Another 6 sided milk carton gift box

 I know I recently posted a picture of one of these lovely 6 sided milk carton boxes. But I've been so enjoying making them for my hostesses to thank them for hosting a workshop that I decided to post another example today.

 I decided to make a matching set. The card uses Outlined Occasions (a free Sale-A-Bration set only available till the end of March. If you'd like to get this set for free just place an order before March 31st for £45 or over). It also uses thin strips of free Sale-A-Bration Designer Series Paper (Everyday Enchantment). The colour scheme is Island Indigo and Lucky Limeade (current In Colours). I embellished with Basic Rhinestones and butterflies cut with the Beautiful Wings Embosslit.

 I embellished the gift box with a giant Pool Party button and tags cut with the Jewellery Tag punch and stamped with Tiny Tags (and attached with my old favourite, Linen Thread). I used the smallest Beautiful Butterfly to stick to the button to tie the embellishment in with the card.

This is the finished box. I cut the base from Pool Party and used Everyday Enchantment papers to surround the box. The ribbon is Ruffled Lucky Limeade.

I hope you all have a lovely weekend and happy crafting to all ;0)

-X-

Workshop Makes

I seem to be getting a bit of my crafting mojo back at the minute. Or more likely I drag my bum upstairs and it is far more tempting to sit in my craft room with iPlayer on and crafting bits out than to face walking back downstairs again ;0) Well whatever the reason, I am enjoying being back in my craft room (and I'm loving catching up on Call The Midwife on iPlayer too).

I demonstrated for some lovely ladies last night. They are regular customers of mine and are very understanding of me keep dropping off in classes and leaving our craft evenings early (just kidding about the nodding off btw). I wanted to share with you the hostess gift I created with the Spice Cake Designer Series Papers.

The set together:

I created the card on a Chocolate Chip base with squares of Spice Cake DSP layered on to Very Vanilla and textured through the Big Shot with the Lattice Square Embossing Folder. I then created the embellished strip using More Mustard, Very Vanilla and Chocolate Chip Scallop Ribbon. The flower is cut from a sheet of the DSP (I have cut two flowers and layered them with dimensionals and finished with a Pearl).

 Here is the gorgeous 6 sided box I created for my Hostess (using the fabulous Milk Carton die). This is again a Chocolate Chip base embellished with Pool Party Ruffled Ribbon, Spice Cake DSP and the matching large Pear Pizzazz button.

 I love that I have suddenly rediscovered linen thread and my Tiny Tags set. Together they perfectly finish this little thank you box (filled with lovely SU goodies for my hostess).

Please excuse the upside down labels. It looked OK till I tied the bow and then the tags refused to lie correctly. But you get the idea ;0)

Hope you're all having a lovely week and looking forward to the weekend as much as me (baby's nursery is beginning to take shape- the desire to clean is overwhelming- so I'll probably be found up to my ears in antibacterial wipes and Dettol).

Happy Crafting ;0)

-X-

Hostess Thank You

Here is a gift I made for my lovely new Hostess last week. I haven't made a sour cream container for a little while so thought it would be perfect to combine with the Everyday Enchantment Sale-A-Bration Designer Series Papers. I used the same papers to match the thank you card we made at last months card class. The small tag is punched using Tiny Tags and finished with a metallic brad. I filled the sour cream container with a mini Stampin' Up! starter collection (Dimensionals, buttons, ribbon, brads) as I wanted to showcase a lot of our lovely coordinating embellishments for a new group of crafting ladies.

And hoorah for some good light finally. So pleased I managed to get some realistic colour shots of these beautiful papers. They compliment the current In Colours so nicely (and Pool Party is my new favourite colour to craft with).

Happy Crafting ;0)
-XXX- 

Last month's card class makes

Apologies for my slack blogging recently ;0) I have been making lots of lovely things for classes and future workshops but seem to have run out of energy for sitting on the computer to update my blog. To make up for it I am sharing two cards today that I taught at January's card class (and i'll hopefully blog the other two tomorrow via the wonder of post scheduling!).

Here is the first of the cards we made (and my favourite of all my makes recently). I saw this card on the talented Jenny Moor's blog last week and knew my class ladies would love it. This was a last minute substitution for a card I had made but wasn't 100% happy with. This card is a Sale-a-Bration inspired wonder. It uses the exclusive (and free!) SAB set, Fresh Vintage and the strip of DSP is from the lovely free SAB papers Everyday Enchantment. The colour scheme is Peach Parfait, Calypso Coral, Pear Pizzazz, Very Vanilla and Pool Party. We used the fantastically versatile Stampin' Write markers to colour the stamp before stamping which gives this lovely detailed multicoloured effect.

 The second card I wanted to share with you today is another inspired by Peg. We have a whole series of family weddings this year and my Mum had seen this card and asked me to recreate it for the class. I created two versions of it, the second of which I was a lot happier with (my first attempt fell foul to an accident with a bottle of Tombow so I had to trim it to an odd shape and dimension).

I love this layered Whisper White look and the effect of using lots of different textures to create the layers. I used lots of different embossing folders, punches and Embosslits to create the textured layers and the stamping was done using a retired stamp set sadly (it was the only set I currently have featuring hearts). This will make a perfect wedding celebration card. And my class ladies were very keen to change it to an anniversary card by changing the tag greetings. It was finished perfectly with a glitter brad and three rhinestones.

 Here is my first version (the tombow spilt one) which I created from Peg's original, with a winter wedding in mind (hence the Serene Snowflakes).

Right, thats all from me today. Hope you enjoyed todays projects. Like i've said before, roll on lighter evenings so i can get some better quality photos again. I'll write another post now to share the other projects tomorrow.

Happy crafting ;0)

-X-

A Scrapbooking Sneaky Peak

I thought I would share a scrapbooking layout I designed for a Stampin' Up! competition for Demonstrators. Our brief was to only use current product (meaning it had to be products moving over into the new catalogue). So I chose the new In Colours as my focus for this page. The Lucky Limeade base colour matches the sunny photos of my Kala perfectly.

The embellishments were all stamped using Circle Circus and the In Colours (Pool Party, Island Indigo, Calypso Coral & Wisteria Wonder).

The title was stamped using my favourite Broadsheet Alpha stampset.

I have embellished with a Subtles Button and a large basic pearl.

 I have layered the Circle Circus images on top of each other and embellished with buttons from both the Brights and Subtles collections. All of these circles were punched with the coordinating sized circle punches (including the scalloped circle).

 The final embellishment was punched in Wisteria Wonder using the Tab punch. I then stamped the small heart from Tiny Tags and embellished with a line of basic pearls.

Hope you enjoyed this little sneak peak into the new catalogue and that you are loving the new In Colours as much as me (I cannot stop stamping using Pool Party- makes me want to pack up and take a sunny holiday somewhere). If you'd like to book a place at my Catalogue Launch Open House on October 1st, i still have spaces available for the 1-3pm session (£4 to include refreshments and a new catalogue). Just get in touch on poulton_sarah@yahoo.co.uk or 01983 609249.

Happy crafting ;0)

A final wedding card

Good morning all. Not sure whats got me up so early this morning. But as I am awake I thought I would share a new project with you. This Saturday is the final of my three summer weddings this year. I am safe to put this on my blog a bit early as I am sure the Bride and Groom have much more pressing matters to deal with than surf my blog ;0)

I made this card with the left overs from the wedding invites. If you see this post you can see that I have themed the wedding card with both the acceptance and invites that I made for them. They were so pleased with their invites that I wanted to tie in the additional cards I made for them (I also have one final project themed in the Cajun Craze, So Saffron, More Mustard, Early Espresson colour scheme to share. But that will have to wait until next week....)

To create this card I used a base of More Mustard and added Cajun Craze and stamped layers to this.  The leaf stamp is unfortunately from a retired Hostess Set from 2009-2010. I stamped the 'Congratulations' from Curly Cute in Chocolate Chip and added a length of Early Espresso ribbon. The hearts were punched with the Heart to Heart punch (the tiny Kraft letters are not SU but from my scrapbooking stash. They were the smallest letters I could find to add a tiny monogram). And finally I embellished with a length of linen thread and two tags stamped with 'Mr & Mrs' and 'Love' from Tiny Tags.

Really pleased with the result. I think the tiny tags finished the card off perfectly ;0)

And one more thing while I am blogging on this fine Thursday morning. This Saturday is the In Love With Stamping Last Chance List blog hop. So please pop by at 10am (*fingers crossed* the technology doesnt fail me as I will be at the wedding on the mainland!) and see all the lovely projects created by Stampin' Up! Demonstrators with stamp sets and products that are about to retire from the catalogue.

Happy Crafting ;0)

-X-

Stampin' Up! Wedding Invites

I am currently in the midst of making wedding invites for my lovely friend Natalie. While I obviously cannot share with you their finished invite design I did come across photos of some of the invites I made as samples for them. They have picked an Autumnal theme for their September wedding so I picked similar colours for each design.

This first wedding invite uses Just Believe with More Mustard & Cajun Craze. I've coloured the stamp set with the matching Stampin' Write markers. The small 'Love' sentiment comes from the Tiny Tags set. Inside the invitation i created an RSVP pocket and the RSVP was stamped with the smaller flower stamp from Just Believe.

 This second sample was a lot simpler but striking all the same. I themed this around So Saffron and Early Espresso and stamped the leaf image from Paisley Prints. The 'You're Invited' is from the Cheer and Wishes stamp set.

Just a couple of the samples I made. Happy to share to show whats been keeping me so busy recently.

Happy Crafting ;0)

-X-

Funky Friday #70- 'Anything But A Square'

My work colleague had her baby early this past weekend so I didnt have as much time as I had originally anticipated to make her a card. But I decided to give it a go last night with the Funky Friday challenge in mind as I did so. This week's challenge was 'Anything But A Square' and you know what, as soon as I started, every idea i came up with had some sort of square in. But here is what I came up with. I designed this card to match the gift box/wrapping I already made for her when she left work on maternity leave.

For this card I used:

Stamps: Fox & Friends, Tiny Tags, Just Perfect Alphabet, All In The Family
Punches: Scallop Circle, 1-1/4" Circle, Heart To Heart, Word Window.
Ribbon: Certainly Celery 5/8" Grosgrain Ribbon
Colours: Gable Green, Ballet Blue, Brocade Blue, Chocolate Chip (Baby Outline)

If you have any questions about Stampin' Up! or would like to find out more about ordering any of the products above, please feel free to get in touch: poulton_sarah@yahoo.co.uk or 07830 343830.

Workshop Demo

Here is the workshop demo I did for Tuesday's evening with Chris. I filled the sweet treat cup with Bold Bright buttons. Unfortunately the photos I took with the buttons in the cup havent come out clear enough to post. The workshop went really well and I enjoyed meeting all the lovely ladies. There were a few hiccups (I stuck the card all together and then realised I had completely forgotten the sweet treat cup! So I'd essentially made a card with a hole through it! But i managed to get it apart again and fix the 'blip'!) but all in all we all had a great time.

Each of Chris's guests completed the following make and take. I adapted a bag I had made at my last card class for them each to have a go. I let the ladies loose with the Tiny Tags stamps and each chose their own greeting in place of the 'Handcrafted' one I used. I saw a great array of sentiments used and i was happy to see each lady putting their own 'stamp' on their project (sorry I couldnt resist that one!).

Tomorrow is my monthly card class from 1-4pm. Its going to be a full house but I've lined up some fun cards to make and I'm well prepared. No doubt I'll spend the morning practicing and remaking all my samples again like last month *laugh* Photos on Monday...... (along with the two LOs I'm behind with Scrap With Us! Oops!)

A few crafty updates....

Spent yesterday in Bicester with my Mum. We went for a crafty day out at the Pink Ladies Quarterly Training hosted by my upline Michelle. Mum and I had spent the previous Friday designing and recreating 16 swaps to share with other demos at the training session. We decided on an Isle of Wight postcard theme using retiring colours; 'My fond farewell' swap as I called it ;0) I was really pleased with the result. I forgot to take a photo of the reverse which I had designed as a postcard complete with a Stampin' Up! stamp and address details for the Centre we were training at.

It was lovely to have a day out with Mum as well as meet other demos in the team. I was so pleased to win the second prize in the raffle. I've been umming and aahing over the 'Thank You Kindly' set for a while as I make a fair few Thank You cards so I was made up to be able to pick this as my prize. We worked on a mini scrapbook/flip album for the make and take. I chose to work with the Christmas Jingle Simply Scrappin' which felt a bit weird as its only July. But I love those papers. Picture will be posted once I've done a bit more decorating and embellishing. The album is fairly bare at this minute.

For my swap (below) I used the 'Life's A Breeze' stamp set with Tempting Turquoise, Pink Passion & Barely Banana Card Stock. I used my Bold Brights Stampin Writes and various punches to create this seaside postcard design ;0)

I will take some photos tonight of the lovely demo swaps I received in return ;0)


I have a jam packed crafting week this week with a workshop tomorrow and a card class on Saturday. I still have some prep to do for both so I'm going to be busy busy busy this week. Wanted to just give a little preview of some of the class and workshop projects i have been working on.

At the request of my lovely hostess Chris I will be demo-ing a variation on the A4 gift bag we made in last months card class. This is not the final version but one of my works in progress. I've used Orchid Opulence card with the Cottage Wall Papers. I have teamed this with the Flight of the Butterfly & Tiny Tags Stamp Sets, Rich Razzleberry Ink & Ribbon and the scallop punch. I'll post a clearer photo tomorrow once I've finalised the design tonight.

I've also put together designs for two of this months cards for my Saturday class. For my first card I was attempting a card for a man. I tend to fall to pieces a bit when crafting for the men in my life. So, using the Fox & Friends set (with embellishments from Tiny Tags) I set about creating a more masculine colour scheme. I used the Hostess Designer Series Paper in Mellow Moss with Brocade Blue and Chocolate Chip. I used the Stitched Grosgrain Ribbon (Choc Chip), the word punch and a sentiment inked from the 'Fun and Fast Notes' stamp set. I finished the card off with two brads taken from the Earth Elements colour set.
The second of my cards is one of my favourite creations to date. Mainly because it is my favourite SU colour- Pumpkin Pie (with a bit of Dazzling Diamonds thrown in for good measure). I used the Simply Said stamp set to stamp the background with Versamark. I then used Heat and Stick powder with my heat tool for the bold flowers to stick the glitter to the card. I embossed the outlined flowers with Versamark & White Embossing Power. I punched the heart with the large heart punch and used paper from the Pumpkin Pie designer series for the backing. I actually dont think the photo can do this card justice because of the glittered effects and the tone on tone use of Pumpkin Pie/White. I'm so pleased with this effort I may even be brave and post it to the gallery of InLoveWithStamping ;0)

Right, so I've given you a bit of a sneak peak into my crafty week creations. I'll post again with clearer photos of some of the other projects I have on the go......

Happy Crafting ;0)

-XXX-

My first card class- Saturday 26th June

My Stampin' Up! display board (my fridge!) featuring my own designs and swaps from the Reading Training and Pink Ladies Mini Catalogue Swap.

The table all set ready to go.....

My punch fan.....

Excellent use of my new microwave- showing off my new scrapbooking skills.....

My Stampin' Up display. Showing the range of colours and products available (or just an excuse to display and play with all my lovely Stamp Sets ;0)

This Saturday saw my first Stampin' Up! card class held at my house in Newport. I spent the afternoon in the company of Chris and Pat and my lovely sister Sophie (who is not a crafter but joined in for moral support ;0) I scouted around a few other demo websites for inspiration and ideas just to help me get started (thank you to the demos who inspired the cards we made).

I saw a card similar to the above (using up retired colour card stock) on Demo Elaine's Blog. I used Barely Banana, Real Red, Taken With Teal Ink and Cardstock with papers from the Sweet Pea Stack. I used the Bird Punch with the Scallop Circle and Stamps from the Tiny Tags Set. I accessorised with Linen Thread. The envelope design is taken from the Tiny Tags set.

This gorgeous use of the bird punch to make the tulips was taken from one of my favourite Demo websites, Julie's Japes. This card demo's Rich Razzleberry, one of the new SU colours paired with Orchid Opulence, a retiring colour. I also used the Vintage Vogue stamp set with Rich Razzleberry Ink (and polka dotted ribbon), Old Olive Card Stock & Whisper White too. This was my favourite card of the day.

The final card of the afternoon was centred around the limited edition Cottage Wall Papers paired with the Vintage Vogue set from the mini catalogue. I again used Rich Razzleberry (Ink, Card Stock and Polka Dotted Ribbon) with Orchid Opulence. The Flowers were stamped in Pale Plum and Rich Razzleberry using the Rock N Roll technique. I finished the flowers with a brad taken from the 'Fire' collection. This was inspired by a card on Jo's blog.

I have completely forgotten to take a photo of the bag we made too. So i'll take pics and post them later in the week.

Having completed my first class and enjoyed seeing the results of other people I have gained a lot of confidence. Next month I'm going to create my own cards from scratch and teach my own inspired creations. I am thankful, however, to all the lovely demo blogs that I regularly read that help me gain new ideas and encourage me to try new colour combos.

For anyone interested in coming along, upcoming card classes will be held in Newport on the following dates:

Saturday July 24th 2010 (1-4pm)

Saturday 21st August 2010 (1-4pm)

Card class is £8 or £5 if a qualifying order of £20+ is placed during the workshop.

If you have any questions about Stampin Up or would like to place an order please do not hesitate to contact me on poulton_sarah@yahoo.co.uk or 07830 343830.

WCC Scrap Challenge- Week 13

Here is my LO for week 13's challenge. I found these gorgeous pictures of Tintagel and my friend Hannah's Hen Party a couple of years ago. I loved this week's challenge and using the sketch and photo for inspiration.

I used my new Stampin Up Cottage Wall Papers and the tiny tags stamps and punch for this LO.

My first Stampin Up workshop

The lovely Paige was my hostess on Friday evening for my very first Stampin Up workshop. I had practiced my demo and 'make and take' over and over so I was very well prepared. I was so pleased with how it all went and it was lovely to share SU with some lovely crafters. Paige had done such a fantastic job with nibbles and drinks that I was happy we managed to get her some lovely hostess goodies as a thank you ;0)

Here are the two projects I demo'd for Paige's workshop:

This mini scrapbook page was a variation on a demo that I saw in Liverpool at the Hobbycrafts show. I made a couple of different versions of it showing how it could easily be adapted into a greetings card with the addition of an extra flower and a greeting stamp. For this project we used: Chocolate Chip Card, Old Olive Card, Pink Passion Card, Taken With Teal Ink, Pink Passion Ink, Earth Elements Stampin Writes, Heart to Heart Punch, Chocolate Chip Grosgrain Ribbon, Scallop Edge Punch, and the My Sweet Pea Stamp Set from the new mini catalogue.While seeking inspiration for my demo project (knowing that i wanted to demo the Sweet Treat Cups) I had a look around at a few of my fellow SU demos websites. I came across a card similar to the above on my lovely upline Michelle's website. I used my own tools and colours to personalise this project and to make a lovely adult style card from the Something Sweet Stamp Set (I have previously posted the many variations of childrens cards I have made with this set).

This card used: Taken With Teal Card, More Mustard Card & Ink, Chocolate Chip Card & Ink, Old Olive Card and Ink, Sweet Pea Designer Paper Stack (Mini Catalogue), Tiny Tags Stamp Set and Punch (Mini Catalogue), Sweet Treat Cup, 1 3/4" Circle Punch, linen thread & paper piercing tool.

Birthday Cards

Here are a selection of the lovely handmade cards my Dad and sister received over the weekend.

This is my card for Dad. I made this using various Stampin Up sets and tools as well as some old cardstock and papers. I cut the windows using the 1 3/4 circle punch and then stamped the fish using the stamp from the Something Sweet stamp set. The weed is stamped using the small flower from the Tiny Tags stampset from the Mini catalogue ;0)

Mum's card that she made for Dad. I loved this owl (and the greeting is familiar from the Happy Moments SAB set).

Mums stunning 3D card for Sophie that she made using acetate to make the card rounded in shape ;0)

Natalie's gorgeous card for Sophie stamped using the All in the Family stampset. I love how each element of the girl is stamped in a different colour using Stampin Writes ;0)

My card for Sophie using an old 'sweetie' themed pad of cardstock and the Something Sweet stampset. I stamped the sweet machine with Versamark and then mounted under the Sweet Treat Cup. I created the pull tag so the sweeties could be got at without ruining the whole card ;0) I filled the treat cup with only Ss, Js and Ps for my sisters initials ;0) Sophie's name was stamped (without the use of my Stamp Ma Jig) using the Just Perfect Alphabet!