Introducing.......... Aunty Vera's Creative Team 2017

Hello Crafty Friends!

Thank you for joining us today as we welcome our Creative Team for 2017!

These ladies will inspire and amaze you with their beautiful projects and fabulous ideas throughout the coming year. They will be sharing their Box Opening moments (always such fun!!), showing you their individual takes on using various products from Aunty Vera Land, sharing tips and techniques that will have you using your Stash in ways you may not have thought of, and running challenges to keep everything fun!

Please say hi in the comments section below, and show your support by following their Social Media pages. Because without them - Aunty Vera Land would just be a shop.

Returning to Aunty Vera Land in 2017.... please give a WOOHOO to Amira from AmiraInOz!

"Hello! My name is Amira and I love handmade creations. I love all things paper and out of paper, I love to make pretty things. From making your own cards, planners, journals and  embellishments to the more daunting processes of scrapbooking and making your own art, I hope to challenge both myself and you to get crafting in 2017. 

My motto is to be inspired and to inspire others. I hope you join us for a HAPPY 2017

I am currently working on a whole lot of happy mail to post out to crafty friends.

I'm also currently working on making paperclip ribbon tassels for planners and friends."

Here are some of Amira's latest creations......... so sweet!!

Follow Amira on You Tube HERE
And on Facebook HERE

Please welcome to the Team..... Donna! Hip Hooray!!!

"Tasmania is where I call home.. Married for 27 years to my best friend, 5 children, 10 grandchildren and 2 ½ great grandchildren.. I love crafting, reading, movies, dancing and my favourite place to be is home creating"

Here is one of Donna's latest creations..... *faint* 

Get social with Donna......

On Donna's Blog HERE
On facebook HERE
On You Tube HERE
On Twitter HERE

And big cheers for Lolly Palooza who is joining our 2017 Team all the way from the USA!

"I am a semi-retired R.N. and live in beautiful Colorado, USA.  I am fond of natural wellness, hiking, reading, paper crafting, and teaching.   My favorite crafting is coming up with ideas, projects, and techniques that I've been inspired to do in my "crafty dreams." "

Here is one of Lolly's latest creations ..... pass the smelling salts please!

Join Lolly on You Tube HERE
On Facebook HERE
And on Instagram HERE


What an exciting year 2017 is going to be! I can't wait to get started!!

We'll have some very exciting news about a fun new Aunty Vera Land product on the 1st of January.... so be sure to pop in and find out what we've been up to behind the scenes!

Enjoy the last few days of 2016.... and if you live somewhere hot (like I do)... keep cool!

Aunty Vera :) 

Exciting news!!!!!

A Month of Christmas Crafting 2017 - Advent Calendars

Happy Christmas Eve dear Crafters....... I hope you are all having a lovely day.

It's been super busy here with cooking and baking and baking and cooking....... lol.... big family dinner tonight! But I thought I would pop over and show you.....my advent calendars!!!!

Yes, you may remember that I showed a little bit of panic back in November when confronted with this.....

The big question was..... would I get this Kaisercraft calendar finished by the 1st of December??!!

Well I painted the frame.......

and put all the little boxes together......

I then used Kaisercraft's Glisten collection to cover the background of the shadow box, and all those little drawers.....

Biggest part done! Now all that was left was a bit of decorating and embellishing. 

 Kaisercraft's Sleigh Scene sits in the box and the glittery snow effect is achieved with Bo Bunny's Glitter Paste.........

And I left the rest of the background blank as I've had the clever (or not?) idea of buying a new ornament or craft piece every Christmas to put in this space......

I added a little something special.......... LIGHTS! (I just twirled a string of battery operated fairy lights through the tinsel). Pretty, yes?

Now I had so much fun making this calendar I realised I also had a Dusty Attic calendar in my stash. Sooooo.......

The calendar and houses are covered with Bo Bunny's Merry & Bright....

Now both my boys have new Advent Calendars. They are WAY too old for them but - like I say to them - they have to act excited for ME!! lol

Ok, off to check my oven!

Have a great day / evening

Aunty Vera xx

A Month of Christmas Crafting 2017 - Frosted Cards with Leanne

Hello Happy Crafters!

There have been so many wonderful Christmas collections released this year and one of my favourites is Kaisercraft's Frosted. I love the blues and greys and winter-y feel...... and don't even get me started on the stamp set. That tree!!!!!!

Our friend Leanne had so much fun creating Christmas cards with the Frosted collection...... feast your eyes!

For the first card I used 12"x 12" papers from the collection, the Kaisercraft Wooden Flourish Pack with a spray of white Kaisermist on them and Tim Holtz Distress Inks - Old Paper and Stormy Sky.

For the second card I used Frosted 12x12" papers, Tim Holtz ink - Hickory Smoke, Stickles - Star Dust and Christmas tree die cuts.

On the next card I used papers from the Frosted collection, Tim Holtz DistressInks - Stormy Sky and Hickory Smoke and some of the Frosted Collectables.

This card features papers from the  6" paper pad, the Collectables, Tim Holtz Distress ink and snowflake die cuts

I also made this shaker card using a Kaisercraft square nesting die and also the Kaisercraft 'Seasons Greetings' die along with some Stickles on the trees to give them sparkle. 

I hope these cards have inspired you

Leanne :)

How fabulous were those cards! I love the shaker card to bits!!!!!

Thank you so much for sharing Leanne.

Aunty Vera xx

A Month of Christmas Crafting 2017 - Christmas Postcards with Sarah

Hello Happy Crafters... how is your Christmas countdown going?
Me - I'm still experiencing that fabulous adrenaline rush of last minute Christmas card making....lol... so it's always great to find inspiration along the way. And Sarah's Christmas postcards are just that! Enjoy!!

I always get so flustered making cards, so thing year I thought I’d do something different and make Christmas postcards! I know that it’s essentially the same thing, but something about doing a postcard instead of a greeting card sets my creativity off.

I used old book pages as the base for all of them, and inked around the edges. For the first one I stamped a wreath directly onto the book page and coloured it using water colour paints. I stamped ‘Merry Christmas’ on some red card stock and cut and layered it with the green to create a little banner, before stamping a decorative border on each of the corners - the stamp was actually the top of a Christmas tree! 

For the next one I used an animal nativity stamp and coloured it using watercolours. I then stamped the sentiment and star directly onto the book page and added some kindy glitz to make it all sparkle. Isn’t the manger pretty?

For the last two I decided to paper piece some Prima dolls. I love the holly on Rita’s dress and because Nikki is so thin I added a Christmas tree to her postcard. I coloured their hair and skin using copic markers before adding glitter to them also. Nothing like a little sparkle! 

I learned something interesting when finishing these cards off. In order to protect them in the mail I coated them with a thin layer of Ranger’s Multi Matte Medium. But, when putting it over the kindy glitz it went all gluggy and didn’t look nice at all. I put another layer of kindy glitz on after the multi matte medium had dried, and this seemed to work much better. My advice would be to use any sealers before adding glitter! 

Hope you like these cards I’ve made. Merry Christmas! 

Sarah :)

 Thank you so much Sarah, these postcards are gorgeous! I especially love Rita in her holly dress!!

Aunty Vera :) 

Aunty Vera's Kitchen - Christmas Cranberry Cake

Hello Happy Crafters.... it's the weekend and that means it's time for.......

I needed to make something special for an End of Year / Christmas morning tea this week and remembered that I had saved an awesome looking recipe on Pinterest for a Christmas Cranberry Pound Cake. Well that was it! I just HAD to make it! Follow THIS LINK to the original post and recipe (then tell me how you could possibly resist?!! lol)......

Here is mine....

 As you may guess from the picture I totally forgot to get the camera out when it was whole!!

I so totally recommend this recipe! It makes a beautiful moist cake. I was worried that the frozen cranberries I used would be too tart but the masses of sugar and white chocolate in the cake totally negated that cranberry scrunchy face effect.

I probably chose a bad slice for taking pics... there WERE a lot more cranberries in the cake. I promise! They just seemd to have migrated to the parts that I DIDN'T photograph!!

I did make a few changes to the recipe. I only used 1 cup of sugar. Also I didn't bother with the whole melted butter over the top of the batter thing.... basically because I'm lazy (lol) but also since I was icing it, I didn't really see the point.

I also used less icing sugar in the frosting. Add it gradually and taste as you go to get it the way you like it.

It's a fairly quick and easy recipe to make..... and just lovely for this time of year. My friends absolutely loved it and so did I!

Anyone for a slice of cake and cup of tea?
Aunty Vera :)