Greetings all WOYWW people. Having been beavering my way across the net, I realised a mass error I had made in my last two offiical posts, in that I had not linked back to the wonderful originator of this crazy and fabulous idea. So if you wish to join in, or just have a look at the other lovely workdesks, make your way over here and have a nosy.
So, not so neat and tidy this week I'm afraid. I'd first like to mention the addition of the shelf on the wall. Not strictly workdesk but it was the first piece of proper DIY done in the new house and my poor OH got a blister for his troubles. I would like to point out though that it is perfectly stable and level so well done him! The large green sheets on the keyboard are the marriage certificates for my great-grandad and great-aunt and I have sucessfully tracked gt gdad on the 1911 census after months of searching! The orange cards are my version of this tag book (yes, I know, its ANOTHER mini book, but I like them!) and its destined to hold pics of last years trip to Eurodisney and will be despatched to my disney partner-in-crime. The yellow 12x12 sheet and the bits on top are the starting of the "Wooden Boat" layout. I was very happy as I managed to print onto some vellum style paper without ripping it or my printer to shreds. So that layout should appear some time at the end of the weekend, as well as a wedding card, a 21st Birthday card and possibly a tarted up family tree.
Enjoy your WOYWW, I shall be soon, armed with a cup o' tea, to have a good look!
Love Elliefantasy
Hello to all. Thank you again for all the lovely comments on the WOYWW post this week. I managed to get both mine and my step-sisters accordian books done as you can see. For a more detailed view, I have uploaded a flickr slideshow. The original site that held the design was here and I really really love this style of book for a relatively quick and easy to construct mini-book.
The apology relates to the scrapbook layout that was half finished on the desk, for which I did get a few comments. I did get it done on Thursday night and it did look very good. However nephew's mummy has decided not to post pictures of bub's on Facebook and I haven't managed to ask her yet if she minds me making an exception to this blog. So next week I will try to post a layout that you will actually get to see the finished result of, I promise.
I have had a bad (or good) week for spending money this week. Thursday I managed to dodge the torrential downpour and get to The Range, ostensibly to buy DS tape. They didn't have any that I liked, but they did have a bin of cheap stamps, so I got 3 forever friends stamps. They had an offer on embellishments so I got myself and my mum some lovely buttons and some nice flower embellishments for me. And then I found the sale section! So I managed to bag myself some glittery paper and a cheap 12x12 album! All of the above came to a pretty penny so I told myself "no more spending"
I lasted until Saturday when I popped into my local craft shop to get the DS tape that I actually like. Its mostly a sewing shop but the lovely lady who runs it does stock some paper craft bits and pieces. And on the shelf I saw some Fantasy Film. I saw this stuff in a magazine, Papercraft Inspirations or SC&P and I really loved it. There were only 2 colours, Lilac and Brown (?) so I brought the lilac pot. When I got it to the till, the owner informed me that she didn't really sell a lot of it as no-one knows what its for, but she can get me other colours if I want! I found some wire when I got home and had a dip. It came out quite well, but OH wasn't that impressed when I interupted the GP qualifying to show him!
Hoping that you are all having fun doing whatever you are doing
Love Elliefantasy xx
Tidy desk this week, and I have to admit, slightly tarted up in preparation. Was very encouraged after last weeks first official post and the lovely comments that I received (thank you) and also by the fact that I have spent a larger percentage of my time since then crafting rather than doing random stuff (tho the white paper under the ruler on the far left is the life insurance paperwork that needs to be filled in)
The pictures on the green card are for the first layout of my gorgeously cute nephew. The feature of the layout is that most of the pictures are blurred as he just doesn't keep still for his aunty when she gets out the camera. The pinky bit to the right is the top sheet of a load of calendar pages that I intend to scan to make my "whatever year" wall planner. They were cut from this years vimrod calendar, the top bits are stored ready for scrapbooks. The little blue squares on the mat and the 12x12 cardstock next to it are concertina mini albums in the making. One is for me and one is a birthday present for my stepsister, both will be entitled "Pocket Nephew" and a proper post will come when they are finished. And finally the card in the clip by the left monitor is a Promarker insert which lists all the available pens. I have marked the ones I have and have only to wish and hope that I can get my grubby little mitts on some more!
Hope everyone is having a lovely Wednesday
Love Elliefantasy xxx
As promised here are more details of the mini book that I posted up yesterday. It was all a bit of a quick thing, but I have accumulated a fair bit of stuff so finding matching bits and bobs wasn't much of a problem. My lovely mother had recently brought me a Papermania Basic Album (left), which I had decided to break down to become the covers for three mini-albums instead.
In fact (and totally randomly) this was a bit of a Papermania album. The paper that I used as a cover was from a Papermania big stack, and the flowers and brads on the front came from a Papermania embellishment set; three tubes containing buttons, brads and paper flowers. The letters on the front I had from a massive set that I think I got from the works, and I tried to set in some eyelets to seal the holes. Unfortunately the chipboard was a bit too thick.
The pages were all done digitally. I have just got my hands on a new version of Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 Ultimate (which shall be known as Corel from now on) and all the pictures I had been given were either e-mailed or *borrowed* from Facebook. I am slightly quicker on digital and managed to make myself some template pages. Once again I used my Boho Chick kit by Brandy Buffington, just one paper and all the embellishments and frames. It made things much easier with placing photos and editing them, and all the pages could be printed out onto sheets of photo paper. I managed to finish a roll of Xyron during the process (a grand excuse to go off to Hobbycraft tomorrow!) and it was all put together with very little fuss and bother. For those that want to know, the pages were made with some cream card, cut down to size and corners rounded.
It went to work today for signing with the strict instructions that everyone had one shot at writing their message as I hand't managed to supply myself with spare pages. Harriett absolutely loved it, and even if I do say so myself, I am very very pleased with it. I shall definately be using the other covers in a similar way and its a marvellous way to christen the new craft room.
Happily all the paperwork is done now and the desk is sort of clear again. So I can keep sorting and start crafting and hopefully should have lots of lovely things to post.
Love Elliefantasy xxx
What a messy desk! I honestly did have it tidy on Sunday night. All the paperwork was filed, the final boxes unpacked and everything clipped nicely up. But on Monday I found out that a friend of mine had got another opportunity to go holiday repping in Greece and was leaving on Friday. So the first thought that popped into my head was "mini-book" Which is the little blue book in the sort of clear space on the desk. I'll post up proper pictures tomorrow but i'm very pleased with it since its only taken me a couple of days, didn't cause me much of a headache to make, and is a nice mix of digital and proper scrapbooking.
And its the first project made in the new craft room! (small fanfare) I am now back to being a scrapbooker and it couldn't have come quickly enough.
Love Elliefantasy xx
I like things to be organised. But now that I have the craft room and am starting to get all my little bits and pieces out of boxes, I am starting to wonder at what level do I stop organising it all.
The ideal state would be to have every possible thing to hand and be able to grab and select without having to move from my chair. This isn't quite possible, unless I had some kind of circular super-desk with robot arms that brought me things on command.
I have been having frequent discussions on this topic with my mum, who is also a scrapbooker/card-maker. We have both decided that boxes of paper should be available without having to lift other boxes to get to them. And that often used "machinery" like Robo's, Xyrons and Cuttlebugs should be on shelves, easy to reach and just as easy to put away.
But surely, if one is not careful, one will come to a point where too much time is spent organising and tidying new stash away, rather than getting it all out to be used. I would rather have five wonderful layouts and a messy desk than a perfectly organised space with nothing to show for it. And rather play with any new stash than spending two hours sorting it into the correct space.
So fellow scrappers, don't forget whilst in the pursuit of your perfect crafting space, that it is a space to do some crafting, and not a space to show off your stash. Those places are called Craft Shops!
Love Elliefantasy
Yes, I realise that this post is two days later than promised, but Thursday was taken up with finding BF's birthday present in time for weekend and Friday with driving to my mum's (which is where this post is being written - apologies for the lack of photographs)
So, Digital Kits from scratch. When I first had the idea for doing myself a heritage digital kit, it seemed like a simple thing to do. Get some background papers and some fun elements, some family information and then off you go. But actually it is much more difficult than that. Even getting started caused me some trouble. I wanted this kit to be something that is designed by me, for me, for the purpose of doing all of my family scrapbooks, but that if I deemed good enough, could be offered as a free download for others to use. I want the albums to have an old style feel, lots of shades of old, faded paper, old record cards and typewriter style fonts. Obviously there will be some totally individual pages tucked here and there, but there needs to be an overriding continuity to the whole project.
My first step was to find an image of a record card, which I have manipulated in Paint Shop and make blanks of to be used as my family record cards. The second step was to find some images of old paper. This lead me to a variety of websites which are banks of photos of different textures, all free. This will be invaluable, not just for this project, but also for future digi-scrap kits I might attempt.
And the third step, although not put into action just yet, was to look around me and see what can be used to aid my design. Our doors and bathroom windows have a lovely swirled frosted glass effect which, if I can capture and edit, will look great as a background or as an embellishment. I also have a large corsage in just the right colours, which will make a wonderful embellishment. Everything around me seems to have potential, and whilst I am compiling the digi-kit I shall try to post pictures of the original item and the finished texture/item for you to see.
Love Elliefantasy xxx
Today has been a good day. OH and I both back @ work after The Big Move, keys to the old house have been given back, and we finally have t'internet back, which means that I can post again! Hooray!
So here is my WOYWW picture. Apologies, that again its boxes, but these are boxes that are to be unpacked. So I wont be linking up to the other WOYWW posts this week, but hopefully will have something to share properly next week.
The craft room is coming along. I certainly have the space to play with. Some things are coming along very nicely, some things have yet to find a home. The room is a lovely shade of cream (Ivory from B&Q Colour range if anyone is interested) I have accepted the green carpet and redesigned my scheme so that now I have shades of cream, green and beech wood. When money and time allow, I will finish all the sorting and tidying up and put proper pictures up.
Family tree - The home-made digi kit idea is something that I am still playing with, and I will do a further post tomorrow. However I did have a flash of Weetabix induced inspiration this morning, that the glass pattern on the front door would make a very good background pattern on a page. All I have to do know is work out a way of photographing it so that I can get it into Corel and start to play. For those that are undecided over their photo package choice, I use Corel Paint Shop Photo. I've been playing with free 30 day trials of X2 and X3 and have just purchased X2 Ultimate as my package of choice. But again, more of this tomorrow.
Love Elliefantasy
Greetings all WOYWW people. Having been beavering my way across the net, I realised a mass error I had made in my last two offiical posts, in that I had not linked back to the wonderful originator of this crazy and fabulous idea. So if you wish to join in, or just have a look at the other lovely workdesks, make your way over here and have a nosy.
