Apologies for being a totally hopeless blogger...

....but would you forgive me if I told you I ran my first marathon last weekend...and I've been kinda preoccupied preparing for it?

Being a goon after spotting the finish line from the opposite side of Circular Quay

I ran the Blackmores Sydney Marathon in...well, Sydney (DOH!)....and I am still feeling giddy with excitement at having finished. I ran all 42.195 km in 04:07:04...and after being worried that the six hour cut-off might not be enough time for me...04:07 is a dream finish!

SO....I do hope you'll forgive me...I'm gonna try and make some time to play with paper and glue this weekend :-).

Hurting a bit on the home straight...

Invited you are...

This fun little creation has been lurking on my computer since back in April! It is the party invitation for Master 7's 2013 birthday, and as you might be able to tell...he is something if a Star Wars fan.

This invitation was created using Stampin' Up!'s My Digital Studio (MDS). I have been having a lot of fun with MDS lately. The possibilities really are endless!

MDS Supply List (all by Stampin' Up!):

Background:
Designer Series Paper/Designer Kits/On the Go - designer series paper/On the Go - 11
Mats:
Designer Series Paper/Designer Kits/On the Go - designer series paper/On the Go - 10
Designer Series Paper/Designer Kits/On the Go - designer series paper/On the Go - 5
Designer Series Paper/Designer Kits/On the Go - designer series paper/On the Go - 3
Designer Series Paper/Designer Kits/On the Go - designer series paper/On the Go - 7
Card Stock/Marina Mist
Embellishments:
Eyelets/More Mustard - eyelet
Eyelets/Real Red - eyelet
Brads/Real Red - brad

While I'm here...I wanted to pop up a copy of my City2Surf results. I really am very excited by my time. I slashed almost 30 mins off my best time for the C2S...achieved back in 2001:

And last but not least...thank you so much for the comments on yesterday's post! I will reply later today. Right now I am going out to gently run 5-10 km. Have a lovely day!!

Blowing the dust off my neglected cyber-garden!

Hey there blog buddies! Loooooooong time no blogging in here. I'll be surprised if anyone is still checking this poor old neglected neck of the cyber domain. I am going to try and spend a little bit more time in here. I have really missed my blog garden, and the friends I have made through it!

I honestly don't know where the last four months has gone. Would you believe it if I said...time warp? No, didn't think so! No excuses. Just life doing its thing I guess. But I haven't been doing nothing. Most of my spare time has been spent running and cycling. I have participated in two duathlons and two half marathons here in Alice in the last four months, and have another half marathon coming up this weekend. I also went to Sydney for the City2Surf last weekend, and took advantage of the fact that Stampin' Up! had one of their Make a Statement Digital Tour events on in Sydney that weekend too. It was a fantastic event, and I've come home all educated and inspired to create some delish digital goodies!

In the mean time, here are some pics of a little tag that I created for my beautiful upline Di Barnes, back before convention in Brisbane this year. They have been sitting on my desktop collection digital dust every since. I have lots of pics collecting digital dust, so I am taking out my big ol' digital duster and giving them all a big dust off, and hope to have them up here over the next few days.

Project Recipe (all products by Stampin' Up! unless otherwise noted):

Cardstock: Kraft A4, Confetti Cream A4, Summer Starfruit A4 and Pool Party A4.
Ink: Basic Black and Sahara Sand Classic Ink
Stamps: Curly Cute
Dies and Punches: Apothecary Accents Framelits and Boho Blossoms Punch
Accessories: Pop-Up Posies Designer Kit, Lacy Brocade Textured Impressions Embossing Folder, Essentials Paper-Piercing Pack, Large Pearl Basic Jewels, Sycamore Street Button Pack, Linen Thread, mini glue dots, SNAIL Adhesive and Dimensionals.

If you are still here, thanks so much for being patient with me, and I'll leave you with this last little picture, by way of some thank you eye-candy! These are the delicious take-away macarons we bought from Ladurée in Westfield Sydney, after the City2Surf (raspberry, vanilla, chocolate and salted caramel). Don't worry, we also stopped for some tea and eat-in macarons too ;-)...

MDS Moshi Party Invite

Well, it is that time of year again. Little people party time! It is fun, but boy does it take a lot of effort.

Miss-almost 9 asked me if she could have a Moshi-themed birthday party this year....and I of course said...'why, yes boss, right away boss'! I did try and make some Katsuma-esque punch art, but it didn't look very convincing to me, so I went back to the drawing board.

Thank goodness for My Digital Studio (MDS), which eventually made whipping up some Moshi-themed party invites very, very easy!

All digital elements © Stampin' Up!, except Katsuma image
which was sourced at: www.walls360.com

Thanks for the prompt karen! I had meant to add here that I just printed these invites out at home using our Epson Stylus Photo R800 printer, and Epson Archival Matte paper. On this paper the colours always look really vibrant, and the resolution was great too. They looked really cool (if I do say so myself ;-).

MDS Supply List (all by Stampin'Up!):

Background
Designer Series Paper/Designer Kits/Hoppy Memories - designer series paper/Hoppy Memories - paper 4
Mats
Card Stock/Poppy Parade
Embellishments
Designer Kits/Hoppy Memories - borders/Hoppy Memories -border 11
Designer Kits/Happy Bday - tags/Happy Bday - party time (re-coloured - Brilliant Blue)
Designer Kits/Happy Bday - flowers/Happy Bday - large white flower
Designer Kits/Happy Bday - flowers/Happy Bday - large flower (re-coloured - Brilliant Blue)
Designer Kits/Happy Bday - flowers/Happy Bday - flower 2 (re-coloured - Bfrilliant Blue)
Designer Kits/Happy Bday - flowers/Happy Bday - flower 4
Basic Pearls and Rhinestones/Basic Pearls and Rhinestones - rhinestone large
Basic Pearls and Rhinestones/Basic Pearls and Rhinestones - rhinestone small
Basic Pearls and Rhinestones/Basic Pearls and Rhinestones - pearl large.

Gonna be organised for Mother's Day this year!

I made a card for mum this week. I had this brainwave and thought I'd try and get my skates on and finish it before Mother's Day this year.....cool idea eh? If I get it in the mail some time this week, Oz Post might even manage to camel it to Sydney in that time too. Happy days! Next thing you know they'll be using coaches...then look out world, here we come!!

It is a peaceful, sunny afternoon here in the Territory. Currently 30 degrees C and just a few puffy white clouds in the sky. The kids head back to school on Monday, after just one week of school hols. We only get a week now and in October, because we have four weeks in July. But I digress. Hope you are enjoying a peaceful Saturday too, wherever you are.

Thanks for visiting...

Project Recipe (all by Stampin' Up! unless otherwise noted):

Cardstock: Midnight Muse, Very Vanilla, Confetti Cream, Pool Party (textured) and Kraft;
Paper: Comfort Cafe DSP;
Ink: Basic Black and Crumb Cake Classic Ink;
Stamps: Occasional Greetings;
Accessories: Natural Linen Thread, Circle Brads, Lacy Brocade Embossing Folder, Essentials Paper Piercing Pack, Apothecary Accents Framelits, Ribbon Seam Binding - Pool Party, Glue Dots, SNAIL and Dimensionals.

Don't Worry Be Happy!

A little more My Digital Studio (MDS) fun, just because I felt like it!

MDS SUPPLY LIST (all by Stampin' Up!):

Background
Designer Series Paper/_Designer Kits/You're My Sunshine - designer series paper/You're My Sunshine - pattern 4
Mats
Designer Series Paper/_Designer Kits/Special Delivery Subtle - designer series paper/Special Delivery Subtle - 5
Designer Series Paper/_Designer Kits/Downtown Grunge - designer series paper/Downtown Grunge - 5
Embellishments
Designer Kits/You're My Sunshine - embellishments/You're My Sunshine - large flower 1
Designer Kits/You're My Sunshine - embellishments/You're My Sunshine - large flower 2
Designer Kits/You're My Sunshine - embellishments/You're My Sunshine - small flower 1
Designer Kits/You're My Sunshine - embellishments/You're My Sunshine - large flower 3
Designer Kits/You're My Sunshine - embellishments/You're My Sunshine - small flower 2
Designer Kits/You're My Sunshine - embellishments/You're My Sunshine - circle flower 1
Designer Kits/You're My Sunshine - embellishments/You're My Sunshine - circle flower 3
Designer Kits/You're My Sunshine - embellishments/You're My Sunshine - circle flower 4
Designer Kits/You're My Sunshine - embellishments/You're My Sunshine - frame 1
Designer Kits/You're My Sunshine - embellishments/You're My Sunshine - border 3
Taffeta Trimmings/Taffeta Trimmings - long bow crushed curry
Designer Kits/Downtown Grunge - embellishments/Downtown Grunge - note tag
Basic Pearls and Rhinestones/Basic Pearls and Rhinestones - pearl small
Basic Pearls and Rhinestones/Basic Pearls and Rhinestones - pearl medium
Basic Pearls and Rhinestones/Basic Pearls and Rhinestones - pearl large
Stamps
Fantabulous You/Fantabulous You - don't worry, he happy, Color - Basic Black.

Baking Paper Flowers

Just a few more pics I haven't had a chance to post yet. As part of my recently acquired Stampin' Up! starter kit I bought the Bigz XL Flower Folds die, and I couldn't wait to have a play with it. I didn't want to waste cardstock while I gave it a test run though, so I used some Multix Baking Paper instead. When I was finished I assembled all my trial cuts together, and I thought that my baking paper flower looked pretty good, so I decided to use it on a card rather than just chucking it out. I gave it a good ol' scrunching up first, and here is the finished product...

I think my mum liked it :-).

Project Recipe:

Cardstock: Whisper White, Kraft and Calypso Coral (SU);
Ink: Basic Black and Calypso Coral (SU);
Stamps: Just For You (exclusive to the Pop-Up Posies Designer Kit by SU);
Accessories: Lacy Brocade Embossing Folder (SU), Kiwi Kiss Corduroy Buttons (SU), Paper Piercer (misc), Baking Paper (Multix), SNAIL Adhesive (SU) and Dimensionals (SU).

Another little MDS project...

Just a little more My Digital Studio (MDS) tinkering that I thought I'd share with you here. I thought this would be a cute idea for a boy's party invitation. You can easily whip one of these up in MDS, and then either print it at home, or perhaps even through something like Vistaprint (although I'm not sure you'd ever need 50 of these....would you??).

All of the papers and embellishments that I have used for this little project are included in the original MDS download, which costs only $24.95 and is available in Australia now (or if you are going to convention in Brissy, you get it for free....which is how I got it....:-). Alternately, you can try it for free for 30 days...Bargain!

The list of supplies is as follows:

MDS SUPPLY LIST (all by Stampin' Up!)

Background

Designer Series Paper/_Designer Kits/Day in the Life - designer series paper/Day in the Life - 6

Embellishments

Designer Kits/On the Go - embellishments/On the Go - helicopter

Designer Kits/On the Go - embellishments/On the Go - frame 1

Designer Kits/On the Go - embellishments/On the Go - best trip ever

Designer Kits/On the Go - embellishments/On the Go - traffic light

Designer Kits/On the Go - embellishments/On the Go - dump truck

Designer Kits/On the Go - embellishments/On the Go - label 4

Designer Kits/On the Go - embellishments/On the Go - arrow

Designer Kits/On the Go - embellishments/On the Go - 1...2...3

Designer Kits/On the Go - embellishments/On the Go - let's scoot

My Little Blue Beanie

I made this little blue beanie a few weeks back, but forgot to pop up any pictures in here.

I bought the yarn from my favourite online yarn store, Deramores. It is made using Sirdar Snuggly Smiley Stripes DK in Hulabaloo (50 grams, 95 m, 80% Bamboo and 20% Wool)...check it out here. I used about 1.5 balls to make this beanie. It is crocheted using the Bob Wilson half double crochet beanie pattern (available via YouTube here) and I used a 4.5 mm Clover Armour crochet hook (which you can see here).

And this is the final product...

Thanks for stopping by,

Blogged to: Miniscule - The Sled and The Ant, ABC TV.

Tinkering with MDS...

Earlier this week Stampin' Up! released MDS (My Digital Studio) in Australia, and because I am going to convention in Brisbane (hooray)...I got a free copy (double hooray)!! This afternoon I thought I'd have me a bit of a tinker with it, you know...push some random buttons and see what happened. Well, I pushed buttons for a good bit longer than I intended to, but I did have a lot of fun.

I find the program is quite intuitive, and those things that I haven't been able to fathom for myself, I got help with from my lovely (and oh-so-patient) upline Di. Thanks Di. I can see we are gonna have some fun with this :-).

Anyhoo...this is what popped out the other end of my button pushing session...

I was not going to write up a supply list, but then I remembered having seen a button labelled 'supplies' somewhere along my wanderings. I just went and checked and managed to find it again...so here it is, a list of supplies (hooray)...

MDS SUPPLY LIST (all by Stampin' Up!):

Background:

Designer Series Paper/Nursery - designer series paper/Nursery - 1

Embellishments

Staple & Stitching/Chocolate - Simple Stitches line 3

Staple & Stitching/Chocolate - Simple Stitches line 10

Taffeta Trimmings/Taffeta Trimmings - ripple regal rose

Staple & Stitching/Chocolate - Simple Stitches corner 2

Basic Pearls and Rhinestones/Basic Pearls and Rhinestones - pearl

small (re-colored = Chocolate Chip)

Stamps

Little Additions/Little Additions - bunny, Color = Chocolate Chip

Punches

Labels & Tags/Labels Collection 2, Filled with: Designer Series Paper/_Designer Kits/Special Delivery Subtle - designer series paper/Special Delivery Subtle - 5

Mats

Designer Series Paper/Cottage Wall - designer series paper/Cottage Wall - pattern 8

Designer Series Paper/Nursery - designer series paper/Nursery - 2

Designer Series Paper/Sweet Details - designer series paper/Sweet Details - 6

Card Stock/Chocolate Chip

If I don't make it back in here again before Easter, Happy Easter! I hope you have a lovely, long holiday weekend.

For all the Lego fans!

 I think we are a bit like many other households with young boys, lotsa Lego love here! I am continuously tripping over the stuff too, and getting little ouchy bits stuck on the bottom of my feet has me thinking about Lego lots, which has resulted in the following card...

The Lego pieces are far more convoluted these days. They are not designed simply to build a house or car, but rather are transformable into Pre Visla's Mandalorian Fighter or a Sith Fury-class Interceptor. You know, important stuff like that! But I am sure that any true Lego fanatic will recognise the rudimentary bits on my card regardless, and know it for what it is. This particular card is for my brother, one of the main suppliers of Lego in this house...so I thought it only fair that I return some of the Lego love ;-). Hope he likes it!

Project Recipe:

Cardstock: Real Red, Brilliant Blue and Yoyo Yellow plain and textured cardstock (SU - some retired),
Ink: Basic Black, Real Red, Brilliant Blue and Yoyo Yellow Classic Ink (SU - some retired),
Stamps: Birthday Wish (SU - Retired),
Punches: Owl Builder (SU),
Accessories: Chevron Embossing Folder (SU), Paper Piercer, Dimensionals (SU) and SNAIL Adhesive (SU).

It is fitting that I have used the owl builder punch (to make the Lego circles) as I have a little owl-themed pic to pop in here. Some of the amazing local residents, trying to go incognito...

Tawny Frogmouth Owls

Blogged to: The Paradise - Episode 8 - ABC 1.

All the world is birthday cake,...

...so take a piece, but not too much (George Harrison). Been thinking a lot about cake of late. Partly due to the fact that I am seriously cake deprived right now, and partly due to the fact that April/May is party central in this house and cake is on the menu (as always).

This year I decided I'd try and step things up some, and enrolled myself in a one-day course at Charles Darwin University to learn the art of decorating with fondant. That course was yesterday, and it was a GREAT course! The teacher, a lovely lady by the name of Hayley....is a fabulous cake-maker, and so much fun to learn from too. Check out her awesome creations on Facebook at Cake-a-Licious.

Now, in the interests of full-disclosure, my cake was supposed to have a bow on the top. But when it was all said and done my bow looked so dismal and icky I chucked it in the bin and went with a bright floral design instead. Here it is:

I can not take credit for the swoon-worthy chocolate mud cake. Hayley made those for us...and they are, well, I'm lost for words. I am not usually a mud cake fan, but this...it is scrumptious! I also believe it is completely calorie-free ;-). Hayley also made our yummy chocolate ganache. We then had to apply the ganache and make a perfectly cylindrical cake, before colouring and applying the fondant.

My mouth is watering just thinking about it! I don't think I did too bad a job for my very first try either :-).

Gotta go start dinner now (and stop thinking about the 5 kgs of iced cake sitting on my bench).

Have a good one,

Crochet Beanie Floral Edition...

After I finished my first crochet beanie, which you can see here, I found a tutorial for a pretty crochet flower which I also wanted to try. You can see the tutorial here. Clare makes it so easy to crochet something for the first time!

Here is the result...

Now, if only it were cool enough to wear a beanie here!

Have a great weekend,