September meeting - Swing Card

Hello everyone, Hope you've all had a good summer and enjoyable holidays. We had a week camping in Scarborough, which was hard work. I am not a camping person, the simple life is not for me! Looking forward to getting back to normal, you will all hear the big sigh of relief from me next week when all the kids are back at school! Believe it or not I am actually in Christmas mode, so that's what the plan is for next week (although not necessary if you don't want to). I've found this nice little Swing card that's a bit different together with instructions, so I can't take the blame if your cards are wrong. I have followed them and it's pretty easy.

You will need:- A piece of card measuring 6" x 9" (which will make a 6 x 6 card, Two images or an image and a sentiment for the centre, Pattered papers to decorate, Embellishments / sentiments, Ruler, pencil and scoring tool. See you all next week. Sarah x

July meeting - 9th White embossing and Kraft card

Hi everyone, First of all apologies for cancelling last month, as there would have only been four of us I felt it wasn't worth while. I realise people are going to have holidays and things coming up, so really need to decide what to do in the future if there are not many of us. On the plus side I have found my mojo, just need to get more organised and try and find some nice projects in advance and get my email out sooner. This month we will be playing with white embossing powder and Kraft card for a change. The images can be left as they are or coloured with your pens or pencils. Big stamps especially flowers (as you will see from my cards) work well, or detailed ones if leaving them plain. If you have white embossing powder and Kraft card that would be great, if not I will bring some, so you do not need to go out and buy it just for the evening. A heat gun would be handy too, although I have two and the club one. If you want to make you embossed images into a card on the night don't forget your other bits and pieces otherwise you can just play with the stamps. There are no birthdays this month. Look forward to seeing as many of you as possible. Sarah x

April meeting - Script Stamps

Hi everyone, Hope you all had a lovely Easter. I'm last minute as usual, it's becoming a habit now. Too many things to do and not enough time! Doesn't help the way the weeks fly by. Anyway, this month we will be playing with script stamps. Don't worry if you haven't got any, we can share. I haven't got any samples made (hopefully will make some over the next few days) but I have pinched some ideas off the internet. You could use background stamps as an alternative to patterned papers, or use them with other stamps and the masking technique. I have some lovely Penny Black collage stamps with script on which look nice inked in different colours or with the brush markers. You will need your basic cardmaking stuff, coloured inkpads (distress inks) might be handy if you have any. Cardblanks and papers etc if you wish to make a card rather than just stamp images. One birthday this month and it's Margaret Jackson. See you on Tuesday. Sarah

February meeting - 12th

Hi everyone, Hope you're all looking forward to next week's meeting - they soon come round. Well I said I was going to stick to square cards in future after my mishaps with measurements so here it is - a 6x6 card

with a difference, it has a pop up insert

Here's Wendy's sample

You can either use two 6 x 6" card blanks or one with a patterned piece of 6 x 12" for the insert (it's needs to be quite thick), patterned papers for decorating, images and/or sentiments any embellishments, pencil, ruler, tape, craft knife, scoring board and tool - if you have a 12 x 12 board these save so much messing about. I will bring my Big Shot if anyone wants to use it. We have four birthdays this month! Wendy, Sue, Lin and Ron so you better get busy gluing and sticking. Before I go, just want to share a picture of my gorgeous baby girl and the others, can't believe she's nearly 8 months old already. These were taken just before Christmas.

See you all next week Sarah

January meeting - 8th

Happy New Year to you all. Thank you to those that came to the Christmas meal it was a lovely night and the food was fabulous as always. I hope you had a lovely Christmas and managed to avoid all the nasty bugs going round. I'm so glad to get back to normal, craft club appears to be upon us rather quick thanks to the 1st falling on a Tuesday. A friend sent me this little project I thought we could do as I haven't had chance to trawl the internet for ideas and am only just findin my craft mojo. If anybody has any suggestions or there is anything specific you fancy doing let me know. What with all the coughs and sneezes about these tissue holders should be handy and would make a nice little Get Well, along with some chocolates of course.

(These aren't mine - pic taken from a blog) You will need an A4 sheet of card, papers to decorate, an image (the one I've used is approx 9x9cm), embellishments and for the aperture you can either cut it freehand or use a nestie. Needs to be no wider than 4.5cm. I will bring some tissues. It's Val's birthday this month, so don't forget your card. Look forward to seeing you all on Tuesday. Sarah x

November meeting - 13th

Hi everyone,

Apologies for being last minute, I don't seem to find the time to get online as much as I used to and certainly haven't been crafting.  I have to admit to buying Husband's birthday cards for the first time in years!

Next week we will be making a lovely little tag book which would make a nice present or keepsake, as you could put little notes or photo's in it - how you decorate it is up to you.

Here's one I made, I went a bit OTT with embellishments and it's a bit thick really, it doesn't fold very flat, the second picture is a the basic book.

You will need one piece of double sided 12x12 paper for the book itself, and co-ordinating pieces of card/paper for the pockets and tags. I've used sentiment stamps on my tags or any small images will work.  A hole punch, a small circle punch (1") and a border and corner punch - I have these if you don't,  a piece of ribbon and a few embellishments, gems/pearls, brads, flat flowers.  You will also need scoring board and some strong quick drying glue or narrow double sided tape.

It's Tina's birthday this month so don't forget your cards, can I please also ask that any outstanding subs (£20) are paid please.

December is fast approaching, we can go for the usual meal at the Hesketh.  I will pick up a menu, it's £14.95 each, of which club can pay the £5 deposit if you are happy to pay the rest.  Or if you have an alternative suggestion put it forward next week.

Before I go and try to remember how to make the book here's a recent pic of Izzy.  She's still a role model baby, sleeping through and as happy as she looks all the time.

See you all next week

Sarah

October Meeting - 9th

Hi everyone, First of all another year is upon us so subs are due. As I mentioned last month I propose increasing them to £20 each plus £2 per month. This is purely to cover the cost of hiring the room when we have quiet months and only a few turning up. Hope you understand. If you cannot make this months meeting but still wish to come please let me know and as always if you know any other crafters, drag them along! This month you need to root out your Christmas stuff, we're starting early(not as early some though!) We will be doing a card with a maching gift bag which is really quick and easy, we'll start with the bag so you can finnish the card at home if we run out of time. You don't need anything special, scoreboard with meaurements is easier if you have one. The bag itself is made from one sheet of 12" x 12" it needs to be quite sturdy card but foldable. Everything else you need is just your usual stuff.

So that's all for now, we have no bithdays this month. See you on Tuesday

September meeting - 11th

Hi everyone hope you are all well,

Today I breathed a huge sigh of relief as the children went back to school, looking forward to some peace and quiet and getting back into a routine and may be finally doing some crafting.

I can't believe craft club is upon us once more, I've not had chance to come up with a project so thought we could make some cards decoupaging stamped images. It's not something I think of doing, but I know Wendy does and they always look lovely.

The best sort of stamps are ones with larger areas and not too detailed as you need to cut the sections out. Character stamps such as Tilda, Penny Blacks and flower stamps work particularly well.

You will need all your general cardmaking stuff, stamps, colouring pens/pencils, small sharp scissors and 3d foam / silicone glue.

Margaret J suggested that we could have some "general" crafting evenings rather than doing a project where you can bring whatever you are working on or just have a natter and share ideas, so we will have a few of those in the future.

Unfortunately last month there was only 5 of us again and I was debating giving up the room and running the group from home as we are not covering the rent. To be honest I don't think this is going to be practical so, as the subs are due next month I propose to increase them to £20 for the year plus the usual £2 per month. This way the rent is covered for the year before we start no matter how many attend each month. I hope you understand.

I will organise some advertising to try and increase numbers.

Finally it is Marie's birthday so don't forget your card.

See you on Tuesday

Sarah x

August Meeting - Clean and Simple

Hello everyone,

Hope you are all well and that I can find some craft mojo from somewhere, I haven't managed to make anything since having Izzy.

I thought we could have a go at some Clean and Simple cards, these are the main requirements for a CAS card:

Clean & Simple (CAS)

A design of card with clean lines, minimal elements, areas of white space and few or no embellishments.

White Space

An area of the card which has no image, layer or embellishment.This can be any colour dependent upon the colour of the card blank.

One Layer Card (OLC)

One piece of card folded in half with no additional layers and minimal embellishments, where the image is stamped or printed directly onto the cardstock.

So for all you paper fearing people and those that aren't great at colouring in or simply need a quick card these are ideal.There are a few blogs that are dedicated to cards like this, if you want to take a look the links are below.

I will bring some sketches with me as a starting point - the rest is up to you.

Less is More
Clean and Simple Stamping
A Load of Old Pickle

You will need basic card making materials, sentiment stamps and smaller images work well as do coloured inks such as Distress inks, scraps of papers, gems and ribbons are useful too.

It's Margaret Brown's birthday this month.

See you on the 14th

Introducing Isobel Amber Swire

Well my beautiful little girl is finally here, she arrived at 3.34am on the 12th June weighing 8lb 13.5oz and we've called her Isobel Amber or Izzy for short.After not wanting to come out she made her entrance into the world very quickly, so quickly Daddy missed her arrival.

We are both home and doing well, albeit a little tired!



Hope you all enjoyed craft club and just to show willing I even had a go at making some myself before I went into hospital!



If Wendy doesn't mind planning next month's meeting again, I will bring Izzy to see you all.

 Good Afternoon Ladies & gents,

Sorry it has taken me so long to put this out but I had to get hubbie to help me get onto the blog and get the photos on here. I thought we could take Marie's idea from the last meeting and have a go at this card shape.

 I don't know what it's called, but it kinda closes in on itself.

 

So, you will need some card stock to make a square card, some patterned paper and good quality card to make the frame parts nice and firm, and an image for the centre (not too big... maybe about a 5/6 cm square image for a 15cmx15cm card. You will need the usual basics, glue/double sided tape, foam mount pads if you wish, pencil, ruler and so on. Important, you cannot do all of the parts on a paper trimmer or guillotine, you will need a cutting mat, steel ruler and craft knife. I will bring spares so don't worry.

I think I have remembered to tell you everything. See you all on Tuesday.

PS I will bring some mens stamps this time if anyone wants any samples just bring some paper and ink pads.

Wendy

May meeting 8th - Male cards

Hi everyone, Hope you are all well, it's that time again. Can't believe I've only got four weeks to go until my due date! Wendy will be in charge next month. First of all I'm hoping most of you will be able to come, the last few months there have only been about 5 or 6 of us and to be honest if it carries on like this we might have to rethink the club as we are not covering the rent of the room. So it will either mean increasing the subs or if there are only going to be a few of us it running it from home. Wendy, Tina and I are hoping to have a meeting to see what we can come up with. On to next week, something nice and easy, I'm struggling to craft at the moment. We are going to be having a "male" themed week. It's Father's Day on the 17th June so they can be Father's Day or Birthday cards. If you want to bring a selection of stamps maybe we could stamp a few of each others and it might inspire everyone. Embellishments such as buttons, brads and string work well on male cards.

There are no birthdays this month so see you soon x

April meeting - 10th

Hello and welcome to another month, crossing fingers the snow will miss us after those lovely few days of summer we had the other week, wish it would come back!

This month's project is a Criss Cross Card, these make good invitations or in my case birth announcements (if you've time to make lots of them!) pretty straight forward and only need your usual stuff, cardstock, papers, images and embellishments.

The card itself is made up of two 6x6 card blanks plus an extra piece of 6x6 for the insert. Obviously any size square will work, I just prefer this size.





We have one birthday this month, Margaret Jackson.

See you next week, hope you all have a lovely Easter.

March meeting - 13th Tealight Cards

Well it's 4am and I can't sleep so thought I would post next week's meeting.

As it's Mother's Day thought these cards would be a bit different.

They are tealight cards although you could put chocolates in, if you can find some to fit.







You will need two pieces of card 11.5 x 5" and 6.5 x 5" (you can get both out of a sheet of 12x12), small piece of acetate 1.5 x 4.5", scoring tools, double sided tape and/or glue, image and papers to decorate. I will bring the candles.

The only birthday this month is mine and it's on Mother's Day.

February meeting - 14th

Hi everyone,

Hope you are all keeping warm, so glad the snow missed us, for now anyway. Where do the weeks go? February already.

This time we will be making something a bit different, an exploding box. This one has taken me quite a while to add all the decorations, so you may want to concentrate on the basic box and finnish at home. I have made the roses and butterflies for the centrepiece but you could always put a small gift inside.







You will need:

4 sheets of good quality 12x12 double sided paper
(one sheet needs to be cut into four 6x6 pieces)
The off cuts can be used for matting and layering but you can use extra papers.

Scoring board with measurements or ruler and bone folder

Wet glue / Double sided tape for box lids

Corner punch if you have one

Embellishments (these may be added later)

We have quite a few birthdays this month - Wendy, Sue, Ron and Lin so you're going to be busy this week.

Look forward to seeing you all next week.