Fun filled week...

.... last week was a weird and wonderful selection of this'n'that...

tuesday - a normal day in the land of sparkly things...
.... and a quick trip over to PaperArtsy HQ.... I spy with my little eye something beginning with B H....

wednesday .... a lovely day over at Tewin teaching a couple of workshops for Card Inspirations - really nice to see some familiar faces (and of course new ones too)

thursday ...another 'quick' trip to a&e - its an on-going issue - all under control now :o)
... back home to find a pigeon has flown down our lounge chimney and can't get out - its not a big chimney (and pigeons are quite big) so we're not sure quite how it managed it - but it did.....

friday... 0700hrs  operation free pigeon! it took both me and hubby to extract our feathered friend from the chimney - it had settled (probably exhausted) on the mesh at the bottom of the chimney - our chimney hasn't ever been a wood/coal burning fire one so the mess was minimal (LOTS of lost feathers) and the pigeon, I can happily report, was fine - we (lol, ahem hubby) put it on the garden table and it flew off straight away - a happy ending.  We were quite proud of our rescue effort - while in our pj's at 7am!!

saturday... a this'n'that day

sunday.. a lovely day teaching my 'Grow' canvas workshop over at Crafting Time.... more about that in a later post...

It was a good week!
Something else exciting happened too but that's also for another post....
I spy with my little eye something beginning with BB...

Enjoy the sunshine...

Card Inspirations....

..... was one of the first shops where I ran classes - I loved teaching there & I was really sad when they closed their bricks & mortar shop a couple of years ago.... They have maintained an online shop and this month they are going to run their first 'pop-up' shop in Tewin where I will be running a card making class in the morning and another in the afternoon (repeat of morning).

I'm really looking forward to returning to Tewin - I hope you can come along to shop or get inky/painty with me.  It would be lovely to see some familiar faces.
To book your place please call Card Inspirations - go here for more details.

All good things must come to an end....

... but sometimes they end too soon don't they!

Yesterday - Saturday - was my last class at Card Inspirations ... actually its the last class ever at Card Inspirations as they'll be closing their shop doors at the end of the month.

This is sad because
1) its always sad when a good, friendly shop closes
2) I've really enjoyed teaching for them over the last 2 and a half years.  It was a great team to be part of and a really nice place to work... the ladies I've taught have been a pleasure and I will really miss it. 

So thank you to everyone who made being there so enjoyable- I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did!

L to R:  Some of the CI team:  Sarah, Me*, Lynn, Christina and Katrina

* (looking a bit red nosed because I got a bit teary when I left! lol)

Taking the 'stress' out of 'distress'....

...with the help of a few Tim Holtz stamps...

I made these for a classI taught  at Card Inspirations last week - Mixed Media...  The stamps came in at the very last minute - well, technically half way through the class (luckily I had a back up plan!)  I don't think I've ever been so pleased to see a set of stamps! lol  and they are very nice stamps lol

The cards were created using distress inks, acrylic paint, perfect pearls, archival inks (the oriental text on the bottom left card is a different stamp make - sorry, don't know which...)

Card Inspirations....

... is where I spent a lovely couple of days (fri & sat) teaching and getting creative with the ladies - much fun had with shaving foam, inks, stamps and the Cuttlebug! (not all at the same time you understand! lol)

But there was a small hitch in the plan when one of the sample cards I'd made was awol from the shop - so to the ladies from that class who wondered what the card looked like...

...  here it is - its simple but v cute (even if I say so myself! lol) - its only a sneak peak because the class runs again towards the end of the month.... (and by then the card - and another thats m.i.a- will have been found - or I'll have recreated them... I think the latter will be the case! lol)

any questions - please email using the addy under photo top right.  (love the stamps used by the way - the detail inside the petals)

Demonstrating at Card Inspirations

I normally teach CI, and occasionally I demo and that's what I was up to on Saturday. 
It was a good day - played/worked with the Cuttlebug - of course!
(apolgies in advance for the slightly dodgy picture quality on this post)

After demo'ing the Cuttlebug here's some of what I created later:
I created this card using the 'flower' embossing folder and one of the cute little 'Notelets' from one of the new PaperMania ranges: 

I also worked with one of the PM clear acrylic albums.  These come in various shapes (scalloped hearts, circles etc) but I used one of the simple square shapes.  Instead of creating an album I turned a page 90degrees so the binding holes were at the top and made door/name plaques.

On 'Freya's' I stamped on the acetate's surface with white stazon, used the PM notelets again as a mat for the name, and painted a couple of chipboard flowers and of course some buttons & bling!

For 'Max's' name plate I die cut a few images from Basic Grey's Archaic range and matted and layered it up.

I really like the transparency of acetate - seeing the different layers behind and infront.

Later in the week I'm going to use a few more of the pages as album cover.... 

These albums come with 6 pages in the pack - so I'm thinking these could be used to create:

• 3 albums with acetate covers or
• 6 name plates or
• 1 12 page album (2 pages per piece of acetate - using front and back) or
• 6 panel hanging decoration (achievable because the crop-a-dile will punch through the acetate!)
• or a concertina album could be created in the same way as the above!

and there must be lots more other combinations!

New Classes at Card Inspirations

New Year, new term of classes at Card Inspirations.  Contact the shop to request a full listing of all the lovely classes they have planned for the next few months. Here are a few sneak peeks of mine:

Ooooh Christmas tree......

This year I decided that I wouldn't put the christmas tree up (shush now with the 'bah humbugs', and the 'oooh you've got to put the christmas tree up!')(or is that just the voice in my head saying this...) reasons being:

1. BIG christmas tree & decorations stored towards the back of a VERY full loft and M isn't here to assist.

2. over christmas we will be clearing the flat in preparation for getting it on the market to sell. so less decorations =  less to clear and sort....

3. We'll be out and about, backwards and forwards, visiting relatives over christmas

4. Small cat who thinks christmas trees are chew toys! (that'll be Bertie.  Lola learned the hard way last year that she probably shouldn't have chewed the lights wires! - lights flickered and she shot out from behind the sofa where they're plugged in!)

any hoo I gave in (mainly because the decorations at B&Q were too cute to resist, and 1/2 price last week!!) and so here is our tree:

 

I may have over estimated how big a 3ft tree actually is! lol I have some other decorations but they were too big, and poor little tree doesn't have lights - couldn't get a length short enough with clear wires (bought a 40 bulb length but I don't think you would've been able to see the tree for the lights if I'd put that on! rofl).  Its small - but i like it! (but it doesn't look as pretty without lights....)

I don't think the pressies are going under it though, do you?

More class cards - this time a PaperMania set - Joyeaux Noel.

Oops - almost fell off the posting wagon again...

.... I was distracted by Strictly Come Dancing and XFactor! lol  sad but true!

These are more cards designed for classes at Card Inspirations - they may still have a few packs of these Inkadinkado (clear) stamps for sale in the shop  - the images are so interesting and detailed.

I really like this reindeer card, the stepped shape is really easy to create yet really effective.

Thanks for popping by - more tomorrow.....

Cuttlebug christmas....

I'm on a bit of a roll so here are some more cards.....
I love my cuttlebug (nice new one after a slight mishap with my first one) and these are a couple of the cards I designed for Cuttlebug classes at Card Inspirations.  The machine can give you such great results - how can you not love it! lol - I'm teaching more Cuttlebug classes at CI in the new year - check the site for details or to request a copy of the brochure.

The card below is a bit of a favourite of mine - and deceptively simple to make, and really versatile.  I really like this card - its so cute! lol (even if I say so myself!)

The best laid plans....

It seemed like such a simple idea: post up a card a day until last the last Royal Mail posting day... well I fell right off that wagon didn't I! roflmao...*
(*in my defense (such as it is) - some unexpected things came up that I had to do but that aren't really postable/ postworthy)

So, I've got a bit of catching up to do - let start now, I worked out I need to post about 13 cards to catch up..... so here goes - first batch - more tomorrow.......
 
Here are cards that I designed for a class at Card Inspirations (new brochure out v soon (if not already) and enrolment day for 2010 classes is on the 8th Jan).  Class was using stencils - love the different effects you can get with 1 stencil.  l to r: with Perfect Pearls, with chalks and plain embossing, with sprayed inks on a cuttlebug'd card base.