Well, I have been busy lately with various little projects amongst a house full of kids over the school holidays. My gorgeous niece and nephew come to the farm every school holidays for one of the two weeks and they have a fabulous time, my two tiddlywinks love the extra company, and although I love having them here, it does bring those little extras like more cooking, cleaning, washing etc. However, there is nothing better than the sound of children's laughter whilst they are outside in the sunshine trying desperately to catch yabbies in the creek (not to mention the great photo opps).

I have had a fun time with the Kaisercraft 30 days of competitions. I entered a few of the challenges and was very happy to have been chosen a winner on day 14 and day 29. So stoked to receive two lovely packs of the off-shore and childs play Q1 ranges.

I)

II)

III)

IV)

 I) The card I made using the Kaiser Flower (Spring) pic for Day 1

II) Photo Frame using the 2nd Kaiser Ice-cream Pic (Summer)

III) My winning entry for Day 14 Kaiser Leaf pic (Autumn)

IV) My second win (very happy) Day 29 Kaiser Gumboot Pic (Winter)

Here are a few more layouts that I have been busy with for various little project.

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II)

III)

 I)  This layout was done for a numbers challenge, where you had to use a certain number of products. I used one of my 'fav' paper ranges from 3 Bugs in a Rug.
II) This layout was done for a word challenge, the word being 'reflections', we also had to include: paper tearing and distressing and use something clear.

 III) Hand sewn layout, darn time consuming and fiddly but I really am quite happy with the final result.

From Farm to you...

Melinda x

I've done something that I thought I would never do... apply for a Design Team position! After the LSBS Cyber Crop guest designer gig went better than I had thought, I decided to take up an opportunity that was put in front of me. Nat Williams from Ready, Set, Scrap sent me an email to let me know that a relatively new sketch blog was looking for extra design team members... and instead of doing the usual "oh I can't do that, no not me blah blah blah", I decided to apply. And the rest is history! So come take a peak at Totally Adicted To Sketch and have a play around with a new sketch each month, not to mention the chance to win a great prize. This is one of the layouts, using Kaisercraft "Offshore" collection, that I sent in for the submission.

Septembers CyberCrop at Little Scrap Book Shop is over for another month. I was eagerly awaiting this one because of my guest designer spot (and really worried that no-body would attempt my challenge). I managed to sit in on the Friday night bingo (didn't play, as I didn't think I was going to be around) which was an absolute hoot, some of the pics that were gracing the screen had me in stitches and brought back so many memories of the 80's. I couldn't keep up as I was laughing so much, those girls are such funny buggers!!!

I only managed to get two of the challenges done... Helen's card sketch challenge and Belle's layout challenge.  And, I was absolutely thrilled as everyone gave me such lovely comments in relation to being this months guest designer, and what topped off a lovely weekend was the wonderful layouts that some of the girls put together for my challenge (see, I was worried for nothing). How very thrilled I was that they enjoyed the challenge and did a great job with their layouts... here's a link for a sneak peak... Guest Designer Gallery

News Flash... Very excited as my little 'beaver' card was chosen as the winner of this challenge. I really love this entire collection from DCWV (especially as it has lots of little Beavers).

 Belle's Layout Challenge.

It is almost cybercrop time again at LSBS and I'm really looking forward to this one... the theme is 'all things blokey' which will be a real challenge 'cause I tend to use flowers and bling in most of my layouts. Well still have a week to think about it!

NewsFlash... Just had an email from Nic asking me if I would consider being the Guest Designer for this months Cybercrop.

Well, I was truly knocked off my chair at first but Nic convinced me that I could do it. Bit nervous, then started to dread putting up a challenge and not having anyone do it, sigh! Anyhow, all things blokey... hhhmmm what to do, what to do????

Decided to do a denim look background, but couldn't find any card stock that represented denim... went and raided wardrobe and found a pair of old jeans... perfect! Was even surprised that I could stamp on them and use rub-ons without any problems... yeh for denim!

So, my challenge to the troops at LSBS ended up being: Raid the blokey wardrobe and find something to use for the background of the layout eg. jeans, t-shirt, etc. Oh and to add just that little bit extra, I also asked that one embellishment be hand-made (my hand made imbellie is the "cowboy plaque".

Here is my sample layout pics.