Mixed Up Saturday

 

Good Saturday Morning Ladies,

What a day for moving !!  We have 99 % chance of heavy rain all day, with the added bonus of strong winds!! Typical Riley moving weather!  🙄  Thankfully tomorrow is supposed to be better.   I hope that you all have better weather, although Lilian you could be in the path of the strong winds from Storm Antoni as well, fingers cross it misses you.  

On to more positive things, how beautiful is that Rose from my Mum's house, it fills me with joy just looking at it as both Mum and my Dad absolutely loved that rose, he trained it to go up and over an arch over their back gate.  I have also been blessed with an amazing display of the most beautifully scented sweet peas, I can't pick them fast enough,  it really does help to pick them often as we have never had so many !  

New Glue

In my endless search for the petfect fine tip Glue I bought this 'Bearly Glue'  its quite popular in America, it comes with 2 different tips, a pin and a green cap that goes onto the bottle top when not in use, I like the little tube to keep all the tips in, they would get lost in my craft room otherwise. 

The glue is quite 'wet' , I found the larger tip the glue tended to run out, you didn't need to squeeze it, I'll have to get used to that, the fine tip you did need to squeeze,  as you can see, it does what it says on the tin!  A lovely fine line of glue.  

It says that it dries clear, won't wrinkle your paper, its flexible too.  It does tell you to wash out the tip at the end of your session, which makes sense.   I will try it out over the next few weeks and let you know my thoughts. 

Sue has kindly written us a fantastic magazine review....

Simply Cards and papercraft Issue 247

This months magazine has Christmas stamps including a large one of Father Christmas with holly around him and some sentiment stamps. There are two dies. One cuts an outline around the holly in the main stamp and the other is the word Believe. A pack of A5 Christmas papers is also included. Some of them have quite large patterns so I’m not sure how you would use them. 

Katie Skelton has designed 7 cards using the freebies. There are some nice cards in various styles including a shaker card filled with gold sequins which is perfect for Christmas. 

The main Tried & Tested this time is the new Sizzix Tim Holtz Embossing diffusers. The results give you a plain inner or outer on you card front depending which combination use These come in 3 sets of 2 diffusers, a circle and two different ovals shapes. They cover A6 or smaller size cards. The diffusers are made to be used with any embossing folder, but 3D folder results may vary. They replace one of the cutting plates on your die cutting/embossing machine. I would be happy to be able to be able to only emboss certain parts of my cards so will be waiting to see how people get on with this new product.

Christine Smith has designed some very pretty cards using vintage style stamps but with a modern look. I absolutely love the snail and flower card but some of the others are not for me. A technique that can gives you more use from your stamps is always a bonus

Sarah Jackman Read has made some lovely Christmas packaging including a gift bag, tag, money holder wallet and a box so something for everyone. There are bonus free matching papers and templates for a cracker and a shaker gift box included. 

Digital stamps- free download. Simply made crafts have some pretty Christmas/winter digital stamps which could be used to make some beautiful cards if you prefer to craft that way. I love the gingerbread man and all of the different mittens in particular so I might have to try digital

Jessica Rouke designed several cards using the Stepped Back die-cutting technique. I hadn’t heard of this before but you simply create a tunnel effect on your card. And instead of raising the main focal point you raise up the things around it instead. You can also raise or lower layers to add even more dimension. Another new interesting technique for me that I will have a go at.

If you want more details of anything shown here please ask. 

Take care. 

Sue 

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Thank you so much Sue, for a great review , not sure this one is for me!  The Santa isn't my 'cup of tea', some great features though XXX

Sonia's Shopping 

Oh Sonia,  you got some lovely new dies, are think we are all Gummiapan converts.  Now those strip dies at the back are multi purpose, they can be used as sentiment dies and dies to make backgrounds, Sonia sent me this example....

I look forward to seeing what you create my lovely,  thank you so much for sharing your shopping XXX