hop Day

Welcome to a very exciting day!  It's the start of Sale-a-bration today, and to celebrate, we are blog hopping with the ESAD girls!

What is ESAD?

ESAD stands for "Extra Special Australasian Demonstrators" and it is an on-line group just for Australian and New Zealand Stampin’ Up! demonstrators.

We so love what we do, and not only do we love to share it with our customers, friends, and wonderful blog visitors, but we share our love for what we do with each other, as demonstrators. We run swaps, challenges, tutorials, product know-how, and cyberstamps, and we are always there to help and support each other when it is needed.

So if you are a Stampin' Up! Demonstrator  located in Australia or New Zealand, then please feel free to click here to join our wonderful group. 

If you're not a Stampin' Up! Demonstrator then you should be!  It's so much fun!  There is even a great join the SU! family promotion during Sale-a-bration with a discounted starter kit and a FREE stamp set - any one you want!!

What are you going to see on our blog hop today?  Sale-a-bration Items!  Twenty-three of us have designed and created lovely new projects using the gorgeous products you can get for free during Sale-a-bration.

I have used the delicious Designer Series Paper Pack : Everyday Enchantment and created a tri-shutter card to show you.

The paper is so vintagey, but in lovely bright colours, and I adore how it co-ordinates with the stamp set You Are Loved, from the Summer Mini Catalogue.

Here are some of the little close up details for you :

You can see I've had lots of fun inking up the stamps with my Stampin' Write Markers for multi-coloured stamping. It's one of my favourite techniques as the results are always different and surprising!

The next stop on the blog hop is back to the very start to Sherylee Tutt. If you are just starting here, click on the link following her name, to go to her creation, then follow the links from there to go the full circle. Please leave a little blog-love by leaving a comment for as many of the ladies as you can. We love and really appreciate your feedback.

In case you get lost, or one of the links is broken, here is the full list of participants.

1.  Sherylee Tutt  www.stampinup.net/esuite/home/sherylee/blog

2.  Juliette Chapman  www.juleskraftikrafts.blogspot.com

3.  Alison Barclay  www.gothdovedesigns.blogspot.com

4.  Corina Beyer  www.beyondinkstamper.com

5.  Christie Krunkel  www.christiescreativecorner.blogspot.com

6.  Jane Norrish  www.janenorrish.com

7.  Nicole Derendorf  www.nicolederendorf.com

8.  Jacinta Argent  www.jacintascreations.blogspot.com

9.  Leonie Schroder  www.stamp-a-latte.com

10. Alisa Tilsner  www.alisatilsner.com

11.  Keryn Campbell  www.kerynscards.blogspot.com

12.  Sharlene Mayer  www.magpiecreates.com

13.  Madonna Dunn  www.madonnadunn.com.au

14. Joanne Kechagias  www.Joannekechagias.blogspot.com

15.  Pauline Bennetts  www.paulinebennetts.com/stampede

16.  Monique Fielder  http://www.stamping-with-moni-q.blogspot.com/

17.  Bron Heslop  www.bronheslop.wordpress.com

18.  Felicity Fernandez  www.stampinwithflick.blogspot.com

19. Michelle Grech  www.stampmeshell.wordpress.com

20. Kelly Nelson  www.kellysstampinspot.wordpress.com 

21.  Louise Layton   www.inkyloulou.com

22.  Yvonne Walker  www.yvonnescreativecorner.blogspot.com

23. Kathryn Ruddick  www.katlodesigns.com

Happy hopping folks, enjoy the journey, and please fall in love with the Sale-a-bration products and book a Sale-a-bration workshop with your demonstrator!  Or ASK one of us about how you can be part of the fun and get the discounted starter kit and extra FREE stamp set!

Recipe for making SUNSHINE!

Take one flower stamp from Fabulous Florets and add Daffodil Delight Ink.

Take leaf stem from Fabulous Florets and add Wild Wasabi Ink.

Take another flower and add Tangerine Tango!

Take the smallest flower and fill in some blank spaces with Melon Mambo . . .

Oh! Oopsie, I might have gone a bit far there!! LOL

Well, let's see what it looks like cut down from A4 into card front size pieces :

Now that's not SO bad!  But, time to make it into something!

Get out every one of your circle punches and scallop circle dies and punches and go silly with the same colours AND add a few snippets of the totally gorgeous BEYOND THE GARDEN designer series paper too.

Add a couple of flower brads for joining and a snip of pumpkin pie ribbon to hang it with . . .

And there you have it! You've got sunshine, on a cloudy day . . . !

The Stampin' Up! 2011-2012 Ideas Book & Catalogue has a great stamp set called "Best Dad Ever".  Now, I am not so sure I would ever find a use for a stamp with Best Dad Ever on it, but certainly there are three other VERY useful greeting stamps and a fantastic tie image stamp in this set of five from Stampin' Up!

Lots of male birthday's coming up, so last night, accompanied by my lovely mother who was making a very funky card for my nephew, I pulled out this stamp set and some warm masculine colours and made a batch of cards.

There are five tie images on the stamp, so I started by stamping the whole stamp five times, once each in Not Quite Navy, Old Olive, Marina Mist, Cajun Craze and Early Espresso inks.  Then I hand cut each tie out individually to mix and match on each of the cards.

They are very simple images to cut out, no funny angles or awkward bits so it didn't take long at all.  I selected some current Designer Series Paper off-cuts from my left overs basket, and some scraps of Early Espresso and Old Olive ribbon, and stamped the Happy Birthday image also from the Best Ever Dad stamp set onto the DSP.

These were such simple cards to make, and so effective for their clean lines and uncluttered look.  You could easily whip up a batch of these in an afternoon to get you through all the male birthdays for the coming year!

Simple stamp set, lots of mileage! Woodmount set is just $34.95 or the clearmount set is $27.95.  A packet of Regals Collection card stock in A4 ($13.95) will get you 40 A6 cards in 10 very masculine colours.

If you're stuck for masculine card and scrapbook ideas, why don't you consider hosting a Masculine Themed FREE Stampin' Up! workshop where you and your friends can check out lots of inspiring ideas and even take home a finished project that you made there.

Email me today : [email protected]

I am participating in a very exciting project this year - TWELVE -  a Big Picture Class, taught by the amazing Stacy Julian.

This is going to be one heck of a year of scrapbooking - the class aim is 12 layouts per month for 12 months! That's 144 layouts, and I haven't even started!! But I have been having an awesome amount of fun preparing and getting organised.

Here's my folder with all the printouts from the class :

And in the pre-class we had to prepare some dividers for 12 topics and a file box to keep them in. Here's my dividers (using Mocha Morning DSP) and Inspiration file :

And the dividers in the Inspiration File :

Now, ALL I need to do is print some photos and start scrapping!!

What about you? Are you participating in any really cool on-line classes this year that we NEED to know about?

Very exciting times are upon us, with Sale-A-Bration just one week away!  Have I told you how much I adore the Everyday Enchantment Designer Series Paper that you can get for free during Sale-A-Bration?

Check out the gorgeous print on the front of this tri-fold card :

And I love the patterned paper on the inside too!

The delicate organza ribbons tied in a bow on the front are part of another gift you can receive during Sale-A-Bration.  The pack includes two rolls of ribbon and a container of very fun brads which co-ordinate with the paper.

Don't you love the way Stampin' Up! co-ordinates everything making projects so much easier?

Back soon!

Whilst holidaying in Tassie I stayed with my lovely creative friend Elaine, and of course, we had to find some stamping time!  I wanted to make some sample cards using some Summer Mini Catalogue stamp sets, and some of the Sale-a-bration products which are going to be available soon.

I was delighted to find that the gorgeous stamp set, You Are Loved from the Summer Mini Catalogue, actually coordinates beautifully with the Designer Series Paper Pack, Everyday Enchantment which will be available free to qualifying customers during Sale-a-bration.

Oh, and it also goes with Four Frames, which is one of my FAVOURITE stamp sets out of the 2011-2012 Ideas Book and Catalogue.  How gorgeous is that background paper?

I've rarely used Poppy Parade card or ink before - who would have thought of such a combination(??) but I think it works beautifully!  This card is an easel card which I made at Elaine's, based on the structure and layout of a totally gorgeous Christmas Card she had made in a class last year - so talented!!

The hand-cut patterned paper, layered on Early Espresso Card is mounted on Stampin' Dimensionals so that it sits up slightly, holding the top layer of the card in place when it is open.

If you'd like to see it in real life, why don't you consider coming along to my Sale-a-bration Party, which will be held on Saturday 4th February in my stamping room?  Sale-a-bration starts on Tuesday 24th January, and I will put all the details of my party here soon!

Have you tried the Stitched Stockings stamp set and great coordinating Stocking Tag builder punch, from the Summer Mini Catalogue yet?

I totally love these matching products!  It sure makes life easy when you don't have to get out the scissors to cut out what you have just stamped.

I made a stack of Christmas cards in November, using both these products, and in fact, I took my inspiration directly from the sample on page 9 of the Mini Catalogue - gotta love Stampin' Up!'s clean, simple, easy to replicate designs!

Using the delicate doilies from Flirtatious Specialty Designer Series Paper, a small scrap of Wild Wasabi stripes from the Patterns stack, the wreath stamp (hand cut) from Welcome Christmas stamp set, and the absolutely delicious Silver Glimmer Paper which is on page 13 of the Summer Mini, these cards were very easy to create.

I alternatively used Letters to Santa Designer Series Paper on some of the cards. Love the diagonal Wild Wasabi & Early Espresso stripes!

The Summer Mini Catalogue has a great little range of new products which I have been having a lovely time with. Please let me know if you'd like me to post you a mini catalogue.  Email me [email protected]

I have some more Summer Mini & Sale-a-bration creations to show you soon, so see you in a day or two!