Tuesday 28 December 2010
It's Sale Time!
Come on over and grab yourself a bargain to start your new year off in creative style!
Parcels are being posted everyday that the post office is open over the festive season.
We would like to wish all our customers and blog readers a very happy and healthy 2011!
Monday 27 December 2010
Post Christmas Sale is now on
Happy shopping!
Wednesday 22 December 2010
Want To Be Featured?
That got us thinking about how fun it would be to look back at 2010 in review by looking at some of the layouts our customers and blog readers had done in the year gone by.
If you would like to share your work from the year gone by then drop me an email - Mel@atripdownmemorylane.co.uk With Blog Feature in the subject line. For each person featured we will need between 3 and 6 layouts or projects which you have worked on in 2010 along with a bit of info about you and why you chose those projects to send in. The written info could be just a sentence or if you feel inspired to tell us a little more about the story behind the projects, the techniques used or anything else then that is fine too.
We will do a draw at the end of January of all the readers showcased and send a box of goodies to one lucky winner! If there are enough people wanting to take part we can continue into February and do another draw at the end of February.
I hope we can get as many people as possible sharing their work so we can celebrate all the creative achievements of 2010 and look forward to a year of fun and crafting in 2011.
Sunday 19 December 2010
12 days of Christmas Printers tray
I was really happy with my windows for the 9th and 10th, the dress made out of layers of cut blossums for my 9-ladies dancing and a grungeboard "leaping" reindeer was my loosely interpreted lords-a-leaping window.
My 11 pipers pipers piping window featured music note stamped clear-embossed background with a chipboard scroll adored with several musical elements, including a prima music pebble and my 12 drummers drumming window contains more grungeboard which I inked and stickled and addes to a music note stamped background.
So my printers tray is now completed and is located on the wall in the hallway of our home for the rest of the month and until 12th night. Then I will remove each page (which I only adhered lightly) and store them ready for next year - then I can decorate my tray windows all over again, maybe with family photos so it can be featured in my home all year round!
The printers trays can be found here in the shop and would make a great new-years project!
Wednesday 15 December 2010
A Few Festive Layouts For You....
Monday 13 December 2010
More Christmas \ Winter Layouts
Sunday 12 December 2010
Have You Been Treating Yourself To Some Chicken Soup?
The 12 Days of Christmas feature has offered up a wide variety of projects, inspirational recipes and general all round Christmassyness to get you crafting for Christmas!
The three recipes I worked on were "Trees" "Decorations" and "Father Christmas" which are shown below. I also have some projects, old and new, which would relate to some of the other recipes. Check back tomorrow to see my take on "Winter Weather" and "Christmas Food" and then on Tuesday for a couple more!
Saturday 11 December 2010
ATDML Spring Retreat
If you are looking for something to look forward to in the new year why not join us for a weekend of scrapping and fun (oh and maybe a little bit of shopping!)
Details of the retreat can be found HERE on our website and bookings can be made by emailing Mel@atripdownmemorylane.co.uk
Tuesday 7 December 2010
December Class...
As ever the instructions are available to download as a PDF for free. Just click HERE to download them to work on at your leisure.
Monday 6 December 2010
12 Days of Christmas
A partridge in a pear tree - this being the first "window" in my 7Gypsies printers tray that I purchased whilst at the retreat in November. I have been longing to get one of these trays for sometime, but knew if I purchased it before I had an idea what I might do with it, then it would sit unattended in my craft room gathering dust. Rest assured after some contemplating I settled on the idea of making a 12 days of Christmas display for our home. I spent an hour or so on the internet doing image searches for each of the days to get some inspiration which I then sketched down roughly, gathered some supplies and started to create. Because the tray comes with 12 equal sized windows I first made a template to make sure I knew what each card needed to measure. These I searched through my stamp collection to see what I already had that could be used to interpret each day. The little partridge on my tree here for day one is part of a PaperArtsy Stamp from a few seasons ago, stamped, cut out and raised on a foam pad. The background is a card cut from the card sheet of patterned paper from Fancy Pants Hot Chocolate collection to which I added Frayed Burlap distress stickles to the trunk. My favourite element is the pears which are clear chandelier drops with dark brown alcohol ink dropped on, which I then adhered with a clear drying wet adhesive. I added a small Crushed Olive distress stickles stems to complete them before inking the edge of the entire card in charcoal ink to blend it into the wooden printers tray frame.
Final card being shared for today is for the 5th day of Christmas - my five gold rings card which also featured on the ChickenSoup blog last weekend as part of their 12 days of Christmas inspiration. The rings are small washers which I added alcohol ink to and then stickles over the top with Tarnished Brass. The background paper is again Graphic 45 but I picked out the berries and added tiny dots of stickles to those, stamped a wreath and added a couple of punched out holly leaves (also distress stickled) and some red gem berries.
More sharing of my 12 days printers tray later in the week, but why not have a go at making one of these yourself? With 12 windows you can add images of loved ones from months around the year - it would make a lovely Christmas present for someone and they come together in no time once you have settled on your idea and the papers you will use. Find them in the shop here.Sunday 5 December 2010
December Challenge
The deadline is January 5th ( a little extra time allowed as i guess many of you will be a little busy this month!
The winner will be announced on January 7th and will receive a £25 ATDML shopping voucher.
Friday 3 December 2010
For The Grunge Lovers Amongst You
If you feel drawn to this and want to treat yourself to an early Christmas present you can see all our Tim Holtz products HERE and the Ranger products HERE.
Despite the awful weather we are still processing and posting orders and will continue to do so as long as the Post Office is open so why not cheer up the cold snowy days with a parcel of goodies :)
Wednesday 1 December 2010
November Sketch Winner!
Tuesday 30 November 2010
More than just the packaging
So, here I am a few weeks later sharing my altered notecard box. First up, BBA image (Box Before Ann!)
And now BABA image (Box Altered by Ann!)
I have made the box into the housing for my Shimelle Christmas journalling class and the inside which once held Prima Journalling cards, now holds blank 6.5"x4" pieces of Kraft cardstock ready for the first class prompt tomorrow. The box actualy comes apart reasonably easy making it simple to cover in your choice of papers, and then reassemble as it was before. Add some distress stickles and a few beads, a stamped tag and a thickers JYC title and I'm all set.
The Prima notecards can be found here and are less than a fiver! Nice inexpensive Christmas gift to yourself!
Monday 29 November 2010
Special Offer In The Run Up To Christmas
From now until Christmas Eve (or until stocks run out!) we are offering a free mini book kit with all orders of £20 (excluding postage) or more. The kit will include a shaped book with chipboard covers and 10 cardstock pages, 2 book rings, co-ordinating ribbon and 10 chipboard embellishments. It will be added automatically to your order, there is no code to remember.
So why not give yourself a little pre Christmas present from us!
PS October Afternoon Modern Homemaker arrived today and is on the website... it's very pretty and the die cut paper is great if you love your retro papers! Think Ladybird Reading Books!
Sunday 28 November 2010
Remember Remember The Sketch of November
Happy Scrapping!
Saturday 27 November 2010
Creating for Christmas
Several of them are for the Chicken Soup 12 Days of Christmas project so I can't share them here until they have gone on the soup blog.
One of them is my card class for the Eclectic Keepsakes Christmas crop so again I will share here after the crop!
What I have been doing which I can share is making some little Christmas gift bags and boxes using dies for the Big Shot. I love these for putting little gifts and goodies in - I will be making a matching set to be table favours for when my in laws join us a couple of days after Christmas for a rerun of Christmas dinner!
Friday 26 November 2010
Snowy Layouts
Thursday 25 November 2010
Teachers gifts for the holiday season?
Think I might be scraplifting this idea!
Anyone else care to share their top-tips for creating that handmade something for our teachers and classroom assistants? I could use the inspiration with December just around the corner!!
Wednesday 24 November 2010
Belated Challenge Winner!
Monday 22 November 2010
A Couple Of Websters Pages Cards...
Hope you like them and also that the recipients like them too!
PS Just another shout out for Queenie - please send me an email - you won the giveaway and we have some goodies for you :)
Sunday 21 November 2010
And The Winner Of The November Giveaway Is...
Friday 19 November 2010
New Layout - Old Paper!
The papers are from the now ancient Lillipop Shop collection from Basic Grey which I liked at the time and which have stood the test of time because I still like them! It seems funny to think back to the time when every new release from that company caused such an enormous buzz of excitement that you could harly move on forums for posts asking when it would be here, who would get it first, which scrappers would be first to get a layout scrapped and uploaded using it etc.... Basic Grey is still popular but with a vastly different economic climate and seemingly endless products to choose from that fever pitch of excitement hasn't been replicated for a while!
Don't forget to leave your comment on the giveaway thread before 6pm on Sundayto be in with a chance of some free stash... you've got to be in it to win it as they say!
Come back over the weekend to see another new class with free downloadable PDF instructions coming your way!
Thursday 18 November 2010
It's Giveaway Time Again
just post a comment on this thread before 6pm on Sunday night (21st November) and on Sunday evening we will consult with Random dot org to see who to send the goodies to.
Good luck!
Tuesday 16 November 2010
Love My Bump
This is one of the layouts I finished off at the crop I went to. It is at the extreme end of simple but I love it all the same. The journaling talks about how I loved having a baby bump. The photograph was taken by Kirsty Wiseman at our first retreat - that seems such a long time ago - it was almost exactly 3 years ago.
There were a load of different patterned papers in the baggie with the half finished layout but in the end I used the plain white Bazzill and two sheets of Basic Grey which were some of the plain but distressed pages from their collection packs. It is clean, simple and straight forward but I love it all the same, for the sentiment it represents and of course it is one less layout on my "half started will it ever be finished?" pile!
Monday 15 November 2010
*Mel Waves Hello!*
I did have a wonderful day out on Saturday at somebody eleses craft event and it was simply heavenly to sit down and just scrap. We absolutely love doing the retreats but there is very little time to sit and just enjoy it because there is always a list of things that need doing - for the entire weekend our job is to do whatever we can to ensure that the delegates have the most relaxing and fun time, so to just enjoy a bit of time to sit and scrap was lovely this past Saturday. I worked on my class for the Eclectic Keepsakes December crop (which obviously I can;t show you!) and then accomplished something I have been promising myself I would do for ages and complete some of the half started layouts that sit in my "work in progress" drawer at home.
It is half past 11 and the light is dreadful but I will photograph and upload the two I finished tomorrow. Once again I needed to remind myself that it is ok to mix it up and have some layouts which have taken a lot of time and effort and others which are quick and simple. I find it is a constant battle with myself to balance out faffing around trying to make a masterpiece with the need to get on and get some photos scrapped and in an album!
I am pretty happy with the two layouts I finished - they won't win any prizes for exciting technique or design but they are now complete and it feels good to be able to file those away instead of keep looking at them half done in a drawer!
I also made two cards - one of which was an emergency, send it in a hurry card and I forgot to photograph it and one is for the Chicken Soup Blog - we have something quite fun coming up in December so keep an eye out over there :)
Apologies for no pictures - i will get those layouts up after work tomorrow :)
Sunday 14 November 2010
New Gallery Now Online
Click HERE for the gallery
Saturday 13 November 2010
A little more retreat sharing
Closing for the teachers last weekend was Suzanne with her gorgeous Prima layout full of texture and colour.
In addition to the sketch challenge, the card challenge and the altered heart challenge delegates were able to particpate in a mystery kit challenge, a music challenge and play scrapping bingo over the weekend.
The mystery kit contained 2 double sided sheets of paper, a sheet of card, a HOME die-cut and a bag of flowers and buttons. There was a wonderful array of layouts created using the kit, with only a few items permitted to be used with it such as white card, black/white stitching, die-cutting machines/punches/stamps, adhesive, photos and black or white pen/ink.
There were some fabulous layouts entered for this challenge but the winning one was from Melissa and featured some beautiful handcut layered flowers.
Six delegates chose to enter the music callenge and the winning layout was the yellow melon-muching page!
The final challenge was Bingo scrapbooking which we have featured here on the blog before. Our crafters had to choose a line of scrapbooking components and then build a page around them, plenty chose to do so and picking a winner from these was a real chore!
The winner chosen in the end was this lovely page.
Thursday 11 November 2010
The retreat news continues & the November sketch
As promised I'm back bringing you more news from the 7th ATDML retreat last weekend. Sunday morning saw the crop room in rays of glorious autumn sunshine and after a hearty full english breakfast it was crafting time again, the classroom filling up this time for a festive minibook taught by yours truly. Known amongst those who took the class as "the class the just keeps on giving!" the lovely Echo Park Merry Christmas papers, a few sheets of cardstock and some serious cutting out lead to this 12 tales of Christmas minibook being made - all ready for photos from the forthcoming holiday season.
Clare taught next in the classroom with her ATC/Mini Album class using 7Gypsies products. Again lots of lovely variations of this created by class attendees, all very happy with their projects.
Sunday lunch up next, always a very popular roast and this year did not disappoint. The dessert did cause quite a bit of a stir with waiters almost being bowled over in the rush to secure one of the very pretty cheesecake desserts that were initally in short supply!
The raffle was drawn just after lunch and over £400!! was raised for Cancer Research which included proceeds from the sale of raffle tickets, from the silent auction bids and from the sale of Christmas cards some delegates had made in advance. Many thanks to everyone for their generosity in both donating raffle prizes and cards, and indeed in purchasing tickets.
Tomorrow we will share the last of the classes for the weekend and some more challenge layouts, but to close for today, the sketch challenge entries and of course the sketch.
Congrats to Jackie who won this challenge with her Princess layout - especially nice as she had to leave the retreat early due to feeling unwell.
We haven't forgotten that we need to post the winner for the September sketch challenge, that will follow next week when normal blog business resumes after all this delicious retreat news! Until then let this be your November sketch, post your layout or card inspired by this sketch here to be in with a chance to win a £10 ATDML Store voucher. You have until November 30th to play along! Back tomorrow with the penultimate day of retreat news
Wednesday 10 November 2010
Mid-week retreat review
Over the weekend the make-and-take table also saw delegates making giftbags using Sizzix dies, alcohol inked metal ornaments and notebook covers.
The classes on Saturday were kicked off to a flying start with Suzannes Crate Restoration paper photo cube project. Featuring multiple photographs, this cube would make a wonderful gift which anyone would love to receive, although I'm not sure many of them were going to be given away as they seemed too cherished by those who made them!
Next up teaching was Debbie who worked a little magic with die cuts to achieve a beautiful layout using Girls Paperie papers. There was plenty of options within the kit to change this layout around by mixing up the die-cuts which led to several unique pages being created for some very happy scrappers.
The next class by Clare Brown saw delegates creating a stunning A4 shadow frame wall décor item with a time theme in a “steampunk” style featuring some beautiful 7Gypsies embellishments.
After a refreshing cup of tea and delicious pastries that were virtually on tap all weekend the Saturday afternoon classes continued with a gorgeous layout from Mel using My Minds Eye and October Afternoon. Quite possibly one of my favourites from the weekend this blues and browns layout featuring a floral cluster of embellishments was very popular among those who took the class.
The final class for Saturday was again with Suzanne who created a luxurious layout using the exquisite and unique range of papers by Pink Paislee (Parisian Anthology) and distress inks.
Saturday dinner was as always divine, and the every popular crumble for dessert made the evening! Plenty of free time then was enjoyed into the early hours as class projects were finished off and more challenges were undertaken. Here is my workspace just before I abandonned it for sleep at 3.45am Sunday morning!
More retreat news tomorrow including the sketch challenge which is always popular at the retreat and images from the Sunday classes.