Thankyou cards

Recently I received a lot of help from some dear friends and family.  I wanted to make thankyou cards for the wonderful people who helped out in a hurry.  Here is what I've made them:



Happy Belated New Year

Well I'm back after a VERY long summer holiday. Looking back at the end of 2010 I got really slack at blogging. I have a few excuses:

- my Mum's health took a downward turn for a while [thankfully she's good now]

- we moved in with the folks while our house got pulled apart [renovating]

- the end of the year is always busy, with ballet concerts, school concerts etc.

- my crafting and cooking became focussed on what I NEEDED to do for that week.

- this situation has continued until today, when I finished sewing kindy sheets for Miss 3 ready to start kindy this Friday.

- it has been Christmas holidays so I've had all 4 cherubs home and too tired at night to craft much

- here in Queensland we've had major flooding, including in my hometown

Anyway those are the excuses... I have a few pics of projects I've completed over the past couple of months. Unfortunately more missed out on photographs than I thought:

Firstly, a nappy cake I made for a friend who had a new baby:



Then, the christmas gifts for each of the girls' school teachers [all 7 of them] - a set of homemade cards in matching box, with a block of chocolate.

I can't find a photo of the 3 string bags I crocheted for my MIL and SIL's for Christmas, or the 5 crocheted kitchen hand towels, or the dress I made for my niece's birthday. I also missed photos of the towel elephants I made as Christmas gifts for other family members. Not to mention the cooking... I even had a go at gluten free crumpets.

Oh well. At least writing that list, I realise I haven't been idle. I'm planning to blog more regularly in 2011. And craft more.

In case you're wondering, the house isn't finished, we'll be living in a work zone for a few months yet.

My latest card day creations

Here are the cards I did with the playgroup ladies at coffee and cards this week: the black and white card is a slightly different take on a father's day card - not your usual sailboats or tools. The sillouette card is a new stamp I wanted to try - simple but very effective. You can't tell in the photo, but I cut out and mounted a second set of the largest flowers on foam which gives the card a real 3D pop-out factor.

We had a lovely time on Wednesday, it was a great time-out for the busy mums.

What I was up to last week

This is the birthday card I made for my MIL to go with the animal doorstops and fabric I mentioned last week. She received them in the post late last week and I'm happy to report she loved them.

I decided before I tackled anything else I needed to tidy my sewing room as every surface was covered [again]. In my tidying I uncovered a panel I'd forgotten all about for a soft book so I made that up:



And I rediscovered my UFO's - a very large tub full - and decided I must use one of them to learn to free motion quilt on my new machine. Here is my first attempt:


I've a lot more panels to quilt but if I remain consistent I should have it complete by the end of the week I hope! It took me ages to work out how to find the menu to set the machine up to quilt... it was actually quite easy to find, but I had no idea where to start! I'm hoping for many more hours in front of the machine this week!

CARDS

Here are the two cards I'm teaching at my card day tomorrow. I'm really enjoying finally using the stamps I've been collecting over the past year or two. I discovered Stampin Up about two years ago and have found it very satisfying to start and finish a papercraft project in one sitting [unlike my scrapbooking which is unending].

The first card is stamped then coloured with watercolour pencils and an aquawash pen. The second is stamped in two different colours.

Mum's coffee & card morning

This morning I invited some of the Mums from my new playgroup over for morning tea & to make a card or two. They'd never stamped or made cards before so it was great fun showing them how easy it is. I am VERY thankful that Julie taught me so well, I learnt from her that having everything pre-cut and being prepared is the best way to go. The girls are keen to do it again another day, so I guess I'm running coffee & card mornings now!

More Christmas cards...

In a previous post about my last day making cards with Julie I mentioned I'd be using one design for the girls to give to their school friends. Yesterday I worked quite hard [around the school concert, dinner, & other activities] to get these done. I did have some help, but I've discovered that if you have to make 48 identical cards & you are doing them in a production line [ie all cutting first, then all the scoring, then stamping, then folding] a 2 year old gets bored very quickly, and a 4 year old quite soon after. So the help was short-lived, which made me much quicker!

I've just taped candy canes in 21 of them for Miss 4, who has stamped 'love from Miss 4' on the inside of the cover. Miss 6 can write in hers [she doesn't know that yet]. It's a lovely way of combining a card & candy cane gift in one. Although I must say I don't want to make any more for a while...

TEACHER GIFTS

Things have been quiet-ish on my blog for the last month, not because I haven't been crafting, but because I haven't FINISHED anything. My list of deadlines [eg all gifts bought & wrapped prior to Dec 1; all handmade gift finished by Nov 30] has kept me flitting from project to project.

But seeing as Miss 6 finishes school on Friday, I needed to FINISH her teacher gifts, which meant finishing Miss 4's seeing as they're all the same. I've made each teacher a bag [three here but five in total] and I'm pretty certain none of them read this blog so it's safe to show you what I've been up to.

I also got the girls to help me make cards - they have a perforation along the side [thanks, Julie!] so that part tears away into a bookmark. This is the result of our efforts.

my last 'cards with Julie'

Yesterday was my final card morning with Julie [see here for more info]. It seems strange to be doing my 'lasts' - it hasn't really sunk in yet that we're moving soon. These are the cards I did with her yesterday. I will miss her creativity & company. Today I have been working on 48 of the small matchbox style cards [the green one] for Misses 4 & 6 to give to their friends. But instead of a punched Santa, I'm stamping a gold Christmas tree as I would go mad if I tried to make 48 of those little guys!!

Off to finish sticking them together now...