Feeling Blah

Feeling very 'blah' at the moment and drained of creativity. There's a few reasons for this feeling, but too boring to go into here....

Anyway needing to make some birthday cards for some upcoming birthday's, I dragged out the trusty alcohol inks, to make some quick (but hopefully) presentable birthday cards.




and another





AND I have no lettuce left!! Which is one of my fav colours!!! BLAH

Wednesday Stamper - Colour White

This weeks WS theme is the colour white. So here is my entry.

5'x7' Canvas, with text glued down, then texture paste stamped into over the top of the text. Let to dry and then rubbed over slightly with gold paint. Lady glued down and flower, then highlighted with white beeswax.

Hope you are having a good day!

Beautiful Gift from a Beautiful Friend

Yay I got a Dotee Dolly today for my bday... thanks Dotee!! Love the colours (as you know) and the beautiful bird embellishment!! Thank you so much for thinking of me :-) you are such a special and wonderful friend....

And not to forget her gorgeous and COLOURFUL card



Thank you so much my friend for thinking of me :-)

Evolution of Dance

Watch this all the way through! It's very very clever and funny to boot!

Another day, another year older

Ok so I normally wouldn't post about my birthday, but I felt that instead of being quiet about it, I'd celebrate it!! Normally I just kind of let it pass without too much fuss, but I guess as I'm rapidly approaching the big 40, I should embrace it. I remember a very dear friend telling me, that once she hit 40, she felt such a release, as she finally started feeling comfortable in her own skin. Well let's hope the same thing happens to me. Hey I might even do my very first scrapbook page on it! My 40th that is.... hey it's another 4 yrs away yet.... Well I keep saying I'm going to do a page, it might take me 4 yrs to actually get my act together and do it!! I've even bought a couple of scrap mags lately to try and get some inspiration.

Ok so here's a photo of me when I was 9 months old. No recent pics, as I'm normally the one on the shooting end. Note to self **** must take more photo's this year in order to do some scrapbook pages!

Gothic Arch Book Update

So far I have 8 players!! Yippeeee... 2 more would be nice to make the book just a little bit fatter.

Remember here's the link to Belinda's Gothic Arch Book swap featured on Arte-Zine.

I'll get back with more details, hopefully once I have 2 more players. By the way, Belinda Schneider wants to play, so if you'd love one of her pages, this is the swap to join!

See you
Nat

Gothic Arch Book by Belinda Schneider and friends

Check this out for some eye candy and inspiration!

http://www.art-e-zine.co.uk/Belgothic.html

Not many replies yet to my original post about me hosting one of these swaps, so will wait a bit until I get some more players. I'm thinking I like the idea of the coptic binding, but then I also like the idea my friend Dawny Thomas came up with, where everyone binds their own and then they get the 'look' they are after. Hmmm some more food for thought.

Wed Stamper - Vintage Paris

Can't sleep, so burning the midnight oil. Another entry for Wednesday Stampers theme of Paris for the week.

Wednesday Stamper

This weeks theme for Wednesday Stamper is Paris.

Here I've used a Paperartsy Stamp, some Collections chipboard alphabets, Cherry Pie background stamp, and some assorted Artchix products.

Thanks for looking.

Fab Mail Day!!

Check this fabo "Good Luck in your New Home" card that I received from Belinda Schneider today! I just love love love love love the colours Belinda uses together. Belinda also makes a lot of her own stamps - which I'm just in awe of - and then she makes these fabulous backgrounds using them. I love the shape of the card, not something I've done before, but now am inspired to do.

Also in the package from Belinda was this gothic arch page. Ok I'm definitely inspired to do a whole book of these now. Anybody want to do a swap?? I'll host, not sure how I'll bind it yet, but leave me a comment if you're interested in doing a swap. Nice thick one would be good. Due date will be yonks and yonks away, but if you're inspired as much as I am by this, drop me a line....



But wait there's more!! How lucky am I to also get 3 ATC's!! Check these beauties out! Again with absolutely yummy scrummy Belinda backgrounds!




Did I say more!! Yes there is more..... Belinda has sent me some yummy gifts also. Check out the vintage napkin these goodies were lovingly wrapped up in. I've not seen anything like that here (Belinda is from Luxemborg), so I can't wait to have a play with it. What about the rusted heart and snow flake! I know exactly what I'm going to do with those....Ok it might take me a little while to get there, but I do have plans for them (in my mind anyway).




Thanks so much Belinda, I'm just in awe!! Not only of your work, but also of how sharing/caring you are.... Big hugs Natxx

A little bit of time for playing

Made this card last night for a friend who is having a birthday. Maybe she will read this post, maybe not, before she get's the card. Once again horrid photo of it, but it's too lumpy/bumpy to scan and well I need to either invest in a better camera or learn how to use the one I have better. Anyway hopefully this lady wont guess it's for her and it'll be a nice surprise. Happy Birthday my friend for tomorrow!! Ahhh now there you go, I've given it away. So it'll be a little belated..... big hugs Natxx

Been playing with some new stamps!

Yay had a play with some new stamps I got the other day. OK, so this goes against one of my NY resolutions, but I have to say I have wanted this grumpy prince (the larger version) stamp for sooooooooooo very long. Gotta love those Stampers Anon stamps, especially the Tim Holtz range. Ok can you tell I'm a fan of his!

Ok, let's do one more for useless bits of info (but they are fun!)

You Are Best Described By...

Landscape With Butterflies By Salvador Dali

What Famous Work of Art Are You?

What side of the brain are you?

You Are 55% Left Brained, 45% Right Brained

The left side of your brain controls verbal ability, attention to detail, and reasoning.Left brained people are good at communication and persuading others.If you're left brained, you are likely good at math and logic.Your left brain prefers dogs, reading, and quiet. The right side of your brain is all about creativity and flexibility.Daring and intuitive, right brained people see the world in their unique way.If you're right brained, you likely have a talent for creative writing and art.Your right brain prefers day dreaming, philosophy, and sports.

http://www.blogthings.com/areyourightorleftbrainedquiz/">Are You Right or Left Brained?

Wed Stamper Challenge - Butterflies

I do love these challenges on WS. This weeks theme is butterflies and here is a canvas I made last night for this theme. I do love these challenges, as it makes me dig deep into my stash of stamps and see what I can come up with. I have used a script stamp on this canvas, however it is faded and in the background of the canvas. Hope that that's ok. The rest are assorted collage elements.

I can't seem to get away from using the colour Aqua at the moment. This time I thought I'd combine it with orange instead of the copper colour combo, I've been doing so much of lately.

I'd love to have me a bit of TImmy!!

Ahhhhhhhhh bet you thought that sounded rude!! I meant some of the new Tim Holtz range of goodies - http://twopeasinabucket.kaboose.com/chavid.asp?day=3, click on Wednesday to see his new range that were displayed at CHA.

Fat Book Page

Ok so I went to water aerobics tonight for the first time in my life! Thanks to Jaimie for convincing me it was a good thing. So I dragged my lilly white wobbly body down to the local pool and gave it a shot. Before tonight, I had been thinking "water aerobics isn't really a work out". WELL let me tell you, I ate my words after about the first 5 mins, not to mention about a litre of pool water!!

Anyway I digress, here is my latest Fat Book Page for the ABC group - theme is Wings. Thanks to Belinda Schneider for sending me the white wings recently, I love them. I have been itching to use them, but hadn't (until now) found the 'right' image to go with them.

The half flower I've made using the photo turns, I would have liked to have put further over to the left hand side of the page, but there will be binding going down that side and I didn't want to jam up Kelsey's brand spanking new binder!! Dont think I'd be very popular...

As usual my scanning is dodgy......things/colours/lumps are always better in the flesh.

Wednesday Stamper - Footwear

A little bit of vintage from me this week for the Wednesday Stamper Challenge which is footwear. I haven't done vintage in a LONGGGGGGGG time, so thought I would re-visit it. This card I will be sending to my neice for her bday as she loves vintage.

Have used Paperbag Studio stamp, Collections Ephemera, Tim Holtz Distress Inks and also my dymo to make the word steps. Thanks Kelsey for sharing with me your technique of running cardstock through the Dymo machine, instead of tape.

Have a great week everyone!

A Get Well Card for a Special Boy

Made this card tonight for a special boy who has just had a hip operation and he's only 11! What a brave boy!! I tell you, it makes you thankful every day for having healthy children. I fall apart when one of mine get's stung by a bee, so you have to give an amazing amount of credit to his mum - Julie Guilfoile. What a tower of strength this woman is (sorry she doesn't have a blog that I know of, so can't point you in her direction).

And to top it off, she is also one of the nicest, most loveliest people I've ever met.

I do hope this brings a smile to his face when he sees it.

Hoping you're all having a wonderful week.

Hugs Natxx

Down for the count

Yep I have the flu (obviously the summer version of it) and am feeling rather yucko!! So haven't ventured to my craft table to create or finish off swaps. So nothing to share at this stage. Although tonight I am going to drag my body out to a scrapbooker get together, to try and meet some fellow arty people here in Tom Price. I'm not a scrapbooker, in other words I've never done it before, but I'm not against the idea of doing it either. I just wish I had more hours in the day! So if I manage to create anything of worth tonight (I may just sit there and sip tea and watch others), I'll share tom. Hope everyone else is managing to stay well.!!!

Some work from me now -

Here is my latest page for the ABC group. 8 pages to go... the theme here is Retro. Thanks Kelsey for picking this theme (NOT).... Ok so it's not a style I normally work in. I love and admire what people do with it (especially Kelsey who does such fabulous Retro work), but I just found this so difficult. Not my best work ladies, sorry, but anyway hopefully you still like it. Well you gotta love the quote anyway!

more.................

And this one is from France Chevalier. Well France also uses colours/paints in such a beautiful way, that I would one day love to be able to do. Another KL mould, which I just have to HAVE!!

The ATC here, is from Sally Garrett, who is a super star. She is going through such a rough trot at home, with 2 people in her family, suffering from Cancer and she is a working mum of 3. And yet, she found time to do this ATC for me. Big hugs to you Sall and thinking of you and your family...

And last but not least, is an ATC from a dear friend of mine sarah Baker. She is only a very newbie to stamping also.


Thanks so much girlies!

more photos cont....

This one is from Mary Wise of Busselton WA. Another stunning artist that uses colours so well.

This ATC is from a relatively Newbie to Stamping, Peta Jakes. Her work has just come leaps and bounds in the last few months and she I have to say, is the main organiser/co-ordinator of this calendar. Such a sensational girl and she is going to be a bride in a few months time, so can't wait to share that day with her and her hubby to be.

Cont....

And this one is just awesome. From Kelsey O'Mullhane who has used some foil tape, some dry emossing, black paint and some clipart, to get this sensational ATC.

And this one is from the very talented Kylie Mell, who does vintage so well. Thanks Ky!

Another sensational ATC... this one is from Lorri Lennox

Calendar Continued

And this one, is from Elaine Berkhout. Isn't the colours in this fabulous!

And this ATC has a self potrait of Julie Hetherington (the artist) transferred over the top of the background. How clever is that!

I'm hopeless loading pics

So I'm going to load a few, then do a new post, or it gets all jumbled up.

This one is from Dawn Thomas or as I call her Dawny P (short for Prawn).

This beauty is from Debbi Baker who is an extremely talented and well known artist who lives in a rural town of WA called Kalgoorlie.

Fabulous Gift from Fabulous Friends

Today I received a 'care' package from my sister in law in Perth. For those that might be new visitors to my blog, I've recently moved to a remote country town in Western Australia, and my SIL - Ann Gerlach, is going to send me 'care' packages to keep me in touch with the "stamping/arty" world of Perth. In this care package, aside from lots of yummy goodies, was a surprise! A group of my friends got together and made some ATC's and put these together in the form of a calendar. So I can flip to Febrauary for example, and on the opposite page, is an amazing piece of artwork! So hopefully blogger will allow me to load all the pics of these ATC's below.

First one on left is from my SIL - Ann Gerlach

This one is from the very talented girl - Annie van Leeuwen

This absolutely gorgeous ATC, that I took a crap scan of (my scanner doesn't like lumpy bits), is from Carmel Trigwell.

A Canvas for a Friend

I made this canvas today for a friend who's having a bit of a rough time of late. I guess you could say it's ala Claudine Hellmuth style in a lot of ways, with the house and the sun and the flowers. But maybe with a twist of Natalie Briney added to it.

Hope she likes it! and most importantly, hope it cheers her up.

Last post for tonight

Another ATC made using the same colour combo's as the previous post. I've enjoyed challenging myself with this.

NIGHT!

One Colour Combo - 3 ATC's

Ok had a bit of fun tonight using 1 colour combo and made 3 different ATC's.

In my bid to use/aquaint myself with stamps and ephemera I haven't used/seen in a while, I thought I'd challenge myself by just grabbing whatever out of the cupboard and trying to make something (worthwhile) to look at.

So here's what I came up with. All quite different I think.

The flower ATC, you might say is even slightly "cute". Not my usual style, but had fun anyway.

Think Pink - Wednesday Stamper

Sheesh I wish I was better at taking photo's! This isn't a very good shot of my card contribution to Wed Stampers Think Pink theme. The word at the top says Embrace and the tiles down the bottom say PINK. I'm not really a pink kind of girl myself, so I thought I'd try and embrace this colour, rather than fight it!!

I'm going to send this card out as a RAK to another non pink kind of girl. Hehe

First Day of School 07

This pic was taken early this morning before we left in a mad rush to get to school on time. Up here in Tom Price, school starts at 8am and finishes at 2.15pm. So we were all a little slow to get moving this morning, after having so many sleep in's (which is one of my fav parts of the school hols!).... hence the mad rush to get to school on time.

This is my boy's very first day of school. *sob* no longer my baby... He was absolutely fine when I left him to come home this morning, so I'm not sure if that was a good thing or not.... although there was one little boy most upset that his mother was going, so I guess I'm kind of glad Luc wasn't like that. Emma seems happy also in her new class.

Hope all of you other school mum's had a smooth run this morning.

Another Quickie!

Feb/March is a busy month for us for bdays, so I've whipped up another for my Brother In Law, who is a manly man, with a bit of a cheeky sense of humour, so hopefully he "gets" this card.

I'm just glad to be getting a little time to create and forget about those awful boxes still sitting there waiting to be unpacked!! The trouble is, I've no room to put anything else. All available cupboard space is taken. Tempted to take all the rest of the boxes straight to the tip and forget about them.

Hoping the WA girls got some welcome relief weather wise today.

Big hugs
Nat

Quick Bday Card

Made this card tonight for my DH's grandmother's bday in a few days. It was quick because I'd already coloured this image (stamped up at Dawn T's house and her oil pastels used to colour also - thanks D!).

Such a beautiful stamp this one.

Some Time to Play - YAY!!

I had some time to play last night and have been working on a 4x4 fat book page for the ABC group that I'm involved in. This month's theme is text and I'm a little late, but hopefully will get to finish the 8 other pages before the end of the week. We have to do front and back this time, so I guess when you think about it, it's 16 more pages.... but my back is pretty plain really.

The mould is a Kraft Lady one, that I had acquired late last year and this is my first time using it :-)... I have said it a few times, but I'm endeavouring to use up things in my stash more as part of my NY resolutions. Not sure how long it'll last though...hehe. Especially with all these yummy tempting stamps/moulds/papers/bellies that keep being bought out...

What the?????????????

I saw this on Claudine Hellmuth's blog and had to share! And as she says, avert your eyes if your faint of heart!!

I could never imagine my DH in these and come to think of it, I dont think I'd ever want to imagine him in a pair of these...

Wednesday Stamper

This weeks theme for Wed Stamper is Mona Madness. Well I'm not sure if my Mona looks a little mad, but I guess seeing as I've given her an eye piece, she does look a little strange.

I should be feeling guilty as I haven't yet unpacked all my boxes and here I am taking time out to create. But it's been so long and my fingers were itching to do something. The good thing about not having unpacked all my stash, is that I had to use up the items I had on hand for this card. And that's one of my NY resolutions. To use up more of my stash and not just keep accumulating and accumulating. I was horrified when I packed up all my bellies when we moved, just how much stuff I had!!

Hope everyone is having a good day.

Toys have been packed away

Last night I finished off a swap (yippeee) and then packed away my toys (um stamping stuff) for hopefully only a few weeks. Hopefully it will be the little break that I need (creatively speaking), so I can get full on into it again and start putting up some more work here on the blog again. I have been feeling very flat and unable to create much lately, but I think that's due to the build up of moving. Although saying that, I'm starting to get a little excited now.

Take care everyone.

Shapes Wed Stamper

Theme for this week is shapes.

So this is where we'll be moving to!

http://www.tompricewa.com.au/ For those that don't know much about it, here's a little info.

And this is our view from the front door of our house. Yep, we have neighbours on either side, but not a house in sight in front of our place.

Only just over a week now and then we'll be making our way there, thanks to Qantas!

WOW! Put 8 talented artists together and what do you get?

A fabulous charm bracelet of course!!

And here it is...............

A big thanks to Julie Hetherington who organised and put together this fabulous bracelet.

Starting from the left with the charm with wings - Elaine Powell, wach parts - kelsey O'mullane, Cat Frame - Julie Hetherington, Face and swirled bead - Me, Soldered frame with bird - Sulea Lee, Face and trio of beads - Kelly Winstanley, Budda Head - France Chevalier, Square beaded assemblage - Carmel Trigwell.

WOW! Thanks ladies