Dream Big

Hello dear bloggers,

Belated Happy New Year to all of you.

Wow, this was a long absence indeed. My older one was visiting from university and my mum also joined us from India so it was a nice reunion. My older one, Zeenya is 20 years old and she is great company. She has chosen Psychology so there was lots to share besides other things.

For New Year's Eve, we went to a beautiful Indian restaurant for dinner. There was live Indian music accompanied by traditional folk dances from Punjab, the green state of India. The food was good, too.

Now to my card. The background has been created with Camlin brush markers from India on 300 gsm watercolour paper. As you can see, the hues of these brush markers are bright and super colourful which I simply love. 

The stars and sentiment have been die cut using a yoghurt lid which seems to be quite my trademark for some time now. Lol. 

I will participate in the following challenges:

http://alwaysfunchallenges.blogspot.com/ - anything goes

http://lilpatchofcraftyfriends.blogspot.com/ - always anything goes

http://cardsgalorechallenges.blogspot.com/ - anything goes

Happy card making,

Monica

Partially recycled

Dear bloggers,

Life has been nicely busy... I just finished the last session of 'guided meditation and the science of happiness' session for the parents at school. It went well overall and I am grateful that the parents who attended the programme found it calming and enjoyable. We managed to collect a sizeable sum from the earnings of this programme and went to visit the shelter for abused women where we handed over the cash along with 20 handmade cards with love to be used for birthdays at the shelter for women and children. I also took small tubes of hand lotion from Bodyshop to spoil the ladies.

The card below is one of the 10 thank you cards that has been requested by the manager of the shelter. 

This time I concentrated on giving goodies to the staff at school and tried to include whoever I could and it was so nice to see smiles on their faces. A small pack of chocolates or biscuits can create such wonders!

Now to my card which has been created with silver washi tape, a strip of printed vellum and a sentiment which has been die cut from a yoghurt lid. I thought the photo was fine but obviously, it is not. Lol. There is always a new tomorrow to hope that it will be better next time.

I will enter my card in the following card challenge:

https://perfectlycas.blogspot.com/ 

https://cutecardthursday.blogspot.com/ - anything goes

http://southerngirlschallenge.blogspot.com/ - anything goes

https://thethreemuseschallenge.blogspot.com/ - white space

Happy card making,

Monica

Partly recycled

Hello dear bloggers,

Here is a rather bright birthday card made with leftover tape from Aleeza's acrylic painting. She used it as masking tape and when she got it off the canvas it was too nice to be thrown away. Known to be the recycling queen (title given by dear Lynn), I had to use it and this is what I did. 

The birthday sentiments are store bought. It looks a bit messy here as the background is too close to the colours on the card but in real life, trust me it looks really nice.

Happy card making,

Monica 

For CAS(e) this sketch

Hello dear bloggers,

Ever since I started these meditation sessions for parents in school, life has become full and busy in a nice sort of way. I would have raised something like 1600 dollars at the end of two terms. The good news is that the Singapore government will match each dollar donated so the contribution would get doubled.

Now to my simple card for CAS(e) this sketch. 

The flower has been die cut with the packaging paper of a bouquet. In the centre is a ready made pink flower from my stash. The silver nestie has been die cut from a yoghurt lid. The purple nestie under it has been die cut from a piece of cardstock. I embossed a piece of cardstock and stuck it on the card before sticking the rest of the stuff on it.

I will enter this card in the following challenges:
https://moo-mania.blogspot.com/ - use your scraps
http://cardsgalorechallenges.blogspot.com/ - anything goes
http://happycraftchallenge.blogspot.com/ -anything goes
http://challengeleannsworld101.blogspot.com/ - anything goes

Happy cardmaking to you,

Monica 

Happy Birthday card

Hello sweet bloggers,

Here is a card that Aleeza die-cut using a new die we bought over Amazon (for a fraction of the price I would have paid in a store here) and she used Pentel watercolour tubes to colour the flowers, leaves and borders. She said she found the border quite tedious to colour in. I stuck it over cardboard squares instead of double-sided foam dots to make it environment friendly. A pink ribbon saying happy birthday was tied over the rectangular nestie to complete the picture. I quite like this shabby chic kind of card.

I will submit this card to the following challenges:

http://southerngirlschallenge.blogspot.com/ - anything goes

artydivas - anything goes

http://lemonshortbreadchallenge.blogspot.com/ - anything goes

Happy card making,

Monica

Thank You card by Aleeza

Hello dear bloggers,

Here is a card to show you today which was made a month ago. The green and gold effect was done Aleeza with a sponge. She basically used the leftover acrylic paints from a canvas to get this effect. 

I quite like how it turned out and the thank you sentiment was die cut after Aleeza went over a packaging sheet with Mala gold colours. There were some telltale signs on the white parts of the paper so I stuck rhinestones to cover it up. 

Down below is the room where I held the meditation sessions in school yesterday. There is a plaque which says, 'The purpose of our lives on this earth is to be happy' - by Dalai Lama. I am trying to learn that!!! Lol.

We had our first session for the second term and it went pretty well with a turnout of 10-11 people. We did a fun introduction of ourselves without talking of our children or our work followed by a guided meditation and we read randomly from inspiring books. 

It was fun and we did some more meditation. In the end, we watched a ted talk on slowing down which was quite interesting. 

I will participate in the following challenges with my card:

https://audsentimentschallengeblog.blogspot.com/ - thank you 

https://craftingwithanattitude.blogspot.com/ - anything goes

http://southerngirlschallenge.blogspot.com/ - anything goes

Arty Divas  - anything goes

Thank you for reading and happy card making,

Monica 

Partly recycled

Hello bloggers,

I have good news to share. Today my initiative hosted a meeting wherein I conducted a meditation and a speaker came to talk about essential oils and their therapeutic benefits. Tomorrow begins my second programme for meditation and relaxation in school for the parents.

Here is my card to show you today which has been upcycled using a chocolate packaging. The orange dots are shiny in real life. The hand made papers are leftovers from a larger sheet. The sentiment is a die-cut and I have put a rhinestone over the i of smile to jazz it up.

I will enter this card in the following:

artydivas - anything goes

http://lemonshortbreadchallenge.blogspot.com/ - anything goes

https://artsystamperchallenge.blogspot.com/ - monochromatic

http://lilpatchofcraftyfriends.blogspot.com/ - anything goes

Happy crafting,

Monica