Monday, 18 April 2011

Daniel's party pack

This is a project I had made for one of the ladies at work, her son is one on Saturday and she is having a little party for him - with it being Easter this weekend she wanted Easter pastel shades but not too girly as he is a boy after all!  I have had a scrapbook paper pad made by K&Co called Sweet Pea baby boy for an age and it never seems to run out! The colours and designs in the pad made it perfect for a boy/Easter project.

I like the way the little bows turned out, they are for the party bags along with the tags.  I also made big pinwheels to be used as decorations and the mini pinwheels are for the cupcake tower and finally the banner turned out CUTE! It spells his name and the pinwheels at either end can be taken off if preferred and attached by ribbon or tac, I kept the back of the banner plain block colours so it could be used the other way round as well... Hopefully she will take lots of pictures on the day and I can share them on here.

Let me know what you think, thanks for stopping by, leave me a comment.

Thursday, 14 April 2011

A few more pictures



These are some of the pictures that were taken by the organiser's "Creative Moment"  Claire is a whiz with the camera, I may need to ask for some tips! You should check out the pictures on Facebook click on the title to go to their page...




Getting stuck in...




Donna checking out my finished article - it got a sign of approval!!




I love this picture, it absolutely shows where I am in my creativity at this point in my life, I was bowled over when I saw it - suffice to say I may even use these pictures and make a layout, which is also a challenge as scrapbooking doesn't come naturally to me....

Tuesday, 12 April 2011

I see a theme!


April 8th-11th
Creative Moments & Donna Downey
Seven Dials Club
42 Earlham Street,
London
WC2H 9LA


 
inspirational journal
a free creative play time


 
heart & soul
a mini heart-shaped canvas album


heart and soul photo strip

I do indeed see a theme!  Crop number 2! I got this as my birthday present in March, a chance to take some classes with Donna Downey who I love I am totally inspired by her!  Even better it was in London so not too far to travel and the stamp show was on all weekend at Alexandra Palace my favorite place in London - really, what more could a girl want??

I had an amazing time on Friday night I attended the Heart and Soul class we were only a small group,Donna sat with us, made a page for each of us...minus a bar and wine you would had thought we had all known each other for an age. We were all chatting about anything and everything.  Donna has got to be the most affable person I have ever met, I feel really lucky I got to spend this time with her!



So this is the kit and the first page Donna made demonstrating with red acrylic paint and some black glimmer mist, the kit was really pretty and I got to use canvas for the first time along with some Prima masks.





I can't tell you how happy I am with this page (!) for a first timer it came out pretty good everyone was quite impressed...I don't think I am going to be able to put a picture over it yet.



The front cover, needs some pictures....



Well the class on Sunday was a real eye opener for me, I wasn't sure what to expect, Donna called "Boot camp for art"  She wasn't wrong she didn't always give you time to think you had to go by your instinct and in a time frame I tried a ton of different techniques, I enjoyed the "dripage" and the photo transfer technique with a photocopied picture and studio medium. What I really enjoyed is the layers you can do on the pages of your journal - its freedom to create and that nothing is a mistake, one of my pages has ended up with four layers of different techniques so you can't tell which came first - but I'm not ready to show that page yet....





In between all of that I met some lovely people - the sweet Clarie who was attentive and bubbly the whole weekend from Creative Moments they had the mammoth task of coordinating everything in Convent Garden along with their stand at Alexander Place.  Bill Downey - amazing and lastly all the lovely ladies that I got to meet sharing this experience with me.  Can't wait to do it again!

Sunday, 27 February 2011

My first crop!



Ha! I had the most amazing day - I have to say I was a tinny tiny bit worried about going on my own, but I can hold a conversation and I'm not bad company - I think? I met some lovely ladies who had come on their own so we budded up for the first class which was with Lin and Leandra from Paper Artsy to make a project which meant getting inky and messy, I realise now that I am more of a clean grunge sort of crafter as you can tell from the tags in my last post I need to get more dirty hehe!!!

Well I wanted to learn new techniques and I wasn't disappointed I learnt how to metal work, use acrylic paint and the mists at last!  I have conquered my fear of them not sure really why I was so worried about the misting but I'm hooked and brought myself a little collection to use at home. The girls where amazing at the class even though we had instructions printed they went through every stage with us and told us loads about each product we where using which is probably the direction I needed.  I kept my notes as I will use them as reference again.




Here is my completed project, I love the way it turned out and the colour combination. It's made with mount board frame, card stock, ranger mists, acrylic paint, metal sheet,  Tim Holtz embellishments and tissue tape.





I am very proud of my inky fingers!




Well after lunch I did a spot of shopping and was almost late for the start of Tim's class but I got separated from my new buddies and sat at a different table which fate having a hand in sat me next to Nicky who I got my inspiration from to make the tags.  That made my day as I had been looking out for her but hadn't been able to spot her so I got to swap tags with her which was great.  I took a picture but as usual I closed my eyes!




Tim thoroughly spoilt us! We got given tons of goodies and got to use products that haven't even been released yet how great is that?  Alain from Ranger was also there overseeing everything, it was nice to meet him as well, I'm really pleased I got a picture with Tim he is such a lovely man, charming, funny and inspirational and had time for everyone and there was a lot of laughing. We made a configuration box but mine is nowhere near finished but I think I'm going to give it to Damon for his 40th as I was making it it took on elements of him - such as the electrician description on the text paper as this involves his work and there's a bit of a love theme, I'm sorry the picture is a bit blurred - too much excitement on my part...





Some of the goodies given to us, the tissue tape you can see in the background we all got to keep two rolls each after the class!





My box taking shape.





OMG! I nearly pee'ed my pants when we got to tip out the bags of this stuff!  We came back from our tea break - Tim says he finds this hilarious that we Brits need afternoon tea, what can I say you can't beat a cuppa in the afternoon it's the perfect pick me up!





This is as far as I got but I'm pleased with it so far.  You can see three inchies I made, originally I was going to swap these but I ended up making tags instead, part of the threads before the event was to make an inchie for Tim and to put them all in a book to be presented to him at the end of the class on Friday, we were the last class, we got to be part of that.  The inchie on the right is the inchie I made for him.  When he was presented with the booked he was really touched and said that he rarely gets given handmade present these days as people feel the art wouldn't be good enough and at one point he couldn't speak as he was looking through all the messages we had written - that was a good feeling to have been part of that........





The lovely, amazing people that made this an inspiring and memorable day for me.  I feel really blessed to have this hobby that I love so much and I am in constant awe of what my hands can create with all the wonderful products that are out there and how inspired I am by other people's talent......

Sunday, 20 February 2011






So look where I am off to next week!!!  I'm so excited! I have never been to a crop or crafted with other people - Damon realised today that I am going on my own and he's all worried....  I told him that he shouldn't be worried there are lots of other people going plus I will wear my badge on the train hopefully I will find some people to natter to! 

As part of the excitement there are other attendees making tags - 12 tag challenge so I thought I would make some too, although I don't have much in the way of Tim Holtz stuff I've tried to make them along his theme.  I hope if I get to swap the receiver is happy with my style! http://sunshinegirlnicola.blogspot.com/ here is where I got my inspiration, Thanks Nikki!  I've also been follow the threads on the Artsy group. The following pictures I took before I finished them, they all have ribbon now but it got too dark before I could take a picture of the finished items.  I'm really pleased with the way they have come out and I really really had a good time making them it's the first time I have made tags.  let me know what you think?







Monday, 11 October 2010

All things October!

10.10.2010 - A lucky day for those who believe in the power of numbers, but for me, it marks my 1st wedding anniversary!  I can't believe how quickly this year has blown by and all the things I have set out to do this year I have almost achieved so I am feeling proud of myself and thankful for my fabulous husband!  The last leg now is to complete my secondment next week and pass my assessment for my PTC level 3 teaching awards...  I have been trying to complete my lesson plan today and started to get butterfly's so I thought I would take a break and write a blog post instead.  What do you think of the picture above?  I love it I took it 2 weeks ago at Alexandra Palace when I was going to the Stampers Exhibition.  The palace was once a weekend home of Henry the 8th and its one of my favorite spots in London.  The other thing I love about the picture is the beauty of Autumn that it shows and it's my favorite season I love the bright blue sky, the warmth of the sun with a bite of wind on your cheeks and the leaves turning their rainbow of colours! 

Tuesday, 14 September 2010

Volunteers needed!


Blue Peter Whizz Kidz Appeal

Volunteers are needed to work at the Blue Peter Whizz Kidz
Go Cardz Appeal fulfilment Centre in Victoria.

Whizz-Kidz have devised an innovative and creative project.
They will ask Blue Peter viewers to design and create handmade
Christmas cards which will then be sold in Tesco
stores throughout the UK on Whizz-Kidz’ behalf. The Cards
will be sold for a minimum donation of £1 for 2 cards. The
money raised by the appeal will fund a revolutionary new
project for Whizz-Kidz. Whizz-Kidz aims to establish a network
of clinics around the UK where a disabled child will
have their assessment and fitting with a therapist and can
take home their chair on the same day.

They are looking for volunteers to help man their Go-
Cardz fulfilment centre from the beginning of September
2010, when they will begin putting together card making materials
for Blue Peter viewers, right through to December
2010, when the handmade cards will be distributed to Tesco
stores nationwide. The fulfilment centre will operate 7 days
a week from 9am - 1pm & 2pm - 6pm.

They estimate they will need over 1500 volunteers to help
man the fulfilment centre. The fulfilment centre will be
based at Whizz Kidz HQ at Elliot House, 10-12 Allington
Street, Victoria, SW1E 5EH.

A volunteer diary planner has been set up with Volunteer
spot, where volunteers can choose and book online the
dates that are most convenient for them. Please follow this
link to sign up to volunteer:-

 
 
The dates I have volunteered for are:
2nd October, 6th November & 4th December 2010 (morning shift).




Friday, 3 September 2010

Creative Design Team call!!







So my favorite hybrid site are looking for people to join their creative design team - I couldn't belive what I was reading!  I'm so excited!  These are my entries let me know what you think....

Holiday review part 2

The 80's Rewind Festival was fabulous and quite surreal at times.  Henley on Thames is very very pretty and I could easily live there as well but would need to be a higher earner to fit into that lifestyle - but one can dream? The whole weekend played music from that era including all the food stands, bars and the fun fair.  All the live music was pretty good but my highlights would be 10cc, Level 42, The beat, Kid Creole and the Coconuts, Odyssey, The weather Girls.  The collaboration between Go West , ABC and Tony Hadley was pretty smooth Tony Hadley as a young man I has a crush on him but what young girl didn't? As an older man he reminds me a bit of a Tom Jones in the making he can still belt out the tunes and I was very impressed that he sang a hit record of his nemesis Duran Duran's Rio he also did covers of songs by The Killers, King of Leon and the Hives. He was very personable and got the crowd going even when it started to pour with rain for the last 2 hours! Damon loved it, we popped his cherry so to speak as he is a festival virgin!  But we didn't camp we stayed in a hotel.  This is definitely a very grown up festival as you would expect from somewhere like Henley - There were people mooring their boats and yachts then coming in to join the fun...
Lots of families and lots of people dressed up!  Damon said to me "Only you could stand in the middle of a field eating a cupcake and drink champagne"  Well of course dahling!  Is there any other way to do festival??