RAK from Judy

Judy has been busy & hopefully lots more of her lovely cards will be seen on her blog as I know my sister Tracey & my mum has received one too. She's a very plucky lady who has had one bout of ovarian Ca, then she has just had gastric surgery to remove a secondary growth & is scheduled for more chemotherapy next week. I know all of US wish you a speedy recovery.

I'm very lucky as she's joined my SBS group of blogging stampers! which will be fun.

Stamp sets: Bloomin' with Beauty, Lots of Thoughts (retired SAB 2008)
Other: White embossing powder, glitter, scallop circle punch, 1-3/8" & 1-1/4" circle punches

Thank you Judy from all the Rogers gals - they're beautiful!

Lavender Lace Bag-a-Lope

Monday night was my first training of my downline - yes I have recruits & a downline now (thank you SU! & SAB) who made it all too unresistable.

So a big welcome to the SU! family for Tracey, Clare & Donna.

One of the great things about this company is that the person who signed you up theoretically is responsible for their recruit's training & guidance. So hopefully I can inspire just a wee bit and share my love of paper crafting with the girls; if so that will be awesome.

So after a run down on the demo website on the PC; especially where to find templates, patterns etc. We were allowed to play. I had thought I'd do a re-run of the bag-a-lope technique & copied the concept I'd done for Jax's birthday treats as I had embossed the flower & thought yah we can cover 2-techniques in one session here!

I think it was a successful night for the Braeburn Paperkrafters as pretty much anything went & lots of creativity occurred.

This was my original concept but the troops final projects slightly resembled mine (most were better I have to say) - go team!!

Finally a reason to be creative

Wow since returning from my wee holiday to Whangamata I've been busy preparing for the Auckland Extravaganza next week - have I stamped & cut (& still not quite there yet but close). I didn't know that stamping was an exercise until now, but let me assure you I've sweated for you plus my shoulder & right thumb aches.

So I was delighted that my friend Jackie was free yesterday to join me for afternoon tea. She celebrated her birthday whilst I was away so this gave me a chance to play with stamps & bake (another passion of mine). As I'd missed the real event I just wanted a wee decorative container/bag to put in a few movie tickets (talk about a hoot she actually gave me a "boring" envelope with two in too as my Chrissie pressie at the same time).

In class last year I'd learnt to make a bag-a-lope - a decorative bag made out of a plain white envelope & completely forgot how to do it. So I Googled the term - I love Google!! It's so easy can't believe I could have forgotten how - so as I'm so kind to you I have made a bag-a-lope tutorial

Inspiration was taken from the original bag-a-lope I learnt to make using the Petals stampin' around wheel & Polka Dots & Paisley both of which were in our Spring Mini Catalogue & a lovely card my fantastic upline Jacque gave us all at Christmas - she used two of the FREE sets that are available as part of Sale-A-Bration at the moment - Friendship Blooms and Lots of Thoughts.

So I still used the same wheel for the background with Certainly Celery ink. Embossed the largest flower on Pretty in Pink cardstock with white & then added the highlights as "per Jacque" with my white Signo gel pen (the bestest & whitest - says me who has a few other models that are hopeless - yes one learns through one's mistakes). Crystal Effects & clear microbeads added to centre of flower to add pizazz - all cut out & mounted on Whisper White with the flourish from Friendship Blooms stamped randomly in the background. Then mounted on Bashful blue.

I made a little flap for the top & used the Cheers to You & It's Your Special Day sayings from Lots of Thoughts & then stamped a wee flower from the Friendship Blooms set again. A bit of pink grosgrain ribbon, a few dimensionals & all done. Much prettier than a "boring envelope" & so easy.

And by the way the Upside Down Blueberry & Apricot Cake wasn't bad either. Cheers for now :-)