New Traditions

Today, I'm celebrating my birthday. The last in my thirties. I think I'm starting a new tradition of taking a picture of myself every year on my birthday. Last year I took the picture myself, this year Renee was my assistant. She couldn't look through the lens, but she could press the button on the remote very well. Here's the one I chose to publish:

I got lots of nice presents. Most importantly David, Rebecca, Ruben and Renee each made a card for the me. They are all gorgeous. Furthermore I got a dress from Monsoon, a cooking book, a gift voucher for a beauty treatment and lingerie.

I haven't been posting my December Daily, as I'm lacking any energy to take pictures. I have updated it up until the 12th, so I've got a bit of catching up to do as well.

Very very last minute, I made some Christmas cards for the teachers:

Renee has already finished school, while Ruben and Rebecca have got their last day today. This morning Renee and I made a little angel for the Christmas tree:

Got to run to pick-up Ruben and Rebecca. Thanks for stopping by and have a nice weekend.

Birthday Wishes

Today my niece, Fleur turned 8. Quite a big girl already. I created a real girlie girl card for her. For the shape I used a page from a chipboard album from Basic Grey and cut around it with an x-acto knife.



Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill Basics, PP, rub-on, brad and sheer flower - Imaginisce, stamp - Melissa Frances, ink - Stampin'Up, white flower - Heidi Swapp, ribbon - garden centre, tag - Staples.

Earlier today, Fleur told me on the phone she got some lovely presents, so I trust she had a great birthday.

Also, the past 4 days I've been a guest designer on this blog. I didn't get much feedback (thanks Ingrid for leaving a comment everyday :-D). Here's a photo summary of the sketches, cards and LO I created. If you would like the read the complete posts and see the supply lists, you can read them here, here, here and here.

That's all from me today. I've caught up with my December Daily today, but haven't taken any pictures since day 3. Have a lovely weekend and thank you for stopping by.

Thank You Cards

Besides sending out Christmas cards, I also had to create Thank You cards for everyone that gave Renee a present for her birthday. Since I had to make 34, I decided to keep it simple and make them in Photoshop. To make it more personal I altered the content of each note. As the 'Thank You' is from Renee, I had her write her name herself using my Wacom tablet.

(For privacy reasons, I've deleted the content of the note).



Supplies: mainly Mindy Terasawa's 'Beautiful Me' kit

Tomorrow I'm catching up on my December Daily album. I'll already be dismantling it, as I've got several things I want to add.

Guest Designer Sneak

I just wanted to give you a head's up that I'll be guest designer on this blog, which is linked to this shop. I'll be posting 4 consecutive days, starting next Tuesday. Here's a sneak of what I've created:



Want to see more? Go check it out from Tuesday.

P.S. One of them is a LO!!

December Daily: 2-3

Currently I'm living day by day, finishing few tasks each time. Yesterday it was the Christmas cards, as more than half of the cards need to go overseas and I still needed to inform everyone of our new address, in case they want to return a card. Today, I had to prepare for Sinterklaas, whom will be bringing the children presents in their shoe tomorrow morning. Besides that, I needed to bake two cakes for both schools, which will be sold during their Christmas fair. Even though Ruben and Rebecca go to the same school, Rebecca wanted both of them to bring something in. So, we (Rebecca was a tremendous help) ended up baking one victoria sponge cake and two Dutch apple pies.

Here's a catch up on my December daily:




Supplies: clear stamps - Fancy Pants, Art Warehouse, white pen - Kikki.K, no. 2 - Elle's Studio, PPs - Making Memories, punch - Fiskars.



As I was sending the Christmas cards that day, I will include one for my records into this album. I will probably be adding a few more things as I go along. Since I already bound my album, I will rebound it at the end of the month to include the things I've added throughout the month.

Supplies: journaling paper and circle tag - Elle's Studio, our Christmas card made on a Mac using iPhoto.



Renee had her Christmas play with school today. Her drawing of an angel was on the front of the program. I've cut it out and stuck it on the back of the Christmas card to include in my album.



Supplies: digital stamp and brush - Katie Pertiet at Designer Digitals, edge brush - Rhonna Farrer at 2Peas, PP and number - Making Memories.

Oh, regarding that moving note. I've made it almost 3 months ago, but it has been on my desk since. I thought I'd show you what it looks like (for privacy reasons, I've erased the address details):



Enjoy your Thursday! I'm off wrapping a few chocolate letters...

December Daily: 1

I find it quite astonishing that it's December already. This means we've been back in the UK 5 months, but it surely doesn't feel that long. I realised I didn't give you a supply list last time I posted my 31 days of December album, so I'll add as I post each day.



Supplies: PP, ribbon, button and paint - Making Memories, cardstock edge - Bazzill, chipboard numbers - Maya Road, snowflake die - Cuttlebug, clear stamp - Heidi Swapp, ink - Stampin'Up, scrapper's floss - Karen Foster, Dimensional Magic - Royal Coat, Dymo label maker, bind-it-all machine and ring, corner rounder - EK Success.



Supplies: PP and holly - Making Memories, epoxy sticker - Anna Griffin, digital brushes (on picture) Rhonna Farrer, digital 'December 1' overlay - Ali Edwards @ Designer Digitals, clear stamp - Basic Grey.

On Sunday I totally forgot to post a card I made for Renee's friend, Julliette. She was born 10 days after Renee and was therefore also celebrating her 5th birthday. I made this card, before I made Renee's... Renee asked to get exactly one like it, but I did make it a little different. Here's the card I made for Julliette:



Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill Basics, PPs, brad and die cuts - Basic Grey, rubber stamp - Hero Arts, white ink - Staz'On, chipboard number - Maya Road, paint - Making Memories, dimensional magic - Royal Coat, flower and bling - Prima Marketing, border punch - Martha Stewart, ribbon - local haberdashery.

Until tomorrow.

Advent Calendar

I'm so excited... last night I finished the Advent Boxes, which were inspired by Ali Edwards. Just like the December album, I wasn't too sure that I was going to be able to finish it. I was short of patterned paper and cardstock. I didn't have enough chipboard numbers to do all of them. How and where am I going to put them? Lots of questions I kept asking myself, but as the project was evolving, things seemed to come together.

On Friday I went to the art shop to buy a piece of foam board (size A1) and the postman delivered the cardstock I needed to fold the last boxes. By the way, if you want to know how to fold the boxes, you can find it here. I adhered the boxes to the foam board with double sided tape. And I ended up punching two holes in the top left and right corner and used ribbon to hang it on a wreath hanger that fits over the door.







Everyday also contains a little note. Today's note reads (in preparation of Sinterklaas):



Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill, PPs - Basic Grey, die cuts - Sizzix, Cuttlebug, buttons - unknown, butchers twine - supermarket, ribbon - local haberdashery, stamp - Art Warehouse, Basic Grey & Fontwerks, tag - newsagent.

Have a great Monday!

The right moment

Today, my friend Beth and her husband Stuart are celebrating their anniversary. I was very uninspired last week, when I last minute (again) was making their card to get it to Australia in time. She received it yesterday, and is very pleased with it. I rung her this morning to congratulate her and catch up with her. She told the card couldn't have come at a better time, as her daughter Lauren (whom was Rebecca's classmate) was in hospital yesterday having a tooth surgically removed as it was dying. We spoke for over an hour. It was so lovely to hear her voice. Happy Anniversary for today!

This is the card I made for them:



Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill Basics, PP - Making Memories, ribbon - local haberdashery, heart pin - Fancy Pants, bling - Prima Marketing, clear stamp - Autumn Leaves, button - unknown, ink - VersaColor (pinecone), chipboard alphabet - American Crafts Thickers.

Also, today I received this award from Nancy:



Thank you so much, Nancy. It's nice to hear that others appreciate my work.

I'm normally not one to participate on 'chains', but as I've been inspired by so many others lately I would like to pass it onto: Bibbi, Danni, Heidi, Peet and Kristina.

The Rules are :
1. The winner may put the logo on their blog.
2. Put a link to the person who sent you the award.
3. Nominate 5 blogs.
4. Put links to their blogs.
5. Leave a message for your nominees.

I'll be finishing my Advent Boxes this weekend, as the long awaited cardstock I'm short of turned up today. Just in time. I hope you'll have a fantastic weekend!

2S4Y Bonus Sketch

This week Hanneke has provided a bonus sketch over at 2S4Y. I love the shape of the card, so I decided to play along.



Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill, PPs - Basic Grey (Mistletoe & Pear), ribbon - local haberdashery, snowflake - Making Memories, rub-on - Hambly, rubber stamp - Inkandinkado, ink - Staz'On white and VersaColor (Pinecone), transparency.

I also created a card along Kazan's sketch, but I won't be able to show you that one quite yet. Stay tuned!

31 Days of December

For a brief moment I thought this album was never coming together. I've been procrastinating so long. I had the cover finished a couple of weeks ago, but couldn't get myself to do the inside pages. After seeing many gorgeous albums here, here and of course here. Yesterday, I finally was inspired enough and put the whole album together in one day. And I even made a totally new front cover as well.



You can see all the inside pages here. As of next week I'll start adding our daily adventures and will post these throughout the month.

Thanks for stopping by.

Five Already

Today our little girl, Renee, turned 5. It's quite amazing how fast time has gone. Five years ago we lived here (UK) as well. Renee was born 9 days late, and if it was up to her, I'm sure she would have been three weeks late. I was becoming very impatient and demanded to be induced. They induced me on the 19th, hoping she would be born that day, just like David, Ruben and I were born on the 19th (be it of different months). But no, she decided to come 2 1/2 hours later, so it turned out to be the 20th. At least Rebecca wasn't the only odd one out.

Our little 5 year old, who isn't so little anymore:



I hope you had a wonderful birthday, little one. I love you!


This is the card I made for her:



Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill, PPs and die cuts - Basic Grey, scallop punch - Marvy Uchida, flower punch - Woodware, butterfly punch - Martha Stewart, embossing folder - Cuttlebug, bling - Prima and KaiserCraft, ribbon - local haberdashery, chipboard '5' - Maya Road, paint - Making Memories, Royal Coat - Dimensional Magic.

Until next time!

Colour Challenge

Last month when Ingrid and I were busy making cards together I received an email from one of my favourite US stores, Potterybarn. The image in the newsletter inspired me instantly and I thought it would be fun if Ingrid and I would make a card using the colour scheme of the picture. The reason I didn't publish my card yet, is because Ingrid wanted to use it during her online crop over at Dolls & Decorations.

Here's the picture from Potterybarn:



And here's the card I made using those colours:



Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill, PPs - Basic Grey and Making Memories, chipboard - American Crafts, Flower Punch - EK Success, ribbon - American Crafts, rub-on - Melissa Frances, pearl - KaiserCraft, ink - VersaColor

What inspires you? Thank you for your wonderful comments.

hb2u

It seems keeping my fingers crossed worked. Ingrid received my card on the day. Happy Birthday, SIL! I hope you'll have a lovely day.

Last week I'd found some leftover 7"x 5" envelopes. I thought they would come in handy, because then I can create slightly larger cards. This is exactly what I planned to do for Ingrid's card. But hold on a minute, cardstock is only 12" wide, so that wouldn't work. I wasn't left defeated that quickly... I adapted the card and this is what it looks like:



Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill, PPs, die cut stickers and glazed brad - Basic Grey (Urban Prairie), bling - Prima Marketing and KaiserCraft, ribbon - local haberdashery, flower punch - McGill, foam alpha stickers - American Crafts.

Earlier this week I was browsing 2Ps website and saw this. I quite liked to colours and Googled it to see if I could find it anywhere in the UK. Well, I didn't have to search far and found it here. I received the papers yesterday and was inspired straight away and made two cards last night.



Supplies: cardstock and scallop edge - Bazzill, PPs - Basic Grey (Mistletoe & Pear), ribbon - garden centre (blue), ? (brown & green), rubber stamps - HeroArts and Stampin'Up, ink - VersaMark, Staz'On and Stampin'Up, clear stamp - HeroArts, embossing powder - psychedelic StampWorld, paper frill - Doodlebug, tag - newsagent, corner rounder - Woodware, snowflake and brad - Making Memories, border punch - Martha Stewart.

It's the last day of the week and one out of three kids is back at school today. Let's hope they'll be recovered well enough over the weekend to all be going back on Monday. When I was about to leave to take Renee to school, the car wouldn't start, for the third time. As David's away at the moment, I could take his instead. Roadside assistance came quickly and replaced the battery. Still within the warranty, phew!

Thank you for all your lovely comments on my post yesterday. I wish you all a fantastic weekend with hopefully lots of creativity (that's what I'm hoping for at least).

Laura's Sketch 12 & Kazan's Sketch 13

I'm still here, I've just not been in the right frame of mind to blog. I also haven't done an awful lot of creating lately, although I'm working on several projects at the moment. And my head is spinning with ideas too. Only good that I've decided to sign up for Jessica's Stories in Hand. That what I can jot it all down and get back to it at a later date. I'm a little behind, as I haven't received my album yet. Hopefully it will turn up next week.

Some of the other things I'm working on are December Daily Album and Advent Boxes, all inspired by Ali Edwards. I considered to do Melodee's 31 Days of December again, but I thought there wasn't quite enough room for journaling. So, I'm doing a combination of both. I'm making it 31 days, as there always seems a lot happening between Christmas and New Year, but in Ali's format. With regards to the Advent Boxes, as I couldn't find any boxes to buy, I've decided to fold them origami style, like I did here last year.

Now on to the cards. I've had Laura's card from last week ready since last Friday, but never got round taken a photo, and each time I thought of it, the light was already gone. Right now, it's 3.08 p.m. and the light is already disappearing and we've still got more than a month to go until the shortest day. Yuck! Also, since last Friday all three of the kids have all come down with flu. Firstly, Renee, then on Sunday Rebecca started and finally yesterday Ruben had a fever too.

Here's my card for Laura's Sketch 12:



Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill Basics, PPs Pink Paislee, ribbon - local haberdashery, tag - newsagent, stamp - Autumn Leaves, ink - VersaColor

And this is my card for Kazan's Sketch 13:



Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill, PPs, rub-on, diecut border and alpha stickers - Basic Grey, ribbon - local haberdashery, staples, scallop square punch - McGill, bling - Prima Marketing, ink - VersaColor.

While Eric, Ingrid and the girls were visiting last month, Ingrid and I spent quite a bit of time making some cards together of which I've only shown you the pop-up card assignment for 2S4Y. Here are some of the other cards I made that week:

A Valentine's card



Supplies: cardstock and scallop edge - Bazzill, PP - Making Memories, ?, ribbon - Vandoros, clear stamps - Autumn Leaves, heart die cut shape - Sizzix, pearl - KaiserCraft.

My first Christmas card this year



Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill, PPs - Basic Grey, rubber stamp - Inkadinkado, ink - Staz'On, VersaMark and Rangers Distress, clear stamp - HeroArts, psychedelic embossing powder - StampWorld, felt ribbon - Crate Paper (I think), other ribbon - from Tarisota kit.

And then my second Christmas card



Supplies: bling cardstock - Bazzill, PPs - Scenic Route, snowflakes and brads - Making Memories, borders - Fiskars (borrowed from Ingrid), clear stamp - Autumn Leaves, ink - Staz'On, ribbon - ? (also borrowed from Ingrid, thank you), corner rounder - EK Success.

I've got one more. This one I'd already made before Eric and Ingrid's visit, and considered it for my bonus sketch for 2S4Y, but decided to make a different one.



Supplies: Cardstock - Bazzill, PPs and die-cut flowers - Basic Grey, tag - newsagent, clear stamps - Autumn Leaves, ribbon - Maya Road, ink - VersaColor, sentiment clear stamp - Melissa Frances, pearls - KaiserCraft.

That's it for today, I'll be back tomorrow with my card for Ingrid, as she'll be celebrating the big 4 0! Hopefully she'll receive my card in time, as I was awfully late sending it with everyone being ill. Fingers crossed.

Goodbye Beth!

After four lovely months having Beth spent with us to help us settle back into the UK, it has come to the point it was time to say goodbye to her. Beth is a unique person, who is always welcome in our house. Thank you, thank you once again for all your love and care. You'll be missed heaps!

Of course I made her a card:



Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill, PP - ? & Scenic Route, stamps - Stampin'Up & Hero Arts, bling - KaiserCraft, ink - Staz'On, journaling spot - Jenni Bowlin, floss - DMC, ribbon - local haberdashery, button - ?, flower & butterfly punch - Martha Stewart & McGill.

To leave Beth with a few lasting memories, we bought her a few presents to take home with her, here are some pictures of the kids giving her the presents and the very last picture at the airport.



Have a save flight home, Beth. We love you!

Kazan's Sketch 12

This week is the last week for the Fall Design Team at 2 Sketches 4 You to submit their card. The past three months have gone really quick, but it's been tremendously enjoyable. The last sketch to make a card for is by Kazan:



Kazan asked us to make a Halloween card, or otherwise a Fall card. As I don't have any Halloween papers, I chose to make a Fall one:



Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill, PPs - Anna Griffin, Creative Café and Basic Grey, chipboard - Maya Road, journaling spot - Scenic Route, rub-on - Melissa Frances, ribbon - ?, marker.

I hope you enjoyed my cards for the 2S4Y design team as much as I enjoyed making them. I would like to thank Laura and Kazan for this great opportunity and inspiration. Good luck with your amazing sketches and the new design team.

Laura's Sketch 11 & My Bonus Sketch

Although I haven't shown you anything in the past week, I have been creating a couple of cards together with Ingrid, while she was visiting. One of those, was our card for 2 Sketches 4 You. The sketch was as usual, but we were asked to make it on a pop-up card from DeNami Designs, whom is this week's sponsor.

Even though I was a bit apprehensive about making the card, I'm surprisingly pleased with the outcome. Here's Laura's sketch:



And this is how my card turned out. I used the three-tiered pop-up card:





Supplies used: cardstock - Scenic Route, PPs - Scenic Route, ribbon - ?, pearls - KaiserCraft, border punch - Fiskars,  corner rounder punch - Woodware, clear stamps - Basic Grey & Melissa Frances.

Go and check out 2S4Y to see all the amazing creations by the design team.

Also, this week it was my turn to provide the bonus sketch and card:

Supplies: cardstock - Bazzill Basics, PPs - Making Memories, Sassafras Lass & Scenic Route, ribbon - local haberdashery, bling sentiment - Heidi Swapp, butterfly punch - Martha Stewart, clear stamp - Hero Arts, pearls - KaiserCraft, flower - Prima Marketing.

To be card of the week, you don't have to make a card along my sketch, but if you do decide to make a card along my sketch, please leave me a link in the comments, as I'm curious to see what you've created.

And lastly, in case you are interested to be part of the Winter Design Team of 2S4Y, you can apply here. I must say it's been fabulous to work with Laura and Kazan over the past three months and definitely worthwhile investing your time into.

Until next time.