Monthly card class - October

Tonight was my monthly card class, and this time I did a mixture of Christmas and non-Christmas projects!

The first card uses the Starburst/Sunburst technique - a great way of using up scraps of patterned papers. These papers are the Season of Style Designer Series from the Autumn/Winter catalogue.

The second card features the 'For the Birds' stamp set.  The ladies had free choice of all the stamps in the set, but they all chose the Christmas bird!

These were stamped with black stazon ink (a permanent ink) onto watercolour card, and then coloured using the aqua pens and ink.

The next card really got us into the festive spirit!! This uses the Festive Flurries stamp set which I have fallen in love with and can't stop using! We heat embossed some of the snowflakes with silver embossing powder to make them shine, and the rhinestones in the centres add a bit more sparkle!

Lastly we made a love bird card and I let the ladies choose their sentiment.  I thought this would be great for an Anniversary, Engagement, Wedding or just for someone you love!

The birds are punched out from the Natural Composition Speciality papers.

This month's cake was Delia's spiced apple muffin cake with pecan streusal topping, warm from the oven and made with apples from the tree in my garden!

Kylie x

Class With Polka Dot Pieces

Happy Sunday everyone! Today I have some time to relax after a hectic few weeks and I thought I should catch up with some blogging!

Yesterday we had a fantastic crafty afternoon at our Summer Papercraft Class. Fiona Cullen and I taught 14 lovely ladies how to make 3 cards and a gift box using their very own set of stamps - Polka Dot Pieces - a brand new set in the Annual Catalogue. I think this one is going to be really popular - it's got flowers, butterflies and birds all in one set and a cute sentiment too!

With it being so new, there isn't a lot of photos online yet of cards and projects made with this stamp set. So my usual source of ideas and inspiration for my class projects was quite limited. But the stamps are really easy to work with, especially using the coordinating punches too, so it was fun coming up with a range of designs for the class projects.

Here are the 4 projects we designed for the class.

The first card used the bird. We coloured the stamp with markers and punched it out with the bird builder punch. The flowers are made from the Simply Pressed Clay and molds - we made these in advance of the class. The papers are the Gingam Garden Designer Series Papers.

The second card was a simple one with butterflies and the sentiment from the set.

The third card was an explosion of flowers and a sentiment from perfectly penned in the centre!

Finally a simple 2-4-6-8 gift box decorated with butterflies.

Some picture of the ladies in action, and some of their cards where they had come up with designs and ideas of their own...

Everyone got their stamps to take home in a goody bag which contained an extra treat...

We even decorated the bag and treat using the same stamp set to give everyone more ideas for how they can use the stamps to make more projects at home.

This was Fiona's first class since becoming a demonstrator in my team in May. She did brilliantly and everyone enjoyed their afternoon of crafting so no doubt there will be more!

For details of my upcoming events and classes, click here

If you live closer to east Leeds then check out Fiona's classes

Kylie x

Bird house New Home card

Here's a card I made recently for Julie Kettlewell after moving into her long-awaited new home. I was so pleased to be able to give her this card and its great to see the family enjoying their amazing house at last.  And I'm not at all jealous of Julie's new craft room - honestly!!

Products used:

Card stock: Melon Mambo, Pool Party, Pretty in Pink, Gumball Green, White Naturals

Papers: Natural Composition

Punches: Bird Builder, Itty Bitty Shapes, 1" Circle, Scallop Border

Other: Pearls, Early Espresso marker

Kylie x

Little bird thank you!

Just a quick post tonight (just can't seem to get an early night this week!!).  I am sharing a little thank you card I made for a customer recently.  All my customers get a handmade thank you card along with their order (and often some extra little treats in the bag too!!).

The background papers are the Natural Composition Speciality papers - well they are actually more like card - and they are my favourites for making really special gift bags and boxes.

Kylie x

Name badge

This was the name badge I made for the Regional Training event last weekend. All the demonstrators made their own and I saw lots of beautiful and very creative ones!

I made mine with the Labels Collection Framelit dies, some Tea for Two designer series papers, rolled paper flowers and the leaves were punched out using the Bird Punch!  My name was stamped using the Noteable Alphabet stamps. I then I finished it off with some ribbon and pearls!

I'm still feeling very inspired and motivated after the event.  It has given me a boost to do some organising so I have spent most of this evening promoting my upcoming classes and sorting out some facebook posts. While this renewed energy lasts I might as well make the most of it!

Kylie x

Apothecary Art and Attic Boutique

I'm still loving the Apothecary Art stamp set from the Summer Mini catalogue!  And I've also only just realised how beautiful the Attic Boutique papers (also in the Summer Mini) actually are!  I bought them ages ago but have only recently started using them. 

This card has more of the spiral flowers which I really like making...

Products Used:

Stamps: Apothecary Art

Inks: Pool Party, Crumb Cake,

Stamp write markers: Pool Party, So Saffron, Always Artichoke

Card Stock: Crumb Cake, Pool Party, Very Vanilla, So Saffron, Soft Suede

Embellishments: Pearls

Equipment: Label Framelit dies, Circle punch, Bird builder punch, Itty Bitty punches

Baptism card

Here's a quick post to show you a baptism card my friend asked me to make.  It was for her friends seven year old son, Elliot, and she wanted something bright and fun rather than something religious.

I used the Big Shot and letters dies to cut out the name and printed out the sentiment.  The papers are some retired ones (Play Date) and the leaves are punched out using the bird builder punch.  The owl stamp is from Fox and Friends!

New home card

I saw a really lovely bird house card on a blog (click here) this weekend and wanted to recreate it to make a New Home card.

The fence is particularly effective I think - it is punched with the scallop border and then scored using the new Simple Scored tool.  Simple!

The paper I have used for the bird was the Sale-a-Bration papers Everyday Elegance, and the cloud stamp is from the retired Good Neighbours stamp set.

I printed out the sentiment and used the word window to punch it out.

Stamps: Good Neighbours

Cardstock: Soft Suede, Very Vanilla, Lucky Limeade, Pool Party, Poppy Parade

Inks: Whisper White

Equipment: Simply Scored, Scallop Border punch, Bird Builder punch, Itty Bitty punches, Circle punch, Word Window punch

Others: Linen Thread, Brads, Pearls