Hide n Seek card

 The sun is shining today, but it's really cold here! I've not had much time to be creative this past week, but wanted to share my Sunday afternoon creation.

I love playing with paper mechanics, when a card does something other than simply 'open' which explains my recent obsession with boxes, and the Matchbox Easel card I have planned for classes this week!

This is a Hide n Seek card, where the card has a 'hidden' interior section.

This is the first thing you see when you open the card, a lovely series of stamped and layered panels. Then, if you close the card and push the outer edges back ,when you open the card again.........

Ta Da!!  A 'hidden' message, in this case, the panels say 'With Love'

this is actually a really easy card to make, but takes ages to decorate all the panels. It's great fun though, both to make and to receive.

Start with a piece of A4, crease and fold to an A5, then add further creases as though it is a gatefold card, mountain fold the centre crease, and valley fold the 2 outer creases.

On the centre fold, mark and cut 3 evenly spaced horizontal slits, cutting from the centre fold to the outer folds at 5.25, 10.5 & 15.75 cm.

Fold each panel you have created alternately left and right. Cut 4 panels of mirror board at 21cm x 7.2cm , sandwich them back to back in pairs. Slide one mirror strip through the 2 left hand panels, and the other through the 2 right hand panels.

fold the card open and closed a few times to make sure it folds smoothly, then decorate to your hearts content!

Thanks for stopping by

Debs

WOYWW 138 and more boxes!

This is today's crafty corner of the dining room, prepping samples for this Saturday's class making gift boxes.  Centre front we have a cute little butterfly hexagon box (templates from a CD by Payperbox) stamped and decorated with butterflies.  Behind that is a pyramid box decorated with hearts (yes, Valentine's Day soon dear, if you're reading this :-)

Then you have a small collection of my Stickles glitter glues, and just behind that a teeny tiny set of dragonfly and butterfly stamps that I've had for years and absolutely adore! They are tiddly tho, perfect for backgrounds!

I didn't dare take a pic of the whole table, cos anyone who read my blog last week might notice that most of the same stuff is still there! Have been super busy this last week, and lost a day yesterday after a visit to the osteopath (old war wound lol!) after which I felt like I'd been kicked by a mule (actually petite and blonde, but she still packs a punch!)

After doing a quick flick thru my Blogger reading list, has anyone seen the preview of the new Distress Ink Marker Pens???   Ooooooooh, I really NEED these!!!! 

I have deadlines coming at me all over the place, 3 classes in the next week, and samples to make for the trade show at the NEC, so forgive me if I don;t make it to your WOYWW entry this week.  I will do my best later today when I have a bit more time, so for now, I'm off to add my name to the list over at Julia's blog, then it's back to the inkpads :-0

Thanks for stopping by

Debs x

Sandown Craft show - new stash!

So I blew my New Year's resolution, which was to not buy any more stash in January!! went to the Sandown Stictch & Creative Crafts show, and bought some goodies........

The beautfiul Isabelle paper pack, lots of glittered and double sided papers in soft shades of green, brown and pink - yum! Packs of coloured card, 10 sheets per pack, £1 a pack - bargain! Got the Martha Stewart punch reduced cos there was no box - yay! And the set of Pro Markers incljudes 5 ultra fine nibs, so very happy with those.  Some extra Glossy Accents mini bottles - so useful for my classes, a leaf punch that I've been meaning to buy for a while, and was reduced, and a cute little Tina Wenke stamp of a book-reading hedgehog that I absolutely fell in love with! 

I was very restrained, kept picking up goodies,sighing over them and then putting them back on the shelf - there were sooooooooo many stamps I 'needed', but still I managed to resist - made of stern stuff, me! Also, the fact that all the credit card machines at the show were playing up helped, cos most stalls were only taking cash and that ran out really quick........ :-)

Been demo'ing at Hobbycraft all afternoon, showing the Papermania 'Blue Burleigh' Capsule Collection, and the Portobello Rd Collectiion.  This is one of the quickie makes using the Blue burleigh  Collection, which includes these great die cuts that you can use to layer up with the toning backing papers for really quick and easy cards.  This one is 2 die cuts, each with a hole punched in the centre of the scalloped edge and tied together with a ribbon bow, then fixed to the front of the card with foam pads.  I finished with sticky gems - super easy!

Thanks to the lovely ladies from my craft classes who stopped by to say hi, it was so nice to see you and have a chat, see you at the next class!

Thanks for stopping by

Debs x

Woyww 137 - The West Wing!

 Ok, so this is the current workdesk pic - chaos as always! I am in awe of those crafters who can stay tidy. I think I'm doing well if i can see any table top at all!!

Working clockwise from centre front, on my craft mat is a concertina'd paper strip ready to turn into a rosette, going left my rubbish pile - usually put this in a box lid as I go, but the box lid was full of other crap lol!!

Left of that a set of Sizzix alpha dies I was going to use on my project but changed my mind, and precariously balanced on that my I-phone!

then one of the cards from my DT project - using Papermania Portobello Rd kit to make some patriotic British cards!Then my pile of stash, various sticky things, a 2nd card for the project partially finished.

and finally...............the West Wing of the crafting mansion!! 

Formerly known as the kitchen, and now in use as a stamping, embossing and die cutting station.  And......I have hit on a great way of saving on the heating bills!

I put my washing in the washer/dryer on the drying cycle when I am working in the kitchen - keeps me toasty!  In fact, if I'm using the heat gun, can get positively tropical lol!!

For those of you who are wondering why on earth I would post pics of such a disaster zone, pop over to Julia's Stamping Ground, where she hosts a weekly blog hop of crafters desks and works in progress from around the world. Great fun, hugely addictive, and I only managed to visit bout 25 blogs last week, so will try to see more this week, but not all today!! Got a class tonight and I still have some work to do - yikes!

Thanks for stopping by

Debs x

WOW! Embossing January Challenge!

So the first of our monthly Challenges is up and running! To be in with a chance of winning any 6 WOW! Embossing powders of your choice in a handy carry case, you need to check out the challenge details on the main WOW! blog here. 

The challenge is to create a project based on the theme of LOVE (well it is Valentine's Day in a few weeks lol!) and/or using the Colours above as your inspiration. You must use WOW! products on your project, post it on your blog, and then list it on Mr Linky's Magical Widget on the main WOW! blog. The Challenge closes on Jan 31, so jump on in! Do leave us a comment letting us know what you think of the Challenge, and the DT projects.

More DT projects coming soon, and I can't wait to see what ideas you crafty lot come up with!

Happy Crafting

Debs x

Love is in the air!

Beautiful sunny day here in the South of England, and I wanted to share my DT project for this week - a Valentine's card.

Yup, Easter eggs are being advertised on tv and it's Valentines day a month from today! Any ladies thinking of proposing, it's also a Leap year, so brush up on your proposal etiquette lol!

The card was made using WOW! stamp sets - With Love, Build a Butterly (so cute!), and Flowers background stamp and WOW! embossing powders in red glitz and pale gold.  You can see the rest of the DT's projects here

The ribbon band across the centre of the card was an experiment, I tried embossing on mirror card and it worked a treat! My advice would be use an anti-static pad on the mirror card before stamping.  WOW powders are all treated to be anti-static but mirror card holds finger prints etc so it is better to be safe than sorry (the voice of experience!!)

Thanks for stopping by

Debs xx

Woyww 136 and a bit of happy!!

It's been one of those running around trying to get everything done days, and I got home this evening to find I had missed the postie in my various 'popping in and out' and have one of those lovely little red cards for me to go pick something up at the sorting office, which I can't do til the weekend!  but lo!! Under the pile of junk mail what do I find but the latest edition of Making Cards, so I make a cuppa and pop my feet up - with a choccy biccy cos that's the law.  And as I wrench off the plastic wrapper what do I see but.........my card is the main pic on the cover!  AND, 2 more of my cards are on the cover too! 

Some of you will know that I contribute to Making Cards as a freelance designer, and there are usually a few of my cards in each edition, but I've never been on the cover before, and I was chuffed to bits! Mine are the iris-folding card top left and the 2 cutesy cards bottom right.   I knew that the cutesy cards were going to be in this month's, cos I was asked to design the cards using the free craft papers in the centre of the mag this month. When I told hubby this, his first reaction was 'so you're the centrefold girl??'  Men! Can't live with 'em and can't shoot 'em!

Also, hubby's car finally came home yesterday from the garage, so I got my car back - freedom!

So this is why there is not pic of my workdesk for you Woyww'ers to see - nothing going on there last couple of days - but if you pop on over to Julia's blog, there are lots of desks far more productive than mine.  Thanks for stopping by

Debs x

WOW! Design Team

Some of you will already know that I am on the DT for WOW Embossing Powders, and that I made a bunch of samples for the NEC show in November.  The DT is now up and running, and the blog will be updated soon and introduce you to the team and their designs during the course of this week.

Look out for some amazing inspiration, challenges and giveaways and check out the blogs of the rest of the DT from the side panel!

this is one of my designs exhibited at the NEC.............. more to follow!

 

thanks for stopping by!

Debs x

Creativity returns! Hurrah! And WOYWW

woo hoo!  Finally, after a couple of weeks of crafty inactivity, I get to craft again.  Have to confess, I didnlt really feel ike crafting much over Christmas break, which surprised me, as I had several days of 'nothingness'. However, these were spent semi-comatose in front of tv eating anything and everything to hand and watching drivel on tv - bliss!  We have had a few weeks of the 'everything that could go wrong.......' syndrome, starting just before Christmas with Hubby's car dying, so I am currently car-less while he makes use of mine. Isn't it amazing how much you take a car for granted? I hadn't realised just how much I use mine, particularly for last minute supplies for classes!!

Then the dishwasher decided to have a heart attack just in time for Christmas, my poor Brother in Law is still in hospital, having now contracted MRSA and a chest infection following his 4th or 5th surgery. And yesterday, with the storms, I spent a fun few minutes sailing across the garden hanging on for dear lifge to the canopy from our swing seat, as I tried to prevent it flying into someone else's garden, and then our fence blew down!

My work desk is a bit of a work in progress today, as I am frantically packing up kits for tonights class, having left it to the last minute (not intentional - lots of interruptions!!)

centre front is my lovely new A3 cutting mat courtesy of Santa Hubby! and on that is the sample card for tonight (more detailed pic below) and set of packing/construction instructions and box of kits.  If you look carefully at the top right of the pic you will see my Christmas oven mitts which have not yet been returned to their home for another year :-)

So this is a close up of tonight's project - a shutter card with lots of matting and layering, flowers, butterflies and mirri card.

May not get to look at everyone's desk today on WOYWW, but will hop on over to Julia's blog now and hopefully will get a chance to catch up tomorrow.

Thanks for stopping by

Debs x