Why is it some days are just so much faster then others?!

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What an amazing it day it’s been today and here it is 11pm and I’m still going… not bad considering I only managed FOUR hours of sleeps last night… and the only thing I probably haven’t achieved was any time down in the Studio but hey, today I can live with that!

I’m still in disbelief as to what I’ve achieved all because of some plants! Yes, you read it correctly… plants! It’s always annoyed me that we inherited a front garden that wasn’t quite planted up correctly. I ask you, who in their right mind plants bromeliads into full sun… WHO? So this week-end, we’re righting a wrong!

Having put out an SOS to a dear friend, I was locked and loaded to collect what I thought was some mere cuttings mid-morning.  Preparations for school, returns made, and  a grocery shop and unpack were all made in record time before heading out for these cuttings.

CUTTINGS! Hello, I returned home with the back of my car looking like a nursery – 2B’s I can’t thank you enough. Of course, the majority of these plants needed to be in the ground TODAY so home I went but before I could get to the garden I needed to sort the cupboards under both vanities, reorganise the walk-in robe, vacuum the entire house, take some of our excess to the basement and get gardening gear sorted… that’s all… oh nearly forgot, we also have two extras for sleep-overs tonight!

After all this I didn’t get into the garden until almost 4pm but what I did in an hour impressed even ME. Although after all one side was dug up and planted up, I will admit I did feel a little bit of the dill standing their watering my new plantings… in the rain (lol). So Phase 1 of the full-sun area is complete, tomorrow we start on the shaded area… bring it on!

After all that I feel bad I haven’t a card now highlighting plants in some way. Perhaps tomorrow I’ll squeeze in a butterfly or two to celebrate our gardening achievement. In the meantime here’s a little deja vu as you’ve seen this card before but in one of the retired colours so I’ve redone it to bring it up to speed, so to speak.

This card uses the wonderful Medallion Background combined with Versamark and Stampin’ Pastels. Whenever I get the pastels out it alwasy leaves me wondering why I’m not using them more as the effects and depth of colour you get from them is just fabulous. And no card would be complete at present without an Antique Brad!


Card Recipe
Cardstock: Certainly Celery, Early Espresso, Whisper White
Stamp Set/s: Medallion Background, Dreams du Jour
Classic Ink: Old Olive
Accessories: Stampin’ Pastels, Antique Brads,
Deminsionals, Sponge Daubers, Versamark

Oh, and have yourself an... Inkee Fiddling Day!

Joanne x


Lovin’ the Pastels!

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This weeks Technique classes had me really working outside of my comfort zone by working with pastels. As I’ve mentioned before, if it hadn’t been for my initial starter kit, there would have been no way I would have bought these chalks… but goodness, oh how glad I have them now!

Initially I didn’t know where to start so I did some surfing whereby I came across a tutorial by a very talented lady in San Jose by the name of Elaine Schader. I was wanting to highlight the technique of  making the pastels “pop”. I so like what she did I couldn’t help myself but CASE it. If I do say so myself, I really do like this card, what do you think?

The next technique was to sponge the colours directly onto the card-stock then erase what you want to create your desired effect. In this card I chose to create a lattice effect by putting my work under the arm on my Stampin’ Up cutter, then simply ran the eraser down where the blade would normally go. Made even lines that much easier!  Ithen combined this with the Level 2 Hostess Set from the Autumn-Winter Catty, Asian Artistry, which I think compliments it perfectly!


Which leaves me with the third style within this technique which was to use the blender pens to pick up the pastel then colour the image that I’d stamped in black StazOn. Once again I was able to utilise my current “favourite” stamp set – Dreams du Jour… what can I say, I’m totally besotted with this set just at the moment!

What I did to the background was to stamp in Versamark  a butterfly randamly over the cardstock then daube with same colour as the cardstock. Which I think is Apricot Appeal but when I foolishly take photos of a night it is sometimes difficult to tell!

And  hey, I even had a go at doing a ribbon twist rose but I admit now, one requires more work on that technique!


Oh, and have yourself an... Inkee Fiddling Day!

Joanne x

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