the "twine" manuscript

hi there and greetings from a windy wintery day here in switzerland,

todays my day at the twinery and my project was something that started out as a christmas decoration and ended up...well as a page of music!

Whilst perusing the christmas decorations at a local department store i came across a Mozart display with these amazingly glittery treble clefs.. i knew immediately that they would look super cool on a card and made this hot pink diva version initially...

I really loved the pink black combination of this card but i bought four of the treble clefs and wanted to make an even classier version! I had a light bulb moment where i envsioned the note on a piece of manuscript paper...well not just any old piece of manuscript paper of course ...Queue: Charcoal Twine!

I created the paper from twine by simply cutting similar lengths and attaching them on the back of the white card at either side and fiddling a little on the front side to make them evenly spaced.

once i had finished the paper i attached the clef on top, blinged it up with a rhinestone brad and glued the whole project to a black card to make it pop even more..the end product was this....

any guesses as to the actual sheet of  MUSIC its lying on????

if you guessed i am an ABBA fan...you were right! In the spirit of the season it should probably be a christmas tune but they will be all too plentiful in the coming days so ABBA it is :-)

I hope you enjoyed my little project as it is indeed my last on the Twinery Design Team. I opted not to reapply for the team next year although i have thoroughly enjoyed my time with them. It goes without saying, the twine is super cool to work with and the colour selection is second to none but i wanted to concentrate on some projects closer to home and I look forward to seeing a dynamic 2012 Twinery Team very soon!

Thanks for stopping by today!

The Twinery and Authentique Blog Hop...

welcomes you! If you came here from Emily Lanham's blog you are right on track.

I hope you are enjoying the hopping as much as i did playing with the gorgeous Authentique and Twinery products. They have the most amazing colour combinations in the Authentique lines so it was hard to choose just one to scrapbook with let alone matching the great Twinery twine selection up to them - so many awesome combinations are possible when these two fun companies come together..nonetheless i managed to narrow it all down and made the following page.... but first a little background to it..

I left New Zealand 16 years ago with a young and single, excited and positive outlook to what might await me in Europe..well Frankfurt to be exact which was my first port of call, so to speak...turns out i was there for five years although my intention was three weeks or so and then make my way round Europe.. one never knows what tomorrow may bring, right? So rolling it into a short story - flew to Germany, met and married future (Swiss) husband, son #1, moved to Switzerland, son #2 = 16 years! and here i am...
As you can imagine my "excited, positive" outlook back in 1995, took a hammering here and there and although pretty much still in tact i do have the odd day where my thoughts wander back to those last words of wisdom from my Dad... (as i was about to step on the first flight in a total of 24 hours flying) his words were - "don't forget - home will always be here for you whenever you want to return". Those words were comforting then and many moons later they still make me smile. Having now had children of my own though i realise how he must have felt as he watched me go... at the time i remember trying to make myself focus on what the world held for me rather than what i was leaving behind..as a parent i am sure it would, and will be, much more difficult??! I love my Dad for being so supportive at that particular moment - those few words gave me strength and courage as i took the first step of that 'big' journey. I just hope that I too, can be together enough to pass those exact same sentiments on when the day comes for my little darlings to spread their wings! I trust that's still a long time away, i might add, even though that old cliche..they grow right before your very eyes.. kind of rings true. In any case, one fine day i want them to know...home will always be here for them.

i was so glad to get these feelings down on paper together with this photo taken a couple of years back of  my Dad and me. The vintage feel of the Authentique papers in soft yellows and greys were just what i needed to portray my thoughts and the stone twine matched perfectly with them. Lemondrop or Pink Sorbet would also have done the trick but i wanted a more subtle look to coincide with my quiet thoughts of home - so stone was indeed the lucky one!! Rather than leaving it loose, I pulled the twine tight and stapled it at either end to remind me of the strength my Dad gave me...

But enough deep and meaningful....moving right along, as I mentioned above i couldnt resist all of the beautiful Authentique collections so in honour of the big day coming up in less than six weeks!!! (scary thought) i cut up a few more papers and made this layout "also about home" when we were lucky enough to be back in New Zealand for a white oops i mean, warm Christmas. I tied the whole layout up like a parcel with none other than.... maraschino twine of course and it was all done and ready to pop under the tree. LOL!

Last but not least, be sure to leave a comment here to go into the draw to win some goodies..

The Twinery will be giving away a 'Colorful Bunch Sampler Pack' (retail value $20)

and Authentique will be offering a prize package of the same value.

The next stop on the blog hop is Heather Conklin - many thanks for stopping in today and i wish you much inspiration throughout the remainder of the Authentique and Twinery  blog hop.

Stamps of Life and the Twinery Blog Hop

Hello and Welcome -

Are you ready for some fun?

The {Stamps} of Life and The Twinery Design Teams are playing together for this hop!

 If you came here from Beverley Sizemore's blog you are right on track.

I was priveleged to be able to design with a fun Christmas set of stamps called Christmas2Build from Stamps of Life. The details in these stamps are just beautiful and i loved the font that the sentiments came in as well.

I have been wanting to scrap our tradition of placing boots at the door, forever..well not just any old boots of course :-) they have to be red and glittery!! subsequently when i saw the "boots" included in this stamp set it was the perfect opportunity to do that. i was equally delighted to find that the teeny tiny snowman also fitted right inside the cuff of the boot making a great little decoration. The Merry Christmas stamp filled the gap across the top of my page like a glove or should i say like a mitten LOL! Last but not least i stamped a little border of snowflakes along the bottom for my title to rest on. I left the cappuccino twine simply  flowing across the stamps to give the illusion of a banner. i think it makes the sweetest addition, dont you?

Loved the snowflakes so much I couldnt resist just stamping a couple of extra little ones on these tags.

I picked up the ribbon at a local craft fair and thought its cuteness factor was right up there with these little stamps so put the two together! They rock, right? LOL. Not to mention the sentiments.. Little Red Riding Hood saying - Merry Christmas from our "woods" to yours. The knights in shining amour saying - Merry Christmas from our "castle" to yours and the pirates saying - Merry Christmas from our "ship" to yours :-) and of course the finshing touch is the Twinery twine in coordinating stone, maraschino and cappuccino.

As you make your way through the hop make sure you comment on each and every post. There will be 2 prize winners chosen randomly among the blogs:

One winner will win 2 stamp sets  (winners choice) valued at $12.95 -total retail value: $26.90 per prize! from The {Stamps} of Life.

&

One winner will win the Ultimate Color Sampler Pack ($25 value!) from The Twinery!!!

The prize winners will be announced on The {Stamps}of Life and The Twinery Blogs on Wednesday November 16th.

Thanks so much for coming by today and I hope you enjoy the rest of the blog hop - your next stop is Tami Mayberry!

The Twinery gets Sweet and Sassy!

   

Welcome to the Twinery/Sweet and Sassy Stamps blog hop. If you came here from Julia Aston's blog you are right on track. These two companies are such a great team together as you will see from all the inspiration along the hop. More importantly there will be TWO prizes awarded for those who leave comments on all participating blogs.

The Twinery will give away to one winner:

One Ultimate Color Sampler Pack (retail value $25)

Sweet & Sassy Stamps will give away to one winner:

One Season of Change Stamp & Die Set (retail value $28)

I was lucky enough to receive the Seeing Spots stamp set from Sweet and Sassy and immediately had all sorts of ideas flowing especially as the set includes super sweet sentiments such as "for my friend" - i thought that was delightful and its in the tiniest font which adds huge points to its charm factor. I just had to incorporate that in my project somehow.

The second line of thought came to me rather unexpectedly as i was strolling the city of Zurich last week and came across a toy store closing down. Being the recycling/obsessed collector type that i am i promptly wandered in. I was of course amongst several other pushy "collectors" who were frantically shuffling through boxes at the very back of the store. As i got closer i realised said boxes were full of stationery! To cut a long story short i discovered lots of small red paper bags and several more slightly larger green bags. Hello Christmas i thought to myself!!

So even though the stamp set has no hint of Christmas i went right ahead and used them as my background on the bags..the great thing is there are nine different spot designs so there are unlimited themes you could use them for. 

In a nutshell that is the story of how these elements became super smart christmas cookie bags!

I stamped a mixture of the 'spots' with Versafine Black Onyx on each of the small bags and layered the tiny stockings on top. The maraschino twine was a no-brainer - there aint no Christmas without that colour twine - it should be a staple in everyones collection especially with the "season" almost upon us. Last but not least i stamped the adorable "for my friend" at the top of each bag and all i need now is to bake some cookies.

Thanks so much for coming by today and I hope you enjoy the rest of the blog hop - your next stop is Kim Schofield! The deadline to leave comments is 11:59 EST, Saturday Oct 22nd. Winners will be announced on the respective company blogs, Sunday Oct 23rd. Dont forget you have to leave comments on ALL blogs on the hop.

Have fun and good luck for the draw, "my friend"!!! (i just couldnt resist stamping a couple more times with this sentiment before i slipped it back into its packet lol.)

Operation Julie's Smile Blog Hop

“I am so glad that you joined us on this amazing blog hop for Operation Julie’s Smile. If you came here from Tifany deGough’s blog, then you are in the right spot. If not, you may want to start from the beginning at the Sweet Stamp Shop’s blog and take your time. You have ALL WEEKEND to hop with us and win prizes!”

The creative blogging community is coming together this weekend to help one of our friends, Julie Ranae.  You may know her as the Design Team Coordinator for many wonderful companies from bakers twine, die cuts, rubber stamps and more.  What many people don’t know about Julie Ranae is that she has had some pretty major dental surgeries in her lifetime due to medication she had to take as a child.  It was in her plans to think about having all of her teeth  replaced at some point in the next 5 years, a decision that was pretty easy to plan out.  But then it happened…she chipped her front teeth on a weekend a month ago. The dentist told her there was no way to save them & that it was his recommendation that she give in and have all her teeth removed soon, but for that day, they needed to get her front teeth done so her gums could begin to heal. He said he would 'work out payments with her to have ALL this work done...but when she called to make her appt for the first step of impressions, they told her the amount of money that was needed and that the 'payments' applied only to the two teeth that were extracted that day. Her husband Paul was with her & that too, was his understanding as well. So this is how she has found herself in this situation…Needing at least $4000 to get started and another $3000 to finish the process…a total of $7000. Nicole Rixon, owner of Sweet Stamp Shop put together this benefit after finding out about this situation and before Julie Ranae knew it, it took flight! Because she is an event organizer by trade, she has taken on the job of organizing all of the blogs in this hop as her way of ‘working overtime’ for what she needs, the same as if she were able to work overtime at an outside job to pay for the work to be done. It is the goal of all of these generous friends & sponsors to help make this situation more do-able for our friend so that she can share a brand new smile with all of us soon. If there is anything you can do to help with a financial donation, there is a donation button ready for you to click.  Any amount is appreciated and ALL DONATIONS will be eligible for prizes from our sponsor pool of over $2500.”


I wanted to share with you today a very simple idea that my son initiated actually. It seems to be the birthday season in his class at the moment and he is celebrating someones birthday almost every week. In his vast 9 years of birthday party experience??! he told me he wanted a birthday tag that he could just write the persons name on and go - not unlike "nutella and go"which is what he happened to have in his other hand at the time. Being the accomodating Mami that i am i decided to make his wish come true and came up with this clean and simple tag...well bunch of tags actually..his go-to stack shall we say.

(Stamp: Stampin Up, Ink: Versamark)

I simply printed the sentiment on my computer and stamped the fun bunch of kids underneath. I love the pink/brown combo so blossom and cappuccino Twinery twine was a no-brainer. I decided he should also at least write his own name and left a huge blank at the top for him to creatively draw the recipients name. The latter may not quite gel with my son's rather more minimalistic approach but at least i left him a suitable space should the mood arise one fine day.

“I hope you enjoyed your stop here on the hop!  The next stop is Grace Hester’s blog.  Make sure you leave a comment here before you go so that you can have a chance at the amazing prizes up for grabs and if you can, please make a donation so we can help bring back a new smile for our friend”

JULIE RANAE





of pink and green with a dash of cupcake!

a friends daughter had her birthday party recently and i was honoured to be asked to provide the table settings and goodie bags - all with a cupcake theme.

She supplied me with the serviettes and i worked around those... into glassine bags they went wrapped around a pink fork with each guests name on the negative of a cupcake tag - pink of course... (read on for where the "positive" cupcake landed lol!)

the little cupcakes in the bottom corner of this photo (to the left) are actually erasers... sooo cute!



These were what went into the favour bags.. as they were soo tiny i decided to "fatten" them up a little.. and made a "tissue" bag first..

i added some pink and green rafia "inside and out" to enhance my colour combo and then stamped on more glassine bags with an inkadinkadoo cupcake stamp and some yummy Jenny Bowlin ink.. love the stick candy colour and it was a perfect match.. the finishing touch was the "positive" pink cupcake punched from a fiskars squeeze punch... so those sweet little erasers ended up wayyy bigger than they actually were... but oh so pretty dont you think?

The party was held at a ceramic studio and each girl got to paint a ceramic cupcake.. a week or so later when they had been fired i made thank you tags to dolly up the plain brown bags their completed cupcake was delivered to them in.... used a touch of Echo Park Country Drive on these with a dash of blossom twine from the Twinery!

 i need to find another supply of glassine bags... theyre my current - go to!! lol.

and the lucky person is...

before i spill the beans and tell you who the very lucky person that won the Ultimate Sampler Twine pack is - i just wanted to say, in the fineprint below, i mentioned that i was expecting a "parcel" from Canada yesterday and i am delighted to report that 'said' parcel landed safely and is now happily installed back amongst us.. my DH has been away on business for a couple of weeks and was terribly missed by young and not so young alike!! Let me just say, it was such a nice feeling to be able to set the table for FOUR again last night...

anyway back to business - thank you soo much for all your wonderful comments and praise.. i was made up by the response to the Twinery blog hop! The person who will be able to twine happily away very shortly is.... Vanessa!!

Your card's really cute, love the little canvas dress. I don't have any twine YET {{{GASP!!!}}}, but I am loving grey lately so I'd have to say stone. :)

well in a few days you will indeed have ALL 14 colours of Twinery twine Vanessa - congratulations!!

The Twinery BLOG HOP

Today marks the start of the fabulous Twinery Blog Hop and over the next three days the whole design team will be showing off the great colours and numerous creative possibilities using this wonderful twine. So, if you came here from Jen Carters blog then you are on the right track.
My project for today is a card using one of the new colours, Denim. Its fast becoming my favourite actually, such a brilliant shade of blue.
Anyway if youre like me and dont like to throw away your scraps of twine then this idea is perfect for you. Simply mark the spot where you want to adhere your twine and lather on a nice portion of your favourite glue (i used a roller). Next place a layer of similar lengths of twine together and then add another layer right over the top at a 90 degree angle and hey presto you have a patch! Although possibly a little on the sad side, its a fact of life, we all have to say sorry at some stage and this card is a fun way to say it dont you think? Lets patch it up!!

(Dress - Maya Road; Alpha stickers - October Afternoon; Buttons - Doodlebug)

Last but not least i am delighted to advise that i am also hosting a giveaway as a thank you for stopping by on the blog hop. The Twinery has ever so generously offerred an

Ultimate Color Sampler Pack worth $25!!

How awesome is that. 

 In order to be in the draw for the pack you simply need to leave me a comment telling me your favourite colour of twine from all 14 colours offerred! The giveaway will close on Monday 0800 EST (when I just happen to be expecting a very precious delivery from Canada!!) and please be sure to leave me an address so that i am able to contact you should you be the lucky winner. The giveaway is open to Twinery lovers all over the globe so let me know what colour is at the top of your list.

Have fun on the rest of the blog hop, your next stop is Emily Leiphart

and just in case you lost your way completely please follow this list:

The Twinery                      

Stephanie Johnson        

Deena                                               

Monika Wright                 

Jenny Suchin                    

Grace Hester                     

Jen Carter                          

Hera Frei    (you are here!)

Emily Leiphart                  

you make my life a whole lot lighter!

as a recent party favour idea i wanted to do something "different". I found these miniature lighters on special in the $1 shop as i refer to it here and although at the time i had no clue what i would do with them - they were indeed different and extremely cheap (on special for .79c) - both high priorities on the conditions list!

i spent a few sleepless nights wondering how to incorporate them into a favour and came up with the following... a small gold bag, a doily for catching wax candle drips, a heart punch and the finishing touch - a dash of lilac twine from the Twinery, of course.

the sentiment on the label says... you make my life a whole lot lighter

didnt they turn out cute?! so if youre looking for a change from sweets in your goodie bags at your next (non children!!) party, why not try a lighter LOL!

ps. come back on wednesday - its the Twinery Blog Hop and there might just be some lovely twine on offer!!

End of Summer Blog Hop

just a heads up to pop over to the Twinery and check out the End of Summer happenings! They are celebrating the End of Summer over the next three days along with eleven other sponsors and it goes without saying....there are loads of prizes up for grabs and some very cool twine inspiration of course.

I have an end of summer tea party coming up and made these little invitations for it.. attached to a teabag with charcoal twine from the Twinery of course. Subsequently your guests can drink a cup of tea whilst reading their invitation - how handy is that!! Enjoy your day and Good Luck with all those lovely giveaways!

Stamp: PSX; Font: LD Quick Script.

showcasing: denim

it's my day at the Twinery today and after recently receiving the three gorgeous new colours they produced, denim, buttercream and stone - i chose to spotlight DENIM. It's such a brilliant shade of blue.

By now you are no doubt getting used to my very clean and simple style so this layout is no big surprise...however i wanted to point out two things on this page.

The first is that it is possible to put pink on your 12 year old son's project (as long as he doesnt see it!! lol) Actually there is good reason for this and that is, this page is loaded with emotion and pink was my way of bringing that through. My son will start college tomorrow and although he is over the moon excited about it, Mami is somewhat more subdued. Mami's are allowed to be like that on milestones, right? Anyway the real deal is - my first born is halfway out the door as my lovely husband rather more 'positively' prefers to see it!!?? I, on the other hand, am happy, proud and pretty sad mixed together ie. a mess! and i chose pink to portray my motherly emotional "mess" :-)

Secondly I wanted to really let the "denim" be in the limelight here and show you that a few loose strands of this beautiful twine is all one needs to add interest to an almost paper only page. There is no fancy tying or knotting it is simply detailing how the radiant denim colour totally contrasts to the papers and just goes to show -

Twine can be all you need to give a layout the perfect finishing touch.  
Et voila, my page dedicated to my son's first day in college, tomorrow...

I am sure there will be some happy tears shed by she who shall remain nameless but once thats all out of the way I am thinking we might just bring out the cupcakes and candles (and bubbles!) and celebrate our big boy.. moving on.

I hope I have inspired you to add a dash of DENIM to your next project.

you lucky duck!!!

WOW! what an awesome response to the Twinery's First Anniversary blog hop. It was great to see all the hoppers and i was overwhelmed by all the wonderful comments. Thank you so very much!
The very lucky prize winners have been announced over at the Twinery blog - maybe you were one of them - and if you were....... you're a lucky duck!!

Card materials: Echo Park - For the Record. Twinery - Lemondrop twine. Queen & Co. - gemstones. EK Success - label punch.

The Twinery/Echo Park Blog hop

We are so glad you could join the Twinery as they celebrate their one year anniversary all this week. If you came here by way of Danielle Flanders blog you are on the right track. If not, make sure you start at the beginning over at The Twinery's blog because there are terrific prizes for those who complete the hop by commenting on each blog.You'll have two days to enjoy this hop so relax and have fun!

The Twinery are giving away the Ultimate Sampler Pack

Be sure to hop to each of our amazing designers hops and check out the projects using bakers twine from the Twinery and the fabulously creative design papers from Echo Park.

I was lucky enough to team up with Echo Park for the party and used one of their original collections - A walk in the Park - its one of my all time favourite series of theirs.

I loved the coil pattern in the lazy days paper and simply imitated it with my carribean twine - coil over coil. i set it down and then just glued it where it crossed over so that some of it remained loose. Easy peasy!

 i placed some of their cute stickers along the bottom of my page and then ran "railings" of cappuccino twine down either side of the sentiment. It actually hides a multitude of sins along the edge of that strip as i freehand cut it and it strangely didnt come out all that straight. well not straight enough for this virgo anyway!
I'm so glad you stopped by! i hope i have inspired you to give bakers twine a try.Please make sure you leave a comment on my blog because there are terrific prizes for those who leave comments on each designers blog. The deadline for commenting is 1159pm est Friday August 19th. Prizes will be announced on Saturday August 20th. Your next stop on the hop is Sheri Twing's blog.
Good Luck and Happy First Anniversary to the Twinery!

happy swiss national day

first august is full of fireworks and celebrations in switzerland... oh and little cowbells on the table decorated with the brand new twine from the Twinery - today they released three new fabulous colours - stone, buttercream and denim. pop on over and check them out as well as some awesome projects showing them all off.

to the moon and back...

couldnt pass up an opportunity to play along in a bakers twine challenge and as a result this card was born. It was this weeks CREATE contest. The sentiment is from one of my childrens favourite books (from many moons ago lol) and the honeydew twine is of course from The Twinery.
I simply cut a bunch of twine to the same lengths, placed a line of glue in a semi circle around the writing and layered my twine on top. Lastly i gave it a quick snip at each end to make more of a moon shape.

go check out the rest of the cards - loads of awesome twine-ness!

Twine Nest Tip!

my apologies - its been a while but i am back with a useful twine tip....
whilst stamping these cute little birds for a new home card i discovered a useful way to use up my scraps of twine. I was about to use the nest stamp which came with the set and then had a lightbulb moment..i realised i could make the nest from twine rather than stamping it - and this was the result. not to mention a great boost of dimension and texture on my card to contrast from the stamps. all those little bitty bits that you trim from other projects can simply be layered together to form an egg nest... they would be great for Easter as well, even multi-coloured but for my congratulations on your new nest aka home cards, they were perfect. Make sure you head over to The Twinery for the best twine to "secure your new nest"!

all girl.

just wanted to show off one of my pages using the gorgeous Teresa Collins Coredination papers. the pink lattice pattern is so pretty and totally appropriate for a photo of me, no? lol. albeit of me in full stream telling a riveting story, no doubt. this was one of the few times i had my nails manicured and i was obviously trying to show that off! i am not really an "all girl" type at all.  :-)

"kinder" champagne all round!

its a big day in our house today. Our oldest DS passed his gymnasium (college) exams! i still believe its way too much pressure to have at such a young age... who knows if they want to go to university at the tender age of 12?? nonetheless he passed this first stage so is on track to possibly end up there one day. In any case we are extremely proud and it was screams and (happy)tears and bubbles all round! Very proud...