A bit of scrap booking

I don't know that these pages will be inspiring anyone very much but I'm pleased just to get some scrapping done! So many photos of the kids to catch up on so am keeping it so so simple and I'm working on using up all my "old" stuff - you know all those lovely papers you've got sitting there waiting to be used - well I'm just using them up as much as I can!

Rest of my trip

Friday morning was really fun with swapping and make and takes.

Here's Liz swapping her lovely Christmas ornaments with Vanessa who made nifty decorations with the pennant die.

Here's my table for the make and takes. We made some lovely projects with a new stamp set from the upcoming Summer mini catalogue.

The husbands amused themselves for the morning - some went to play golf, others went bushwalking (like Matt did) or just chilled out by the pool.

I spent the afternoon lazing by a pool with Liz and our hubbies having a cocktail and reading trashy mags. :-)

Dinner that night was lovely! The Italian restaurant at the Marina was great.

On Saturday Liz and I and our respective husbands went for a visit to the air traffic control tower! My husband is an air traffic controller in Brisbane and knows the controller on Hamilton so we went to say hi.

It was really cool to spend some time in the tower watching the planes and helicopters come and go and to see the controller doing his thing. Although its probably one of the shortest towers around, it still had lovely views.

After the visit to the tower we grabbed some gourmet picnic hampers from the hotel and went off in one of the gold buggies to have our lunch. Check out the scenery!

Later that afternoon we gathered in the hotel bar to find out our activity for that evening. It was kind of like a treasure hunt! We were put into teams of 4 (there's our buggy buddies in the photo above!) and sent off in golf buggies to hunt down the answers to a bunch of questions and clues. As we drove around the island we stopped at various locations where a Stampin Up staff member gave us prizes - whoo hoo!

The very last clue we found gave us the location of our farewell dinner - the beautiful new Yacht Club. Absolutely gorgeous! We had some pre-dinner drinks and nibblies and then went inside to see...
...the beautiful table settings - lovely! The dinner was by far one of the best meals I have ever had - every element was just perfect. A beautiful ending to a dream get-away.

Hamilton Island Incentive Trip 2010

As many of you may already know, I earned Stampin' Up!'s annual Incentive Trip this year. The Incentive Trip is earned on a combination of sales and team building and there were 25 demonstrators on the trip this year.

I thought you might like to have a bit of a look at where we went and what we did.

Day 1

When we arrived we went to visit the "hospitality suite" which was on the top floor of the Reef View Hotel. The room was a gathering place to meet with the other demonstrators and Stampin Up staff. Each day we could spin the wheel and win a little prize. The room was also stocked with jars upon jars of American Candies for us to eat! (I brought a few home for my lovely team members to share at our meeting!)

Here's me with Kim Gavarra (another Brisbane demonstrator) and her husband Warren. You can see Warren filling up one of the bags that had out for us to put our "candy" in!

Here's me getting a sneak peak of the next Summer mini catalogue that will be available from December 1st. Sorry, I can't show you what's inside - top secret!! But trust me, there is heaps of great new stuff in there - my wishlist is HUGE!!!

We had a Welcome Dinner that night (and of course I forgot to take the camera along!) and when we got back to our room this gift was waiting. Its a wet seal bag containing underwater cameras, snacks and instructions for the next day's group adventure - a trip out to go snorkeling on the reef!

Day 2.

Here's Kim and me waiting at the Marina for our trip to the reef. Gotta love the big hat! LOL! I didn't end up wearing much out at the reef pontoon as it was a bit too windy. The windy weather made for rough seas and most of the boat was throwing up! I was nauseous but managed to keep it all down. :-) They sold a lot of Sea Sick tablets before the return journey!

Once out at the Reefworld Pontoon we snorkelled and sat up on the sundeck. Matt and I spent a bit of time chatting with Shelli and Sterling. (Shelli is the CEO and co-founder) and found them to be very lovely people - very friendly and down to earth. They weren't keen on the snorkelling but Matt and I gave it a go and I'd like to do it again sometime.

We went out for dinner at one of the local restaurants near the hotel with Liz, Martin, Kim and Warren.

After dinner Kim and I went up to Liz's room to help her stick her swaps together. Goodness knows how long she'd have had to stay up for if we didn't help! LOL! It took ages! Here's me and Kim being worked like slaves! LOL!

When we FINALLY got back to our rooms, here's what we found: A lovely tin with all the supplies we'd need for the next days make and takes. Can't show you inside as it contains a new stamp set from the upcoming Summer Mini!

Goodness me, this is taking me forever to post. I am going to publish this much, take a break for lunch and come back to finish the rest this afternoon. :-)

Scrunchy flower and funky bird

This is a card I have been demonstrating at my recent workshops. Its a really fun one because you use markers to ink the stamps and also the scrunchy flower is my new favourite embellishment!


Stamps: Cheep Talk
Inks: Concord Crush, Pear Pizzazz, Early Espresso and Peach Parfait Stamp'n'write Markers
Paper: Concord Crush, Whisper White, Dsp is from the Level 1 hostess gift paper stack.
Accessories: Early Espresso Satin Ribbon, Rhinestone Brads (Circle Fire collection)
Tools: Scallop Circle Punch



This one is pretty much the same card, turned on its side, but with a knot in the ribbon instead of the flower.

Cute Owl!

Here's a card featuring the very cute new 2-step Owl Punch.

Stamps: Woodgrain Background, Teeny Tiny Sentiments

Inks: Soft Suede

Paper: Confetti White, Crumb Cake (formerly know as Kraft) Soft Suede, Daffodil Delight, Greenhouse Gala DSP

Accessories: Daffodil Delight Taffeta ribbon

Tools: 1 3/4 inch circle punch, 2-step Owl punch

September Xmas stamp-a-stack cards

Christmas Stamp-a-Stack cards

In Septmeber I held a Christmas Stamp-a-Stack Class. A Stamp-a-Stack involves making multiples of a few nice and easy card designs. Its a great way to get started on your Christmas Card stash! I will be holding another one on the 26th October with 3 new designs.

Here are the 3 designs from September:



This one uses Early Espresso and Crumb Cake. The embossed carstock has been lightly sponged over with White Frost shimmer paint.



This one uses Cherry Cobbler, Chocolate Chip and the Jolly Holiday Designer Paper. The Dasher reindeer stamp has been inked with markers. Then glitter was added with a 2-way glue pen and Dazzling Diamonds.



This Christmas tree is from the Season of Joy stamp set. I mixed a few drops of White Frost shimmer paint with a few drops of Old Olive ink and applied it to the stamp with a spnge dauber. The result is a pearlised Old Olive ink!

Sharing some Scrapping

A while ago I attended my first scrapbooking weekend retreat - what fun! I had a mission to complete my eldest son's Baby Album (just the first year really) and am hapy to report that it is almost all done! (I came down with a virus on the Saturday night so didn't get anything done on the Sunday) There's still some journalling and dates that need to be added, must get onto that soon!

I thought I would just share a few of the pages with you here. The best thing I did that allowed me to get lots done was to get organised before I left. I spent a day choosing my photos and then the papers and embellishments to go with them. I used only what I had in my stash at home so it was not an expensive exercise at all. I find I work best/fastest when I have limited supplies, otherwise I get paralysed by choice! Also, there just simply was not room to take everything I owned!! LOL! I kept the layouts very simple in an effort to just "get it done!"

I'm not going to list all the supplied used since most of it is "retired" Stampin Up product that is no longer available. If you do have any questions you can always send me an email :-)