Just for Fun!

Good afternoon,

I feel like a bad blogger at the moment, it's been over three weeks again since I last posted, so please forgive me.

It's been over six months since I started my new job, but I am still getting used to the new regime - I'm out out of the house and working more now than I have done in the last thirty years - how does that work?! Lol.

Having said that I am absolutely loving all aspects of it - working in the store, demonstrating and teaching classes. I was promoted to Supervisor a few weeks ago, so my job role has changed a little (with more responsibility), but then I have always loved a challenge!

It's been one of my days off today and I have actually had a chance to 'play' in my craft room, instead of what I now class as 'work'. So, after spending what seems like an age watching crafting videos on You Tube this morning, I found this gorgeous little project which several people have done tutorials for and decided to have a go myself. So here's what I have been playing with today ...

I have used mainly 'Stampin' Up' products for this one (with a little Crafter's Companion thrown in for good measure).

I made the shadow box from a piece of 12" x 12" Sahara Sand cardstock, which has a little bit of text stamped on it using some Pumice Stone distress ink. The background design paper is from the 'Falling in Love' suite, and I cut lots of embellishments from a piece of the left over design paper using some of the dies from the 'Botanical Builder' set. . I also die-cut the beautiful 'Bloomin' Heart' from cream linen cardstock to fit in the centre of the little box.  

I had to sneak in a pretty die-cut butterfly, which is from the 'Shabby Chic' Signature collection by Sara Davies (I think this might appear on many of my projects from now on - I love it!). The stamped banner is also from the same collection.

I am planning to make more of these for an up and coming craft fayre that I want to attend, so watch this space.

Enjoy the rest of your evening,
Hugz Jan xx

Anything but a Card

Good Morning to you all,

I hope everyone is enjoying the extra long weekend - I only have one more week left of my summer break. This time next week I will be back at school, trying to fit all my crafting in when I can.

It's time for a new challenge over at Make My Monday and this week it is my turn to choose the theme. As you can see from my post title I chose 'ANYTHING BUT A CARD'.

This is a favourite theme of mine as I love making home decor projects and I have been wanting to show you this one for a while. So, here's what I made for my DT inspiration ...

After much research on the subject - here's my version of a decorated shadow box. I chose the cream and pink theme to give a 'shabby' look to the project. The whole thing is made from scraps of paper from my stash, together with lots of little items from my craft box, including a baby domino, a little penny farthing charm, a miniature clothes peg, a dice, a mini wooden cotton bobbin, a mini clock charm and loads of tiny little punched butterflies. The letter 'B' in the largest section is to represent my surname (Brown) and I also added the date in one of the sections too. 

Here's a closer look at some of my favourite sections ...

The top section

I love the little bottle of beads

I covered the little cotton bobbin with some lace

I must admit this took a while to finish - but I am thrilled with the outcome and it now sits proudly on my display cabinet.  I am hoping to make these to order in the future, so watch this space.

I hope this has inspired you to have a go at something other than a card - I will be back on Wednesday with a little midweek motivation. 

Happy crafting,

Hugz, Jan xx

Shadow Box

Morning everyone,

We have actually had a couple of sunny days here this week, but the rain is back again now.

I have a project from the 'Studio 12 Picknix collection CD' to show you today, which can also be found on the Studio 12 blog today too.  If you haven't visited the blog yet, it features loads of fantastic projects from the Studio 12 design team, illustrating just what you can do with the CD, so pop over and take a peek.

This project is a Shadow Box and uses digital images from the 'Heavenly Garden' section of the CD.  Some of the images have been used digitally and some have been printed off and cut out, before using.  Here's what it looks like ...

The projects consists of two pieces of A5 card and two concertina spine dividers.  I just adore the tree image with the cute little tree houses in and wanted this to be the main focal point of the project.  I printed both the tree house and the cloud onto a piece of plain paper and stuck it onto the back piece of A5 card.  I made a frame out of the second piece of A5 card and covered this with paper from the collection.  I added acetate into the window space and added the fence and watering can behind the acetate.  The extra flowers, leaves and bunting were added to the front of the window.  A cute little sentiment from the collection finishes off the project.  It is difficult to see the dimension in the photo, but it does have some depth in real life, making a cool 3D project.  Hope you like it :)

Enjoy the rest of the weekend,

Hugz, Jan xx