My First Design Team

Hello Everyone,
Today I get to tell everyone the wonderful news that I have had to keep under wraps since early November.
I have been chosen to be a part of the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown Challenge Blog. So from now on you will see this badge being proudly displayed on my side bar

I am so happy to be a part of this team and look forward to bringing you my card projects. I also hope that you might consider coming over to the blog and playing along with our challenges. Their is a different type of project each week here a list of what we get up too

Week 1 - Sketch
Week 2 - Colour
Week 3 - Theme
Week 4 - Technique or Stash

We are also listed at...

Once again I am so happy that I am going to be a part of this design team and look forward to working with the other members to bring a little Christmas all year round. But it also helps to get your Christmas card stash to grow.

And as always before you go I would love to leave you with this thought for the day

 

And here is a link to the Welcome New Design Team Members post on the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown Blog.

Have a Happy Crafty Opportunity Filled Kind of Day,
<3 Tracy B

Santa Christmas Love

Hello everyone. Yes I am back with another card that I have crafted today. I mean what else are you supposed to do when there are storms around the place? Craft of course! Well it helps with not liking storms much I get to concentrate on something else.

But any way onto the reason why you stopped by - my card project

This card was inspired by the blog Cards in Envy. Their challenge at the moment is Santa Baby and this stamp set is a new acquisition of mine and thought it fitted the challenge. But I wasn't 100% of how to pull it all together so I went to favourite help - a sketch. And I found this one from the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown Challenge in November 2016
The sketch doesn't come with measurements I have added them later myself but thought others may be interested. Each of the matting layers is cut 5 cm bigger than the measurements given above.

The small squares I used my Cuttlebug and a small stitched square by Uniquely Creative. All the other elements I cut using my paper trimmer. The papers that I used this time around are a 6X6 paper pad called Twig & Berry by Kasiercraft. I stamped the images in My Favourite Things Hybrid Ink and coloured them in with my Copic markers. All of this is matted with black layering weight paper.
Thanks for stopping by and looking at my project. Please consider leaving a comment and liking the post. And as always before you go I would like to leave you with this thought for the day

Can not believe that the weekend is almost over as I type this. Where did it go? Now I know why I keep a planner otherwise I wouldn't be able to keep up with life!

Have a Happy Crafty Planned Kind of Day,
<3 Tracy B

Summer Snow Globe

Hello everyone. Summer Snow Globe – yes I know it sounds different? weird? But as I have said before I am in Australia and we don’t have snow when Christmas comes around. We have heat and cooling drinks sometimes over crushed ice which looks like snow. But anyway onto the reason for stopping by my blog – my card!

So as you can see I haven’t used a typical image within my snow globe. But you maybe asking yourself what started the creation of this card. Well it was prompted by Myrna from 52 Christmas Card Throwdown Challenge and her November Theme Challenge: Snow Globes

I knew that within my stash I had a snow globe image but then I went looking for an image that depicted my Christmas a little better. Once I found these I stamped the image of the glass and iced pitcher onto some Copic safe paper ready to colour. Then I stamped both the globe and sentiment onto some light weight card and after I did this thought it would be perfect for a 1 layer card. Then I decided that I would try out a shaker card for this design as well.

So to keep this quite flat for posting I decided to give more interest to the front I would do some stencilling with some distress ink. But first I had to use some Mask It masking paper and masked both the globe and the sentiment. To do the stencilling I used one of my various dots stencil in A5 size from Scrapmatts and my Fired Brick and Mowed Lawn Distress Inks by Tim Holtz and mini distress ink sponges. I put some double sided sticky paper on the back of the panel to make mounting after cutting easier. After this I cut out the inner of the snow globe.

Once this was done I mounted the whole front panel up on fun foam to give me the depth to make the shaker card. I used super fine glitter and some sequins inside the shaker then added the lemonade pitcher and the glass image. Then mounted this straight onto a white A6 sized white heavy weight card stock base.

I had a lot of fun creating this snow globe. Thanks for stopping by and looking at my creation today. And as always before you go I would like to leave you with this last thought of the day

Another fact about me – if I’m not making cards you can find me either with my head in a book or watching an episode of Star Trek. I have most of the series on DVD I am working towards getting the others. But I like this quote from Garak from Deep Space Nine. I know that coincidences do happen but I definitely don’t trust them.

Have a Happy Crafty Star Trek Kind of Day,
 Tracy B

Pink Blue Green Christmas

Hello everyone, I am writing this to you from a half made craft space. I started moving into my new craft space on Saturday with the help of my husband. And I have continued on from there.  I am hoping to be almost complete by the end of this week. I will write a post up on my new space once I have completed the move.

But anywho onto I'm sure the main reason that you have stopped by to look at my blog today my card creation.

This card is actually inspired by 2 challenge blogs today. The first being the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown challenge and since it is the 2nd week of the month it is time for a colour challenge. November Colour Combo is Pink, Blue + Green

And the second challenge is - I suppose you have already guessed if this isn't your first visit to my blog! Can you guess?? If you guessed a sketch then you would be 100% correct. This sketch is being brought to us by Linda from Freshly Made Sketches and it is Sketch #362.

Everything used on this card is from my stash, nothing new! I did look at my Christmas stash of products and it is getting low. I may need to look at buying some new supplies. I never thought that I would see the bottom of my old stash. But also with the sketch I have decided to make it bottom to top - so the circle is the lower most element on this card and I built it up from there.

I have used a very old piece of Christmas paper that I have fished out of my off cuts drawer plus the other papers came from this same drawer. To cut this I used MFTs In&Out Diagonal Stitched Rectangle die. Then I cut the circle element from some white card stock and placed pink layering weight paper behind this element. Out of blue and green paper backed with Couture Creations double sided backing paper I cut out the sentiment using my Cuttlebug. I dug into my sentiment dies and found the Kasiercraft Decorative Dies Christmas Word Pack and the sized worked for this card.  The finishing touch was to add some pink, green and clear stickles in just a few places.

Thanks for stopping by and looking at my project. And as always before you depart I would like to leave you with this final thought

Even though I am without a craft space I still have to craft in one form or another! When I am not making cards I am doing crochet or colouring or spinning. I never go anywhere without a project just in case I find the opportunity to make some progress.

Have a Happy Crafty Progressive Kind of Day,
<3 TracyB

Cards to be Made

Hello everyone, another card made for my Christmas stash. But some of you maybe wondering why I named this post the way that I have.

Well at the moment there are cards to be made but at the moment I don't have my space to make them. I am in the midst of changing the location of my craft room and it's taking so long. Not because I have more commitments than I have in the past but now I am fighting my chronic pain all the way. It's hard because I remember when I could change things around in a couple of days. Sometimes my family would walk into our family area and find that things had changed while they were at work and school.

I am making progress and that is a good thing. But during this I needed a distraction and crafting a card for my Christmas stash was the perfect excuse. So I went onto my computer and looked at a favourite blog of mine to see what the next challenge would be. And since it is the first week of the month it is Sketch Challenge time over on the 52 Christmas Card Throwdown blog and this is the sketch

The only change that I made to the sketch this time around is the orientation and the elements are further apart than on the sketch. I only noticed this after I had stuck everything down because I didn't have the sketch with me. That will teach me not to print the sketch and make my notes before making it ... OH I want my craft space back.

Thanks for stopping by and looking at my project. And as always on all my blogs I would like to leave you with this last thought

I am 2 years today since I got the news that I had lung cancer. 

I was very lucky on 3 accounts. 

1. that this was found at all. 

It was while I was having a scan for something totally different that this was detected

2. that it wasn't aggressive

It was found out later that this spot was on a previous scan that I had in 2003, but it wasn't picked up for some reason

3. that surgery has advanced

  We were informed that this was operable and that I didn't have to go through a lot of the bad side effects.  Before this they wouldn't have operated and put me through courses of Chemo and Radiotherapy instead.

BUT this experience has changed both how I see things and also how my family sees things. We are grateful for the advances in medicine but also in God's timing. Things would have been so different if it was detected back in 2003.

Have a Happy Crafty Grateful Kind of Day,

💓 TracyB

Christmas All Year Round

Hello Everyone

As a card maker and paper player I am constantly making Christmas Cards all year round so that when the end of the year rolls round I am not just having to make this type of card.  I did this once and swore that I would never put myself through that again ... I  mean it got so bad that I almost crumbled and bought \\:0// cards.

On here I will be showing you my makes and maybe I might even inspire you to make your own or if you are already making your own give you some fresh ideas.

Have a Happy Crafty Cardmaking Kind of Day,
💓 Tracy