Just My Scrapping World...

Day 1....

2012-02-22T19:41:00.002+11:00

Today I wanted to share with you my last projects created with Graphic 45's An ABC Primer collection which I was kindly sent by Suzanne to work with as part of my DT kit from Handmade by Suzanne.

This layout is called Day 1. This is the first day of kindergarten for Maria, which was on January 31st this year. At the back of this layout, I have written my feelings and thoughts of ..Day 1 without her.

* I used An ABC Primer papers and chipboard (Tags 2) .

* I cut the alphabet border of An ABC Primer - Building Blocks patterned paper and pasted it over An ABC Primer - Calico Kids.

** I used my trusted Martha Stewart Crafts - Punch Around The Page Set - Cherish to create the border strips behind the photo.

* I misted and inked the edges of a large paper doily.

**I used the journalling tag and other chipboard from An ABC Primer Tags 2 .

**I combined a number of different flowers including, Kaisercraft Paper Blooms (Honey) and Kaisercraft Mini Blooms (Honey) , Prima Romantique Coventry and some other Prima from my stash. The orange crochet flowers were in a Prima pack I was sent from Suzanne but sorry I cannot locate it in the shop.

**some of the same flowers I mentioned above and the chipboard.

**I am in love with this new paper punch I bought from Suzanne's recently. Its called Fiskars - Large Easy Squeeze Punch - Jenni Bowlin - Scalloped Banner

**Alphas are American Crafts Thickers - Eric

I also made a card with all the left overs. I was inspired by a card I saw by Karola Witczak somewhere. Inspiration is a wonderful thing isn't it? To see something and to just want to create is an awesome feeling.

** I used my Spellbinder's Shapeabilities Fleur De Lis Motifs to create the scallop circles and swirls.

**I punched squares out of a square paper punch and positioned them on the front of the card using 3D dots.

Before I leave you, let me show you the other 2 layouts I created with this collection which you can see more details in my previous posts..

I hope you have been inspired somehow to create something new today. Hope you are all having a great day. Don't forget to visit Handmade By Suzanne where most of the materials I used for all my creations with this collection are available HERE.

Bye for now.

Once Upon A...Sketch February 15th Challenge + handmade By Suzanne

2012-02-20T22:27:00.002+11:00

Hi there everyone.

I hope your week has started well. Its a typical crazy Monday here. I went back to the gym today after a 6 week break and it felt pretty good. Its raining like crazy which is so strange as we are still in our summer season here. But that's OK. I love the rain, I love the cold and the whole feel of winter.. A tad nutty huh? LOL.

Well anyway. I have one more layout to share with you today using my DT pack from Handmade By Suzanne. I was sent the Graphic 45 An ABC Primer collection which is primarily a school themed collection. THANKS Suzanne and Marelize for being so thoughtful. You see they knew Maria started school a few weeks back so they KNEW I must have had a million "first day" photos to scrap!

But this time I actually decided to challenge my self, as I do all the time, and use this collection to create a layout for the current challenge I set at Once Upon A...Sketch.

February 15th Challenge

Journalling criteria/theme: HOLIDAYS/VACATION

Have you printed out all those photos from your last holiday/vacation or most favourite holiday/vacation? We would LOVE to see them and hear all about it. With the theme of holidays/vacation for this challenge, we would love to hear about: your favourite holiday/vacation of all time or a favourite place you would LOVE to take a holiday in . Or how about the last holiday/vacation you went to? Maybe you have not travelled yet? Then tell us about your DREAM HOLIDAY /VACATION destination.

Remember that you are allowed to also create a card or altered project based on this sketch and theme and instead of the journalling criteria you need to use a quote.

You must combine our journalling criteria/theme with this sketch.

Here is what I created for this challenge..

Here we are in Melbourne in January. Here we visited Victoria Markets which can be seen in the background. They are right in the middle of the city which can also be seen behind the markets in the photo above.

The last time we went on holidays, it was for our 10th wedding anniversary which was a very memorable day in Australian history. Memorable for all the wrong reasons. We went to Coffs Harbour, which is in New South Wales for 1 week, and it was 7th of February 2009. This day will always be remembered as the Black Saturday Bushfires day here in Australia where almost 200 people died in Victoria and many lost their homes or were injured in out of control bushfires. Such a sad sad sad day. But besides that , it was a very difficult holiday for us as Ioanna was only 3 months old and Maria was just 2 and , to put it nicely, it was a nightmare! Coupled with this natural disaster , it was best forgotten.

So this time, I was so hesitant to go anywhere and to be honest we were not expecting to go anywhere as I was supposed to have my baby in a few days. But when plans changed, we saw a window of opportunity and went and we had SUCH a good time. The kids ask us every day "when are we going to Melbourne again?" . Its a fantastic city. I can't wait to go back.

Here are some close ups...

**I have used here An ABC Primer papers and chipboard stickers (Tags 2)

** I was also sent the small Kaisercraft Mini Blooms (Honey)

**I created the large circle with Webster's Pages Western Romance trim, by overlapping it.

**I added some Kaisercraft Paper Blooms (Ruby)

**I was also sent those lovely crochet flowers in a Prima marketing pack, but I cannot seem to locate them in the store.

**I used 2 pieces of Imaginarium Designs chipboard - Clock Face 3" and Sharing The Good Times title . I simply inked them with white ink a couple of times. Then I went over both of them with Versa Colour Cube (Sand beige). I then used a darker brown ink on the title and went over it with Ranger Glossy Accents

** I also layered some ABC Primer chipboard (key and journalling spot)

* I have seen the string around the photo a few times lately on some people's layouts, but I cannot remember where! I am sorry if it was your idea!

Well that is it.

Please visit Once Upon A...Sketch HERE to see details on the awesome prizes we have up for grabs!

Please also hop on over to the Handmade By Suzanne gallery to play along with the monthly sketch challenge there. Here is the sketch this month, and just by entering you go into the draw to win AUS$30.00 (+ free shipping) in a random draw!

Take care everyone :)

C'est Magnifique Kit Club MARCH Kit Paper and Add Ons Reveal

2012-02-18T17:37:00.001+11:00

Oh I thoroughly LOVE being on the Design Team at C 'est Magnifique. If I was not on the team, this is the one kit club I would have joined because the kits are just SO my style. The Design Team is so lucky to receive the kits about a month in advance and this is awesome for me as I have a lot of time to play with them.

This month's kit is just absolutely gorgeous and ..well..April's one is just as stunning! It should be here in the next week or so and I cannot wait. Everything is so well coordinated and it all just comes together so easily for me.

Today, I wanted to show the paper and add ons for March. Each month, the upcoming papers and add ons are revealed from the 15th onward as well as an example from each Design Team member until the FULL reveal on the 1st of each month.

SO let me start by showing you the INCREDIBLY gorgeous papers from Pion Designs.. *sigh* These papers were designed just for me I think! :)

"A Breath of Spring".

*Remember this is only part of the main kit. The full reveal will be on the 1st of March

Flower Add-on featuring flowers from Manor House, Prima and Petaloo

and

Embellishment Add-on featuring items from Want2Scrap, Ranger, Melissa Frances, American Crafts and KaiserCraft

Please remember that if you want to receive our add-ons every month, contact Leslie by e-mail at leslie@cestmagnifiquekits.com to sign up

Here is my first layout with this gorgeous kit ..

Here is a layout I created using a photo of our recent holiday to Melbourne. While there we met my scrappy friend Jasmine Shea for the first time and she has 4 GORGEOUS children. I went for a monochromatic look here as I kind of wanted to give that "old feel" or a "vintage feel" to the layout to express my desire I guess that we will see this beautiful family again and hope to stay friends for a long time.

I put my Martha Stewart and Fiskars paper punches to good use here as I was trying to create a detailed and layered vintage effect."

All materials are from the MAIN KIT, whose embellishments will be revealed on the 1st of March.

From my stash:

**Martha Stewart Punch Around The Page - Swirling Lace

**Martha Stewart Deep Edger Punch - Vintage Doily

**Glimmermist - Coffee Shop

**Cheery Lynn Designs - French Pastry die (the one that looks like a doily)

**2" and 2.5" circle and scalloped circle punch

**Ranger Liquid Pearls - Bisque

**gesso for the chipboard

**brown ink

** October Afternoon Mini Market alphas

**Fiskars - Large Easy Squeeze Punch - Jenni Bowlin - Scalloped Banner

I have to tell you the C ést Magnifique kits are selling out VERY fast and unfortunately this one has already sold out. The same goes for the add ons, but if you still like some items there are some available HERE

If you like the look of these kits and wish to secure one each month please have a look at how you can do that HERE.

There is also a sketch challenge happening at C 'est Magnifique for February with this sketch designed by me..

Sorry for the long post!

Hope you are well wherever you all are and whatever you are doing. Love always, Nadia.

My first Imaginarium Designs DT work!

2012-02-16T17:21:00.000+11:00

SO happy to share with you my very first Design Team work using Imaginarium Designs chipboard. Please do check out the Imaginarium Designs blog HERE, but I will share my work with you here on my blog too!

So here is what I created for your inspiration this month.

Creating 12x12 layouts is second nature to me. It's all I EVER do!! So I decided this time to challenge myself to create something different and I thought creating some lovely tags as gifts was a clever idea and something I could probably handle! I also wanted to show you how versatile this chipboard is and boy was it SO easy and quick to create these.

This first one is a gift for my eldest daughter who is 5 years old. I called it "Our Story" and explained to her that every family has a story and her story is that she was the first born child of this family. I used soft colours and a beautiful 3" Clock Face Imaginarium Designs Chipboard to give this tag a romantic and feminine touch. What little girl wouldn't love this hanging on her wardrobe knob or her door? I can tell you MINE did!

A close up...

Now, I will confess that I am no champion at doing all kind of fancy things with chipboard but I find that a little 2 tone ink and some glossy accents on top will create a stunning result which is what I have done here.

SO all you need to do is go over the entire chipboard with gesso a couple of times allowing for it to dry each time. The you start with the light coloured ink and go over the chipboard a couple of times and the what I did is take the darker ink and dab it randomly over the edges.

Once that is dry just over it with Glossy Accents and you are done! As I said...no fancy stuff here!!

Products List

** Imaginarium Designs Chipboard: 3" Clock Face

**Webster's Pages Winter's Fairy Tales : paper, fabric tag, fabric bloomers,

**Kaisercraft : paper blooms (fuchsia)

**Prima Marketing: large white flower

**Martha Stewart: Punch Around The Page Cherish paper punch

**gesso

**Glossy Accents

**light and dark pink ink (brand unknown)

**gauge

** string

**brown tag

**Glimmer Mist : Coffee Bean

My next tag was a gift for my second little girl who is 3 years old. She loves bright colours so I knew this would appeal to her. And it did! I layered a couple of different Imaginarium Designs chipboard pieces as well as some other elements and again I applied the same technique to the chipboard as I mentioned above.

Products List

**Imaginarium Designs Chipboard: "Love You" title and Swirly Frame

**Webster's Pages Winter's Fairy Tales : fabric bloomers, flower

** Prima Marketing : Shabby Chic Metal Treasures - Bird Cages/Pillars, Romantique rose

**Light and Dark purple ink (brand unknown)

**white and purple ribbon (brand unknown)

**Gesso

**Glimmer Mist: Coffee Bean

**Glossy Accents

**Brown Tag

My last tag is for my super sweet friend also named Nadia, who lives just a couple of minutes away from me. She has helped more than she knows the last few months and I wanted to give her something handmade by me as a token of my appreciation.

I wanted to keep this tag romantic looking but still elegant to give to a 30 something mum so I changed the colour scheme a little. I used an Imaginarium Designs LARGE Butterfly placed on top of some flowers as well as an Imaginarium Designs Mirrored Frame. For the frame, I simply used Gesso and nothing else a few times to give it a rustic look, while for the butterfly after applying gesso a few times over it I inked again randomly with a brown ink.

Products List

*Imaginarium Designs Chipboard: Large Butterfly and Mirrored Frame

**Webster's Pages Winter's Fairy Tales : fabric bloomers

** Prima Marketing : Green flowers, Romantique rose, pearls

**Martha Stewart: Deep Edger Punch (Vintage Doily)

**brown ink (brand unknown)

**pearl ribbon (brand unknown)

**October Afternoon: Mini Market alpha stickers

**Gesso

**Glimmer Mist: Coffee Bean

**Glossy Accents

**Brown Tag

**gauge

Lastly I want to share with you my last project which is one of my little 3 year old!

As soon as I had the Imaginarium Designs title "Adore" in my hands and her close up picture it was a match made in heaven as I, simply put, cannot find another way to describe what I feel for her little sweet face.

For the title I used the same old trusted method I used in the tags above, which includes the inking and then covering in Glossy Accents.

This was one of those PERFECT pictures you catch of your children which are SO rare so I wanted to "frame" it in a way so what better way to do that than using this 6" Swirly Frame from Imaginarium Designs? I simply once again went over the frame a few times using gesso and once that dried I applied a sand coloured ink and then some clear Crackle Medium on top of that. I then inked the edges slightly.

Lastly, I find that these little Mirrored Frames add a special little detail to the layout and as well as that they create a nice contrast on top of the bright pink.

Products List:

**Imaginarium Designs Chipboard: Adore title, Mirrored Frame, 6" x 4" Swirly Frame

**Webster's Pages Winter's Fairy Tales : paper, fabric tag, fabric bloomers,

**Martha Stewart: Punch Around The Page Cherish , Swirling Lace and Layered Arches paper punches .

**ZVA Creative: pearl flourish

** Flowers: Prima Marketing, Manor House Creations, Petaloo

**leaves, brown ink, puffy paint

PLEASE NOTE: You can purchase all Imaginarium Designs chipboard HERE

For more inspiration using Imaginarium Designs chipboard and to share your Imaginarium Designs projects please visit the ning site HERE

I hope I have inspired you all to try something new today!

Thank you for letting me share my creations with you all :)

Once Upon A..Sketch + Get Creative February 15th .

2012-02-15T02:17:00.000+11:00

Firstly...a very big THANK YOU for your encouraging and supportive words in my previous post. I will never get used to the words that you all type about me. I just won't! You are all just..such positive energies in my life and I thank you for your wise words. Thank you to the people that took the time to email me personally, thank you to those people that took the time out of their CRAZY BUSY lives to say something to make me feel better. I hope I replied to everyone, but some people I just couldn't find their email, but THANK YOU :)

I want to stress once and for all that if it is one thing I am not it would be an attention seeker. I, in fact, walked away feeling sick after publishing that last post because I know that every single person out there is dealing with something and NO BODY wants to hear negativity or bad thoughts. So I am very sorry if I saddened you with my last post. This blog , I think, has kind of interlinked both my creative and personal life as it seems that one cannot escape the other. I am sorry if my tone is not optimistic at times. But one thing I have been with all of you since starting this journey is HONEST and i cannot start changing now. I guess I will have my bad days too..just please do not ever think I am bearing my soul here for any reason other than to get it out of me and find some solace in all of you.

I try to stay very positive but ... some days, just like last week..I will hear a song, or a phrase and it will set everything off. I AM a positive person..I really am.

So let's go on to some scrappy stuff. I cannot say I have been entirely full of creativity this past couple of weeks. I have created some things for DT projects which I cannot reveal yet but here is one for the current Get Creative challenge.

It's time for another Design Team swap between Once Upon A...Sketch and Get Creative. We have had so much fun doing this swap. I hope you all liked it too and got to meet some new people and discovered another challenge blog to play along with.

Now remember that being part of the OUAS Design Team , I played along with this sketch from Elina from get Creative.

Here is my take on this sketch..

A bit different from me huh?

I was sent Graphic45's collection An ABC Primer from Handmade By Suzanne to work with this month which is quite busy and school themed. Perfect for my school photos of the first day of kindy for Maria.

Here are some close ups

You can find the collection of papers and chipboard elements (tags 2) HERE .

Also used Martha Stewart Crafts - Punch Around The Page Set - Vintage Flower which is also available at the shop.

There we some gorgeous pictures which called for fussy cutting on these papers. You can see the 2 I cut just above (the 2 girls)

The chipboard title is from Imaginarium Designs and you can find it HERE. I simply inked it with 2 types of ink and then went over it with Glossy Accents. LOVE that finish.

The various flowers you can see around the page were also from my DT pack. Some leaves and other flowers were from my stash and others you can find at the shop HERE.

Just showing you some layering.

SO if you head on over to Get Creative you will see what else the OUAS team did as Guest Designers over there and then why don't you head on over to Once Upon A...Sketch to see the current challenge and see all the details of prizes etc and what the Get Creative team did with my sketch.

I have created a few more projects with this collection from Graphic 45 and I will show you in upcoming days. Remember it is available here

Have a great week everyone :)

On A Journey To The Past.

2012-02-11T23:21:00.001+11:00

Hi everyone..

I was reading an article in a magazine just a few days ago that said that a few years back, a young , beautiful, popular and wealthy British woman was found dead in her apartment after 3 years. I was horrified. I wondered..would anyone miss me if I disappeared tomorrow? These thoughts were playing heavily on my mind the last week or so. Sometimes I wonder who I am..What am I doing here? What purpose do I serve? If I am a good mum, wife, daughter, teacher etc. If I am making a difference. For me, its a constant battle. A daily struggle because I do not let my self become complacent. A few days absent from blog land leads to many emails and questions from you . I guess..maybe some of you would notice if I was gone tomorrow. That is a selfishly wonderful feeling and it makes me feel better. THANK YOU !

My first born started school 2 weeks ago as you all know. But did I tell you that for the last 4 or so years her starting school was the last thing on my mind every night and the first thing every morning? Yeah..it was. That's what i am like. I think about everything years in advance. Its the only way I can cope. And I don't know if I have coped with her starting school. I know ..I KNOW just how good it is for her. I KNOW everything you will all say. I know it! But against ALL that I know and have studied and learnt throughout my years as a teacher my heart is aching so badly right now. I know this is also connected with the loss of the baby last year and year before and the fact that in 2 weeks time I should have been having my 3rd girl. It is all gelled together and I can't let go. I know she will thrive at school. I know ..I know...I know.. But, she is gone and our days here at home will never be the same again and as I have said before I just do not deal well with finality and I guess you could say this past week I have been on a ...

Journey To The Past..

Have you seen the kids movie Anastasia? ONE OF MY ALL TIME FAVOURITES!! I fell in love with it when Maria was watching it when she was a toddler and we had not seen it on DVD for a year or so now. So the other day they decided to play it in their car DVD players and while I was driving it bought everything back and thoughts and feeling started flooding in my head and my eyes filled with uncontrollable tears. I haven't been the same since the day everything happened last year. I am not who I was. A part of me died along with that baby and it will never be resurrected. Its so painful. Its so so so so so so horrible too go through the whole process of labour and not have a baby to hold at the end. You are all women . You understand that feeling I am sure. I can't get out of my head the moment the baby came out..I just remember that feeling so clearly because the previous 2 times that feeling meant relief that my baby was out and OK. Not this time.

I will let you all know openly that we have started the too often heartbreaking path of conceiving again. Something that happened SO SO miraculously easy with my first 2 children has become the biggest fight of my life right now. I am not giving up but I am so lost. There are simply no guarantees..no real answers. You tell me..where will this road lead? What will happen? You can't tell me can you? And as much as I say "Que Sera , Sera" (Whatever Will Be, Will Be) it just aches to know what I almost had and what I lost.

I wish this pain on no one. And I know this will sound SOOOOOOOOOOOO cliche' but please just hold your children really tight today and tell them how much you love them. Take a really good look at them. I mean...REALLY look at them. Look at their arms, and hands and think what an absolute miracle they are. I know I will do that with mine.

I hope you have a chance to see the movie and if you have a few minutes maybe you can hear the song I like from the movie called "A Journey To The Past" and you will understand where I have been these last couple of weeks.

Just wanted to share a piece of my mind with you..Thank you for letting me share.

I hope you are doing better than me wherever you are.

Until next time, its goodbye for now .

Handmade By Suzanne February Sketch Challenge

2012-02-09T10:31:00.001+11:00

Hi all! Hoping you are well.

Today I wanted to show you the new sketch that is up at Handmade By Suzanne for the month of February. Remember that ANYONE can play along no matter where you are from, or your skill level as all the entries go into a RANDOM DRAW. The prize is $30.00 (+ FREE shipping) to spend at the store.

You can see the gallery and enter your layout HERE.

So here is my layout..

based on this sketch...

Thanks so much for having a look.

Bye for now ;)

New Winner for my JANUARY GIVEAWAY

2012-02-07T11:52:00.000+11:00

Hello everyone. Unfortunately the winner of my January giveaway did not contact me after 1 week so I had to do another random draw this morning.

So, its second time lucky for ....

EVELENE STERLING (USA) who was Number 62

Congratulations Evelene..can you please email me your address details ( nadiac78@hotmail.com ) within 7 days and I will send the pack to you right away!

Two Ways To Win!!

2012-02-06T21:30:00.000+11:00

Hi everyone. How are you all going? Just quickly posting this challenge after a VERY VERY VERY long day today running around like a maniac from drop offs at school, to pick ups and dance lessons and parent meetings. Does it EVER slow down? Because I dont think I can take much more.

I am so sorry for not having been around much the last 2 weeks. As I told you last week my eldest child started school, and someone should warn parents that they are starting school too. OMG! I am a tad overwhelmed with everything and its only been 1 week! I hope to get the hang of it soon. SO again I apologise for not visiting many of you. I have not forgotten you all but I have hardly been active online as I am extremely busy with all the school stuff..

Now just wanted to direct you to two giveaways that I think you will all like.

{Giveaway 1}

C'est Magnifique

We are starting a new give-away that will take place ONLY on the C'est Magnifique blog. blog. On the 5th of each month we will be posting a photo of everything that Leslie, the owner of C'est Magnifique, has remaining after creating layouts with the kit for that month. It will include kit items, as well as items from the embellishment and flower add-ons.

So, if you weren't able to get your hands on the February kit, now's your chance to win the bits and pieces remaining from Leslie's kit. Or, if you did receive this kit, and would like to add to it, you have a chance to win, too.

Take a look at everything Leslie is giving away (and she will ship it to you free of charge, anywhere in the world!) Please note that you will receive partial pieces of paper, embellishments, flowers, etc. It's her way of passing along the bits and pieces from her kit.

All you have to do is write your FULL NAME using the Inlinkz button on THIS post at C'est Magnifique blog. You might want to follow the blog too to see if you are the winner. You have until February 12th to add your link. Good luck. We will announce the winner, by a random draw, on February 13th. Good luck!

{Giveaway 2}

Imaginarium Designs

So ..... Is it time for a Competition????

We have THREE great prize packs to give away in February!

1st prize is AU$50 worth of Imaginarium Designs Chipboard

2nd and 3rd prize is AU$25 worth of Imaginarium Designs Chipboard.

So what do you have to do to win?????

*** Head over to our NING site and become a member

*** Put our ID NING Badge on your blog

*** LIKE us on FACEBOOK

and

*** Leave a comment on THIS post (at Imaginarium Designs )letting us know that you did it with a link to your blog,

The more things from the list above that you can do, the more chances you have to win!

Share the love - tell your friends

We love to giveaway ID Chipboard!

GOOD LUCK everyone!

C'est Magnifique February Kit Reveal and Projects!

2012-02-02T23:05:00.002+11:00

Oh I have been dying to show you these projects. But firstly let me show you the February kit from C ést Magnifique kit club and my first official month as part of the Design Team there...

We are excited to share with you our February kit featuring paper from Riddersholm Designs. This beautiful paper is their "Chantilly Dawn" line. Our February kit sold out very quickly. If you want to be sure to receive a monthly kit, you can become a member by visiting our website. That is the only way we can guarantee you will receive a kit each month. Details about our memberships can be found HERE.

Take a look at our amazing kit,

"Echoes of Winter".

Take a closer look at the embellishments in this kit.

Here is a close up of the Riddersholm Designs paper in the kit.

And here my friends are the remaining projects I created with this kit and the add ons (which are purchased separately) . You might remember I already showed you THIS layout last month created with this kit.

"She"

(She is my precious little girl who will be my only companion from here on since Maria went to school. She is simply ...precious)

"Home is everywhere YOU are"

(I have hardly been away from her in all the time she has been in my life. I truly and honestly mean it from the very bottom of my heart that home for me is everywhere she is ..and that everything is completely worthless unless she is near me"

"Love"

(OK..not all siblings get along. Not all families get along, but I believe that there is something between people that are blood related that pulls them to each other)

"Us in Melbourne, January 2012 mini album" (RARE for me!!)

"Hello and Hi cards" (I wonder if the people I sent these to will notice :) )

I have absolutely LOVED working with my very first kit. THIS is 100% my style of kits. Classy, elegant and includes papers from those hard to find places. If ONLY I could just show you the kit for March which I am working with right now...*sigh * I just love it. Bring on March!!

Unfortunately the C 'est Magnifique kits are very popular and all the main kits and the add ons have SOLD OUT!! If you do like the look of these kits then check out the blog HERE , how to join HERE or the website HERE to see more details.

One last image I promise...

I have designed this sketch for the February sketch challenge at C'est Magnifique.

You can find all the details on how to enter in the forum HERE. You DO NOT need to be a kit subscriber to enter the sketch challenge. Anyone can enter using ANY materials. Hope you join us. The entries last month were OUTSTANDING and we had a very very hard time choosing the prize winner.

Once Upon A.. Sketch teams up with Get Creative

2012-02-01T20:45:00.000+11:00

Over at Once Upon A...Sketch, we are nearing the end of our first year and during this time we have noticed a huge amount of support from many countries around the world and we are incredibly lucky that our challenges are supported by so many people from all different parts of the globe.

One of these countries is Greece, and we have come to realise that we receive many entries from such a small country where scrapbooking is so new, so we had a think and decided to team up with another challenge blog based in Greece and run by our very own Irini Liolia called Get Creative. How exciting!!

We have decided to become "sister" blogs, because let's face it...most of us scrapping are women and is there anything stronger than a sisterhood? So for this month only, the Design Team from Once Upon A..Sketch are guests over at Get Creative and taking part in their 1st and 15th of the month challenges and the Design Team from Get Creative are guests on Once Upon A..Sketch!

Thus a new bond is formed between 2 challenge blogs.

Here is the sketch that the Once Upon A..Sketch Design Team had to follow. It is created by Get Creative Design Team member Elina Katechi..

And here is my take on the sketch...

Materials used
Imaginarium Designs chipboard title "Getting Ready"
Webster's Pages "Winter Fairytales" Papers, trim, die cut
Prima Marketing flowers, butterfly, metal cage

Here is a close up of my title. Just inked it with 2 different shades of pink and went over it with Glossy Accents.

Don't forget to head on over to the Get Creative blog to see what the rest of the Once Upon A ..Sketch Design Team created and to find out what prizes etc are up for grabs and then visit Once Upon A...Sketch to see details on the February 1st challenge

Now, about this layout. Yep...the day finally arrived yesterday morning when I had to let her go. And guess what? No tears (her or I or hubby) , NO tantrums, NOTHING! She was MORE than ready to go and God heard my prayers the last 5 and a half years. I prayed almost every single day that she would just turn around and say "Bye mum" and get on with joining the class and I prayed that God would give me strength to handle this. And He did. I tell you, He has never left me. I know this. I was incredibly strong, and pretty much handed her over without a fear of "losing her" .

Maria is a very bright and independent girl who has just about asked about BIG school almost every day as her preschool was just across the road this past year. She is READY and I am ready. In my heart I know that for 5 years now, I showed her incredible LOVE and I know that she knows that I love her and I did EVERYTHING possible to get her ready and let her know all she needs to know. She is just like me..she can handle things if she knows all the details LOL!

It has been just 2 days and hubby and I looked at each other this afternoon and said "WHO is this girl? "LOL! She has not stopped talking ..explaining, re enacting and telling us EVERY SINGLE detail. Which again is PERFECT because I want to know everything..every minute, and every lesson and every friend she played with. She is SO happy and because of this I am happy too. I did not lose her..I did not go home and cry. Instead I walked away proud of my oldest child and believing that she is just where she is supposed to me. I cannot wait to see her read and write better and learn things. I am still shocked that I handled it so well so THANK YOU God for giving me the strength. You know..I think I am stronger than what I think!

Here are some pictures from Tuesday.

Proud sister! I felt so sorry for Ioanna..we kind of pushed her out of the way to take a million pictures of Maria. She handled it OK though.

Ready for school. 8:00am! She is attending our local Catholic school and for those that don't know here is Australia all students wear a uniform everyday to school whether they attend Catholic, private or government school. This makes life SO much easier as there are NO choices about clothes etc etc.

Proud daddy. On a side note, I should tell you that these shots were taken at the front of our house and the ENTIRE gardening, tiling and landscaping you can see was done by Sam himself. He is a qualified landscaper.

Found her name and got down to work right away. No fuss!

PROUD mummy. Look at her smile..would anyone be sad walking away from that? I know she is in good hands. Its an awesome school with Christian values and morals that Sam and I both believe in. She will be OK. She will.

So that's it. We live to fight another day as they say.

Hope all mummies in the world everywhere have the strength to let their little ones go to school. Believe me, if I can do it anyone can. Just up to 3-4 months ago I was crying each time i thought about it.

Apologies for the long post!

Take good care :)

January Giveaway **WINNER* Announced + February Giveaway

2012-02-01T12:48:00.003+11:00

Hi everyone. Its time to announce the winner of my January giveaway which consisted of this pack..

There were 130 entries! WOW! If only postage was not so expensive, I would have loved to have given everyone something. But, there can only be one winner and that person is..

#82 is..

Rosi from Brazil

Congratulations Rosi! Please email me at nadiac78@hotmail.com to claim your prize. You have 1 week to claim your prize. Thank you :)

FEBRUARY GIVEAWAY

Now, if you missed out that time never fear! here is one more giveaway I am having for the month of February

(apologies for the picture..it is a cold, cloudy windy and rainy day here in Sydney today and it is supposed to be Summer!)

This pack consists of packaged:

*Fancy Pants alphabet

*Tattered Angels Glimmer Glass

**Heidi Swapp alphabet mask

**Kaisercraft mini alphabet stickers

**Teresa Collins flowers x 2

*Teresa Collins Blingage x 5 packs

*Numbers mask

*Kaisecraft Bonjour journalling tags

** lace x 6

**assorted flowers.

Details

1) Please become a follower of my blog if you aren't one already.

2) This is open INTERNATIONALLY! Yep.! Everyone can enter NO MATTER where you live.

3) This is open until midnight 29th February 2012 (Australian Eastern Standard Time). I will use random.org to choose 1 winner who will be announced here on my blog in early March. All postage will be covered by ME!

4) All you need to do is write your FULL NAME & COUNTRY using the Inlinkz Button down the bottom of this post. If you do not have a blog, you can just write your name and where it asks for a URL address, please enter the address of this blog.

That's it! Good luck to all of you and THANK YOU :o)

CSI#4 + Handmade By Suzanne

2012-01-29T09:23:00.002+11:00

Hello out there to each and everyone of you. Hoping this post find you well. I seriously hope all in your life is great.

I have been a little quite online the last week or so. I have been busy creating projects for Design Teams and also upcoming Australian magazine specials and I have hardly been able to do much else. I have also lost my mojo a little. Been inundated with other commitments does that to me so I must be careful not to burn out yet again.

Plus, the week that just passed was the last week before the new school year starts here in Australia. Maria is starting "big school" on Tuesday so things have been rather hectic and I am not doing very well emotionally. Old wounds are flaring up again with the thought of her officially leaving me and I have been feeling very emotional , which for me quite often comes out in the form of what most would call "stressing". Summer (if we had any!) is coming to a close in the next month and with the new school year everything and everyone is winding down. Just like everywhere I guess, our summer holidays draw to a close and the whole Christmas, New year's etc celebration time feels like a long distant memory.. Its a little sad...

So today I want to show you the final layout that I created with my DT kit from Handmade By Suzanne. As you may recall I was working with the Hummingbird collection from Kaisercraft which you can find available HERE

This is also my final layout for my Guest Designer spot over at Color Stories Inspiration (CSI) and I have loved creating with the challenges and the prompts there.

Lastly, I also based the design of this layout on Saturday Sketch #2 at the Kaisercraft blog.

So here is what this week's CSI Case File looks like. You have until Sunday February 5th to enter this...

"Degraves St Melbourne"

Materials Used Available at Handmade By Suzanne: Kaisercraft Hummingbird patterned paper, collectables (die cuts), sticker sheet, rub ons. Kaisercraft Paper Blooms Sea Breeze, Manor House Creations Christmas Star White (large white flower). Kaisercraft Wooden Flourishes Lamp Post. Kaisercraft Lamp Post Rub-Ons. ZVA Creative Triumph Flourish Clear Crystal. Glimmer Mist , large paper doily, Glossy Accents, black ink.

As the challenge requirements, I used wet mediums (on the lamppost and the white base cardstock) and rhinestones (flourish) from the evidence. And from the testimony , I used "reflections" , as in reflecting back to the time we spent in this gorgeous street opposite Flinder's Street station called Degraves St. during our time in Melbourne earlier in the month. LOVED this chic' place and cannot wait to go back.

Here are some close ups.

I started with a white cardstock and placed a large paper doily on top of it to use as a mask. I then sprayed Glimmer Mist and removed the paper doily which left the pattern on the while cardstock. Above, you can see I inked the wooden lamp post with black ink and then went over it with Glossy Accents to create a shiny finish.

The large butterfly, die cut stems and yellow journalling spot are Kaisecraft Collectables, which are a pack of GORGEOUS die cut elements and SO much value for money. I just scattered them through out the page and layered them using 3D dots to create depth. The smaller butterflies are from the Sticker Sheet

The large white flower is from Manor House Creations and the birdcage and oblong journalling spot is again from Kaisecraft Collectables, The blue small flowers are Kaisercraft Paper Blooms Sea Breeze.

The letters are from the Hummingbird Sticker Sheet. I inked the edges with black ink and used small 3D dots to elevate them a little. The lamp post is Kaisercraft Lamp Post Rub-Ons.

I sure hope you get the chance to play along at CSI this week. You can find all the information you need HERE.

And don't forget that there is also a SKETCH CHALLENGE still going on at Handmade By Suzanne and you can win a HUGE $30.00 (plus FREE shipping) voucher to use in the store. You can find all the information for that HERE.

Why don't you combine the 2 challenges? That's a thought for you!!

Just before I go, I want to show you in one post all the creations I have made with the Hummingbird collection this month. It truly is gorgeous and hope you feel inspired to use it too. What I like about it is that 4 layouts with this collection and in my opinion they ALL have different colour schemes. That's awesome I think. Remember if you like the look of this collection you can find it all HERE .

Have a great week everyone.

Outstanding!

2012-01-24T21:46:00.001+11:00

Is there a better accolade than that? Seriously. For a teacher I know that there is nothing beyond outstanding and to be described like that by the owner of Imaginarium Designs, whose team I have just been accepted in, is such an honor.

Today is my introduction over at the Imaginarium Designs blog. Check me out HERE.

How exciting. I should tell you I received the MOST generous pack of chipboard from Imaginarium 2 weeks ago and will NOT share it here with you girls because you will go green with envy LOL!. No but seriously. I received a WHOLE pizza box full of all kind of chipboard you can imagine. I am so grateful. I really am. I still wonder why i was chosen to be on this team and anything that comes my way I just appreciate so much. THANK YOU Jane and Natalie :)

Oh and one more thing I need to tell you about. Have you been using Imaginarium Designs chipboard at all?

If you have, you might want to go and post your work at the brand new ning site HERE

Visit Imaginarium Designs

and you never know whose eye you will catch!

Have a great week everyone.

The Simple Things..

2012-01-23T10:36:00.002+11:00

..are the ones that make me happy.

Happy Monday everyone! I am going to try and get this post out quickly while having a 3 year old crawl all over me!! LOL!

I sincerely hope you are all doing well. All is great here. 1 more week and Maria starts "big"school and emotions are running high in this household at the moment.

I will definitely miss her every single moment. I will! I am not just saying that. I will miss days like the one I scrapped about below..The simple things. That's what I am about. I wouldn't say I am fancy or high maintenance. I don't think it takes much to make me happy..I am not interested in money, or materialistic things or houses and cars etc etc. I am interested in being happy and none of those things will give me that happiness. Doing every day things with my kids, being a mum with my good and bad days , is what makes me happy. Being a family and being around hubby as he teaches the kids stuff is what makes me happy.

How true is this quote..

And I DO!

Here is a layout I created with the Kaisercraft Hummingbird collection which is available HERE at Handmade By Suzanne. Remember I was sent this collection in my Design Team kit and I have loved it. There are some amazing colours in it but don't let the brights scare you.

I based this layout on Saturday Sketch #3 and I flipped the sketch to make it look like this.

Supplies Used: Paper, stickers, die cuts - Kaisercraft Hummingbird. Flowers- Kaisercraft Blooms (Coconut) sprayed with red mist, Green Tara Mini Roses (White). Martha Stewart Crafts - Deep Edger Punch - Daisy Fan. Websters Pages - All About Me - Simple Frill - Red

Some close ups..

The birdcage, tag and large butterfly are Hummingbird Collectables. The centre of the butterfly is from the Hummingbird Rub Ons. The birds on wire and the circle border are from the Hummingbird Sticker Sheet

The alphas are from my stash..The bird border is from the Hummingbird Sticker Sheet and the red trim is from Webster's Pages.

The love die cut heart, stem and big butterfly are from Hummingbird Collectables.

The love hearts are Hummingbird Rub Ons.

Hope you feel inspired somewhat.I have one more layout to show you later on in the week that I created with this collection. In the meantime you can find the collection HERE .

I am also playing along with Workout #60 at ScrapFit where we needed to create a layout about The Simple Things that make us happy :) This is a new challenge blog I have discovered and it looks awesome. Thanks for the inspiration girls.

Have a great week everyone.

Friends

2012-01-21T15:50:00.003+11:00

Good morning to all . It is a wet and rainy Saturday morning here in Sydney and I do not mind that at all. I like the rain.

Here is a layout that I created using my beautiful kit from Handmade By Suzanne. I have been working with the Kaisercraft collection Hummingbird, which is available HERE.

I based this layout on the sketch over at the Kaisercraft blog . I don't think I told you that I won their December sketch did I? Well I did and I got a HUGE pack as a prize last week. YAY!

Supplies Used: Paper, stickers, die cut paper, specialty paper, quote sticker, rub ons and alphas - Kaisercraft Hummingbird. Flowers- Kaisercraft Blooms (Coconut), Manor House Creations (Christmas Star White), Manor House Creations (Cutie Pie Pinks) , Green Tara Mini Roses (Pale Pink and White). Chipboard- Kaisercraft Wooden Flourishes Berry Vine. Spellbinders Lacey Circles dies. Versamagic Dew Drop ink (Nutmeg). Tim Holtz Ranger Distressed Stains Ink (Picket Fence). Tattered Angels GlimmerMist (Tattered Rose)

The pink flowers are Manor House Creations (Cutie Pie Pinks) and the little pink and white ones are Green Tara. I inked all the edges with VersaMagic Nutmeg ink to give it that extra detail.

The chipboard which is painted white with Tim Holtz Ranger Distressed Stains Ink (Picket Fence) is Kaisercraft Wooden Flourishes Berry Vine

The big flower is Manor House Creations (Christmas Star White), which I sprayed with Tattered Angels GlimmerMist (Tattered Rose) and inked with an aqua ink.

The base paper is Kaisercraft - Hummingbird - Specialty Sheet - Flutter and the blue sheet on top is

Kaisercraft - Hummingbird - Diecut - Meadow

You can find most of these items in the store so you just need to click on the links provided.

Don't forget that there is a sketch challenge going on till the end of the month at Handmade By Suzanne and you can win a $30.00 voucher to the store. You can find all the details HERE.

And here are some new items that have just arrived at the shop..

Echo Park A Boy's Life

Kaisercard

Sew Easy Sew Stamper

Kaisercraft Lil' Primrose

Thanks for having a look everyone! Have a great weekend.

Scrap Africa!!

2012-01-20T08:37:00.001+11:00

Have you heard of the BRAND NEW challenge blog that JUST went live? It's called ...

Scrap Africa

and I am delighted to tell you I was asked to be one of the two very first Guest Designers at their blog!!! YAY!

The concept is very simple and you can read all about how it works HERE but what is more exciting is that this the first challenge blog to come out of the African continent ! It is an international blog too, so ANYONE can participate. The blog is run my the super talented Evgenia Petzer and Svetlana Austin who are both from South Africa and I would love for you to go on over and maybe follow their blog and have a look around?

There is also a giveaway for South African and Namibian scrappers too!

SO here is their very first challenge. It is a sketch! An awesome one too and easy to interpret.

and here is my take on it..

Supplies: Patterned Paper, alphas, stickers,chipboard stickers - Bo Bunny Welcome Home, Flowers: Prima Marketing Fleur De Lys (big flower), Prima Marketing Romantique, Kaisercraft Paper Blooms Sea Breeze, Petaloo branch, Green Tara Mini Roses Ivory, Martha Stewart Punch Around The Page Swirly Lace, Dusty Attic Chipboard Frame,

FINALLY! After all these months I can show you this layout I created for my scrappy BFF Irma Peredne. Isn't she just drop dead gorgeous with her Eastern European look? My husband thinks she looks like Courtney Cox too!

I created this for her last November when I was asked to be Guest Designer at Scrap Africa and have sent it to her and she has had it for a while now. Irma is a very very very special friend and woman in my life. She was one of my very first followers on my blog and from there we became very close friends. She tells things like they are without being hurtful and I appreciate that in people.

I wanted her to know just how special she is because with everything that has been going on lately with me, she and many others have been feeling that I have forgotten all about them and distanced my self from them..

As I told Irma, I simply find it very difficult to just chit chat with people that I love and act like nothing ever happened when I am STILL working through so many things inside me. There are some people that I cannot put on a brave face with and that's why I pulled back. But anyway..NOT talking about THAT again..we are trying to move on here. :)

Have a GREAT weekend everyone and hope you find some time to come and join us over at Scrap Africa!

Winter Magic

2012-01-18T07:59:00.001+11:00

Hi everyone.

Today I wanted to share with you my last layout created for my Guest Designer spot at Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge.

The challenge this time is to use the following sketch and to scrap something that represents winter - children playing in snow, winter scene, whatever says winter to you!

"The Magic Of Winter"

This is the sketch for the challenge.

Everything on this page is from Webster's Pages Winter Fairytales collection.

Thanks to a tip from my friend Irini, I am linking this up with Use It Tuesday #23 All About Winter . Awesome site! Thanks Irini.

I admit it..I love winter. Summer is awesome and now with the kids its just easier. But winter is just magic! I love the rain, the cold...I am weird..I know!

It has been wonderful being a Guest at Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge. Thanks Anne.

Take care everyone.

Cést Magnifique February PAPER and ADD ONS reveal

2012-01-16T16:56:00.002+11:00

Hi everyone..

The February kit PAPERS and add-ons have been revealed over at C'est Magnifique . I received this kit a couple of weeks ago and have been creating with it all last week. LOVED LOVED LOVED the colours and the beautiful things that came in the kit. I also purchased the add ons just because everything looked so YUMMY! I simply LOVE these kits and I will tell you that I had just subscribed to them right before being asked to join the Design Team because in my humble opinion there are not many kit clubs out there that cater to my style...soft, feminine, floral etc etc.

One of my layouts is up on the blog today today with the reveal and here it is now..

This is my gorgeous Maria...my precious first born daughter who is 5. I can honestly say I do not remember anything in my life before she came along. She is about to start kindergarten, which is the first year of schooling here in Australia, and...well..I simply cannot let go. She is and always will be my little baby no matter how old she gets. She has the most special spot in my heart because , like I tell her, she made me a mum and no one can take that away from her. She is sweet and kind, and girly. So I wanted this layout to be feminine and soft just like her.

In the background I have used an old Tattered Angels mask from my stash and also some Texture Paste to add some details. I inked the Dusty Attic frame in a sandy coloured ink and then went over it with puffy pain and also some white ink. I loved layering all the different little embellishments on top of each other under the title to create a cluster. I also inked the letters and their edges and went over them with Glossy Accents

Add On's Used

From the Embellishment Add On

**Dusty Attic Frame

**Prima Shabby Chic Metal Treasures (lamp posts)

**ZVA rhinestone swirl

**Prima Amore Frost (love heart under the title)

From the flower Add On

**Prima Meredith Mer flower (big white flower)

**Prima Aglow Mica brown leaves

From my stash

**gauge

**green leaves

**Tattered Angels mask

*Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist (Sand)

**Puffy paint

**Glossy Accents

**Texture Paste

Now here is what the kit papers (the embellishments included in the kit are not shown here) and add -ons look like.

Some are already sold out and if you like the look of the kits or the layouts that you see me or the other Design team member's create then have a read all about how you can join up HERE . There is also an online store and you can still get some of the pieces from the add ons HERE

February 2012 Paper and Add-Ons

Our papers this month are from Denmark from a company called Riddersholm Designs. They are such a different color scheme, with the rich purples, golds and blues. They are truly gorgeous and I guarantee that you will be most pleased with this kit! Here are the papers:

And the add-ons:

Unfortunately, both of our add-on pkgs and our paper add-ons are sold out, but there are a few individual items still available.

Have a great day everyone!

Simplify Your Life: Week 2

2012-01-16T16:40:00.002+11:00

Well hello everyone..it is Monday. The beginning of the 3rd week of January already! I trust you are all well. I am ..OK. I got some not too nice news late last night and I have come to realise I am not over what happened. I am not. Actually, i am worse now as the due date draws near and ..let's just say I am a little lost these days. I cannot get things out of my head. I think of words, images, thoughts etc of those initial days and its like a flashback and I find myself right there and then on 9:00am Monday October 10th 2011. ..Anyway..I am not one to be negative and sit here and want a pity party, and in fact I surprise myself with what I say on here as I simply never want anyone to feel sorry for me or think I am doing this for attention. But, sometimes I can share more with all of you than with anyone I know in my life. I know not everyone will agree with me sharing pieces of my self on here but so many of you send me such good vibes that I know its OK. And I know that in this day and age, with life being so hectic for everyone , we dont want to hear other people's problems. Especially when this is supposed to be a scrapbooking blog. But, I guess you will have to let me be because I feel like I have been on this roller coaster ride right from the beginning.

So anyway..enough bad thoughts!

If you recall I told you all last week that I was playing along at the 52 Weeks To Simplify Your Life challenge, which are little life prompts that go up every Monday. Today i am supposed to write about Week 2 which asks us to define our personal values.

Here is my list of Top 5 personal values in no particular order

#1 Family. I come from a very good Greek Orthodox family. We were brought up with very deep morals and values and to be there for each other always. Because we migrated to Australia and had absolutely nobody here but each other, we have a very strong bond. We still all live minutes from each other. My family would do anything for me, and I would do anything for them.

#2 Respect. I firstly respect my self. I set my expectations high in all aspects of my life and do not aim low. I demand respect from everyone around me because it is what I give 100% of the time where it is due.

#3Loyalty. I would die first before I turn my back on my family or friends.. I am fiercely loyal to those I love .

#4 Fairness. Something just does not sit well with me when I see things that are not fair. I have been known to speak up for people who cannot defend themselves and will never stop that.

#5 Religion. I have always believed in God and that there is a higher power. All I have to do is look at my children to know that God exists. Their very existence is my proof. I will not claim that I go to church every Sunday, but in Oprah's words "God has never been too far away from me". He is the beginning and the end of anything that exists in my life and of me.

So, there you have it. Let me know if you play along so I can check out your personal values.

Once Upon A...Sketch January 15th Challenge!!

2012-01-15T15:22:00.002+11:00

Hello everyone! I hope all is well where you are and you are enjoying your self somewhere in the world. It is Sunday afternoon here and the kids are out with hubby and ..*sigh* I love them like mad but a little quite time does wonders to the soul LOL!

So earlier this month I was sent a beautiful and very generous pack of goodies in my Design Team pack from Handmade By Suzanne which included one of Kaisercraft's newest collection Hummingbird. This collection in its entirety is available at the shop HERE and I will provide all the links of other things I have used on this layout as well.

This is the first layout I created and it is for the January 15th challenge at Once Upon A...Sketch which just went live.

SO here is my layout ..

based on my sketch...

I guess it would have been easy to go the opposite way and say Goodbye 2011 but the bright colours and gorgeous happy designs of this collection made it too hard to focus on any negative thoughts. I guess in my heart I am saying good riddance 2011 but ...lets just look forward and maybe 2012 will be different.

So here are some close ups.

To create the circles above, I firstly cut out 2 circles in 2 different sizes from Hummingbird Double Sided Patterned Paper Flowers and the I used my Martha Stewart Punch Around The Page Swirling Lace paper punch to punch out some decorative borders from Hummingbird Double sided Patterned Paper Nest . I then used a sewing machine to stitch around the circle edge and overlapped the border and stuck it under the circles.

The birdcage above is from Hummingbird Collectables which is a pack of die cut shapes.

I also used this gorgeous white flower from Manor House Creations- Christmas Star (White) , Kaisercraft Blooms (Buttercream) and Green Tara Mini Roses (Bright Yellow) . The die cut flower is also from Hummingbird Collectables . I also used a ZVA Lovely Flourish in Clear Crystal.

I also used my Martha Stewart Deep Edger Punch Garden Trellis and Martha Stewart Punch Around The Page Cherish paper punches.

For further details on the products used, you can click on the links or visit the store HERE

I hope you get the chance to play along at Once Upon A..Sketch this time. We have some awesome prizes and Guest Designers so please click HERE to see all the details.

And don't forget that Handmade By Suzanne also has a Monthly Sketch Challenge, and you could win a $30.00 voucher (plus free postage) to use in the store. You can see all the details HERE

Take care everyone. See you soon!

Color Stories Inspiration Case File #2

2012-01-14T16:08:00.004+11:00

Hi everyone!

Continuing with my Guest Designer spot over at the new challenge site Color Stories Inspiration (CSI) , here is Case File No. 2

And here is my example..

"If Only..."

Looking at this now it doesn't look too bad, but I almost threw this in the bin before I submitted it. I created this 2 weeks ago when I was on holidays in Melbourne. Yeah..I brought a few things along as I already knew what colours I would be scrapping and decided to give this a go. I really didn't feel comfortable creating away from my supplies and all that but I tried anyway and I am not very happy with this, but anyway..here it is. Also..I am noticing that the colours are different from when I printed them out. They look different on screen than on paper..sorry!

As part of the requirements I have included:

**flowers

**sheer elements (Maya Road flowers which I misted blue)

**something stone like (Prima Marketing bench)

**Use this quote as inspiration: "Good advice. If I listened earlier, I wouldn't be here. But that's just the trouble with me. I give myself very good advice, but I very seldom follow it." -- and journal as advice. Mine is the hidden journalling at the back of the photo.

This layout is called "If Only..." and documents my thoughts on the advice given to me when I was younger about having children early. I was 20 when I got married to Sam and didn't have Maria 'till 28 because that's what we chose. I always wanted children..we both did. But we were very young and came from very strict home and had not really lived our lives at all so we traveled and saved money and built a home...and all the while people where asking "when will you have kids?" and they would say "have kids now, don't leave it too late". At the back of my head I was thinking.."yeah right..when I am ready I will just click my fingers and it will happen" . And it did for the first 2, but if only I knew then what I know now I would have listened to that advice..I would have started much earlier and could have had more children by now. But anyway. Such is life. I wasn't to know what was around the corner for me.

So if you have some time, come and play along at CSI.

The deadline for completing Case File No. 2 is

Sunday, January 22, 11:59 p.m. EST.

Thus, you have a week plus the two weekends to complete your layout.

Handmade By Suzanne January Sketch Challenge

2012-01-11T09:53:00.002+11:00

For my January giveaway click HERE
*****

Hi everyone! How are you all doing? I hope you are happy and doing something that pleases you :o)

Today I wanted to share this layout that I created for the January sketch over at Handmade By Suzanne . You can have a look at the Gallery HERE to see what the other Design Team members have created too and don't forget that there is a cool $30.00 store voucher (plus FREE postage) for a randomly drawn winner!

Here is my layout...

..based on this sketch.

That beautiful girl in the picture is not me! It is my friend Georgia Heald and as I said last month I am really enjoying creating layouts for people other than my children such as my online friends. Georgia and I became friends when she started participating at the challenges over at Once Upon A..Sketch and after I added her to the design team over there I grew to like her even more. She did something VERY special for me which I am never going to forget. So this is just a small way of saying THANK YOU to her..So Georgia..THANK YOU for being Just You!

Here are some closeups.

Papers are from Glitz Designs Vintage Blue. I have used textured paste over a Prima wall mask. Also stamped some images all over the page with black ink and a clear stamp set from Pink Paislee.

In the image above you can also see some random leaves from I am Roses, which I went over with puffy paint as inspired by my other talented scrappy friend Gerry Van Gent.

Supplies List

From Handmade By Suzanne

**Prima Marketing - Shabby Chic Treasures Resin - Arch Window

**Kaisercraft Paper Blooms - Buttercream

***Kaisercraft - Rubons - Timeless - Lamp Posts

From Imaginarium Designs

**Mirrored Bracket on oval frame

** Circles Border (8")

**Just You

Other

**Patterned Paper and mini alphas - Glitz Design Vintage Blue

** Grey flower - Prima Marketing

**Orange flower - ZVA

I hope you can join in the fun over at Handmade By Suzanne!

Take care everyone.

JANUARY GIVEAWAY

2012-01-10T12:42:00.004+11:00

Time for another giveaway everyone.

This time, one lucky person will win this pack from me..

Details

1) Please become a follower of my blog if you aren't one already.

2) This is open INTERNATIONALLY! Yep.! Everyone can enter NO MATTER where you live.

3) This is open until midnight 31st of January 2012 (Australian Eastern Standard Time). I will use random.org to choose 1 winner who will be announced here on my blog in early february. All postage will be covered by ME!

4) All you need to do is write your FULL NAME using the Inlinkz Button down the bottom of this post.

That's it! Good luck to all of you and THANK YOU :o)

Winner of December's giveaway!

2012-01-10T10:57:00.000+11:00

Hi everyone. I had to draw another winner for my December giveaway as the last winner did not get in touch with me. So the new winner is..

ROMY VEUL!!

Romy! I am SO so pleased you won something from me :) I cannot wait to send the goodies to you. CONGRATULATIONS!

Please email me at nadiac78@hotmail.com with your address so I can get these out to you.

Keep an eye out for a my January giveaway to be posted very soon.

A Simplified Life?

2012-01-10T02:00:00.003+11:00

Hi everyone. Its almost 1am here in Sydney and I have just finished unpacking and getting everything in order after arriving home about 8pm tonight from our road trip to Melbourne. It was an incredible time and I miss the time I spent with Sam and the kids already. Before you know it routine will almost delete the carefree days we spent in Melbourne, visiting family and friends, sightseeing, eating etc etc.

I really missed you all. I did. I can't wait to get back into the swing of things. I am such a homebody. I am just always glad to be home.

So while blog hopping just now, I came across a few blogs I follow that are taking part in the

52 Weeks To Simplify Your Life challenge.

A new prompt is put up ever Monday and I think I might like to play along. For as long as I can or whenever I can. This has nothing to do with scrapbooking. But I feel the need to talk a little.

Week 1 challenge was this:

Create a list of everything that went “right” in 2011

**2011 started out on a positive note. I had time off work and by the time I went back in April I was more energized than ever. I was ready to put behind me all the misfortunes of 2010 and felt surprisingly liberated enough to say "what will be will be" . I worked hard at work, became involved in meetings , planned excellent lessons and was incredibly content to be back at work 2 days , be around like minded people, professionals and other dedicated teachers. I became a leader and not a follower. I was happy.

**Maria thrived at preschool and her English was perfected. She came out of her shell and her personality came through. I realised she is sensitive and hurts easily ..much like me. I realised I need to go easy on her as I saw my self in her. Ioanna finally lost her dummy and therefore her little mouth was going a hundred miles an hour. Everything that child says is music to my ears.

**Scrapbooking wise, 2011 was an exceptional year. After scrapping just for a few months I was accepted on many Design Teams and although I rode that wave of excitement for a while, it eventually caught up with me and I am just now feeling proud for calling it quits when I knew I had enough. I realised I had the guts to do that when many wouldn't have. I stuck up for my self. I just couldn't do it anymore.

**By the middle of the year I was expecting my much wanted baby and being sick for most of the nearly 5 months I was pregnant made me realise that if anything happened to me my husband would be able to look after our girls. He is the best father I know and possibly loves our girls almost as much as I do, because in my head there is no one that can love them more than me. hehehe!

***finding out that my baby was lost on Monday, 10th of October made me realise for the first time that these things happen to people like me and I am not exempt from it. I realised that the 2 children I have could possibly be the last ones I have and made me look at what kind of mum I was. I was and am a good one. I am not perfect but I am a good mother. This self reflection made me like my self a little more.

**The outpouring of support from strangers was overwhelming and I learnt that there are, simply put, good and descent people out there and that I should not give up on the human race. There are people out there that are like me. I left some of my pain with them and it helped. It was wonderful to know people simply cared.

*** By the end of 2011, I felt loved. By my husband and children, mum and dad, brothers and all the in- laws, nieces and nephews and even neighbors down the road told me in their way they loved me when they had no idea what happened. Fellow bloggers also showed me such deep love. It was too much for me to bear. I mostly felt like I didn't deserve it but somehow accepted it and felt like I wasn't doing this alone. I learnt that the world just understands and maybe I should just give it a chance.

**I am also grateful for somehow surviving this year because if someone had told me a year ago I would be doing the things I did , and come out alive I would have laughed. I am stronger than I think and even though 2011 will always be remembered by the horrible pain I have in my heart and the vivid images and things I felt that horrible day while delivering my stillborn baby, I will always remember that I chose NOT to be defined by those events and not be the girl that "THAT" happened to. I am more than that.

And that, as they say, is THAT my friends. Why don't you play along too? I'd love to read all about your 2011. Here is the link to Week 1

C'est Magnifique sketch challenge

2012-01-09T10:20:00.000+11:00

Hi again!

I am back to show you a layout I created based on a sketch that I also created for the very first sketch challenge over at C'est Magnifique kit club! Yep! We are starting a sketch challenge there as of this month and you can play along whether you are a subscriber to the kits or not. You can read all about it at the forum HERE but the winner , as voted by the Design Team, will win a $10 store voucher and if you are already a subscriber and use your kit to enter this challenge you can win a $20.00 store voucher.

So here is the very first sketch I designed..hope you like it!

Here is my Design Team example..

So what do you say? Will you come along and join us at C'est Magnifique and play along with this sketch challenge?

Guest Designer at Color Stories Inspiration!

2012-01-07T10:24:00.000+11:00

I am SO excited to tell you that I am the VERY first Guest Designer for the VERY FIRST challenge over at the new challenge site ....

Color Stories Inspiration.

I was asked by the owner Debbi Terhani , if I would like to be a Guest Designer, and even though it was short notice and I had to come up with something real quick, I wanted to play along and to be honest I had a Christmas kit sitting on my desk and this picture printed out so when she sent me the challenge details I created my layout very quickly.

SO you can find all the information HERE but the challenges sure do look like fun and here is the very first one which JUST went live..

And here is my Guest Designer example...

As part of the requirements, I have used pins (THANK YOU Tina Dalton) and a bow. I also journalled on a tag and used the word time.

Be sure to visit the site and find out what the rest of the Design Team created right HERE.

THANKS Debbi for the honour of being your first " special" detective! I DO feel special LOL!

**Just before I go everyone, I should tell you that I am currently on holidays in the Australian city of Melbourne and even though this post is live, all my previous ones this past week and the next few are pre scheduled. I am sorry I have not been around much but we are having a MUCH needed family holiday and it has been great so far. I even managed to meet with a special friend and I will post some photos and details next week. I want you all to know I am doing OK. I really am. **

Take care and thank you!

Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge

2012-01-05T09:42:00.000+11:00

How are you all going?

Last month I was asked by the lovely Anne, owner of Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge, to be the Guest Designer over there for January. I have said before just how much I love the challenges there. I love the prompts and the sketches as well.

So this is the first challenge for January:

A Christmas memory from your childhood – incorporate a photo, a momento or something or someone that represents that time for you, maybe use a photo of a gift you received !!!! If you do not celebrate Christmas – scrap a memory of another holiday that is special to you.

1982

OK..that is me in the middle. I dont look like me at all. The photo is of course from 1982 so it was pretty bad quality. I did the best I could to touch it up a bit.

As the journalling suggests, this is my 2 brothers and I and my little cousin at Christmas time in 1982. I am about 4 years old here..maybe a little less. But would you believe that I do actually remember this moment? I remember the adults (which were my age now!! yikes!) asking us to sit in front of the camera. My cousin and I look like the only happy ones there...LOL! It was pretty rare for us to go to Athens from our small town. But I just simply loved (and still do!) the BIG CITY. It was such an experience for me to go to Athens and especially in winter around Christmas time..the lights, the snow, the decorations..intoxicating. I always knew I was a city girl at heart :o)

Supplies Used:

Paper, dice cuts, stickers, Fabric Ribbon, journalling card: Webster's Pages Waiting For Santa

Green Bloom Trim: Webster's Pages

Flower and Butterfly: Prima Marketing

Paper Punch: Martha Stewart Punch Around The Page Swirling Lace

I hope you can find time and play along at Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge this time.

Bye for now :o)

Crafty Sketches!

2012-01-03T09:23:00.000+11:00

Hey everyone. Last month I won the challenge over at Crafty Sketches and I was lucky enough to be asked to be Guest Designer for their January challenge.

Here is my take on their current sketch. I have created a page about my dear friend Jasmine Shea, who I should hopefully meet any day now while I am in Melbourne. I only used one word on this layout..'loyal' . This is the exact way I see Jasmine so not much more needed to be said. She is a very loyal friend and I am just so glad to have met her.

Loyal

In the centre of the the background I have used this Prima Marketing mask.....

It is only a 6x6 mask but i repeated the pattern all over the page. I just used a sandy coloured ink over it to get the pattern.

I used my favourite paper punch at the moment which is this...

I just love that it is so elegant and just adds a gorgeous detail to my edges and layers.

Papers are from Prima Marketing Romantique . In the photo above you can see I also used pages from an old book and a paper doily (thank you Lizzy C. )

I also used a mixture of flowers from Prima, Petaloo, Kaisercraft and the mini white roses are Green Tara . I also used a ZVA creative flourish and you can find some similar ones at Handmade By Suzanne .

Supplies Used:

(available at Handmade By Suzanne. Just click on the links below to be directed to the item in the store)

Mask : Prima Marketing Floral 550028

Paper Punch: Martha Stewart Crafts - Punch Around The Page Set - Cherish

Paper: Romantique

Flowers: Prima, Petaloo, Kaisecraft Blooms (Buttercup) , Green Tara mini roses

Flourish: ZVA

Brown Leaves and Skeleton Leaves: I am Roses

SO why don't you head on over to Crafty Sketches and play along with this month's sketch?

What a way to start the year..

2012-01-01T12:17:00.000+11:00

Maybe 2012 WILL be my year. What do you all think? I am envisioning this time next year holding something very precious in my hands..but in the meantime my hands and mind will be otherwise preoccupied..

I made the 2012 Imaginarium Designs team!! Check out the announcement here.

SO incredibly INCREDIBLY happy at this. An awesome feeling to be picked out of so many but even more exciting the product I will be working with. I LOVE Imaginarium Designs. You will see LOTS of it in my pages throughout the year and I hope to inspire you somewhat to use this lovely product. I always feel nervous when i start a new term with a Design Team..what if I don't produce what they wanted? What if I am a let down? What if..what if...what if??? So..my best bet is to be my self and create the way I create yes? I wanted to say a big thank you to the team at Imaginarium Designs for this opportunity and thank you for trusting me!!

While I am here I just wanted to quickly show you also the new challenge that is up at Once Upon A...Sketch !

January 1st Challenge

Journalling Criteria/theme: New Years Eve!

Our theme this time is New year's Eve. We would like you to journal about your feelings around this time of year, or tell us about your most memorable New Year's Eve. Where were you? Who were you with? What did you do? Why is this one memorable? Note: the photo that you use for this challenge does not have to necessarily be from New Years Eve. For example, if you spent New Years Eve with your family you can have a photo of your family taken ANY time of the year.

Remember that you are allowed to also create a card or altered project based on this sketch and instead of the journalling criteria you need to use a quote.

You must combine our journalling criteria/theme with this sketch.

Check out the blog HERE for more information.

I leave you all with this beautiful quote I love ..

Be your self no matter what, because if you try to be like someone else you will end up being NOBODY at all.

Have a good year everyone. Let's see what 2012 brings for all of us.

HAPPY NEW YEAR + giveaway winner!

2012-01-01T02:41:00.000+11:00

YES ..the joys of being so far ahead of most of the world means we get to celebrate these special days first!

So to all my wonderful readers with lots of love from the beautiful city of Sydney..

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Let me announce too the winner of my December giveaway!! I am so happy to say that

Sofia Chrysou

is the winner!

CONGRATULATIONS Sofia. Please email me at nadiac78@hotmail.com to claim your prize.

Bye everyone..I am off to sleep! Its almost 3am here and we had a HUGE fancy dress party. Will share more another day.

Take care! Nadia.

Last Chance..

2011-12-30T20:15:00.001+11:00

..to enter my December giveaway.!!

The details

1) Please become a follower of my blog if you aren't one already.

2) This is open INTERNATIONALLY! Yep.! Everyone can enter NO MATTER where you live.

3) This is open until midnight 31st of December 2011 (Australian Eastern Standard Time). I will use random.org to choose 1 winner who will be announced here on my blog in early January. All postage will be covered by ME!

4) All you need to do is write your FULL NAME using the Inlinkz Button down the bottom of this post. It will ask you for a link, so if you do not have a blog you can use your Facebook page, or any other link you like.

That's it! Good luck to all of you and THANK YOU :o)

A friend in need is a friend indeed..

2011-12-28T21:05:00.001+11:00

Isn't that how the saying goes? How true..! I wonder who came up with such sayings because they are just so true. When do you need a friend more than in your darkest hour? Never.

As the year draws to an end, I am nostalgic and growing more melancholic with each passing day. This happens to me every year. I can't say that I deal with change very well. Actually, I do not think its change but rather finality that I don't deal well with. I do not like things coming to an end. Even though the end of this horrible year is nearing and the new year is full of promises, I still have a hard time letting go. I do not want the year to end surprisingly .. because with it a lot of things will end. I am strange in that I like to hold on to the pain..If I let it go it means I am forgetting what happened and if I forget what happened then it's like nothing ever happened. But it did.

Over this Christmas period I saw many people that I had not seen since I lost my baby. People who saw me in my last days of my pregnancy when all was well and I was VERY pregnant. People that KNEW I lost my baby. It surprises me how people deal with things..people are SO afraid to talk to me about it. But the WORST thing you can do in this situation is NOT say anything. I know that everyone feels awkward and yes its true..NOTHING anyone says is appropriate. I understand that. But...please don't just say NOTHING and carry on like nothing happened the next time you see someone in my situation. That is so hurtful. Because what happened , happened. And when people say nothing it is like they are not acknowledging what happened and that is almost offensive.

I saw some friends the other day and about 1 hour into the conversation I had to say "well you know what happened right?" And they said "yes of course , we just didnt know what to say?" ..So your solution is to say NOTHING? :( I said to them, and I will say to all of you the only appropriate thing to do in this situation is to grab that person it happened to by the arm, look at them in the eyes and say "I know what happened and all I can tell you is I am thinking of you and I am so sorry" . That is it.

Anyway, I am sidetracking ...I really just wanted to share this layout I created last week for my friend Heather Jacob. I have been creating a number of layouts for some of my friends these days as I find it helps to thank some people that helped me. Heather was a friend in need and she said all the right words. She is as old as my mum is and has endured her share of tragedy. She inspires me in so many ways and so many levels and I wanted to write a whole essay on her layout but I kept it short. I hope it makes sense..

She is a treasured friend and seeing that she is in Australia I have a chance to meet her one day.

Here are some close ups ..

I used Prima Marketing - Romantique ...

...my fave Martha Stewart Punch Around The Page Cherish punch ...

...Green Tara mini roses and Kaisercraft blooms.

I also based this layout on the current sketch over at My Creative Sketches .

I hope you are all doing well :o)

Take care now!

Christmas day!

2011-12-26T18:33:00.000+11:00

Our Christmas Day 2011!! I hope you had a good one :o)

Merry Christmas ..and words of hope!

2011-12-23T17:43:00.000+11:00

Dear friends,

I wanted to take this opportunity to wish you all a blessed Christmas Day. I hope from the bottom of my heart you all have happiness and love on this special day and I thank you from the deepest of my heart for all the love and support you have given me this past year, especially the last 2 months. I will never have enough words to express gratitude on behalf of my husband and I for the support you all showed me and my family, the words that you all spoke, the care and love you extended during my very difficult time. I wish all the happiness in the world for all of you and I want you to know I am doing OK. I really am. I have not died from the constant pain of what happened yet, so let's just look forward to the new year and hope that someone up there knew what they were doing.

Being Christmas, and being the season for love, happiness and hope, I finally wanted to share with you this amazing gift I received from my friends at Once Upon A..Sketch. i.e. my Design Team. I remember the day I announced to them I lost my baby. It was so matter of fact! And then I never really talked about it much after that. It was business as usual. But behind my back, they lovingly put together this album for me . They named it a Golden Book or The Book Of Hope with the theme throughout being just that..."hope". The day I received it, about 5 weeks ago I slept with it in my bed. I just could not believe that all these people conspired and did this FOR ME! I touched all the pages and cried and cried and cried. Cried at its beauty and its words, cried that these people cared for me enough to do this. Something inside me healed a little that day and ever since then I have this gorgeous book on my fireplace mantle piece, not far from where I scrap and glance over it and again, each time something heals inside me.

This is by far the most amazing and treasured gift i have ever received, together with stunning handmade cards, beautiful flowers accompanied with touching words, emails, messages, gifts. All in the days that followed the loss from so many of you. I do not know what I did to deserve this but i just know that all this scrapping, blogging etc entered my life just over a year ago so I can meet all of you and for you all to help me with this. In the words of a quote that Maiko Kosugi wrote on her page below:

" When you are sad, friends of the world walk with you hand in hand. The heart of the world wants to surround you"

I leave you all with these wonderful pieces of work and hope that wherever you are and whatever you are going through, you just keep the hope alive and take some inspiration from the words my friends have written on their pages.

Take care my friends! Merry Christmas!!

**all album inserts and covers by Heather Jacob who also collated this special album.

Natalie May

Georgia Heald

Lene Neby

Vibeke Harila

Jasmine Shea

Pamela Young

Helen Tilbury

Heather Jacob

Sandi Taloumis

Jeni O'Connor, who together with Heather initiated this project I am told :o)

Maiko Kosugi

Irma Peredne

Natalie Elphinstone

Vicky Varvadouka

Prima December Build-A-Page

2011-12-20T17:56:00.001+11:00

Hey there! How is everyone doing this Tuesday? On the home stretch to Christmas now huh? Sunday will be here before we know it. I think scrapping is the only thing keeping me sane these days.

Well anyway, as you all know I have entered a few challenges lately and ..well..I have been lucky to win a few :o) The latest was just announced today at My Mind's Eye blog HERE . Yikes! That's a big one. I get to choose 3 complete collections! OK so let me have my moment and brag a little more..In November I won Scrap The Girls HERE, White With 1 HERE and Challenge Me Happy HERE , Crafty Sketches HERE, Scrap-It-Lah HERE as well as a few other places. It feels great. Its fantastic actually :o) Well anyway, just sharing with you all . Oh and I was going to ask..do you all believe in Karma? Well I do. You know how it goes..what you give is what you get in return. People are always telling me I am SO generous with all the stuff I give away. But the thing is it makes me happy to share. It really does. So..after winning all these challenges I have won and the prizes I will receive, don't you think that maybe this is the way it works? You give ...you receive. Even though I TRULY and HONESTLY do not enter challenges to win the prizes, I think I have just about won back all I have given away. LOL! So ..expect a few more giveaways I say!

Now..lets move on to this month's Build-A-Page over at Prima. This is my layout...

and here is the sketch I based this on...

I have used the Romantique collection , which is available at Handmade By Suzanne HERE. The big flower on the right hand side is from my beautiful friend Georgia :o) Thank you :o)

The title "remember" is from Imaginarium Designs (who have announced that they chose their Design Team and emails should be going out but I dont think I made it! CONGRATS to all that did. )

Remember, Forever & Together on a board

I inked the chipboard and went over it with puffy paint which puffs up when heated.

Take care everyone and MANY thanks for letting me share my little joys with you...!

xoxoxo Nadia.

Kaisercraft Sketch Challenge

2011-12-18T21:51:00.000+11:00

Hi all! Hope you are well.

Just wanted to share with you this layout I did using Kaisercraft Sweet Nothings collection which is available at Handmade by Suzanne HERE. Must say I really LOVE this collection and I purchased almost the entire collection last week.

I kind of intended this for something else, but in the end I based it on this sketch that is up at the Kaisercraft blog

Take care everyone. Have a great week.

Guest Designer..

2011-12-16T07:44:00.002+11:00

Hi everyone. I am posting this quickly this morning just before the kids wake up and then there is NO chance LOL!

I was asked by the super friendly Anne Pennington, owner of Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge blog to be Guest Designer there for their December 15th challenge and also in January! SO happy about this. I have mentioned before how much I love the challenges there. Make sure you drop in and have a look!

Let me tell you I am SO glad I designed all my layouts for their upcoming challenges nice and early because scrapping is nowhere in the horizons at the moment! The last 2 weeks have been just crazy. Is it just me? We have had one thing after another..dance concerts, swimming, Christmas parties! Oh I tell you one more thing and I will just about lose my festive mood..:o)

Anyway...moving on..

For the December 15th challenge at Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge there is a sketch to follow plus some added criteria...

Scrap a favourite recipe – use a photo of the item if you can or wish to. Make sure the recipe is included on the layout!!

Something you probably do not know about me is that I LOVE cooking. I mean..I LOVE it! And OK I have been told I am good and whatever but besides scrapping , cooking is my other passion and relief. I just love seeing the look on people's faces when they dig into my food. My hubby thinks I am THE BEST! LOL! Which is a good thing because he is very picky. But anyway, I couldn't really decide which is my favourite savory recipe so I decided to go for my all time GREATEST sweet recipe...which is actually the only one I make!

Look yummy huh? I made this a while ago, but I think I used the Glitz Designs Beautiful Dreamer collection.

So what do you say? Will you find some time to come along and play with us?

You have until December 31st and you will fin more examples of this challenge HERE

Bye for now everyone!

2011-12-15T21:42:00.000+11:00

Hi there lovely people. Thanks so much on your kind words about me joining C'est Magnifique yesterday! I am not sure if you have been over to the BLOG yet, but there is a little section at the top left where you can sign up for their newsletters. Well I just received my first newsletter and the January kit and add ons have been released in detail and here is and idea of what January's papers and embellishments look like...

Cést Magnifique January 2012 Paper Reveal

7 Dots Studio's from Poland and some Kaisercraft from Australia

For a better look at the details in the 7 Dots Studio Dreamer Collection, please visit the 7 Dots Studio website and click on each individual sheet of paper.

January 2012 Flower Add-On

Our flower add-on features many beautiful Prima and Petaloo flowers! Flowers will be sold individually as well.

Member Price: $19.49

List Price: $21.65

January 2012 Embellishment Add-On

Our embellishment add-on features products from 7 Dots Studio, Prima, Dusty Attic and KaiserCraft. Embellishment items will be sold individually as well.

Member Price: $24.08

List Price: $26.75

********

Over at Handmade By Suzanne there have also been some super cool additions to the shop including ..

October Afternoon Farmhouse. Gorgeous colours and embellies!

New ZVA Creative

New Echo Park Yours Truly

and do not forget our December sketch challenge..

There are some awesome layouts already in the gallery, so do not forget to upload yours by the end of December for your chance to win a AUS$30.00 voucher (+ free shipping) to the store.

Just My Scrapping World...

Day 1....

Once Upon A...Sketch February 15th Challenge + handmade By Suzanne

C'est Magnifique Kit Club **MARCH** Kit Paper and Add Ons Reveal

My first Imaginarium Designs DT work!

** Prima Marketing : Shabby Chic Metal Treasures - Bird Cages/Pillars, Romantique rose

**Light and Dark purple ink (brand unknown)

**white and purple ribbon (brand unknown)

**Gesso

**Glimmer Mist: Coffee Bean

**Glossy Accents

**Brown Tag

My last tag is for my super sweet friend also named Nadia, who lives just a couple of minutes away from me. She has helped more than she knows the last few months and I wanted to give her something handmade by me as a token of my appreciation.

Products List

*Imaginarium Designs Chipboard: Large Butterfly and Mirrored Frame

** Prima Marketing : Green flowers, Romantique rose, pearls

**Martha Stewart: Deep Edger Punch (Vintage Doily)

**brown ink (brand unknown)

**pearl ribbon (brand unknown)

**October Afternoon: Mini Market alpha stickers

**Gesso

**Glimmer Mist: Coffee Bean

**Glossy Accents

**Brown Tag

**gauge

Lastly I want to share with you my last project which is one of my little 3 year old!

As soon as I had the Imaginarium Designs title "Adore" in my hands and her close up picture it was a match made in heaven as I, simply put, cannot find another way to describe what I feel for her little sweet face.

For the title I used the same old trusted method I used in the tags above, which includes the inking and then covering in Glossy Accents.

Lastly, I find that these little Mirrored Frames add a special little detail to the layout and as well as that they create a nice contrast on top of the bright pink.

Products List:

**Imaginarium Designs Chipboard: Adore title, Mirrored Frame, 6" x 4" Swirly Frame

Once Upon A..Sketch + Get Creative February 15th .

On A Journey To The Past.

Handmade By Suzanne February Sketch Challenge

New Winner for my JANUARY GIVEAWAY

Two Ways To Win!!

C'est Magnifique February Kit Reveal and Projects!

Once Upon A.. Sketch teams up with Get Creative

January Giveaway **WINNER* Announced + February Giveaway

CSI#4 + Handmade By Suzanne

Outstanding!

The Simple Things..

Friends

Kaisercraft - Hummingbird - Diecut - Meadow

Scrap Africa!!

Winter Magic

Cést Magnifique February PAPER and ADD ONS reveal

February 2012 Paper and Add-Ons

Simplify Your Life: Week 2

Once Upon A...Sketch January 15th Challenge!!

Color Stories Inspiration Case File #2

Handmade By Suzanne January Sketch Challenge

***Kaisercraft - Rubons - Timeless - Lamp Posts

**Just You

JANUARY **GIVEAWAY**

Winner of December's giveaway!

A Simplified Life?

C'est Magnifique sketch challenge

Guest Designer at Color Stories Inspiration!

Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge

Crafty Sketches!

I just love that it is so elegant and just adds a gorgeous detail to my edges and layers.

Mask : Prima Marketing Floral 550028

Paper Punch: Martha Stewart Crafts - Punch Around The Page Set - Cherish

Paper: Romantique

Flowers: Prima, Petaloo, Kaisecraft Blooms (Buttercup) , Green Tara mini roses

Flourish: ZVA

Brown Leaves and Skeleton Leaves: I am Roses

What a way to start the year..

HAPPY NEW YEAR + giveaway winner!

Last Chance..

A friend in need is a friend indeed..

Christmas day!

Merry Christmas ..and words of hope!

Prima December Build-A-Page

Remember, Forever & Together on a board

Kaisercraft Sketch Challenge

Guest Designer..

C'est Magnifique Kit Club MARCH Kit Paper and Add Ons Reveal

JANUARY GIVEAWAY