Jubilee Tattered Corsage - Tutorial

I thought I would share how I made this paper corsage, which I will be wearing during our Jubilee celebrations.

Take your papers or thin card.  As it is the Jubilee I have gone for red, white and blue.

Cut some flowers, a few of each colour in three different sizes.  You can use nesting punches, I used the tattered florals die and the Big Shot.

 

 Pierce a hole through each flower and fasten together with a co-ordinating brad.

Spritz with water or water mixed with mica powder if you want it to shimmer.

then start carefully scrunching up the petals, breaking down the structure of the paper.

 Give the whole thing a scrunch and then wait for it to dry.

 

Add some Glossy Accents around the central brad, to glue in some beads.

Finally glue a brooch pin to the back of the corsarge.......

.....and you are ready for the celebrations.

Papercrafts - Lincoln

I do enjoy Hobbycrafts at the NEC there is always loads to look at and new techniques and materials to explore - but it is huge! I rush around to try and see everything, through the masses of people, often trailing trollies behind them or carring huge rucksacks.  If you get to see a demo you are fairly lucky and if there are any 'celebrity crafter's' it's unlikely you get to chat at all due to the number of people surrounding them.  Then there are the queues, the cost to park and the price of a cuppa....

I've been to the other extreme of craft show, where I have arrived at a venue and paid a small entrance fee to find there is only about six vendors stocking either cheap(ish) rubbish, or the same as everyone else there.  It takes a few minutes to look at all the stalls and I leave with no new product knowledge or any inspiration at all.

This weekend I drove to Lincolnshire, not quite knowing what to expect from the Papercrafts Lincoln show run by Sincerely Yours Shows.  All started off well with a free car park right next to the venue and no queues.  Just £3.50 to get in was also a fair price, although for £3 in advance we could have got free tea and coffee all day!  There was just about the right number of vendors with a great selection of products, most were doing demonstrations and had time to talk and discuss their products and all in a really friendly atmosphere.  There were also several show offers with generous discounts and a raffle.  With plenty of seating and tables we had a relaxing lunch after buying sandwiches at the venue for a very reasonable price.  I left with lots of goodies and tips I'm looking forward to the next one. 

SAW Wishing Tree

Sherwood Art Week is just around the corner!  One of the community projects is the 'Wishing Tree' at Sherwood Library.  Children can make and decorate leaves, add their wishes and hang on the tree at the library. 

Come and see us at the Sherwood Festival, Woodthorpe Park on Saturday 16th June and make your leaves.  The drop-in session in the Art Marquee is free of charge and materials are provided.     

There is still loads to do, but thanks to a big effort this morning by volunteers - over 700 brightly coloured leaves were cut out and punched with holes ready for dispatch to the library for the children's activity sessions during art week.

Printmaking at The Artisans Studio

Fancy a go at Printmaking?  The very talented Julie at The Artisans Studio is running some collograph workshops in her fabulous studio in Arnold, Nottingham.

Julie has a lovely selection of original art work, prints, jewellery, scarves, bags and other handmade gifts available to buy at her studio as well as professional picture framing.  It is well worth a visit.

New Course Coming Soon

I have been working on my new 'Papercrafts Techniques' class starting on Tuesday 19th June at The Textile Workshop in Sherwood.  Administered by South Nottingham College it is a 7 week course  (6:30 - 9:30pm) and costs £52.50 (free on some benefits) plus small charge for materials each week.  As with the last course there will be a vague theme of making the most of your craft stash each week.  We will be covering more watercolour techniques for crafters, some embossing techniques, 'pimp your papers', monochrome stamping, ATCs and more.  There will be lots of rubber stamping and use of different inks, paints and papers.

If you are interested contact The Textile Workshop on 07809158606.

Creative North East

I've just returned from a holiday in  the North East with some beautiful papercut images of Holy Island and Bamburgh Castle bought in a tiny art shop in Durham.  The artist is John Speight when I got home I checked out his website, there are some amazing pieces of work on there

Well worth a visit is the Woodhorn Museum in Ashington.  A free museum based around the mining industry in the area, there is also a permanent art exhibition with selected works by the "Pitman Painters", a group of miners from Ashington, as well as a number of temporary exhibitions.  At the time I visited the Embroiderers' Guild North East Region were exhibiting 'Mining a Golden Seam' there were some very imaginative and inspiring pieces of embroidery and mixed media work.

Artist Trading Cards

I've been making ATCs for a few years and although the idea is to swap them, I do tend to keep mine.  They are generally made from a base of card (well mine are anyway), but can be made from anything from fabric to clay to glass.  There are two main rules with ATCs; the size should be 3.5" x 2.5" and they should never be sold, only swapped.  When entering into a swap whether at a networking event, through a magazine or swap website, artists will sign, date name and number each card and provide an email address.

One thing I like about ATCs is that I get to use stamps and images I wouldn't normally use for making cards.  A mini canvas, I tend to start with a background, have a central image or a collection of images and some embellishments.  These two are my most recent ATCs and are a very simply made using a collection stamped images (in a single colour), glossy vintage images, metal charms and ribbon.