more buttons!

Marika has sent in a fabulous button page. I can't say how much i adore this bright yellow background - it is so striking! And the detail in the flowers (in case you can't see they are machine stitched and gathered ribbons for the stems)

and what a cutie patootie baby. She looks so much like Julie C's baby (Matilda?) - must be those strong Giddings genes!

buttons!

photo by Tiff.

Sandra's beating the heat and Marika has ric rac-ed in.

First up we have Sandra with some brilliant scrapping.

She says -

I actually scrapped today!Forgot that my scrap room had an airconditioner!!! doh!So I hid away in there for a couple of hours. lol I did this layout today for a challenge blog (www.puzzlepieces.blogspot.com), Nic Aspinalls site (she is coming to the retreat!) oops sorry, I digress!the reason why I am sharing it with you is because I tried something new today.... Paper Piecing! I hear it is slowly coming back into vogue and I saw this little owl template and thought I might give it a go! Cute huh?oh and the layout was inspired by a Jane Jones layout.

Wow Sandra. This is great! Paper peicing certainly comes in and out of vogue and you have done a fabbo job on that owl! Great colours too!

and Marika has sent me a couple of jems to share. First up is her answer to the ric rac challenge. I love love love the white background on this with the vibrant colours. And omg at the 'haircut' surprise for mothers day :-0 The doodling (wow wow WOW) and the ribbon cluster is nothing short of fantastic.

and she has also sent us an absolutely jaw droppingly beautiful sunset at Farm Beach to aww over.

Cant wait to see everyone's button creations!

Challenge 25

BUTTON IT UP.


Isnt this what we tell our kids all the time??? Well now it's your turn to button up.


these very handy little items are sooo popular right now. You will see them on so many LOs atm. (Nicole Pomeroy's 'Love this Girl' in SBM january issue pg 43)


I would love to see what creations you come up with using buttons. Whether you use a button as a centre for a bloom, as an embellishment on the page or to actually button something up on a page or OTP project. Whatever.


you dont have to sew them conventionly on a page. Have a look at SBM Master Toni Crane's LO of 'My Boy' in January's SBM on Pg 121.


I did this one the other night and is very boring compared to Nic's button tree so I will endevour to get another one done this week.



so use some imgination and button up.

;)

Introducing Ange

Welcome Ange. So great to see you here. Just to intro you to the 'regulars'.

Ange is a digi scrapper. And a very talented one too. Check her out in the SBM Vol 10 no. 11, page 64.

Ange is also involved with Elemental Scraps . I am not sure in what context tho. Praps Ange u may like to enlighten us. :)

I got to know Ange thru an online forum and she is one of the most genuine scrappers I've met. EVER. Hopefully with fingers crossed I'll get to met her irl later this year.

I asked her if she had any LO's with a bit of ric rac on it and this is what landed in my inbox.

Looks so real doesnt it. I adore the torn notebook paper and the doodled arrow. And how about those red undies on the outside of her son's (Coban)outfit. I have to admit I am wondering if they are DH's jocks ;)

Thanks so much Ange. Looking forward to seeing your answer to the next challenge.

Rac the Ric

at last.

I've got round to the ric rac challenge. Sorry it took me a while but the E2C team have been super busy with retreat stuff and trying to not melt in this heat.

If u squint with one eye shut and hold your tongue just in the right spot you should be able to see the mini ric rac I used on both the paperclips. Not very inspiring I know, but I do struggle with using it well. So it was a good challenge to get me to actually use some.

Karen is in da [ric rac] house

oh i just love getting these emails with fabbo pics attached.

this one is NO exception. Karen yet again you have wowed me with your fantastic colour choices, eye for detail and leaving perfect amounts of 'space'

The photo is also cute in the EXTREME! and it goes without saying that your ric rac rocs.

lol.

Great to see some old faces rocking back in here after the silly season.... (well not old as in age but as in familiar!)

Clever clever Sandra!

Sandra has sent me some thing amazing.

This fab. grid type layout.... i have always admired them as they look so tricky. Please dont tell me it is as easy as grabbing your ruler and a pen? It looks very complicated and so bloody effective!

I really have to say that i love everything about it Sandra. The colours, the grid, the RIC RAC, the buttons, the photo, the journalling spot and the rips and dotty paper - what the heck ISN'T there to love about it.

clever clever chook.

a few things to share...

I know we are all super busy at the moment - school going back and just settling back into routine after Xmas and the usual January holiday mode.

Sandra sent me this image for us to laugh at - she says:

Just thought I would share this photo I took at Monarto while we were in Adelaide.
I have it on my desktop and it always makes me smile....
You would almost swear that he's trying to hide, wondering to himself... (well it HAS to be of the male gender, surely!)
Can they see me???

hopefully it will bring a smile to others too

What a cute photo Sandra! And i agree ... it must be a male!

Next thing to share was a page from Janice for the current ric rac challenge. She said:

This is a layout that I did earlier for your December
Challenge (7 Flowers)... it also includes some
Ric Rac so thought I would send it to you for the Ric Rac challenge

What gorgeous hair she has! Love the little flowers and the ric rac. Perfect layering too with the main photo and the papers. Super clever stitching in that circle also!

Janice also sent two amazing pages that she finished for the Xmas challenge i set about a month ago - the one based on the 25 days of Xmas carol. She says:

This is a couple more from your December challenge.Daughter of mine... (6 staples).Matt... (2 hearts).Ive done a few more but thought I would share these 2 with you

WOW WOW WOW Janice, these are stunning! Thanks for taking that mammoth challenge on - not many did so hold your head proud! Fantastic page - i love the green in the daughter page and the red, black and white in Matt's page.... both so striking!

The final thing to share is some great news. Congratulations in fact! I got my hot little hands on an ABB 2009 calendar yesterday and the first thing i noticed was KYLIE SHEPPERD'S children in a massive photo for the month of October. It seems she has won a competition by ABB which was Australia wide in it's entrants and of course only 12 could win. I will also mention here that Jenelle Whelan was also a winner and is a RN at the Cummins Hospital!

Congratulations girls - this is a really incredible acheivement! Both of the photos are totally awesome.

Here is Kylie's photo and month!

I hope everyone has a smooth transition back into school/kindy tomorrow and with any luck our scrapping mojo will come flooding in!

phew.

Well it seems i am NOT talking to myself in here!

woohoo!

Sandra has sent in a fantastic layout - not a ric rac one (she promises us that is still to come!) but one she prepared earlier. I really love the title in this - so catchy!

I think that Sandra has come so far in her scrapping confidence and abilities! I also love how this girl just seems to make circles work for her on her pages - this is a real gift!!!

brilliant stuff.

And Maryanne has sent in two pages.

She says "I have done these 2 last night, ric rac along the bottom.Both pretty boring and a bit "same old",but havent scrapped lately [thats my excuse anyway].all my pages seem "same old "lately, so looking forward to the retreat, and "scrapping outside my box"."

and i say ' pffffffffffft'

Your work is always awesome Maryanne. You doubt yourself too much! I love the photos - brilliant and how you chose the papers - they look so NT with the colours! I also think in the second page that your journaling is a great example of how you can say so much without going ott with words or mushy stuff. Brilliant!

I look forward to some more ric rac pages coming my way!

and

starting to worry here....

Ok.

I am starting to worry myself. It seems i am in here talking to myself the vast majority of the time.... and we all know that is only a hop, skip and jump away from 'hearing voices' or 'talking to yourself'.

well i guess you can book me into Hillcrest right this minute in that case!

Here is another ric rac page WITH IS AN ABSOLUTE DIRECT LIFT FROM THE LINK I SHOWED EARLIER by Wendy Bretz. I can take absolutely NO credit at all here as i loved her page so much i really wanted to make mine exactly the same (well i did put my own photo, title and journalling in cause lets face it.......that would be a little crazy if i copied those bits too!)

I am hoping like mad that Sue didn't want to do the same as i got an email asking me if i had any yellow ric rac. Ummmmmmmm yep Sue - i sure do!

hiya Tanya

Welcome aboard Tanya S.

Tanya is from Alice Springs. I met her at the weekly Thursday scrap nites at Scrapworkz (Hi Leonie) in Port Lincoln.

Tanya is also Tracey W sister in law (I think I have that right).

Tanya has been bitten by the scrap bug. For her first ever scrapping project she created a 50th wedding anniversary album for her inlaws. That's a big project anytime let alone being the first one ever

CONGRATULATIONS Tanya.

You have done a terrific job. I am sure your inlaws will appreciate all the time and love you have poured into it.

Tanya says:

I am SO proud! I completed my first scrap project. An album for my in-laws 5oth Anniversary.
Gee I had fun!
Loads of procrastination + chardonnay!

a little bit of ric rac

it scanned a bit crooked but here is mine.

click on the image to see the journaling

hmmmmmmmmm

hello?

testing testing...

*echo*

well it has been very very quiet in here... too quiet.

I would love all our lurkers to come out of the woodwork and to say hi - particularly if you are coming on our retreat which by the way, in case nobody had noticed is only 54 DAYS AWAY!!!!!!! omg so exciting!!

I thought perhaps we might need a new challenge to get our creative juices flowing again (gawd knows i feel a bit scrappy blah atm).

So this challenge (25) is for ...........ric rac. You know that zig zag type of ribbon trim stuff? Well in case you dont know here is what i mean -

Let's see how we can incorperate some of that on our pages!

I have found some inspiration here but I haven't really found much else with my online search for inspiration. It is something that comes and goes in the scrapping trends but let's see if we can make our pages rock with ric rac!

my summertime photo

Hi girls.... we are home.

Lots of blog activity since i have been away! Thanks so much to Meredith who kept things rolling along. Many fab photos and layouts! I forgot to turn off my email notification so had 83 emails when i logged on today for the first time in 3 or so weeks..... i think about 76 were messages were comments from this blog! Great to see LOL.

I have done the summer photo challenge by picking one of my many that i took while i was away. Nothing says summer time like a runny icecream and messy kid.

Our week ...

Well I'm feeling a bit slack in that I haven't put any shots up so here are two from today.

Jack & Lachlan have done both lots of "learn to swim" these holidays and we can see a definite improvement in their swimming.

Here is Jack today ...

PS: Sue recognise your nephew!!

Lisa's Summer snaps

"Hi Meredith,
Hello to you and your family - I hope you had a great Xmas and New Year. It's been flat out for us - good to be home for a rest! LOL!!
I've attached a few pics for the Summer Photos Challenge- was really hard to narrow it down..................
Summer to us is always at Arno Bay (one of these years we might head somewhere else................) We always end up playing croquet on the lawns out the front of the house, so some shots from that too.
And also Fireworks at Cowell between Xmas and New Year. My first time photographing fireworks and pretty happy with how they turned out.

Mmmm, 7 photos!! Sorry, as I said, was hard to narrow it down! I won't be offended if you don't post them all! LOL!
Will hopefully get my scraproom sorted this week and have some scrapping to share soon too!

Hugs,Lisa"

Love the fireworks shots Lisa and the jetty looks beautiful too! Looks like you would have had a relaxing holiday!!

Thanks for sending in the photos!

Marika has some marvelous shots & a couple of layouts!!

Hi again!! Gosh this is a busy job when there are lots of "entries" in the challenges!!

After a small technical glitch I can now bring you Marika's photos for the challenge and then 2 new layouts.

Marika said ...
"Hi Meredith,
I have attached a couple of photos as well as a couple of layouts. The double page is inspired by a Backy Higgins sketch and the single page is a scraplift from the December Scrapbooking Trends magazine. I hope you had a great Christmas and new year.
Thanks Marika"

What a delightful face!! Makes me feel so happy looking at it!

And this looks like so much fun!! A great action shot Marika!

And now the layouts ...

Love this one ... the tag ... does it have journaling on it?

A great record of fun times at Port Neill ... good to see a double page with lots of photos! I haven't done a double for ages ... maybe that could be a challenge soon.

Thank you Marika ... glad I could get the photos up for everyone to see.

Sandra's been scrapping

"Hi Meredith

Here is another layout that I have just finished. I hope you don't mind me sharing. Not really part of any challenge.its based on a sketch from Page Maps... just love that site!

bye for now Sandra"

Sandra it so doesn't matter that it isn't part of any challenge!! It's great to have so much blog activity!!

Love the red on your LO and what great photos!! And of course the reverse scallop is fabo!!

And a link to Page Maps ... click here!!

Karen's cooling off!

Just had this one pop into the in box!!

Karen said

"Hi Meredith,
Hope you had a great Christmas and New Year. Just emailing my summer photo challenge, usually summer means BBQs by the pool, but so far this summer our pool has been out of action waiting for a new liner. So Sunday we got cracking, probably not the best place to have the camera and it was really glary (?) and secondly I thought Id attach a LO I managed to do last night. Its of Mitchell getting his Christmas lunch, I thought it could nearly double up as the photo challenge - summer means seafood!!!!
Cheers
Karen D"

Looks lovely hey! I'm just wondering how you took the photo??!! The colours look amazing!

EDITED TO ADD: Apparently Jane Pearce's husband, Paul, took the photo!! Great work!

And now Karen's fab layout!

This is fantastic - love the patterned papers, the 'U' (those rubons I still haven't used!!), the journaling strips and the little black flowers! Wow! Makes me feel inspired to scrap!!

Keep those photos coming girls!!