To help those victims of the bushfires that have ravaged Victoria, Stampin’ Up! have launched a Bushfire Appeal.

Here are the details:

From 12 February through 31 March 2009, Stampin’ Up! will donate 50 percent of the retail value of all sales from a select group of 10 stamp sets to the Australian Red Cross Victorian Bushfires 2009 Appeal. 

Here is a list of the Bushfire Appeal sets:

*These sets will appear on the upcoming list of retiring products, so they will only be available for the Bushfire Appeal–while supplies last.

I will also be donating any commissions I earn this month from sales - so if there’s anything on the list that takes your fancy, in particular the retiring sets, please think about ordering them now - and help Stampin’ Up! help those who lost their homes and loved ones in the recent fires.

Don’t forget, you can order from me, from anywhere in Australia, and Stampin’ Up! will deliver to your door!

As of 20th February, the total raised was $15,744.85 !! Lets see how much more we can raise!

Thanks for your help!

I’m struggling at the moment, like many others in Victoria and Australia, to deal with the devastation that has occurred with those fires that started on the weekend. I’ve donated, and I’ve registered to start giving blood again, and thus far I don’t know of anyone personally who has been affected. I’m not sure what else to do right now to be honest.

I’ve been trying to design some cards over the weekend for my next Stamp-A-Stack, but my heart hasn’t been in it - please be patient, they’re coming! If you receive my customer newsletter it should be with you by the end of this week, for the Stamp-A-Stack designs for Sat 28th Feb.

In the meantime, here is a simple card I made with the free Sale-A-Bration set Botanical Blooms. It’s very simple, but I like it.

The colours are Rose Red, Certainly Celery, Brocade Blue and Pretty in Pink.

The sentiment is from Occasional Greetings.

Hope you like it, keep safe everyone!

Gosh he’s all growed up all of a sudden!

I was worried about how he was going to go to be honest. He was a bit clingy at the orientation sessions last year, and didn’t seem to keen on going to school, but LOOK OUT! He is a changed child. He LOVES school - was very disappointed that he couldn’t go on the Wednesday (rest day for the new preppies), and he’s the Roll Monitor, which, as he tells me, is a very big job. “Mum, I have to go to the office with one other kid, and NO ADULTS!”

I should be using this unprecedented child free time to design my next Stamp-A-Stack, but as my order hasn’t arrived… I’ll have to do that over the weekend.

Still, here is a card I made with the supplies from my last one in January - if you check your Mini catalogue on page 12, you’ll see I’ve just changed it around a bit. One of my class attendees (thanks Marg!) made one of her cards with the chair, and Missing You as the sentiment, and I thought it was so cool an idea, I have snaffled it!

The Missing You sentiment is from a Level One Hostess set, So Many Sayings (which I lurve). I’ve wheeled the Lots of Dots jumbo wheel onto the Real Red base card, and done my fave method of plonking the Bashful Blue inkpad all over the Bashful Blue piece to get that distressed effect. Now I know that my black line around the white card is not straight, and you probably won’t believe me because I fib to justify my mistakes, err, never make mistakes, BUT that was on purpose. The image just looked too stark on it’s own, but I didn’t want to rule a line - the image itself looks hand drawn, and the sentiment is wonky, so I went with that. Honest!

Oh, the little garden seat is from Time for You, which is from the Summer Mini Catalogue, which runs through to the end of March.

And before I go to get ready for work - my email provider is currently having a hissy fit, and I haven’t been able to get to my emails since LAST Saturday… so if you’ve emailed me in that time, please resend your message to jenni.oliver1@gmail.com and I can get it there!