Bird Song Tea Bag Caddy

You may remember a couple of months back, that I made a Tea Caddy using the lovely "A Ladies Diary" collection of papers, which had lots of fussy cutting of the ladies on the side panels.

So, this coming Tuesday, I will be teaching the ladies at Alice in Paperland how to make one of these lovely Tea Caddies.  Quite often in my classes I will have already done the cutting of various pieces of cardstock and papers just to speed things up a bit, but this project will have the ladies starting right from the beginning.

The original Caddy in the photo is currently on display at Alice's with details of the coming class, which meant I needed to make another to ensure that all my instructions are correct.   This time I decided to use papers from the "Bird Song" collection and give it an oriental feel.

My instructions were given a little tweaking, which resulted in my lid fitting better than it did in the first caddy. As you can see there is no fussy cutting in this version, each picture was just adhered flat to each panel.  I'm still deciding which papers the class will use, because I rather like both of them, or perhaps I'll give them a choice ........ English Ladies or Oriental Ladies.

Thanks for visiting and all your lovely comments.

Happy crafting!

Footnote:  the ladies all decided to go with the Oriental version and they looked great!

Bird Song & Dragons

I'm sure most of you reading this would have heard the words "mum, can you make me a card for ....... , the party is tonight, remember I told you about this last week?" or words along a similar vein.  And so it was last weekend when DS#1 reminded me that I said I'd make a card, the theme for the night was 'dragons'.  Oh yes,  sorry I thought it was next weekend, oops!  

Out came my new "Bird Song" collection of paper from Graphic 45, along with a stamp set I'd bought at the same time that has a lovely dragon in it.   I'll make a never-ending card, that'll be fun and keep the birthday girl amused, but alas the dragon stamp was just too big to fit, and if you've ever made one of these cards, you'll know you need to keep your folds, well, foldable.  OK, next idea - why not a tri-fold shutter card, that should work, and it did, beautifully.

I coloured the dragon using three different Distress Markers directly onto the stamp, gave it a good Darth Vader huff, and stamped it onto ivory cardstock.  I love how the colours blend into each other when using this method.  The remainder images are cut from the Bird Song papers, and the words are copied from another stamp (which was far too big to fit in the space) "Do not meddle in the affairs of Dragons -  for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup!".  I've had this stamp for ages, so have no idea whether it is still available, but it came from Stamp It - 'Good with Ketchup'  #2025G.

DS#1 tells me the birthday girl really liked the card (and the quote) and he caught up with friends at the party who he hadn't seen for a while.

I've been playing with more of the lovely Bird Song papers, so I'll be back again soon with something else to show you all.

Have a crafty day!

 

Relaxin' with Gibi & Gooseneck

Thought I'd drop by and introduce you to "Relaxin'" with  "Gibi" & "Gooseneck", just three of the characters from the Stampotique range of stamps, that are taking centre stage in my next class at Pages 2 Scrap on the Central Coast at Tuggerah in October.  I saw some of these stamps earlier in the year while window-shopping at at craft market (I was very good and didn't buy anything) and was quite intrigued by them.  And so when I saw them on the shelf at Pages 2 Scrap, I couldn't resist buying 1 or 2 or ........!  As I was surfing the net, I came across Michelle's blog here and was inspired by her creations.  Thanks Michelle!

These are a bit different to my usual type of cards, more arty, sort of halloween meets Tim Burton style.  I was quite happy with the way they all turned out, and each card is going to look different, even if it's only because every background will be different.

Happy crafting!

Techniques with Tim

Techniques with Tim Holtz, almost but not quite.  I've had a most enjoyable morning at Alice in Paperland playing with a whole assortment of Tim's techniques thanks to the talented two,  Jenni & Kerrie.  A few months back they were lucky enough to attend Tim's class held in Sydney, and came back brimming with all his wonderful techniques, and of course, there were lots of people who wanted them to do a class, and so they have teamed up to do two classes.  Today we made 10 tags, and next week the second lot of 10 tags will be taught - 20 tags in total.  Can't wait to get inky fingers again, it was such fun.

The tags were made using Distress Stains, Dabbers, Distress Inks and a little bit of shimmer thrown in just to add a sparkle.

I think this is my favourite tag, although my photo doesn't do it justice.   It has a beautiful suede feel and is made by scrunching, dabbing, drying, dabbing some more and finally adding some perfect pearls to add shimmer.  I just keep wanting to pat it, hee hee!

Have a crafty day!

The month that was ....

I've just come home from teaching my second class at Pages 2 Scrap at Tuggerah, bit disappointed that more didn't join the class, but those that did enjoyed a morning of crafting.  Today's cards were the Kaisercraft Vintage Tag cards, lots of blending Distress Inks and fussy cutting, but at the same time, relaxing.  I'm repeating this class at Alice In Paperland on Tuesday morning at 10am, so if you're reading this and you live in Sydney and want to have a fun morning out, give Alice a call on (02) 9638 1523.

I finally got October's class cards finished last night as they were due for submission by today!  My friends who know me well, know that I'm good at panicking finishing things at the last minute.  But I'm reasonably happy with them.  They are more arty then I normally do, quirky meets halloween Tim Burton style, you'll have to wait and see ...... they'll be posted soon, I promise.

My apologies for not posting very much recently.  Very sadly we have lost both my father-in-law and my father in the last 4 weeks and our family has been rather distracted.  There are things that need to be done at a time when you are feeling very emotional and upset and you just seem to run on auto-pilot.  This last week the days seem to have blurred into each other, so if you were to ask what I did two days ago  I'll probably look blankly at you.

Next week is the final week of school before the holidays, which means for my DS#3, no more school.  Wednesday evening is the Year 12 Formal, with Friday being the Year 12 Final Assembly.    After the holidays he has his HSC exams and then he's finished.  Yikes! where the time go?

Anyhow, I need to finish babbling on because I'd really better have a look at what we might be having for dinner tonight before the hungry hoards family start ferretting around in the fridge!

Until next time, happy crafting!

Pages 2 Scrap

A few weeks ago, my BFF forwarded me an email from her local papercraft store, Pages 2 Scrap, located at Tuggerah on the Central Coast.  When I'm on the Coast visiting, I love going to this store, as they have lots of goodies to ooh and ahh over, and I rarely leave without buying something.  Anyhow ..... the email she sent was headed "Card Teachers Wanted" and she thought I might be interested in applying.  My initial thought was "it's an hour away" but as she pointed out, how many people commute to Sydney on a daily basis and never think twice ...... she had a point.  So I thought "why not?".  The criteria was to email 3 recent pieces of work, meet submission deadlines and have experience in teaching cardmaking.  I fitted all three, so sent off the relevant information.

If you think these cards look familiar, then you'd be right, they have all been posted on my blog before, but the store really liked them so a few days later I headed off to meet up with the owner and before I knew it, I was booked to teach two classes in September.   Yesterday was my first class teaching A Ladies Diary set of cards and the 5 ladies who attended all had a lovely morning crafting.  My next class will be in a couple of weeks time and we will be making the Kaisercraft Vintage Tag cards.  I'm yet to put together my samples for the October class, but it's on the drawing board in my head (which could mean anything hee hee).

Wishing a Happy Father's Day to all those dads and grandads out there.

Have a crafty day!