What a journey

125 more views and we will have 80 000 views

What a highlight!!

Thank you 

Thank you 

and one more humble

Thank you !

This is now five years and 320 posts later.
Benice and I really enjoyed our journey.
We learned, laughed, cried, painted, planned
and packed a lot.
And we stitched a few things together.

Things change and life moves in different directions
so today will be my last post on this blog.

Benice will still be creating, sewing and writing
articles.

I will still be blogging, sharing, teaching and creating.
So now I want to introduce you to my new blog.

www.thegreyladder.blogspot.com

As with many things, the grey ladder has a story.
My Grandfather made this ladder over 90 years ago.
He made it out of Bamboo and wood.
He used it a lot and when he passed away it was
 left unused and in storage for a long time.
When we built my studio I knew I wanted this ladder
to hang from the roof.
So now it is in its new place and every one that visits the studio
notices it. So what better name for my studio than
The Grey Ladder.

Back to Between Cupcakes and Tea,
these are our top six posts:

 Decoupage on Canvas Sneakers - 2786 views
Memories of a Princess - 2520 views
Into Bracelets - 1591 views
49 Today - 1516 views
Birthday Calendar and Note pad - 656 views
Nine Love Stories - 614 views.

There are many things we shared with you
over the past 5 years, please browse through
the blog and enjoy.

Keep well.
xx

Fabric Collage Book Covers

Last week Thursday we made book covers.

I send the girls an image of what my book cover looked like

and for the class they also brought along small elements

that they wanted to use on their fabric collage.

This collage cover was made by Kim.

I like the way that she embroidered over the 

"Handmade by" sign. 

This one  was made by Esther.

Look at the small pin and the beads that she used

and the lace to cover the top.

This one was made by Gail. She will use the green dotted fabric

to make the cover of the book and then use this collage as the the front cover.

We all enjoyed the class.

Thanks Girls!

Tomorrow is our Market Day.

This is the link to the Facebook page.

https://www.facebook.com/events/909534532443304/

You are welcome to join us!

Shrink Plastic

A friend of mine contacted me and said that she 

sells the Lucky Squirrell shrink plastic brand 

and that she has stock at the moment!

Please feel free to contact her at:

paperchain@mweb.co.za

her name is Niki.

We are preparing for a house market on Saturday

and I am changing the name of my 

business, so it is new 

branding and business cards !!

I still need to work on it a bit.

Keep well !

Crepe Paper Flowers

I attended a flower making class and

it was so much fun!

It is something I can get hooked on.

I am definitely going to try this

and make my own. 

Shrink Plastic and Felt Broaches

I know shrink plastic is hard to find at the moment.

So if you find some, buy some and hold onto it.

It can be cut with scissors or with your 

Spellbinder or Sizzex dies.

Here are the tools that I used to make the broaches.

Co-ordinate your felt colours with your embroidery thread colours.

A bead needle and two strands of embroidery

thread will make your life easy when you

sew on the seed beads.

I used Sharpies to colour the images on the shrink plastic.

Remember if you do the colouring before you shrink the plastic,

you will have very intense colour.

The step by step of these broaches are in the 12th edition 

of the Creative Hobbies magazine that are on sale at the moment.

Felt Broaches in Purple and Pink

It's Friday....wow..

Tomorrow I am attending a Flower making class.

I am going to learn how to make huge 

flowers out of Crepe paper.

I am very excited. Hope to share my creations with you!

These are the felt broaches that I am busy making 

for an upcoming market.

 I think they would also look lovely on a headband.
Felt was never really my "thing" but
I really like doing the free hand embroidering on it. 

On my studio table I have a few projects going.

Cards for an upcoming class,

a decorated tin that is nearly finished 

and the art journal techniques and samples

for the students.

Have a creative weekend. 

Art Journal Creative Hobbies 11

When you do a step by step for a tutorial, you take a lot of photos!

Here are a few more photographs of the Art Journal that I made for the magazine.

Here are most of the supplies that I used.

For all the pages of the Journal I used a 200 gsm

mixed media pad. This paper can take the punch!

You ink, stencil stamp and emboss.

The ink process is wet and you do both sides of the paper,
so you need a good quality paper.

Anything can also be added to your Journal.

Envelopes, craft paper dividers and scrap pieces of papers,

Have a look at Issue 11 for more info on this project.

Art Supplies for Art Journaling Class

Art Journaling is a way to express yourself....without

any criticism.

There are no deadlines, there are no rules.

You can use what you want 

and create what you want.

These are my absolute basics. 

A4 Heavy duty mixed media pad

Micron pens

Glue

Aqaurelle pencils

Water colour paints.

If you feel like creating, writing, doodling, drawing, scribbling,

painting, stenciling, texturing, gluing, spraying, stitching,

cutting and playing..... you are invited! 

We will start off with one class a month. 

One for the girls who can make it on a Thursday

and one for the girls that can make it on a Saturday. 

Here are the dates:

Thursdays: 

18 June

16 July

20 August 

17 September

15 October

19 November
all classes 09:00 - 12:00

Saturdays:

 20 June

18 July

 22 August

19 September

17 October

21 November
all classes 10:00 - 13:00

I will teach you the basics:

Where to get inspiration

how to create a background

how to use the different products

and a new technique each month

The aim of the class is to learn how to be comfortable to create

and find your own style.

( if you don't have a style yet, don't worry!

if you miss a class, don't worry !)

 Available for class use:

stencils
stamps

die cuts and machines

embossing folders

punches

and all the other non consumables

You need two things to start with:

A4 mixed media paper pad (photo)

Micron pen. 0.4

Reply by e-mailing me.

I hope you all look forward to start expressing
yourself on paper!

Small Mixed Media Canvasses

Using different mediums on a canvas can be challenging.

Will the tissue paper tear? Where do I put my embellishments?

What colours am I going to use?

For this class we:

Covered the canvas with gesso.

Painted it with two colours of distresss paint.

Blended the colours by wiping it with a baby wipe.

Used gel medium to adhere the tissue paper and the 

doilies to the canvas. 

Then we used stamps and ink to create some depth.

We created shadows by using distress markers and a water pen.

To create the butterfly and the heart, we glued a piece of 

watercolour paper to a piece of canvas paper.

We then used die cuts and a die cutting machine to

cut out the two shapes.

Then we embossed the two pieces before they became to dry.

Let them dry completely before you apply the colour with 

your distress ink and applicator tool.

Each of the students brought their own individual touch to the canvasses.

It is amazing how different the end results can be.

Here is a list of the supplies that we used:

6 x 6 inch canvasses

Gesso

Distress paint

Distress markers

Distress stains

Baby wipes

Gel medium

Tissue paper

Doilies

Stamps

Archival ink

Die cuts

Die cutting machine

Chipboard words

Metal embellishments

Experiment with these techniques in your art journal.

Play around and enjoy the process. 

Cards in a Bottle

These are the projects that was featured in 

Creative Hobbies Issue 8.

The Mason Jar is filled with cards to give as a gift.

The jar is decorated with washi tape, ric rac, lace tape, a paper rose

 and a stamped image on paper. 

The paper Strawberry is filled with special treats.

It closes with the ribbon on top.

(This is my favorite)

 The Paper cones have small thank you notes

and are filled with Lindt Chocolate of course!

These Washi tape and paper feathers are used as decorations for

small paper bags filled with sweets.

Creative Hobbies Project. Sneakers with Sharpies.

This is a project that I did for the 

Creative Hobbies magazine, Issue 10. 

The Pilot Frixion Pen is a miracle. 

(those are the red lines on the tekkie)

As you can see, you draw what you want, colour 

the drawings with your sharpies. Outline the 

images with your black marker and then make

 the red lines disappear with the heat of a hairdryer. 

I used surgical spirit to blend the colours.

Unlike the decoupaged tekkies, these are waterproof

and ideally suited for kids.

Decorated Tekkies

It is March.... the last time I posted was in December.

Before we breathe again in will be June...

Are we keeping up?

Anyway, we had a tekkie class earlier this month and it was 

huge fun. The ladies are entering their Tekkies into a competetion!

None of them had ever decorated a tekkie before.

The pink tekkies were made by a Grade 5 girl. 

All of them turned out beautifully.

I am glad that I am not the judge.

Well done Ladies!