Another preview...

Just popping back again to share some more previews of the new stamps, but the first picture is of a card that Joanne made when she came to help me with sample last week. You might just be able to make out the spider that we made to put into the Corked Vial, along with the ubiquitous string that seems to be a necessary part of a boy's collection of bits! The flash on my camera has rather eclipsed his boots, but hope you can make out the rest of the card okay. Joanne made a great background with lots of swooshy inks and Picket Fence Distress Stain. The card itself is made using My Minds Eye Kraft Funday paper - although it's such a great weight it really is a cardstock. Fabulous paper as there are resist areas that show up when you ink over them. Again, you can check the range out on the Personal Impressions website.
The angry boy is called Humbert, and the set he's from is "Humbert & Spider Boy" (PICSA6279) which features two little horrors! Great fun for boys and teenagers cards, or journalling of course. I wanted these to be real scruff bags with a touch of the Gothic about them. Hope you like these two...I have a soft spot for them!!! Next is another words set, this one being "Love that Binds" (PICSA6273) which is a set of dictionary style definitions. I wanted a distressed, old book feel to these, so the words are rather soft focussed and bleached out in areas. Another useful one! The last set that I'm sharing tonight is called "Building Blocks" (PICSA6288) a set of six houses that can be built into street scenes, set on top of hillsides etc. I went for a slightly Zentangled look that lends itself to lots of colouring in and highlighting with white pen work. I'll post a picture at a later date of what I did with them. Meanwhile, here's a frame that I made from scratch and painted with Martha Stewart acrylics after creating the texture with MS Stucco. The MS range is really extensive - it even includes magnetic paint! Once I'd dry brushed metallic gold and copper over the base colours I then added the central image behind the aperture. I made the background with Scattered Straw and Pumice Stone D inks and stamped steampunk images from two of Andy's new sets. I then added "Steampunk Sarah" after I'd stamped, coloured and cut her out. I added more stamped images and a selection of TH Idealogy items that I had altered with MS acrylic paints. This was a really fun piece to work on and I'll explain how I made the frame itself at a later date.
Well, that's all from me for tonight. I've got two more days to get everything finished for the show. The excitement of Stitches is approaching rapidly! Take care everyone.

Crafts Beautiful

Two posts in one day...I'm making up for lost time! I just thought I'd share these pictures of some new projects that I did for the November issue of Crafts Beautiful magazine using the beautiful My Minds Eye Lost & Found Christmas collection. The papers are a really lovely mix of quite vintage images and colours but with a modern twist and a good lashing of glitter! I also used the matching brads and dimensional stickers as well as my Christmas Collage stamp for the card's focal image.

I have to thank my big sis, Heather, for suggesting I make a Bunting decoration! I really liked the way this turned out and I was especially pleased that I was able to use the MS Holly border to punch around the triangular shape. Certain of the punches will allow you to be a little more experimental and daring with how you use them. So long as you hold the punch upside down then you can check that you aren't cutting through an area you've already punched - I also found it easier to start at the point at the bottom as this one is harder to punch around otherwise. I have found (by accident!) that I can also use this particular PATP set to punch around squares and rectangles that aren't the standard size, simply because the holly leaves are a fairly random pattern. It's also just a really lovely design that I like using! The Triptych is made from a base of mount board and is really simple to make. Embossing all the edges with gold powder takes extra time, but is worth it for the extra neatness and stability that it adds. Patterns are included in the magazine of course, and you could enlarge or reduce this...I quite fancy making some Triptych ATC's. Hope you like them. If you want any more details about Crafts Beautiful, just check out the link in my sidebar. I've had a nice day colouring in, so I have a little stack of images now, all ready to add to my backgrounds and cards this weekend. Hope to see you in Essex!

Not gone, just resting!

Hello all, and apologies for my absence this past week and to anyone who I still owe an email reply to. It's been a week or so of meeting some deadlines, combined with both David and myself having a nasty bug...well, he is very generous, so, of course, he had to pass the bugs to me! So, thank you to everyone who put up with my sniffly nose and croaky voice at this weekend's demonstrations! Last weekend I was away in Carlisle and it rained...quite a lot! I had a wander around the city centre for a few hours then back to my hotel room for a good night's sleep before my day at Houghton Hall Garden Centre. I had visitors from north of the border as well as the local area, and must say a special hello to Helen...good luck with your new venture and hope it all goes well. On Sunday, well, you may recall that the rain was even heavier, to say the least. We set off driving to Northwich in Cheshire and the roads were more like canals. Thankfully, almost everyone was being sensible and driving carefully. When we pulled onto the Garden Centre entrance it was like a massive log flume! Needless to say, it was a fairly quiet morning as everyone waited to see if the rain would ease up. So, I busied myself making some extra cards and tags. I have really been enjoying making tags just lately, as you can see....The day did brighten up I'm happy to say, so I got to meet plenty of ladies who were keen to be inspired!

So, this week I had a Crafts Beautiful project to complete which took some time as there were problems getting some of the products that I needed. The yucky bugs took hold of me too, so I really felt like just doing nothing at all, but deadlines have to be met! Thankfully I got everything done and after feeling awful all week I began to feel more human again on Friday night. So, yesterday I was at Crabapple Crafts (Rosemary Merry's shop)in Frodsham. There was a clue that I was going to be there due to the giant sized posters that had been displayed, and I do mean giant sized! I'd hardly set up when everyone began arriving and it was the start of a really enjoyable day that just flew by. I saw friends old and new and hope everyone has been trying out the white card with Distress inks? Let me know how you get on with the trees and the faux bleaching. Thank you to all the Crabapple staff for keeping me supplied with fruit tea all day - it was most appreciated!

Today was a demonstration at the Garden Centre at High Legh in Knutsford, not too far away, so not much travelling today. Hello to Chris and Hazel and the lovely lady from Congleton whose name I don't know, but who I was tempting with punches and papers....sorry! Talking of which, take a look at this sweet snowman.... .....he is made using the MS DIY snowman punch and is so easy to create from just a few colours of card and a little shading. The punch has the elements for the main body, hat, scarf, buttons and twiggy arms. I drew the face in but, guess what, the confetti from the punch that I've used on the mat (PATP Deco fan) are just right for the carroty nose if you punch them from orange paper! Anyway, I used the reverse of a sheet of Best Creations Frosty Christmas paper (Snowscene) to partly cover the card blank and then punched a 5" x 3 1/4" panel of white card with the Deco Fan which I softly blended Stormy Sky Distress Ink over. I then added a panel from the fronts of the Snowscene paper to the centre of the punched mat, having rounded the corners first as I think this looks better. My little snowman is wearing a scarf punched from my Lilac Snowballs cardstock which I also used for his hatband. The greeting is from the matching greeting toppers. I then cut a 3 cms wide strip of white card and punched each side with the Deco Fan before wrapping an alcohol inked length of ribbon around it and fixing to the card to complete. This was a deceptively quick and easy card to make but I like it....mainly because of that so cute snowman! I have it in mind to make a card featuring a whole row of them, all posed differently and facing in both directions....I'll post a picture when I get round to making it!

Well, I just wanted to sign in and show that I'm still in the land of the living, so am off now to enjoy dinner that David is cooking as I type. I am feeling much better but poor David is now suffering from a Neuralgic after effect. Think we need a holiday, hmmm, some chance! Lindsay

Liverpool and Blackpool

But first, I wanted to let you know that Personal Impressions are now supplying the white card which I use with Distress inks in my demonstrations....hoorah! This 300 gsm cardstock is a superior quality which can take plenty of water being brushed onto it, making it perfect for the faux bleaching technique that I use to creat skies, trees, snow and general bleached out effects. I get lots of emails about the card I use, so I can now give a definitive answer! If you are interested in purchasing the card, ask your local craft shop if they can get it for you...the product number is PIP300CWH and any store that sells Personal Impressions products will be able to get it for you. Not only is it the perfect surface for Distress inks, it's also ideal for stamping onto as it is very smooth. It also works perfectly with Big n Juicy rainbow ink pads - I like to stamp a collage style image using Hydrangea, Vibrant Primary or whichever colourway you prefer, heat set the ink for a few seconds and then waterbrush over the surface to create a softly blended image. Imagine getting so excited over plain white card! Lol! (You know how it is though!)

Anyway, tomorrow I shall be at Crafty's in Liverpool, and have been busy with samples for this demonstration as well as for the Sunday at Burnside Garden Centre, Thornton, near Blackpool. I got a few new Martha Stewart punches and have a couple of quite simple cards to show you how pretty the punched designs are. This first one has a double border of the Four Petal Flower punch (punched through Best Creations adhesive glitter paper....how good are these punches?!). The new punch, though, is the Large Flower, M42-30004. I cut a strip of white card to fit down the right hand of the card (after placing a strip of my Red Gingham card and two thin strips of the red glitter paper) and punched a flower at either end before punching the centre one. This is a pop up style punch, so it only cuts part way through. I edged the petals using Barn Door Distress ink (I put paper beneath them to keep the rest of the card clean) and then stamped the sweet, delicate floral circles into the centres using Paula Pascual's stamp set "All Year Round" PPCSA6007...I couldn't believe how perectly they fitted! Paula's stamps are "just so". As I said, this is a very simple card as I wanted to show off the punched flowers - the effect is so pretty once the petals are lifted up. This punch is not a Christmas one, but I immediately thought that it would work as a Poinsettia type of embellishment. I punched six of them (Large Chrysanthemum Flower M42-30008) from white card and then gently swooshed with Fired Brick Distress ink. I made double flowers by adhering the centre with Glossy Accents (I recommend this when Distress ink has been applied to a surface as the ink tends to repel 3d Foam, DST etc) and I moved each top flower around a few mm to ensure that the petals didn't line up. A few spots of gold Stickles in each centre and a few upward flicks of the petals really gave them the festive feel. The card has my Holly cardstock, Vanilla Teddy topper and message from my "Ggggreat Christmas Words" stamp set. I smudged some more Fired Brick around too...well you have to really! I have more new punches, so I'll try to get some snaps of them this weekend. Lastly, here are a couple of Christmas tags that I made yesterday. The left one has Pine Needles and Fired Brick Distress inks blended over the tag (made from that brilliant card!) which I lightly spritzed with water for the snowy effect. I used two more of my new MS punches (nearly forgot about them!) the Postage Stamp M283006, and Medium Holly and Berries M232316. I love the dinky stamp punch. I cut two little festive images to fit within the stamps which I had lightly darkened with ink. I applied Crackle Accents once they were on the tag. I used a little piece of Tim's Symphony Tissue Tape to wrap around the tag near the base. An Adage Ticket, which I inked and spritzed and the numbers were some 3d card stickers which I applied red Stickles to. The holly was punched from Glitter adhesive paper from BC again. The words are stamped using an image from a lovely stamp set by Marion Emberson, which I will be using on Sunday - amongst other things! The main image from the set is the lovely swirling tree on the blue tag, as well as the message which I curved to fit the edge of the tag. The stamp set is called "Christmas Wishes" PICSA6160. I added punched holly again. Both tags have ribbons which I dyed using alcohol inks. Hope you like them! Well, time to relax for a while now. My bags are packed, I'm ready to go.....oh oh, I'll be bursting into song in a minute! So, I'll be back after the weekend with more photos - if I remember to take any! Have a great weekend whatever you are up to. Lindsay

Evening all! Just got back from a busy weekend of demonstrations. Hasn't the weather been gorgeous? Especially today so David took the scenic route home so we could enjoy the spring daffodils, early blossoming trees and the gorgeous shades of green intensified by the sunshine...makes one glad to be alive!

On Saturday I was at Reams in Derby city centre, a fabulous shop which sells artists materials as well as craft products and well worth a visit if you are in the area. Jill and the staff are a really lovely and friendly bunch so there was lots of fun and banter with the regular customers. It was a smashing day that seemed to just fly by! And look what Jill handed to me before I left....

.....isn't it a beautiful bouquet? So big that I couldn't take a picture that showed the lovely wrapping and bows as well as the flowers! Thank you Jill, it was lovely of you, and the flowers have been arranged and look stunning. Well, carrying on the purply pinky colour theme - here is a card which I made using a stamp from my Teddy Bear's set no 3 and the MS punch around the page set "Flower Shower". That particular punch is so pretty and the amount of flower confetti that comes out of the punched card is great...lots of different sizes and shapes too. The way that I coloured the teddy here gives a gingham effect which really suits this sort of image. All I did was a sort of loose "cross hatching" technique....just scribble the brush pen one way and then scribble it the opposite way. Doing very fast strokes means that you leave white lines between the strokes. A really simple "technique" but looks cute!This next card is one that I made a few weeks ago, using a Hero Arts set that features this hilarious bird! I stamped the bir onto white card and then smudged Distress ink over and around the outline. I then stamped him (her?!) again onto K&Co Que Sera paper, cut the image out and stuck over the inked bird. I like the way this gives a hazy shadow. I embellished with some gorgeous Que Sera sequin flower adhesions and stamped some spirals from the same Hero Arts set. This one made me smile!This next picture shows the huge tables I had to work on today at my demonstration in Northwich. It was so nice to have space and room to put all my punches and card so that I didn't knock half of my display over every time I went to pick something up! These are two background papers that I made using the wonderfully named Ink Potion no 9 with Distress ink pads. The left one was Broken China rubbed over gloss card followed by Dusty Concorde, I then spritzed the Ink Potion over and heated the surface...the effect doesn't really show until the card is heated. The one on the right uses Tumled Glass and Stormy Skies inks for a very soft effect. I keep banging on about PI's premium gloss card but it really is amazing quality, standing up to whatever you throw at it. I love working with gloss card as it takes silhouettes stamped images so well, giving really crisp coverage. If you haven't tried the Ink Potion do give it a go as the effects are stunning. For a more bold look use it with any water based liquid ink (Impress re inkers or Distress re inkers both work well).Finally, this is a card which I made using the wonderful MS Ladybug (American product!) corner and edger punches. Rather than creating them in plain black or red I punched them once in black and then again in red. Look away now if you are of a nervous disposition as you have to cut the red Ladybird heads and legs off! I use a glue pen to then stick the red bodies over ther black images to give a more dimensional effect - aren't they cute as a bug!?! I punched the corners of the card itself - with MS punches you can punch the inside corners too and attached red paper triangles to the inside of the card to show up the white ladybirds, sorry lady-bugs! The flowers in the centre are Petaloo Colour Me Crazy. These come as plain white and you can then colour them with chalks, inks, pens whatever. Here I went for really rich colour by drizzling alcohol ink onto my craft sheet and dabbing the petals into the ink. I used a greeting from one of Paula Pascual's lovely message stamp sets as the centre of the large flower and some black gems for the remaining ones. Everyone seemed to like this one - I think it is just a cheerful card!Well, that's all for now - I will post photos of the ATC's I got in Heather's swap and the lovely ones which Sheila sent me as soon as I get photos taken: hopefully tomorrow. Apologies for the less than crisp photos of the cards tonight, but my camera seems to be misbehaving. Or it may just have been my bad photography!!! Lindsay

Cream Crackered!

For some reason, that's how I have felt since Friday. I went down to Sudbury by train...just a mere four and a half hours, and, as this was my first visit to this lovely Suffolk town I would have liked to have a good look round whilst it was still light. However, as I didn't arrive until nearly five o'clock, all the shops were closing and it was such a gloomy day that I only had an hour of daylight. Anyway, I made the most of it and explored the mix of shop lined streets and small residential lanes. It's always fascinating to see the difference in architectural styles from town to town. Here I noticed that front doors seemed to be smaller than the norm - or maybe I was still dreaming about Fairy Doors!!! It was too dark to take any pictures unfortunately. I had a good wander and ended up walking around Waitrose as I didn't want to spend all evening in my hotel room! Still, I can happily browse the aisles for quite a while, and I bought some Belgian Paté de Fruits (posh fruit jellies!) for my mum - her favourite sweeties! I felt really tired, sore feet and heavy eyelids, so I had a lovely shower and then snuggled down for a really good sleep thanks to some cloudlike pillows and a comfortable mattress. Next day Roselyn (on the far right of the picture) picked me up and we went to her shop, Inspirational Crafts. I was teaching a morning and afternoon workshop with a demonstration in between. The first group of ladies made a card using stamps with Distress inks and Martha Stewart punches - no photos of this session I'm afraid as we were so intent on the project that I forgot to take any! However, here is the card which the second group, in the photo, made. Alcohol inks of course and some more punching - I am getting quite hooked on MS punches as they are just so simple to use, go through card and acetate as easily as anything and they are such lovely designs. I just received a pop up butterfly edger today which I am very eager to use as every other butterfly's wings can be lifted for a dimensional look. I shall post pictures once I have used it!

Many thanks to Roselyn who looked after me, fed and watered me and even gave me a slice of her daughter's home made coffee cake - very nice. Before I knew it I was back on the train - no chance of catching the wrong one as Sudbury Station has only one platform. I had three changes including going through my beloved (!) underground (mmmm...right) so it was a looong journey.

Next day I didn't wake until 10.30am which feels like the middle of the day to me, and I felt really stiff and tired - too much sitting in cramped seats on trains methinks. We then went over to mum and dad's - Heather had already taken them out for lunch, so we didn't go anywhere, just had a natter and gave mum her jellies, sorry, Paté de Fruits (!) and a bowl of Hyacinths. Little Tara kept us entertained with her antics too of course. Heather had left me the boards for my pages in her chunky book swap, which I am looking forward to getting on with in any spare moments. I do like to have a reason to do something for myself from time to time!

I am just about back to normal now - I don't often get that exhausted feeling, so I hate it when I do!

Below are the front and inside of the pop up card which I showed when I was on QVC on craft day, using my Boys Toys sets of stamps. I can never resist doing a pop up with a new set of stamps and these ones leant themselves to it very well. The metallic thread on the yoyo goes right through the front of the card to the inside. I like to do a fairly simple outside to these cards so there is more of a surprise when

you look inside!
I'll be updating my demonstration list soon, as I have more dates booked now, so do keep checking if you want to see if I'll be in your area. The places on my workshops at Dawn's Studio are filling up fast, so do give them a call if you fancy coming along to join in the fun! Heather is coming to three of them....there'll be trouble if she heckles me!
Well, I am going to watch David Dimbleby's "Seven Ages of Britain" now, as I missed it last night and it is an absoloutely excellent series. He's a great presenter of art and history as his enthusiasm and delight at the objects he's looking is really infectious. A real TV treat for a change! Will add more photos and dates soon, Lindsay

A great weekend

Thanks to all the lovely ladies (and one or two gentlemen!) who came along to Burnside on Saturday and Crafty by Nature on Sunday. It was so busy on both days and I had a great time with lots of laughter, as well as seeing everyone keen try all the techniques that I was showing. Joanne and her lovely hubby came along so it was great to see them, though we didn't get much time for a proper catch up. I did swap an ATC with her though as well as one with my sister, Heather, who also came to see me. Heather had brought some fabulous book swaps that she has been working on, but I missed out on having a proper look...well, I will catch them again hopefully.A couple of ladies came along to both days (hello to Alma!) and here are some of the keen crafters who came to see me on Sunday.

I am still bearing the stained hands from the weekend, as I used just about every type of ink known to man I think! I was also using Martha Stewart punches which everyone else seemed to love as much as me. My friend Jan and I made quite a lot of the samples for the Martha Stewart TSV which starts at Midnight tonight on QVC and which I am betting will not last for very long going by how popular they are!

This is the card which I promised to put up on here so those who bought the Versamagic inks and the Swirly Birds stamp set could remember how it looked! I stamped the birds with Sepia Archival ink and used Cut n Dry foam to smudge different ink colours over them . The paper down the side is from the Blossomwood paper pad from K&Co (gorgeous) and I used the Lattice Arch MS edger punch on matching brown paper which I slipped underneath the Pussy Willow paper. I added some tiny gold gems to the bird's eyes, and layered flowers and a large gem as a finishing touch.

Personal Impressions have now put some of the new stamp designs up on their website which you can check out under "coming soon". There is a whole mix of styles and themes by myself, Sue Dix and other designers. If you want to know who designed any particular image, or set, just click to enlarge the image for details. The images which I have been working on for the last couple of months are not up there yet, as they are for release later in the year.

Well, I have been busy all day, so am now going to relax a bit! Lindsay

Another cubic foot has gone "poof"!

....Or, in other words, I have to find space for some more tools! I received a package of Martha Stewart punches today - Edgers, Deep Edgers and Punch Around the Page. They really are stunning punches and they go through pretty heavy duty card as well as paper. I also got some inks and potions and papers and they are all for my demonstrations this coming weekend. So, tomorrow I will be putting together some cards, tags, ATC's and other ideas to hopefully inspire! I made the projects for my Stitches workshops today, so that is another task ticked off my list - they are very bright and cheerful, so I had a lot of fun making them. I'll post pictures of them after the show.

Just a quickie post tonight...now, where shall I put those punches?!! Lindsay

Anyone know where I can get an artistic octopus...?

That is to say, I could do with another two or three pairs of hands at the moment! I have a list of work to be done and I keep ticking things off one by one so that I can feel some progress happening and keep track of what I am up to.

Anyway, on Saturday I was up in Carlisle and had a very early start to the day, a really chilly old day it was too! Unfortunately I got there a bit too early so I was frozen. Thankfully it was warm in the shop (Heart of Craft) so I busied myself getting ready for my demonstration. This shop has only been open for a few months but they are already hosting workshops and have a great range of products, so worth a visit if you are in the area.

It was great to see everyone, including Helen and her husband....Helen had sent me a beautiful card and letter the previous week and we swapped some ATC's last year - well, I took an age to send mine, but I got there eventually! As you can see from the picture, Heart of Craft is under one of the railway arches so we had the sound of an occasional train going overhead! Mind you, it could have been my tummy rumbling as I'd had no breakfast and thought there was a cafe nearby - there wasn't - so I had no lunch either!

I was using my favourite Distress and Alcohol inks and a mixture of my stamps and some Darkroom Door ones by Rachel Grieg. I was also demonstrating how to make Grungepaper flowers, so hope everyone went home and made one! Don't forget to check Tim's blog for a step by step guide on making these lovely roses.

The bird card has not photographed very well as the image was stamped and embossed onto acetate then laid over an alcohol inked background, so there is a lot of glare. You can't really see the colours inked onto the brads either. Oh well! The second card was just a quickie that my friend Jan caused me to make. I was mounting a set of DD stamps onto Klingon when she rang me and during our conversation she mentioned the mosaic technique that she had seen, using the offcuts of rubber that are normally thrown away. Needless to say I rummaged in my bin and retrieved mine! It's not a great card, but I just wanted to try the technique...really easy of course, just cut up the waste rubber and stick it onto an acrylic block before inking and stamping. I used Distress inks and stroked them across the rubber to give a textured tile effect. I didn't have that much rubber left over, I just kept re inking and stamping till I'd filled a larger area. I shall be doing this again with more forethought to creating a particular design maybe. Interesting though - thanks Jan!

Well, before setting off home I called at a fish n chip shop to get a bag of chips as I was feeling almost faint by now! Got home late evening so it was a very long day indeed. Yesterday I had a lot of samples to make but I woke up feeling terrible and was forced to spend most of the day doing not very much...aaarrrgh! David said it was a combination of being frozen and not eating all day. Anyway, I felt 95% better today so I have been pushing on and catching up with myself and have now got a pile of things ready to post off tomorrow - phew! The samples are for the craft day on QVC on the 23rd February (I think I am on at 7pm) but are needed ahead of time for some promotional filming.

Some of my new stamps arrived over the weekend, so tomorrow I'll be designing some card projects with them that I'll be teaching at Stitches (trade show) later this month. I've more or less decided on the techniques but until I start using them with the new stamps I can't be sure!

After that I'm starting on some new samples for the demonstrations in Thornton and Bolton next weekend. On Saturday I'll be at Burnside Garden Centre in Thornton, near Blackpool and I'm going to have lots of Martha Stewart punches, stamps and various inks to show everyone...and guess what? No Ranger in sight! Well, maybe a bottle of Glossy Accents! I have some background ideas using Ink Potion no 9 and liquid inks - great fun and very messy! I know that my sister Heather will be popping in and will have some ATC's to swap, and I'm sure that Joanne will be calling too, so if you want to grab a great ATC, do bring some with you! On Sunday I'll be at Crafty By Nature in Kearsley, Bolton and I'll have Ranger inks with me, as well as stamps, Grungepaper, punches and a host of other goodies. So, hope to see lots of you this weekend and I'm looking forward to showing you lots of things.

I am supposed to be relaxing after dinner now, so I am going to sign off before I get told off! Take care everyone, and will post again soon, Lindsay

Coming up for air!

I feel a little bit like a terrapin swimming my way to the surface of a tank to grab a lungful of air before diving down again! The most recent batch of stamp designs that I have been working on are finally complete, in the presentation folder and ready to send off in the morning....whew! It's always a lovely feeling when a set of designs are finished and I'm especially pleased with these ones, which is quite unusual for me. I can't give any details about what they are of course...there are spies everywhere.....lol! There are more designs in the pipeline soon, but, at least for the moment, I can lay my pencil and pens down.

I had two very full boxes of new products delivered to me in the last couple of days and am now going to spend the next week making samples and a magazine project from them - needless to say all with unfeasibly short deadlines! There are some gorgeous new K&Co papers and embellishments as well as Martha Stewart products.....all scrumptious!

Unfortunately the demonstration at Crafty Corner in South Shields has been cancelled, so, if you were planning on popping along there to see me, I'm afraid that I shan't be there. Well, more time to work on these deadlines!

The snow around here has been thawing quite slowly but surely and the snow that was falling today hasn't stuck, so I'm guessing that we may have come throught the coldest of the winter now - I hope so anyway, as I am due to go up to Carlisle for a demonstration in a couple of weeks and I know it has been bad up there.

Well, this was just a quick pop in to keep in touch with everyone! Sorry that there are no photos tonight, but hope to remedy that soon. If you haven't checked out my sister's blog recently, have a look at the gorgeous post Christmas present that she has made for me.....aren't I lucky? (She is really getting far too clever

Halloween ATC's and inky backgrounds

Yes, I managed to take a few photos yesterday...at last... so here are some of the Halloween ATC's that I made for yesterday's demonstration. They all feature Alcohol inked backgrounds, some on gloss card and some on Personal Impressions metallic film which makes the transparent inks really zing. I also used my new Martha Stewart Scary Fence border punch on a couple of them as well as some stickers from ATD and K&Co. They were terrific fun to make I have to say - the pouncing cat one is a little different in that, looking at the inky background that I had made, I could sort of see a cat shape suggesting itself. I simply exaggerated what I could see and used a fine black pen to draw the shape in and accented it with white. It was a bit like looking at a cloud and seeing a particular image, so I must try this idea again. You will spot a few Christmassy ones in there too - really simply made by stamping Tim Holtz's wonderful ATC sized stamps over the background and highlighting with white. There is also one featuring the smaller version of my Scribble Snowman from the clear set. Nobody swapped with me yesterday, so these cards will all still be available at next weekend's demonstrations at Dawn's Studios.

Above is a box which I made from K&Co Christmas Cheer papers using a very straightforward origami fold. I used a square of my Alcohol inked gloss card to decorate thetop with the addition of a beautiful K&Co snowflake. A simple way to make an inexpensive Christmas gift look quite special methinks!

The card above was made using Distress inks to create the snowy background. I then stamped the trees onto alcohol inked metallic film and cut them out, adding tiny green gems at their points. The snowflakes are glitter peel offs which I've used alcohol inks on. This card started out as a bit of a mish mash, but I ended up really liking the end result!

Next is a simple, and, actually, unfinished (!) card that I made yesterday. I used three shades of Alcohol inks (Purple Twilight, Stream and Sailboat Blue) with the direct to paper technique onto gloss white card. The snowman was one of my designs last year and still one of my favourites as he is so easy to use. I added some white glitter paper across the bottom for him to stand on and I drew some naive snowflakes with the Inkssentials white pen. Maybe I'll get him finished next weekend!

Well, these are some of the things that I was up to yesterday. I now know that this coming wekend I will be doing Ranger based demonstrations at Dawn's weekend - both saturday and Sunday. So, there will be inks, paints, grungepaper, stamps (both mine and Tim Holtz designs) and some ATC's to swap too of course! I'll also be signing copies of my book and, hopefully, Heather's Beading book will be available too, as I know that some people have had difficulty in getting a copy. I'm really looking forward to a "grungy" weekend (!) and hope to see some of you there. I'll be in the Studio this time, as the Mill could not accomodate the extra demonstration tables as they normally do. So, it may get a little crowded, but it is really going to be fun! Please remember that, if you do come along, please do introduce yourself as, especially if you have blog photos that are not of yourself, I don't always know who you are, and I do like to say a proper hello! Lindsay

The week's events

Hello folks, I have pictures to share tonight as I finally got the camera batteries sorted out...about time too! Today I received copies of my new book as well as the three others in the series. To get a sneaky preview just go to http://www.magmaker.co.uk/ and click on the link to the Mastercraft books. They should be available in the shops from the end of this week.

Now for Matthew's progress.....good and bad news really. The good news is that his tail feathers are now coming through and already about a half inch long which is great, as it means that the feather follicles were not damaged when he was attacked. The bad news is that, because he has no tail to balance with, he is having to rely very heavily on his one good leg and he is obviously struggling, so he was finding it very hard to hop onto the sill to get his seed and nuts in the last couple of days. However, we are making sure that he gets a fair ration of the food, so it is now fingers crossed that his tail regrows quite quickly so that he won't have to carry his entire weight on one tired little leg. Will keep you posted of course.

On Thursday I had caught up with myself so David decided that we should go out for the afternoon and we ended up in Southport. We had the best fish and chips that we have had in a very long time - from The Dolphin, on Scarisbrick Ave if you are in the area! We had a stroll through the town and along the marina front before the obligatory spending of several pennies in the arcade of course! I then got a phone call which meant that we had to curtail our day and head home so that I could write some project instructions for a sudden next day deadline! Such is life!

On Saturday I was in Lancaster at Card Craft and below are some of the cards that I was making on the day. The one below is using my Robin Post stamp on a background of Peppermint Twist paper, and some of my favourite snowflake embellishments from the K&Co Swell Noel range. I used pens to colour the robin and then added a sheen using the Gold Just Glitter pen that gives a subtle accent. My newest acquisitions are two Martha Stewart border punches and you can see the vellum border near the bottom of the card which is the Doily Lace pattern and is just stunning and really easy to use. I have used my other punch - a Zig Zag with holes and an embossed line - on the pink snowman card. I added fine Candy Floss glitter to the embossed line using a glue pen. These punches will be getting a lot of use I think! Next is an acetate card which I hope that you can see okay as, for obvious reasons, this card was tricky to photograph! It features my Feathered Friends stamp as well as K&Co Peppermint Twist papers and embellishments. Some toning ribbons just finished the design off nicely....a good tip is to round all the corners of the acetate, including those on the backbone, which gives a nice notch to hold the ribbon securely in place.

The card with the Sitting Snowman Baby in lilac is a "cheat's" shaker card! I can't take the credit for this idea which I saw...somewhere! ButI thought it was a great idea and a good use of the cellophane bags which we put our cards into. The image has been stamped and stuck well down onto a background then put into the clear bag. Then I added chunky glitter and some Micro Beads before sealing the bag, sticking it to the card front and adding a simple covered frame over the top. Eh voila! A quickie, cheaty shaker card! The final card here is one where I just got carried away and combined my stamped image with Peppermint Twist papers, Swell Noel snowflakes, grunge board flourishes and some sheer ribbon. Over the top, but fun! Mmmmm, now I see that the pictures have actually come up in the wrong order, so I hope all that made sense! Hello to everyone who came along to see me in Lancaster - your kind comments were very welcome and I hope that your fingers didn't get too dirty with all the Distress inks that you bought! Thank you to Joanne, as usual, for the ATC swaps...I love the them.

Today I went to my parents' as it was my sisters' birthday so we all had a day out together (I'm doing well for days out just now!). Part of the afternoon involved a trip to Farmer Parr's in Fleetwood, which is a lovely place full of friendly farm animals and also has a museum of farming and domestic "nick nacks", tools and general nostalgia. Here are just a few photos to share the day with you....how adorable are these white Chipmunks? There were about six or so in a large enclosure and they all wanted to be at the top of this artificial Christmas tree! They were tearing around the cage at a rate of knots and we spent ages just watching their antics. Very entertaining little critters! Well...I had some more pictures to share, but for some reason they are just refusing to behave now, so I shall have to sign off for tonight and try again tomorrow to complete this post properly. Maybe it is getting late and my brain may have gone awry now! So, I'll say goodnight and continue, hopefully, tomorrow. Lindsay