Monday 26 December 2016

My Christmas Cards 2016 (Sizzix, Elizabeth Craft Design & Stampin' Up)

Merry Christmas everyone! We've had a lovely time (in spite of me having vertigo today and being sick this morning!) I cooked Christmas dinner for 15 of my family yesterday, and were joined later by more of my family, and today there were 16 of us with Scott's family visiting.
Just thought I'd show you the Christmas cards I made this year. Happy to say I made ALL my cards this year, and started early enough that I had time to really enjoy it.
I made probably about 20 more than shown here, in another couple of designs.
Most of the designs here are not my own, but are adaptations of ones I've seen around the internet, so I can't claim any credit for them.

Some of the products used:


   

Thursday 8 December 2016

CHALKOLA Chalk Board Marker Pens (Dry Erase Pens) Review



 I was contacted a couple of weeks ago by Chalkola Chalk Markers, asking if I'd like to try some out. Would I like to try out pens??!! Yes please!!  They arrived really quickly via Amazon, and I was sent two packs - the pack of 10 neon 'Party Colours' and the pack of 8 'Earthy Colours'. (Check out a 20% discount code further on in this post, which Chalkola have given me to pass on to you, if you are interested.)
 Between the two packs there is a really lovely range of colours:

The markers come in see-through plastic cases. There is a white marker in each pack, but the rest are different.

Straight out of the pack, the marker tips are not loaded with ink. 

Here's my biggest tip for these markers: Remove the tip while it is still unloaded with ink. The nib has a bullet tip at one end and a chisel tip at the other. Turn the nib around and put it back in the marker, so that the chisel tip is sticking out. To get the nib to fill with ink, you need to shake the marker, then press down the nib around 20-30 times (fewer if you do slower presses). When I was getting the ink through for the first few pens, I did the pressing action on the bullet tip, and it damaged the tips a bit, making them draw with a wider line. (In the colour chart above, you can see the red, orange and yellow lines on the left are all wider and slightly ragged looking.) If you depress the nib by pushing against the long flat edge of the chisel tip, no damage is done. Once the nib is saturated with ink, you can then take the nib out and switch it back to the bullet tip, or leave as a chisel tip.

OK, so with the ink flowing, I got to play! I wrote on paper first, and you can see here just how gorgeous and pigmented the ink is!! The ink is really nice to use on paper, though when dry it will smudge a bit, making a chalky shadow. The markers are highly satisfying to use on paper though, and I imagine little kids would love it.

At this point my teenage daughter arrived home, and quickly grasped the potential of the markers! She grabbed some and headed to the porch where there's lots of glass!

Pretty soon the front of the house was covered with designs! We had brilliant fun!!
When you are covering a large distance quickly, understandably the ink is less intense (as with the sun rays in the picture below, for example). When you take a bit more time, the coverage you get is really good - the ink is highly pigmented (as you can see in the pink and orange flags below).
It was an interesting talking point with a delivery guy, later that day!

We then thought we'd decorate the window directly inside the porch with a Welcome Home layout!

After that, my daughter went crazy with the markers, leaving messages and notes on pretty much every smooth surface in the house!!!

All of our family photos got a make-over:

...and she kindly left messages on all her brothers' windows! (This one to my youngest, who has recently been making some fantastic junk modelling creations: ''This room belongs to the greatest cardboard artist to have ever lived!!!'')

She also tried out the kitchen cabinets!
When I first wiped this off with just a damp cloth, a faint outline still remained, but I was able to get it off completely with a cream cleaner. 
The markers have come off glass absolutely spotlessly and with great ease, but I'd do a small test on other surfaces in a less obvious place first of all, just to double check they won't stain. It may not be entirely obvious if a surface is completely non-porous at first glance, but of course ink will seep into any 'pores'. The ink will come off any non-porous surfaces easily.

The next morning, we had quite an unpleasant surprise, coming down to a large Donald Trump on the dining room windows!! (I live in the UK and am not stating my opinion on American politics - I'd find it equally unpleasant to find a large Hillary on there too!) One of my sons had sneaked down and drawn it after we'd all gone to bed!

My daughter couldn't tolerate Trump for too long, so he got replaced with Napoleon Dynamite. The day after, Nigel Farage from the UKIP party appeared (courtesy of my son, who thinks this is hilarious!), but suffice to say, Nigel didn't last long either.

You can see again here, how pigmented and opaque the colours are, if you don't rush excessively.
Our dining room gets quite moist air in it from the tumble dryer and cooking, and with it being freezing outside, the windows get condensation on them. The chalk ink lasts pretty well, but when it gets too moist can start to blur and run a bit, if there is a lot of ink in a small area. The single line snowflakes which I drew are still going strong after nearly two weeks though. 

Chakola have kindly given me a 20% discount code to pass onto you. The markers are available via Amazon (links at the top), and you can use this code upon checkout: 20OFFSTR

I don't have experience with any other chalk markers - all I can say is that these Chalkola markers are lovely to use, are vivid and bold, and so much fun! I put some of these pictures on Facebook, and one of my friends commented that I got far better results than she had done with markers of a different brand, so she has bought some Chalkolas now instead.

Finally, I'll just show the picture of the Chalkolas being used on an actual chalk board again (this is a board I made myself with blackboard paint). They work like a dream on chalkboard, and I used a little cream cleaner along with a damp cloth to fully remove it. You might find some other painted chalk boards are more porous than this and have a bit of difficulty erasing them completely - again, do a small test first, if you're not sure how porous a surface is.

I hope that gives you a decent review of Chalkola markers anyway. They get a big thumbs up from the Cryer family!


Saturday 26 November 2016

Reverse Confetti Bird Cards

A quick post today, to share a couple of cards I made a while back with some products from Reverse Confetti - the Big Stripes Tags Confetti Cuts, and The Tweet Life stamp and die set.
The sentiment stamp is from Paper Smooches, and the flower punches are from Stampin' Up. I used Nuvo Crystal Drops for the flower centres, and black Enamel Accents for the bird eyes.

For the bird, I fussy cut the patterned paper.
I got the lovely woodgrain cardstock from Payperbox. I met the owner of the company earlier this year at the Stitches show at the NEC (in the UK), and he's the loveliest guy! His paper is really good value and really good quality.

I made a second card, with similar products, using the Brushstrokes Birthday Greetings Dienamics die for the 'happy', which I coated with Versamark ink and Melt Art Ultra Thick Embossing Enamel.
The 'birthday' was from Reverse Confetti's Whole Lotta Happy stamp set, and the stitched frame was cut with Marianne Design Craftable Passe Partouts, Square.

Links to some of the products used:


   

Friday 18 November 2016

Flower Pot Pop Stand & My Favorite Things Fall Florals Card

I got Karen Burniston's Flower Pot Pop Stand die set from Elizabeth Craft Designs last week, and a few other new crafty bits, including a stamp and die set from My Favorite Things ('Fall Forals'), which I used to decorate the flower pot with. This was a fun card to make!

I used Karen's Video to help me construct the plant pot, then stuck on the flowers.
I used Happy Birthday die cuts, from Marianne Designs, and added some border strips.

I added a bow cut with a Stampin' Up paper punch.
I used ink colours from Stephanie Barnard's Color Box range, and added decorative  dots with white Enamel Accents.

The card still folds flat enough to post!

The flower pot unfolding as the card opens...
Some of the products links:


   

Thursday 27 October 2016

Elizabeth Craft Designs Cake Pop Up Card with Brenda Walton Sizzix Lanterns

My daughter's birthday was on Monday, and though she turned 19, I couldn't resist going all pink and girly!
I cut a card base from Tanya Whelan's 'Bella Rose' paper pad, and die cut Karen Burniston's Cake Pop Up into it.

I used Brenda Walton's Sizzix Thinlits Lanterns die set to cut the garland, lanterns, butterflies and layered flowers

I used Reverse Confetti's 'Whole Lotta Happy' stamp set for the sentiment, and used Karen Burniston's Sizzix Fancy Frame Bigz die for the surrounding frame.
I added some floral paper from the Bella Rose pad, and finished it off with some sequins from Stampin' Up.

Links to products:


   

Thursday 20 October 2016

Evergreen Pivot Christmas Tree Pop It Ups Card

I'm not quite over the fact that summer is finished, but I've made my first Christmas cards now, so I must be accepting it!
This is quite a quick card I made using Karen Burniston's Evergreen Pivot Card die set.
I used the decorator dies that come with the set to make the tree layers, a Stampin' Up punch for the glitter stars on the trees, and some snowflakes from Tim Holtz's Mini Paper Snowflakes Thinlits die set.

I added some Pewter Pearl Drops to the snowflakes, and a sentiment using a banner die from Brenda Walton's Sizzix Floral Wreath die set and a stamp from Purple Onion Designs.
The papers are from First Edition's Christmas Wishes 12x12'' Pad.

Product Links:


   

Friday 12 August 2016

Hanging Charm Pull Tab Butterfly Card

We got back last week from our family holiday - I just thought I'd share a few pictures, before I show you my latest card.
We visited Dubai, then Hong Kong (here's the family overlooking Hong Kong from Victoria Peak)

 We spent a few days in Bangkok, (big lizards in the park!)

then Cambodia,

then Vietnam for a few days.

The main mode of transport!

I've been pretty ill since getting back - picked up some kind of flu on holiday, but today I felt alright and ready for some crafting again!

I decided to use one of Karen Burniston's recent die sets, the Hanging Charm Pull Tab set.
The set cuts out the pieces for a pull mechanism that makes a frame stand up, from which you can hang charms. You can put the mechanism just on a plain card stock base, but I decided to stick the mechanism to the front of an opening card so that there'd be room for me to write a message inside the card.
Here's the card with the mechanism still folded down flat.

 When you pull the tab, the frame stands up. I used the butterfly charm die that comes with the set, to create a hanging butterfly, and then attached another butterfly with wire. I cut the butterflies from adhesive wood veneer, made them double-sided and glued on sequins.

When you pull the tab it reveals a space, where I stuck some die cut paper Smooches letters. (I used Elizabeth Craft Designs double sided tape on the back, to turn the die cuts into stickers.)

I added an arrow to the pull tab (using a Stampin' Up punch) and I made the word 'pull' from the same Happy Birthday paper Smooches die set.
Finally I added some sequins and stickers.

Product Links: