A warm welcome to all my visitors,

Thank you for taking the time to come and look at my blog, I really do appreciate it. I would love you to leave me a comment, even if it’s just to say Hi. It means I can come visit you!

All my designs are original, so copyrighted to me. If I have been inspired by someone elses work, I have named them in the post, and where able, I have provided a link.

Please feel free to use my designs for inspiration, I just ask you to credit me, and provide a link back to my blog.

Thanks, Shaz XX

Showing posts with label books. Show all posts
Showing posts with label books. Show all posts

Tuesday, 28 June 2011

WOYWW #108


Happy WOYWW to everyone, pop over to the Incredible Julia Dunnitsfor this weeks wander around the workdesks.

This is whats on my desk at the moment- a pair of new blades for my Silhouette, courtesy of E-bay, and two purchases from The Works. A flexible ruler, which I thought 'will come in useful'- I have a houseful of stuff bought under THAT particular mis-apprehension, lol, and the book, Handmade Celtic Cards, by Paula Pascual.


Its a Search Press book with 48 pages, full colour, and some lovely ideas.








As you can see, nice clear illustrations & directions.


















Lots of ideas, using stamping, embossing & peel-offs onto card, acetate & metal or metal foil.
And as it was reduced to 99p, I consider it my bargain of the month!

The reason there is so little to see on my desk this week, is that I intended to spend Sunday crafting, to give me stuff for this week. However, that plan went out the window thanks to Ambrose.You may recall seeing him on my post a couple of weeks ago, looking quite handsome. This is a photo of him taken today.

You see the bald spot over his eye? This actually looks a lot better now than it did on Sunday morning. I had taken my coffee out to sit on the decking, with a cigarette (or two), before getting down to stuff, and he comes walking up the garden, looking like the definite loser in a recent brawl! The swelling above his eye was seriously raw, and looked infected. Looking closer, I saw a tick just below his ear, and I think he must have been trying to scratch it off and had scratched off all the fur, and made it bleed. So a visit to the vets was needed, and fortunately, Pets At Home have a vet on the premises on Sundays. 
So he is now on antibiotics- and we had the choice of tablets or liquid. Given the trouble we have had before trying to get pills down him, and believe me we have tried every known method, and invented a few ourselves, we went for liquid. While not exactly any easier, at least he has to swallow liquid- pills he just keeps in his mouth until you finally release him, then spits them out. We've held his mouth shut and stroked his throat for 10 minutes before now- doesn't work- put pills in food- he just eats around it! The difficulty comes in because he HATES being picked up or held- he loves to be fussed, but is not a lap cat, and really dislikes being handled. So it takes at least two of us to get his medication down him, twice a day, and is really not the ideal start to your day at 5.30am! But as I say, it is doing the trick, because he does look better. The other news is that he is now on a strict diet,lol. Apparently he is overweight- 6 kilos, and he should only be 4. So now he is on dried cat food, a rationed amount daily. I admit, looking at the side of a box of Whiskas pouches last night, ( maybe I should have done this before), it does say that a neutered cat should have no more than two pouches, or 1 1/2 pouches & 50 grms of dried food a day. Ambrose had 2 pouches for breakfast!
 To add insult to injury, it was stiflingly hot here on Sunday night, even with the windows open & fan on, I was so hot I couldn't sleep, so eventually I turned myself around on the bed, and lay down again with my head at the foot of the bed, closer to the fan. I did then drift off to sleep- I know this because I got an extremely sudden awakening. I obviously turned over in my sleep. and because I was facing the opposite direction, -THUD- I landed on the floor! I sat up, somewhat startled, and my Beloved Husband ( who had woken up at the thud) checked I was alright, then howled with laughter at me! And no, there are no pictures of that particular event,lol.



Wednesday, 16 March 2011

WOYWW #93

Happy WOYWW, pop over to Julia's blog at The Stamping Ground to join in,if you are new to this. So here is my desk for today.
The stamps I have used are four Botanical plates, unmounted, and I have had them for a few years, and long since forgot where I got them from, sorry. A few months ago I made up some crackled background paper to use  with stamping, and I thought the botanicals would work well. I used watercolour paper, I bought an A3 pad from The Works (Yes, I know I shop there a lot!). The first coat of acrylic was a pale yellow/ brown, which I got by mixing white and Wheat. This was coated with a layer of crackle medium, then an off-white top coat. I stamped in a mix of inks, Versafine Sepia & Olympia Green, Adirondack Espresso, and Memento Tuxedo Black.Just staring the painting process now, using H2O's, will be trying Promarkers, and maybe watercolours on some of them.
As I haven't got any finished projects, and haven't been shopping anywhere to find any bargains, I thought I would share one of my absolute favourite craft books with you this week.I'm sure I'm not the only one who has occasionally ordered a book, only to get it & open it and think, hmmm is that it? Wish I hadn't bothered.
Well this book definitely does NOT fall into that category.



The title is  Paper Transformed, A Handbook of Surface Design, Recipes & Creative Paper Projects, By Julia Andrus. The link will take you to it on Amazon.It contains an amazing number of techniques for ways to transform paper with paint, ink, pearls, glosses, glazes- you name it, its here.

All the finishes and effects are displayed as tags, this one shows 'cosmos paper'-simply put, a tag is inked, covered in Perfect Medium (or Versamark works the same) , and coated with UTEE 3 times. Then coat once more with medium/versamark, lightly brush on Perfect Pearls/ Mica Powders. Then sprinkle with UTEE again, and start heating from a distance, so it doesn't blow away. As it melts, bring the gun closer.The micas begin to sink into the UTEE. I have done the three first layers, then coated again with Versamark, flicked on some mica powders, sprinkled with UTEE and heated. This worked the same, and I didn't have to worry about the UTEE blowing away.



A page on overstamping, gilding and crackle effect.
There are pages on ageing, distressing and creating fake metal looks and effects, like rust/verdigris etc.


Batik effect


The last half of the book has projects using the effects & techniques shown in the first half of the book..

The book is 174 pages long, and every page is a delight.

There is something for everyone, and all the techniques are explained clearly in at most half a dozen steps, so they are not difficult, but they ARE all stunning. Even the cover is full of scrumptious looking projects, and unlike some, they are not just showing the best from the book on the cover!
This is one book that comes off the shelf regularly, and I guarantee it is an investment you will not regret.( You could always put it on your Birthday wish list, lol.)It costs just under a tenner on Amazon,which seems the average price. By the way, Julia Andrus has her own website,which I found earlier, and it looks stuffed to the gills with wonderful ideas.


An End of an era

An end of an era

I write this with a broken heart, that only time can heal My beautiful, wonderful wifelet Shaz (Silverwolf) passed away peacefully in the ea...