Hoping for a bit of inspiration...

I have been going through a complete brain melt down since my holiday. I haven't been able to rouse any ideas or inspiration which is so unlike me - my brain normally travels faster than my hands can write down the ideas or process them - so I thought that if I bought a couple of plain wooden boxes from the local Chino bazaar - like pound shops - and painted them it might kick start my mojo or at least awaken it. I have loads of assorted sewing items and buttons scattered around so I thought if I gave them a home in one place that would be a good start so this is what I made...
A distressed sewing bits n bobs box...
and a button box... in a funky urban style...very Barbie pink and bright...with grungeboard letters and rub-ons...
Will have to see on Monday if the therapy worked but I am generally pleased with the way they turned out and if nothing else they will be useful and help me be a bit more organised.At the start of the week I made this little book with sticky back canvas covers, alcohol inked letters and spray inks for Inga as I had forgotten her birthday - to give her due credit Tanya originally made one for me - although I used templates with the spray inks...as my mojo was still somewhere over the USA I decided I could lift the idea and I know Tanya wouldn't mind...after all it was a personal gift for a friend and not a class.

Right, I have loads of ironing still to do - 16 days away sounds good but when you come home to bad weather and can't dry the washing and the clothes you are wearing in the meantime also need washing it mounts up to 3 and a half weeks worth - anyway, I am now wafffling so I will say

Bye for now

Sue

Happy Birthday to art y facts

art y facts, my lovely craft shop had its fifth anniversary Monday of this week.
When I opened the shop I confided to a friend that if I could stay open until Christmas I would be happy, then it was Easter and then the first anniversary. Well, five years have flown and I am still here Woohoo! I have made so many lovely friends in that time and we have moved on to bigger and better things. The shop is now in premises four times the size and in a better location even though on the same road... and has a dedicated craft studio.

We are holding a Christmas themed open day on 10th September between 10am and 4pm and there will be demonstrations, make 'n' takes and loads of ideas to help kickstart the Christmas crafting season if it hasn't already started for you. This in part explains why there has been no blog posts as I haven't had anything to show. I have made loads but can't show it just yet. This is the advert in the local Female Focus complete with editorial. More details later in August...

And here are the loves of my life Abigail and Josh - they came to stay for a week bringing Dad ( son Lee) and I had so many cuddles and so much fun with them -and they both love - and are good at - crafting.

My latest favourite is a new Sizzix die that makes suitcases. No sorry it die-cuts suitcases - you have to put them together and I have made loads - did I say how addictive they are!!! All I can show you now are these two and the mini album I made to go inside the pink one. The others will be unveiled at the open day - did I mention we are having a Christmas open day 10th September from 10 till 4!!!

Here are some of the girls that came to class last night - I broke my own record of fourteen from last Wednesday - EIGHTEEN girls came! Whew!
back row - Alice, Megan,Alex, Victoire, Iciar,Cristina

front row - Olivia, Alexia, Anna, Dayana, Celine, Beatrix...
they are a mix of Spanish, English, French, German and Russian/Canadian nationalities

April, Nicole and Chloe...

Berta... I don't know how Alesha and Klara managed to escape my camera but I will get them another time - you'll see!

For classes I normally make the same project on Monday, Wednesday and Saturday during term time but with holidaymakers coming to class I am having to teach different projects each class and with not knowing how many will turn up its difficult to kit up but not to worry - we cope.
Monday night saw the girls making what I call Marsha's bag - Marsha made these as a make 'n' take at kkd last year or the one before...thanks Marsha -they are brilliant but despite the air con on at 17 degrees in the shop the gluesticks still melted and the bags had trouble staying stuck. Outside was high 20's even though it was 7 at night. Saturday 6th August eight girls made paper bag albums... Friday morning eight ladies made coin spinner cards...Megan (below in red) has been coming to classes for four weeks in summer and two at Easter since July 2007 and is now 12 and taller than me. I suppose at 5 foot 3 that's not so difficult!

She and Alice (seated in blue) are now old friends and they and Alesha had a fit of the giggles when I said smile please girls...not possible!!! control yourselves!!! no chance!

Gotcha!!!Abigail with Dayana the same night with their coin spinner cards... right, let's see if i can remember all their names....

Natasha, Kayleigh, Ola, Alesha at back, Daniella, Dayana, Zoe, Sofia
here they are all busy...
Blaithin, Lucia, Alesha..Sienna... Dayana... Natasha..Lauren...Chloe my little boxes with a tattered flower and a Wendy Vecchi rose... eleven - no not lords a leaping...did I mention I am having a Christmas themed open day on 10th September from 10 till 4 - I did! oh well never mind..... but eleven ladies (and girls) making boxes and two different types of flowers... Tanya and I do enjoy ourselves when we get together....she stayed for two weeks to recuperate from her awful cancer treatment... her lovely son Bart has booked her a surprise flight to come for another fortnight and on Monday night I will be driving to Alicante airport to collect her. I heard a shriek one morning and asked "what's wrong?" "I've found three eyelashes" she said so pleased. It will be lovely to see how much her hair has grown in two weeks.

I took Tanya to visit Feddie, a Spanish neighbour who has built a Gaudi inspired garden - I knew she would love his place...I will show more photos of his house and garden in future...Back to the shop... and a bit of face painting...well not literally..four visitors... and three regulars Becky, Dayana and Alice with their doll paintings.

I think that's a precis of the last four weeks Whew!- hope I haven't bored you.....and don't forget the Christmas open day on 10th September from 10 till 4 - see you there.

Bye for now

Sue

A week of repeats...

This is what I have spent my Sunday doing! Making air dry clay foods.......well it beats doing the ironing any day!!! The pizza and breakfast are unfinished - pizza has slices of pepperami on its base but no tomato or cheese and the breakfast tomato is unfinished - my red marker ran out- oh and the tomato on the burger isn't done either...but the cakes aren't too bad. This was my first attempt - well actually my second if you count the faces I made yesterday... so I am not too disappointed with them...

I made these when yesterdays class had left - the lovely Liz Welch had been using air dry clay on her blog and with a spare half hour to fill I made these gruesome offerings... I first taught this marbled paper years ago and was asked by one of the Saturday girls if they could do this... ... and here's the youngsters from Saturday with their marbled notebooks... This is a CD album project I first made last year and Barbara had seen it lurking in the shop and asked to make it -I didn't tell them it took five hours to complete.....

and here they are ... Friday's ladies with their CD albums... I took this into the light so sadly you can't see them too clearly but they are all smiling...even if just the bare bones of the project was complete -they will need to add the stamping and finishing touches at home...my lovely friend Norah (2nd left in the photo) is visiting Javea and came to class - she has been so ill and it is great to see her looking so well...

Celine has been asking for ages to decorate wooden boxes and so on Wednesday the girls sanded and painted their wooden boxes ...after unscrewing all the metal hinges and fastenings of course... Right, I have an iron getting hotter and hotter so I had better go and attack the pile - how come there's so much when there's only the two of us these days???

Bye for now
Sue

A bag, a box and happy ladies...

I decided to do a class making alcohol inked boxes with roses and got everything prepared and ready but the ladies had other ideas.



They decided they would like to make a gift bag with tag instead so that was what I showed them and then when only an hour into the class they were finished we moved onto my original plan...so they went home very happy with two projects today...
Here's Monica, Margaret, me and Q


I was blog hopping and read on Dylan's blog that she had Dina Wakley to do a couple of classes at her studio. Envious me...flings hair back Miss Piggy style - Moi!! No - of course I am!!! Lol!
So yesterday afternoon I decided to have a try at Dina style (I have actually signed up to do one of her online classes starting soon) and here is the result - so far pretty pleased even though I say so myself but whether I will be once I have taken her class who knows - but I am at the moment!!!



Right, that's it for today - now off to have some much-needed lunch and a collapse in front of the TV for a bit.
Bye for now
Sue

More alcohol ink flowers and boxes

Just a quickie post today...We had a great time learning new alcohol ink techniques...

Mu pouncing away - her broken finger nicely cocked!! She didn't quite catch the bottle of water hubby Mike threw her. Ouch!!!



Margaret showing her finished box...




dinky blue earrings today...



and that's all folks!!
Bye for now
Sue