with 2012 heading to a close it can be soon enough. it's been a great year on so many levels and it's also been the crappiest ('scuse my french). crap mostly because it involved people. now i have nothing against people in general but they seem to be the common denominator in all things bad. yes and on a confession level i guess it includes me too. what i really dislike about people is that they seem to think of themselves as gods and if you don't worship them the way others do, but rather see them for what they really are they turn evil - literally. which brings me to my word for 2013. LISTEN.

to listen to that little voice, to God's prompting, to my own intuition, to experience, to what i know. to listen more to God's word and His sweet whisper in my ear, be it how soft, to listen and trust my instincts and never give in to the loud and disturbing and distrusting voices of those who mean me harm. to simply listen....

here's to listening to my own voice and not let it be drowned by those who speak so loudly and want to silence God's word and will for our lives. here's to a wonderful new year of listening!

this year is heading to a close fast - can hardly believe another one bites the dust. but i am not sad to see this one go for many reasons. and with the close of 2012 comes more scrapping time in 2013. we heading out to Scrapbook Studios' event in February and here is the first of a few sneaks peeks of the projects. for this layout we will be working with Prima and Crate papers mainly. then there's a few specially designed stamps for the event and some other custom made goodies. so if you still haven't booked (only because Cariena opened a few more spots) then hurry up or miss out. we will be doing some funky new techniques showing you how to make your own papers and elements.

here's wishing you a few more days of lazing around and reflecting on the next 365 days.

keep your eyes open for more sneak peeks of the other projects and hop on over here to book your spot http://www.scrapbookstudio.co.za/2013-retreat.html

remember those chines lantern style lights that were so popular way back when...well i think they are making a come back - even if only in the crafting world. i decorated this light using a range of flowers and some elements mad using the beautiful Pretty in pink range by Glitz. I so love this range. i had 2 curved rows going down the front and back of the light using a selection of the pretties collected.

i used a four piece die set from Cuttlebug to cut the leaves. I sewed 2 leaves together folding the top one upwards for dimension. I did the same with some of the butterflies.

to alternate the butterflies i hand sewed some pearls to the centers of the butterflies. with the paper scraps left over i punched some smaller flowers and added diamante or pearls to the centers.

vintage pearls....

after sewing i left long strands of thread hanging from the leaves and butterflies - i loved the messy look they bring to this project.

i am still trying to get the actual light hanging with a bulb inside LOL - and will then post a pic.

every year i want to do something different with my Christmas cards. So this year i decided to make some fun postcard style cards - they had to be quick and easy but also feature real postage stamps, some stamping with ink and some texture. what better way to achieve all three than to grab for my cuttlebug and some of my other favourite goodies from The Wholesaler. this little postcard project is featured in the new scrapping & kie magazine.

i used some Teresa Collins Christmas patterned papers for my base as well as for the embossed baubles. i love how a large embossed image can be trimmed down into an accent.

to add texture to my photograph i used a Christmas tree embossing folder turned on it's side to represent a swirl at the top of my photo. i lightly sanded the raised surface so that the texture would be more visible.

some of my favourite rubber stamps...

and more rubber stamped images on top of real postage stamps...

the cuttlebug is truly a versatile machine. and if you don't own one by now...you still have time to add it to your wish list for Santa to deliver.

photograph credit: 

Barbs du Plessis and Alistair du Plessis

there's a new challenge up over at Scrap Africa today. This challenge is hosted by the talented Elizna and it's a good one - film strips! They come in many shapes and sizes as well as die-cuts and pre-made. so it's time to get creative!i cheated a little bit with my film strip and printed my photos onto a digital film strip. remember that you can play along with us and stand a chance to become a guest designer or win some awesome goodies - but you have to swing by the Scrap Africa blog.

punched circles surrounded by diamante on top of the custom made background

embossing and inks combined together to create a visual feast of colour and texture

and some punched circles adhered to the background creating an interesting effect

just for playing along you can win some awesome goodies like these custom designed buttons - wouldn't mind some of these myself.

hope you are having a creative weekend! thanks for stopping by....

Christmas festivities are loads of fun when you have fun toys to play with - referring to the new Cuttlebug v2 machine. this week i used my machine to create some fun cubes by embossing patterned paper and adhering them to wooden cubes.

for this cube i used the Christmas village embossing folder to both blind emboss and add colour to the images transferred onto the paper.

for the top section of my decor cube i used a recycled bottle cork and added a glitz giant gem to the top. a beautifully coloured seam binding ribbon from Scrapbook Studio was added on top of a glittered snowflake die-cut.

colours to dye for....

the embossed papers were finished off with some glitter using glitter glue and a pigment mist.

beautiful gold american crafts glitter was added on top of a die-cut snowflake. the festive season will be extra special when you add some glitter to your projects.

i am building a Christmas village using some of these festive blocks alongside other simple vintage decorations covered in book paper. what are doing around the house to get into the festive mood? and just in case you need some festive crafting supplies - Scrapbook studio is well stocked up with products distributed by The Wholesaler. for a detailed step x step on using the cuttlebug head on over to www.thewholesaler.biz/blog

it's been a while (ok maybe a week or so) since i have been so excited by a new collection of papers and embellishments released. I simply love the new Little Bo Peep and Little Boy Blue ranges. again, it's the vintage feel and look that appeals to me, as well as the versatility of it all - the papers although themed can be mixed and matched with any theme. for more details and to see the layout i created you can visit www.thewholesaler.biz/blog - and why not check out the entire collection and orders yours from your nearest scrapbook store.

the easy to use embellishments and accessories makes for quick projects with loads of dimension

beautiful kaisercraft rub-ons match perfectly with the colour and theme

adding texture with brads and ribbon

layer upon layer the tags and papers compliment each other.

Products used

we all find inspiration somewhere. we all need inspiration sometimes. and sometimes we just need to copy something and do something that doesn't require that much thought! right! i am pretty comfortable in my scrapping style, i know what i like and what i don't like, but it doesn't mean i am not going to try something else....and that is how this layout came to be. i saw a sketch by Michelle van wyk on let's scrap and thought of trying it. it took a while and many tries of cutting up papers and discarding papers until i finally just lived with this....

it's way too busy, way too full for my but i loved the outcome in the end! maybe it's the photos of my little nephew, maybe the beautiful papers, maybe the pinwheels or maybe it was just the fact that i embraced it all. who knows? so thanks for the inspiration michelle and the challenge.

teresa collins mixed with bazzill ...

pin wheels for fun, texture and pops of colour

pockets stuffed with tags, postcards and images cut from the beautiful beach themed paper

and some signature sewing that brought it all together in the end

i miss this little dude so much - but was lucky enough to see him for an hour this past Saturday. he is soooo cute and adorable, sparkling with life and full of personality! love them so much!

here's wishing you a wonderful creative sunday - mine is a pajama day - a day for reflection on what people think when they openly do something that is not honest, how people can so easily be cruel, how people so easily justify not giving credit or paying someone for work done, how people look after their own needs so easily and yet forget to see the suffering in the world.

thankful for being home with my family, thankful for work, thankful for my daily bread, thankful for talent, thankful for beautifully creative people i meet every day, thankful for support and love, thankful for peace and being able to hear the birds outside!

another month and time for a new sketch over at scrap Africa. this is an awesome sketch and i simply love what the design team came up with - all so very unique and creative. The sketch is so unique and as usual perfect for those single pages, but i turned my into a double page layout.

and here's what i did with the skecth.

i stretched the sketch and changed things up a bit as usual. i loved working with the new Glitz papers and embellishments. to make things interesting i also added basic grey chipboard and crate cardboard stickers. other elements include a prima butterfly, some teresa collins brads and washi tape.

i love how this one turned out. simple yet filled with bits and pieces grouped together for impact.

remember to play along with us over at Scrap Africa - you can win some amazing prizes just for playing along with us. hope to see you all there....

the thing about December daily is that it is real - it's about the real things we do in our everyday lives.so day 3, 4 and 5 is random things happening - some fun and some still work. both for which i am very grateful. we are blessed! day 3 was well received with a great big gift parcel filled with home baked Greek goodies! they are amazing.

day 4 saw us watching Ice Age 4 for a bit of R&R. just chilling. i pulled an image off the internet and printed it onto photo paper. i added a till slip from groceries. my patterned paper choice for this fun day was the SN@P range by Simple Stories. i love the bright fun and festive colours in the range. the keep calm and snap on bit was cut from the packaging found on the album cover.

...snap on was also the theme for day 5 as we headed off to a photoshoot for some work related design work. we booked some studio time and spent most of the day doing what i love most -  playing with cameras! i used the invoice from the studio as part of my background and filled in bits and pieces using Teresa Collins, simple stories, American crafts and kaisercraft.

how's your december daily going? i am keeping it simple - it's not about the what but about the story behind the everyday, the extraordinary ordinary things.i do this for myself - to capture at least one month a year showcasing bits of our life just in case we forget....how very blessed we are.

Wow, can you believe we are there already? yip it's December! this year i am taking my December daily project a step further - making it public. every year i tinker around and make a little project but never share it for some reason (well many reasons actually). but this year i have The Wholesaler as a sponsor and will be working with a number of their fabulous products they distribute to the shops here in south Africa. so here we go...Day 1
Day one was a pretty ordinary day with a class in Jhb and then some down time at home in the afternoon. my focus for this festive season - Breathe. I used plain white cardstock splattered with brown Mr Huey ink before adhering a quote cut from the new Basic Grey quote booklet, a green star punched from simple stories paper and the no 1 is from teresa collins' Christmas range. i kept it simple with lots of breathing space.

then on the right hand side is a fun page. I used AC tinsel in red applied to double sided tape both by The Wholesaler to create my base page. I covered the tinsel with acetate sewn to the base to help keep the tinsel in place especially when the album will be handled a lot. The star is cut from the same Simple Stories check paper as before and decorated with a printed tag, stamped image from the DoCrafts Christmas range with Red Glitzin' Glamour glitter glue details, ribbon and a festive pin. Everything is layered using Pop Dots distributed by The Wholesaler.

the beautiful seam binding ribbon was sponsored by Scrapbook Studio JBay - you can find them here. they have an amazing range of products distributed by The Wholesaler and will get anything you need and want. The ribbon was coloured and gave this amazing green/cream colour combination.

and a close up showing how i sewed right through my chipboard word. To see the entire range of chipboard elements distributed by The Wholesaler you can visit their website here

I will be sharing my pages daily as i finish them and then an overall of the entire album as it fits together later in December. what will your little creative project for the holidays be....have a wonderful day!

thankful!pretty much sums up my day today. driving home from class today, i was stuck in traffic again for way toooo long in fourways. way too many people irritated and driving, way too many people consumed by the rush of spending money they probably don't have. way too much of ugly. i am so thankful for making it through this year, for the opportunities and the blessings bestowed on me in this tough year, but i am glad it is heading towards the end. i am thankful for the small little things that are the big things in my life, since the big things really are just things and can be taken away in an instant. i am thankful for just being. and so thankful for the people who share my creative journey in so many ways - so that means you if you are still reading.

i am also so thankful for being able to work with beautiful stuff - for the little inspiring projects like wrapping a gift in some prettiness. i love graphic 45 paper so much, but find it hard to work with - what i do like is that embracing the "differentness" of the papers and turning it into the unexpected and the different makes the product blossom even more. so i loved wrapping gifts in the papers, with special bows and gorgeous gift tags.

so this means that my colour scheme for this festive season is bold and bright and totally happy. it's filled with pretty and delicate and glitter and bling. here's wishing you a 'thankful' ordinary day and may your preparations for the silly season be reasonable and sparkly and keeping the spirit of caring alive. have a thankful day! i am playing catch up with my December Daily project...stay tuned