Archive for the ‘Freebies’ Category

Keep Calm … there’s new stamps!

February 17th, 2012

I bought the original red Keep Calm poster from Barter Books in Alnwick back in about 2002, long before it became a global phenomenon.  I had it on my office wall for many years and still have the poster now.  Many times I have glanced up at the poster and taken a deep breath, absorbed the words and repeated them, mantra-like, while dealing with some petty crisis or other.  I think it stood me in good stead for when the major crises came our way – by then the motto was ingrained and automatic.

The phrase has been so over-used, commercialised and parodied in the last few years that it’s hard to remember its original purpose (to keep the British upper lip as stiff as possible during WW2) and see the soothing common sense of the message.  It’s great life advice for anyone, anytime really.  Having said that, I think my favourite parody is “GET EXCITED AND STAMP SOMETHING”.

Anyway, philosophizing aside (is that a word?), this card is made with the latest stamps from Crafty Individuals which we have just got onto the website today.  There’s a great mix of vintage and retro Britannia – perfect for all things celebratory with the Jubilee and Olypmics here this year.  I stamped the patchwork Union Jack onto a selection of papers from the Essence of Nature CD and cut and pieced the flag together.  I wanted a very simple, faded vintage look.  The card edge is sponged with Stormy Sky distress ink.

We have also launched a new stamp set of our own today too – this one is going to be a well used set, it’s called Artistic Expressions and it’s the little black dress of stamping – it goes with anything!

It’s so new, I don’t have any finished artwork with it yet (lots of stamped and die cut words and sentiments), but the Design Team do and if you check out the DT blog, they’ll be showing it off soon.  I’m also giving away a free set on the Design Team blog, so pop over and leave a comment to be in with a chance to win.  The winner will be announced on Tuesday, so it’s just for this weekend.

I managed to get some better photos of the tags I made last weekend, so thought I’d show you them in more detail.  I’ve angled them so you can see the embossing.

Stencils used were Pomegranate and Circle Explosion

Stencils used were Spring Fling and Circle Grid

This uses the two part stencil Poppies.

Have a great weekend, we’re off to Cumbria to visit St Oswald’s church in Grasmere.  A sentimental journey to visit the place where Adrian and I were married fifteen years ago.   Nothing to do with the Grasmere Gingerbread shop in the corner of the churchyard.  No, not at all.  Honest.

PS – if you are a Guild member, log in to your account and go to the Guild Offers department for special prices on the new stamps.

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Bling it on – this post contains the C word

November 5th, 2011

We had a trip planned to Holland in early October, but of course under the circumstances, we had to cancel it at very short notice.  I was going to be demonstrating at one of our Dutch stockists, Papillon-Hobby and I was looking really looking forward to it.  (Ladies, I hope to be there next year!)

In the course of our discussions, Ingrid, the owner of the shop, told me she was importing WOW embossing powders, so I thought I would give them a try.  They have a massive range of colours, so I selected a handful to road test and I was impressed enough with the price and quality to get them into our own online shop.  I didn’t go with all of them, but selected a mix of 25 colours (click here to see them all).

The Christmas card above features Ruby Romance powder, embossed onto a deep red card.  This is my favourite shade of red – not quite burgundy, not quite brick, but a deep rich red.  The sparkly powder is incredibly difficult to get a really good photo of – I’ve angled the card to the light so you can see the sparkle – click on the image for a closer look.

The baubles are Nestability cuts and the stamp used is from Fat Robin – I placed the cut out shapes onto the stamp so I just got the snowflakes.  The stamp used on the green background is from Doodle Birds, stamped in Versamagic Cloud White.  The border is a old rub-on, I think it might be My Mind’s Eye, but I really can’t remember, and the greeting is from Christmas Cheer.

Here’s the same Ruby Romance powder used on an old Scrap-FX piece.  This time I have added clear powder over the top and the sparkle is trapped under the clear like a glass paperweight.

I really haven’t had as much time as I would like to focus on crafting lately.  I love doing creative projects for the Guild newsletter, but I seem to have less energy in the evenings than I used to.  I wake up pretty early and tend to be at my brightest, freshest and most creative in the mornings so I am trying to arrange the working week so that I can use that energy when I have it.

One of the things that has kept me and Lesley busy over the last couple of weeks is putting together a fantastic Christmas Inspirations leaflet.  It is 21 pages long and full of large photographs of Christmas cards, tags and projects from myself and the Design Team.  It is free to Guild members (until the end of December) and £2.99 to everyone else, though there is an free offer on this week for email subscribers.

So who’s got that smug feeling of having all their Christmas cards done and dusted?  I’m sure there’s got to be at least one organised crafter out there, but I’m not one of them.  I’m already working on Valentine’s and spring cards – Christmas always seems to get lost in the name of forward planning.  I am determined though to have a proper Christmas at home this year – it’s been far too long since I felt really Christmassy and this year I’m going to embrace the traditional stuff.  Twinkly lights, spiced candles, log fires and a little home baking.  If I can find some, I may even get some old fashioned crepe paper streamers – remember those?!

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Did someone say Blog Candy?

April 10th, 2011

What a glorious season Spring is.  It has to be my favourite season of the year, I just love seeing the trees come into blossom, the lighter evenings and the lambs in the fields with their spring loaded legs and wing nut ears.

And we are having such a treat at the moment with this June like weather in April.  I was wearing cropped trousers and sandals yesterday – crazy!

Spring is also the season of renewal and rebirth and it very much ties in with a lot of what I’m feeling at the moment.  Two weeks ago I spent a weekend in Amsterdam taking part in a two day workshop called “Refilling your Creative Well”  with an artist I had admired from afar for a while called Lisa Sonora Beam.

I had looked longingly at Lisa’s descriptions of her retreats in Mexico and dreamed of making it to one of them someday.  (I still hope to.)  So when I saw that she was doing a workshop in Amsterdam I jumped at the chance as there are cheap direct flights from my local airport.  It was meant to be – I spent two days in the company of some very special women, working in a journal, getting in touch with some deep truths about my own creativity and my artistic dreams and I came home feeling refreshed, renewed and refocused.  Lisa helped me to get in touch with parts of myself I’d been avoiding, helped me to realise it’s ok to express grief and loss, and in the freedom of my journal, I began to define the new me that is emerging from the chrysalis.

On the way there, I heard some people getting upgraded to first class on the flight and I thought hmm, an upgrade would be nice.  In reality, it’s a very short flight from Durham to Amsterdam and first class simply means a few more inches leg room.  I didn’t get a flight upgrade, but boy oh boy did I get an accommodation upgrade!  I had booked a B&B, but got upgraded to a penthouse suite!  I had the top two floors of a typically tall Amsterdam town house with outside terrace and the most amazing views over the canal.  The open plan living room/kitchen had four huge double windows overlooking the Singel canal and everything was fitted out to the highest standards.  I felt like Kate Winslet’s character in ‘The Holiday’ when she got to the house in California!

So I had a very special weekend of luxury and creative introspection and it was just what I needed.  I also had a healthy dose of exercise walking up and down five flights of VERY steep stairs every day – if you’ve ever stayed in Amsterdam, you will know exactly what I mean.  Those seventeenth century builders couldn’t afford to waste valuable space on stairwells, the staircases are practically ladders!

So I’m feeling pretty good about life at the moment and I’m sharing some of that feel-good factor over on the Design Team blog at the moment with a blog candy giveaway.  I’m also enjoying some preparation for my colouring class which starts in a couple of weeks time.

So I’m off to my craft room now, but before I go, I wanted to let you know that we now have a chat room on our ning community website (www.chocolatebaroque.ning.com) and every day next week I will be online for half an hour for a lunchtime chat between 12.30pm and 1.00pm.  As well as being available to take questions, I will be using the time to let you know about some discontinued products that we only have one or two of, starting with punches on Monday.  You will need to register on the site to take part in the chat.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend and long may the sun continue to shine!

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Merry Christmas – I have a gift for you

December 24th, 2010

Wishing you all a very joyous and happy Christmas and I have a little Christmas gift for you all.  My usual terms apply, you can use this for your own personal use, but you cannot distribute the file to others.  This freebie will remain here for the twelve days of Christmas, after which it will disappear!  To grab the printable file, right click (CMD Click on a Mac) and choose ‘save target’ (Save image as on a Mac).

Enjoy!

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It’s blog candy time again

October 27th, 2010

I’ve had some problems with the blog over the last week – well, with the site where it’s hosted actually.  Hopefully their technical issues are fixed now.

So I’ve been wanting to shout about this and haven’t been able to – there’s blog candy over on the Elusive Images Design Team blog – yay!!

This elegant lady is part of our new ‘Belles’ collection – three very stylish ladies wearing stunning dresses, plus some gorgeous chandeliers and swirls.  Leave a comment over there and you could be in with a chance to win a set.  I will announce the winners soon, probably this weekend sometime.

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