This Time I REALLY AM BACK!!!

Hi to all my Blogging Friends out there! Yay.... after working on my PC since Friday night, I'm finally back on line and 'de-bugged' by the look of it (fingers, toes, legs and arms all crossed tightly).

It has been a real battle and test of wills and skills (more will than skill I can tell you). After wiping my PC and re-installing Windows (twice since Friday night) I had everything zipping along beautifully yesterday until I tried to install the re-location disc that AOL sent out to allow them to move me over to their new BB Network and then it all went pear shaped and I lost my Internet connection.... same on my lap top! A very, very nice PC engineer came out this evening and sorted the connection out and got my systems singing sweetly once again.

Now I just have to install Office and all my other programmes, printers, camera etc, etc. I will work my way through everything methodically. But one thing's for sure - I can get onto Blogger again and I even have an operative browse button to access my photo's and a hyperlink that works too... yessss!

So I should be back with you again very soon. I have lots of pics to download and newsy bits to update so keep checking back. Thank you all for sticking with me through this technological nightmare, I really appreciate it and for all your lovely comments left on previous posts.

Now, back to work. The sooner I get all of this sorted the sooner I can come out to play!

Still Having Fun - if not a lot of sleep!

Now Blogger's playing games - the date should read Satuday 19th July. I'm not the only one who can't keep track of time!

Before I get started I'd like to say a big thank you to everyone who's left comments on the last couple of posts and for all the lovely things you've said about my Grungeboard Tags. I really do have an addiction to that stuff and there WILL be more to come. Thank you for taking the time to let me know you're out there! For all the Graphicus Guild members, look out for next months Guild Newsletter (August) - I'm doing a 'step-by-step' on creating the Grungeboard Flowers.

OK, let' get started. What a whirlwind month July has turned into. So much so that I am totally convinced it's still June, having written June three times in one day instead of July. I really can't get my head around the fact that we are more than half way through this year.... frightening!

To catch up a little with what's been happening I'll go back to the end of June and the beginning of July when we held our two day Retailer Retreat. It was one of those events that you think you have plenty of time to prepare for and then before you know it..... you don't!

It was held at the magnificent Headlam Hall Hotel between Darlington and Barnard Castle. What a beautiful setting. We had the whole of the Edwardian Suite .... complete with a reception room, conservatory, anti-room where coffee was served morning and afternoon and of course, the main room which was set up for workshops. We also had two days of really beautiful weather. I am so pleased that everyone who attended got the opportunity to visit the North East when the sun was shining (it does - just occasionally)!

Glenda, Lesley, Annette and myself were teaching workshops for two days solid. It was like speed dating only for crafting 'Speed Crafting' - great fun! The workshops were all based on the products that Elusive Images manufactures or distributes to the trade and although it was both mentally and physically draining, we had an absolute blast. Hop over to Glenda's blog where you can see some photo's - I was so busy my camera never even left my bag which is a great shame because at the end of day two just before everyone departed, Adrian treated us all to his rendition of the 'Gay Starfish' - don't ask, if you haven't seen it I couldn't even begin to explain but it is side-splittingly funny. Oh how I wish I'd captured that..... could have made a fortune.

Then there was the aftermath of the event with work being extremely busy. At the end of that week, Glenda had the Pick of the Week launching on Create and Craft TV with the new CD ROM: Peacock Summer Party and a live show with brand new themeplates, so life at Graphicus and Elusive Images was mad - totally and still is!

I promised last time to post a photo of the parchment necklace I made using the Ruby Tuesday and Diamante Delights themeplates. Thanks go to Carrie-Anne for the photography! It was made for the 'Glimmer with Glenda' show featuring these stamps and was also displayed at the retailer training event. It has given me a lot of food for thought and I have another venture planned on a much 'grander' scale, but you'll have to wait for a sneak peek as it's going to take some time to take it from the design stage to completion. This one's a long term project for the coming months.... keep popping back and I'll keep dangling the carrot!

Ok! It's time to make art....... and this is where it happens.


Another thing I promised, was to show you some of the finishing touches I added to the home studio. I'm a terrible collector of objet d'art (another reason why I need a bigger house - or loft, as that's where most of it seems to end up).


I love this tweety bird carving - it's so cute and rustic! The crystal metal 'thingy' was originally a light. It was the crystals that caught my eye and I thought they would make great additions to Stampbord pendants, altered jewellery pieces etc., I may even be tempted to get my soldering kit out for these.

Do I have a thing about birds? I didn't think so - but maybe I do.... just liked this one too! Hey, maybe I DO, especially after my 'Percival' interlude! Do Peacocks count?

These are my inspirational affirmations, they are now hanging on the wall to the left of the window so they're in my line of sight when I enter the room.

The little display unit also has a home now and so do some of the jars and tins of Prima flowers that I seem to have amassed - you should have seen my suitcase after my last trip to Las Vegas! I had to buy another one just to get everything home, not to mention all the ribbons too. One of these days I'll show you a photo of all the crafting goodies I brought back.

Another project in the making, I think I may decorate this little metal dress form with tags and small pieces of art.

And finally, a little rustic stand to display my CREATE word just waiting to be worked on. Why are there never enough hours in the day, days in the week, weeks in the month?
And that just about brings me full circle........

To bring this bang up to date, we've just had a two day sale at Graphicus, yesterday and today. To say that it was hectic would contravene the trade descriptions act..... it was crazy! We had some extremely happy crafters who went away with some amazing bargains. Friday passed in a blurr and I hadn't intended going to 'the office' today, but I've got a lot of prep to get underway this weekend and my PC is still not playing nicely. It's refusing to open PDF files with Adobe and I needed to print Artylicious papers so I popped in to work midday to do some printing and get some materials to work with. The place was heaving again. Ran into some lovely friends and acquaintances and did far too much chatting and even ended up demonstrating things like the Cuttlebug.
So with only 11 days left in July here's what I have to fit in...... tomorrow and Monday I will be prepping for two live TV shows and getting everything ready to hit the Peterborough road on Tuesday after we finish in the office. Glenda and I have to be at the TV studio at 7 a.m. Wednesday morning to set up for the first show which is live at 9 a.m. (who agreed to such an early slot)? I'll let you guess the answer to that one - only kidding Glenda! Then we get an hour to set up again before we go back on air at 11 a.m. for the second show. Fortunately, Adrian has very kindly 'offered' to chauffeur us there and back so we can get some sleep en route if necessary. If you're around on Wednesday morning, don't forget to tune in - we have MORE NEW STAMPS for you and some firm favourites too!
I'll arrive home on Wednesday evening and start prepping again and putting up the kits for our Christmas Workshop. Thursday we're back in the office, the sale area has to be packed away and the studio set up for our 'Christmas in July' workshop which takes place on Friday the 25th. It's completely sold out and so has the next one that we don't even have a date for at this moment in time.
Saturday, I'm teaching an 'Altered Canvas with Ten Seconds Studio' workshop. I am so looking forward to this one - I love teaching and enjoy all of our workshops regardless of the subject but this one I am REALLY looking forward to. Let me warn those of you who are attending, we're going to be getting down and dirty on this one. The music will be loud (I hope you like Aerosmith), bring your latex gloves and an apron because we'll be spritzing, spraying, waxing and metal working to name just a few of the things I have lined up for you! It's going to be WILD!
Now, I'm off to my little studio upstairs accompanied by Led Zeppelin and a bottle of wine to start some prep.... I mean the CD naughty, not the band!

Grungeboard Inspiration

Well, I said there was a chance of some more Grungeboard Flowers and here they are! I'm not going to share techniques with you at this moment in time as I have something in the pipeline which I'll tell you more about in a couple of weeks......

The basis of all my tags start with Distress Inks and anyone who's watched me demonstrate knows just how much I love these inks. You could take all my other inks away from me and as long as I have these and a Ranger Archival Black pad, I'd be as happy as a pig in....... (whoops)clover! But if you really wanted to make me happy I'd have to have my Adirondack dye inks too.

The flowers are made from sheets of plain Grungeboard or Grungeboard Basics to give it its correct name. You can do such a lot with this fab product from the man..... Mr Tim Holtz. It's very very robust and will stand up to inking, spritzing, crushing, hammering, being skwidged in the Cuttlebug and even put in the washing machine on a normal wash. How cool is that? Yep! you can sew it onto your clothes and continue to wash them as normal!! Just think of the possibilities. By the way, the Grungeboard Basic Pack is back in stock at Graphicus, it arrived from the USA on Friday so if you want some get it now, it's never on the shelf for long - just leave some for me!!!

Just look at these wonderful colours....... ooooooh so scrummy. The technique I use for laying down the inks is pure Ranger. Mr Holtz has taught this method for some time now and it is real easy but gives great results. Check out his web site, he has some real cool technique-based videos.The photograph above will give you a big clue as to where my inspiration came from for forming the Grungeboard flowers. This is a beautiful necklace that my Mum bought me for my birthday earlier this year. I loved it so much and thought it was a work of art in itself. I had been wearing it one day when I found myself in my studio playing with sheets of plain Grungeboard. I took my necklace off and placed it down on the worktop where I was sitting and my eyes kept going back to it glinting in the lights. I love the way the petals curl and it has such wonderful dimension and texture and that was it. I dragged out all my stamps with flowers on them, stamps that I could use for backgrounds and texture and I was off.......

This was the very first flower I created. Once I had my background worked up I added the flower and finished it with just a touch of Stickles.

Elusive Images stamps are brilliant for using on your Grungeboard. Try the Big Flowers Themeplate, or the brand new Ruby Tuesday or Diamante Delights Themeplates .

Here, I've mixed my stamps using some Blonde Moments flowers with Impression Obsession Swirls in the background and a little Hero Arts alphabet for words.

You can see the pattern and texture on the flower petals of the necklace, this gave me the idea to overstamp a layer of the flower.

I used EI's dots and swirls background stamp on the second largest flower which prompted me to use the 'Bandana' technique to pull the whole thing together. I love the 'Bandana' technique (devised by Robin Beam) and added touches to the stamped image on the tag using a Sakura pen.
Why stop at flowers? Butterfly's don't escape the Grungeboard either and they look great with a little dimension.

After a little while I spotted my Cuttlebug sitting on the floor and thought I'd try putting the Grungeboard in an embossing folder to see how well it would take, although I haven't included any photo's here I can tell you the results are stunning. Of course, Grungeboard Alphas and Elements do come in a range of textured designs but if you want different patterns... here's your answer.
On this sample, I put the tag in an embossing folder and ran it through the Cuttlebug and then inked the high spots and edges. This way, you really don't need to do any background stamping as the texture and colour is quite enough. Just add a few embellishments!

On this tag the background and the top layer of the flower have been spritzed with Glimmer Mists before assembly and you can just see the subtle sheen it gives to the otherwise dull surface of the Grungeboard.

Here are a few more pics of the culprit responsible for my Grungeboard addiction! This necklace was also the inspiration for a necklace that I made for Glenda's new TV Show: Glimmer with Glenda. I'll include it in my next post.

And finally..... NO GRUNGEBOARD! A very simple tag made predominantly with the fabulous Glimmer Mists. I started by spritzing lightly all over with Robin's Egg Blue and dried it completely. I then attached a Heidi Swapp Mini Damask Mask and spritzed over the top with Suede and let it dry before attempting to remove the mask. Finally, the tag was stamped with 'Art' words from EI using Walnut Distress Ink and a Fancy Pants Swirl stamp in Black Versa Fine.

A little tip...... for a long time I was disappointed with the results I was getting stamping in black over shimmering backgrounds such as Tattered Angels Glimmer Mists or Firework Inks, Shake 'n' Spray and Liquid Lustre all by Sticky Fingers so I decided to sort the 'men from the boys' and test all my black inks to see which performed the best. I sprayed card with Glimmer Mists and overstamped with every black ink I possess (and there's quite a few I can tell you). I tried the obvious ones first: StazOn, Archival, Memories etc and still didn't get a nice solid black that stayed black. They all seemed to be affected by the metallic pigments on the card until I tried Versa Fine Black Onyx. There was a marked difference and a very crisp, dark image which dried well and stayed black. Perfect!

I'm Back (in a round about sort of way)

Well, I hate admitting defeat but I'm afraid for the last three months my PC has defiantly beaten me to a pulp. Little by little one thing or another would fail, not play ball or down right refuse to do what I asked of it.

Now I may not be a technology whizz kid but I know enough to keep my system clean and in good order. I regularly do my housework, back up my system and de-frag my hard drive. So you would think it would show some semblance of respect wouldn't you? Nahhh! To cut a long story short I've wasted so much time trying to sort out the problems and got absolutely nowhere. Norton and AOL seem to hate each other with a vengeance, blogger has blogged off and won't let me create hyper-links and the 'browse' button is inactive and won't let me 'browse' my photographs. To add insult to injury, the search page is all jumbled up and system restore won't restore.... time to call in the big guns I think.

Anyhow, by hook or by crook I'm going to update this blog if it's the last thing I do so I'm using my Mum and Dad's PC to get me back up to date while I work on mine to sort out all of the problems.

Going back to the end of March and beginning of April I had a weeks leave. So I thought what better way to spend a couple of those days than cleaning out and redecorating my studio? To be honest I should just say 'decorating' my studio as it has never really been finished properly.

I designed the room some four or five years ago while I was still designing kitchens for MFI and my DH made my designs come to life. He built everything to my specifications using a combination of kitchen carcases and custom built units. While he worked on making my designs a reality my thoughts turned to the interior decoration and I hunted down the fabrics and paper that I wanted to use.

However, I was so impatient to get the room into use to see if my designs would fulfill my needs that I never really got round to the decorating part and I turned a blind eye to the cracks in the walls that needed filling and flaking emulsion that had come off when I stripped the wallpaper off to start the refit.

I'm normally quite an organised individual and I don't like working in a mess but when your time is divided between work, looking after a house and all that entails and having an all-consuming hobby (make that addiction), sometimes you just have to ignore the mess and get on and create. But faced with this........I just knew that it really was time to gut the room, get the paint brushes out and re-organise. I thought a couple of days would see it finished and put back. Huh! how wrong could I be. First of all the paint wouldn't cover properly so I had to apply an undercoat - like this.......

and then I decided if a job was worth doing it was worth doing well, so I gave it two top coats of emulsion in a lovely rich shade called Brown Sugar. Then the paintwork had to be glossed etc. I wanted a simple white blind for the window, how difficult could that be?........ Very!

Magazines and books in abundance had to be sorted and catalogued..........

So I bought some nice new magazine files that would complement my new decor and set about sorting through mountains of American and English mags, keeping the American ones and ditching most of the others. Then, as I brought everything back into the room it was sorted and found a home (well most of it found a home). Some of it is still in the lounge and one of the bedrooms! I'm still trying to convince DH that he should custom build a large log house in the garden into which he could move his model railway and then I could convert the integrated garage and move my little empire into a ground floor room..... a bit more work is needed to persuade him I'm right.

OK, so back to my current set-up. As you can see, the room is very compact but I've tried to make good use of the space available. Leading on from the book shelves on the left hand wall is open storage from floor to ceiling. Originally, I had intended putting doors on but as the room is so narrow I decided against it and being able to see what's on the shelves helps me to use things that might not otherwise see the light of day. A portable 12"x 12" paper storage stands at the far end and is home to my two tier Clip-it-Up.

Lighting is extremely important and I have three different lighting systems built in. Phew! it can get hot in here when they're all on together.... but great in the winter!

Coming down the right hand side is an end to end work top with storage built in above and below. The narrow drawers on the left of the photo above house just some of my wood mounted stamps. As much as I love unmounted stamps, I also love my wood mounted stamps and couldn't bring myself either to part with them or to desecrate them by removing the wood - they just wouldn't be the same. Some stamps are just meant to be on wood! I also have my little TV, Video and DVD player mounted onto a bracket on the wall so if there's something worth watching on TV (like one of Glenda's shows) I don't have to stop crafting to go watch it in another room.Located under the work bench is more portable storage on wheels, and some A4 paper and card towers. At this end of my work top is a tall storage unit which houses a collection of Xryon machines on the top shelf, then DVD's and Videos and three shelves of A5 card and printed paper collections. The black wood display unit is going to go on the wall eventually.

I have a pull out shelf to the right of my sitting area and this is where I put my machines when they're in use. The Cuttlebug, Cricut and Sewing machine (for sewing paper of course) all fit beautifully on here but the Cricut Expression is a very tight fit.

Here's a better look at some of my wood mounted stamps. I have quite a collection since I bought my first stamp back in 1981 when unmounted stamps were unheard of. In fact, stamps of any kind were unheard of in the UK except for maybe foam ones for splodging on walls. My very first stamp was a Rose design from a lovely company called PSX but unfortunately they disappeared a few years back. Some of their original designs are now available again from Inkadinkado.

I need another set of these drawers putting in at the opposite end of the unit for all the stamps that are currently homeless and living in boxes. The runners are fully extendable so that you can get right to the back of the drawer box. Neat eh? DH's unique design! I just told him what I wanted and how it had to work and he made it happen.

A lovely little nick nack that was just waiting for a home in my studio..... another TK Maxx find!

Essential tools.... the Making Memories carousel, I can't do without it now, it's brill and more portable than you may imagine. My large Score-It Board, Mini Misters filled with Distressed Inks and of course 'Tim Hotlz Scissors' superb for cutting out unmounted stamps on EZ Mount cushion. Boy do they make life a whole lot easier with the amount of stamps I cut out!

The pull-out trolley is home to mainly ink pads and is great for standing the Ink Locker on when I'm sitting at the bench.... everything to hand.

And finally, back to the wall behind the door and leading on from the book shelves. The glass fronted drawer unit is home to large spools of ribbon, wools, tissue paper, fabric etc. Then more 'stuff' on the open shelves.

Since these photos were taken I've tweaked the decor and added a couple of nice finds which I'll post next time.

Well, I'm going to call it a night for now. My poor Dad thinks I've hi-jacked his PC for good..... little does he know that he may be seeing more of me than he would like (at least until I get mine sorted out anyway).

Back (hopefully) in the not too distant future.

PS: Most of my tools and gadgets can be sourced here.....

What a Difference a Day Makes (or 7 of them to be precise)

Having been away at the NEC, it's now seven days since I last made the almost 60 mile round trip to work and what a surprise I got this morning. In only seven days - Spring has Sprung (despite the fact that snow is forecast for Easter this weekend).

It was a mild morning and quite bright and as I drove along the very scenic route to work. I was taken aback by the beautiful blossoms in abundance on the trees, some pink and some white. These trees had been completely bare last week. Japonika and Forsythia bushes were in full bloom and the sunny yellow of their flowers made everywhere look stunning. I had to resist the urge to stop and take photographs - I'd never have got to work if I had.

Now, back to my adventures at the NEC:

Having got the first very successful day over with, I returned to the hotel in the evening. There were several other exhibitors staying in the same hotel and we made arrangements to all have dinner together. The company was good even if the food was just 'OK'.

Friday 14th: You could really be forgiven for thinking today was Friday the 13th not the 14th. Overnight, the hotel car park had been hit by a gang breaking into cars looking for lap tops and sat navs. Seven cars were targeted where I was staying and one of them just happened to belong to a colleague and friend also exhibiting at the show. They seem to have gone for cars that looked like they could be 'reps' cars. Mine was fine but as I walked out to it that morning I could see glass all over the ground and a car just one away from where I was parked had been broken into.

We later learned that just about every hotel car park on the NEC complex had been targeted.

Although the day had got off to a bad start for some, the show turned out to be another successful and enjoyable day. A bit of a strange day in a way as one moment the stand was completely inundated and the next the aisle was almost completely empty. It left you wondering if the hall had been evacuated and no one had told you! But then the next wave would hit and you couldn't see the stands across the way again.

Some more examples of some of stamps and techniques that I was demonstrating at the show. Sorry about the lighting on these examples, I tried using the flash but it was bouncing off the pearlescent card and the pearlescent paint on the Peacock feathers. The Peacock has been stamped on vellum and 'bowed' out from the front of the card to give it dimension. I adore the little Peacock Feather stamp around the border - it is so delicate. The background stamp in black on the card above is also on the Peacock Glory themeplate and gives such a lovely damask 'feel' when stamped repeatedly. This is a very adaptable plate of stamps and well worth having in your collection.

Saturday 15th: Such a sad day. The show got off to a great start, it was busy from the word GO at 9.30 and by 11 a.m the hall was heaving. Then tragedy struck. I'm not going to go into too much detail, you'll understand why. One of the exhibitors collapsed on his stand and a very serious medical emergency was declared. The show was temporarily closed while the paramedics gave assistance and the air ambulance was brought in but I'm very sorry to say that every ones efforts were in vain. This very sad event cast a subdued air over most of the exhibitors I spoke to that day and our thoughts and commiserations are with his wife and family.

On a happier note, everyone I spoke to who stopped by the stand appeared to be enjoying the show - many people, even late into the afternoon had not stopped for lunch in fear of missing something good and they kept walking the show.

I got a lot of enquiries about the ink pad storage system I was using. It's called an Ink Pad Craft Locker. I knew that we didn't have many left back at Graphicus and some of you have been on the phone and placed your order for this very nifty little locker since seeing mine at the show. When I got back to work this morning I checked to see how many we have and there is ONLY ONE left now. So if you were one of the people who wanted one and you haven't secured yours yet, do it now! I know that we haven't got any more on order at this moment in time.

Sunday 16th: and the final day of the show started quietly, probably due to a combination of heavy rain and the fact the it was Palm Sunday. But again, by 11 a.m. we were in full flow and it was fast and furious. I love the buzz of the show, to hear all about the exciting things people have found to buy and what you have planned for using them. I was also really delighted to see how many 'young folk' we have coming into the crafting community - and boys too. Maybe the next Tim Holtz was standing watching my demo's over the last four days - who knows?

All too soon, it was time to pack up my demo equipment and head off back up the motorway in the direction of home. I'm pleased to say that the heavy rain of the morning had passed over and the driving conditions were relatively good. My little Punto did it's 'Transformer' impersonation and turned into a Porche and I was home in next to no time. Exhausted, but at the same time wired with enthusiasm to continue creating and I have lots of plans for the next two weeks to get some 'eye candy' ready for our Open Days at Graphicus on the 04th and 05th of April.

Here's a peak of a work in progress.... this is how it looked when I put all the elements together to get started, it's looking a little different now that it's about half way to being completed. Any ideas? I'll show you when it's finished!

And last but not least, I did get back in time to see the end of the final of Dancing On Ice. Wow, what a show. I'm sorry I missed the fly wire performances but what I did see was spectacular and on a completely difference level to last weeks show. This series has been the most brilliant entertainment and has given Sunday night viewing the sparkle it has sadly lacked for many a year now. Just a pity that they can't find a show to do the same for Saturday night viewing! The great British viewing public pulled it out of the hat again and the results were spot on. Hurrah!