AWOL

As many of you may have noticed, I have not been posting much in the past couple of weeks. Things have been extremely hectic as I have had my Mum visiting from New Zealand and have been ill with a very bad cold. The annual Stampin' Up! Convention starts tomorrow and I have also been furiously trying to get swaps made for this.

I have now made 75 swaps, put my Mum on a plane at 6.15am this morning and am feeling slightly more human than I was a couple of days ago!

So...I will be back with regular posts from next week, and I am sure I will get plenty of inspiration at Convention.

I hope you all have a fabulous weekend.

xx Nicky

The INKlings blog hop

Welcome to The INKlings' Team's first ever blog hop. You may have arrived from Beth's blog, or you may just be visiting my blog, whichever way once you have checked out my creations, you can continue the hop through the link at the end of this post, to the next team member.

What style of cards do we frequently get asked for inspiration for? More often than not it's masculine cards, be it little boys or grandfathers, everyone seems to struggle with cards for the males in our lives. So, as a team, we thought we'd help you out by providing you with 20 team members' fantastic blogs that you can hop through and get lots of fantastic ideas from.

We also have some Blog Candy to give away. All you need to do is leave a comment on each blog in the hop and then email Michelle Dyson and let her know you've done so. You will be in the running for a fantastic prize of 20 handmade cards plus other goodies. (Sorry blog candy is not available to SU! demonstrators).

Now onto my project ... when masculine cards were first mentioned, I immediately thought of the Owl Together Now stamp set, which I think is a good one for male cards. Colour wise, I went for my favourite male colours, chocolate chip (of course), always artichoke and mellow moss. Here is what I created:

For the first card I stamped the branch and the owls on a scrap of white card. I coloured them with my blender pens, cut the owls out and adhered them, with the middle one being on dimensionals. I used the weathered background stamp over all the background layers and used a dauber to ink around all the edges. The sentiment is from the fantastic new set from the autumn/winter mini catalogue, Teeny Tiny Sentiments.

For the next card I punched out three squares and mounted an owl on each one, again coloured with my blender pens. I paper pieced the middle owl into three layers.

The last project I made was a money wallet. I have made quite a few of these over the past couple of years. They are very simple, but are a nice way of giving cash to someone.

The belly band keeps it all closed, and this is what it looks like open.

Well that's all from me. Next stop on the INKlings' Team Blog Hop is Dani Fender who I'm sure will have something fabulous to show you. Don't forget to leave a comment to win our awesome blog candy.

Til next time,

Keep on creating
xx Nicky
Supplies:

Stamp sets: Owl Together Now, Weathered Background, Teeny Tiny Sentiments

Card: Whisper White, Chocolate Chip, Always Artichoke, Mellow Moss

Ink: Always Artichoke, Chocolate Chip, Mellow Moss, Brillian Blue

Other: Choc Chip 1" ribbon, stampin dimensionals, blender pens, dauber

Are you ready for another blog hop?

Time seems to be getting away on me this week and I have so much I need to be doing ... but my motivation is somewhat lacking.

I thought I would drop by and let you know that I am participating in another blog hop which starts at 8pm tomorrow night. The theme for this blog hop is masculine, as I'm sure most of us struggle with what to do for the males in our lives. If you get a chance, call back tomorrow night, as I am sure there will be some fabulous projects, and with 20 people participating, a lot of inspiration.

Keep on creating

xx Nicky

Welcome Baby Micah

My brother-in-law Andy and his partner Jade have welcomed another little boy into their family, a little brother for Joshua. This is the card I made for them.
I used the wash day wheel (which I borrowed off my good friend Kylie ages ago). I really like the simplicity of this wheel, and since I love colouring in, it was the obvious choice. I made the card base from brilliant blue card, and used some bashful blue with it. I stamped the baby's name with my jumbo outline stamp set and mounted it along the bottom of the card with dimensionals. I double stamped the overalls image and mounted it up on dimensionals too. Here is a close up.

I left the inside blank, just adding a strip of bashful blue cardstock along the bottom, and an all-in-one suit.

I was really happy with how the card turned out, and Jade and Andy loved it too.

Just a short post today as I have some first birthday invitations I am trying to get done. Hope you all have a fabulous day.

Til next time, keep on creating.

xx Nicky

Supplies:

Stamp sets: Jumbo outline alphabet, wash day wheel (R), polka dot background, nursery necessitites

Ink: black stazon, certainly celery, bashful blue, blush blossom, barely banana, almost amethyst, versamark

Card: Brilliant blue, bashful blue, whisper white

Accessories: blender pens, stampin dimensionals

Pony Party birthday invitations and Crown cake

Finally, Jessica's birthday celebrations are over. With her birthday being during the school holidays, and me being somewhat disorganised when it came to sorting out her party, the celebrations have been stretched out over a month! However, we had her party on Sunday, and it was a fabulous day, with lots of friends, great food and some very tired children at the end of the day.

We had a look through my stamp sets and Jess picked out the pony party set for her invitations. I decided to make a gate fold card, but kept it pretty simple as I had to make 20 of them. Here it is.

Jess wanted to design the card herself and of course she wanted the card to be pink. As I was running extremely low on cardstock, we didn't have too many colours to pick from - it was regal rose or regal rose! When we were discussing what other colour to put with it she said "orange mummy, because that's your favourite colour" - bless her. So regal rose and pumpkin pie it was.

Jess knew exactly what she wanted the image on the card to look like, and when she caught me trying to add more grass, she wasn't very happy. I decided it wasn't worth the agro, so just did what she wanted me to do, it was her party invitation after all. I stamped the card base with the polka dot background stamp in versamark, then stamped the pony image in stazon and coloured it with my blender pens. A small mat of pumpkin pie and then I adhered it to the left hand side of the card. I stamped the party hat out on some scrap card, and once I had coloured it, mounted it on the pony's head with some dimensionals.

Here is a close up of the pony:

On the inside I did another sheet of whisper white card and used the stamps from the cheer and wishes set, to put the details in. Here is a picture of the inside:

We have a few children's cake books and after much deliberation Jess decided she wanted a crown cake. I had a bit of a disaster with the first cake I made, it broke into three (well disintegrated more like) when I took it out of my roasting dish, so I had to make another one before the decorating could begin. Here is a picture of the finished cake.

And one of Jess with the cake-

Well that's it from me today. I have the card I made for my new nephew to show you next time.

Thanks for stopping by.

Keep on creating.

xx Nicky

Supplies:

Stamp Sets: Pony Party, Polka Dot background, Cheer and Wishes

Ink: Black stazon, pumpkin pie, regal rose, certainly celery

Card: Regal rose, pumpkin pie, whisper white

Accessories: blender pen, stampin' dimensionals