Half term is upon us and so I get some time to catch up with my crafting. I have a couple of craft fairs coming up and need to make lots of little bits to sell. Here are a few I've come up with so far!

 tea light box

 sweetie treats

 baubles

And then I have workshops to prepare - this sunburst card is going to be our next project!  Shame I can't show it the right way up for you! Sorry!

Anyhow - busy busy and loving every moment!

Join stampin up for £25!!

 From the 7th to the 21st October 2013, for just 2 weeks only, you can join Stampin’ Up! for just £25!  This is a fantastic economical way of joining as a Stampin' Up! demonstrator and taking advantage of all the great opportunities this will give you. 

For £25 you will get to sample discounts, great resources to help you on your SU journey and extra income if you want.  Purchase the kit through me, and you’ll instantly become a member of an established team structure full of friendly,inspirational demonstrators.  

There are lots of benefits from Stampin’ Up! when you become a demonstrator :

§ 20% off Stampin’ Up! discount on products

§ Pre-order new products one month before the customers sales period.

§ inspired by video tutorials and project ideas on the Stampin’ Up! demonstrator web site and regular newsletters full of inspirational ideas.

§ Earn free stamps with Stampin’ Start, Sale-A-Bration and other promotions.

§ Qualify for cash bonuses, product bonuses, incentive trips and other awards.

§ Earn additional income (called volume rebate) based on your monthly product sales.

§ Enjoy 2 free months of a personalized Stampin’ Up! on-line store and blog.

§ There’s NO pressure to reach quarterly minimum of sales, or if you wish to end your time as a demonstrator at any time.

This offer is a specially priced £25 starter kit including :

• £25.95 worth of Stampin’ Up! product that you can pick from the Annual or Autumn/Winter Catalogue
• A Business pack of : a box of annual catalogues, a pack of current seasonal Autumn/Winter catalogues, Getting Started DVD, Order forms and Customer postcards
• An 10% extra discount on your first order of £150 or more when you place your order in the first 45 days of joining.  This will mean a total of 30% off!!
• If you join and you are ready to party within your first 30 days.  If sales for the party reach £150 or more you can also chose ANY stamp from the annual catalogue FREE!  

There is also no postage to pay on the starter kit, but remember this offer kit is available only between 7th-21st October 2013.  During the offer period, the regular £99 starter kit will not be available.

You can choose to purchase the starter kit to for your own hobby, just to share with friends with catalogue orders or take that first step to start it as a business.  I will support you as a team member and share ideas and business knowledge along with the great supportive structure and training offered within my upline.

If this is the chance you have been waiting for to sign up or you are considering it for the first time, you are sure to have some questions before you commit so please feel you can email on katebodle@btinternet.com and we can talk through it some more.

This is a great opportunity to join right now so grab your chance!

Yesterday was world card making day so I couldn't pass up the opportunity to take part! I needed to make a quick card for a friend who has a passion for the butterfly stamp but wanted to do something a bit different with it! I decided to go for colours that I wouldn't usually associate with something as delicate as a butterfly so went for daffodil delight and black. I'm quite pleased with how it turned out!

I used the happy birthday from 'sassy salutations' - I did however make the school girl error (once looking it up!) in that I used basic black ink on the whisper white cardstock - it doesn't work! Luckily I had some staz on black in the depths of my cupboard so now I know what to use next time!

Anyhow - happy world card making day for yesterday!

Last week I went to my first Stampin up event! It was the creative tour - an opportunity to get some inspiration and see some sneak peeks of new products. We learnt about MDS - my digital studio - which looks amazing and I can't wait to try it out.... it'll be great for party invitations and I may even try my hand at making some business cards!

The thing that I found most exciting was 'swapping' - well, I was totally unprepared! I'd heard that you needed to take a few 'card fronts' and that you would 'swap' them with others...well! People had little baskets full of delightful creations that they gave away in return for one of my paltry efforts - each one had a sticker on the back with all the details of the cardstock, stamps and punches etc used to make it. I was staggered! I have so many lovely card fronts and a notepad and a 3d sweet holder to look at and get inspiration from!

I have come back full of gusto to make some things for the school Christmas fair - please excuse the photos! I had a go at making a little candle box - a simple design I found on a you tube video! The candles are wrapped with washi tape! I think they'll be great little gifts!

A little bit nervous!

I took my box of wares to sell at a small but really lovely local plant nursery today! The lady there really liked them - let's just hope her customers do too!

They are now for sale at Nin's Nursery in Ewelme http://www.ninsplantnursery.co.uk/ if you are local please go and have a look - lovely plants and nice things in the shop too!

I then had to make a quick card for a friend's birthday tomorrow, it needed to be masculine so I used the neutrals inks and the daring adventure stamp set as well as some washi tape from the Autumn Winter catalogue. Turned out ok I think!

I love it when a brown box arrives!!

Oh my pre-order for christmas has arrived - loving the washi tape and the Christmas paper stack! I managed to order lots of adhesive to replace all that I have used over the last couple of weeks - I am so pleased with the stampin up adhesives. They last longer and are better quality than most things I've bought before! I also got a couple of new stampsets and the new in colour inks and cardstock. Look out for creations after the weekend!! Unfortunately I'm not doing so well with my other holiday jobs of sorting and blitzing the house but hey ho!!

What have I been doing for so long?

Well real life has been in the way for a while and now it is the school holidays I'm back crafting with avengence! I had a few days away house sitting and ended up making loads of things on my project list, surfing pinterest to my hearts content and generally having a great time! I even managed to get another retail outlet for my cards and boxes! I have taken a lot of inspiration from Sam at Pootles Papercraft so thanks to her for that! Here are some of my creations!

 Loving the craft boxes covered with polka dot parade and brights paper!

 little boxes (Pootles Paper craft inspired) in colour 12-14 paper

 cased on pinterest - incolour 12-14 designer stack paper and the butterfly punch!

 A box with hidden closure (Pootles Papercraft) covered in twitterpated (now retired) dsp containing 3x3 cards

notebooks covered in dsp and embellished!

And between all this I've made 30 cards too!!! Love Summer!!

Getting more ambitious!

I have spent some time this week trying out some ideas I have found on pinterest (thanks Keenan creations and Little Bay Stampers for the inspiration). I am quite pleased with my results!

 

This one used the pocket sillhouettes stamp set I have had for an age but never used, midnight muse ink and the small butterfly punch from the spring summer 2013 catalogue. I punched out the squares then inked them up.

 

 

I am really pleased with this one too - sassy salutations and madison avenue stamp set in the in colours 2013-14 range. sorry I can't change the photo round for some reason but you get the idea. This one was taken directly from Keenan creations.

Had a brilliant workshop tonight - lots of young crafters getting very enthusiastic - some very creative Mums with them too!!

caseing on pinterest!

I have been spending many a happy hour pinning my favourite things and here are some of my cased (case = copy and steal everything!) cards.

This was one from Little Bay Stampers - It has inspired me to request a big shot for my birthday so I can get some embossing folders as the background is so plain. I raised the banner on dimensionals though and love the idea of a little punched window.

The next card was an Easter card - again cased from pinterest. This was my first use of the madison avenue stamp set. I felt the balance was a bit out but you get the idea!

 

My six year old son helped to stamp this one - not a bad job for a junior crafter!

 

My final card today was a birthday card for a friend with a significant birthday. I decided to stamp the background (until I get my birthday gift!!) so used the madison avenue set again.

 

 

 

I used another friends cricut to cut the flowers and the large label shapes. So I think perhaps I need to get the label punch or die next. Hmmmm......

feeding the habit!

And then it gets even  more away from my original intention to just dabble and make my own cards... Simon asked if I'd like to sell some of them through his work... no pressure. So I buy some plastic covers, decopatch a little box and get creating. I used up lots of old bits and bobs so some of the cards are a bit samey but I enjoyed doing it. The ultimate test will be if anyone actually wants to buy any! Crossing my fingers as it'll be another way to fund what is fast becoming a more expensive habit than the illegal kind!!

 

I can't figure out how to turn this round but it is made with the incolour range and rich razzleberry. I used  the secret garden stampset with punches to make the 'label' and the hostess gift sentiments. It looks a bit off centre but that is because it's in it's plastic wallet and you can see the envelope behind!

start of something new?

Well here I go - new venture time. I didn't go become a Stampin' Up demonstrator to do classes and workshops but it seems to be starting to happen so I thought I'd go the whole hog and start a small blog too. Not sure how it will all pan out! I have no idea how to run a blog so this will be a total learning curve!

I made these cards by using the penant parade stampset, white embossing powder and the pennant punch. You can just about see some little gems on the white cards at the back. I used dimensionals to get some depth to the cards.

Just playing around really but I was pleased with how they turned out!