What is On Your Workdesk? Wednesday 138

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Hullo everyone. Here we are, another week is screaming into view and we are halfway though already! So tis time for WOYWW or What Is On Your Workdesk Wednesday. So do please join us at Julia’s wonderful blog of the Stamping Ground to peek at the glories of desks of the world!

Now the point of my first photo is not to totally throw you – but here is a mess! Yes, the reason for the pickie is really to clear up this deception that the fine folk of WOYWW seem to have - that is that I craft very neatly! 

Week after week the kind WOYWW-ers say how neat I am - but I am not! I make a mess. However because this is the dining table it is cleaned up very frequently – and this is not today’s desk as it is like Old Mother Hubbard’s cupboard - bare. I am supposed to be starting a piece of calligraphy (print out of test layout on right side of table also) as the card I was working on at this messy desk is finished but cannot be shown yet. It is under the piece of blank paper in the lower right. As you can see have been playing with my Spellbinder Fancy Labels two above this, plus my Martha Stewart Scoreboard which were used - but none of the ribbons there were used. Amazing how much stash you pull out and discard.

 

 Now for a sea view of the ocean, about 7pm I was walking along North wall and marina the other day when the weather was fine. As you will see on my previous post it is not the way now. The hills you see faintly in the dusk-light background are leading to the Great Dividing Range which is the backbone of the of Australia. It follows the coast up and down almost parallel to it – and it is really raining over that way. It is flooding over there too, and up north especially south east Qld again, as described in previous post. It happens frequently there so they are well prepared. God willing we will escape it.

May God bless your day wherever you may be and thanks for popping over for a peek and chat!

Shaz in a very wet Oz. x

PS. for those who like the brayered lavender piece on last week desk it is on the card below this post. Lunch Lady Jan commented on the piece before it was made into a card :D

Craft a Scene Challenge - Brayer Elusive Images - Sympathy Card

Hullo everyone just a very quick post here today!

'Tis a bit damp under foot in our part of the coast. However, it is not as wet as on the Great Diving Range west of us. It is flooding there, at the foot of the range. It has poured up on top and on the winding road down. The spectacular waterfalls were running over the road, as you come down the mountain so the Waterfall Way (as it is called) was closed. We may have more rain by week's end - I just pray it is the right amount!

Now this is my third entry in the Craft A Scene Challenge -  do join us over there you have till Friday 27th to share a scene and anything goes! This is a sympathy card made with the brayer and Adirondack inks Cool Peri and Cloudy Blue with a moon post it note. Then inked up with black Archival ink the Elusive Images (discontinued, but I recently bought this set on eBay) Meadow set stamps. Used two - the Lavender one and the grassy one and multi-stamped them. Added a stamped sentiment cut with Spellbinder ribbon label, embossed the base pale blue card extended (post on how to do this - see here) out of Cuttlebug folder - Argyle. The really observant among you may have noticed this card beginning on my desk below...

Thanks for popping over, and do stop and chat - also there is candy see link on sidebar!
May God bless your day wherever you may be,

Shaz in Oz. x

Happy WOYWW, and Brayer with Cuttlebug plus!

Hullo there everyone – well here we are again with yet another WOYWW on its way - wait we haven’t caught up yet from last week – please!!

For those not in the know the acronym WOYWW stands for “What Is on Your Workdesk Wednesday?” For those of you who would love to join in the fun of looking at work desks around the world, do join in the fun, and take a trip over to Julia's Stamping Ground!

 

 Here is my desk today – I liked better yesterday when the cards were being made (for all details on the brayer marbled green cards see here ) and now am just try into get inspired for the rather large calligraphy verse you see have printed the words out on the printed sheet at the back of the desk – a rough layout idea. The green card here I have entered enter this in the PanPastel Challenge – “Anything Goes” a brand new challenge blog, so do join in!

Also on my desk you can see some Chinese calligraphy shown better in the close up photo below. It was a present at Christmas from my sister and brother in law as they had been to China for the year – now wonder if any of you can read Chinese characters. 
I cannot – but since I do calligraphy they thought I would like my name in calligraphy – Chinese style.

It is a very good addition to my room at present in computer room but when craft room eventuates I hope to put it in there.

In the centre of the desk is this stationary set from Rwanda – it is made by the orphaned children over there out of Office scraps here is a close up my friend are missionaries to Rwanda (see previous post here) and they are home on furlough and they brought this lovely gift bag home with two gifts in it this one the stationary set from them and the little Rwanda hut carving for our mutual friend Bonaventure – he bought it of his own volition as a thank you for support for him. The dear, kind man – my friend here in Oz, Elaine and I occasionally as led may send him a small gift for his needs. He was doing Bible study this year under Chris. Thank you Bonaventure!

 

There is one new card on the desk the beginning of which you can also see in the photo with the Rwandan items. It is a brayer card too and have made it up simply with the Cuttlebug plus folder Carly, I think it is called, a favourite Lavender Fairy stamp I have had for over twenty years and some ribbon binding.

Well thanks so much everyone for popping over for a peek and a chat and don’t forget to join in the candy thank YOU for my Wonderful Encouragers click here or post below!

May God bless your day wherever you may be,

Shaz in Oz. x

One Hundredth Encourager Mystery candy - THANK YOU!

(Hi, this is now drawn see post here )

Okay, one an' all - here we have a wee candy, a mystery one - cos have yet to figure out what is in it - but was excited (cant quite believe it you know ) to have one hundred Wonderful Encouragers.
I so wanted to have  wee candy to celebrate, you  see!  A big thank you to everyone who comes to this humble blog - but most of all, a hearty hug and huge thanks you to all, who join encourage and comment regularly.  

So to enter this blog candy, please:

1. You MUST be a Wonderful Encourager - after  all, that is the whole point - it is a thank YOU! The last time had a candy draw it was someone who comes here regularly and comments who won, but was not an Encourager so do check, please - we had to do a re-draw - 'cos would be in trouble if broke my own rules! All new ones are welcomed with open arms if you like what you see on this blog :D but not candy hunters, please - thank you.

2. Please put a comment below so I know you want to enter this candy.

3. Please post this candy on your sidebar of your blog if able, ie if you have one and you know how - for those who don't know how, you just add a picture widget in blogger set up - if not ask and will help as much as I can.

 The hat draw will take place on - 14.2.12! (mm, chose it cos it was Tuesday for WOYWW - but Valentine's day is good date too, huh?)

Thanks one and all and may God bless you wherever you are,

Shaz in Oz.x

Also a VERY Special welcome to Claire my one hundredth Encourager - see  her blog here. Also to Jude here is her fantastic blog too!

PS. Update on mystery - okay, I think I was smart, I have bought something online (so may take while to get here) as the main item.
I simply adore this, and have it already and so wont want it!! hopefully the receiver wont have it - to have a teeny weeny hint it is on this post here :D - will be few other things too, am looking.
Mm, that is bad very bad, but good cause, huh!

Less is More + Craft A Scene Challenge + PanPastel Challenge

 Hullo there everyone! Well, today I had to make some cards so decided to hit a few challenges with the cards.

First of it was Less is More that set me off – you see this week was to be a One layer card – with little or no embellishments with white areas is the criteria – and Title for this week - "Birds".

Here I decided to get inky! Out came the brayer, inks,Stampin Up black pen and few other tools. I Cuttlebugged a double mask (so no bleeding with just one layer) in Labels Four.

 I then used Tim Holtz inks (Mustard Seed, Peeled Paint) with the yellow/green end of Kaleidocolor “Calypso” plus Tim's Tattered Sparrow stamp in Archival black.

I did my brayer marbling method I developed and posted last year in full – here you can see it step by step. It looks dreadful to start with but love the effect myself. 

The idea came by looking at the lid of Tim’s inks (namely “Peeled Paint” online as did not have any then) and thought:

“Mm wonder how I could do that?”

I did not have any of his inks then only Stampin Up spots! The desk is shown set up with the mask to show anyone who is not familiar with this method.

 

Now either the very plain white card can be used for the Less is More challenge, or the one with two brads. I was not sure if two brads were ok?

If not then I will enter the totally plain one but I really like the two brads on the second card.

I also made third one with a black frame – just for a difference! I am going to enter this in the PanPastel Challenge – “Anything Goes”!

They are having their very first challenge and you don’t have to use Pan Pastels to enter. But – hey, the prize is some of them so then you could end up with some, couldn’t you?

I love Eileen’s entry, she is on the DT and I have followed her for years. 

She was my very first Wonderful Encourager. Her entry is so clever – deceptively simple and effective!

And lastly but not least, I will also enter this last card also in the Craft a Scene First Ever Challenge for my second entry (first entry here). Here also “Anything goes” as long as it is a scene – this is their very first challenge too so do join them also if you can! At least have a look and be inspired by the brilliant entries so far.
So thanks for popping over everyone for a peek and chat. And may God bless your day wherever you may be,

Shaz in Oz. x
PS a big welcome to my new Wonderful Encouragers too! You and also those long-time ones are appreciated so much! take a peek at these bloggers and new wonderful encouragers -  Anne, Olga, Brenda, and Gay .

Great ideas, WOYWW + Christmas Card Challenges - Recycled + Anything Goes!

Hullo there everyone - well nothing much to show you this week as it was cleaned up - I have done things, but cant show them. However there are heaps more interesting desks on our exciting learning time at the neatest blog hop around - join us over at Julia's Stamping Ground!

Hoping to make up for my desk, I am to share some great ideas I have just seen .. just back from my friends blog - Jocelyn of Instead of Ironing blog and do take a look at her card over at her amazing blog and the great idea for stars with glitz that does not fall off!! the mind boggles at the ideas this can lead too... tone on tone, etc.

Next is paper storage!

Any crafter out there with a problem in paper storage?
Here is another amazing idea from a fellow blogger who I met some time back. Like me, she is a Christian calligrapher and makes cards so you could say we kinda clicked - here is the link to her blog Crafty Quills or here more specifically.

Now to quote her "Not being able to justify spending £7.95 per acrylic tray I wanted it to be cheap....So, for the princely sum of 71 pence each (per tray) I have my storage." If you want to know what she used - take a peek it is really truly brilliant!

Okay now to share a card or two from last week's WOYWW post as promised (see here).  I have only just managed to photograph some of them, and these are six of them, supposedly the same.

Do you ever make a card exactly the same? I rarely do - as you can see. This is going in the Recycling challenge over at Hazel's Christmascard blog - as the baubles here are all made with recycled wrapping paper (which were baubles on the wrapping paper) - but I adapted it a little! I used the Martha Stewart Pine Branch punch which you can also see on last weeks desk. it had just arrived. I had seen used to great effect on Kittie's blog (Kittie Kraft - see here) - are you familiar with her amazing flowers? and so Kittie kindly helped me to find a place on eBay where I could buy it - talk about one kind lady! Thank you, Kittie!

Anyway I was merrily punching the lovely detailed green leaves out with the punch when  I though how great it would look as a border down the side of the card -so that is how I came to use it that way!

I did make other cards using the punch the way you are supposed to - but will show you those another time. This card has a gift card from my nephew on it - and recycled on this card.

The last card has a recycled greeting and a cut-out from another card on it (one which did not come off)- doubly recycled! It is a little off centre as it was stamped on a piece of paper slightly too small for the Marianne die! So might as well enter these in Hazel’s challenge and this last one in the ABC Christmas Challenge - Anything goes! (Frame is Designables Cut & Emboss Folder 908)

Sorry my desk is super boring but hopefully this will make up for it – and last a pickie of my sister first lily as shown on her desk - she picked it from her garden while I was visiting her last week - amazing beauty in God’s creation? And this is her Maiden hair fern behind it - it is huge. Not that you can really tell from the photo.

Blessings on you all and thanks for all your wonderful comments and a big welcome to all the new Wonderful Encouragers of this blog. A special welcome to some Newbie bloggers - Anne, Marleen, Victoria and Mariette.
Thank you long-time and new ones - you are such an encouragement.

Thanks for taking a peek and chat, and may God bless you where ever you may be,

Shaz in Oz.x

What Is Our Life…?

Do you believe in co-incidences? A very dear friend, Isabella, once said to me some time back, “Co-incidence is God’s way of remaining anonymous”, and this saying occurs to me at such times.

Let me share with you this threefold co-incidence. When I recently re-vamped my blog for the New Year, I also chose a new “Verse To Ponder” to replace the Christmas one on my sidebar. I change these regularly. I chose: 

  Then the next day in his sermon our Pastor chose to preach from this very passage (click here to read the few verses in James 4:13-17). And then just tonight, in my devotional the passage is the very same one. There are 66 books in the Bible with some of them containing over 150 (Psalms) chapters, and yet God chose this again!

I think God has something to say to us here… or to me at least...

The reason the verse leapt out to me for selection on that day was as a consequence of a early morning phone call to say a friend, aged 38yrs, had died in his sleep that night.
He never lived to see 2012, as this was New Year’s Eve. We had known him since he was 12 years old. I pray for all who loved him, for God's comfort at such a time as this.

When such an unexpected event occurs it really puts life into perspective. As James says, I am not to boast myself of the morrow, and all I might do – but rather if the LORD will I will do this or that…

Where is this young man now? He is in heaven with his LORD and Saviour, Jesus Christ. Tim trusted in the Lord as a teenager, and was faithful to the to Him, to the best of his ability. That is all that is required. We are not expected to do what we cannot do… but God does enable us to do what we cannot imagine we will do. This blog is a small example of this in my life.

It is not wrong to plan, but it is wrong to let that plan control you and to rule you, and I need to remind myself of this.

I dedicate this post to a faithful servant of the LORD - Tim, till we meet again.   

“God holds the future in His hands

With grace sufficient for the day,

Through good or ill He gently leads,

If we but let Him have his way.

(By Rhors.)

Those who know Christ as their Saviour

Can face the future with joy.”

(Excerpt from Our Daily Bread. 5.1.2012)

WOYWW + Recycling Cards for Christmas.

Yes, dear fellow WOYWW-ers you read that right! I am, on the first WOYWW of 2012, talking of Christmas.

Before I go any further for those who may have arrived here from elsewhere – WOYWW is the most amazing blog hop on the planet and all hosted by our marvellous Julia at her blog here. Please do join us peeking at the desks of the world, all to learn much! Nothing to do with being a sticky beak - mm, well, mostly not!

 I know some folks will no doubt be totally over Christmas, but the OCD me wants to get organised while I have these great ideas floating around buzzing in my head. If I don’t do them while at this stage I will forget and not do them at all!

 When I get cards or pressies I look for what I can use to make cards for the next year. Most of the cards on my desk today (there are 31 for 2012) are made from some sort of recycling. They are mostly simple, and quite a few are repeated style. The pressie paper, centre-right edge of the table, behind a new pine branch punch, is covered in red and silver ornaments. These became beaut ornaments which I used on cards in all sorts of ways. Then at the front left and middle are some straight conversions on the cards given with some extra bling a folder or ribbon, etc. I will show some in more detail on further posts.

This soft blue Christmas card (on the easel) arrived to my surprise in the post - all the way from USA dear Brenda of Butler’s Abroad. I am yet to contact her, she will be in bed when I do this! Somehow she found out my address and sent it off to me – what a blessing she is, and isn’t it so lovely? Some snow, she said for us in warm Oz, so kind – thank you, dear friend!

Also here is a Christmas gift here by a very clever man – my sister’s father in law made it for me – thanks so much, Mr and Mrs Tolly! It is a wooden spooled tape measure and the tape measure is pulled out by the leather tab then you wind it with the top section, so practical, and I love it! :D

Now the brayer card has been made for the very first challenge over at Craft A Scene. It is Anything Goes (ie made anyway but must be a scene) and you have until Jan. 27th to do this challenge. This is one of the most enjoyable challenges I have done – not that I have done many. I must confess, I'm not terribly good at getting around to them, but please do take a peek over at their brand new blog. They have a DT call out too until January 10th, and some very talented folk have put their hat in the ring. The recipe of this card have posted it in full here (or post below)!

In case you think the weather here has not been nice and that is why I have been so busy making cards – no, cracker days and everyone is enjoying it here – in Melbourne they have copped it (see Jocelyn of Instead of Ironing Blog's post,) they are now having heat-waves, but just lovely Goldilocks’ weather here and very glad of it (ie not too hot and not too cold)

And please take time if you can to visit two fairly new bloggers who are now tow Wonderful Encouragers of this blog - welcome to Karen and Anja! It is great to get to know you.
Well, thanks everyone for popping over here for a look and a chat! I shall be bit slow getting around again to folks, as am flat out for the rest of this week until the weekend. Craft and computer won’t get a look in – but hope to get around at the weekend, all being well.

Happy WOYWW every one and may God bless you wherever you may be!

Shaz in Oz. x.

PS. I wonder how many times I end a WOYWW post with a PS? I seem to a lot. Well look another a card from another WOYWW-er has arrived here lunch time today! This is from Bridget Larsen of Fruit  Salad Blogspot has sent me one of her very stunning cards - dont you love it?
These were on her desk a few weeks back and I said how I loved them - the colour is what grabbed me at first and also the simplicity of the beauty in this card.

Thanks so much dear friend! (see not just being a sticky beak, but real joy and pleasure from being a WOYWW-er!). I had to smile how she said inside about us meeting over messy desks!

PPS. To those asking about Monkey's top, he came with it (see this post here) - he is called Deer monkey, cos of his top. He came from the UK to Oz in April with family - he  usually travels in the car with Tweetie Pie and Mechant (my little PT Tips monkey), but came into superintend proceedings over Christmas - totally approves of all the cards for next Christmas! :D

Stampscapes - Craft A Scene Challenge

Hullo there everyone - well isn’t this so very exciting? Our very first entry in Craft a Scene Challenge and this one is Anything Goes, as long as it is a scene.

Please do join us in the fun of this very new Challenge!

Now I have had this piece of brayered glossy card here in my stash box begging to be used and thought of it when I was reading Sheree’s post saying sometimes she uses Stampscapes with colours that are way out there…
Well, my background is certainly that. You will see the recipe for this background on this post. It is done with some Iridescent Medium and Big and Juicy ink pad, Hydrangea (aren’t you glad at times like this you have a blog – I had no idea which ink pads I had used on this till I looked at this post!). The Iridescent medium is amazing and this why it has the lovely shimmer on it shows up best on top right of photo), making it seem more life like.
I saw it being used with watercolours. Using it with a brayer, as far as I know it is my idea – I just though it would work well. It does, but don’t put it on the brayer – as my earlier post says, I put it on the paper.

Now to the Stampscapes.

Wow, I love them! Used here are the following stamps:

Reeds 067B and 304B, Lakeside Cabin small 147F, and Row-boat 166A, partially stamped Gulls 302A, Rock Duo 131A, Ripples 069A, Oak branch 203G

Also edged around glossy card with black ink, then mounted on back handmade paper, with corner cut with Martha Stewart Deco Shell Corner punch, mounted on rippled blue card to complete the card

So that is how I craft a scene!

Thanks for popping over for a look and a chat and may God bless your day wherever you may be,

Shaz in oz.x
PS A big welcome to my new wonderful encouragers, one who does not have a blog, so can't link over to her blog, and the second one is I Create For Fun (her latest post has three gorgeous cards). Sorry I missed you three days ago! Thank you ladies you are a blessing to me!