Oh baby

When I asked the ladies who attended last Thurday's class if there were any requests for upcoming classes, the suggestion was to do a baby card. Not everyone needs several baby cards on hand so next week there will be a choice of doing either all baby cards (boy or girl) or one baby card and one of the gatefold cards shown plus the usual surprise card:) I will be away from Sunday to Tuesday evening visiting family and the store will be closed Monday and Tuesday so the leak can be repaired. I am praying that everything will be OK when I get back so I can put everything back where it belongs again. It's been a stressful week and I am tired of listening to the sound of water dripping into a pail LOL! Have a great weekend:)

Christmas in July

Hard to believe July is almost over, but it's the last week of the month and that means.... Christmas cards!!! We're going to be using the spotlighting technique on one card. I love this technique, particularly for images that would take forever to colour (not a good thing if you are making multiples of the same card LOL!) All you do for this great look is stamp the image twice, punch out the area you want to spotlight and colour it in, then you can either line it up with the large image and adhere or add another circle behind it first, for an extra POP! The snowflakes card is done using distress inks over clear embossing...LOTS of fun. The pink and blue is a treat for one of my regular Thursday class ladies who just LOVES this colour combo:) Finally the holly card is embellished with some Christmas red stickles, which look very festive in real life...not sure how well the camera picks them up.
Yesterday I forgot to announce the winner of the Cuttlebug, which was drawn last Saturday. Congrats to Claudia Tavares... I have left a message on her phone but haven't heard back from her yet. Hurry in for your prize Claudia or we may have to draw a second ballot......

A leaky week!

Just in time for the sidewalk sales last weekend, the ceiling over my computer began leaking and my printer and receipt printer went on strike!!!! It's been a hairy couple of days and it looks as if it may take a while to fix, so the store is in a bit of a mess. I had to move my computer and cash area over into my cutting/die cut area and it's cramped to say the least. I'm still open for business, but had to cancel tonight's class. Everything should be OK for our Thursday class though, and I'll have photos up tomorrow. Next week the store will be closed on Monday and Tuesday so the repairs can be done. Fingers crossed that nothing else goes wrong this week!

Polished Stone Technique

I've been playing around with colours and stamps to use for this week's polished stone technique class and this is my favourite combo so far. The inks are my old Stampin' Up re-inkers in Melon Mambo and Groovy Guava and are applied to a piece of felt soaked in rubbing alcohol and attached to a Ranger ink applicator. You add a couple of drops of each colour to your felt and dab onto glossy cardstock. You can also use a cotton ball, but you need to wear gloves unless you enjoy rainbow fingers and nails for days!!!! Be sure to use Stazon or archival ink for your stamped image. This was such a bold image and bright colour that I didn't think it needed any embellishment...however if you look closely, you'll see that I managed to get a couple of smudges from my inky fingers onto the white cardstock...Grrrr! I hate when that happens. I think if we stay with a neutral cardstock and black mat, everyone can choose their own colours and image for this class. I'll test a few more combos so we'll know what works and what doesn't.

The missing cards.....

As promised, here is my first Iris fold card using the fabulous new papers from The Japanese Paper Company. I am totally in love with these papers and they are perfect for this technique. The other two cards are the ones I came up with for the last two classes in addition to the ones posted. It's funny how the last minute ideas often turn out to be my favourites:) Now, for those of you who heard me raving about how I had lost my sample cards for Faux Mother of Pearl class, and had to re-make them.....
they surfaced this morning, and believe it or not, my cats had hidden them! I'm not kidding! Both my cats love anything with a shiny or glossy surface and will often "steal" things left on the coffe table. I guess I must have put them down on the table while I was getting ready and I left them behind. Fortunately, they were in clear cello bags (which is probably why they stole them) I saw one peeking from underneath the couch this morning and had to pull all the furniture out to find the other one! Anyone want a couple of mischievous kitties?????????

Faux Mother of Pearl Class

I've been neglecting my blog lately because I've been having fun playing the new Japanese Papers as well as experimenting with some new and not so new techniques for upcoming classes. Faux Mother of Pearl is a technique that I haven't done for a long time and when I decided to give it another spin, I was surprised that I haven't used it more often. The pictures don't show the lovely pearlized background, which is fairly quick and easy to accomplish. You do need to let the Lumiere dry a little before sponging or brayering the background so we will do another card while we wait for the first two backgrounds to dry. The third sample is in progress (isn't it always?? LOL) but I will upload a photo of it as well as one of the third card we made last week using the emboss resist technique everyone loves so much. Oh yes and I'll also share my first iris fold card with the Chiyogami papers...stay tuned :)

Weddings and Anniversaries

Next Thursday (by request) we'll make 3 cards with wedding/anniversary themes. I have two samples to share and as usual, the third is still in my imagination...lol!
Hope everyone enjoyed Canada Day, the weather has been just perfect and I'm looking forward to spending some time outdoors this weekend, so fingers crossed for more of the same. Have a great weekend.

Happy Birthday Canada and June contest winner

Congratulations to Lucille who received the most votes for her stunning wedding card. The photograph does not do this card justice at all and I had several customers who asked if they could buy the card!!! Thanks to everyone who participated... all the cards were great. We'll take a break from the contest for the summer and resume in September. In the meantime...Happy Canada Day everyone:)There are some great buys in the store right now: All Albums are discounted by 30% and most scrapbooking kits are also 30% off. Kits are a great idea to take to the cottage during the summer, in case you suddenly get the urge to create...everything you need is right there (well almost everything..LOL.) Prismatic paper is still on sale for just .75 cents a sheet and every Friday during July we'll be announcing new items going on sale. Now for the very exciting news..... Starting Monday July 5th, for each $20 you spend in the store you will receive a ballot for the chance to win a Cuttlebug Machine...WOW! Class fees will count towards this and being as I now have to charge HST on classes we will include the tax portion in the $20 minimum. Grab yourself acouple sheets of paper or a new marker when you pay for your class and you'll get a ballot AND a stamp for your VIP card...How great is that?
We'll draw for the prize on Saturday July 24th during Kingsville's "Discoverfest." There will be lots of fun things going on in town that weekend some come out and enjoy. My daughter is visiting this weekend so we are going to check out Art at the Marina in Leamington. Hope you have yourself a wonderful weekend.