My frames arrived today, I could be taking a closer look at them shortly.
It has been an odd day as DH went off to work late and will be out till very late so my routine has been all upside down and I haven’t done a thing. I haven’t even had time to decide what I am going to do with the frames. I am hoping inspiration will strike when i get to my desk.
I placed an order last Thursday and got notification that it had been dispatched over the weekend, supposedly first class if the website is to be believed. It hasn’t arrived and I so want to get some frames made. I will be making a note not to use the site again. Most online suppliers make the effort to get stuff out next day if not the same day so I was really expecting things to be here. Not a happy bunny.
On a positive note I did get my pages finished but forgot the batteries for the camera so they are waiting to be done tomorrow. That will be when the post arrives and I up up 2 flights of stairs I don’t doubt.
….the finished tag collection. I put it all together with the Bind It All and finished it off with fibres and ribbons.
I had a free day today so I popped down to Pickleberry and took some photos with me. I have been working on and 8 x 8 album with different techniques in, one for each letter of the alphabet. It as been badly neglected recently so I did some more of that. None of them are finished as they need titles which I will get cut on the Robo in the next few days. I had a play with the new Tim Holtz dies as well. Thanks to Kate I managed to get a US flag on one page as well.
I have been in the craft room for a couple of hours, tidying up a couple of the tags with small embellishments and remaking a couple of the pages for the book. I got my Alice stamps out to complete the theme.
Here are all the tags 
And the pages to hold them
Now all I have to do is to finish off with some threads and ribbons and find some charms to complete it all. I will post another pic when it is done.
The workshop was really good and I have had a wonderful day. We mad a book of tags with all the different techniques, I will take some pics tomorrow and post my favourites.
The next best thing is that Jenny from the Artistic Stamper is going to do a mixed media class in May – something else good to look forward to.
OK so we now have thunder and lightning so I am off to get the camera out in case it gets good enough to get some shots.
I had big intentions this morning, a few hours free and I was planning to scrap. Instead I realised I needed to gather a small toolkit and bits to take to the workshop tomorrow. That quickly degenerated into a big tidy up and a bit of reorganising.
I now have my toolkit ready to go with a new heat mat and a new apron. I really should have done something with that. My lunch is in the fridge, a nice healthy salad, and I am ready to go. I will do a full report on what we do but it may not be till Sunday as I will be back too late to get it done tomorrow.
Yes my eyes have totally settled down and I am back to my daily edition. I have managed to do a bit of scrapping, I did a LO yesterday but haven’t quite finished – picture to follow.
I have decided we need some up to date pictures of the boys so have ordered some chipboard frames that I can decorate and then get some nice pics as the weather improves. I have a few ideas for the frames but don’t want to start till after Saturday as I have a workshop on distress inks to go to and there may be some new ideas I can use. Besides the frames have to arrive first.
I have mild infections in both eyes and I have to rest them as much as possible. So as I have to work that is where my time is being spent at the moment so not much crafting. I can watch the TV and flick through magazines but that is boring to report on day after day so, until things are easier I will be giving this a rest as well. Hopefully it will only be a day or 2.
I had a play with metal this morning and I think I need to find someone who is already used to using it. I need a few more ideas than using embossing moulds and peel offs. I did find out one co0l thing though.
The metals I have are purple one side and silver the other so I embossed to use the purple as the top, then I tidied it up and sanded it, that showed the silver through which I liked. However I made a few mistakes and some sanded bits were not what I wanted. I decided to try and paint the wrong bits with some alcohol inks. I have a pen that you fill with alcohol inks but I have filled it with blending solution. I tried the ink fill but all that happened was the purple came off, clearly the blending solution was removing the purple. So I did learn that at least. I also found out that my stamping mat is perfect for embossing on, not too soft but just right.
I have been trying to watch some more of the videos but they are buffering just too much to watch sensibly. Maybe I will have a look for some more or try and see if I can find a workshop somewhere.
I am really pleased with the first of this years travel books. I used a variety of different techniques which made it interesting. I used alcohol ink on the acetate cover and that showed the stamped and distressed front page. On the other ages I used plain stamping, stamping and heat embossing, spritzing with a mask, rub ons etc.
this morning. Should have been working but everything I touched was only half there so I gave up.
I popped into Kate's and got the Bazzill I needed and a few sheets of Basic Grey from the Granola range. There is still something about BG, it just shouts at me to buy and use it. I also got an Acetate and Chippies album, the tag shape, to make the Journal for our holiday in Norfolk. The BG will be just right for that, the colours are perfect.
Then I saw this, the Tim Holtz stamp storage
and I fell in love. I know it is only acrylic but it is so gorgeous, looks just like tooled leather and very expensive. I also know that I have recently made a lot of storage for my unmounted stamps but there you go.
There is a video on You Tube showing how to customise it with acrylic paint but I am not sure I want to do that, at least not now, but that may change.
I have been watching the Ten Second Studios videos and there are some lovely ideas. In particular there is one I found with Tim Holtz but I haven’t had time to watch that one yet.
That is it for my crafting today, not much but it has taken up all the afternoon just sitting and watching and taking a few notes. I will have time to try some of them out at the weekend, or maybe even tomorrow.
That’ me at the moment. I can’t seem to get back to my routine and it is driving me nuts. I am OK in the morning but come lunchtime and it all goes to pot. I have got used to having lunch then spending some time on crafting. Now that can be half an hour with a mag, watching TV shows live or recorded or getting into my craft room and doing some. Then in the evening, after supper, settling down to catch up on blogs and blogging. The last bit is the most difficult right now and I seem to be failing badly.
I am hoping that actually putting this here will drive me to get back on track.
So Wednesday saw my metal sampler arrive. I have some basic tools and some metal to play with. I put a piece through my embossing machine and it worked perfectly, I want to try alcohol ink on it later. There are lots of videos on the Ten Second Studios site and I want to take a look at those.
Catch you later I hope.
I mean books with pockets and not the ones you keep in a pocket. We are hopefully having 2 holidays this year and I need to make a book for each so I have somewhere to keep receipts, tickets etc. I keep a written journal or blog for our holidays and have done for ages now, they get printed off and included in the album(s) I make for each. I also have all these little books with lots of bits in them that haven’t made it into the albums. I love looking back through them and seeing what we bought, where we ate and stayed and some of the things we did.
Ideas for this year are coffee filter books, tag books, concertina books and anything else I can find for a change.
Our first holiday will be to Norfolk in June where we have a boat for a week so this will be a nature based theme. We haven’t finally decided on the second holiday but it will be at the end of September and somewhere there is still some warmth and sunshine so this may be a ‘hot’ theme. More as I get things organised.
Off to watch QVC for a couple of hours, maybe there will be some inspiration there.
was very busy! A full day in the office which is very rare, and and evening seeing Alice in Wonderland with the wonderful Johhny Depp.
So no crafting but I am hoping to make up for it today!
Yes I managed to get it done. I tried a couple of sources before I found the one I used, had some problems with the others but this one was easy and there are lots of variations to choose from. When I change the photos, or do another one, I will try out some of them. There are also 2 LOs in the selection that I finished this morning. I am having great fun trying to use up lots of old stash too. there are more to add yet so watch out for changes.
Happy Mothers Day to all Mums out there, I got a lovely card and a prezzie to come in the next day or so.
well one of them failed yesterday, I wrote and up loaded my post from Live Writer but it didn’t show up. So what did I do yesterday – well not much really. I was quite busy with work so didn’t have that much time. I read all the blogs that I am subscribed to, assuming they had posted of course. I also downloaded a couple of ideas for future projects.
I am going to combine this with today’s post. I have been into the craft room and managed a couple of LOs but then the F1 qualifying started and I HAD to stop. This afternoon there is 3 hours of crafting on the TV and I am planning to watch that and take notes and draw some sketches.
that’s what I have made today, and my desk is covered with them. I need to get them together and assembled in the small bowl I have. Then I can display them with the grandkids pictures.
I am quite surprised I got them done as it has been a busy day with visitors and a lunch out but I always say I work better when I have lots to do.
More tomorrow I hope…
OK so now I should be up to date as this is officially Wednesdays post.
I have been looking at Shimelle’s class for a while thinking that I didn’t really need to do it but yesterday I gave in. Her latest is all about using
up all that stash that is accumulating, including things like brads, buttons and ribbons. I though it might stretch me a bit as well. I got the first prompt today and there will be 3 a week so I should be able to keep up nicely. The plan is to make use of the prompts at the weekends when I can definitely have some time to scrap and it will also make the Texas album a bit different.
Where did 2 days go? I am quite cross with myself, I have not updated here since Sunday so. This post is for Tuesday which will mean I can say I just missed one day, as long as I post later.
So what has happened in the crafting world for me. Well I had the privilege to win a lovely stamp in the blog party at http://www.your-creativemoments.co.uk/ on Saturday, I will be showing that off as soon as it arrives. I also asked a question about the alcohol ink pen during the party and the lovely Claire answered that yesterday. You can see her explanation on the blog here.
I have been keeping an eye on QVC as well, they had a TSV yesterday, very pretty and cute but not me somehow. I did order some stamps though, acrylic and classic flowers.
A bit off topic but on the subject of QVC I received a delivery from them and the item was faulty. I phoned them yesterday morning and they couldn’t be more helpful. I got a heartfelt apology and they arranged to have it collected at my convenience. I so wish customer services were like that in other companies.
So, if it all goes to plan I will see you later.
That is what I have now, after playing with stuff earlier. I got a couple of LOs done, suppose I will have to create a slide show soon and get them uploaded, there are probably enough now.
Once that was done I decided to play. I have a pretty stamp from hero Arts, it has a blank centre and grasses and seed heads round the edge. Unfortunately I don’t have an acrylic block quite big enough to use it properly so I have been playing, Today I used Versamark and out the paper on top, trouble was I couldn’t then quite see were I had inked it so it was a bit of trial and error and the odd pick up and catch the light, till I decided to use Perfect Pearls. I spritzed them, that not only sets them but tend to intensify the colour a little. Then I stamped a poppy in the centre, used Distress Ink in red, then water brushed the colour to highlight the flower. I then sprayed some sparkle mist over the top and ruined the whole thing by spraying too much. I had fun though!!!!
I took out a subscription to one of our crafting mags recently and, though it has been a struggle, the DVD which was the subs offer at the time, finally arrived today. I won’t bore you with the story, probably because I am pretty bored with it myself. Suffice it to say that I now have it sorted and may well not renew when my year comes up. i will just order it through my local newsagent instead. i can’t be bothered with all the hassle and having to deal with customer service staff who try to wriggle out of things.
Enough! I have the DVD and it is all about stamping, one of my favourite things to use. There are some old and some new things to try and I need to watch it again and make some notes then give things a go.
I really hope I can get to do some real craft tomorrow!
I have had a long day at work today which is quite unusual these days, we seem to have got our working days organised so we only do the odd full day and it really comes hard when it happens. never mind, it brings the cash in!
This means that I won’t make the attic today. I have only occasionally been an evening scrapper as I have had it by the time supper is done. This evening though I will be doing some titles for the Texas LOs. I have a few in mind and have a ‘lite’ version of the software I use right here on my netbook so I can sit in front of the TV and so them.
That’s what happened today. I managed to sort out the envelopes for the invites, and left them behind when I came downstairs. I did a very quick, very simple LO as well, that came out of trying out a TH technique which didn’t quite work as expected but I loved the effect.
Basically I cut a rectangle with round corners using a Coluzzle template. then applied distress inks in 5 colours, using the blending tool. The nest bit was the bit that didn’t do as expected. I inked up a stamp with Distress Ink then misted it with water and stamped onto the shape. Took the heat gun to dry it off and the stamped image was supposed to bleach out but it didn’t. I got a muted version of the image and it looked great. Now as much as I like Tim’s stuff I can’t always see how I am going to use them but this was perfect.Somehow I had chosen colours that went with a couple of photos so I used it as a base for the title. As before this LO will be in a slide show sometime soon.
I have been really busy with work, trying to rectify problems caused by others, always seems to take 3 or 4 times longer than it should.
So the only craft today has been to watch some stuff on QVC and I have to say I was bored so I turned it off.
I want to plan some sketches this evening, more LOs from TX. Then I can get some more done.
Hope your day has been more exciting than mine.
Will it mean more time to craft, I hope so.
I finished the cards today, they are all slightly different as the main image is hand tinted with Distress Inks, the embossing on the main card is also coloured with the same ink, I used a cotton bud for that.
I just have to get the addresses on the envelopes now.
