Quick Christmas Scene Die Cards.......

Good morning all,

This is another Scheduled post for me as I will be travelling back from Spain today after a well earned break!

So today I thought I would show you a few more samples that I made using the gorgeous scene dies from Nellie Snellen. I ordered these dies in for ideas for the class and totally fell in love with them once I started using them, they are perfect for quick and easy Christmas cards or even winter Birthdays. 

      

I created a layered background with Distress Inks using a Leane Creatief die Houses, Clouds and Mountains. I cut a mountain background from card and used this as a mask and then added Distress Inks in coordinating band colours. I just love this look.

I die cut a black layer with the Nellie Snellen Christmas Window Scene 2 and then I die cut a circle from white card to add as another layer over the top to frame the scene.

I added a sentiment and some extra die cuts to embellish, one being the lovely Marianne Designs Tiny deer, so useful at this time of the year.....

The second card was done in the same way but using the Nellie Snellen Christmas Window Scene 1 

and different colour distress inks and then again embellishing with Marianne Design Ivy Corners and a sentiment.

Well I hope you have enjoyed having a peruse today, it is a quickie from me as I have much to do but I will be back with you next week.

Love and hugs 

Lisa B xxx

    

Birdy Tower

Good morning, Kirsten here with another post to show you some of my recent Lisa B Designs samples, I hope you had a nice weekend.

I've got four cards today, all using the Woodware Clear Magic Birdy Tower stamp and all very quick and easy.............

These two were stamped onto watercolour card with Onyx Black Versafine and heat set with WOW! Clear Gloss embossing powder.

I then coloured them with various Distress inks, used as watercolours. I am a very poor watercolourist, but I think I'm improving slightly, I managed to get just a few nicely blended areas!

Time for some paper piecing, using the Teresa Collins' 8x8 patterned paper pad. I don't use patterned papers these days, but these papers are great for smaller images, because the patterns are also small and they look great with kraft card.

This was the one time I wished I had a bag of googly eyes, because I had to stamp the birds onto white card, then cut out the eyes and beaks. Very fiddly, but worth it when I'd stuck them to the patterned paper and added Glossy Accents to the eyes.............

Finally, I could not use this stamp without making a Christmas card. I've just realised this is the original photo. I didn't have a Christmas sentiment small enough to fit the top right hand corner, so after I put the card together I borrowed one of Lisa's. I'll try to update this photo at some point.

As before, I used Distress inks and added a bit of stamping to the background with the snowflake.

The next Grove Green workshop is on Sunday, October 15 and it's all about Imagination Crafts' fabulous Rusty Patina. Click for info and booking details.

                  

        

Thanks for visiting the blog today, see you next time.

Kirsten

When is Tree not a Tree?............

Good morning all,

This is a scheduled post for me today as I am in Sunny Spain taking a well earned break......

Apologies for not blogging too much lately, I have had a lot going on and just kept forgetting. I think it has something to do with age, lol!!!!

Below are a few card samples that I made for last month's workshop using the gorgeous Leane Creatief Paper Patch Bauble and Tree Dies.

  

Now I really loved using these dies for many reasons.......

The first reason being that you know as well as I, that we have all got a massive paper stash in our collection of wonderful craft supplies. So these are the ideal dies to die cut and paper piece with those gorgeous papers that you have been stroking for years.

It is time to let go and use them.......Nooooo, I here.....

I know sacrilege isn't it!

But not only is it good for those papers but you don't get any waste because you mix and match them and the aperture you cut from the card you can use as a stencil for inky baubles.......

I just love them. 

Now when it comes to Christmas I love to do Clean cut, quick and classy and this is exactly what I did with these dies as you can see below.

One of my favourite all time collection of papers to use is  Teresa Collins Designer Paper Pad.

I can't tell you how much I love this pad with it's ditsy prints in my favorite colours teal, black, peach and kraft. It has gorgeous designs that I use all the time with dies and even my much loved Paper Artsy Stamps. A little paper piecing in between colouring works wonders and I know Kirsten has also enjoyed using this pad too and you will see some lovely blog posts from her with it.

It has lovely script papers as well as classic prints and works with so many projects, even torn paper on canvases as backgrounds and journaling too, before you add paint layers, I just love it........

Well for the first card I used the Leane Creatief Paper Patch Bauble die and also the Marianne Design Petra's Poinsettia Die  in conjunction with the Teresa Collins Designer Paper Pad

It is pretty self explanatory really, just die cut from the paper pad and teamed up with die cut black and kraft card circles. It just makes such a classic card, the baubles were die cut with one of each co-ordinating papers and then swapped over so no waste! 

The greeting was a Hobby Art Stamp from Christmas Frosting......

This second card was made in a similar way but this time using the Leane Creatief  Paper Patch Tree Die, again using coordinating paper from the pad. The sentiment came from the same Hobby Art Stamp set and I added a lovely Marianne Design die Holly Corners. This is such a lovely fine die that cuts perfectly every time.

So on to the last card.......

You see the blog post title......When is a tree not a tree......

When it's a bauble of course!!!!

I remembered seeing such beautiful bauble shapes in the shops at Christmas and looked at the tree and thought.......'If I use the bauble top and the tree die up the the other way.........hmmm, that would make a good bauble' and then voila it was done.......

This time I used black papers from the pad and gold mirri card. Gold and black for Christmas......

you can't go wrong!

And you have guessed it, the sentiment was from the Hobby art Stamp set and then the holly corner die to finish off.

Well I hope you have enjoyed my ramblings and I will be back next week with another post but for now Adios and have a great week,

Much love Lisa B xxx

            

September Class Samples

Hi everyone, Kirsten here. Yes, it's been a while, what with one thing and another blogging just got away from both Lisa and me. Thank you so much to Jan and Martina, who kept things going for us. I'm going to do some catch-up posts over the next few weeks, which will hopefully bring us to the next Maidstone classes on October 27. 

***There are NO classes on October 6, Fant Hall is not available.***

These cards are based on the September class projects, you can see the cards made by our ladies in this album on the Lisa B Designs Facebook page.

 I used Versacolor inks - they blend so well! - to create simple backgrounds with templates cut from the Leane Creatief Houses, Clouds and Mountains cutting die set.

The tress are the Happy Holidays Pine Trees by Joy Crafts and the deer is from the Marianne Designs Tiny Deer cutting dies set - I added Diamond Sparkle Medium to the trees and deer.

These are the Leane Creatief houses and the ivy pieces are Marianne Designs Ivy Corners cutting dies.

The stamped image on this card was used for the class projects. It's Christmas Corner 1, a set of three layering stamps by Nellie Snellen. Again, I used Versacolor inks.

              

That's it for now, I'll be back soon with more of my recent Lisa B Designs projects. 

The next Grove Green workshop is on Sunday, October 15 and it's all about Imagination Crafts' fabulous Rusty Patina. Click for info and booking details.

Kirsten

October Newsletter

  Hi everyone, long time no see!! Welcome to the October newsletter. Apologies for not blogging for a while. I had great intentions, but every week Wednesday seemed to come and go before I'd even realised!

 I hope you've had an enjoyable September. I spent a few days with Sue and Harvey of Imagination Crafts two weeks ago. Sue and I demoed at the Exter Hobbycrafts show and as always, we had a great time. We met lots of lovely crafters and had a lot of fun.  The next time I'll see Sue and Harvey will be at the Hobbycrafts Christmas show at the NEC in Birmingham, I'm already looking forward to it.

The most important thing to tell you right at the start is that there are NO classes in Fant Hall, Maidstone, next Friday October 6. The hall is not available, unfortunately, so I have decided to take myself off to Spain for a little holiday. I leave tomorrow morning and I can't wait! As a result, if you order from the website between now and October 11, it won't be dispatched until October 12. However, if you're attending my Grove Green workshop on October 15 select 'Store Pick-up' when you check out and I'll bring your order to the workshop.

Speaking of the workshop; there are still places available if you'd like to learn how to get the best out of Imagination Crafts' fantastic Rusty Patina. 

There will be two projects; a working clock and an 8x8 canvas panel.................

 

   

We'll be using various colours of Rusty Patina as well as Alchemy Waxes and Starlight Metallic Paints.

Included in the £30 workshop fee will be the projects, a bag of embellishments to use on your projects - any you don't use will be yours to take home - and a FREE 6x6 stencil.

The venue is Grove Green Community Hall, Penhurst Close, ME14 5BT.

You can book online, or email me; lisabaker1@btinternet.com, before Saturday, October 14.

Please bring your lunch, (there is a Tesco beside the hall), an apron, paint and stencil brushes - my go-to stencil brushes are the domed stencil brushes and they are available on the website.

The workshop after the Rusty Patina one will be the Christmas workshop on November 12.

A kit to the value of £20 is included in the £40 workshop fee and more information can be found HERE.

The next classes at Fant Hall, Maidstone ME16 8NN will be on Friday, October 27. The projects will be two cards with a snowman theme..............

We will be using Distress and Versa Color inks, colouring pens and lots of loose glitter!

     

If you would like to join us on Friday October 27, there a couple of places left in both classes; 2.30 - 5.30pm and 6.30 - 9.30pm. The class fee is £16 and this includes your projects, a tool kit to use during the class and tea/coffee and a slice of cake.

Places must be booked in advance; a deposit of £6, or full payment, will secure your place. Please contact me by lunchtime on Thursday October 26; lisabaker1@btinternet.com/01622 675078

I've added some very cute snowmen stamps to the website and restocked items that sold out at the September class, as always, you'll find all the new products in the

 What's New section.

I have scheduled a few blog posts for the next few weeks, so you'll see me here soon......

I hope you have a great weekend. Until next time, happy crafting.

Lisa B xx

A Sparkly Wreath for Christmas

Good morning all! Martina here with a sparkly take on the Christmas Wreath Stamp by Nellie Snellen. How many Christmas cards have you made already? My daughter has already made her 'special ones', written them and put them in envelopes (this was actually all done by August!). If only I was a bit more prepared...

This week I have gone all sparkly with embossing powders for my card. I hadn't really 'twigged' that using this stamp and its layers would be perfect for creating an embossed design!! Coupled with the use of a stamp press and you are 'cooking on gas'...

Now my excuse for the lack of photos here is simply that, well, I kind of forgot. It is such a simple card to do, it really doesn't need them anyway, you'll see what I mean...

Using some black card, I cut a topper and put in my stamp press. I placed the first wreath layer (greenery) into position and then stamped onto the card with Versamark. Removing the card, I applied some green Embossing Powder. The next layer was the cones/twigs layer, so I repeated the same process again with brown powder. The final layer is the red berries, bow and flowers. Now at this point I had a slight 'poo' moment, (!) as when I added the powder and heat embossed, you could hardly see the detail. The reason for this was that I had used some very old (12 years) red embossing powder that I bought very cheaply... The solution here was to simply put the card back in the press and repeat the stamping over the top and add more powder. This effectively meant that I was 'double embossing'. Still not happy, I then 'triple embossed' and then, well, what ever the next one would be...(quadruple embossed? Is that a thing?) Eventually I got there folks! (I then chucked my powder away...)

 The sentiment from the Hobby Art Christmas Frosting Set was added in the same way, this time with Wow White Powder. 

All layered onto a card blank, some white dashes and all done. I think it would have taken half the time if I had had some decent powder...lesson learnt!

The next Grove Green workshop is on Sunday, October 15 and it's all about Imagination Crafts' fabulous Rusty Patina. Click for info and booking details.

See you soon,

Martina

xxx