Christmas Craft Class - Scentsational Season

Last Saturday, I went to my friend and downline Kylie's Christmas Card Class. She's got a lovely house, with a conservatory that's perfect for holding classes at home. There was 9 of us altogether, and I went as a guest (although I was on tea and coffee duty!). We made four cards, and I'll be sharing these in the next three posts.

The first two cards we made was with the Scentsational Season stamp sets and Framelits dies, and the Festival Of Prints DSP. The card blanks were Cherry Cobbler and Lucky Limeade, with Very Vanilla. I chose to use the tree stamp and the ginger bread man stamp for the cards. It was nice seeing all the other designs that the other ladies made in the class. The star on the tree and the hearts on the ginger bread men (punched from the Owl punch) were made using the red Glimmer paper.

Customer Workshop

Morning,

I thought I'd share the projects I made at a customer workshop last month.  Ama kindly held a workshop at her home, and invited a few friends and family along for an evening of crafting.  There was a few non crafters, but they enjoyed it still, and did a great job at the make and take card, which is shown below.  We used the Scentscational Season stamp set and matching Holiday Collection Framelits dies, and Curly Cute was used for the Seasons Greetings sentiment.  Ama has a few pieces of the Emma Bridgewater pottery, so this card was perfect with the stars.

I also showed Ama and her guests how easy it was to make a little gift holder, using the Labels Collection Framelits dies.  I used the Be of Good Cheer papers on this gift.  As a thankyou for hosting the workshop, I gave this to Ama, and inside it contained lots of ribbons and buttons for her to use on her own cards and projects. 

I also showed them how easy it was to make an envelope using the Simply Scored Board, and a sheet of Designer Paper Series.  They really do look good, and they are so much nicer than a plain envelope.

Ama is a great baker, and she always puts on a good spread!  Her cakes were delicious.

We all had a nice evening, and Ama received some great benefits for hosting the workshop.  She earned £40 of free products, and chose some lovely items.  If you'd like to host a workshop, please let me know.  I have a few spaces available before Christmas, it could be a great opportunity to get some gifts if you have crafty friends, or to buy products to make Christmas cards, it's not too late still!  Don't forget the fantastic offer is still on for the free set of ink pads, available when workshop sales reach £325.  That's in addition to the £50 you'd have to spend on products from the Catalogues, and a half price item. 

Advent Calendar

I can't believe it's December already! Where has the time gone? I hope you all opened your advent calendars this morning, and got something nice.  I thought I'd share with you the advent calendar I have made.  I got the idea after I had shown a few friends the treat boxes from the Buns and Roses workshop, as a few people said they'd make a good calendar.  I made 24 treat boxes, using the Be Of Good Cheer papers, and used the Memorable Moments stamp set for the numbers.  It's a great stamp set, it's got all the numbers, and can be used for birthdays or anniversaries.   I can see this set will get a lot of use.  I punched out the numbers with the Large Oval Punch and the Scallop Oval Punch, and used Gumball Green and Cherry Cobbler card stock.  Cherry Cobbler seam binding ribbon was used to tie the boxes at the top.  I then hung them at random on my favourite Christmas decoration I own, a wire tree that I bought a few years ago. I normally use it to display my cards, but this year I'll have to find somewhere else to put them.

There weren't quite enough hearts to place the boxes over, so I decorated some clothes pegs to make some extra hooks.

My sister was over on Sunday afternoon, and she saw my project and wanted to make one too.  She used the Festival of Prints papers to make hers from.  I'll share a picture when she has it all set up and displayed.  She said she was going to come to my house and fill mine up, so I wonder what will be in my boxes each day!

Betsy's Blossoms card

A few weeks ago, Kylie had an open house catalogue launch party at her house.  She'd set up displays of all her projects and cards, and she took us all through the Annual Catalogue and the Seasonal Catalogue.  She'd also baked some tasty cupcakes, which we munched our way through while we got to play with some of the products.  The card below is what she'd prepped for us to make.  The colour combo is Lucky Limeade and Daffodil Delight, with the Floral District papers.  The stamp set is Betsys Blossoms, and the sentiment is from Petite Pairs.

I had a really enjoyable afternoon, it's always fun enthusing about Stampin' Up! products, and Kylie got some really good sales from the afternoon.  She'd done a raffle, and offered the hostess benefits as a prize.  Her friend Louise was lucky enough to win, and got an amazing £60 worth of free products!  Kylie also offered the half price items to us, and I was thrilled when she pulled out my number, so I used it to my advantage to purchase a Big Shot.  That will be really useful, as I've been borrowing Kylies so far for my classes and workshops.

Buns and Roses Workshop - Treat Boxes

Morning,

This is the last post about the Buns and Roses workshop.  The fourth project was to make two little treat boxes, that small gifts or sweets can be placed inside.  I've made these a few times now, and they really are easy.  They are just a rectangular piece of paper, scored in half lengthways on the Scoreboard, and then scored from the middle of the narrow side to the fold in the middle.  If you'd like to make these, please send me an email or leave a message on here with your email address and I'll send instructions.  The papers used for this project was Be Of Good Cheer. The crop-a-dile was used to make holes in each side, and Cherry Cobbler seam binding ribbon was threaded through to make a bow on the top.  The Merry Christmas stamp is from Teeny Tiny Sentiments, and was punched out with the Scallop Oval Punch and the Large Oval Punch.  There was a tin of Caburys Heroes on the table, and it was funny seeing a few of the ladies asking how to tie them up, after cramming as many sweets in there as they could (or couldn't as it happened, they can only hold two chocolates!)

I really enjoyed the workshop, and hope to do something like that again sometime.

Buns and Roses Workshop - Ornaments card

This post is the third project from the Buns and Roses workshop, and uses the Festival of Prints papers and the Delightful Decorations stamp set and Ornament punch.  The ladies got to choose their paper and could make the card in a selection of colours, of Lucky Limeade, Cherry Cobbler and Island Indigo.  The tricky part of this card was remembering to attach the Bakers Twine to the back of the paper before sticking it down onto the card.  The ornaments were stamped onto Whisper White and then punched out using the Ornament Punch.  The Merry sentiment is from the Snowflake Soiree stamp set, and was punched using the Decorative Label Punch.  

A close up of a Cherry Cobbler ornament, with a Rhinestone Jewel in the centre.

Buns and Roses Workshop - Snow Flurry card

Here's the second card from the Buns and Roses workshop.  This was the quickest project out of the four tables, which was good, as it gave the ladies a chance to catch up! This was the only card that used the Big Shot, I think they all liked having a go at embossing and die cutting. The Perfect Polka Dots embossing folder was used for the panel in the centre.  The card used was Whisper White, Crumb Cake and Gumball Green.  The other exciting part of this card was that it was spritzed with the Champagne Mist Shimmer Paint, which gave a lovely shimmery finish.

Here's a close up of the die cut snowflake, and you can see the Glimmer Brad in the middle.  These are nice sparkly brads, and come in gold, silver, champagne, black and gray.

Here's a close up of the greeting, from the Curly Cute stamp set, in Whisper White ink.  The edges of the card were daubed with the Daubers and the ink, to give a snowy frosty effect.

Buns and Roses Workshop - Owl card

Last month I mentioned that I'd run a workshop for the Leeds WI, Buns and Roses.  You can read all about the evening here, written by Gemma Rathbone.  I had a great evening, and I think all the ladies that came along enjoyed it too.  It was the first time I'd ever run an event with so many people, there were 26 on the evening, and it was great experience. It was originally meant to be run by myself and Kylie, but she'd got her dates mixed up, and was actually in Germany that evening attending the Stampin' Up! Convention. She shared with the preparation and designs of the projects, and she kindly lent me lots of her projects for the display tables.  You can see these on the three photos below, and there's more on the Buns and Roses blog mentioned above (thanks to Gemma for letting me post the pictures she took on the night)

I'll be sharing the four projects we made over the next few days.  Here's the first, which uses the Owl Punch, which has been cleverly turned into a penguin!  Bashful Blue and Whisper White card was used, with Tangerine Tango and Basic Black for the penguin.  The snowflake stamp is from Snowflake Soiree, and the sentiment is from Petite Pairs.  It's hard to see from these pictures, but on the edge of the snow slopes, the glue pen was applied, and Dazzling Diamonds Stampin' Glitter was applied for the bling effect! 

Christmas Card Class - Frosty Friends

Hello,

Here's another card from the card class I attended at the weekend. I think this card is my favourite from the four that we made. The stamp is called Frosty Friends, it's a stamp that comes on its own and costs just £10.95. We all had a great time using the markers to colour in the snowmen. The glue pen was used along the bottom of the snowmen, and then Dazzling Diamonds was applied to give a lovely glittery effect. The card blank is Pool Party, with Cherry Cobbler. A piece of the Bakers Twine was tied around the card, for a bit of added detail.

Adhesives

Evening,

I hope you've you all had a nice weekend.  I've been doing a bit of crafting, yesterday I went to a card class run by my downline Kylie.  It was nice to attend a class as a customer, rather than a demonstrator, as I could sit back and enjoy the crafting.  I did help out a bit, it's hard to come out of demonstrator mode sometimes! I'll share the cards we made soon.  Today, I've had my sister over, and we've been finishing off a few Christmas projects, which will also be appearing soon.

I have some very exciting news for you.  Stampin' Up! have just changed their policy on Cash-and-carry sales.  Previously, as a demonstrator, we were't allowed to buy products to sell to customers, all products had to be bought from the catalogue.  This has changed, to allow us to carry a small range of adhesives to sell at workshops, classes or events.  I think this is a great opportunity, as I know I'm always running out of Tombow glue, and I'm sure my customers are too.  I'll have a small selection with me at my classes, which will be available to buy there and then.  I'd recently had a customer contact me and asked me to buy a glue for her when I do my next order, but I haven't put one through for a while.  Just let me know before a class if there's anything you'd like, and I'll try to bring it along.

Christmas Gift With Purchase Promotion

Between the 1st November to the 30th November, you can get a free Festive Paper Piercing Pack when you purchase the Ornament Keepsakes Stamp Set and Candlelight Christmas Speciality Designer Paper Series Paper Bundle.  You can choose the wood or the clear stamp set, and you can purchase just the stamps and papers or the stamps and framelits bundle and the papers.

Contact me if you'd like to take advantage of this offer.

Ink-redible!

Between the 1st November to the 16th December, you can earn yourself an ink-redible promotion from Stampin' Up! Host a workshop with sales of over £325, and you can get hold of a whole set of Classic Stampin' Pads. You can choose from Brights, Subtles or Regals.  This is in addition to the regular hostess benefits of hostess credit and items at half price. 

Contact me to book your workshop now, this offer is too good to miss.

October card class

A few weeks ago, I held my monthly card class at Dock Street Market in Leeds. There's been a few changes there recently, and an additional side room has been created where a small bakery used to be. I held my class in the side room, and it was much better, we had much more space, it was quieter and the light was brighter. I had six ladies come to join me crafting, and on arrival they were given a pack of the card stock they needed to make eight cards (Cherry Cobbler and Lucky Limeade), and a pack of the Festival of Prints papers. I had made a few samples of the cards they were going to make, but I'd left it up to them to design their own. I'd brought along all the festive stamp sets I owned, so they could mix and match. The stamp sets used were Snowflake Soiree, Watercolor Winter, Scentsational Season, Delightful Decorations, and sentiments from For My Family, Petite Pairs, Teeny Tiny Sentiments and Owl Occasions.

Here's a picture of me in action! It's an bit fuzzy, it must be all the crafting that was going on.  Do you like my new apron, it was the first class I'd done since I bought it.

 Here's the cards that I'd made as samples.

Centre Step Card

This is the last card of mine I'll be sharing from the Inspiration Station from the team training day. Like my previous post, I can only claim half of this card. I made the card base, and then Kylie finished it by adding the Floral District papers, the stamped images and the sentiment. I like making these fancier cards, they look daunting, but once I've had a go once, they are really simple the next time. I found this template on Pinterest, from this blog here. The only tools you would need to make a card like this is a ruler and pencil, and a paper trimmer with a cutting blade and scorer.

I've just had an idea for a future class...watch this space for an announcement!

Betsy's Blossoms card

Most of the cards that were made for the Inspiration Station were based on the colours in the Floral District set. I had a card commission to make that weekend for a wedding, and I'd spotted a card like this on Pinterest. 

I liked the simplicity of it, so decided to recreate it. I made one card for the Inspiration Station and another for the wedding. The colours are Basic Black, Basic Gray and Rose Red. I used the Betsy's Blossoms stamp set again for this card. Rose red ribbon seam binding ribbon was tied around the card, and a sentiment from Teeny Tiny Wishes (now called Teeny Tiny Sentiments) was stamped and punched with the Large Oval Punch and mounted onto a border punched with the Scallop Oval Punch.

Because the card stock was black, I used the Decorative Label Framelit dies to cut out a shape where the writing could be seen in the inside of the card. I stamped the leaf image for a bit of extra detail.

Floral District zig zag fold card

Hello. I've another Inspiration Station card to share today. I'm not sure of the correct name for this card, possibly a tri fold card, but I'm going to call it a zig zag fold card! I'd made one of these before, last year using the Beau Chateau papers and the Beautiful Wings embosslit folder. For this card, I used the Floral District papers, with a Crumb Cake card blank. It's an easier fold than it looks, it's just a matter of scoring from one corner to the other on an A4 sheet of card, then scoring and folding in thirds. I put papers on the three sides that would show at the front, and used the Blossom punch to punch a shape from a stamped image from the Betsy's Blossoms set for the large flowers. The leaves were from the Betsy's Blossoms stamp set too. The centres of the flowers were cut from the same image as the big flowers and punched using a small circle punch.