ArtsyCrafts - 2 fabulous weekends

What can I say? Lin and I are both totally overwhelmed with the wonderful feedback from the delegates who attended both of these events. We think we have now found a format that works really well, operates at a nice pace, and creates a warm friendly and supportive environment suitable for newbies and experienced alike.

 So many people told us in their evaluations that this altered art weekend was the best they had ever attended, which was the biggest compliment to us we could ever hope to receive. So take a look at the pictures below from the event, because maybe this kind of thing is somrthing you might like to attend in the future. We had people in the last 2 weeks travel from as far away as Scotland, Ireland, Wales, Devon, and even some international,"across the ditch" people came from France, Holland, and Norway. So if you live in England, the location near Milton Keynes is very central, and close to Luton airport. So don't try telling us it's too far away, we won't believe you!!! LOL

We provice everything for the weekend that you need. In fact if all you arrived with was a pair of Tim Holtz scissors, you would be set to go! Here is the table set for the first class, with step out colour notes, the class kits, and lots of goodies on the table to work with. We issue each person for the whole weekend with a metal working kit, so you have a basic tool set with paper stumps, a mat set, sanding block, glues etc for you to use whenever you wish.

Each table also had one of these samples to refer to so you could see how the colours might work together.

We were very pleased that just about everyone got all their projects finished at the event, so the timings were pretty much on the button for all the classes. People seemed to enjoy all the projects and techniques we taught, and everyone met new people and made fantastic new friendships.

Here are some of the projects we made in various colour groups. Below is French Maison (blue and beige),  Autumn Days (warm tones of rust, olive and brown), and English Rose (soft pink and cream). We also had Peacock (rich greens, blues and chocolate with gold and copper highlights), Cappucino (coffee coloured shades of brown), and Country Charm (pale soft shade of duck egg blue and pistachio green with silver highlights.

 Within the groups there was the opportunity to ramp up the colours or tone them down based on your personal preference. So it was fascinating how a table could have huge variations by only using some of the colours, eg just using green instead of blue and green, or by creating the project rich instead of pale with cream or white base.

The rooms were quite spacious, with an area for the shop at one end of the room. With 5 people per table, and supplies in the centre, there is plenty of room to flap your wings, and yet you can still reach what you need.

As you have probably gatheredhe theme was "time" and the main project was a large clock which we created over 3 sessions. We also made a mini box decorated inside and out, a small arch shaped concertina book and a UTEE metal clock embossed embellishment with grunge wings, perfect to decorate a diary or journal cover.

The techniques and products we focussed on were viva Decor Terra texture paste, Kaisercolour paints, and Viva Decor precious metal colour paints. Our aim during the weekend is to use most of these products a few times in different ways so that people grow in their confidence with those products, and understand the versatility of how to work with them in a variety of situations. Each event we also try to incorporate an item with UTEE, and so we had a session with the melt pots too. Melt pots are always a new thing for some of the delegates, but it's nice to show how versatile they are.  And of course the glue of all these sessions are Lin and my specialty areas; Metal and Stamps. We incorporate new techniques and ideas with Metal and stamps in all the sessions so that people learn many ways to use these products together.

If one thing came through in the evaluations forms is that it is very evident to the delegates at ArtsyCrafts events how much preparation Lin and I put in. It is very important to us that people go home with full colour step-by-step notes for each session. We impart so much information, that it's nice to have a professional resource to refer back to when you are at home and wondering "how the heck did i do that?" 6 months later!

 

"A bit of me time" Mini Box.

This was a cute little box which we painted, decorated with stamped/ coloured papers, and then adorned the inside with metal embellishments.The outside has a fob watch with a cracked face on the cover. The sides of the box had cuttlebugged metal on them.

"Storytime" Arch concertina book

The cover chipboard and pages were all painted with Kaisercolour paints, stamped, and we did some masking, adding more paint for depth, and decorating insdie the arch with metal birds on pearl metal.

"Time Flies" UTEE Embellishment

The clock with wings was our UTEE class. Lin worked out that using UTEE on top of embossed metal is a great way to support the metal instead of using a polyfiller type product from behind. So we stamped an image onto pearl metal, embossed (puffed out) the metal, then glimmered it and finally added a layer of clear UTEE. this was cut out with a cookie cutter. To this we attached wings made from painted and stamped grungepaper.

"Tick Tock" 

So to our big project, the clock. We taught this over 3 sessions. The face of the clock was textured with Terra which we stamped into. Once dry we painted it with acrylic paints, and sprayed with glimmer mist, and added some Viva Precious metal colour accents to the high points.

We also painted some metal to match the colour of the clock face so that we could stamp on this surface for embellishments on the canvas, however, some people opted to do these directly onto the copper painted metal.

The base that the clock rests on is a large rectangular canvas. This was painted, and stamped. with pale colours. Then overstamped with Viva preciuos metal colour.

Then we added quotes in black, and together with the metal panels and painted embellishments, plus the clock numbers it all starts to come together.

The 4 metal panels to go on the canvas had been embossed on the Ten Seconds Studio moulds.

 The panels were painted and perhaps glimmered to antique them.

We also created some other clock metal embellishments (the painted/stamped pieces mentioned before), and of course the numbers for the clock were also stamped onto metal.

It was wonderful to look at all the artwork that was displayed around the room as each person developed their own version of each project. We were amazed how the artwork different even within a table.

Here is a group photo of weekend number 2, we never got a piccie from the First weekend, but we'll make sure to do this at future events! 

Colours choices at ArtsyCrafts events

When people register with us to attend the event, they indicate their colour preferences from a list of up to 10 options. We count up everyone's first choices, and this determines the colours available at the event. For this event, 'French Maison' was so popular we had 3 tables of that colur scheme (soft blue and beige) and we were thrilled that practically everyone at the event got their first available colour choice to make the main project (clock).

When making other projects over the weekend we allow a free choice system so that delegates can have a go at a different colour, which means there are about 2-3 opportunities to try something different. This system also means that you don't know who you will sit with until you arrive, and at the end of the weekend you have met so many new people, that even those who came with friends were happy to have made many new ones too.

Lastly can I say a huge thankyou to all who came and made the event such a success and so enjoyable. Both groups each weekend were so lovely to teach. Even those who were out of their comfort zone jumped in boots and all to give every project 100% effort and it really showed in the results. We were in awe of the wonderful and inidividual ways you all expressed yourselves. And of course Lin and I couldn't do it without our fabulous helpers. Here we all are in the picture, from the left Jo, Lynne H, Lin, Karen and Leandra.

This was the 5th ArstyCrafts event we have offered, and with so many new people and committed fans who have attended every single event, we anticipate the march 2010  weekends will sell out fast. The popularity and high quality of these events have created a demand point where we could probably offer 3 weekends, but we cannot fit this into our schedules. So with this in mind, we expect it's likely to be a bit of a rush to book places. To be fair to everyone, we will be announcing the details in full for a few weeks before the booking date commences. If you are on either the LB Crafts or PaperArtsy mailing lists, you will get an email, otherwise sign up to this blog or Lin's blog (LB Crafts) where the same info will also be made public. Start saving now, we have a fabulous theme lined up and Lin and I have already had a meeting where we have sketched out some potential class ideas! I think you will love it...we are buzzing about it !!

If you attended one of these events, please can I ask you to leave a comment on this blog post and a link back to your blog post about the weekend so that people can come and take a look now and in the future your opinions of ArtsyCrafts weekends and the items you made.

Have a great weekend, now that the rough winter weather has arrived, it's perfect to start thinking about Xmas cards and gifts...maybe you could make small clocks for gifts???

Leandra

Day 7: PaperArtsy 12 days of Christmas

Day 7:  Featuring Jo Firth-Young 

using Nut and Meg Plate 7

 Jo F-Y is back with an adorable plaque idea with the elf. The plaque is about 8" x8" so would make a great wall hanging, or a nice display on an easel too. Jo has secretly confessed to me that she has sketched ideas for a whole wardrobe of outfits for these elves, even dungarees...so I have a vision of a row of elves on her mantlepice all dressed up to celebrate the season!! She was also dreaming of flip books where the top middle and bottom were all different, and even little tabbed clothes, like the kind we used to cut up as kids. Being a cat lover, she had to include our christmas moggie from SINM8, who makes the perfect buddy for our elf. You can see more of Jo Firth-Young here on her blog.

Elves Wanted Plaque

by Jo Firth-Young

This plaque is created using mainly Nut and Meg plate 7, but also includes stamps from other plates: Cat (SINM 8), Parcels(SINM3), Snowflakes small (SINM1) and large (SINM8). Small circles around edges are Squiggly Mini 15.
 
The Plaque:

• Cut shaped plaque from chipboard (sand the edges slightly to smooth any rough edges)

• Paint surface with Kaiser colour White acrylic paint. Colour the edges with Kaiser colour Sea Breeze acrylic paint – blending the 2 colours and leaving the centre of the plaque pale.

• Stamp the large and small snowflakes randomly (and sparingly) over the surface using a blue pearlescent ink. NB if you don't have a pearlsecent ink pad for the bubbles , you could also use a Viva Decor metallic paint to stamp the bubbles onto the chipboard. Blue Azure is perfect. 

• Spritz the surface of the plaque with Glimmer Mist – Pearl 

• Draw white lines around the edge of the plaque with Ranger Inkessesntials white gel pen.

• Drag/ smudge Blue Metallic paint Viva Decor: Blue azure, blue lagoon, Turquoise, Pearl Blue would all work well) around the edge of the plaque – smudge over the white lines to soften the harshness of the white.   
  

• Highlight some of the small stamped circles with the white pen and add spot details to the snowflakes.

• Add a hint of olive green paint to the edges to tie in with ground that the elf etc will stand on. 

• Paint chipboard snowflakes with silver precious colour metallic paint and a very pale blue acrylic paint made by adding white to a small amount of the sea breeze paint. The large snowflakes have been painted in very pale blue and the edges and centres wiped sparingly with silver shimmery paint. Set aside.

The Elf:

• Stamp elf head and feet stamps (SIEN7) onto white card. Draw elf body yourself! You can do it! It's not that hard, and if you fail, get a child to do it! A triangle makes the top, belt at the middle, with a triangle skirt with wobbly hem and trim.  Draw the arms with knobbly elbows (to match the knees) which go behind the elf's back so you don't have to tackle the problem of hands! Cut all out and attach to each other. 

• Stamp cat and cut out. Stamp the parcels 3 times and cut out (colour each set the same as they will be decoupaged). 

• Colour all these pieces – I’ve used coloured pencils and highlighted with metallic pen for belt buckle, parcel stripes, and cat’s scarf & added glaze gel pen to the holly on hat. Add shading on the images to give dimension. 

• Create some ‘aged’ paper for the signs by wiping ink (Antique Linen Distress Ink) on to white card and diluting with water.  Dry thoroughly. 
• Stamp ‘wanted’ sign onto the card, and for the other 2 phrases you will also need to add lines in the same vein as the Wanted sign to create signs. 
• Cut two rough edge strips of brown card for the sign posts – create wood grain with a brown pencil.

Putting it all together:

• Position the painted snowflakes around the edge of the card and all the stamped images in the centre of the plaque.  

• When happy with the positioning and the balance/ spacing attach some of the snowflakes with 3d foam pads and stick others directly onto the chipboard. In the middle of the larger ones add an adhesive gem. 

• Mark where the bases of the elf, cat, parcels and signs are going to sit on the plaque then remove them and add a "green ground" where they were positioned. Use green with a bit of brown pencil. Reposition and attach the pieces where marked.

• Add a bit of shadow or darkness around the feet/signs etc.  

•  The parcels are 3d decoupaged to add a bit of dimension.

Another big thank-you to Jo Firth-Young for sharing with us this fun and achievable project. I am sure it will get your heads buzzing with ideas, and i just love the shape of the chipboard.

Next for today, we have a couple of projects from Joanne Wardle, and one from Jo Capper-Sandon, so it truly is a "Day of the Jo's" here on the paperArtsy blog!

Elf House Hanging
By Jo Wardle

Cut a house shape 11cm tall x7cm wide. Cut a window approximately 4cm square. Stamp text and elf onto white card, using stamps from plate SINM7. 

Colour elf with coloursoft pencils and sansodor solution to blend and soften. Cut out. 

Colour house with vintage photo distress ink and over stamp with “wanted” stamp. 

Stamp in black little round swirl repeatedly and corner stamp onto house. Attach elf and the sign with words. Add an eyelet and some raffia.

Elf Watercolour Gift Tag

By Joanne Wardle

This is another of Joanne's Watercolour tags using the same technique as described in yesterday's post. As it was using today's featured plate, I thought I'd slip it in here.

Winter Girl

by Joanne Capper-Sandon

1. Stamp splash mini 57   randomly onto white card in soft blue and black ink.
2. Overstamp in black with USYT3 girl image.
3. Edge the card with silver peel off strips. (Yes we caught Jo using Peel offs...you heard it here first! She's going to kill me for revealing this, but it's the scoop of the year! lol)
4. Stamp Peace etc and edge with more peel off strips...should we be worried?? lol 
Position at the foot of the panel.
5. Layer stamped panel to white coredinations card which sands back to a lilac core. The dark portions are the sanded bits.
6. Colour face etc with copic markers.
7. Attach grey ribbon down LHS of card, and secure clear snowflake with pearl centre brad.
8. Embellish with lilac-grey buttons.
9. Apply glitter shards to the card.


Its Ok Jo we still love you....we all use peel offs in secret, and we all have them in our stash. I am quite partial to using the magenta ones as masks (in fact i taught that technique for quite a while a year or so ago, even in Holland!), and I was over the moon back in the day when the typewriter alphabet came out....so breathe easy. lol.  You're allowed a guilty pleasure. I'm going to bed giggling tonight.

PaperArtsy Blog Giveaway: Please leave a comment and we'll randomly draw a name to win Nut and Meg Plates 7 and Urban Snapshots YuleTide plate 3 on EZ Mount worth £18.80. This offer ends midnight GMT the day of this posting, 10 September 2009, and is open to all players worldwide.