The LilyPad Weekend Bonanza and a Giveaway ...

********* My Mam picked 2 winners tonight by the time old method of closing her eyes and scrolling up and down and then stopping!!! She picked debsdesignz and *crystal*, girls hopefully I've contacted you both just now xxx **************

There are some super fantastic things going on over at the LilyPad this weekend, August 29th - September 1st, read on to find out how to win a giftcard for Jacque Larsen's store worth $5 to spend after the sale.

So what is happening then? First off is the back to school, back to scrapping sale with 30% off storewide, you don't want to miss that.

Also, Nancy Comelab is sadly retiring but - check this out!!

Then of course is the collaboration kit that the designers have put together which is free, yes FREE!! with all LilyPad purchases over $15.

And if all of that wasn't enough, as it's the start of another month we have the new September BYOC (build your own collaboration kit).

These are a few of my favourites but there are tons more new kits in store that can be used as stand alone sets or that co-ordinate perfectly together.

I fell in love with Kate Hadfield's Woodland Whimsy doodles, especially the hedgehog. He was just calling out to be made into a shaped card and I made him lovely and spikey by printing several copies and cutting and layering them and curling his spikes so they stuck out slightly

And, and, and we have a new designer debuting too! But you'll have to go visit the store to find out about that one!

So, does anyone want a giftcard for Jacque Larsen at The LilyPad? Worth $5, good after the sale, leave me a comment on this post and I shall draw a winner on Sunday. (I have comment moderation switched on so you won't see your comment straight away but I will check back regularly to publish them xx)

For more chances to win LilyPad goodies check out these girls' blogs: Manda, Mabel, Anso, Heather

Happy Post ...

My lovely postman brought me lots of lovely post this morning but the best was a parcel from PaperCrafts Magazine. I have 3 cards published in their latest magazine and they kindly sent me a few copies of the magazine as well as returning my cards. I have been so excited as this is the first time that I have had anything published from across the pond. The magazine itself is great, I subscribe to the regular PaperCrafts and always like to buy the specials too, especially the Christmas special.

So that is the first of my exciting news snippets, the second is that I have been invited to join the BellaScraps Magazine Creative Team which was a lovely surprise and the third is that I am finally going back to work on Monday. Although this is exciting I am also more than slightly scared, I've been on sick leave for so long (10 months) but I know in my head that everything will go just great - it's those enormous butterflies in my tummy that don't understand!!

I've spent this week trying to settle back into being at home. I had some design team projects to
work on. It was a public holiday here on Monday and it rained so I spent the whole of the afternoon and evening sitting at my kitchen table surrounded by a sea of paper, flowers, buttons and chipboard. Watching the movie channel and playing, I had a lovely time.

This card was for the LilyPad blog challenge on Monday, to use some of the weather symbols and weather related kits. I couldn't resist this cute snowman - even if it is August!!

I used the snowman from Jacque Larsen's Whatever The Weather kit

Talking of the LilyPad - check this out. This is a sale you don't want to miss out on

The final project to share is a luggage tag using my very talented friend Kay Miller's latest digital kit. She's now selling over at Sweet Shoppe Designs which is so exciting for her

I used her All Aboard kit to make this cute luggage tag

I have some more projects to share but I'll leave them for another day - need to go get some beauty sleep!

Andrea xx

A rather late LilyPad Friday ...

Before I went away on Friday I finished a few projects for the LilyPad girls. Each month the LilyPad designers join together to create a BYOC (Build Your Own Collaboration) kit. Each set stands alone but when you join them together they create a collaboration kit. Oh my goodness they just keep getting better and better.

I loved all the pieces but a few really stood out for me this month

Challenges

The challenge over at Daring Cardmakers this week is to include a quote on a card. Whilst I waiting for my prescription at the chemists yesterday I was checking out the selection of greetings cards they had and I spotted this written on the front of a card. I guess that makes it a quote, right?

(credits)

This second card is for the challenge over at Caardvarks, this week they've set the challenge to create a drinks themed card

(credits)

Isn't it just so sweet - it's made using an element from my friend Kay's newest digital kit, I used the same kit for this card and added a whole load of glitter to the flower.

(credits)

The LilyPad latest collaboration kit is just so summery I can't help but use it again and again!

(credits)

(credits)

More challenges...

I love joining in with crafty blog challenges. The Daring Cardmakers challenge this past week has been to include beads on a card. My lovely friend Dawn actually sent me some beads just last week and their colours matched perfectly a digital kit I have been playing with from Natalie Braxton at the LilyPad.

Catching up ...

We had a great NSD crop over at Prima Hybrid (if you're looking for the template it's further down) and I can share the examples I made for the challenges I was running, the members who took part really caught hold of the idea of shaped cards which was my first challenge and I loved seeing what everyone created.

My second challenge was and advert challenge and this is the frame I created, it's a gift for a friend so I've left it empty so she can add her own photograph.

'Catching up' seems to be a frequent type of blog post around here but I want to share the cards I've been working on and I love to go right back to the start of my blog and look at the cards I've made and given away.

Design work for the Digi Chick

Design work for The LilyPad

Design work for Funky Playground Designs

Design work for CatScrap

(credits for all of these cards in my gallery here)

News... and a few challenges... and some enabling..

This might be long!

First off my crafty news - I've been invited to be part of FunkyPlayground's site CT. Wow! I'm so very happy and the invitation came right out of the blue. These are some of the projects I've been working on this last week using the new collaboration kit at Funky Playground - Funtastic.

The dare for this week over at Daring CardMakers is the theme of 'hot and spicy'. I set myself my own little challenge to use orange products to represent the hot and spicy theme. I'm not a big fan of the colour orange so I was surprised to see how many orange coloured products I have in my store

(Digital papers bt Gina Miller, Dani Mogstad and Kim Christenson, WHSmith luggage tag, MM clip, Basic Grey button and brad, American Crafts ribbon, Prima flowers, Fancy Pants word art)

The challenge on the LilyPad blog yesterday was to combine two templates to make one project. I took inspiration from Amy Martins Love of Space 3 templates to create my card - I seem to be loving the whole torn edge, vintage lace style at the moment.

Do you fancy some enabling? Mary Fran over at NitWit Collections has created a fabulous space themed kit - it's absolutely gorgeous and perfect for anything boy related - layouts, cards, invitations etc. I've already got stuff printed out all ready for a few cards in the morning. Want a peep?

I've got more crafty news but I'll save that for another day - I'm off to bed now. Night Night xx