A garden of Love grows in a Grandmother's heart.-- Author Unknown

Surprise ... Linda!!!

 Welcome along and thanks for stopping by ... this is a little blog hop in honour of a lovely friend, team mate and "Grandmama-to-be" ... Linda Callahan of Stamping Seasons.  Linda is a very talented and creative crafter and blog writer extraordinaire ... if you are a follower of her blog, you know what I mean ... she writes the most wittiest and thought provoking posts .... every time!  She is taking a break from our team at Freshly Made Sketches while she prepares for her new grand baby!

So Linda ... this is for you ... we will miss you whilst you are on leave, but will know that you are well and truly enjoying your time with family and your new soon to arrive "little one".

 Our blog hop is not only dedicated to Linda, but also as an inspiration to our grandmothers ... did you notice the quote above?  So so true ....

My card features the hydrangea in the colour palette of blues, purples and pinks .... these are the flowers that remind me of my grandmother - they were always in bloom and in every colour ... they surrounded the hill that lead to her home and they always graced the kitchen table on arrival ... they hold a very special place in my heart as that is where she now lives!

If you are participating in the blog hop ... you would've arrived from Jen's blog ... now you are ready to hop along to LeAnne's blog ... click here!

If you have just arrived and would like to start at the beginning ... click here to go to Lesleys blog, otherwise you can click onto any of the links below.

Lesley Croghan

Mary Fish

Cindy Hall

Anne Marie Hile

Jaydee

Nance Leedy

Jen Mitchell

Tui Nathan  (you're here)

LeAnne Pugliese

Ann Schach

Jennifer Timko

Rita Wright

 
 Thanks for stopping by and have a great weekend!

Baking Beauties at Our Creative Corner

Welcome back to another theme challenge with Our Creative Corner.

This week our hostess is Kristen Tierney and this is her challenge for us:

I'm obsessed with beautiful cookies and 'fancy' cakes!  I always try to make them myself, but generally fall a bit short...  Your challenge this week is to make a creation based on these delish looking treats - the catch?  You MUST use something you would use in baking in your creations.  Get creative - use food coloring, paper liners, or sprinkles.  Know any cool techniques with egg whites, flour or sugar?  You need to explain your 'ingredient' in your description of your creation.

I kinda used the image above quite loosely... and used the tag in the bottom right ... butterfly, lacey edging, white, green and kraft ... like I said ... very loosely!

Anyway, for my baking item I used food colouring mixed with perfect pearls powder and water, I then  spritzed the white background of the butterfly, and with the solid butterfly die cut I swiped up the left over splatters from my kraft sheet.  There you go ... next time you need some colour for misting/spritzing check out the kitchen cupboard before you head to your local scrapbooking store!

I hope you feel inspired to join us in this fun challenge this week ... but in the meantime, check out what delicious creations our DT have for you!

Thanks for stopping by and have a great weekend!

Sending Love at Freshly Made Sketches

Happy Wednesday and happy sketch day at  Freshly Made Sketches!  This week we have the very talented Cindy Hall of Pretty Impact as our hostess and she has a great sketch for us, one which I am sure you'll love to have a play with.

Need some inspiration to get your creative muse flowing .... head on over and see what our amazing DT have created for you at FMS.

I hope to see you in our gallery!

Thanks for stopping by and have a great week!

Miss You at Our Creative Corner

Welcome back to another fabulous challenge from Our Creative Corner.

The week the talented Kristen Tierney of LilyBeth Boutique is our hostess, and this is her challenge for us:

10 years ago yesterday, I married my amazing hubby.  In honor of a decade of married bliss, my challenge is for you make a creation with either the number 10 in it or it must contain 10 of the same items (ex: buttons, flowers, repeat images).

 

As you can see, I kept my creation rather simple and used 10 hearts and the Alcohol Ink technique (see here), the effect is so beautiful - I was going for the abalone shell effect - it wasn't quite there, but I was happy with what came out!

I hope you can join us this week - please be sure to check out the fabulous creations for our amazing Design Team!

 Have a great week and thanks for stopping by!

A Freshly Made Sketch for you!

Welcome back .... hope your looking for a great sketch to get your creative muse flowing, cos Freshly Made Sketches has got one here you!

Our hostess this week is the lovely Lesley of Always Playing with Paper ...  her sketch will really help you showcase that new stamp waiting to be inked, or some fab die cut ready for cutting or it may even be some awesome paper needing some glue .... I hope you come along and join in the fun with us!

I have also used the colours from Dynamic Duo's - melon mambo and basic black ... this is a great colour challenge site that you really wanna check out!

And in the meantime head on over and be inspired by our fabulous DT - they have created some awesome creations from this weeks sketch!

Thanks for stopping by and have a great week!

Burlap n Buttons at Our Creative Corner

Welcome back to another fun week at Our Creative Corner.

We have the super talented Linda Coughlin of The Funkie Junkie hosting again this week, and this is her challenge for us:

This week, we are going super simple with just two required ingredients, but they are some of my favorite embellishments - Buttons and  Burlap or Bows (must include buttons and either burlap or bows or both)

I have certainly been tested in many areas these past couple of weeks (creatively)  ... but, you know what,  I am loving these directions and am thoroughly enjoying the ride ... I have gone with all three ingredients and this is what I came up with:

Although difficult to see I have layered some die cut burlap flowers in amongst the ribbon and paper flower, shredded some fibres and added them in the layer, a black flourish die from Cherry Lynn and paper from Kaisercraft and finally some distress ink around the edges ... whew!!!  Oh, and that lacey edge die is from MFT.

I hope to see your creation in our gallery ... in the meantime, head on over to the Our Creative Corner  and check out what our fab DT has for your inspiration pleasure!

Design Team Call

Our Creative Corner has a Design Team call ... and are seeking some new designers with individual styles ranging from CAS to shabby chic to grunge! 

Interested .... click here for all the info ... no previous DT experience required!

Applications close Friday, 22 June 2012.

Hope to see you soon ... have a great weekend and thanks for stopping by!

Bon Voyage - A Freshly Made Sketch

It's Wednesday ... and that means it's time for a new sketch challenge at Freshly Made Sketches, this week hosted by the creative and talented Jen Mitchell.

I hope you join us, this is a great sketch and I really enjoyed creating with it!

I have used the Tasteful Trims die (SU) for the zig zag rik rak .... isn't it cool, added some awesome glimmer paper for some pretty sparkle .... and this groovy little VW beetle is from Papertrey.

I love this colour palette, it's from the CR84FN challenge ... 

Hope to see you in our gallery .... now if you are a needing some inspiration to get you going, head on over to the Freshly Made Sketches site ... cos our fab DT will blow your mind with their awesome creations!

Have a great week and thanks for stopping by!

A Tim Technique at Our Creative Corner

Are you up for a challenge?  Well, it was a bit of a challenge for me .... but, I tell ya it was great fun and I enjoyed it immensely.

This week at Our Creative Corner our hostess is the uber talented Linda Coughlin of The Funkie Junkie, and her challenge for us is:

Your favourite Tim Holtz Technique:
Whether you are a big fan of Tim Holtz or not, you can't deny that he has had an incredibly powerful impact on the paper crafting industry and it's a lot of fun to try out some of his techniques.  Check out his blog and the Ranger blog for all sorts of step by steps and demos on dozens of techniques.  What's your favorite Tim Holtz technique?

 For my card I used the Brushless Watercolour technique:

This is a simple technique, basically all you do is stamp your stamp with various inks (distress inks are best because they react with water), spritz your stamp with water and stamp ... I have used watercolour paper here.

Once I had created the pretty watercoloured flower I was kind of at a loss as to what to do with it ... I was then inspired by the talent of Jill Foster, she's just brilliant!  I added some background stamping with the water and script stamps from SU French Foliage, and ink blended around the edge.  I'm not sure the brand of this flower stamp, as I bought it from a garage sale!!!

Anyway, I hope that you'll join us .... it's fun, you'll get really inky and have a ball!  Check out the DT's favourite techniques over at Our Creative Corner to really get you inspired!

Thanks for stopping by and have a great weekend!

A Freshly Made Sketch with Linda

Yay ... happy Wednesday and happy new sketch day at Freshly Made Sketches.

Our fellow teamie, Linda Callahan is hosting this weeks sketch and it's a goodie ... play it up, play it down, your choice, hope you play along with us!

I've used Island Indigo, what a great boy colour this makes!  I have also used a very old DSP by SU, it retired so long ago that I can't recall the name ...that star cutouts have been filled with glossy accents and they look really cool and very shiny in real ... a few lil buttons, some twine and it's a great boy card!

Also, we've got 5 new designers that have joined our team now and they are all fabulously talented - so stop on by and say "Hi".

Jennifer Brum
Allisa Chilton

Jen Sannes

Ann Schach
Linda Suarez

As you can see inspiration abounds at Freshly Made Sketches, I hope you join us this week!

Thanks for stopping by and have a great week!

 

Framed at Our Creative Corner

Looking for a theme a with a bit of punch .... check out our new challenge at Our Creative Corner.

This week Susan Butler of Scrumplescrunch is our creative hostess, and this is her theme for us:

Embellished Frame - Make it any shape, but make the Frame the primary focus of your project.
I would like it to be the first thing your eye catches before anything else.  Your creation can be off the page, out of the box, or whatever obscure title you come up with, in other words it does not have to be a card/tag. So have a play and have some fun and enjoy the experience, try mixed-media if you dare!!!!!

This is what I came up with:

My frame was created from a die cut (I'm so sorry, I have no idea of brand or name - all packaging was tossed) which I cut out 4 times and adhered together to give extra lift.  The tiny liquid pearls in the top corners are a little sad aren't they ... I might have to revisit those corners before I give this card away!

I hope you get a chance to play along with us, but in the meantime there are some fabulous creations by our amazing DT, head on over to Our Creative Corner and check them out!