Mixed Up Saturday featuring Michele's Magazine review

 

Good Morning Ladies,

I hope that you are all well and are able to enjoy the weekend.  Thankfully I felt a lot better yesterday, which was relief as I had to get ready to go to the opticians for lunch time.  I still felt achy but the fatigue had mostly gone, I felt a little worse after going out but that was to be expected.  My heart has quietened down too thank goodness, I think that Thursday was one of the worst days I have had as far as the AF goes.  Rest assured I felt well enough to unpack my Parcel from Stampin Up!  I was quite excited for it to arrive, although at the moment I get excited for my new things to arrive, I unpack them, have a look but then just get crafters block and try to think back to what inspired me to buy it, so I go to Pinterest and then find 5 more things that I want to buy!! Does that sound familiar to anyone???

I am going to start today with Our Michele's Magazine Review, this issue is a great one and I will definitely be hunting it down....

Thanks so much Michele, I love the features in this issue even, frustrating that you had to wait so long for it to arrive!  

The flower pot dies and plant marker are great and useful for many different card types, good for Male cards too, the Embossing folder is a nice one and some of the projects inside the magazine are really inspirational. 

Another great review and I will definitely be buying this issue!  Thanks again for the time you take to write these reviews my lovely XXX

Michele's Magazine Review

Hi Ladies,

Finally-the most recent issue of Simply Cards & Papercraft arrived!!
It has a lovely set of stamps, dies & an embossing folder. The dies & the embossing folder are tiny though.

Here’s some ideas of what’s inside the magazine.

First feature using the free gift plus the free downloads.

Here’s more ideas to make some lovely projects-not just cards.

Great idea how to introduce texture using paste & hessian.

Part two of the Texture feature.

This article shows one of my favourite fancy fold card styles, it’s so easy to create and looks so impressive.

Some lovely cards in this feature-just to show how you can use your flower & butterfly dies to recreate these projects.

More ideas.

We might not have the exact same stamps used in this feature but I’m sure we’ve all got something similar so why not try this technique out.

This feature show how you can use you dies to  make Stamps-perfect way to use up that Funky Foam. This technique makes great temporary stamps.

Another great article showing some fancy fold cards-perfect timing for this weeks challenge!

These cards look lovely with the bright colours & the bold Stamping.

More inspiration.

I’m sure we’ve all got a set of layering stamps-look what you can create.

More inspiration.

Well that’s all for this week so
Happy Crafting.

Love Michele

Thanks so much Michele, I love the features in this issue even, frustrating that you had to wait so long for it to arrive!  

The flower pot dies and plant marker are great and useful for many different card types, good for Male cards too, the Embossing folder is a nice one and some of the projects inside the magazine are really inspirational. 

Another great review and I will definitely be buying this issue!  Thanks again for the time you take to write these reviews my lovely XXX

Sonia

Sonia has shared her latest craft shopping with us, I am so excited to see that you have bought a Gel Plate, those stamps and stencils you have bought will work great with the Gel plate too, I haven't come across those Sprays before, what inspired you to buy them?  I love love love that Butterfly stamp, it's a similar style to Tracy Evans, I have to say that Woodware stamps have really upped their game with stamps, for a while they were a bit stuck in the dark ages, they must have some new designers.  Thankyou so much Sonia for sharing your new goodies with us, I can't wait to see what your create with them XXX

My Shopping 

Now, where do I start?!  

I am mostly going to blame Pinterest, because while looking for inspiration for other stamps some of these products came up and well.....I just couldn't resist, I needed to put an order in to SU because I was in 'pending' which means you need to buy or your out! hahaha! I was going to leave it and join again in a month or so but I have just reached the next discount level so I thought I would just order some of the things that I love and I got some freebies to boot!!  I also get an ''any item half price'' offer so I decided to get their little Die cutting machine as I have about worn my others out, it is a great little thing and despite its size the cutting plate is 3 1/2 inches wide which is a good bit bigger than some, I will do a full review on it and let you know my thoughts.

The two SU stamp sets... I absolutely love that Peony stamp, there are some lovely sentiments too and I can't wait to have a go at colouring those flowers.  The other stamp set was mainly bought for the 'Maidenhair Fern stamp, I LOVE it, I am a sucker for anything with foliage!! It also has some lovely sentiments.  Sentiments are something that I am lacking in my stash.

The Julie Hickey set, I loved the stamps and matching dies, the sentiments are great and again I saw Hayley using them on Hochanda and couldn't resist.  Now I will say that I struggled to find both the stamps and dies in stock anywhere but for some reason a Website came up that belongs to a lovely lady in the village that we lived in in Lincolnshire, our children went to school together, you may have seen her on Hochanda, her name is Jo Channon and her craft shop is called Let's Create, I am guessing that because they aren't one of the bigger stores like Craftstash they don't come up at the top of search engines, but to my delight she had stock that nobody else did of the die and Julie's little glossy dots in beautiful bright colours ( I may have bought them too) oops!!  Anyway everything was delivered in a couple of days and when it arrived it was beautifully wrapped in ribbon, it's a shame that we sometimes overlook the little independent craft suppliers.  I will leave a link below if any of you want to browse.....

Let's Create  

I have always loved Altenew stamps but until I got a stamping platform I would never consider buying a multilayer stamp, this one again caught me eye on Pinterest and as I mentioned above I really want to try and focus on some colouring techniques. 

My final items were bought after watching a Bee Crafty show on Hochanda, I find those two girls so lovely to watch, both hilarious and inspirational, the Mirror plates seem boring but I loved what she did with them, things that you would expect like reversing a bird so that you can have two facing each other but I also saw her stamp the detailed background stamp onto one and she stamped it onto her card and it gave a perfect circle print of that big ledger stamp, so you could add a die cut flower or something over it for a great look, I will have a play and show you what I mean.  The ledger stamp is an actual page from a ledger and I loved it as a background.

So that's my confessions for this week!   Come on Ladies, I KNOW you are shopping, please share your crafty buys with us.  XX

I hope that you all have a lovely weekend,

Love and hugs to all,

Sandra                                                                                                                                                        xxxxxx