Chinese Wedding Dolls

We just came back from another wedding in Malaysia after a week long holiday at Paradise Koh Yao resort on an island off Phuket. I made this wedding card and 'Red Packet' with a Japanese and Chinese theme as the groom is half Japanese and half Chinese. I used the Hero Arts dolls and dressed them up in Basic Grey Serendipity. The flowers were overstamped with a Japanese script. This pattern was repeated in the Hero Arts Big Flowers and in the strips on the inside of the card and on the envelope. A red double happiness and Sakura flowers finished off the stamp nicely. Details of the card are below and photos from the wedding and our trip after that. For details of how to make the 'Red Packet' - see my previous blog.

Ingredients:
Cardstock - Neenah Natural White and red cardstock
Paper - Basic Grey Serendipity
Stamps - Hero Arts LP146, CG290 and Kaisercraft Japanese script (I think)
Ink - Ranger Archival Jet Black
Others - Double Happiness Punch, Nestability Scalloped Square die, Kaisercraft pearls, Sakura punch

This was the second wedding reception as Makoto and Melissa live in Singapore and the first reception was the week before. We are friends of the groom's family and their hometown is in Muar, Malaysia, halfway between Singapore and Kuala Lumpur. We were asked to participate in the traditional tea ceremony, held before the reception. Melissa wore a beautiful traditional Chinese wedding outfit during the ceremony. Afterwards, she got changed into a traditional white wedding dress.

This is my second trip to Muar, we only stayed for a day during our last visit two years ago. I got to see more of the city this trip and I loved walking around taking photos of all the old shop houses and signboards. Hope you enjoy some scenes from Muar. Sorry for the long blog, but I just had to share some of the lovely photos I took. 

A happy parcel awaited my return on the weekend. My winning prize from the Basic Grey Scraplift Challenge, result blogged on Basic Grey! I cannot wait to start crafting again!! Thanks Melanie for the great prize!!

Happy 21st Album

I had a very short time to make a 21st birthday guest book for my niece. I am currently on holiday in Thailand and Malaysia and Sarah's 21st is the week after we get back. A quick idea was to use some beautiful 6x6 My Mind's Eyes patterned pads. I selected two pads which had a lot of neutral backgrounds with room for signing. These were glued down to a two strips of 16cm scored cardstock - 16 x 64 cm with a 1cm overlap. The pieces were folded into a concertina with the overlap glued down. The album covers were made from two pieces of 7inch squared cardboard. They were covered with musical wrapping paper which Sarah bought from Florence for me last year. Before glueing the covers down, I attached strips of ribbons in between. These will be used to tie the album down. I decorated the cover with laser cut wooden letters painted with acrylic paint, covered with Distress Rock Candy and coloured with distress re-inkers and the embellishments were fussy cut and stamped. The rest of the card is below. I will be submitting this into Simon Says stamp - Anything But a Card challenge. Thanks for dropping by!

Challenge:
Simon Says Stamp - Anything but a Card Challenge
Ingredients:
Cardstock - 250gsm cream A1 card
Papers - Musical wrapping paper from Florence, My Minds Eyes Be Happy and Indie Chic
Stamps - Tim Holtz Moths and Butterflies, Hero Arts Antique Flowers and Butterflies, Hero Arts CG657776, Hero Arts CG290, Stamp It Flourish Butterfly, Hero Arts Big Ticket
Inks - Distress Ink Tea Dye, Victorian Velvet, Distress Re-Inkers Victorian Velvet and Peeled Paint Ranger Archival Black and Brown
Other - Indie Chic decorative tape, Wooden letters and numbers, Tim Holtz Ideology Keys, Hero Arts Hues Dots, Kaisercraft Rhinesotnes

Celebrate

I often participate in the Hero Arts Flickr group 90 minute scramble. The task is to make a card within 90 minutes and the theme is set at the start of the scramble. Sometimes the timing is not exactly ideal as most of them are set at American times. There was one last Saturday night at 8pm NY time which translated to 6am Melbourne time (on Mother's Day). I got up for it and made the card in under 60 minutes as we had a house guest getting ready to head off at the airport at the same time. I just made it just in the nick of time. I decided to use the current retro sketch for the challenge. The scramble challenge was set by the lovely Cheiron and the task was to make a card for ourselves rather than anyone else.

I chose my new MME Chevron washi tape and used a matching Chevron paper. The contrasting colour was a dark pink. I used my favourite papers from My Minds Eye. The flower was stamped on patterned papers and fussy cut and layered with foam dots, finished off with a brad from Kaisercraft. A card to 'Celebrate' Mother's Day for me!! Thanks for dropping by!

Challenges:
Retro Sketches - RS#11
Hero Arts May challenge - Happy Birthday
Hero Arts Flickr - 90 minute scramble
Ingredients:
Cardstock - Via Vellum Kraft
Papers - MME A Happy Heart, MME On the Bright Side
Stamps - HA CG290 Four Flowers, HA CL272 All Occasion Messages
Ink - Ranger Archival Jet Black
Others - MME Indie Chic tape, Kaisercraft Epoxy brad, Kaisercraft rhinestones

Zenspired Cards

Time for some really Casual and Simple (CAS) cards using one layered stamping and inspirations from Zenspiration. I first came across the Sakura website last year and was enthralled with Joanne Fink. I'm not really into CAS cards, but have been giving them a go. When I saw the challenge on Less is More - One Layer Card with doodling, the ideas were spinning in my head. The first card I made was using HA Magical Flower (another new stamp I purchased from the Paperific Expo), this was the ideal stamp as it was large enough to fill up most of the card.

It was hard to stop myself from adding any embellishments (What? No Washi tapes?) to the card, just keeping it CAS! I added Zenspired doodles to the outer petals of the flower and the centre. This stamp is just perfect for this challenge! I enjoyed it so much, I decided to do another card, this time using the HA April sketch.

I combined two stamps and masked off each section after I stamped to create the card. The doodling on the flower was fun! I do not have the Sakura pens that Joanne uses, I used black gel and ink pens instead. Thank you for dropping by!

Challenges:

Less is More - Week 63 One Layer

Hero Arts April Sketch Challenge

Ingredients:

Cardstock - Kraft

Stamps - HA CG284 CL297 CG290

Ink - Ranger Archival Jet Black, black gel pen

Spring Flowers in Autumn!

We had a sunny and warm Autumn weekend in Melbourne on the weekend.  I wanted to tackle the third HA April sketch - the one with a tag. I also love the colours of the current Play Date Cafe Challenge - Daffodil...Hydrangea...Kiwi...Cherry and decided to combine the two.

This card gave me the opportunity to use my new HA stamp sets (Four Flowers and Be Happy) and also the lovely new papers from the Basic Grey Picadilly collection. The washi tape (yes, I need to mention that my sister got it from Japan...) made an appearance too. All colour elements in the Play Date Cafe 127 are present. Thanks for dropping by! I am also submitting this card to the Simon Says Stamp challenge - April Showers bring Spring Flowers, most appropriate card for this challenge. By the way, this is my tenth blog post since I started 4 weeks ago, I'm really enjoy all the feedback I have been getting! Thank you for stopping by!

Ingredients:
Stamps: Hero Arts CL606 CG290
Paper: Basic Grey Picadilly, coloured vellum
Card: Kraft, Tim Holtz Distress series
Embellishments: Washi tape, Hero Hues gem (blue) and Kaisercraft gem (pink)
Inks: Ranger Archival Jet Black, Versamark embossing ink (White embossing powder)

Hero Arts April Sketches

Here are my two cards made from this month's Hero Arts sketch contest. I only attempted two of the sketches and will try the third one later this month. The first card does not have a sentiment as I wanted to use the butterfly to sit within the scalloped circle. 

The second card is for a friend who just had a baby girl and I wanted to use my new HA stamp (Four Flowers) recently purchased from the Paperific Expo. I originally embossed the vellum on white patterned vellum and was not happy with how it sits on the card. So I dug out some pink patterned vellum which has been in my stash for I don't know how long. I'm glad I'm finally able to use it and was happy with the end result! I have recently found some transparent mounting tape at Officeworks, which was perfect for the flower in this card.

Both cards will be entered (at the last hour) to A Blog Named Hero's first challenge - play favourites , Simon Says Stamp - Use Your Favourite Tool (My Big Shot) and this month's Hero Arts April  challenges.

Thanks for dropping by.