What a Lovely Mother's Day.

I don't know about you, but I enjoy the special day put aside for Mothers.  I love that I get time to spend with my daughters, but I love too the fact that they are able to enjoy the day with their children. 

This year I was able not only to enjoy their company, but my sister's company too as she visits from England.  She in turn enjoyed her second Mothering Sunday of the year.  England celebrates Mother's Day, or Mothering Sunday as it's called there, earlier than we do. 

Both Christine and I were treated to a gift that brought back some sweet memories for us.  I'll post the photo of that gift later.

Right now I want to show you the two lovely cards we received.  Hand made cards are so nice to receive, though I did have to chastise my sister for almost pulling hers apart as she tried to see how it was made!  She's an avid cardmaker too.

I do have another card to show you, but forgot to get the photo from Linda, so will do that in the next few days too.  Linda made cards for two of Rachel's teachers recently.  Although they were modeled from a card we made in one of the Thursday night card classes, I want you to see how different they ended up.  However.....you'll have to come back for another visit to see them.

Until then though,

Happy Crafting

Lilian

Card Class Last Week.

Did you see the cards that were made in last week's card class?  Here's one of them, and you can look here for the other two.

The ladies had a great time making some pretty neat flowers for to embellish the cards.  Maybe we'll make some more next week too.  We also double punched a strip of cardstock and one of the ladies didn't punch in quite the same way and ended up with a beautiful "outside the box" embellishment.  Drop into the store to look at another way to use your border punches. 

One of our regular cardmakers wasn't able to attend this class and she was none to happy that she missed out on these techniques.  Never mind, we'll be sure to catch you up to speed Tammy.  

It was quite a learning curve for me to discover how many ladies didn't know how to tie the ribbon to make the man's tie on the masculine card.  Having worn a uniform to school many, many, many ....did I say many years ago, I had to tie my tie every day.  It's ingrained now.

What have you been crafting at lately?  Why not send us a photo of your latest creation to share with others on our blog. 
Here's a beautiful card that I received recently from a friend.
It was a lovely pick-me-up from a pretty sad week for me.  I was so thankful for her kindness.


Happy Crafting until the next time I blog

Lilian

A peek into my creative space and more....

Well I promised you some photos of my creative space and again the days got away from me.  Life sometimes throws you curves that impact on your good intentions.  Some background on my space though.  In the planning of my space, I decided that I would repurpose the furniture that I had instead of purchasing more.  This meant finding out how to successfully paint laminated and pre-finished furniture. Thank goodness for the internet!  There are so many blogs where someone has tried to do what you want to do, already figuring out the pitfalls for you.  I learned that the best way to paint laminate was to use a good primer before you paint.  I also chose to let it cure for a bit before I put anything on or in it.  So my two unmatched bookcases and unmatched dressers were all painted white along with the grey counter top on the cabinet I inherited when Linda had her kitchen redone.  I'm very pleased with the results and love being able to put my hands on everything easily.  Well, that is except for my ruler that seems to have done a runner!  So here's a peek into my space......

This is how my space used to look.  See all the mismatched pieces of furniture and the grey counter top.  My workspace faced the window, so my back was toward our living room.

This is the same view into the room with the new look.  The counter top is now white and I changed the door hardware too.   Now the worktable comes out from the window, so when I'm working I can see into the living room.  It is also considerably longer as it's actually a door secured to the wall at one end and supported on the bookcase at the other end.  It's wide enough that my sewing machine sits on one side with the chair in place ready to go, along with space for another crafter on that side. 

 

This photo shows the left side with two bookcases at either end painted white, along with the two dressers.  One was cream and one a dark wood with legs which I removed.  This made it shorter so I bought some dollar store plastic bowls, added the same hardware as on the opposite cupboards and  sat them on top of the shorter dresser.  Randy helped me cut the new counter top for this side as I couldn't cut it with my scroll saw.  I cut a shelf for the top of the bookcases to display some of my "stuff" as I work on it.  It also helped to bring all the pieces together as one unit.  

Here's the right side of the room.  See all the scraps of cardstock organised in dollar store baskets with colour samples hanging on the front for easy viewing.  My Cameo sits in the corner of the counter ready to use, the Cuttlebug is in the cupboard behind my chair.  Punches are to the side of the chair in the plastic bin and patterned paper is in the stack beside my chair.  I can reach just about anything I need without moving much from the chair...LOL.  You can see two more work areas in the background.  One is a rolling table that can pull out and the tall stool in the other photo can be pulled up to the space at the counter.  The pendant lights that you can just see hanging over the desk area, provide some lovely direct lighting.

This is the bookcase that supports the table and holds most of my painting books along with a myriad of other things.

I hope you've enjoyed a look into my space and maybe I've inspired you to craft a space in your home for the crafting that brings you pleasure.

Last but not least I have a quick link here to an interview that my nephew Brian did just recently as the Canadian Olympic campaign was launched.  The campaign is called Give Your Everything.   He is once again going to the Olympics and who knows may again bring home another gold medal for Canada.  Good luck Brian and all our hardworking athletes. 

Well I hope this post wasn't too long and inspired you either as a crafter or as a supporter of the Canadian athletes.

Happy Crafting

Lilian 

 

  

WOW...What a Blast!

It's been a while and this may well be a long post, so go and get a tea or coffee and enjoy the read!

With 33 ladies busily scrapbooking, the scrapbooking weekend was indeed a blast.   

We were privileged to watch many, many pages come from an idea to finished work.  The ladies worked not only on the pages they had prepared into kits beforehand, but also found time to use the three double pages they made in the workshop Linda offered.  I heard many of them say that they had been able to accomplish more this particular weekend retreat than they had in past retreats.   Perhaps that in part was to the preparation and planning they put into the weekend before coming.

 

Along with the many pages that were completed, we worked on over 100 make and takes that were used on some of the finished pages.  Drop into the store to see what the ladies were exposed to and had the opportunity to work on.  They certainly learned, if they didn't know before, that banners, hexagons and chevrons are big this year. Not only that, they got the opportunity to make both chevron and banner embellishments.

 

Then of course came the judging and prizes!  Wow that was a challenge.  So many beautiful pages that it was hard to choose.  And of course pages are chosen for many different reasons, photo content, colour, balance, layout to name a few, so everyone can participate and have an opportunity to win.  I realise I've been speaking only of pages, but we have avid cardmakers join us for the weekend too, so there were some fabulous cards being worked on along with beautiful wedding invitations too.

 

If you don't join us for this weekend (may you should?), then try and take the opportunity of dropping in over these weekends to see the creative talent that comes together.  You are more than welcome to wander around.

 

Here are the pages that 27 ladies made in the workshop that Linda offered.

With this layout the ladies were exposed to the versatility of the Silhouette cutting machine. It's ablilty to cut really fine work such as the ricrac border to the top of the pages is a definite plus. Also being able to trace and cut your own shapes such as the large shaped journalling circle or tab embellishment is really nice. A template was used to pierce the stitched scallop border

 This page again featured the Silhouette cutting machine with the scattered hexagons and dainty leaf spray.  The hexagons were accentuated by the  lines drawn around some of them.  Note the lovely border on the left hand side cut on the Silhouette too.  A quick but interesting page with six photos. 

 You'll notice the hexagon lattice work on this page.  This was the "waste" of the hexagons above and in fact the reverse side of the paper, making nothing wasted. All those lovely circles were pierced using a plastic canvas circle as a template and then either rhinestones on the piercing or the holes joined with a coloured gel pen.  The border on the left page was again cut with the Silhouette cutting machine. It certainly got a workout over the weekend as the ladies experienced it's versatility.

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You will  have seen the pages that won in the various categories.  Here are the sample pages that were used to draw inspiration from.

From the newsletter you know that there are lots of events in the planning stages and along with that, lots of behind the scenes preparation.  Linda and I have chosen, and are working on, a number of cards already for the all day card event in July.  Make sure you keep that day clear ready for when we open registration.

I was going to show you some pictures of my craft room, yes I think I'm done with it, although I cut another shelf just yesterday, so who knows!  However due to the length of this posting I'm going to do that in the next couple of days. 

I'm also going to show you some calendars that were in the prize packages that some of the ladies received.  There was quite a bit of interest in how these were made, so I'll post the instructions too.  They would make great teacher gifts and that time will soon be upon us.  Although in talking with Emily (Linda's youngest daughter) last week, I said school would soon be over and she said....not for TWO months.  I guess it's all in where you are in life whether two months feels far, far away or here in a flash!

Happy Crafting and watch in the next couple of days for the two things I promised you.

Lilian

 

Great Time had at the All Day Card Class

Well we have another event under our belt and it was great fun....at least from our standpoint and we hope for all the ladies that joined us on such a horrible winter day.  With 16 ladies each making 11 cards, that was a total of 176 cards made on a very blustery Saturday, with one lady unable to join us due to the weather.

As often is the way, they seemed to have some favourites which I'll show you here and the others can be seen here.  With many different levels of card makers in our group, from well seasoned to quite new, they were all happily finished by the time three o'clock rolled around.

You can almost see the blustery snowy day outside and yet our dear ladies blithely work on regardless of the weather. 

We will have another all day card day later this year, so make sure you don't miss out on this opportunity to enjoy a day doing what you love and going home with a variety of ideas to make more.

Well I promised you that I would try and share some beautiful scrapbook pages that my friend Edie has been making for her daughter.  She has graciously agreed to allow us to share them with you.  She is very talented and anyone receiving an album from her is extremely lucky.  Here are three pages I've scanned from her album.

Look at the interesting way that Edie was able to use the airline tickets.  Remember I told you how excited she was to learn how to cut borders on her Silhouette?  Well you can see a good example of one of those borders over the photo of the plane. Notice the arrow she cut too and how it directs your eye to the one photo.

This next layout I loved very much.  Such an unusual choice of paper for a Disney layout and yet how perfectly it works.  Great use of stickers too with the words on the left and right bottom and not to miss Mickey lounging there too.

This layout impressed me for a couple of reasons.  Once again Edie used very non-traditional colours for a Disney layout and also for a "boys" layout, and yet again the colours worked beautifully.  See how she cut the enlarged brackets on her Silhouette for both the journaling block and the Title photo.  The direction of them directs your eyes toward the other photos in the layout.

Edie created some perfect examples of how you can scrapbook beautiful pages without using theme paper.

Thanks so much for sharing your talent Edie.

It's hard to believe sometimes how fortunate we are in having such talented customers.  Here's some work of yet another very artistic lady.  Joanne is an avid cardmaker as you can see from these two lovely cards she shared with us and now we are able to share with you.

Joanne created a great boys card here and she was excited that she was able to use some of her "finds" from our garage sale.  The cord around the mat and on the fishing rod were some of her purchases that day.  Don't you love her colouring too! 

I love the whimsical look of these birdhouses and again a great job of colours and inking around the mat.    Thanks for sharing these beautiful cards with us Joanne.

 

Well now you can see why Linda and I love our job so much.  We get to play all the time...well not exactly, but we do get the joy of seeing firsthand the artwork of some very talented people.  How about you?  Do you have something you would like to share with others?  Have you made something of which you are very pleased?  We would love to show it on the blog if you would allow it.

Hope you all have a great week.  The days will soon be getting longer with the time change this weekend and the winter will soon be behind us.

Happy Crafting...

Lilian

What Fun!

Well though I'm certainly not a garage sale person, we certainly had some fun on Saturday!  The shoppers were thrilled with their bargains and the vendors were thrilled with their sales, so totally win win there.  Linda put a photo or two in the newsletter, here are a couple more.  Oh by the way, the official photographer was Emily, Linda's youngest.  Didn't she do a great job?

Did you enjoy Valentine's Day and get something nice from your "Sweetie"?  My Sweetie gave me an early gift and arrranged for me to meet him in Sudbury on Sunday.  I'd said I'd like to join him there for the few days he was away with the drama group from the High School, but hadn't really anticipated it in quite the unique way he arranged it.  Still the thought was there I'm sure!  The rose above I was lucky enough to receive from another "Sweetie".  He was a busy delivery man on Tuesday morning delivering similar roses to the ladies in his life.......seems to me that I've mistaken him for a florist delivery person in the past and yet he still treats me with love....such a sweet man.  Linda's blessed to have him.......though I've told him the same thing......take care of who you have, you're lucky to have her.

I'm trying to arrange a treat for all you scrapbookers in that my friend Edie is almost finished the Disney album she's been making for her daughter and she may allow us to post a few pages for you to look at.  She's an awesome scrapbooker and in my opinion not enough people get to see the lovely work she does.  She's been the lucky owner of a Silhouette machine for a year now, and on Tuesday went home from the store very excited about some of the new things Linda and I taught her to do on her machine.  She's got so many ideas now for future albums we're sure to enjoy what she will do. 

Are you a Silhouette owner who isn't using their machine to it's full potential?  If you're not sure of all the machine is capable of, then take time out for yourself and sign up to our crop nights which are held every other Friday night to learn a little more. 

Linda and I learned today how to place a fancy shape inside of another shape.  No not welding as that loses the inner shape.  (If you're taking the card class on March 3rd, you'll be one of the lucky recipients of today's learning curve.)  Do you know how to fill a word or shape with colour and make it into a print and cut?  These are just some of the things we can teach you on a Friday night, so keep it in mind.   

You don't have a Silhouette Cameo yet?  Well you're in luck because we have them back in stock again, so drop in and capture one for yourself before they're gone again.

Well as my Mother would say, I've blathered on for long enough, but I did promise a link or two for you needleartists and here they are.  Theres a lovely little Dutch girl here, perfect for household linens, just scroll down the page a little.  And here's another one and if you look down the right side bar on this blog they have some nice tutorials on stitches too. 

Anyway enjoy and happy crafting

Lilian

It's Getting Exciting!

Today we had a number of the Garage Sale Vendors dropping off their product and I might tell you that if you sleep in on Saturday, you will for sure miss some great bargains!  These Paper Crafters have divested themselves of some really good "stuff!"  I know you think.....why would I want/need someone else's "stuff"?  Well let me tell you that although they don't have a use for these products anymore, they are most certainly NOT useless products.  So be warned, you snooze, you lose.

This is going to be a pretty short post tonight, but I did have a couple of things to share with you, like the Garage Sale opportunity.  Also as I was surfing the web I came upon this really good tutorial that you may like to save to a folder somewhere in your PC.  Here's the link to it and a look at the finished product too.

Kudos to Tracy MacDonald for putting together this excellent tutorial.  You still have time to make it for your Valentine with some chocolates in it.

For the scrapbooker, have you ever looked at Sketch Support here?  Much as I love Page Maps, I think this runs a close second for me.  They show you a sketch and all week long will show you a variety of interpretations of it.  Don't you love that Disney layout?  So for all  you folk that are working on Disney albums...take note, a great resource.

Here's a quick look at what Linda was busy doing last weekend with her Silhouette.  Pretty nice don't you think...her dear husband was a pretty happy boy with the results and apparently Brendan (son) wants his snowmobile fancied up now.  No limit to that Silhouette except if your imagination is lacking.

Have you tried any wall art with yours yet?  All you need is a roll of the vinyl that we stock and type up the words of your choice.  There's all kinds of ideas out there for you to tap into.

Here's a great tutorial for you jewellery makers that want to make a Dutch Spiral bracelet or necklace.   Really clear instructions too.

Well I really am going now, not that this post was so short after all, but I tried, just hard to stop talking sometimes...LOL!  This is a family week for us with my sister-in-law's birthday yesterday (oops it's gone midnight so it wasn't yesterday after all, it was Tuesday) and my nephew's wedding this Saturday.  When we are busy setting up for your Garage Sale, he will be joined in marriage to a lovely lady.  Congratulations to Dan and Sonia on their upcoming marriage.  This was the wedding that his Mom and I were busily making invitations for last fall when she was here for a visit.

Happy Crafting, I'll try and find some needlearts for you next posting.

Lilian