hop hop hop! 12 days of Christmas with PaperHaus!

(apologies folks if you're seeing this late, some issues with the scheduling)

Hi all,

Christmas is early this year!

If you have been following the news on the PaperHaus magazine and our Facebook page, you'll know that there's a huge giveaway starting December 1st. And I mean HUGE!!

Just a glance at the prizes that are lined up:

12 Days of Christmas Giveaways

December 1: Prima

December 2: Viva LasVegaStamps! "Plate 890" Wood Mounted Stamps

December 3: Eclectic Paperie "Complete eKit mini album"

December 4: Scraps of Darkness "kit"

December 5: Pink Paislee "City Sidewalks"

December 6: Gauche Alchemy "Holiday Washi Tapes"

December 7: UmWow Studio "3 Month Subscription"

December 8: Scraps of Elegance "kit"

December 9: Scrapbook Circle "kit"

December 10: Paper Issues "Santa Baby" kit

December 11: Haus Of W

December 12: Gauche Alchemy "DT Box"

Looks awesome, don't they?

Here's the line up for the blog hop:

Paper Haus blog

Trina

Me! - that's where

you are now

Vivian

Emilia

Sara

Candice

Lisa

Shamu

Marilyn

Lynn

Linda

Katarina

Julianne

and back on to the Paper Haus blog!

Here's a little L.O.V.E. to go along with the hop:

Using some splashes and tea stains, as well as stamping and embossing, I created this layout of the Mr. and me using our favourite wedding photo. Just the perfect keepsake for Valentine's Day!

Just remember to leave a comment as you hop along, and a winner will be picked each day. All the best people, and have loads of fun!

cheers,

who loves a give-away?!

Hi all!

I know it's been awhile since my last post - the work in office is sort of piling up (crime doesn't take vacations) and every day is a mad rush the moment I get home. But the boring stuff aside, now for some really awesome news!

The Paper Hause is having a major event and giveaway!! *yaysss*

Known as the "12 Days of Christmas", there will be a blog hop starting 1 Dec, with fantastic giveaways every single day!

For more details to come, just watch this space!

cheers!

the back-to-work scrap

It's my last weekend as a stay-home mum, and from next Monday onwards I'll be a working mum of two trying to balance my roles as an analyst, dairy farm (I'm still nursing No. 2), playmate, terrorizer and tear-wiper to No. 1, domestic maid to DH, church musician and still find the time to take my photos and scrap them. *phew* that's a handful!

So, to "celebrate" my going back to work, I created the following layout. It's a photo of DH and Ilias that I've always wanted to take, and there was such a sense of achievement as I finished the editing and all.

The papers from Fancy Pants' Hopscotch are so lovely! Even though it seemed to be made for a girl, I just love the distressed co-ordinating papers they have, with so much room for embellishments and just doing fun things with. I was surprised how the orange matched the desaturated tones of my photo so well.

This layout differed from the others in that, I used very little mediums and kept it very clean with lots of resting space. Initially I didn't go too crazy over the embellishments, in fact I was stuck at it for a while with only two sparse clusters in diagonal corners. As you can see, I went ballistics with the flowers and bling!

Some close-ups:

Love, love, love the shabby chic resins from Ingvild Bolme!

As usual, a sucker for Prima flowers. Can't get enough of those!

I'm currently working on a little surprise project for my DT assignment, and the inspiration came while I was in the toilet (yes, you heard right!). Keep your eyes peeled for more news in November!

ciao,

My first tutorial ever!

Being on the DT of the PaperHaus is so much fun - I get to do lots of new things which I never would have done otherwise. One of these is a step-by-step tutorial and I was frankly quite clueless about it. I opted for a photo-based post instead of a video post as I reckon I will most likely stumble over my words!

Here's the layout I've done:

It's a photo of my parents on their honeymoon. This year they celebrate their 35th wedding anniversary. and the layout is meant as a gift for them.

You can see how I put together this piece here.

Some close ups:

Hope you've enjoyed this as much as I had putting it together!

ciao,

and we're off!

It's been an exciting one month preparing for the Paperhaus mag blog's first set of assignments and on 1st Oct we are officially launched!

To start off, my talented teamie Linda came up with the sketch below for you guys to play along with. Check out the other samples by the rest of the DT. You girls rawk! Hope this will inspire some of you who are having a bit of a creative block :D

Meanwhile, have a great day!

we are FOUR!

Bernard and I have been married for four years (oh so fast!), and 2012 has been very interesting for us with adjustments to caring for two kids while juggling work, taking on new responsibilities at work, and facing new challenges in our marriage. We still have lots to work on, but we're getting there!

Anyway, what better occasion for a LO than a wedding anniversary? :D

I used this week's palette from the Colour Room. It's all pinks and polka dots and I have just the perfect picture to play along.

and this is my take on Palette #130:

It wasn't hard to find the shades of pink I want since I've just topped up my stash of mists from the LSS. I also bought a new box of color pencils from Faber-Castell and it proved to be a most useful and fun technique!

These fussy-cut flowers were neutral to begin with. I shaded on some pinks with my watercolor pencils, dabbed a little water with my brush and voila! lovely gradations of pinks! I brushed on some glam for that shine.

And since I was in a painting mood, why not alter these tea roses as well? 

This is how they came in the packaging:

And after some dabbing with left over mists on my craft sheet ....

 It was too fun to resist so I painted the leaves as well:

More pretty details:

That's all I have for now, ciao!

missing the sea

It's been almost a year since our last dive trip and since it was a baby making trip, both Bernard and I felt it would likely be my last one for the next few years to come. So what better place than the Maldives for some awesome diving and chillax?

Looking at the pictures again (and the madness of dealing with two boys now) does make me ache for the sun, sea and sand. And of course, the feeling of looking into the vast endless horizon, knowing that there is nothing but freedom.

oh joy!

It's a good thing I finally got this blog moving again because.... *drum rolls*

I MADE IT ON THE PAPER HAUS INAUGRAL DT!

This is so exciting! And considering I have no previous DT experience, the wonderful people at PaperHaus are so kind to offer me this awesome opportunity. It will be fun meeting new people with so much to share!

Just got my schedule for October. Time to get to work!

ciao,

Prima Sep BAP

If you don't know that that means, it's the monthly Build-a-Page challenge over at Prima. Here is this month's sketch:



And this is my take on it:

Using the color palette from the photo itself - teals and browns. This sketch screams mixed media and I'm a big fan of those paints, mists and pastes! Basically any thing that allows me to create a painting with different dimensions of textures and layers.

Some close-ups:

The title using Maya Road chip words and Prima's own alphas. Not to forget my favourite bandages and banners.

Flower clusters. I'm nuts about those. For this, I used a vine and one of those Prima flower packs I got off MWL during their big sale. It's on-going for the whole of September!

Since I already have one flower cluster, I decided to try something new and made my own hot-air balloons with buttons and patterned paper. The butterflies create the feeling of the balloon being lifted off by them flutteries.

Well, that's all for now. I'm submitting this LO as part of my portfolio for the Paper Hause DT call. It's this new online mag on scrapping that features lots of techniques on mixed media (yay! my favourite!) and tutorials on how to achieve those effects as well. Wish me luck!

Ciao :)

this is bad!

oh my, do all my entries have to be one year apart? LOL and not only that, almost 30 layouts and a handful of projects, and another baby boy later!

I'm reckoning, if I really want to even make it to any decent DT, it's time to get this going. Tomorrow, I promise, will be my first post on my scrap work and other miscellaneous stuff!

That is if I remember.... ciao!