Free stamp makes - Oriental Blossom

The Oriental Blossom stamp we featured in October seems to have been one of our most popular - appearing all over your blogs in various guises!

Check out this gorgeous work featuring the stamp emailed to me by Christine Middleton - isn't it fabulous? Christine says: "It is a decorative hanger and uses Dyan Reaveley's Blonde Moments papers, a piece of embossed wallpaper, some downloaded images from a cd, a bottle top and an old metal coathanger."

I hope you enjoy it. Please keep them coming. I've more to show you in the coming weeks.

Thanks to everyone for visiting and leaving your kind comments. I won't be around over the weekend as I'm up in Harrogate, but here's a little something to keep you going. If I get up to 40 followers by Monday, I'll randomly pick a follower to get a little bit of Christmas candy from Crafty Individuals.

Have a fun weekend!

Katy x

Where did you get that hat? (Part 3)

Sorry I've been a bad blogger this week - very busy making stuff for the magazine, which I can't show you yet. I've been playing with our Feb cover mount which has been designed by Dyan of Art from the Heart/Blonde Moments. Speaking of which, I am off to a retreat at Art from the Heart at the weekend. Am sooooooooo excited - if you've never been taught by Dyan you are missing a treat - the woman is a whirlwind of energy and sooooo funny! More news on my return.
Anyway, I did have time to make a really simple card using a photograph as a centrepiece. I’ve made this for my other half for Christmas, so I’ve used a little black for a more masculine colour-scheme.

Ingredients:
High Hopes Santa hat stamp
Fancy Pants alphabet stamps
Making Memories magnetic alphabet stamps
Hero Arts holly background stamp
White, red and silver card
Black glitter card
Silver Brilliance ink

1 Stamp a panel of white card with the holly stamp using silver ink. Heat set.
2 Cut out your photo and mat onto silver card, then black glitter card. Stamp, colour and cut out the Santa hat and add it to the photo. Add to stamped panel. Stick to a red card blank.
3 Using the masking technique, stamp the word ‘Paws’ so that the letters overlap. Stamp the word santa onto a scrap of red card. Die cut a star from black glitter card and stick the word santa on the top. Cut out the word ‘paws’ and stick below the matted photo.

That’s it! Very quick and simple.

See you soon,
Katy x

Introducing....

We have three - yes three! - talented new artists appearing in the January issue of Craft Stamper magazine. Their styles are quite different but they are all very gifted designers and I am delighted to welcome them to the CS family.

Check out their blogs to see some of their lovely work and (hopefully) whet your appetite for what's to come in the next issue :).

Sharon Neill's Blog

Lana George's Blog

Cath Wilson's Blog

See you soon,
Katy

Advent Calendar / Jan sneak peek

I've made this advent calendar with our next cover mount stamp, which will be yours if you purchase the January issue of Craft Stamper! It's a poinsettia stamp designed for us by those wonderful folks at PaperArtsy.

I don't always get time to make something for myself, but I rather liked this advent calendar idea, which I found at the Bubbly Funk website - take a look at their tutorial for the instructions.

The whole thing is made of 24 matchboxes, a couple of squares of chipboard and the free stamp which has been stamped onto patterned paper and layered (I've used it stamped in gold on the white squares as a subtle background too).

My drawers are covered with strips of paper which has been tone-on-tone stamped and then punched with my beloved Threading Water punch (believe me - you NEED this punch!!!). I've also added wee loops of metallic red thread to each drawer to enable them to be opened easily.

Not only is it pretty, it can be reused year after year and I can put any treats I like into the drawers.

I lurve this poinsettia stamp - hope you do too!

Katy x

ETA - just filled this with sweeties - mini Cadbury's chocs are a perfect fit ;).

ATC swap

My ATC swap with Kim is complete and here is the very gorgeous (very pink!) ATC she sent me. Isn't it just lovely?

See Kim's blog here. Do pop over - she does make rather nice cards.

I'll pop another Xmas ATC up for swap when the Jan issue comes out :).

Hope you're having a cool weekend.

Katy x

Have you been to Dan's place?

If you haven't seen Dan's blog 'My Crafty Life' check it out here.

He offers a freebie download each Saturday, plus very useful video tutorials showing stampy techniques.

Enjoy!
Katy x

Fed up of Christmas cards?

Me too, so here's something I made with a new Penny Black stamp I got at the NEC from Sir Stampalot called 'Portraits'. It's three sketchy flowers and it's rather lovely :).

This card is my usual simple style - I repeat stamped the image onto pale blue card and coloured the flowers with Twinkling H20s. The painted panel and greeting were both matted and layered onto yellow card and silver mirri card. And that's it!

See you soon. Have a fun weekend.

Katy x

PS - poll (on the right) is up for just three more days. Thanks to all who have taken the time to join in.

A new look for Sugar Nellie?

Was perusing the Sugar Nellie blog this morning and saw that they have a new artist on board - Leanne Ellis - with a rather different look from their usual stamps.

Here's the post: http://sugarnellie.blogspot.com/2008/11/welcome-to-house-of-sugar.html

Am intrigued to see more...

Catch you later,
Katy x

New Tim Holtz Video

Have you seen the new masks from Tim Holtz? They are very cool!

Take a little look at Tim's video guide here for some great ideas on how to use the masks.

I NEED the flourish (did I mention I really like flourishes....).

Enjoy!

Katy x

Bonus December Cover Mount Make, by Alix Waterhouse

This card by Alix Waterhouse wouldn't fit on our free stamp makes pages for December issue, so I am sharing it with you here instead.

Below are Alix's instructions:

Using Versacraft ink, stamp the whole image onto a 2” square of cotton. Heat seal with an iron. Stick this onto a 2 ½” square of hessian, then stick the hessian to a square of white card to stabilize it. Using a sewing machine, make small rough zigzag stitches all around the stamping to create a border and to give a quilted effect to your fabric. Assemble onto brown cardstock as shown, and doodle around the border using Liquid Applique. Heat this with a hairdryer to create texture.

Poll

Hi folks,
Hope you all had a lovely weekend? I'm just in the process of sorting the Christmas ATC swap at the moment, so those of you who took part should get your swaps back soon. In the world of publishing Christmas has come and gone already - had a Valentine's project land on the desk this morning....

The first challenge prize arrived this morning from LB Crafts (thank you Linda)! It's rather scrummy but I'm not telling you what it is!!! Challenge will be announced when the Jan issue hits the shops - on 5th December.

POLL: I've added a little poll to the sidebar - please let me know your thoughts on the content of Craft Stamper by completing the poll. Many thanks.

Katy x

Lovely new stash!

Been having fun today playing with my NEC stash! Bit limited in what I could do because our boiler has broken down and am managing with basics - i.e. card, ink and stamps and not much else - as it's tooooooooo cold to work in my craft room (brrrrrrr).


One of my favourite purchases was a pack of Inkadinkado clear stamps called Ornate Christmas (I got these from the very friendly people from Crafts U Love). I've made two cards today with the stamps, with quite different looks.


On the snowman card, his scarf is coloured with my new Xmas colours Gelly Roll pens (which I also got yesterday from Stamposaurus) and his body is coloured with Broken China Distress Ink. All the stamps are from the Inkadinkado set.




On the Seasons Greeting's card I've coloured the stamped image by blending Distress Inks (Antique Linen and Fired Brick). The swirl is a Penny Black stamp. It's a lot nicer in real life - sorry for the awful photo, it got dark fast!

The paper is from the new Basic Grey Wassail collection (have I mentioned I am addicted to Basic Grey papers???).

I hope you like them :).


See you soon,
Katy x

Blog candy winner!

Drumroll please...........

Winner of the launch blog candy is this comment:

bex said...
Oohh another blog to look at! Only thing is 'blog hopping is cutting into my craft time!

Well done Bex, email me your address to cs@traplet.com and I'll get your candy sent out to you.

Don't worry if you missed out - we'll be having more candy in future.

Plus from early December we'll be launching monthly challenges to tie in with the magazine content, which will also have a prize! So watch this space in the coming weeks.

Might be back later if I get time to play with my NEC stash today!

See you later,
Katy

Where did you get that hat? (Part 2)

Another Santa Hat card today.

I made this using one of my favourite stamps by Bam Pop, called ‘M is for Monster’.

Been soooo busy, so I hope you'll forgive me that it’s a very simple card.


Ingredients:

• Bam Pop M is for Monster stamp (from Angel Crafts)
• Papermania clear stamp set - A Wonderful Christmas Time - Seasons Greetings
• High Hopes Santa hat stamp
• Papermania Christmas papers - A Wonderful Christmas Time
• Silver card, fuchsia card and lime card
• Scrap of fuchsia ribbon
• White gel pen (I used Ranger Inkssentials)
• Snow Writer

1 Stamp Monster onto lime card and colour his teeth and eyes with an Inkssentials white gel pen. Cut him out.

2 Stamp the hat and word monster onto the snowflake paper in areas which are unpatterned. Cut them out. Cover parts of the hat with Snow Writer to give it a fluffy dimensional effect.

3 Stamp the greeting in brown ink onto white card. Mat onto pink card. Stick the word monster over the top of the word merry with 1mm foam pads.

4 Cover a card blank with snowflake paper. Stick the monster and greeting onto a piece of silver card. Round all the corners and mat onto a slightly larger piece of white card which also has rounded corners.

5 Add the panel to the card with 3D foam and finish by adding a bow to make the greeting resemble a present.

It might be a little bit bonkers as Christmas cards go but I like it!

Probably won't be around at the weekend but I'll be back next week. Have a fab weekend.

Katy x

PS ATC SWAP: I've chosen a comment at random and am delighted to swap with KIM. Please email me at cs@traplet.com Kim. :).

CANDY: Tomorrow is the last day for the launch blog candy (see first post).

Craft Stamper at Hobbycrafts

If you're going to the Hobbycrafts show at the NEC this weekend, pop along to the Traplet Publications stand (J10) for a great show-exclusive Craft Stamper subscription offer worth over £36!

Show runs from today until the 16th November (Sunday). I won't be behind the stand, but you might spot Julie our Production Manager (responsible for the mag layout). I'll be popping along for a bit of retail therapy myself on Saturday (with quite a looonnnnnnnnnnnng list!!!).

Enjoy the show if you are going this weekend.

Katy x

Christmas ATC

The theme for this month’s ATC swap in Craft Stamper is Christmas. We've had some lovely entries on this theme which really seems to have inspired you to create.

I loved this month's winning entry - see Joanne Wardle's blog for a picture and more of her lovely work.

On the left is my take on the Christmas theme. I sponged inks onto white card, sprayed lightly with red Glimmer Mist and over-stamped with swirls using Brilliance inks. I then stamped with a wreath (Basic Grey Winterland) and seasonal message (Fancy Pants Designs) in black ink and finished with a wee bit of glitter glue (my latest favourite product), a swipe of Ranger gold paint and some paper flowers.

Trade with me! I would love to swap with a reader – please post a comment here if you would like to swap with me . If there's more than one comment, I will choose one person at random to exchange with.

Thanks for visiting, hope to see you again soon.

Katy x

Dyan Reaveley tutorial

Hope you liked our ultra thick masterclass this month? If so, hop on over to Dyan Reaveley's blog for a fantastic tutorial on creating shimmery backgrounds. Some lovely examples and easy to follow steps too.

Enjoy!
Katy

Brand new subscription offer

Have you seen the new subs offer for December in Craft Stamper?

If you subscribe this month there is a gift of stamps from PaperArtsy worth £26! Also available with direct debit subscriptions, so there’s no need to pay the whole sub fee up front. It’s quite a limited offer so better get in there quick to get these yummy stamps for yourself! It’s an ideal time to take out a Christmas gift subscription for a crafty friend or family member too.

Our customer services order line number is 01684 588599 and the peeps on the other end are a nice friendly lot ;). Or see details in our online shop.

(PS- The lovely artwork in the picture is by Leandra Franich.)

Where did you get that hat? (Part 1)

I got a cute little Santa Hat stamp by High Hopes and decided to have a go at using it with stamps I already had in my collection to create some Christmas cards. Have a look in your stash - with a little imagination it’s pretty easy to utilise your existing stamp collection for Christmas makes.

OWL CARD
Ingredients:

• Hero Arts Big Owl stamp
• Perfectly Clear Snowflake Symphony stamps (from Handy Hippo)
• Studio G mini xmas stamps
• High Hopes Santa Hat stamp (from Silly Monkey Crafts)
• Blue Brilliance Ink
• Versamark Ink and Versamark Pen
• Snowflake White embossing powder

Instructions:
1 Stamp the owl onto white card, colour with brush markers and cut out. Stamp the hat, colour the main part of the hat red with a marker. Colour the trim with a Versamark pen and emboss with the snowflake powder. Cut out.

2 Stamp and emboss multiple snowflakes onto white card using snowflake white embossing powder. Using a sponge, ink over the embossed images with Brilliance Ink – the embossed images will resist the ink. Swipe with a baby wipe to remove excess ink from the embossed images. This will be your background.

3 Cut a branch shape from brown card (I traced around a Grungeboard shape – I was too stingy to use my precious Grunge on a Christmas card!). Emboss the branch with a Cuttlebug folder if desired, and ink the raised areas in brown.

4 Stick the branch to the bottom of the snowflake panel. Stick the owl in position ‘standing’ on the branch and stick the hat onto his head. Finish with an embossed, matted greeting. (TIP: If you don't have an Xmas greeting, stamp the word 'Joy' using any alphabet stamps you have in your stash).

I've made a couple more cards with this hat stamp which I'll post soon.

Thanks for visiting, see you soon.

Katy x

Free stamp makes - Strawberries

I’ve been trawling the internet to see what you have been making with our new polymer cover mount stamps.

Here are links to a few fab creations with the Strawberry stamp from the August 2008 issue.

A lovely little notebook by Ann
A gorgeous card by Sanisi
Another lovely card by Nicola
A brilliant notecard design by Liz
Edna's delightful layered card
Last but not least, a stylish card by Kim

I hope you like their artwork (but please respect their copyright and don't copy their designs directly).

I’d love to see what you have created with our recent polymer cover mount stamps. If you have artwork on your blog please leave a comment and a link to your artwork here to inspire others (or if you don't have a blog email me a pic to cs@traplet.com). Thank you for sharing.

CS December on sale tomorrow

The Christmas issue of CS goes on sale tomorrow, so I thought I'd tempt you with a peek at the cover.

There is an interactive mag preview on the Craft Stamper website here as well.

We also have a new PaperArtsy subs offer for December - ideal if you want to give a gift subscription. More details to follow soon!

Meet Joel

I've actually started my Christmas cards early this year (usually I start preparing around about Xmas Eve, so I'm allowed to be a little bit pleased with myself). I've been playing with this new stamp from the Toodles and Binks range, exclusive to Stamp Galaxy . His name's Joel and I’ve made a couple of cards with him to share with you. He’s painted with Twinkling H20’s with a little bit of glitter added for Christmassy sparkle. I coloured over his eyes with an Inkessential white pen and black Glaze pen to really bring them out.


On the red and green card: I’ve stamped the background paper with a swirl stamp (Basic Grey Winterland) in both red and gold to add a bit of depth. I layered my paper with a die cut scalloped circle which I embossed using Cuttlebug Divine Swirls folder, a strip of stripy paper and a length of lace. Before adding Joel to the card, I stamped the edge of the panel with the swirl stamp again as a finishing touch. The papers and greeting stamp are both from Papermania.





On the blue card: I masked Joel and stamped a circle background stamp (PaperArtsy Mini) over the top to look like snow. I left a void at the bottom where I added Snow Writer and glitter glue, inked over with Brilliance Ink to look a bit like a mound of snow. The ‘Let it Snow’ greeting stamp is by Autumn Leaves and the paper is Basic Grey Blitzen range. The snowflake is a Heidi Swapp ghost shape which is covered with blue glitter glue on the reverse. The little pebbles are called Zoomz ,also from Stamp Galaxy. These are a great value buy and make a lovely alternative to gemstones.


I hope you like them :0)

Thank you all for the warm welcome to blogland. Don't forget to leave a comment on yesterday's post for a chance to win some candy!

See you soon,
Katy x

Welcome to the new Craft Stamper blog

Hello and welcome to the all new Craft Stamper (CS) blog! On this blog you’ll find various bits of information which complement the contents of CS magazine including some extra little projects, sneak peeks of forthcoming features, news and other bits and pieces. I’ve included links to our contributors blogs and also links to other blogs which you might enjoy.

The December issue of Craft Stamper is due out Friday 7th November and is packed with inspirational projects for Christmas. Whether you like cute or classic, vintage or modern, we have a great selection of card ideas to suit many tastes. Trish Latimer’s classy star book and Gail Milburn’s stunning altered book are two of my personal favourite projects this month. Fans of Sue Roddis will be delighted to know that she returns to CS this month with some quirky and fun card makes using peel offs – yes, peel offs!!! No, she hasn’t gone mad – her technique still involves getting inky!

We aim to update this blog weekly, so please come back and see us soon for news, mini projects and more. If you’d like to link your blog to ours we’d be delighted - please feel free.

***LAUNCH GIVEAWAY!*** To celebrate the launch of our blog we have some blog candy for you. We are giving away these delightful Penny Black Twelve Days of Christmas stamps, as featured in the December issue. To enter the draw, leave a comment on this post and put a link back to here on your own blog. A winner will be drawn at random on 15th November.

Good luck!