Tuesday 31 August 2010

Live show on Create and Craft on Friday at 11am!

I am well behind with my blogging recently and this is just a quick post to let you know that I am demonstrating on Friday's show for Craft Creations. 

It is a Christmas show that will feature a number of Craft Creation kits that include papers, peel offs and card packs.  My particular favourite packs on the show are the papers, they really are lovely, these have been a favourite of mine since they originally came out, so if you haven't seen Craft Creations Christmas papers before, it's maybe a good time to take a look at them!

There are glitter peel offs which are wonderful to work with, especially in the great style that Craft Creations use them.  The card packs, well, I don't think I need to say about the good quality of those, most of us know they are second to none with quality card...  The ladies on their team have made lovely cards for the show with the products and I hope that you will be able to watch on Friday morning live or maybe catch one of the repeats. I believe the show is to be presented by Leonie, it'll be great to have a natter and catch up with her.

For the stampers out there...Yes, we've got a stamping show coming up that I'll tell you more about soon.

Jill

Tuesday 24 August 2010

Half Price Unmounted Stamps!

We've had another sort out and have finally got round to preparing LOADS of individual unmounted stamps.  As they are half price they are selling very fast in the shop so if you are interested then get online quick!  There are lots of original Maureen Blackman and Wotknot Celtic designs that have always been popular. 

Please click HERE to find them

We still have some of the nautical designs available separately that you can see in the card above.  They are classics for cards for men but they are going really fast!! 

Friday 13 August 2010

The Stamp Man Challenge # 3 - Easel Cards


I was in a French Country kind of mood when I made this easel card for our latest challenge, I love the colours in this set of Starburst Stains, I had a rummage around my Tombow Brush Pen box to find colours to co-ordinate and applied them directly to my new Hero Arts cling stamps CG170 Wildflower Garden.  There are 2 stamps in the cling set, I think they are really versatile designs and I have other plans for them:)  We have them in stock HERE.

I used a number of techniques with the Starburst Stains for the backgrounds, mainly using the scrunch technique for the whole front of the card and the bottom front of the easel card.  I also punched the flowers from a scrunched sheet.  I made the width of the main panel wider so that I could add lots of ribbons to the side.


The base card is about 7", here it is when closed.


We are really pleased with the response we are getting with the challenges, thank you everyone who has entered so far, and we hope you will continue joining in with us.

Jill



Monday 9 August 2010

More Oriental card making kit cards

I'm having a great birthday today even though I'm at work, I received lovely cards and pressies (thank you!), even the sun was shining this morning which has been a rare treat for Yorkshire recently!

Here are more of the cards that Janet and Michelle made using parts of the Oriental card making kit I mentioned yesterday.

This is the kit, I listed the contents in yesterdays post, it costs £7.50 and can be found on our website HERE


You will also find the stamps that Michelle and Janet used, they are the clear stamps by Habico HERE.









Thank you again for making these ladies, they are all superb!

Jill

Sunday 8 August 2010

Oriental Card Making Kit


We've put a kit together containing materials for making Oriental cards.  As people may already have Oriental stamps and inks, we've only included papers and embellishments but we do have Oriental stamps to buy separately. 

The kit contains some of the embellishments in the Oriental section on our website and is a taster set for them. You can purchase any extra items if you wish to add to the kit later.

The kit is good value as there is more than £14 worth of materials included:


4 x A4 sheets of different Oriental patterned paper (normally £4)
1 x A4 sheet of red card
2 x metres of red eyelash cord
2 x gold cards and gold envelopes with die cut patterns
3 x Oriental playing cards
3 x large style stones (normally 80p)
3 x small style stones (normally 80p
2 x red knot embellishments
2 x blue knot embellishments
2 x lengths of mitzuhiki cords (normally £1)  An instruction sheet is included to help you make 2 different styles of Oriental knots, it also gives brief details of stamping onto style stones
1 x pack of 10 large Oriental brass coins (normally £2.99)
1 x double happiness brass coin (normally 50p each)
2 x square brass coins (normally 40p each)
2 x large brass fan coins (normally 50p each)
1 x red oriental tassel
1 x piece of Oriental ribbon

Paper template and instruction sheet to make an Oriental lantern.

DT members Michelle Marshall and Janet Clarke have made some cards using the kit and some of the other items from our Oriental section on our website (HERE), including some stamps you'll find there, to give you some ideas.  Some of the cards are below, I'll show more tomorrow.












Thank you for making these Janet and Michelle, they are lovely!

Have a good Sunday everyone

Jill

Saturday 7 August 2010

September Craft Stamper Magazine Continued...

 

I did mention I had more to say about this month's Craft Stamper magazine in my last post and have only just got round to posting again.  So, to continue where I left off...

Also in this month's magazine are great projects from Kay and Michelle, who are both on our Design Team and then there's my clock project too, I'm showing a little portion of it above.  As you can see I've embedded lots of time themed pieces into the UTEE, Katy the Editor had seen other versions of this technique on my blog and asked me to make something similiar for the magazine.

It actually started as an Ikea mirror but I took out the mirror and replaced it to make it into a working clock.  The items I used for the frame can be found on our website HERE.  I've made a separate section on the website for Craft Stamper project products so they are easier to find and will add to the section with our design team's projects when they have used products that we stock.  I had great fun making the clock and now have a couple more I am working on, I think I will make them with different themes though.  I'll show them to you when they are finished.

The other thing I wanted to tell you about is that we are sponsoring the Cardmaker of the Year Competition for Craft Stamper.  Click HERE for details of how to enter.

If you haven't got your September copy yet, we have them in stock to order by post now HERE. 

I hope you are having a great weekend!

Jill

Wednesday 4 August 2010

September Craft Stamper Magazine


Have you got your copy yet?  If not we have it in stock HERE!

This month's cover stamp has been designed by our very own stamp designer Tracey Coates, you may recognise this as it is a smaller image of a design from the Aspects of Design 63 Alluring Ladies stamp sheet, (which btw have 20% off at the moment so are £11.99 instead of £14.99!).   It is a perfect size for ATC's, in fact there are 2 stamps, the eyes and the word visage which is a new design Tracey has drawn.

Janet has taken this as a theme for the September ATC Swap, which is going to be 'The Look', if you have the stamp we hope you will join in with the swap, it will be great to see what you come up with when using it.  If you don't have it then there's plenty of time to have a think about the theme to come up with something else.

I will be posting again about the September CS issue as there's more to tell about it.

Only a short post for now as I'm about to get started sorting out the first batch of ATC's with Janet so we can select a winner for the blog candy before Janet does the actual swapping, very exciting!!!  Janet and Michelle are here this morning with their parent and young person journalling class, so it's a good time to get this done.

I hope you are having a good day!

Jill

Sunday 1 August 2010

TIME for a new ATC Swap!


Yes, the new theme is time!  Pop on over to our ATC Swap Blog to join us this month.  The design team have made some on the theme to get you started.

The background of this is coloured with distress inks with a splash of Starburst Stain for highlights.  The Hero Arts Big Clock stamp has been stamped onto shrink plastic that was also coloured with distress ink.  The wording was from a book of vellum quotes and the cogs are from Tim's Sizzix die.  The watch faces are great embellishments for this and are now on our website.

I'm looking forward to Janet visiting the shop this week where she will be swapping last month 'wings' ATC's and we will be selecting the winner of the ATC blog candy.  Your swaps will then be posted, exciting!!!!

I hope you are having a good Sunday!

Jill