It's a Creative World

Cyclin' Sunday - Storage solutions

Hi Dolly Here

I thought – as I seem to have spent the last few days reorganising my scrap room – I’d post about storage ideas and hope that some of our regular readers will comment with ideas of their own too.

If, like me, you seem to acquire stash at a somewhat alarming rate, then I am sure that you too are always on the look out for storage ideas that work for you.

I am lucky to have a dedicated scrap room, but it is small and so best use of space is key. I love finding cheap storage that certainly wasn’t meant for scrapping but works really well for crafters. Here are a couple of my ideas.

I love ribbons and have a Pull-eaze for some of them, but this is a storage idea I have found works for me. I bought three kitchen roll holders and a mess of book rings and little zip lock bags. The total spend was probably under £10.00

I then put the ribbons into little bags – many of the bags have two different ribbons in. I punched holes in the bottom and threaded about 10 little bags onto each book ring and then popped them round the central spindle.

They are really easy to get to. You can see them all and they look pretty in their colour coordinated way too.

The ribbons are rolled rather than folded, but if they are a little kinked when I want to use them I just hold them for a few seconds over the bulb in my desk top lamp and they straighten perfectly.

Another neat thing I use is a pill box  OK so in all honesty I have several of them! The pill organiser was 99c on holiday from Walmart and each little section seals perfectly. It works well for brads and eyelets and buttons. This happens to be the brad box (well one of them!)

 

These are also really useful as they have moveable compartments. They were from a local DIY store and have handles –which I removed – so they can be carried really easily. I have 4 of the carriers making 16 trays/drawers in total and Nigel wall mounted them for me. They are incredibly useful.

  Inside you can use them for whatever you need and the dividers move to make either 24 small sections or fewer if you make them doubles or triples.

 

And I have yet to see if this last idea works or not, but it cost very little. I have a LOT (and I mean a lot) of clear stamps. I have tried lots of different ‘systems’ and not found one that works for me. The most recent failure was a 7 Gypsies carousel which looked gorgeous but took up so much room and irritated the heck out of me. So this weekend I bought two pretty boxes and have sorted out all of the stamps in them. I made card dividers to categorise the stamps and made sure the boxes were big enough to store even the Autumn leaves sets that were still in their original packaging and almost never got used as they were not easily accessible. The smaller box stores the small stamp sheets like Hero Arts etc. and the large box takes even the Autumn leaves sets. Oh and they do, of course, have matching lids.

I am, however, still a  little sceptical and will wait and see if this method works. I have more pictures of various storage things in a photo album on my blog here 

Here at IACW we would love to hear your storage ideas so do share what you have found works.

 

 

Saturday Suppers

Hi there! Laura here with a quick nibble recipe which I learned at a Pampered Chef party. Naturally I was too busy ogling the goods and drinking the cocktails (Rosemary and tropical fruit champagne punch - but thats a recipe for another time!) to pay clear attention to the recipe name and  quantities! But I had a play myself which accommodates personal likes and dislikes and thought this name pretty much covers it.

Camembert Pecan and Apricot Melt

Ingredients

A whole camembert cheese, 1 tablespoon of chopped pecan nuts, 2 tablespoons of apricot jam,1/4 red chilli or more depending on your taste buds- mine are very woosy!! Olive oil and 2 part-bake baguettes.  

The follow these steps...

Slice the cheese down the middle so you have two circles.

Chop your chilli and pecans finely.

Then mix with the apricot jam. Believe me when I say it doesn't look good now but the taste is amazing!!

Now smear over one slice of cheese and the layer and repeat.

So that you have a calorie laden sandwich like this!!

Finally, cut your baguettes into 2cm slices, drizzle with olive oil (this will make them crispy)
and then surround the cheese with a wall of bread layers. Pop into the oven at the temp recommended for the bread and leave until the bread is golden and the cheese  has melted.

At this stage I run out of photos - the moment this came out the oven it was eaten leaving no time to get my camera out!!  Serve on the dish taking care not to burn you fingers when eating. The bread is now a crispy scoop to dunk in the cheese. The bread at the bottom needs no dunking as it is now covered in melted cheese. This is indeed a moreish nibble and went down very nicely at my birthday drinks! Hope you give it a try!! xxx                                                 

Thinkin Inkin Thursday - Artist's Journal

Hello, Eleanor here.

Regular readers will know that I love to draw, and I'm still drawing and writing poetry in my sketchbook, but I've started a new journal - an artist's journal (as opposed to an art journal, since I learned the difference the other day!) (see end of post if you are interested!)

 

 My first page had to be a play around with sampling a tin of 24 watercolour pencils (although I knew I had a tin of 36 somewhere) so that I could select the colour I needed (the colours are not always what you think they will be, a case of it's not what it says on the tin, lol):

 

 but a few pages later I found my precious Caran d'Ache tin of 36, so of course I had to make a sample page for those too:

 

 My first drawing/painting was a simple one, part of our picnic on a day out to the coast, at Nairn:

 

 Another drawing from that day, of the Nairn fishwife, Annie Ralph:

 

 On another occasion, a hospital visit found me with time on my hands, and I sat awhile in the hospital chapel:

 

 More recently, a truly glorious day found us at the coast again, and I tried to 'paint' a scene. If I've learnt nothing else, it's that I have a huge amount to learn about landscape painting watercolouring crayoning, and that maybe it's not my thing, however, the beauty of a journal like this is that it's not about a painting to hang on the wall of a gallery, or even a wall at home, it's about a visual memory, created in quite a short space of time, to share or not to share. So, here with all its flaws is my novice's painting of the beach between Findhorn and Burghead:

 

 The bigger picture:

That's all for now. 

x

Messy Masked and Misted Scrapbook LO...

Hi everyone, Mandy here. 

I discovered an new scrapbook site called Skissedilla and they were hosting a Summer Sketch Challenge for July with lots of prizes (always a plus sign!)  I made this LO about when dh and I visited the Yorkshire Sculpture Park last year....

A talented scrapper called Nabon designed the sketch... 

 

I was inspired to get messy!  First off I found a 12" by 12" piece of very thick chipboard (it was from some packaging) because I knew I was going to need a strong base for all the wet media I planned to use.   I painted it with white gesso and a cheap decorator's brush... 

 

I put a mask onto the (not quite dry) gesso layer and using a palette knife, I slathered some modelling paste through the mask, keeping it within the outer rim of the mask... 

Next, I repositioned the mask, overlapping the modelling paste I'd just done.  The gesso was wetter than I thought and you'll notice on the next photo the mask has lifted some of the chipboard (but it just all adds to the texture so no worries). 

 I totally love 'punchinella' or sequin waste.  It takes the modelling paste so well and is so easy...

While the modelling paste was drying, I generously sprayed the whole thing in white Glimmer Mist.  You can't really see on the photo but it was super shiny... 

I did let this layer totally dry for about three days (it doesn't really take that long!). 

Time to add colour :)   I chose two different blue mists to begin with.  The sketch had some butterflies on it so I thought I'd make some butterfly masks.  The big one is a Cuttlebug die and the small ones are made with a Martha Stewart butterfly punch.  I made the butterfly masks with sticky-back-plastic (from Wilkinsons) and stuck the butterflies down before misting over them. 

 

I added some yellow mist which promptly made a gorgeous grassy green in places...

 

When the misted background was nearly dry, I used white Glimmer Mist to make white droplets...   

I let the whole thing dry then tried out my photos on the background.  This is when I decided the misted/masked butterflies weren't showing up as well as I'd wanted (I think I got too carried away with the misting!)   

Also I decided it was a bit too green so I pumped up the blue with a darker blue mist through a different but similar mask...

 

...and sponge dabbed white paint through the punchinella.

To finish the LO I added white foam Thickers for the title and dragged the edges of the photos through some white paint to help them stand out from the background a bit better.   I made some silver butterflies with kitchen foil and the same Cuttlebug die and Martha punch.  I scrunched them up a bit and added a little dark blue mist and once dry, rubbed white paint over them into the creases.  Only the body is glued down as I wanted the wings raised...

To complete the LO I loosely stapled some white crochet thread around in a big circle.  The journaling is hidden on a tag behind the focal photo. 

I'd totally encourage anyone to make a  messy background every now and again as it was so much fun to do!

See you soon,

Mandy.

Teen Tuesday - Welcome Jessie - Decorated Candle

IACW girls are delighted to welcome Jessie onto the team. She's almost 14, and brimming with inspiration. Here's her first post for us, a fabulous well explained tutorial.

I started with a plain cream pillar candle and decorated it using a stamped image on clear tissue paper, a heat gun, and gems.

1. Choose candle.

2. Stamp onto the tissue paper in a coloured ink of your choice and cut around the image.

3. Hold the tissue paper image onto the candle and heat gently with the heat gun until attached but keep moving the heat gun around the image to stop one area from becoming mis-shapen.

4. Leave to cool and decorate in any way you choose. (Ink, gems, glitter, buttons etc.)

 

Here is the finished candle that I made. I decorated mine with gems and adhesive coloured dots. 

I also made a matching tag which I coloured with promarkers and added gems to again.

This is an ideal Birthday / Christmas present or as a gift.

By Jessie

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thank you Jessie, so pretty.

Look out for Jessie on future posts, she has lots to share.

 

 

Decorated Bird House

I don't know if you've noticed in your Blog surfing, lots of people have been decorating bird houses.

I've had one for ages and decided I wanted to do something with it.

Recently I did a class at Paper Arts with Andy Skinner and learnt a new technique: carved gesso.

I used it on the back of the bird house

I have been collecting bottle tops for a while and wanted to incorporate some. I filled the backs with air dry clay to make it easier to stick them on.  I chose an alcohol inked and stamped background as the base and stuck the bottle tops on

 

I then stuck to the opposite side a piece of canvas that I had used a resist technique and then painted.  It looked very sea like so I added a seagull and some waves.

I chose pink for the front and used Dylusions bubblegum pink mixed with an iridescent medium

The penants have been cut from an overlay from a computer keyboard.

 

It wasn't drying very quickly so I decided to give it a blast with the heat gun, hence the blisters!

I rather liked the effect so added more paint and heated it again.

 

The roof is covered in sea glass, stuck on with a hot glue, I used a glittered glue stick, so it looked as though the sun was reflecting off the glass.

and finished

Thanks for dropping by.

 

Lynne x

Cyclin' Sunday

Hi, today we're bringing you some recycling/upcycling links.

Setting for four used wire and a rock for this:

Martha Stewart shows a quick and easy cushion cover from a serviette:

and outdoor cushion covers from vinyl tablecloths:

Fabulous hats from sweaters with picture tutorials so it doesn't matter that it's in Chinese.

An absolutely darling little solid perfume locket at design sponge:

Herself inspired by Souther Salazar, Jenn shows us fabulous light bulb hot air balloons:

And finally, who hasn't got a drawerful of these, waiting to be made into a bright and happy wreath from Infarrantly creative:

See you soon.

IACW

X

 

Saturday Sewing - It's in the Bag

"I love to go a wandering..."

Hello, Eleanor here with a Saturday special - a knapsack.

I found some great instructions which were just what I needed for some IKEA fabric I was hoarding:

Sew a Simple Backpack

and it really was a simple matter of measure, cut, sew, and add a pair of long white shoelaces (in a mixed pack from the poundshop).

So straightforward that I made another from a pretty babycord fabric:

And here's a kitty who doesn't want to be left behind:

"Val-de-ri, Val-de-ra..."

Take Note!

So, whilst making the teacher gifts this year, I spent a little more time on Luke's Teacher - after all, she elected to have them for the second year in a row (crazy lady!) and got him through his SA-Ts with much better results than anticipated, plus 16 A's across his school report!

As you can see from the first picture, I made a co-ordinated set - card, envelope, keyring, picture-frame notice board and pen.  Feeling very pleased with my little self (and wishing I'd kept the noticeboard!) I decided that we could do with one at home, a tool to keep track of everything.

We already have a calendar, and special dates on a small board, and a shopping list on the fridge, and a running to do list around the house.  So I decided to try it with a multi-aperture frame, chopping the background paper to mix it up a bit...

No pretty bows and such yet, and still the cheapie multi-pack IKEA dry-wipe pens - I'm trying to get my husband to warm to the idea.  But once he's onboard this frame will be a permanent fixture and possibly a little prettier, with a calendar in one place.

Plus, another version will be coming in to house my lists of craftiness (you can see them at the moment in two of our quadrants) so I can seperate out swaps, my Stampin' Up! business, other crafty committments (like here at IACW!), and cards or gifts I need to make for upcoming occasions.

I think these have a multitude of uses, with small or large, desk or wall frames - Christmas countdowns or last-minute gifts , Birthday presents, Teacher gifts, something for new Students, Mother and Father's day desk presents, use a plethora of them for Easter hunt clues, Valentine's messages, Wedding presents (or a more unique guestbook, given a permanent marker and space for a photo of the happy couple), Seed markers in the garden (with more permanent markers), Halloween countdown or treat-pot messages

You can use pre-printed jotter paper, digi printouts or real jotters if you're feeling thrifty - oddments of stash, stamping and journalling cards... Why not try it with a mirror?

Ooh, just noticed I can knock another item off my list - this post!

A bientot - until next time -  Thank you for reading, Leanne x

www.beautifulimpressions.co.uk

www.craftaholicleanie.co.uk

Thinkin Inkin Thursday - It's a bit cheesy

Katie recently showed us her shrink plastic lucky cat, and I've been shrinking too. Having struggled with stamping on normal shrink plastic, I bought some inkjet printable sheets and used my printer. I found some images I loved, here from Cathe Holden. She used hers for fridge magnets and bunting but I made mine into a necklace. Sounds bizarre but it's colourful and funny. All I had to do was to lighten the images in Photoshop, print, cut out, punch holes, and shrink.

I made another one (sound familiar?)

and here I am wearing a cheesy grin and a cheesy necklace just to prove I do wear these things I make

Have a look around Cathe's site, there are some wonderful freebie printables, and a host of creative ideas.

Bye for now.