Creations by Miriam

I have a few snippets of exciting news to share- I have already shared this news with some of my lovely customers but realise that some people may not have heard the fab news!   (By the way- If you are not already a newsletter subscriber then please consider clicking on the button in side bar to be added to my mailing list)

Do you want to earn some FREE packs of gorgeous patterned paper?

You can do that in one of two ways!

1.  Firstly purchase 3 packs of paper and you can select a fourth pack of paper at no additional cost!   Pretty cool hey!? Flip to pages 128 through to 130 in the main catalogue and you can see some examples of the lovely papers on offer.

* Autumn/ Winter Mini Catalogue

2.  The other way you can receive some FREE paper is to join my lovely team of demonstrators before the end of this month.    This time it is not just ONE pack of paper you’ll receive but a FREE packet of designer series paper valued at $18.95 EVERY month for the rest of 2012.

Stampin’ Up! have made it even easier and even more affordable to join as a demonstrator.  For the small cost of  $169 you can select ANYTHING you would like from the catalogue up to the value of $235.  Yes- you read that correctly! Pick whatever YOU want in your starter kit (valued at up to $235) and pay only $169 and you can enjoy the ongoing benefits of being a demonstrator.    You will also receive a FREE pack of business supplies with your kit valued at $80 (It includes items such as instructional DVD- catalogues, order forms, etc)  If you’d like to know more then please do not hesitate to get in touch with me and/or you can read more information by clicking on the tab that says “JOIN MY TEAM”  (or follow this link- http://www.creationsbymiriam.com/?page_id=368 )

I have some classes coming up too- but you must book your spots soon- I have a night suitable for scrapbookers AND also cardmakers.  For more details click here http://www.creationsbymiriam.com/?page_id=1890

I have some projects to share but simply haven’t had a chance to take photos- so please be sure to check back soon!

My youngest turned 4 at the end of March.  It is so hard to believe that it was 4 years ago this little delight made his great entrance to the world.  The poor kid will forever be known as “the baby who arrived at home on the bathroom floor because Mum and Dad didn’t make it to the hospital in time”  He’s pretty cute though- isn’t he?

Prior to his birthday he told me that he wanted a birthday with “Dinosaurs, Dragons and Unicorns”.  I told him that might be a bit tricky and he should think about perhaps just picking one…..so we settled on DINOSAURS

First came the birthday invitations (featuring the stamp set called “Dinoroar” and also “Party this way”

Then came the special day!

We had decorations to suit the theme and the birthday boy, “Luke-a-saurus”

…….and lots of Yummy Party food that fitted the Dinosaur theme (complete with labels I made using my Top Note Die in the bigshot and also stamped images from “Dinoroar”)

(It is hard to see in the photo but the pasta is shaped like dinosaurs)

(Just for the record no baby pterodactyls were harmed in the making of this party food)

(I’m probably not the most talented “Watermelon carver” but the kids knew what I was trying to achieve)

(The ‘brontosaurus bread” had little dinosaur shaped sprinkles on top- which you may have been able to see if I’d thought to take the plastic wrap off before I took a photo…..but I was more concerned about snapping a few shots before the hungry 4 year olds descended upon the food table)

A dinosaur party would not be complete without a volcano cake.  When it was time for the birthday boy to blow out his candles we added sparklers to the top.

Here is the birthday boy after blowing out his candles!

Luke had a lovely time handing out the ‘lolly bags’ at the end of the party

Luke even helped to cut out the “Fancy Favour Box” using the bigshot.  We made the handles using the strip from the “Tasteful Trim” Die

…..and of course the loot which included the traditional chocolate bars, sherbet sticks, candy rolls, party blowers, balloons and lollipops as well as dinosaur foam shapes, dinosaur stickers, dinosaur tattoos, dinosaur lollies and little dinosaur toys.

He had a lovely day and was spoilt with lots of lovely gifts.  There were even a few kids who went to the trouble of making lovely handmade cards for Luke.  One very talented Mum made the following gift for Luke

She’s very clever isn’t she?  She should accept some orders from people- don’t you agree.  (If you’re interested please get in touch with me and I can pass your details on to her

I think I had as much fun as the kids did at the party just getting everything organised.  If there is anything you would like to know more about then please let me know!

As promised….here is my card featuring items from the new Mini Catalogue.  I made this card for a special friend who celebrated a milestone birthday at the beginning of this week.  She has moved away from town but came here for a few days and the timing meant that I was able to share some time with her to celebrate her birthday.  (I must confess that I forgot to photograph her card before giving it to her…..so made a second one just like it so I could take a photo)

I’ve used the stunning stamp set named “Apothecary Art” (page 19 of the Mini Catalogue) which includes the “Happiest birthday” greeting….. as well as 4 shapes that are a perfect fit for the new FRAMELITS.   The Framelits are nesting dies that you can use to create a variety of different sized labels and also frames.  Please check it out in the catalogue on pages 18 and 19.

For my card- I stamped the image and then used one of the framelit dies to cut it out.  I then took a piece of baja breeze cardstock and cut out a larger frame using the next size up!  I can see my framelit dies being used over and over and over again in my Bigshot machine.

The colours in my card were inspired by the gorgeous “Twitterpated” Designer Series paper on page 13 which includes lovely colours such as Pear Pizazz, Island Indigo, Riding hood Red, Blushing Bride, Baja Breeze and Whisper White.  I have used a small piece of Twitterpated paper on my card and it also features in the background of the photo.  Stampin’ Up come up such great names for their papers and different ranges.  When I heard the paper was called “Twitterpated” I knew it was a word I’d heard before….but I couldn’t remember where!   It took me some time and then I realised that the word is used in the Disney Movie Bambi….. I just fell in love with this paper so it has quite a fitting name

Today it was my intention to share a card I made using items from the New Mini Catalogue.    I’ve been running errands with my kids and keeping them busy as they are currently on school holidays and with all the chaotic fun I forgot to photograph the card during daylight hours.   One of the perks of being a demonstrator is being able to ‘pick my own hours of work’.  I love that I can spend time with my kids during the school holidays and don’t have the concerns about finding someone to care for them while I ‘work’  (If this sounds like the kind of ‘work’ you’d enjoy please feel free to contact me for more info)

…..Anyway- back to the card.  The photos always turn out better in daylight so I promise I’ll photograph the card tomorrow- but for today I’ll share some other cards I made some time ago.

This card uses the super cute stamp set called “Up, Up and Away”.  I’ve seen so many lovely variations of cards made using this stamp set.

I sat down with a friend and lovely team member of mine to make this card again and I was so busy chatting that I accidentally stamped the balloon basket on the wrong side so had to flip the card design.  It works either way I think!

You can check out this stamp set on page 33 of the main catalogue.  This 14 piece stamp set has four greetings including “Happy Birthday to you”, “Miss you”, “The sky’s the limit” and “Up in the air over you” so it makes for a really versatile set.  If you’d like to add this stamp set to your collection then please get in touch with me!

The New Autumn/ Winter Mini is now available to view ONLINE.  If you are interested in receiving your own copy please be sure to let me know and I’ll pop one in the post for you! Click the image below or the image of the catalogue cover to view

One of my favourite items in the mini catalogue would have to be the new FRAMELITS Dies where you can layer dies inside each other to create frames of different sizes! I’ve even made a card using my framelits already.  Please check back tomorrow as I’d love to share it with you.

We also have a fab new blossom punch, SCENTED embossing powders and a great scoring tool.  I can’t wait to explore and play with all of the new products.

Here is a second layout created using the same basic plan as yesterday’s layout.

People will often ask me how I plan albums for each of my four children.    My children enjoy my scrapbook pages almost as much as I do and I’m sure you can imagine the arguing there would be if one child featured in lots of layouts and another child didn’t…..so I do my best to keep it fair! Although it is fun to experiment when you are scrapbooking- There are other times where it isn’t necessary to ‘re-invent’ the wheel.  I find that sometimes if I want to scrap a page for each of my children I may follow the same basic plan but use different colours or different patterned papers so that each child has a page to go in their album.  Side-by- side you can obviously see the similarities in the layout however in their separate albums no-one would even notice.  You can see an example of this by comparing yesterday’s layout with today’s page.

For this particular layout I obviously have a subject other than my children.  This is our precious dog who passed away in September last year.  I wanted to be able to include some personal journalling about her passing and it was nice to be able to include it on the page but I didn’t want it to be obvious- It was perfect to be able to slip it inside the Petite Pocket

Here’s a scrapbook layout I’ve displayed at a few workshops recently.   I wanted to include the ages of my four cherubs and the date the photo was taken but didn’t want those details to dominate the page- As a result I popped a Petite pocket (cut out using my Bigshot) on the left hand corner and included a tag (Two tags die) with those details

When I created the page I showed my husband who said “You’re not going to like this but you’ve made a spelling mistake in the title”  I gasped in horror thinking “Oh no- I’m going to have to pull stuff off my page to fix it”.  This was then followed by a bit a relief as I figured that at least the title had been created using a combination of the Timeless Type Alphabet (Bigshot) as well as the Just Perfect Alphabet stamp set so at least I could easily cut and stamp some more letters if required.  I looked the page over and just couldn’t see the spelling mistake so I asked him to point it out.  He pointed to the word “Treasures” and said “That’s not how you spell ‘Terrors’”  Hmm!

I’ve got a second scrapbook page to show you- but I don’t have time to post it right now so please be sure to check back tomorrow for that one

If you’ve not see the Summer Mini Catalogue OR the Sale-a-bration brochure- I can only strongly urge you to check them out some time in the next 10 days or so.  In LESS than two weeks the FREE sale-a-bration items will no longer be available.  Also the Summer Mini catalogue finishes on the 31st of March and a lot of the items in that catalogue may never be available again.   Please click on the links in the side bar to view each of these catalogues.

Today’s card showcases the FREE sale-a-bration paper called “Everyday Enchantment” and also a stamp set called “You are loved” (on page 12 ) from the Summer Mini Catalogue.

I just LOVE LOVE LOVE the way Stampin’ Up products co-ordinate.  Did you notice that the flower I stamped in the card above (from the “You are loved” stamp set) matches some of the Everyday Enchantment patterned paper?  Other pieces of the patterned paper- (not featured in my card above) also match the flowers in the sale-abration stamp set called “Fresh Vintage“.  Other sheets match images from the “Elementary Elegance” Stamp set.  It makes working with the products “Oh so easy”  It is definitely worth popping in a qualifying order so that you can receive some of these free items.  For every $100 spent on merchandise- you can select a FREE Sale-a-bration item.  Please get in touch with me via E-mail or phone and I would be more than happy to help you out!

miriamthomas@westnet.com.au

0419 947 047

I haven’t shared a scrapbook page in a while so today that’s what I’m going to do!  I love my cardmaking but my scrapbook pages are a really a ‘work of heart’

I  made use of the “Tickets and Tags” Simply Scrappin’ Kit and some “On Board” Chipboard (”Merry Medley” and “Alphabet soup“)

On this particular day Luke was wearing a blue top but we only had a red hat as we were on holidays and didn’t have his entire wardrobe at his fingertips.  The hat wasn’t exactly the best choice for his outfit but protecting my kids from the sun is more important than colour co-ordination.  Let’s just say I was pretty pleased when I printed out this photo and found that it worked quite well with the colours in the kit.  Even the lady sitting behind Luke in the train was kind enough to wear black with polka dots to work with the adhesive stickers in the kit.

I love how the “Tickets and Tags” Simply Scrappin’ Kit even has a little journalling block.  I could have handwritten directly onto the journalling block but opted to run it through my printer instead

These kits honestly make it so easy to create your pages.  If you’d like to see more of the kits available- please check out pages 132 and 133 of the main idea book and catalogue

The other day I shared a little box.  While the concept of the box is great- the colour combinations weren’t working for me at all.  I was determined however, to make use the of Beyond the Garden Designer series paper. It is designed to work with the really lovely “Fabulous Floret Stamp set” but as I don’t have that stamp set I was feeling a little stumped.  Yes- we all have those creative blocks sometimes.

The paper looked appealing enough in the catalogue for me to purchase so I knew I could make it work….and make it work I did.  What I did was take something that wasn’t working for me in the beginning (the paper) and teamed it up with a few things I LOVE.  I love love LOVE the colours Blushing Bride (lovely musk pink) and Rose Red (A deep warm pink) These aren’t the colours indicated as a match for the patterned paper in the mini catalogue but I could see hints of these colours in elements on some of the sheets of paper.  I also LOVE the stamps sets called “Creative Elements” and “My Friend”. So I combined the patterned paper with some favourite stamp sets and got this…… In the end I was really happy with how it turned out.  What do you think?

My next problem was that I couldn’t decide whether to put the sentiment in centre, towards the top OR towards the bottom….so I tested them all out!

Do you have a preference?  I asked my husband what he liked best and he politely responded by saying “You can do whatever you want!”   Well Yes of course I can- I already knew that!

So…I haven’t shared a scrapbook page in a while.  Do you want to see one of those?  Stay tuned- I might just have one to share.