Mad for Markers - Bron's Sketch Challenge

Hi Blogging Beauties,

Today it is my day to remind you about the fabulous sketch challenge we have going on this week at Mad for Markers.  I can tell you I was so motivated by Bron's sketch I have had my card ready for a month!  I made this for my three-year-old niece's birthday.

Here is the sketch to follow:

I coloured with Copics:

Skin: E00, E21, E11, E95, R20

Hair: E35, YR31, Ys1, E31, E33, E35, E15

Dress: RV10, RV21, RV23, RV13, RV06

Outline: C-0

Button: YR07 and Kindy Glitz 

(I was trying to make it looks like a lolly)

I am so looking forward to seeing your entries, so load them up here!

While you are here please check out my current candies.

Thanks so much for visiting and I hope you have a wonderful day : )

Alicia xx

Southern Girls Winter Inspiration Challenge

Hi Blogging Beauties,

Hooray! It is time for a new challenge at Southern Girls!

There is a photo this fortnight for inspiration and this is it...

It is a winter scene...so you have to use this picture as inspiration and make a wintery card!

Could be perfect for those motivated and organised card-makers who have started their Chrissie cards.  (Sadly I am not one of them!)

We were given Meljen images for this challenge and I chose this cute mailbox snuggled up in a winter scarf.  I coloured with Copics and these are the colours:

B00, B93, B12, B32, B23, B45, BV31, V12, C-1, C-0

Dont forget to check out my candies in the sidebar before you head off to enter your card at Southern Girls.

Thanks for dropping by and have a great day : )

Alicia xx

New Delicious Candy

Hi Blogging Beauties,

I am loving having a candy on-the-go on my blog.  It is fun sending out little parcels of crafting fun to my blogging friends.  This candy consists of 5 papers and 3 flowers from the very new and very gorgeous Manor House Creation range.  I have been making some cards with these papers and flowers and they are lovely to use.  The papers are quite thick and very good quality.  The flowers are large enough so you only need one per card.

To enter this is what you need to do:

1.Become a follower of my blog (easy peasy)

2. "Like" Aussie Cards for Sale on Facebook.

I am really trying to get the word out there about ACFS so if you could "like" our page and even suggest it to your friends I would be very grateful.  Go to our page here.

3. Just leave me a comment on this post so I know you have entered.

Good luck!!

Alicia xx

Male 60th ~ Bus Theme and My Little Vegie Patch

Goodmorning Blogging Buddies,

Last markets we had the gorgeous butterfly 40th card (below) made by the talented Aussie Cards for Sale designer Fran Ashton on display.  As well as a few more lovely cards made by Fran with different numbers such as 30, 50 and 60.

The customers loved them and one requested a special order: a Bus 60th.  So I did my best and came up with the above card.  I followed Fran's design quite closely and made it as masculine as I could (boring, I know).  I posted the card off to the customer and I havent heard how it went, but I hope they liked it : )

Also, I wanted to show you my Mini Vegie Garden.

We bought a big tank garden thingy from Bunnings to plant some vegies.

But we havent got around to filling it up with dirt yet.

In the meantime I thought I would plant some seeds and grow them on my windowsill.

I doubt anything would grow outside at the moment it is so cold here.

In the two white pots I am growing brussel sprouts, in the middle container it is broccoli and in the container on the right are carrots.  This is my first time ever at growing vegies so I am pretty excited about it.  I water my little babies every day as they get quite dry sitting behind the glass.  It is kind of like a mini greenhouse I guess.

Thats about it from me today.  

I hope to post some new candy very soon so stay tuned.

Alicia xx

Expressions of Interest for Aussie Cards for Sale

Hi Blogging Beauties,

Each week I get emails from talented card-makers who are interested in selling their cards at Aussie Cards for Sale.

My aim when I started ACFS was to provide an online space for crafters to sell and for consumers to buy hand-crafted cards.  The site has now been running for almost a year and we sell about 100 cards a month.

We currently have about 20 designers.  I am currently looking to include some more designers to cater for the many card-makers who make lots and lots of cards and who would like to sell them online.

So at this stage I am looking for expressions of interest.

What you need to do:

1. Go and check out the website here if you havent already. 

2. Blog an expression of interest and link it up to this post.

3. Showcase some of your cards that you have ready to sell.

4. Email me your details and a quote for how many cards you have available and your asking price.

5. Like our Facebook page here.

If you are interested you need to know a few details.

1. You will need to pay for postage to get your cards to me.

2. Your cards need to come with a matching paper envelope in a clear sealed plastic bag.

3. Your cards need an ACFS Label on the back (which I will email to you)

4. Your cards need to have one layer of card on the inside or a paper insert.

5. If you are an international designer you are free to apply, but please consider postage costs.

6. You will need to provide email contacts to add to our contact list as we do three to four emails per month to our contacts.

Thanks for reading and have a lovely day.

Alicia : )

Dog Cards and my Candy Winner

Hi Blogging Beauties,

I was asked to make some dog cards by a lady who is a regular customer at Aussie Cards for Sale.

She has her own website selling dog products called Midget Muttz and she sells a variety of products for small dogs.  She wants to add some of these cards onto her site.

The top card you have seen before, except it was just the image, not yet on a card.  I finally got around to putting her on a card.  I kept the card very simple because it is such a big image not much else would fit on.

These next two are very similar...

The Copics used in these two are:

Pinks: V06, RV06, RV13, RV34, RV23

Browns: E71, E57, E47 (a new brown combo that I love!)

Greys: C-0, C-1

Then I made some more cards that she has bought before.

All are the same but have two different quotes.

Finally I think it is about time I drew my Candy Winner!!

I used Random.org this time and the lucky winner is:

Denise Goeldner

Congratulations!!!

I am off to email you now.

I will post more candy soon...

Finally I would like to link up with 

Creating Success Around the World Blog Hop

and

Michelle's Make it Monday.

I hope you are having a relaxing day like this little kitty!!

Thank you so much for stopping over at my blog.

I really appreciate it.

Alicia xx

Mad for Markers ~ Pink and Yellow Challenge

Hi Blogging Beauties,

I hope you are having a lovely weekend so far!

I have a cased Clean and Simple card for you today.

A lady wanted me to make this for her grandaughter and she saw a card made by the talented Aussie Cards for Sale designer Iwona Palamountain and 

asked me if I could make one just like it.  

This is Iwona's beautiful card.  I can see why it has been a top seller at Aussie Cards for Sale.

I changed the colours because I wanted it to fit in with the current Mad for Markers 

Pink and Yellow Challenge.

The Copics I used are:

Pinks: RV34, RV23, RV13, RV21

Yellows: Y08, Y11, Y06

Skin: E11, E21, E00, R20

Hair: E47, E57, E35, E11

The clouds I printed out were already coloured and I found them by googling "clouds" in an image search.

Have you seen this yet???

The first issue of Copicendium.

I am so excited, my copy came in the mail yesterday!!

These gorgeous little magazines are available at Mad for Markers for only $6.95 and are packed full of inspirations, tips and ideas.  Go straight here to purchase yours.

I was lucky enough to have a few of my cards published in this issue.

Only a week left to enter the Mad for Marker's  Pink and Yellow challenge so link up your creations here and I will pop around and visit you.  The prize is a pink and yellow Copic marker.

Happy Colouring,

Alicia xx

Southern Girls Happy Birthday Challenge and Candy

Hi Blogging Beauties,

Welcome to another challenge at Southern Girls!!!! This week we want to see projects with a birthday theme. As always our challenge is open to all types of papercraft, scrapbooking, ATCs, cards, off the page..... if you make it with paper, we want to see it.

International Sponsor

NZ - Australia Sponsors

For my card I made this as a special order for a cousin to give her best friend.

All I seem to be making I special orders at the moment!!

This afternoon I am working on some dog cards.

Dont forget to enter my candy for the watercolour crayons here.

And the candy at Aussie Cards for Sale here.

I hope you have a lovely day today.

Thanks for stopping over at my blog.

Alicia xx

Cards, Awards, and Interior Design!

Goodmorning Blogging Beauties,

How are you all today??

We are into our second week of holidays now.

Yesterday was busy, busy, busy so today is another pyjama day!

You are all going to think I am terribly slack I know...but I promise to do a bit of housework too!!

I should already have a load of washing on...but I wanted to blog first and catch up on my comments.

I found that big pile of eggs I was looking for.  There was ten altogether!! Lucky we are in winter and not summer so they were all still ok.  The chickens had laid them in laying box I had put in their outside yard not long ago.  I didnt realise they were using it and I had checked it, but the angle it was on meant I just couldnt see in properly.  Anyway I am onto them now...I know their secret stash!!

Onto my cards today.

These were more I made for a special order, but I wont say who just in case the person might be checking out my blog.  These are rushed night-time photos but the colours have come up pretty good considering.  The sentiment I googled the quote sites for and then I just printed out on my computer.  The Happy Birthday sentiment on the top card is a printed out one as well.  I print out a whole page of Happy Birthday sentiments in all different fonts and sizes so I can have some ready for a card.  It saves money on buying sentiment stamps.

I thought I would enter this in Michelle's Make it Monday again.

I have been watching "The Block" on TV.

Has anyone else??

They delivered their second room to the judges last night.

If you have no idea what I am talking about you can check out the show here:

http://homes.ninemsn.com.au/theblock

They are even calling for renovators to apply for next year...anyone keen??

Ben and I would be terrible, we dont have a renovating bone in our bodies!!

The show has motivated us to re-think our lounge room though.

It currently holds everything because this winter we decided to move everything into the room with the fire in it.  And it has been really good because we can watch tv, make cards, get on the computer and Ben can play his guitar all in the one (warm) room.  But it does get a little claustrophobic and cluttered as you can imagine!!

We are thinking of getting a smaller TV unit and coffee table as ours we bought about ten years ago when the larger the TV unit the better and we think if we could get a small, compact one that would save us some space and we could get the other half of our corner lounge back in.   I dont think we would win any decorating awards, but at least we are warm and snug and entertained!!

Well before I go after this long, rambling post I wanted to share three blogging awards that the lovely Claudia sent me.  Thanks you so much Claudia.  I really appreciate it.

Also my blog is featured over at Scrapbook Layout Ideas

I thank Shiela very much for featuring my blog.

Have a great day people...wherever you may be.

love and laughter,

Alicia xx

A Wintery Weekend

Hi Blogging Beauties,

Well is has been freezing here this weekend.  I dont think temps have risen above 10 degrees celsius (50 degrees farenheit) all weekend.  I think the lowest temp has been minus 6.  We have been trying to keep warm but on Saturday we were outside nearly all day.  Saturday morning we went to the markets and sold cards.  Then we went and visited some relatives and then went and watched some friends play hockey until about 5pm brrrrrrr!!!

Today we went to Mum and Dad's for a family lunch and their house was so warm because they had the kitchen and lounge room fire going.

 I thought I would share a couple of cards I made for Ben's mum.  She wanted a sympathy card.  I made two and the other one sold at the markets.

I stitched around the edges in white cotton but you can barely see it in the photos.

The sentiment is a SU stamp and I used Vintage Photo ink.

I think they looked nicer IRL as most cards do.

We watched Tangled last night.

Have you seen this movie?

It is so beautiful...the colours, the forest, the animation, the characters...amazing!!

I would love to live in a Disney movie like this one...so beautiful!

Well, I hope you had a lovely weekend.

Thank you so much for visiting my blog.

I appreciate your friendship.

Alicia xx

Pyjama Day

Hi Blogging Beauties,

Today I have decided to give myself a "pyjama day".  This means not leaving the house all day and just staying home and doing what I want.  Well, the first week of school holidays is almost over and it has been a very busy week.  I have been into town every day visiting my sick Grandparents and doing jobs here and there and catching up with relatives.

This morning when I woke up and looked out the window there was a big frost and a thick fog.  It was very chilly.  So I went outside for some wood for the fire and to let Ellie have a run and let the chickies out to have a peck.  They havent laid me an egg in a few days I think they might have a new hiding spot for their eggs...hope I find it soon before the eggs get too old!!

So the fire is going now and Honey is curled up on the rug having a snooze and I am still in my pyjamas working away at the computer.  I wanted to share this little set of cards I made a few days ago.  I was inspired by some gorgeous cards in the Australian Cardmaking, Stamping and Papercraft Magazine by talented Aussie Cards for Sale designer Fran Tynan.

Seeing that many of the girls that design for Aussie Cards for Sale regularly have publications in this magazine I decided to subscribe, so Ben got me a subscription for my birthday in April.  I must say I love getting the magazine and have even submitted a few cards myself...will let you know when they are published!

Below is a picture of Fran's beautiful cards that inspired me.

And here are my attempts.

What appealed to me about them is their unique circular shape and simple design.

I wanted them to have a few cards on hand to send off to some friends.

Because even though I have my own card shop and hundreds of cards of other peoples in my house I am behind on my own birthday list.  Isnt that shocking!!  

My aim was to get a few little cards in my stash.

Because it is a Pyjama day today I would like to link up my cards to Michelle's Make it Monday party.  I havent linked up any cards to anything for ages and ages and ages.

Michelle is another talented Aussie Cards for Sale designer.

Have you popped over to Aussie Cards for Sale lately? I am busy loading up another 50 or so gorgeous cards today.  There are so many lovely cards on there at the moment.  I get so much inspiration from seeing them all.  There are some cards on sale for $4 leftover from our EOFY Sale.

And for every card purchased our online customers receive an entry in our delicious July candy.

I get many emails from card-makers who would like to be a designer at Aussie Cards for Sale because they would like to sell their cards online and I am considering running a Guest Designer link-up party on my blog.  

Please leave a comment on this post if you are interested or have some ideas.

Well, time to end this long post today!

I hope you have a lovely day...wherever you are in the world.

Alicia xx

Thank You cards for Grandmothers

Hi Blogging Beauties,

I am posting two cards in this post.

I made these as a special order for my sister.

She gave them to her MIL (Nanny) and our Mum (Rai-Rai ~ kids language for Lorraine).

It was to say thank you for babysitting her girls Charlotte and Molly this year.

Now she is on maternity leave with her third and not working and so the Grandmother's get a rest from their babysitting duties.

These cute little stamps I have been using a bit of lately for special order cards.

They are from the "Growing up Kids Collection" and you can get them here.

I coloured with Copics.

Thank you Nanny card:

Blues: B12, BG000, BG10, B02

Skin: E00, R20

Hair: Y11, YH31, Y21, E32

Shorts: E31, E33, E21

Spica Pens: Clear and Sand

Thank you Rai-Rai card:

Skin: E00, R20

Hair: E35, E33, YR31, Y21, E31

Purples: V17, V09, V04

Greens: G02, BG23, BG34, G00

I spent most of the day at my sister's house today helping her out a bit.

We dismantled an old bookcase and did a bit of furniture rearranging.

Now I am home I need to get card-making!!

Thanks for hopping over to my blog.

I really appreciate it.

Alicia xx

Glitterfy.com - Cat Glitter Graphics

Aussie Cards for Sale Major Candy!!!

Hi Blogging Beauties,

I just wanted to let you know about the Competition Prize over at Aussie Cards for Sale this month.

For our lovely customers we have a special offer.

For every card that you purchase during the month of July you receive a chance to win this lovely candy.  Included in the prize are four Magnolia stamps, a punch, ink pad, paper doilies, tape, gems, design papers, pearls, ribbon, lace, chipboard, crocheted doilies and lots of lovely flowers.

I have also been receiving lots of emails from card-makers who would like to sell their cards at Aussie Cards for Sale.  I am currently trying to come up with some ways for more Aussie card makers to come on board and sell their cards.  Stay tuned for more information to come!

And here is a little one year old b'day card I made for my cousin's baby; Joshua.

I think I just googled the image.

Copics used:

Blues: B93, B23, B97, B95, BG10

Yellows: Y15, Y38, Y11

Greens: G14

Another busy day for me today.

I am on holidays, but there are so many things to be done!!!

Hope you have a lovely day.

Alicia xx

Netball Cards and Candy News

Goodmorning Blogging Beauties,

I had a special order to make some Netball Thank You cards.

The request was to do them in the colours of the team: blue, white and black.

This is how they turned out.

I coloured them with Copics.

Blues: B02, BG01, B00

Greys: C-0, C-1, C-3, C-5, C-7

Black 100

I have a day at home and in town today doing a few jobs.

Grocery shopping, visiting my Grandparents and getting ready for the markets this weekend.

This month at Aussie Cards for Sale we have a big candy prize!!!

For every card purchased in the month of July you gain a ticket in the prize.

I am photographing the candy prize today it includes Magnolia Stamps, embellies, paper doillies, lace and ribbons, DPs and more!!

Here are just some of the cards available in the shop made by designers Linda Langes, Iwona Palamountain and Fran Tynan.

So pop on over to Aussie Cards for Sale and check out our latest range of cards.

There are still many cards on special for just $4.00.

Thanks for stopping by, I hope you have a lovely day!

Alicia xx