Hot Chocolate!

Well I have to admit that the girls at Winter Wonderland had me completely stumped again with this weeks theme. How on earth was I going to make a Christmas card (that was still usable) with the theme of "Hot Chcolate". No suitable stamps and no punch art possibilities to help me this time! Well with a bit of thinking "outside the square"- this was what I finally came up with The cardstock is (of course!) Choc Chip. The ink is Encore Gold. The stamp set is Baroque Motifs and the gold ribbon is from Lincraft.

Midnight Madness Challenge # 1 !!!

What a great name for a challenge ! Paula over at http://preciosodesigns.blogspot.com/

called it that because she says that she always discovers the challenges at the last minute and then she is up past midnight making, photographing and entering it! Can't say that I do that but anyway I think it is a great name! Now this challenge interested me when I found it in my blogsurfing because not only is there a cute little bird stamp up for grabs but the winner gets to display a special midnight madness trophy on their blog ! Woo Hoo I would like that !! So anyway here is my entry for the challenge. It had to be a Christmas Card using Close to Cocoa/Silver/White/ and one other colour of your choice! Phew ! Again quite a challenge ! I chose Bravo Burgundy for my extra colour and I used my Mostly Flowers and Baroque Motifs stamp sets. The square motif and the sentiment have been embossed with silver embossing powder and the silver cord to finish it off is non SU.

Keesha's Challenge/ Double Deal 2

Today I set out to make a card for Keesh's Challenge. The challenge was to CASE the card on page 85 of the "catty". There were several entries already posted but no-one had done a Christmas card so I decided to do that using what seems to be the "in" colours for Christmas this year- Purely Pomegranate/River Rock /Always Artichoke. But 2 cards evolved from my stamping- one elegant and traditional and the other with a more contemporary feel! So I have decided to make this another entry for my "Double Deals" blog feature ! This time the colours and layout are exactly the same- only the stamp set has changed to give 2 very different styles of card!( Seasons of Joy for #1 and Baroque motifs/Mostly flowers for #2) Which one do you prefer? Vote by leaving a message!!!

The Pomegranate Room

The title for this post would make more sense to you if you had been visiting Gina's blog lately!
(http://www.stampwithgina.blogspot.com/) Each month she runs 2 challenges- a sketch challenge and a colour challenge. She is kind of like Australia's Kristina Werner !!! (except her competition is more fun because her blog viewers get to vote for the winner!!) This is the card I made for her colour challenge .The photo to inspire you was of a beautifully elegant bedroom with brown/pomegranate/pink and grey furnishings. Behind the bed was a large brown wooden carved decoration. I have used Purely Pomegranate/ Chocolate Chip/Basic Grey/ Close to Cocoa and Holiday Harmony DSP. The colours do look a bit washed out in the photo- don't ask me why- normally my problem is that they are too dark! And of course, I didn't feel that I could use anything else than Baroque Motifs for such an elegant room! The square motif is meant to echo the wall decoration. This month's entries are posted on her site now so go over and vote for the one you like best!

Kristina's Challenge # 21

Here is my card for this week's colour challenge on the Kwerner Design site - Sorry the photo turned out a bit small.The colours to use were Old Olive/Rose Red/Regal Rose and Tempting Turquoise. I'm pretty happy with how this turned out considering I almost put it in the "Too Hard Basket"!! The stamps I used are Baroque Motifs and Seasons of joy (the tiny old olive flower) The spotted paper is Pallette 'O Prints If you look closely at the sentiment you can just see a turquoise border around the words-its made with 2 turquoise cuts with the word window punch which are then layered behind the word-I learnt how to do this on Sarah Gough's site (thINKing stamps- see a link on the right) Thanks Sarah!

Postscript- Wow you've got to be quick these days to enter Kristina's challlenge- I was too late again!! Oh well I loved making the card anyway!!

Brazilisa's Bag !

Funny name for a post, I know. But let me explain... I have a friend at work. She is Filipino. She is always happy, always smiling, always friendly. Her name is Brazilisa- but everyone just calls her Lisa for short. Anyway, every day she brings in this nice stripey bag to hold her stuff at work. Now the old Robyn would just think "Hmmm nice bag- I wonder where she got it". But the new Robyn (the one that is now a SU demo) thinks "Hmmm -nice bag.. looks like Purely Pomegranate/ Rose Red/Mellow Moss/little bit of black- Hey! great colour combo- that would make a great card!" So here is my card -with a little help from Brazilisa's bag for the colours and inspiration from Sarah Gough for the layout (thINKing stamps)...I might give the card to Lisa for Christmas... Wonder if she will recognise that it's her bag!

And here is the recipe... Stamp set..Baroque Motifs. Cardstock- Purely Pomegranate/Rose Red / Mellow Moss/Black. Ink..Purely Pomegranate/ Always Artichoke (I didn't have Mellow Moss )

Father's Day

Don't forget it's a special day for Dad's on Sunday,September 7th. These are the cards I have made to send to my Dad and Father- in Law in Sydney ( They are both around 90 years old so I think it's pretty safe to say that they won't be looking at my blog!) Each uses DSP ( designer series paper) from the "Fall Flowers" collection as a background. Also Close to Cocoa/Real Rust and Old Olive / Sahara Sand cardstock. The image is from the Baroque Motifs stamp set and is inked in Chocolate Chip . To finish off 3 brads from the Vintage collection and you're done! Easier and more meaningful than going to the newsagent!

Baroque is Beautiful!

I came across a card by KatieJeanne (SCS) which inspired me to try using this set,which I got in my starter kit but had not used much. I left my band plain and simply added a line of ribbon as I felt that the darker colours I had used looked too "busy" if the band was stamped too (she used both of the other motif stamps in the set on the band too but in paler colours on a white card.Of course - as you can see I HAD to to make it in 2 different colour versions! These are Blue Bayou/Soft Sky and the very elegant combo of River Rock/Whisper White and Black