Christmas Workshop Makes Mark 2

Better late than never. I finally had the time to post these pictures of our workshop makes from Friday. We had a fantastic Christmas crafting workshop with some lovely ladies. I themed the makes around 'Quick and Easy Christmas'. I wanted to show that stamping can take the fear out of making your own Christmas items and you can actually make things in a quick and easy way. So no need to worry about making 50 Christmas cards. With the right design you can make all your Christmas cards in one afternoon.

Here is the mini Christmas card we made using Every Little Bit (this design would also be workable with any of the 30 mini images in the set). I themed all our projects on colour schemes with Crumb Cake as the base colour. This was then embellished with Real Red and Pear Pizzazz and finished with two basic rhinestones.

 We also each made one of these mini nappy pouches using a 6"x6" square of Jolly Holiday Designer Series Paper. We also made a mini 2" square note card to fit inside (stamped in Whisper White onto Cherry Cobler using the background stamp from Season Of Joy).

 A quick and simple gift tag cut using the Top Note Die folded in half. The Dasher image was stamped in Cherry Cobler with a matching Merry Christmas sentiment stamped inside.

 Our final project was a mini window Pillow Box. I created two different versions to show how quick and easy these little treat boxes can be. The first has the oval punched and the Gifted image stamped inside. Then to embellish I wrapped a length of Jolly Holiday DSP around the Crumb Cake Pillow Box. I cut a window sheet into smaller sections which was used to create the acetate window into the box.

 The second version (and the one we all made) was stamped with images from the Season of Joy stamp set in Pear Pizzazz and Cherry Cobbler. This is a perfect little treat box. It could be filled with seasonal treats and then once the sweets have been eaten the greeting is revealed.

Stamp Sets Used: Every Little Bit, Season of Joy, Gifted, Dasher
Designer Series Paper: Jolly Holiday
Ink: Pear Pizzazz, Cherry Cobbler, Whisper White
Card stock: Crumb Cake, Real Red, Whisper White
Embellishments: Buttons, Basic Rhinestones

Any questions or to book your own Christmas workshop, please get in touch on poulton_sarah@yahoo.co.uk or 01983 609249.

Happy crafting ;0)
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Yesterdays Christmas Card Class

Yesterday afternoon I had another lovely monthly card class. We were a bit thin on the ground numbers wise but it meant we got to do a lot more chatting as we crafted. And I forced myself to slow down and not get over stressed by rushing through everything (especially with what feels like the startings of flu this weekend).

We made three cards and a gable box using Dasher and Season of Joy. The projects we made today:

 Gable Box made with Season of Joy stampset. Ink colour: Poppy Parade & Pear Pizzazz (yes more shameless use of the In Colours!). Flourish was stamped with Champagne Shimmer Paint and a sponge dauber. Ribbon: Poppy Parade Poly Stitched.

 I cannot help but absolutely love the Paisley Prints stampset. This was the first on my shopping list when the new IB&C launched. I stamped the Christmas Tree image in Early Espresso. The greeting is stamped with the Curly Cute sentiment set. We used the Paper Piercer and piercing mats for the corner of the white panel.

I dedided to try out a new card style for this card so I looked at some online tutorials. I found this triangle folded crossover card with a tagged insert for writing your message on. Again, we used Season Of Joy to make the poinsettia flower on the front (Real Red with red brads for the berry centre). The DSP is the now retired SU Christmas papers. The insert was stamped with the Season of Joy flourish and sentiment, I hand drew on the stitching and finished with a Chocolate Chip Tag and stamped snowflake.

And finally I've been dying to a tri shutter card for a while. For this we used little bits of leftover DSP, Dasher and Season of Joy. I tried to show that this card is very adaptable and can be decorated in any way you like (made easier by double sided DSP which meant each of our cards was completely different). Each end was highlighted with gold embossed images. We also created the stand out flowers with scalloped circles and a button.

So that was my crafty Card Class afternoon. Now onward to planning for the Hospice Craft Day next month. Places are booking up fast, so if you would like to come along and spend the day crafting all in aid if a very good cause, get in touch to book now: 609249 or poulton_sarah@yahoo.co.uk

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A big thank you....

Firstly can I just thank all the lovely ladies that came along to my Open House yesterday. I had a really fantastic day and I really enjoyed chatting and crafting with both new and familiar faces ;0) It was a great opportunity to introduce Stampin' Up! to crafters who'd not used the products before and I'm looking forward to demo-ing at workshops next month for all the lovely ladies I met yesterday. And another thank you to Sandy for helping out and getting in some Demonstrator practice for her new Stampin' Up! business (now if we could just hurry that Starter Kit order up.....).

Lastly, a huge thank you to my Mum for all her help with my swaps and for the fantastic Pumpkin Cake she baked for the day.

Here are the projects we worked on yesterday using products from the new catalogue:

Dasher Christmas card: Night of Navy card & ink, Oval Punch, greeting from Season of Joy stampset and my new favourite punch- the Scallop Trim detail punch. We then accessorised the antlers with glitter.

 The decorated envelope using Season of Joy.

 Contempo Christmas Card:
For any other demos you'll recognise this card from the recent High Wycombe training. I loved the effectiveness of the 3D bauble so adapted the card slightly to demo yesterday. The card was created using the Ornament Punch, Contempo Christmas Stampset, new organza white ribbon, White Craft Ink, Wild Wasabi or Cherry Cobbler ink/cardstock.

For any questions about Stampin' Up! or any of the products featured above please do not hesitate to contact me: 01983 609249 or poulton_sarah@yahoo.co.uk.

Crafty Catch Up

After a very busy weekend of crafting and classes. I've finally managed to catch up enough to take photos to upload here. Saturday was my first class at Norton Grange in Yarmouth. It was an enjoyable session on a very rainy day ;0) The cards seemed to go down a treat and I look forward to demo-ing there again next Saturday.

Then Saturday afternoon was my normal monthly card class. At the request of my lovely card ladies I did a Christmas themed class. Here are the projects I put together for the session.

The first card was inspired by a similar card I saw the lovely Marguerite demo at a recent Pink Ladies training session. This uses the flourish from the Baroque Motifs stamp set along with small flower and greeting from the Season Of Joy set. DSP is from the Merry Moments set. Colours: Old Olive and Real Red. The finishing touch was a bit of Old Olive Grosgrain Ribbon, Linen Thread and a button.

Our second card of the afternoon was this lovely trifold/twister card using the Dasher stamp from the mini catalogue. We gold heat embossed Dasher onto Real Red cardstock (layered over Very Vanilla). The main card was real red with DSP from Merry Moments. Real Red Satin Ribbon to finish. I'm in the process of putting together a little tutorial for the trifold card as this is my new favourite card to make ;0)
I was attempting to demo different types of card as well as techniques. This was our final project for the afternoon, a lovely easel card using the greeting from Season of Joy. We heat embossed this in gold, outlined the Real Red with a gold pen and layered it onto Very Vanilla again. This was mounted onto a Chocolate Chip easel (also used another small piece of Merry Moments DSP again). The greeting was embossed and cut using the oval punch on Real Red and mounted with a Very Vanilla Scallop oval. I hadnt realised this card was stuck slightly wonky till I took a photo of it. It doesnt look so wonky up close ;0)I couldnt remember if I had uploaded a photo from my workshop demo last week. I demo-d a variation on my Loads of Love truck and Neighbourhood wheel card. I chose to keep it within the Soft Subtles colour family as it is works beautifully with these stamps. I mounted the picture onto Barely Banana cardstock and finished with Certainly Celery Grosgrain Ribbon and greeting punched using the scallop circle punch.
And one final photo for the day. As Mum and I were driving towards Yarmouth on Saturday for my first card class we were held up going through Carisbrooke. There was a long tail back and the traffic was barely moving. I was getting increasingly stressed about it until the source of the traffic jam turned out to be a swan with her babies walking down the middle of the road. I managed to get a photo of them once they'd waddled on up to the pavement and we drove past ;0) Right, off to get ready for another demo tonight. I'm going to be demo-ing the swirly Christmas card from Saturdays card class for some friends of my Mums.

Any questions about Stampin Up or to order products, please do not hesitate to get in touch: poulton_sarah@yahoo.co.uk or 07830 343830.