A Little Light Entertainment!

I'm really busy this weekend... as many of you probably already know, there are two fab event days happening next Friday (03rd) and Saturday (o4th) of July at Graphicus and I am up to my eyes getting stuff ready (that's not a complaint by the way - I'm really having some fun getting very inky and very painty) and working out what I'm going to be demonstrating. But unfortunately, I can't share anything just at the moment - it's under wraps until Friday.

Recently, I have found myself returning to my roots and picking up the pencils and pens... I have started drawing again! It's strange how, after such a long time out of it I've almost had to start from scratch to get anywhere near the quality I used to be able to achieve, but it's coming back - slowly.

What started it all? Well, I had a bit of a turf out and found some old charcoal and ink fashion drawings I'd done many, many years ago and some of my old journals and really liked what I had been doing. I then looked at all the blank journals I've collected over the years (can't help it, I have an addiction to beautiful books) just sitting on one of the book shelves in my studio and I knew that the time was right to get back into the groove.

I want to share something with you that I found while whizzing around the Internet looking at art supplies and yes, more journals. I howled at this.... it scratched my itch on two levels. One: my love of drawing and Two: we used to have a smooth haired Dachshund when I was little and I can just see her doing this!



I hope that made you chuckle as much as it did me!

Well, time to get back to getting even more inky. I might just post a real sneaky peek of some of the things I'm up to later... If not tonight, tomorrow maybe!

Enjoy your Sunday and Happy Crafting!

Blog Candy Alert!

There are brand new Elusive Images stamps on the way..... they will be released next week and there's a different type of giveaway happening over on the Elusive Images blog.

You might want to hot foot it over there to check it out! Remember: You've gotta be in it to win it!

Good Luck All and Happy Crafting!

Playing Catch Up - Part Two

Oh dear, I've been missing in action.... again! It was another dose of hospital and treatment last week which really did put me out of action for a few days. However, I'm going to endeavour to catch up with events and photos from the last few months and then I can get this blog up to date and back to the good stuff... crafting!

In my last post I mentioned that Diesel was off to the vets for his EPI check which I'm pleased to report, he passed with flying colours. Derek was really pleased with his weight and condition. While we were there he had his annual vaccinations and he is such a sweetie, I think he must be one of very few German Shepherd dogs who will turn around and lick his vet smack in the mush for being jabbed with a big needle. My last boy Degas would have taken the vets face off given half the chance.

February was a month packed full of events... some nice and some... not so nice! Early February saw us all at Elusive Images madly preparing for our big annual trade show at the NEC Birmingham. I should explain that most of the time when I refer to work I talk about Graphicus but I actually work for two companies (under one roof) confused? I am, most of the time, especially when it comes to answering the phone on my desk. For those who haven't a clue what I'm on about, Graphicus is the retail side of the company that sells all sorts of wonderful crafting goodies to all of you craft addicts out there whilst Elusive Images manufactures fab products such as the Elusive Images range of rubber stamp themeplates, wood mounted stamps and Artylicious CD ROM's but sells only to the trade. So this show was just for the shop owners, craft buyers and the press and it's spread over three action packed days.

Each year we try to theme our stand and the theme usually reflects a range of new stamps being launched at the show. Last year it was Peacocks whilst this year was Mardi Gras. Of course, the team on the stand have to be appropriately dressed and Glenda had sourced some fabuloso devore jackets in the company colours. Some visitors to the stand thought we looked very 'Harry Potterish'?

Here's Glenda, Helen and Emma all looking very elegant in their beautiful silk devore creations....

Glenda in full flow demonstrating......

And Carrie, Judith and Annette with Adrian beavering away in the background, taking the opportunity to get a hot cuppa before the mayhem begins when the show opens.

What you can't see in these photo's are the totally incredible watches we were all wearing that Glenda commissioned as a surprise for each of us manning the stand. We all sat down to dinner the night before the show opened after spending all day setting up and Glenda presented each of us with a beautiful little pouch and this is what it contained....

Aren't they exquisite? They were designed and hand made by the extremely talented beader extraordinaire.... our very own JUDITH! I was so surprised (although I did suspect Glenda was up to 'something' a few weeks before the show) and I will always treasure this very special piece.
Some of the art work and stock displays from around the stand.........

I have had to scrutinize all of the photos as several pieces of art work displayed on the stand are reserved for editorial features over the next few months, so some of the photos I wanted to show you.... I can't, at the moment.


As we had a strong Mardi Gras theme, I made this Venetian Mask using Elusive Images corporate colours and some of the brand new stamps released at the show. This was a real labour of love, originally inspired by the magnificent masks we saw in Il Prato, a shop in the Venetian Hotel, Las Vegas some eighteen months ago when Glenda, Adrian and I attended the Memory Trends trade show.

..... and the sumtuous colours of all of the other art work..... such stunning pieces!

The trade show is a lot of hard work and planning which usually starts mid summer the year before but it is such a fun thing to do and it's great meeting all of our trade customers, potential new customers, press contacts and of course, some of those well known guru's of the craft industry.

Well, when I sat down to do this post I had intended continuing with the February events which culminated in my knee replacement surgery but I really think that Part Three can wait until next time. It seems a shame to spoil these lovely arty photos with pics of my leg.... post surgery! I do want to share some pictures of the really lovely cards and special things people sent to me during my recuperation so they will be coming up soon.

Just to finish, I will leave you with some images of a tag I made last night. I was just messing around testing inks and ended up with this:

Using VersaMagic inks I stamped all around the edge of the tag using the lovely Christmas Rose stamp from the Roses Themeplate, with one full image in the centre of the tag towards the bottom. I then stamped the Art Words down the centre in quite a pale ink and took a large soft stipple brush and blended the inks while they were still wet.

Then I spritzed over the surface of the tag with Sticky Fingers Luster Spray Ink (Apricot I think) and finally with Fireworks Gold..... so zingy!

I took a Grungeboard flourish from the Elements pack and using my finger blended two of the Adirondack Acrylic Paints onto the flourish and dried. Then I added some Stickles to the flourish which was attached to the tag with silicone glue. Finally, some flat bottomed pearls, a large flower brad, rub-on letters and some ribbon finished the piece.

So, until next time.... thank you for all the lovely comments left on my last post, I really love to hear from you and appreciate the time you take to visit the blog and to leave messages.

Have fun and Happy Crafting!

Playing Catch Up - Part One

Sorry I didn't make a return to the blog last night but my back didn't hold up long enough to get done all that needed doing. However, I now have a lovely cup of latte at my side and a very 'hot' water bottle that I'm half leaning and half sitting on so what more can a girl want? It's quite comforting really!

Moira, I hope you have your cuppa and biccies ready! There's an awful lot to cover going back over the last few months and I'll recap in stages but I want to start with an event from the weekend before last... yes, we had another two 'open days' at Graphicus on Friday the 08th and Saturday the 09th of May.

'Hello' to everyone who attended and boy, was there a lot of you. What a fantastic turn out, particularly on Friday - it was quite a crush. I was a little late arriving as I had a review with my Surgeon before I could get underway to Barny which meant I didn't arrive until about 11.20. The event opened at 11.00 and by the time I got there is was heaving and there was nowhere to park near the building and my boot was full with all my demo kit. I managed to squeeze my car into the tiniest of spaces in front of the big roller door but had a real problem getting stuff out of the boot as I'd had to go so far back. I want to say a huge 'thank you' to the two ladies who came to my rescue and helped me lift my rolling trolleys out of the little hole I'd managed to get myself into... I really appreciated your help.

It was a fun event with so much going on. Glenda was doing wonderful things with awesome paints, inks, stamps, Tattered Angels NEW stamps and all of EI's new stamps too. Lesley made a fab job of reviewing Glenda's new CD Rom which will be coming soon and she made lovely arty samples with sneeky peeks of some of the papers. Then there was our Judith playing with her latest and greatest toy... Suze Weinburg's Melt Pot. Wow! what truly amazing stuff she was doing, the most glorious UTEE beads and some even had centres made with the new CD Rom papers! You have to see Judith's stuff it is wondrous and she's got so many requests for workshops with Melt Pot Jewellery so look out - they'll be coming up in the next workshop timetable. Annette had a real bumper demo going on featuring the Cuttlebug, Cricut's (Personal Cutter, Expression and the Create), the Cricut Juke Box and the brand new Slice from Making Memories. Wow, I was so impressed and both Annette and I have added the Slice to our shopping lists. It is such a brilliant little machine and so portable - just what you need when you want to sit in front of the TV and craft or if you are going to craft away from your normal work area.

I was playing with all things Ranger, Tim Holts Ideaology, his stamps and Wendy Vecchi Studio 490 stamps with a sprinkling of EI too - in other words 'totally awesome' products. Here's a look at a few of the things I made along the way:

A Maya Road tin (Ribbon Sliders) which has been inked with Adirondack Alcohol Inks, although the colours I used were from the original sets we had just taken delivery of the brand new colour ranges. At least one person I know bought one of every colour.... yes Jo, you know who you are and I'm green with envy - aren't they gorgeous colours? Another 24 items to add to my shopping list!

I tore an elegant picture from a glossy mag, trimmed it to fit and slotted it into the little metal tabs on the inside of the lid, yay no glue needed! Idea for the Christmas table: one for each place setting with a special little something inside and a photo of the recipient on the lid - maybe a childhood photo could be fun. They will make great place settings with a difference!

Onto my fave product: Grungeboard (GB). Unfortunately, I couldn't demo Grungepaper as we just can't keep it in stock. The minute it comes in it goes out and the suppliers seem to be having exactly the same problem but hopefully, there's more on the way from the USA as I write this. This flower is a real mish-mash of stamps: I used EI's Big Flowers for the largest layer but stamped on the back of the GB, cut it out and stamped the front with one of Wendy Vecchi's (WV) large background stamps - so usable. The second layer is a WV's Studio 490 flower and back to Big Flowers for the top layer. Inked with Distress Inks and finished with Distressed Stickles and Tim's Metal Foliage = Yummy!

A Butterfly pin cut on the Cricut, embossed with the Cuttlebug, inked with Distress Ink and smooched with Distressed Stickles again. Ideaology pieces to finish. [Thanks to Ranger for the lovely idea for this piece]!

Tim's stamps, this time with Distressed Inks a little Grungeboard and the lovely Metal Foliage again.

Back to Wendy Vecchi's super stamps for this tag but I've mixed them up with Tim's. The Grungeboard Flowers and tag are inked with Distress Inks.

Lovely sentiments on these stamps....

Now, here's a complete mix of Wendy's stamps for the flowers and leaves, Maya Road chipboard swirls stamped with a WV background stamp, Grungeboard for the flower heads and leaves and a pin back attached to the reverse side and you have your very own designer corsage! We were making these in a workshop a couple of weeks ago. I have some pics from the day which I'll get onto the Graphicus blog soon.

I really do love Wendy Vecchi's 'Studio 490' stamps, they are designed especially with products like Grungeboard and Maya Road Chipboard in mind and are manufactured beautifully by Stampers Anonymous - quality through and through and worth every penny!

When I first came across WV's blog at the back end of last year I almost had a heart attack. I saw some tags there and instantly thought 'what're my tags doing on this blog'? Then I looked again and saw that they weren't mine but we obviously have very similar tastes both in products and designs that it's frightening. Then came the stamps which I instantly fell in love with but didn't buy for fear of my work looking even more like Wendy's (only Wendy's work is outstanding - have you seen the stuff she did for CHA Winter)?

On my birthday this year I'd just come out of hospital and was recovering from the surgery at home when Glenda and Adrian pitched up loaded with goodies for me. A chocolate birthday cake from - wait for it:- 'Thornton's', some of Tim's brand new stamps and yes... some of Wendy's too! (Pic above with some of the lovely gifts I got from fabulous friends.) Oh I was in seventh heaven - how generous and kind and that's not all, Glenda kept me going sending me aid parcels on a regular basis filled with new releases from Elusive Images and new papers from Artylicious together with many other fabby things.... am I making you drool? Do you need a new knee too?

Well, it would have been so rude of me not to use the WV stamps wouldn't it? They are so wonderful for using with GB, I just had to come up with things that hopefully don't look the same as Wendy's and I had to stop reading her blog on a regular basis too for fear of her lovely work influencing what I was doing. I do sneak back occasionally in hope that she will give a sneek peak of some more of her lovely stamps that are on the way, presumably for CHA - Summer Show. How will she top what she's already done? Do give them a try.... they're not just for GB but I do love the way you can give your flowers dimension by curling them.

My lap top's started playing up again so I can't link to the products at the moment - it keeps telling me that the 'link is broken' when I know it's not. The pc works fine but I can't sit at it at the mo with my back problem, I need a comfy sofa that absorbs the compression on the discs so I'll try to edit this later and insert the links so you can find stuff easily if you want more info on what I've used.

Thank you to everyone who has stuck with me through my prolonged absence on the blog and for all the lovely welcome back messages... I'll be back with another installment soon, I just hope I don't bore you all to death!

For now, I have to go practice balancing on one leg while I get dressed to go out, can't slob around in these exercise pants for a minute longer I'm afraid. Thank goodness you can't see me, you'd never come back! I'm off to the vets later this afternoon with Diesel for his annual EPI check up (he was diagnosed with Canine Exocrine Pancreatic Insufficiency when he was four), in other words his pancreas doesn't work and therefore he can't process his food and without daily meds he would just waste away. It's all under control but Derek, our fabulous vet, keeps a close eye on him to make sure all his organs are fit and healthy and that he continues to do well. It's not something that he can be cured of but with very careful nutrition we can keep him well and looking good.

Catch ya later..... Happy Crafting all!

A Pre Blog Warning

Look out folks.... I'm back in the land of the living!


I have such a lot of catching up to do on the blog and so many thank yous to send to everyone who sent kind thoughts, positive support and beautiful cards and gifts while I recovered from my surgery. I've also got lots of pics for you (some not so nice taken from my hospital bed wearing no make up - eeeek! frightening) others which are prettier and of the more artistic type.

So while I get my head into gear, edit the pics and make notes so that I don't forget what I'm going to blog about, stay tuned..... I'll be back soon - hopefully later tonight or the wee small hours!

New Year - New Organisation!

Yep, it's that time of the year again when you want to get out there, sort out, re-organise, clean..... now I did say 'want' to, this is not the same as doing it! I'm still enduring all the negative effects of the osteo-arthritis only now I have a back problem which, since the beginning of December has caused acute sciatica from the hip to ankle in my right leg and for virtually twenty four hours a day. It's hideous and means that I have to take advantage of any slight improvement to get things done so blogging and blog hopping have had to take a back seat I'm afraid. I do have some positive news on the health front though but I'm just waiting to have one more appointment confirmed this week and then I'll give you an update.... it's far from doom and gloom but I don't want to temp fate until I've had everything confirmed.

So, back to organising. I really do need to do a lot of tidying in my craft room, it still hasn't recovered from having everything dumped in there over Christmas. Initially, I thought it was just all of the boxes from the Xmas Decs and that once they were taken down on 12th night and stored safely back in the loft it would be all clean and tidy again..... wrong! It would seem that every homeless item in our house found its way to my craft room. One thing has become clearly apparent - I need a bigger room. Negotiations have commenced with DH and he agrees with me so we just have to agree with each other on how we are going to achieve the impossible!

After posting a comment about stamp storage systems on the Graphicus Guild Group last week, I promised that I would let you see how I store my unmounted Stamps. I also realise from the Group that many of you are 'in the mood' for re-organising your stash and work areas. I love to hear and see peoples ideas on how they organise stuff and if you want to utilise my system please do. It works for me....

This is just a small selection of the most frequently used stamps. They sit just above my work surface and are always within easy reach. There are many others which are stacked within the storage unit on the back wall behind where I sit. The beauty of this storage system is that they can store flat or be stacked on end like books. When I want a set or two to take to an event or work I simply choose the boxes I need and they keep my stamps safe and make them easy to transport.

You can laminate the stamp graphic and attach the EZ Mount cushion to the laminate or attach the stamp to the box lid and base and insert the index inside to save having to open every box when you're looking for a specific set of stamps.

These are the boxes that you can purchase through Graphicus. You can even get 'Boxed' sets which come with an outer unit that the boxes slide into - a self contained housing so that they needn't occupy precious shelf space.... you could stack them on the floor or under a bench if need be.

And don't forget, you can label the boxes to make indexing your stamps and finding them again, so much easier!

While I'm showing you my stamp storage I thought I would show you what I've done with all my small rolls of ribbon.....

I have a Ribbon Locker (Graphicus used to sell them but the company that made them are no longer in business) that I use for rolls of ribbon that won't fit into these clear plastic storage pots but I love these.... they can be wall mounted, carried to crops or craft clubs and the storage pots which link in three's can be removed and carried separately if you only need certain colours.

I can clearly see all the different colours and patterns which makes finding the right ribbon a lot less time consuming. I can simply hold up a small piece of card that I am using in my project and match the ribbon without having to open pots, drawers, boxes etc. I'm delighted with how they work and I'm still in the process of colour co-ordinating another stack..... do you think I have a ribbon addiction? Nah! just a total craft addiction that no amount of medication is going to help relieve the symptoms (thank goodness).

Ooooo yummy! I want to go play but maybe I'll just organise the next set. Now for the bad news: I'm afraid that Graphicus don't stock these (not yet anyway - note to self: speak to Glenda) they are just something that I came across while out shopping one day.

I have found some super stuff of late, not specifically designed for crafting but things I liked the look of and could see how it/they could work in my studio both on a practical level and for eye candy too. So I may make this a regular feature and share my shopping finds and organisational skills (eh? well, maybe I do have them sometimes) with you on my blog. I just need to find the time to blog 'regularly'! I will try to get back again this week but it's that time of the year again...... TRADE SHOW and it's coming up FAST!

I may not have a lot of crafty stuff that I can share at the moment as I'm knee deep in preparing delectable little pieces for the show and some not so little either - remember Percival Ponsonby Smythe from last year? Well if all goes according to plan there will be another 'themed' creation taking shape very soon, I just need to get my skates on!

Happy Crafting and good luck with all the organising!

It's a Brand New Year!

Wishing you all a very Happy New Year with good health, good fortune and great contentment to you all.

May 2009 bring you fun, creativity in abundance, and lots of new crafting adventures!

Just for now, I will leave you with this.... it cracks me up every time I come across it:

Life should
not be a journey
to the grave
With intention of
arriving safely
In a pretty, and
well preserved body.
But
rather to skid
in broadside,
chocolate in one hand, martini in the other,
thoroughly
used up,
Totally worn out
and loudly proclaiming
WOW
WHAT A RIDE!

Have fun and happy crafting....