Stickerkitten ‘Penguin and Presents’ Christmas Makes

Hi everyone,

Okay… okay… I know it’s only August but all of you crafters out there know that Christmas in the crafting world starts in June and ends mid September when Spring makes are thrust upon us. So I’m sure you’ll be less than surprised to see a Christmas post me me. Now, I’m not the most Christmas-loving person in the world (I really do have to force myself with Christmas makes) but I’ve really enjoyed playing with these papers – something to do with knowing where they’ve come from?!

Many many moons ago, myself and the lovely Stickerkitten (A.K.A. Sarah!) were on the Docrafts DT together and have remained Facebook friends although we’ve never actually met in real life – yet! Haha!  When she announced she was bringing out her own range of paper crafts I was super chuffed for her and James (her hubby – the designer behind the images) and I have tried my best to support them as best I can.

So today I’m sharing a couple of cute makes using their fabulous new range ‘Penguins and Presents’.

Their latest Christmas themed range has papers, wooden embellishments, super sparkly sequins and stamps and as I mentioned before, all the images are designed by James.

I’ve already started painting the wooden embellishments using gesso before adding some colour

The sequins are available in two sparkly colour ways: red/white or silver/white/iridescent but both are scrumptious!

I love the way the packaging echoes the papers in the range

After watching Sarah on Facebook Live last Saturday, I really liked the way she had used the range with kraft card and although it’s only peeping out on this first quick make, it softens the papers… if you get me?!

I went really simple with the first card, just playing with the stamps

I’ve stamped holographic heat embossing powder on using the stamps to create a sparkly background before adding the snowflakes in Strawberry Sundae by Wow!

To add extra sparkle, I’ve dotted on ‘Icicle’ Stickles from Ranger

The second make uses everything in the range:

I’ve trimmed the string of lights to add it to the top of the card and I’ve then added dots of the ‘Icicle’ Stickle again to give more sparkle as you can never get enough at Christmas!

The wooden embellishments are brilliant and can be easily painted.  I gave mine a coat of gesso first as I wanted the colours to remain bright and not get sucked into the wood itself.

The penguins have been given a coat of the same ‘Icicle’ stickles as previous and finished with a jaunty hat and scarf off the stamp set

To highlight the background paper, I’ve scattered small adhesive pearls in the centre of the snowflakes

So there you have it.  I definitely had fun making these two cards and have a few ideas up my sleeve for gift bags and tags… who knows possibly even a cracker!

Do check out Stickerkitten’s other ranges as they are all utterly gorgeous and being a small, new business, they thoroughly deserve some success!

Have a good week everyone, H x

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Distress Oxide Ink Pads… the new colours!

Well hello everyone!

Wow… been so ridiculously busy as always but was super excited to receive my set of the new oxide ink pads last Friday!!  I’d already sort-of planned what I wanted to make with them (well the colours anyway) and I couldn’t get in the craft room quick enough!

The backgrounds are so easy to make and they’re so quick to make.   It’s a great excuse to get inky… so you can make them quickly and then leave them to dry while you’re catching up with something else!

The chalky finish to the inks gives a fabulous matt finish to the backgrounds, perfect for stamping on

The first card used Antique Linen, Spiced Marmalade, Wild Honey and Fossilized Amber ink pads, all dabbed onto a craft sheet and spritzed with water to make the colours come alive.  I love watching the colours ‘pop’ off the sheet!

The stamped images are all Craftwork Cards, including the textures stamped in Vintage Photo oxide

You can add extra texture to the stamps by drawing into them in gel pens. Here I’ve used white and gold pens to add some detail

The second card I’m still not sure about but I’ve had some lovely comments off people on the Craftwork Cards pages over on Facebook and I do trust their judgement!

I love the grungy background but not sure the white is the right colour for the stamps

My last share for today is probably my favourite. I love the moody darkness of the background and the PaperArsty stamps just work so well.  I’ve clearly harnessed my inner Goth for this card and I’m loving it!

The main stamps are embossed using Wow! heat embossing powders in Vintage Amethyst, Earthtone Grape and Metallic Platinum whereas the large bird is black Stazon

The stamps are fabulous aren’t they?  I do love the PaperArtsy stamps.   You can really treat them badly and they’ll still stamp and give you amazing results!

So there you have it!  Three simple-isa makes using the utterly scrumptious oxide ink pads from his royal highness Sir Tim Holtz… haha!

See you all soon, H xx

Craftwork Cards Workshop

Hello everyone…

Yes, I know it’s been yonks since my last post but I’m so busy I haven’t had chance to craft in a while so bear with (as they say).   I made the sad decision to come off the Craft Consortium design team as I felt I was letting everyone down and I was getting stressed about it… and crafting isn’t supposed to be stressful and I just need to concentrate on other stuff at the moment.

Anyway, on Saturday myself and my partner in craft-crime, Clare, went to a rather fabulous workshop for Craftwork Cards held in Horley (I know!  Down South for a change!)  We’ve been before and always love them and this was much needed as we spent the day giggling like a couple of school girls (well, it was held in an infants school!)

As always, there is plenty of inspiration from Julie Hickey and the DT:

Loving Julie’s inky backgrounds with the different fonts used… very effective

Love, love, love the colours used on this card and using a kraft card blank adds a different finish

Really simple make but I loved the look of it

Craftwork Cards ‘Reveal It’ used here to huge effect

There was 60 of us in total, so quite a lot of chatting and catching up went on as many of us know each other from the CWC Facebook pages and it was lovely to see everyone.

As you can see in the background, it is always necessary to buy a few bargains at these days!

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We were massively fortunate to have a sneaky peak of the new collection “Kimono’ and even use it! Gorgeous papers… really stunning and all beautifully illustrated by Mary Gillingham of the DT. My personal favourite is the tiny Geisha girl paper… super cute!

There were a couple of makes using this collection on display:

I just love the liquid pearls dotted on the background squares

This was the front of a notebook and looked just adorable!

And then it was our turn to have a go. Mary had made a recipe sheet for us all to follow for origami kimono’s which we then topped with cute Geisha girl heads cut from toppers.

The imagery is just beautiful as are the colours

And then we used the adorable new fan card blanks to make the second card:

I love these fan cards and they’ll work really well with some 1920’s inspired papers I have!

Using the same “Kimono’ papers, Pippa showed us how to make these cute origami flowers which I rather love!  There was the most amazing wreath covered these flowers and I take my hat off to whoever made it as it would have taken forever but was just stunning.

The flowers were so simple to make and who knew that Glossy Accents was just as brilliant as a glue gun for quick drying!

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I was then forced out of my comfort zone to make a couple of clean and simple cards… the first of which failed spectacularly as I smudged my ink but the second turned out pretty alright (and I’ve sinned added some gems to the small daisy flowers and glitter glue to the buttons).

I really don’t do clean and simple cards very well as I always feel they’re not finished!?

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Lastly, is an inky make which I didn’t think I would like and it turns out I love it!

We were each given a die-cut sheet of foiled florals which we coloured using just a water brush and a couple of drops of ink.  I went quite heavily into mine with colour (I know, shocking!) and then couldn’t finish at the workshop as the flowers were drying but I was okay with that as I wanted a deep colour and I love it!!

There was only pink or purple to choose from so Clare chose pink and I chose purple and we mixed!

We then inked up a greeting card (Fashionista anyone?!) and arranged the flowers around the outside. Julie had hers framed and I just happened to have a spare Ikea box frame in a drawer and this is the finished make:

So I’ve come happily home with some new makes and loads of ideas!  Julie was talking about the possibility of a stamping workshop which I am definitely interested in!!

That’s all for now though folks…  thank you for reading.

Love H x

Craft Consortium ‘Kori Kumi’ Makes

Morning all,

No, I know I’ve not been about but it’s been a busy time… some good and some not so good and crafting has taken a bit of a backseat the past few weeks (months even). I feel like my mojo has gone slightly and I’ve lost focus but as I’ve got a couple of weeks off work I’m re-evaluating and seeing where I want this crafting journey to go.

Anyhow… How many of you saw the gorgeous “Kori Kumi Phase 2′ on Create and Craft last week?  Didn’t it all look amazing!  I was truly speechless at how quickly it sold out but was so pleased for Craft Consortium as they’ve worked really hard with this range.

I took a few sneaky pics from the telly box showing my projects…

All the DT makes looked just beautiful…the colours were stunning and Angela did a fabulous job of presenting .

I’ve had a couple of ‘Kori Kumi’ makes on the go and the first is a little notebook that I based around the watermelon imagery on the Phase 2 papers:

I am absolutely in love with these papers and embellishments!

 

 

 

The illustrations are just gorgeous and the decoupage pack is perfect for quick makes and looks stunning

 

Don’t forget the added imagery on the packaging… it’s the gift that keeps on giving!

After a visit to Ikea a while ago, I’ve had a couple of shadow box frames just sitting there staring at me and I really wanted to use one for a Kori Kumi project.  I chose ‘Dreamboat’ as the theme for this as it’s another of my favourite illustrations (aren’t they all?!)

The floral strip att he bottom and the tag on the side are all part of the packaging, so be careful how you open it!

 

You an just see the wispy clouds here made using the stamps and white flocking powder… which is utterly addictive

 

The floral dies are fabulous. They cut right first time and I’ve used them on so many projects (and you get so many!)

Right… I need to get these punsters out to wear them out so I can get on today!  They’ve not been very impressed with me lately so I have some making up to do… bless them.

Catch up soon folks ,

Heather xx

Decoupage Father’s Day Makes

Hello everyone…

How is everyone?  All good I hope!

So today I’m sharing a trio of Father’s Day makes I recently made using the fabulous decoupage papers from Craft Consortium.  I know they’re decoupage papers but all I’ve done is simply adhere them to card and that way I can use them as I would ‘normal’ crafting papers.

The Craft Consortium decoupage papers I’ve used are Industrial Chic, White Wood and Old News.  I’ve then used a gorgeous matt copper card to compliment the rustic look of the decoupage papers… which I think works really well!

I first made the exploding box and have used a variety of Xcut and Sizzix dies on this.  The basic template for the box itself is cut form kraft card so it’s nice and strong and then I’ve layered up the decoupage papers and embellishments.

I love the finished look of the box card and the copper accents from the matt card and the heat embossing powder work really well with the sparkly dots courtesy of Stickles.

The dinky gift box will look great filled with sweets…

I’ve used the same elements and papers as on the card so all three elements work together although I think the bottle topper is perhaps my favourite!

So there we have it… three Father’s Day makes using the gorgeous decoupage paper from Craft Consortium.  Check out their blog for some more fabulous crafty ideas!

Heather x

A bit more Kori Kumi Part II by Craft Consortium

Hello, hello everyone…

As promised , here’s more of the Santoro London Kori Kumi projects I made for Craft Consortium using the new collection of papers and embellishments.  It always make me chuckle at how fickle I am when making things.  As soon as I finish one thing, that’s my new favourite and then when I finish something else, that is my new favourite! Haha!  Well this latest make is def my newest favourite and is hanging in my craft room squeezed in-between pics of the kids and other makes.

The base of this wreath comes from Docrafts and is made from polystyrene so it’s easy to adhere things too

The wreath didn’t take too long to make really.  It’s simple in it’s design and once it’s covered you get to the fun part of adding the images and embellishments.

The umbrella die is one of Katie Skilton’s new design’s made by Sizzix and are all amazing!

 

The ‘Hello Spring’ letters are adhered to acetate but once hanging, the acetate cannot be seen and it looks like the letters are floating!

 

The tags, lilac cloud, llittle pot and sign are cut from the packaging of the 12×12″ paper pad. In true Santoro style, the packaging is fabulous!!

 

This card was made using the Kori Kumi decoupage kit and the paper hat boat is just one of the many images available in the pack.   I’ve used the washi tape as edging and then added the resin flowers and leaves under a painted wooden sign that I’ve hand-written.

I’ve used the enamel dots as rain drops on this card and the colours are just gorgeous!

 

The final make for now is bright and beautiful!

Again, I’ve used the tags from the packaging as a main feature on the project

 

With a simple background, I’ve merely layered up elements from the paper pad to create this cute little card fit for any happy occasion. The florals are just gorgeous and so easy to fussy-cut and used them so much  I’ve run out of them now!

With so much available in the new Kori Kumi collection, making projects is so easy… just have a look some of the collection… how gorgeous is it?!!

You can buy all the lovely Kori Kumi products and the rest of the Craft Consortium products from their shop on Amazon.

Enjoy the rest of your day everyone!

 

Kori Kumi Part II by Craft Consortium

Hello everyone,

I’m a little bit excited to share with you some projects I made for the gorgeous new Kori Kumi collection by Santoro London and Craft Consortium.  The second part of the range is just amazing… the colours are bright and beautiful and perfect for Spring/Summer makes and the illustrations adorable!

The collection, aside from the paper pad, is full of fabulous embellishments… twine wooden shaped, buttons, stamps, resin flowers and leaves, enamel dots, sequins, washi tape (gorgeous watermelon washi tape!!!) the most amazing flock powder (it really is brilliant!!) and the cutest water melon resin shapes that I have really fallen for.

So… here’s the first make:

The clouds have crackle glaze painted over them so they have feint subtle lines over them

I had a distinct urge to sew round the torn papers to create a rough sea look and to add to this, I sprinkled heat emboss powder on the edges to give extra texture.  I like the mix of delicate colours with the intense navy of the background and the fact the little figure looks serene while the sea looks choppy.

My next make is an MDF tag which I loved decorating:

I really enjoy making tags as you can layer up elements and create a cute decoration

I started by trimming thick corrugated cardboard to the tag which I had painted in a sage green/blue acrylic and then sprayed distress inks over to add texture.  Using a section of the papers, I added rips and holes so you could see the corrugated cardboard peeping through before adding coloured texture paste with Tim Holtz’s ‘Rays’ stencil.

(Excuse the dodgy photo – suddenly though it would be good to snap it pre-embellishments at about 2am!)

The figures were trimmed from the papers and the hearts embossed using the folders from the first half of the Kori Kumi collection… so much in this range with these new releases it’s so easy to find embellishments to add!

My last make is this ‘Bon Voyage’ card using a mixture of the two parts of the collection:

This thoughtful traveller is perfect for leaving cards

After layering the papers, I’ve added strips of the washi tape from the collection, a doily heart and strips of twine before adding the flowers (made using the dies from the first half of the collection) and the centres are sparkly sequins just to add a hint of pzazz!

So that’s the first half of my makes… I’ll share the others in a few days!  Oh and a huge congratulations to the guys at Craft Consortium who recently won ‘Most Innovative Product Range 2017’ with this gorgeous new collection!  I knew it was going to be a winner… these colours are addictive!

Enjoy the rest of your weekend folks, hope it stays sunny 🙂

Heather x