CURIOUSER      PHOTOGRAPHY    AUTISM      CURIOUS BAZAAR      HOME      SCRAPBOOKING

Visual review

Sienna is a freestyling scrapper in the making - she hand-cut this flower out of paper without even drawing it first, and I was so impressed! Then she coloured it in and posed for me to photograph it, hilarious.

Last week I made a massive Thomas the Tank Engine out of cardboard for a skit / comedy night put on by friends of ours. The Thomas act was for all the kids, and this version of the happy blue engine went to a friend who is, um, 7 years old or so, and has loved Thomas for AGES, so he was very happy.









A couple of weeks ago, when Hayley and Caden were here for the weekend, we did this family photo shoot in the backyard. I set up the tripod with the composition and settings I wanted, and we used the remote control to actually take the shots. Couldn't show anyone straight away, as one was for my parent's 30th anniversary last week, we had a pic of the 5 grandkids printed on canvas for them. More of the shoot is on Kell's blog.


Last night I made this little canvas 'Island', which is about 4 inches square on a 1.5 inch deep canvas. This afternoon I made 'Listen', which features a line from a short story my friend Rosie wrote when we were 16 or something. Really like this painting.



My 'Feel Good File' article was published in Scrapbook Creations 48, and I have put it in my Scrap In Style portfolio and in my flickr, so you can check it out if you like!















Where to start

Actually too many things to mention it all. Let's keep things simple today (and visual!). I'll start with a layout I did last week for Kiti Q, highlighting HEAPS of their fab range, including new Sassafras Lass Owl Pals, Love, Elsie rub-ons, chipboard buttons, etc, Hambly rub-ons, and these American Crafts felt thickers are arriving in store at Kiti Q today (among lots of other thickers!).

The new Q Tea kit is up for December - If It Ain't Baroque. It includes a couple of elements sent to me from my friend Sylvia in Germany - very cool!
I finally completed Jo's Sydney session - sorry about the wait Jo! They are on their way to you today. Here are some of my personal faves. I have to say, Jo's parents are SO CUTE. And they hadn't had photos taken together in years, I was amazed how natural they were in front of the camera. And all affectionate. Adorable :)

Luscious, lovely, loopy, likeable and, well, just gorgeous really

KI Memories lace cardstock, that is ;)

Kell showed me the brand new delivery for Kiti Q yesterday afternoon and I picked out a selection (hard to choose!). Then when I couldn't handle being on the computer anymore last night, I scrapped this layout, using three different lace cardstocks. It was so fun. This is the fabulous Celine Navarro at Papercrafts, with the gorgeous mixed media painting I bought from her. Which I just hung on my blue foyer wall a few minutes ago, and it looks brilliant. Love it.

What is with 'time'?!

It keeps running away from me. Makes me crabby. Actually it wasn't making me crabby until last week, I was just rushing around and doing one thing and then the next, until I got sick last week. I don't even know what is wrong, but think it is possibly just stress and exhaustion? Or some kind of inner-ear thingy.

Anyhow, it makes computer work hard to cope with, my eyes spazz out and I feel dizzy and sick. Also when I do other things, but often when on the computer. Makes processing my photo shoots very difficult, as you can imagine, so that has slowed down this weekend. Will plod on, though, just try and be gentle with me :) Or is that what I should be saying to myself?

In any case, it did feel wonderful to put the computer away entirely yesterday afternoon and scrap at the kitchen table. Sienna scrapped too, though she talks a lot while she does it, and keeps stealing my supplies, so it can get annoying. But she did a couple of very cute, and funny, layouts. Will try and remember to photograph them later.

I finished two layouts I began in Sydney, one in my hotel room and one in Celine's class. I LOVED Celine's classes, the projects themselves were fantastic of course, but really it was such an eye-opener about how classes can be conducted, especially the layout class. Instead of teaching a specific layout and just telling you to make it your own (which, admirably, many teachers do encourage you to do), Celine demonstrated the techniques she used to make the layout, throwing together an entirely different and new layout as she demonstrated her techniques. Then you were given a collection of Rouge de Garance papers and a few embellishments in a pack and given the freedom to use them as you wish! Awesome. Anyhow, I started this green one in that class, though I photographed it at night and inside, so the colours aren't quite right. The papers are from the 'Picoti Picota' range, which is coming to Kiti Q in December - yay!


The other one I finished from Sydney is for Sketches Oz and will be up at the end of this week I believe, inspired by Clair Bremner's sketch. The last layout I did completely yesterday afternoon when the others were finished is 'Sweet Lollipop Dreams' and uses two of the new Lilou papers from Rouge de Garance, which I am very grateful to Celine for giving me in Sydney! They are very sweet and pastel, (i.e. not my colours!) but the designs are beautiful so I still wanted to play with them. This photo is of my friend's daughter Indiana. Embellishments are mostly Love, Elsie. Colours aren't quite right on this photo either, but never mind.

I also just realised I didn't post my Paper Pesto' layouts here yet! Well, don't want to make this ridiculously long, so will just post my fave. I did a little photo shoot of Kell's neighbour Jude and her two boys Oskar and Kasper, as the kit was pirate-themed and I didn't really have many photos from my own stash. This one is of Kasper. Check out my other layout and mini-book in the Paper Pesto gallery.

And having finished processing Kathy's photo shoot from Sydney, I just have to share another favourite or two. I have loads of photos to look through after I finish editing the Sydney shoots, so will be sharing a bunch over the next couple of weeks.



Won't Someone Please Think of the Children?!

OK I'm not a big Simpsons fan, but why not quote a recurring Simpsons joke just for the sake of it, right?

Seriously, it is just what came into my head when I thought of writing this post, LOL, a final heads-up about my online class for Crop For Kids. All the money raised from the $10 class fee goes to The Royal Children's Hospital (RCH) in Victoria, Australia and to ensure that all children with life threatening illnesses receive the best possible medical and clinical care. Good cause, right?

So my class is on Friday night, but even if you don't want to come to chat on the blog, you can register and check out the instructions at any time over the course of the weekend. This also means that you can be anywhere in the world and you can still join in! It is a pretty comprehensive project - a nostalgic, kind of arty, casual kind of mini-album called "Dreams and Memories". Well, that is what mine is called, you can call it whatever you like if you do the class :)

Here is a piccy of the album. There are about 18 more photos and loads of instructions. H
ope to see you there!

Oops almost forgot

First, I now need to tag 7 people, and it's been over 6 months since the last round so I am going to tag Kell, Sylvia, Viv, Lusi, Donna, Bek and Jill

And I also want to say a MASSIVE and huge, really big CONGRATULATIONS to my awesome big sister Kelly Ingram for being selected as one of For Keeps' 2008 Elite Team members. Yay!

Tagged by Em

The fabulous Emily F tagged me on her blog last week, and my blog stats went up significantly for a couple of days, LOL. So, this is the 7 random things of me...

1. I used to take a raw potato or massive raw carrot to primary school for lunch. Because I hated sandwiches (still do - I like them fresh, but not pre-prepared, the slight sogginess of bread makes me feel ill) and I LIKED my raw veg. Yes, my mum was embarrassed about it. But I insisted. I was a strange child.

2. When I was 12 my family went to the Royal Adelaide Show but I couldn't get the showbag I had chosen, as they were all out. So I got a Cherry Ripe showbag instead, choosing it because of the actual camera that came inside. Have loved photography ever since, and still love some of the photos I have that I took with that little plastic camera (110 film - remember that? $2 from the local bargain shop!), including one of my best friend and I which I used in this layout, one of my poppa that I scrapped for Paper Pesto, and one of Rosie (best friend) which I scrapped for my article 'Create an Echo' in Scrapbook Creations.
By the time I was 15 I had hijacked a Pentax SRL from my dad ;) I still have my first camera though, in my camera collection. Actually I still have the Pentax too, but don't really do film anymore.

3. Speaking of Rosie, for years of my childhood we played and made up all sorts of imaginary worlds and games together. The most consistent game, though, was pretending to be flower fairies. Not just fairies, but flower fairies from Rosie's mum's Cicely M. Barker flower fairy books. When Rosie was Blackthorn, I was Snowdrop. When she was Geranium, I was Yarrow. Or maybe they were the other way around. They were our main characters, anyway, though we played a few other fairies from time to time. Now I have the books for Sienna, though they are all up on a shelf at the moment.

4. I am 26. Not really random, actually. Just the thing I thought of next ;) I turn 27 in January, and share my date of birth with Ben's older brother Toby. My sister Kelly is 2 years and 3 months older than me, and Hayley is 18 months younger. My parents are pretty young, my dad just turned 49 the other day, my mum is still 48 until February. It is their 30th anniversary in a week! OK, enough with the 'random fact' of numbers.

5. I have always been a cat lover, ever since I was a kid. We had a family cat who I kind of adopted as mine, he died when I was 12 I think. I also had a cat who was just mine, Shelly. It was at my mum and dad's 15th anniversary party that they said I could have her. She died when I was 18. When Ben and I had been living in Melbourne for a few months, with Kell, we got a new kitten and named her Wink. She was ginger and playful, a good looking cat, and a bit crazy. Later on we also got Neko, our black boy cat, from the vet. About five years ago, Wink went on one of her wanders and never came back. I posted signs, walked the neighborhood, but noone had seen her (and everyone knew who she was!). We now have another ginger cat, Boo, who was one of a dumped litter and we got her when I was 4 months pregnant with Sienna. But since Wink went missing, it just hasn't been the same. I still like cats, and Boo is really a lovely cat, but it's not the same.

6. I studied 'Classical Studies' in year 12. We studied Ancient Greek history and mythology, including Homer's Odyssey, Greek plays by Sophocles etc. I really liked it, it was such an interesting subject.

7. During my (long) labour with Sienna, I listened to two cds. 'Between Darkness and Wonder' by Lamb, and Kind of Blue by Miles Davis. I think it was the Miles Davis cd that was playing when she was actually born. I don't remember having music during Ash's birth. I should ask Ben if he remembers.

Papercrafts etc






Exciting news to begin with, the 2008 For Keeps Elite team has been announced and my fab big sister Kelly Ingram is part of the team! Yay for Kell!

I had a great time in Sydney, especially hanging out with Lusi. Also got a few layouts done, though I have a couple still to finish. Am pretty tired still, have a long to do list for the next
week or two. Here are some pics, I will upload sneeks for my

Sydney photography clients soon, hopefully tomorrow.










































Mental Blank

It has been on my mind to blog, but I am just having a mental blank trying to recall what I wanted to blog about.... hmmm.....

Anyhow, this month's Q Tea kit is probably my fave so far (though I also loved September's), and I used some of my kit to cover my 2008 diary - isn't it cheerfully cherry-ish? I replaced the ribbon bookmark thingy with the red lace from the kit, and attached a dew drop bling and a cherry button to the end, so it will be fun to use next year.

Thanks for all the lovely comments about my mini-book. It sold for a grand total of $61 at the crop day, which I was quite happy about :) And it is a good cause of course. I want to make more books like it, though, as I just LOVED choosing interesting and inspiring quotes, just because I like them, and then just going with the flow. I don't know if Ben would want me to make more, though, I had stuff ALL over the lounge while I was doing it :)

So at the crop day on Sunday, I finished the layout 'dig', which uses a kit from Scrap In Style tv, with that cool background paper designed by Kristina Contes. Then I covered my diary, then I made this bright and fun layout 'She Makes Me Laugh' about cousin Bec. It was totally a just for fun, splash colour on it kind of layout, which is very relaxing and cheery to make!


In the wee hours of the morning, well 5-something, I am due at the airport for my flight to Sydney. Then follows four days of scrapbooking workshops, photo shoots, and general wandering about - all by myself! I am so excited about the classes I have booked - two with Celine Navarro, and one with Lusi Austin. I also loved the sound of Lusi's class on Sunday, but Sunday is my photography day. I limited it to 2 days at the Papercrafts festival ;) Monday is totally unplanned so far, other than the flight home at night time, so that will be interesting too! If anyone will be at the festival, I might see you there!