The Craft is taking over!

Bubbly Scrumptious: Inspiration board challenge

2011-10-24T12:12:00.004+01:00

Bubbly Scrumptious has a new inspiration board challenge,with a prize of some Jenni Bowlin goodies so I thought that I would give it a go. You can find all the details HERE and you have until Sunday to do a project.

My LO-we moved to Scotland in 1994, lived in a caravan for 3 years and slowly renovated our Old Water Mill and garden. We put our heart and soul into creating our Dream Home.

This is my interpretation, green, orange and brown were the colours that stood out,then texture, wood grain overlay, sewing and flowers, embelishments on foam pads made up the layers.

Give it a go.

TFL

Chris

Creative colour workshop.

2011-08-05T14:32:00.013+01:00

I have recently signed up for the new class by Christie Tomlinson: Creative colour. Its all about sourcing colour inspiration from your surrounds, internet, magazines etc and creating mood boards. Its designed to get you to think about colours you wouldnt neccesarily choose.

So i had a play day with my daughter's Sarah and Sarah (Confused!!!!, one is my own and one is adopted, lol). My adopted sarah is severly autistic but just loves to do arts and crafts. We had such a great time, and L Sarah sat for over 3 hours before she lost her focus.

Here are some pics of the preparation and making the backgrounds.

Even my 9 month old grandaughter got in on the act.

and the finished product. Mine is the green/ mustard one, Big Sarah's is the larger yellow one, its for Rebecca's room and the blue/ pink one is L sarah's.

Isnt this outstanding for a very autistic young lady. All her own work except the rub ons which i did for her.

Cant wait for more classes.

TFL

Chris

A bit of recycling

2011-07-26T19:04:00.015+01:00

So its been a very long time since i blogged, me and technology you know, lol.

But i have been having a play around this month. We are in the middle of giving our converted mill a spruce up so i wanted somewhere to store my ideas and decorating inspiration, smash book style, but i just couldn't find a folder or album suitable enough. So i decided to have ago at making my own. I had spare A4 ring binders floating around so decided to start chopping them up.

So here goes, a step by step tutorial on how i made the book.

Materials
Stencils and masks
Gel medium
Old paintbrush
Tissue paper in light and dark colours
Heat gun
Heatproof mat
Spray inks
Water mister
Kitchen roll
Hair bobble or elastic
Large button
Needle and thread
Doodle pen
Cutting mat
Sharp cutting knife
Metal ruler
Pencil
Strong adhesive tape
Pokey tool

Instructions
Start by taking a plain A4 folder. Lay your folder flat onto a cutting mat.

Taking a pencil, mark 2” from the top of the folder. Draw a line all the way across the folder. Using a fresh, sharp knife, carefully cut across the line. Retain the off cut for later. Repeat the process with the bottom edge.

Lay the folder flat again. Using a pencil, mark 6.5” from the spine fold. Draw a line all the way across the folder and carefully cut across. Repeat on the other side of the folder.

Next take one of your off cuts and cut in half. This will form your flap. This should be the same size as the folder, if not, trim to fit. Repeat with the second off cut.

Take your adhesive tape and lay it along the edge of the folder. Carefully place your off cut on the tape, leaving a gap of a few mm and press down firmly. Cut another piece of tape the exact size of the off cut and place over the gap (ie front). Use a bone folder to push the tape into the gap as this will make it bend easier and the tape wont be tight and split. Repeat the process with the second off cut. I cut of my corners on the flap at this point but your can leave them square if you want.

And that is your folder complete. This folder has one flap for closing. But you can use your other off cuts to make a flat pocket on the other side if desired.

Next its time to prepare for decorating. I took some tissue paper and cut it into strips. I used a darker one first as my folder was red so I needed something darker to cover the red. Give the folder a good covering of gel medium and brush the tissue paper down with a brush. It doesn’t matter how rough you do this as it all adds to the texture of it. Cover the front and back in tissue paper. I gave my folder two coats of dark tissue and two coats of light tissue. I left mine to dry naturally in between but you can speed it up with a heat gun if impatient.

Once fully dry, use the stencil, ghosting techniques to decorate the folder, inside and out.

Again once dry, its time to add a closure. I wrapped elastic around my folder on this one but on my second one i used a hair bobble. For this method I punched a small hole in the middle of the flap and added a hair bobble. But you can use other products such as shearing elastic, string, twine, ribbon etc. Next take a pokey hole and punch 2 holes in the centre of the front folder. Don’t have them too close together. Take a strong thread and begin to thread through the button and holes. Pull tight. This is why the holes should not be close as the thread will pull through the holes.

Decorate the front cover as desired.

And that is your folder complete. They are very sturdy and look fabulous. Below is another one i am making for the new shimelle class Explore.

More images below of my smash book

And here is my explore album

TFL and i hope i have inspired you to recycle those folders.

CHRIS

New year, new look.

2011-03-09T09:25:00.001Z

I am shamed by the lack of use on this blog. Have got DD to give it a make over, so hopefully i will master how to use it!!!!!

Chris

Learn something new everyday

2010-08-30T15:10:00.003+01:00

Here is my album ready for Shimelle's new class, Learn something new everyday, which starts on Wednesday

Here is my front cover. I am making my pages on tags as suggested by Shimelle so the album is slightly larger than tag size.

Below is a blank tag. I will add the date/day to the little tags at the top. I will make a tag a day i think. Then i have squares of CS that have been ready punched on the BIA that will be sandwiched between two completed tags.

This is the back pocket page for storing all my ready cut blank tags or works in progress.

And this is my back cover. Still to be finished yet!@#$^%*&*()

Looking forward to the class especially on a smaller scale.

TFL
Chris

Happiness Heart

2010-02-17T20:36:00.003Z

I have recently been having a few play days and experimenting with some altering and getting messy with gel medium.

I made this heart as a present for a friend after being inspired by the vanila sugar challenge blog. The theme this month was to make a heart shaped wall hanging.

TFL

Chris

January art journal

2010-02-03T17:46:00.003Z

This is my finished pages for A cold January

Here are my pages all ready for February. I am really enjoying playing with my little square every day,

TFL

The Kathyn Wheel Art Journal

2010-01-29T15:38:00.007Z

Hello again from Snowie Scotland. Yes we have snow again and lots of wind.
I have joined an Art Journal Challenge called the Kathryn wheel 365 Here is my front Cover

Here are the inside cover and first page.

I really enjoyed playing with paint,ink and paper. There are just a few days left and my January pages can be added.

TFL
Chris

52 in 10 The Journey Begins.

2010-01-26T14:52:00.005Z

I have decided that I need to get sorted, organised and motivated this year so have joined Scrapdolly in documenting the year ahead.

Here is my Album

Here are my pages so far

This is my Goals page. I have made tags and put them into a divider page, Every job done I am going to add a finished tag.

This is my first page, Looking Back. I didn't have my computer so no photo's but I have started a collage on the back and as I find photo's I will add them.

This is my first page explaining why I am starting this journey.

Here is my music page. I love my Soul music but since my DD found the Music channel I have had to learn to like modern sounds, I really love Gnarls Barkley and even Downloaded his album. This song describes me.

TFL
Chris

Home Decor

2009-08-26T09:42:00.005+01:00

This is a door hanging I made at the weekend for my DD's friend.

It happens to fit in with the bubbly scrumptious weekly challenge to use patterned ribbon so I am going to enter it. I have never entered a challenge before except on UKS.

TFL

Go to press

2009-08-26T09:23:00.006+01:00

Here are some more pages of this great class

I am really enjoying this class and am slowly catching up.
Thanks for looking.

I am back...............

2009-08-21T15:08:00.003+01:00

Well when you look at the archives its been nearly 9 month's since my last confession, lol.

So i am having a little overhaul and a get to know you blog session (i will figure out how to use this blog.....) and i will be off.

Here are a few things i have been doing lately. First off i have joined the stress free scrapbooking class called go to press by Shimelle over on two peas.

I am really enjoying it but already not keeping up.

And that's all for today folks

Chris

JYC day 1 & 2

2008-12-03T08:59:00.002Z

Here is my Manifesto and page 1. I am keeping it all very simple so I can keep up every day. I am going along the lines of Shimelles "Learn Something New Every Day" because I really enjoyed that with no pressure just fun.

Cheers
Chris

Its nearly time for JYC

2008-11-27T15:18:00.003Z

Shimelle is running her very successful journal your christmas class again this year. You can find all the details here if you fancy joining in.

This will be my second time taking part so i cant wait.Hopefully i will get it finished this time after last years horrible christmas with the loss of my Dad and my daughters pet dog.

Will be back soon once we get going.

Chris

Ali Edwards Daily December Journal

2008-11-23T20:56:00.006Z

Here is my Ali journal ready for December and what ever i do with it. I had fun using all my old christmas paper to make this journal, i didnt realise i had so much stash, ouch.

Cant wait to get started on this

Chris

Christmas Journals 2007 & 2008

2008-11-23T20:44:00.005Z

So this is how my album finally turned out from last year. It got so bulky that i had to make two albums in the end and bind them into one large album, lol

And here is my album for this years class. As mentioned in my last post i went for another christmas tree album. I have lots of extra pages in it and hopefully this year it will not be so bulky

Hope you like them

Chris

Christmas tree shaped Album

2008-11-23T13:21:00.007Z

I have been playing around with these little albums this week. I got the template from Sandra from our Crop. This one is for my youngest daughter.

I love making these. I have even adapted one to be a bit bigger and added lots of additional pages, so i can use it for my Shimelle JYC 2008 class.

That's it for now

Chris

Hello Again

2008-11-21T15:13:00.006Z

I am determined that i will master this blog stuff once and for all, so watch this space soon hopefully.

I have a few projects on the go at the moment so hopefully will update soon. Here is my Jessica Sprague stories in hand album.

XOXO
Chris

The next exciting installment of my Christmas Journal

2007-12-24T18:21:00.001Z

I had to start another journal at this point as it has got very fat!!!!

Here we go....

2007-12-14T22:24:00.001Z

Day4: Perfect christmas made with an overlay.

See also image at top of post. The above is the inside of the card.

Day 3: Christmas cards

Glorious weather we had that day can be seen above.

The above pages and tags are for day 2: the weather prompt.

The above is my manifesto stating why i am doing this journal and that i will do an entry in some shape or form each day.

This is the front cover of my 2007 Christmas Journal. It is home made using A5 mountboard. I used some of the paper from the extra Shimelle kit that i purchased. It is not showing up very well but i highlighted the doodles with glossy accents and distressed using walnut ink. I made the tree by cutting out a tree shape with the sizzix and then used blonde moments extra thick embossing powder with a few beads added on the last melt.

I am having problems with moving images around into the order i want them here, it must be vista.

Anyway, thanks for looking

Chris

Christmas Journal continued.......

2007-12-14T15:11:00.001Z

Day 11: Trees
Day 10: Wrapping

Day 9: Traditions

Day 8: Missing in action, lol

Day 7: Lists

Day 6: Childhood Christmas memories

Day 5: Count down to Christmas

Thanks for looking

Chris