Hippity Hop...

Save the date!
We would like to invite you to visit with us on February 7th for our first ever DoodleFactory new release blog hop!

What's this all about?
Irene thought it would be fun to put the design team to work creating some super cool brand new projects with our brand new release! And since this release is a whole lot different than what we have done in the past we thought we should do something special to mark its arrival into the stamp world! We are so excited to see what you think of it and we really CAN'T WAIT to show it to you.
So what you need to do is stop back here on February 7th (after 11am EST) and you will find a list of our designers blogs. Start at the first name on the list and visit her blog to see her fun new release project(s) she will give you the link to the next designer's blog and you can pop in over there to see the next great project and so on and so forth down the list it will go!
You are going to want to visit all the blogs because one of them will be giving you some information on some delicious blog candy.
What is it? Well... you will just have to wait and see! So mark your calendar, save the date, stick up a post it, or write it on your hand but do whatever you have to do to be here on February 7th for our first new release BLOG HOP!!

Happy Email!

Well first off, whoa, I was blown away when I came to the blog today. 9 comments, you sure know how to make a girl feel appreciated! About the watercolouring, I generally stay away from the reinkers. I find that they are too vibrant for this type of subtle colouring. I've also found in the past that if you apply it a bit too dark, there is no going back (unlike real watercolours where you can usually smear the colour around quite a bit). Usually, I do the lid squish down thing, or I find a piece of plastic and scribble the markers on it. I find that the markers with my just barely wet aquapainter give me the colour I am seeking. Of course, I scribble around on scrap paper before going to my project. On this card, since the main image was stamped, and not painted, I gently nudged the colour off of the images as best I could, without adding much water. So, the only actual watercolouring was the sahara sand shadowing I added.

But now for my happy email, one of my 3 projects I recently submitted to Paper Crafts was accepted!! This will be my first time in print. I am ridiculously excited. Of course, that meant I had to take down all forms of it on the web, but I think it's worth it :D

In crafty pursuits, etc. here's a pair of earrings I've made. One of the ladies at work insisted that we get all green tomorrow, since we aren't working on Saturday (she's sprayed her hair green for St. Patrick's Day in the past). I'm not usually into that sort of thing, but I thought it'd be fun to try and make some earrings, especially since I don't have any St. Patrick's Day images. So what did I use... This heart from gelatins, and one end of this squiggle from Hero Arts :

Answering a question

If anyone is curious about getting their own gel-a-tins, I ordered mine through them here: http://www.gelatinstamps.com/shop/index.php. My LSS was willing to order them in for me, but their pricing system was actually higher than what the website had listed. The shipping was quite reasonable: $5.00 for expedited (got to me in 4 days from send date). I figured that what I paid for shipping, I saved on PST (they're in Ontario, and I, being in Manitoba, didn't have to pay their PST or ours!).

As far as quality, they are definitely one of the nicest clear stamps I have used. They are extremely sticky, they stay on the block when using the stampin' scrub to clean (I've many a clear stamps NOT stay on during clean-up). The images stamp fabulously. I had a few bead a bit, but a little scrubbing on the dry side of the scrubber fixed that (that's how I also solve that problem with new rubber stamps). The packaging is also super cute, there's something extremely fun about the tins. I've also learned that I am quite fond of this over the CD case storage method. I'm probably going to pick up a few empty case from here: http://www.effectuality.com/store/product.php?store=cdn&lng=en for my other clear stamps.

Not a card, but something else....

Well, today I went out and bought a new digital camera. It's amazing. Although the one I received 5 years ago is still a fabulous camera, it just didn't have all that I would like from a camera, plus I've now spotted a 3rd burnt pixel (gasp!). This new one has 10x optical zoom. It is 7.1 MP, which is a bit much, but hey, now I can do prints at 8x10 or larger, should I choose (I'm sure I will). It also has digital image stabilization, no more blurry pictures!!! Also, and here's a fabulous selling feature, it will take up to 630 pictures per set of batteries/ rechargable batteries' life. Now, it does take 4 batteries, but that is hardly an issue for me, since the old one took 4 as well. It also has tons of preset scene modes and the ability for me to maually set aperature and shutter speed (once I figure out the situations in which I should be doing that). Like I said, it's amazing. I love photographing pretty much anything, so here's a a shot of my first experimenting with the super macro. This is a plant in our livingroom (it's from South America, like most of our plants...). It's located in front of a decorative screen. I am definitely going to be having a lot of fun with this new toy!

Sorry, I totally failed to mention the make and all that jazz (thanks Susan!!). I got an Olympus SP-510UZ. Our film camera was one, as is my older 2.0MP camera, so we just kept with that brand. We've had pretty good luck with Olympus, and this one just happened to have all the things on my checklist ( at least 5x optical zoom, a viewfinder AND an LCD screen, long battery power, digital image stabilization, turbo shooting, manual and automatic setting, and more!). If you're interested in this particular model or others by Olympus, here's a link to the website where you can check it out: Olympus SP-510UZ . Obviously, I am not affiliated with this company, just a satisfied customer of past and present cameras.

They are here!!!

Woot, my stamps arrived!! They were sitting happily on my doorstep when I got home. I guess you are all wondering what I got...Well, here's the picture of ths stacks of stamps. The leftmost piles are all the freebies (Happy Harmony, Delight in Life, So Delightful, Big Blossom, So Very, Very Punnyx2, Bothway Blossoms, Sage Shadow, Pumpkin Pie Reinker, Finest Flourishes brass template, watercolour paper). The other piles are categorized into alphabet stamps and other stamps. I got Headline Numbers, Letterpress Numbers, Typeset Upper, Typeset Numbers, and Short Order Numbers. Of other sets I got Brighter Tomorrow, Beautiful Beach, Balmy Breezes, Ruff Day, The Cat's Meow, And Everything Nice, Still Life Stems and Finest Flourishes, as well as Weathered and Linen. So here's the stack of all my "presents". In other amusements, check out my gifts from my parents. Seriously, she wrapped these before I did yesterday's Colour Challenge! Isn't that crazy?? In other hilarity, I was checking out my SCS private messages, I got a few birthday greetings, etc, and then after I finished checking them, this appeared. That's right 65535 messages. What a birthday! Apparently 50% of the SCS population felt the need to wish me so (not!). You can only have a maximum of 350 messages, however I found this absolutely hilarious, considering it's my birthday. Can you imagine, having 65,000 people pm you in one day??

Tutorial!

I have posted the tutorial for "Faux Airbrushing/Splatter Backgrounds" . I hope it helps those of you who are visual learners! Here's the card I made for that tutorial (which can also be seen at the link).

See, I told ya!

Like I said, since I've got my template all worked out now, I'll change it frequently. The beach one is already gone (if you liked it, I'm sure it will return or be improved in the future). This morning I went searching over the internet for some fun winter-themed Photoshop Elements brushes. I found these cute snowflakes, so I set about making a new banner. I used to do this sort of thing all the time a few years ago, it's nice to do it again. I've got no card to post this morning, was using my creativity to do this instead.

While I wait...

For 12:00 to roll around, here is a photo of our winter "storm". I'm guessing the final snow total was about 15cm (around 6 inches). It's actually quite nice out, but driving what indeed trechorous. I didn't need to use my gas pedal at all, was coasting the whole way home from work.

Okay!! I have a winner, using my random number generator, I have ome to the number 25. After multiple counting, and a 2nd pair of eyes, I have verified that the winner is Michelle Nadraszky! Michelle please email me here with your mailing address!