Clownfish Punch Art...

...or maybe you know them as Anenomefish, or to some they may be more familiar as Nemo! We saw heaps of these little fellas on the Great Barrier Reef. Lots of different types too...some bright orange, some dark, some with black, some without, some with two stripes, some with one. They all had one thing in common though...they move really quickly, and are very hard to get a nice clear picture of!

We tried, oh how we tried! We have numerous shots of bits of them, and many, many more shots where they are just a blurry blob. I should have just bought a postcard and scanned it in, it would have served me better! Anyway, here are a few pics where the fish is at least semi-recognisable (even if you can only see part of them!)...

...and here is my first attempt to recreate them using punch art. At least now he is much easier to photograph!!

...all done with SU punches. I had a ball making this one. I think you may see more of him in the future. If you have any questions, just leave a comment and I'll get back to you asap.

Got plenty of great anenome shots if nothing else ;-)!

Hope you had a lovely weekend,

Turtle Punch Art...

Thumper has an important birthday coming up soon so I've been trying to get myself organised in advance...such a cool concept that, being organised in advance...wonder who thought of it?

Anyway, I started thinking about turtle punch art while we were out and about on Lucey Blue, but I couldn't try it out because I didn't take any punches with me (what was I thinking?...thing is, we already had two hefty anchors onboard..16 or 17 would have been way overkill! ;-).

We saw a lot of beautiful turtles on our travels, and their simple shape kind of lends itself to punch art nicely I think...

So late yesterday I had a play and managed to make a little card that I am very happy with...

All the punches I have used are SU. I can list them for you, if anyone wants to know. I think you can probably see that I've coated the turtle shells in Crystal Effects (not all turtle shells are clean and shiny though...check out the moss in one of the pictures way above). The chipboard '1' is also coated in Crystal Effects. Now...quick question for you...what do you think the cluster of things at bottom left of the main panel is supposed to be? A quick poll here at home resulted in the answer 'flowers'!?!...and these were the people I'd been diving on the Great Barrier Reef with for the past eight months! So, just in case you were left wondering, it is supposed to be a coral garden...you know, the sort of thing a turtle hangs out near ;-).

 ...and a few more turtle shots before I go...because I feel like it.

Hope all my fellow Aussies had a very happy Australia Day. Gonna go stand with hubby in the rain now, listen to Triple J Hottest 100 and help BBQ some lamb. Yummy!!

Sailing into the sunset...

Actually, it looks more like we'll be sailing into a headwind. Not very good news!

Last night I stayed up WAY past my boat bedtime (which has been in the vicinity of 7pm - can you spell P.A.R.T.Y. A.N.I.M.A.L??) and made a little thank you card to give to the marina staff here (with some yummy Haighs chocolate frogs). We have had Lucey Blue at the d'Albora Marina at The Spit for about a year and a half, and have got to know the staff quite well in that time. They are very friendly, super professional and always there to help. It has a been a real pleasure to have stayed here, and we hope to come back to The Spit when we return in early 2012.

I have had this card in my head for about two weeks, but like I said before, the thinking and doing are such vastly different things! As we now hope to start heading north either late tomorrow or early on Saturday, it became a matter of some urgency, so I finally pulled my finger out and got it done.

I am afraid that a full recipe for this card is pretty much beyond me at the mo. The colours (as near as I can guess in dim light) are, Tangerine Tango, Whisper White, Brilliant Blue, Pacific Point (I think I am all out of this now...very sad), Soft Sky and Yoyo Yellow. The sun die is a Die-namics one from MFT (I think), and I ran the whole lot through my Cuttlebug in that scrummy SU texture folder (whose name I can't remember). I might add that I nearly broke my Cuttlebug doing that because the wad of cardstock was so thick that it almost would not go through even though I was only using two B plates. Oh, almost forgot...I also used my recently acquired Corner Muncher (or whatever name it goes by). It munches corners like a hot knife through butter...love that puppy!!

Well, that's all from me for today. I still have to wrap up this fortnight's Distance Education pack, and then tidy up the bomb zone that is our saloon. As our living space is now several orders of magnitude smaller than when we lived on dry land, the mess seems to get completely out of hand in a much smaller amount of time (even though the volume of possessions that we have with us is also several orders of magnitude smaller too). Maybe I am just being overly sensitive to mess, as the number of places that you can go to escape it is very small...non-existent even! Hhhhmmmmmm....I think I need to sit down and take a breather....that last paragraph barely makes sense.

Languid Lucy the Lounging Lion

Meet languid lucy...the lounging lion! Well, I tried to make her look like she was lounging idly by the shore of a crystal clear lagoon. However, my daughter thinks her legs look a bit odd. I tend to agree with her. But I couldn't very well make a lion legless...could I? Anyway...

List of Ingredients:

Cardstock: Pacific Point, Baja Breeze, Whisper White, Chocolate Chip, Close to Cocoa, Kiwi Kiss, Garden Green, Summer Sun, Real Red, Basic Black and Tangerine Tango.
Punches: Wide Oval, Word Window, Scallop Circle, 1 1/4 inch Circle, Photo Corner, 1/2 inch Circle, Flower Trio
Cuttlebug Embossing Folders: Tiny Bubbles, Devine Swirl, Birds and Swirls, Forest Branches, Distressed Stripes and Rellie Rave
Accessories: Crimper, Basic Black Marker, Googly eyes, Dimensionals, Sticky Strip and SNAIL adhesive.

So whaddaya think? Weird or wot?

It is a beautiful, beautiful day here today (except for the significant smoke haze which I think is due to some back burning they were doing around the ACT yesterday...better haze though than massive licking flames and fireballs I say!!).

Tonight is Skyfire on the lake (= big fireworks display)...and we are thinking of taking the little boat out for a spin and having a picnic dinner on the lake and watching the show. Better go start thinking about what to take for that.

Have a good one,

(Blogged to: Six Months in a Leaky Boat - Split Enz and Smalltown Boy - Bronski Beat).

Tags for little kids, or big kids...

Before I get into the tags...I just wanted to say a huge thank you to everyone for the lovely comments you left after my post about the loss of our Oscar. It mean't a lot to us to receive your kind words, thank you for thinking of us!

Back to the tags...just a little project I have been working on today (while hubby and the kids are out shopping for a BBQ....so disappointed to miss that excursion ;-).

 

 

List of Ingredients:

Cardstock: Pacific Point, Whisper White, Summer Sun and Tangerine Tango
Accessories: Provocraft Transportation dies, Spellbinders Nestabilities, Crop-a-dile, metallic eyelets, crimper, paper piercer and SNAIL adhesive.


I am going to go look for some bright white crochet thread later, to tie through the eyelets. I don't have anything here that is bright white, and thick enough to use to tie tags.

Hope your weekend is sweet!

(Blogged to: Rock That Body - Black Eyed Peas ... makes me think of New Year's Eve on Sydney Harbour).

Penguin Punch Art

 

Still pondering punch art here. It is so much fun :-). The inspiration for this little guy came from a project by Dawn Olchefske, which you can see here. Thanks Dawn!

List of Ingredients:

Cardstock: Night of Navy, Pacific Point, Baja Breeze, Soft Sky, Whisper White, Summer Sun, Pumpkin Pie and Basic Black plain cardstock and Glossy White cardstock
Stamps: Best Yet
Ink: Basic Black Classic Ink
Accessories: Distressed Lines, Divine Swirls, Tiny Bubbles and Swiss Dots Cuttlebug Folders, Crystal Effects, Chunky Sprinkles, Styled Silver Hodge Podge, 1 1/4 inch Circle Punch, 1 inch Circle Punch, 5-Petal Flower Punch, Designer Label Punch, Spring Bouquet Punch, 1/4 inch Circle Punch, Heart to Heart Punch, White Gel Pen, Dimensionals, Sticky Strip and SNAIL Adhesive.

I wish this scene was making me feel a bit cooler. I'd like to be swimming in a glacial pool right now :-).

Hope your day is a good one!

(Blogged to: Hot N Cold - Katy Perry).

Just Add Ink Challenge #3

This week's Just Add Ink Challenge is a fun sketch challenge, and here is the sketch:

My card is somewhat inspired by this beautiful creation by Delys Cram, who is one of the very talented Just Add Ink design team. Thanks for the inspiration Delys!

List of Ingredients:

Cardstock: Basic Black, Whisper White, Pumpkin Pie, Ruby Red, Summer Sun and Not Quite Navy plain cardstock and Close To Cocoa textured cardstock
Ink: Basic Black Classic Ink
Stamps: Animal Stories and Inspired By Nature
Accessories: Chit Chat rub-ons, 5 Petal Flower punch, D'vine Swirls Cuttlebug Folder, Distressed Stripes Cuttlebug Folder, Tiny Bubbles Cuttlebug Folder, Dimensionals, Sticky Strip and SNAIL Adhesive.


This was a fun card to make. I really like making little scenes on my cards. It is so much fun seeing how life-like you can make them appear.

Thanks so much for visiting my blog, and thank you for all of the lovely comments that you leave. You make my day!

 

(Blogged to: The Rhythm of the Night - Corona).

Ice Cream Punch Art...

 ... makes me want to eat ice cream! Who woulda thunk it?

The birthday girl tomorrow is an ice cream fan, so I thought I'd make some ice cream punch art for her. There are lots of groovy ice cream punch art ideas around, but I think mine is closest to this one by Lynda and this one by Ros Davidson. Thank you for the inspiration Lynda and Ros.

 

 

List of Ingredients:

Cardstock: Old Olive, Riding Hood Red, Barely Banana, Creamy Caramel and Chocolate Chip plain, and Whisper White textured
Ink: Close to Cocoa Classic Ink
Accessories: Chocolate Chip patterns DSP, chit chat rub-ons, scallop punch, scallop border punch, 3/4 inch circle punch, wide oval punch, scoring tool, sponge daubers, swirly cuttlebug folder, white gel pen, dimensionals and SNAIL adhesive.


Now that I'm thinking of my stomach...I'd better go help hubby with the dinner. We are having BBQ kebabs.

Ciao ciao,

(Blogged to: Everybody Have Fun Tonight - Wang Chung).

Mojo Monday - week 114

I haven't participated in one of these Mojo Monday challenges for quite a while either...but last night I needed some inspiration, and this one looked good to me.

This week is week 114, and here is the sketch:

This is my card:

List of Ingredients (all from Stampin' Up! unless otherwise noted):

Cardstock: Riding Hood Red textured, Very Vanilla and Brushed Gold
Accessories: Christmas Ornaments Cuttlebug Folder, Riding Hood Red Taffeta Ribbon, Gold Cord (retired), Scallop Edge Punch, Chit Chat Rub-Ons, Metallic Eyelets, Crop-a-dile, Mini Glue Dots, Dimensionals and SNAIL Adhesive.

If the Christmas sentiment kinda looks like an after-thought, that'd be because it was! I got to the end and realised I'd forgotten to put a sentiment on (not an unusual occurrence for me, I'm a pictures person). Then I had a bit of difficulty working out where it would go. Ooops!

Thanks so much for stopping by, and thank you for all of your lovely comments. You guys rock!

:-)
Sam.