Saturday 18 May 2013

Hello and Welcome!

Hi there and welcome!  I am so excited to be finally launching my blog, and being able to share some of my work with you all.

Firstly let me introduce myself.  I'm a 30 something year old girl (I can say that for another year at least!), who lives in Queensland, Australia, on the beautiful Sunshine Coast.  I am wife to my hubby of 19 years, and Mum to two gorgeous teens (yes I'm biased), Kayci who is almost 18, and Brent, 16.  Our family is completed with two Cavalier King Charles Spaniels, Rosie and Daisy.

My papercraft hobby started way back in 2003 when my Mum introduced me to what was then her hobby - card making and stamping.  I dabbled in that off and on, and it was five years later that I designed my first scrapbook layout.  It was only last year that I started spending more time paper crafting, entering some online challenges, and with the generosity of the lovely and always supportive Barbi Shipton and the girls at Daisy Chain Scrapbooks, having my layouts displayed in store.  I have since been fortunate enough to be published in Scrapbooking Memories magazine, and now can't imagine a day without spending some time at my craft table playing with patterned paper and pretty things.

I have spent some time designing my own blog (yes that is an ongoing massive learning curve for me!).  I'll probably still tweak a little here and a little there as I learn more about the blogging world, so please give me a shout out if something looks wildly out of place!

So thanks for joining me here on the start of this new journey for me.  For my first few posts I would love to share some of my favourite layouts and projects from the last twelve months.  Today I have a few layouts to share.

My Daily Eight Kilometres

Yes I walk eight kilometres a day, well, weekdays that is.  I started this ritual at the start of 2011 to help lose weight.  Lose it I did - 20kg worth - and I wanted to record this change in my lifestyle on a layout.  I have used mostly Basic Grey's PB&J Collection here, with a little pulled from the Picadilly and Hello Luscious lines as well.


I have tucked some hidden journalling in behind my title on a little pull tab.


Berry Delicious

This is such a simple but fun layout.  We visited my sister in WA in 2010, and at a local berry farm she decided she really wanted to show us how many raspberries she could fit in her mouth at once. Answer?  Quite a few apparently!  Again these are Basic Grey papers, and I have used a couple of Kaisercraft Wood Flourish flowers, and a Kaisercraft rub on.



Flutter By

I had this paper in my stash for years before I used it, I'm not even sure now which manufacturer it came from.  I pulled it out of my stash one day when I was looking to scrap this cute photo of my daughter which was taken as her face painted butterfly was about to be washed off.  I love this layout because it was my first play at using white space in such a bold way.




I was really happy with the effect of leaving so much white space, and also that the layout used only two pieces of patterned paper and two pieces of cardstock.  All of the flowers were paper punched and put together by hand.

Lots of fussy cut butterflies, a bit of bling and some tulle to soften here and there.



Angele

One of the main reasons we scrapbook is to record memories right?  I am very blessed to have a bunch of photographs of my family, some going back to the late 1800s and very early 1900s, and I am also very blessed to have older family members around me that can pass on the stories behind those photos.

This layout records some memories about my Grandma's Grandma, Angele.  Most of her story is recorded in the journalling on the layout, but some memories about Angele are more private, so I have enclosed a separate journalling card for these which is housed in the little envelope on the right hand side.


sometimes it's all about the story.

Kaisercraft's Le Chateau Collection was very fitting for this layout about my French Mauritian Great Great Grandmother.  One of the layers includes a printed acetate sheet overlay.  Kaisercraft's wooden lamp post suits the photo perfectly, and of course this particular layout wouldn't be finished without some pearls.


The Dress

Again, this is another photo that I consider myself very lucky to know the story behind.  My Grandma is now 83, and it's so cute to know that at 16 when she was sewing this dress, all she wanted to do was take the treadle sewing machine outside and throw it in the water!

I tried to really bring the vintage factor to this layout, using small cut pieces of lace, satin seam binding, and even a crocheted doily.  You might notice a dress form in the larger embellishment cluster too.




A close up of some of the vintage goodness.  An ornate frame stamped using Stazon ink onto calico that I had tea dyed and frayed.  I then layered on a butterfly stamped using Stazon ink onto acetate and then cut out, followed by the Our Family tag.  You can see in the background I have run my sewing machine (without any thread) around each of the patchwork squares.

and finally,

Forever


That's me with my sweet hubby.  This layout I created for the 2012 Brisbane Scrapbook Expo challenge, Black & White plus One.  It made the top 20 and was on display at the expo.



The black flourishes were originally a piece of Kaisercraft printed acetate which I took to with a blade, cutting away all but the flourish.  And yes with the bling.  I do have a soft spot for bling aha!

I hope you've made it to the end of this lengthy first post, and that you've enjoyed seeing some of my favourite layouts from the last year.

If you are interested in keeping up to date with my latest creations I would love for you to come back and visit me here.  You can also follow my blog on Bloglovin (button on the sidebar).  If you prefer, you can even enter your email address in the right sidebar where it says "follow by email".  Every time I have something new to share, my full post will come direct to your inbox, easy peasy huh?

Oh, and of course up there on the sidebar are links to my Social Media.  I'm on Facebook, Pinterest and Instagram.  Come say hi!

Hope to see you again soon.











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