Me and my room mate :-)

Hi There blog surfers,
What A week I'm having, we have had our roof of for over a week now due to storm damage, the roof repairers have been re-constructing our roof since last Tuesday and yesterday I heard a big loud crash, I went to investigate the spare room (where I keep most of my hobby stuff) and there on the floor was the ceiling fan and light! Anyhooo, that was just the beginning, hubby went in to have a look first thing this morning and said the whole ceiling had dropped down by about 70 millimetres and I would have to clear it out immediately in case it was about to fall in completely! So believe it or not the whole room was cleared out in about an hour, good thing daughter number two is staying at her friends house for a while to house sit, because most of my stuff is in her room and on her bed. I have now found out that my entire hobby room needs to be cleared out too as that ceiling is also damaged and in need of repair, I've been thing about having a clear out for ages and I spose this will just make me do it a bit sooner...I feel a craft garage sale coming on! Mmmmmm.
The photo above is of my room mate Nic, we shared a room at last year's convention too. We had lots of laughs together and always look forward to the next one before the last one comes to an end, so here's looking forward to next year's convention in Melbourne.
Lots of inky hugs from.....

A little bird told me...

Hello there craft lovers,
I hope you are keeping warm if you're in the Winter of Australia, we are certainly feeling the cold nights up here in the hills. I made this card a few weeks ago now, but thought it would be nice to show you all. It has been made using the wonderful new stamp called Medallion, I inked it up with creamy caramel and before stamping it, I thumped it with a chocolate chip marker to give it that old weathered look. The card stock is Kraft, soon to be re-named Crumb cake. The little bird is of course the new two step large bird punch also from the new mini. I hope you like it.
Take care, lots of inky hugs from....

The first of the June specials...

I'm so excited to let you all know about the June specials which Stampin'Up! are holding all throughout this month, every week there will be a new weekly special put up for you and this can only be ordered in that week for that price, then the following week there will be another one posted and so on. So to start this promotion off here is the first weeks special, which is punches, please feel free to contact me with an order here to make the most of these offers.

So for one week only these following punches are going out for the very low price of $20.12, that's a whopping 30% off their usual price of $30.95. Take your choice of the scallop oval punch (a carry over from our last mini), the scallop square punch, the trio flower punch or the Boho Blossoms punch, at this price why not make it all four??

Stay tuned for some more convention pics and some art work. I will of course put up next week's offer on the 9th of June. Lots of inky hugs from...

I've been gifted...

Hello everyone, I would like to firstly thank all those lovely people who popped over here to say happy birthday to me, thanks to the lovely Keesh who placed a happy birthday post to me on her gorgeous blog, I have had lots of beautiful birthday messages. I feel so blessed to be a part of this wonderful blogging community, all the great bloggers and visitors who take the time to write encouraging comments and share their amazing works of art with us all.

I was also awarded with the "Beautiful Blogger award a little while ago, by two very talented people, firstly Keesh who has the most amazing blog full of inspiration and beautiful art work and secondly the very talented lady Lee whom I met through Keesh at our team meetings, she has a beautiful blog here called "Lulla's Link" full of great works of art which she shares most generously with us all, so thank you to both of these very kind ladies for their gift of this award. I now have to divulge ten things about myself and then give you lucky people ten wonderful blogs to visit, so here goes.....

1) My husband proposed to me after two days and we bought our first house three months later and were married in the fourth month which was 25 years ago in Sept.

2)I was born in Sliema/Malta.

3) I was brought up on a boat and travelled all over the world, going to 8 different schools speaking in five different languages.

4) I don't eat cheese (I know, everyone thinks I'm missing out on something great!)

5)I have 9 siblings scattered all over the world and I'm the baby.

6)I was painfully shy and used to cry if I had to meet new people, before Stampin'Up® came into my life. (I bet loads of you are thinking "What the", but it's true).

7) I've had fifteen major surgeries and some people say I look like I've been attacked by a shark.

8)I went to a craft fair fourteen years ago to get some thread for my then hobby of cross stitch, saw someone heat embossing and got hooked on stamping. I never did finish that cross stitch project and it's still in my draw ;-}

9)It never ceases to amaze me how many beautiful friends I have made through this wonderful world of craft and I feel truly blessed having each and every one of you in my life.

10) Bert Reynolds fixed my bike chain once in Florida and when I asked him what his name was he replied with " you can just call me uncle Bert, honey" and Brigitte Bardot shared my ice cream in the South of France.

Well, I hope I didn't bore you too much and you are now ready to visit some of my beautiful friends at their blogs. These are in no particular order and it was very, very difficult to nominate just ten, I knew lots of you already had been given the award, so that made it a little easier, so here goes....

1) Margaret Knoops of Purple Buttons

2)Karen Thomas of Luv to stamp

3)Amanda Carr of Mandy's stampin spot

4)Samantha Fisher of Samantha's stamping studio

5)Ann Gerlach of Discover-ink (one of my very talented downline)

6)Trish Davies of Cody's nan's blog (another of my wonderful downline)

7)Nikki Pascoe of Perfect Paper

8)Mae Collins of Mae's Cachet

9)Tanya Kitto of Stamp n' chat (one very generous and kind lady)

10)Carl Marbach of Stuff by Carol (one of my lovely American blog frriends)

Have fun browsing those beautiful blogs, lots of inky hugs from ...

I'm home again.

Hi There everybody peeps,
As some of you already know I have been one of the lucky convention attendees again this year and what a fabulous time we all had. This picture is of me with our amazing cofounder and CEO Shelli Gardner. I felt so honoured to have a photo with this wonderful lady and I couldn't get the grin of my face for the rest of the day. We all had so much fun meeting fellow demonstrators and sharing swaps with each other. Spending up big in the momento mall where you can buy all the great Stampin'Up! merchandise such as shirts, cardigans, drink bottles and soooo much more.
We were all privy to some amazing work shop wows presented by some of our very own talented Australian demos as well as some New Zealand girls too. The make and takes we did were awesome, but you'll have to wait a while to see those, because we used some of our fabulous new stamp sets from the upcoming catalogue. We not only received two great stamp sets in our beautiful convention bag, we were also spoiled with an extra set from Shelli during a general session. The screams of delight were deafening when all the sets were being given out.
The awards ceremony was just stunning, we were treated like movie stars arriving at the Hollywood award nights. We walked down the red carpet to be greeted by paparazzi photographers who took our pictures in front of a Stampin'Up! back drop and the cheers came from all the head office staff who waited to see us all arrive in our very best dress up clothes.
The tables were adorned with beautiful flower arrangements of tulips which were entwined around the inside of a large glass bowl, in the center of the bowl was a candle to give off a shimmering light through the tulips. The food was amazing as always and just so beautifully presented, you almost didn't want to disturb it. I said ALMOST!
The dinner was finished and we were then ready to be called up for any awards we had earned throughout the year, as well as cheer very loudly for all those who received them. There were plenty of special announcements throughout the evening about the year ahead and our upcoming catalogue as well as the whereabouts of next year's convention which will be held in Melbourne. We were entertained by a really good jazz band with a Frank Sinatra sound alike, he was so good. The entertainment didn't stop there however, we were also captured by the wonderful Fiji native dancers and drummers, it was a to announce the incentive trip for next year which will be held in Fiji. Oh how I would love to win that one, the dancers were so amazing and got several participants from the audience to join in with them, one of whom was Sterling Gardner, Shelli's husband. The whole night was an affair not to be forgotten and will stay with me for ever.
Thanks to Stampin'Up! for the most fun filled weekend I have ever had and I look forward to the next one, which will be a three day convention instead of two, so even more fun!
If you like the sound of all this and the wonderful friendships you make along this amazing journey, you may be excited to hear about the wonderful join up opportunity that Stampin'Up! is holding until the 31st of July this year. There is 20% off the already fantastic value starter kit., that makes it $259. instead of the already low price of $324. for an incredible kit worth over $560. you get so many goodies in your kit which is interchangeable, making it just right for your needs. I will be posting more about this amazing offer soon, so stay tuned. or you can contact me for an obligation free information pack here.
Lots of inky hugs from ....

A note for you.

Hi There blog surfers, How's the waves today? It's pretty cold up here in the hills this morning and I think I might have to have a bowl of hot porridge for breakfast today. I was going through some old cards the other day and came across the little note card holder we made at regional convention a couple of years ago with the set called Live your dreams. So I thought I'd make the same set but with an up to date set from our current mini and this was the result:

I used the beautiful Kiwi kiss satin ribbon which has very vanilla on the other side to tie it up. I used the new in-colour Melon mambo which is very vibrant but matches up well with Kiwi kiss and I used the set called Vintage Vogue (Love it!).

Thanks for visiting, lots of inky hugs from...

Heritage scrapbook page.

Hello there, I hope this finds you all well, we had a great downfall of rain last night and it was such a shock to hear rain, it actually woke me up with a start. It's lovely to see everywhere begin to green up again, I love the winter months. This next page has been inspired by two very talented Stampin'Up!® demos, the first one is Teneale Williams who used this technique and stamp to make a lovely card for one of Makeesha's challenges, the other one is Sarah Klass who made this scrap page up to display a gorgeous photo of her little girl. It's one of those pages that you can change the look of with just a different colour or a bit of sponging, as I have done here to make it look oldy worldly. I have put in a photo pf the steam ship Marion and the journaling tells all about her. I've used a piece of very vanilla 12x12'' card stock and then added the kraft A4 and a five inch by A4 piece of Baja breeze to do the emboss resist technique on, there is a strip of very vanilla which I have used the eyelet border punch on and of course the two top note pieces, the little flower was made by punching out three scalloped circles from baja breeze, then putting them through the crimper several times (and I mean SEVERAL) til they start to break down and you can peal them aprt. Then scrunch them up and put a brad through the centre to hold them together. The big gorgeous stamp used for the tech part of the page is our wonderful new very versatile Medallion stamp from the mini and the little lacy bit around the topnote is from Vintage vogue. Soft Suede, Kraft and very vanilla cardstock surround the photo, I have sponged some creamy caramel and soft suede ink on the edges of the cardstock. You can click on the picture to have a more detailed look. Hope you like it. Thanks for stopping by, take care, lots of inky hugs from...