My temporary scrapping space.

The wonderful Ian was so kind as to take us in when moving away from the dangerous lady and our previous home. Little did he know what I would do to the dining room with my supplies! This is the temporary setup!






I have no cardstock or patterned paper here, and my heat guns and soldering iron are packed away, as are a lot of other things; so hard being limited, I long to be set up again and spread out!!

But don't get me wrong I'm very thankful to have a roof over our heads!

TFL - Mwah! XXX
Jen

A Baublemark!

Another Bookmark - this time a bauble.  I like this one better than Santa!  The best bit is the ribbon is shorter - better for smaller books like the ones I read!

Ingredients:
Twiddleybitz Bauble
Twiddleybitz Tweeny Christmas trees
Fern Colourspray from Twiddleybitz
Green Tara Velvet Glitter Ribbon
Green Tara adhesive trim - Red
Green Tara bouquet
Kaiser jewel
Music stamp
Gold Paint Dauber
Black Stazon ink

TFL
Jen
*<:-)

Who started this?

Just wondering who in their right minds came up with the idea that I should make so many many Christmas Cards each year - now I know who to blame!!!

Where did the Tradition of Holiday Greeting Cards start?

Every year during the holiday season, we send out and receive greeting cards to friends, business partners and family members. But have you ever asked yourself where this tradition originated? We did and with a little bit of research, found a most interesting story behind this custom: 

  

A British investor and civil servant by the name of Sir Henry Cole came up with the idea and produced the first commercial holiday card in 1843. He commissioned an artist, John Horsley, to create a drawing of Sir Henry and his family raising their glasses in a toast on a tree-paneled image.

Being the business man he was, he not only used the cards to send to his acquaintances, but sold over 2,000 cards for a shilling a piece.

  

Soon others picked-up on Sir Henry’s idea and started producing more and more cards. It was not until 1875 though, when the first holiday cards were offered in America. Once the tradition was started and the business took off, it quickly evolved from flower and fairy images to winter and religious pictures and to more patriotic themes during the two world wars. In the 1950s cartoons and humorous cards became popular and today you can choose cards from a wide range of themes, forms and materials.

Twiddleybitz Christmas Blog Hop WINNER!!!

Thank you again to the Fantabulous Miss Tiff for organizing us Twiddlers so well and making the blog hop so much fun for everyone.

Thanks goes to the other Amazing Design Team members who constantly awe me and inspire me further - you are the most talented bunch of women I know and I feel truly honored to be counted among you!

Thank you of course to Mr and Mrs Twiddles for constantly creating wonderful products that inspire me to create and love doing so,  And for believing in me enough to have me on their design team.

And saving the best till last - Thank you to Everyone who joined in the Twiddleybitz blog hop - and to those of you whom left a comment on my blog and are following me!   I hope I don't let you down and you enjoy my creations both now AND in the future!

That means that Janice - is receiving a little extra something this year!!  Janice could you please email me your address details so I can post your pressie in time for receiving it by Christmas!!

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Christmas Bookmark

For Erin...

Erin is absolutely in love with reading right now!  I am borrowing books from the local library for her at a wonderfully alarming rate :-)  On her christmas Wishlist - Books!  nothing else - just books!

This bookmark is from a cool idea I had once...  the tag hangs freely outside the book at the front, the ribbon is passed between the pages of the book where you stop reading - the flower can stay between the pages in a big book or hang out the bottom of a small book.

Ingredients:

Green Tara - Green jute and sparkly red ribbon
Green Tara - small poinsettias (red on side - white the other)
Green Tara - Santa die cut
Chipboard Tag
Fern colourspray from Twiddleybitz
Holly embossing folder for big shot
Kaiser small red jewels

TFL - Mwah! XXX
Jen

Twiddleybitz Christmas Blog Hop!!

Hello everyone and welcome to my leg of the Twiddleybitz Blog Hop!  The last Twiddleybitz blog hop was my first and I made some Christmas Cards - I do hope everyone found this inspirational and was able to make at least one!!!

I hope you've been enjoying our Christmas Blog Hop it so far - so many beautiful and inspirational creations and fantastic prizes!

I would just like to say a quick but very genuine THANK YOU to Nic, Andrew, Tiff and the other Design Team members for having me on the team.  I am in constant wonder as to why I was picked!  While unfortunately my personal life is a little "restraining" (shall we say) at the moment, my mind is never far from my Twiddleybitz!!  I have so many projects planned out in my little book but limited time and space atm to do them!  I can't wait to share them all with you but (for now at least) we'll start with my latest and then go one at a time!!!  (I'd love it if you stuck around after the hop :-P)

I have been looking at all the 'card hangers' that have been available in the shops - from the ones that look like a very stretched santa to the silver string will small silver pegs... I've tried a few of these out in previous years and this year decided to improve on them!  I have created my Christmas Card hanger!

I have used an array of Twiddleybitz chipboard pieces and the gorgeous Coloursprays in additional to blossoms and other bits and pieces... I hope you like!  The gold cards and envelopes in the picture are from a class I taught recently at StampAntics in Brisbane - It was my first time back in the 'teaching saddle' and I loved it - I never really knew just how much I missed it!

I also taught a layout class that same day and love the layout sooo much - I really want to share it with you - I hope you like it!  It's one of my all-time favourite pictures of Riley, he is really photogenic so I do have a lot of favourites waiting to be scrapped!  I used a number of Twiddleybitz Chippy pieces and love the sparklies!!

Anyhoo - I really should get on with it! LOL  Please have a looksee at my card hanger, It took a while to create but that was more from arranging and re-arranging the order of the pegs and the embellishments, and mis-cutting the bead string than through any difficulty!!

Please leave a comment below and tell me what you think of my card hanger, and if you sign up to follow my blog as well (or are already following me) I'll put your name in the draw for a very secret and wonderful surprise gift from Santa.

Pegged out at work on our special sound absorbing walls!

The gorgeous candy was put through the big shot, sprayed with Fern Coloursprays and rubbed with Silver to highlight the raised surface.

Poppy spray with a little Lippyliscious and silver rub for the candy, fern for the star with some gold wire and red ribbon, flower sprayed with the coloursprays also.

Lippyliscious sprayed on Poppy for the pegs, fern for the Tweeny trees, walnut and gold for the gingerbread man with large green brads and googley eyes!  Gold paint on the bauble.

Gold paint on the Merry Christmas with 3 red buttons, Fern on the candy and fancy bauble, poppy on the star with music script stamp in black stayzon with gold paint on edges. 

 Fern on the fancy bauble, poppy on the star with music script stamp in black stayzon with gold paint on edges. 

I cut every 15th ball from the gold ball garland (Coles) with tin snips, being very careful not to cut the string, then decided the pegs would be too far apart so cut every 8th ball off as well!  I painted all the wooden pegs, Erin helped me with this - finally ending up the 'golden child' as I knew she always was - literally!!! (spraying would have used too much and taken too long), then I decorated all my chippy and created my flowers.  Before attaching the embellishments to the pegs I made sure I was happy with their order and matching pegs, then glued them on with Pritt gel glue.

Thank you for looking - I hope you've enjoyed my latest creation.  Don't forget to comment and follow my blog to get a secret surprise from Santa  *<:-)

Checkout the Ning throughout the Twiddleybitz Blog Hop for competitions and Prizes, inspiration, and a whole heap of chat!  www.twiddleybitz.ning.com

Your Next Blog Hop Host is Karola Witczac at 6pm AEST.  I can't wait to see her lovely creations!

I'd like to leave you with a little verse that is inside all our Family Christmas Cards this year:

Our Wish for You in 2011





May peace break into your home

and thieves come to steal your debts. 

 



May the pockets of your jeans become

a magnet for $100 bills. 

 



May love stick to your face like Vaseline

and laughter assault your lips!

 



May happiness slap you across the face and your tears be that of joy

 



May the problems you had, forget your home address! 

 



In simple words ............




May 2011 be the best year of your life!!!

Merry Christmas

and a Happy New Year!!

Published for Christmas - thanks Santa! SC 84 - p88

Just wanted to share a little toot with you :-)

It's been a long time since I was published and it's always such a thrill to see your work in print.  Scrapbook Creations issue 84, page 88; My two cards are accompanying the wonderful work of the gorgeous Tiff Sawyer (now a Scrapbooking Memories Master by the way - as if we didn't already know how special she was  ;-)).

I encourage everyone to submit your work to the magazines - it's a great confidence booster and it's a double joy - the excitement when you find out you've had your work accepted and then a few months later when the magazine comes out.




Merry Christmas everyone!

TFL - Mwah! XXX
Jen

Don't forget your envelopes!

It's lovely to see all the beautiful handmade cards around at Christmas but I do worry. A flat colored envelope at best is what I see holding people's Christmas cards (and cards for other occasions!). I'm sorry but I do not want white, gold, silver, red, or even green envelopes holding my cards!!! I want to see decorated envelopes too!!!!

It is a little limited if you are sending things through the post but not impossible :-). And if you are hand gifting your card - the possibilities for decorating your envelope are endless!!!

Why bother? I hear you ask, well - do you like that special gift just handed to you or do you like to rip off the wrapping paper and joke about keeping it for next year? It's just one of those things that make your card, and your effort just that little bit 'more' and especially if you are enclosing money or vouchers or a store-card.

Here are some envelopes I have decorated - fairly plain for sending through the post, a bit of masking and misting using Twiddleybitz coloursprays and ink, even running the envelope through my big shot!!

TFL - Mwah! XXX
Jen

Christmas is coming

A couple of cards...

Very plain but I have limited supplies - it's driving me nuts!









TFL - Mwah! XXX
Jen