DoCrafts online store

On Boxing Day, I received my weekly email from the DoCrafts website. I normally just flick through them to see if there are any exciting new products and then delete them but this one caught my eye- no surprise there as it involved a bargain!

They were/are having a sale where lots of items are priced at either 25p, 49p or £1.25. I had a look at the website and there were some proper bargains to be had. The p+p was quite expensive at almost £5 but I ending up spending about £25 on products and just know that when it arrives I'm going to have a major addition to my crafty stash. I can't exactly remember what I ordered as it was a bit manic and it hasn't arrived yet with the holidays, but when it does I'll post a picture of all the goodies.

I know that I've definitely got some urban stamps, peel-off folders and decoupage card kits on their way- and all for a seriously bargainous price!

Most of the goodies have probably gone now but it's obviously a website to keep an eye on and next time they have a sale get in fast- in fact, I probably shouldn't be sharing this information as next time all the good stuff might be gone before I get there! I've think I've probably got enough stuff anyway- just!

Happy New Year!

Get down to Dunelm!

If you're a crafter and you have a Dunelm shop close to home then I suggest you get there as soon as you can or get on their website http://www.dunelm-mill.com/shop/sale/arts-crafts-sale/. I popped into my local one yesterday to see if they had any christmassy fabrics on offer (which they didn't) only to find that pretty much every card making & scrapbooking product they sell was half price! Proper bargains to be had. I ended up spending about £60 but got more than double that in product value. I bought too many things to show you them all but I do have some favourites...

Got loads of these paper flowers in every colour you can imagine for just 94p a pack

These beauties are made of felt and embellished with seed beads & a pearl centre. They were reduced to £1.49 and as well as this blue pack came in every other colour you can think of. The other style have a really pretty crocheted centre.

I also got some really nice paper roses, wool flowers, suede flowers, peel-offs, backing papers & chipboard toppers.

They had loads of really good stuff and I'm guessing not many people know about it so get there as soon as you can and get some bargins of your own!

New cricut, papermania & card candi goodies

Can't believe that it's been nearly a month since I last posted- December has obviously been a manic month. But it's almost done and I've thankfully got a bit of free time. Tried to get some crafting bargains when I visited the sales yesterday but was a bit disappointed- the Hobbycraft tills were down so they couldn't reduce the prices of most things- luckily some other goodies lifted my spirits.

The 'cricut craft room' system has replaced the old 'design studio' software and is a really good tool for making the most of your cartridges and doing new things with them. I've only just started using it properly and keep finding new things each time I have a go. You can download cartridges straight from the website rather than buying an actual physical cartridge- this is obviously great for those people that don't have much space (that's pretty much every crafter, anywhere, then!) but you can also link the cartridges you already own. They've got a 25% off promotion at the moment so it seemed like a good time to try it out. I've now got the Disney Pixar Cars, Elegant Edges, Fontopia Crests & Cards and Create a Critter cartridges. They came to about £66 all together which is very good value for 4 cartridges, especially a branded Disney one too.

I also picked up some 6x6 papers from the new Papermania 'spots and stripes' capsule collection for just £4 which are in a really nice selection of pastel springy colours and these match today's delivery perfectly! The lovely post-lady bought me the final part of my Card Candi TSV which contains 12 mini packs of Candi including spots, flower print & gingham patterns in lilac, green, orange, turquoise & yellow.

I've used all of my new stash to make this card (but also some old favourites that I haven't used for ages...)

I started with a 6x6 craftwork cards scalloped edge card blank, that I inked with 'Squeezed Lemonade' distress ink and just a little 'Shaded Lilac' on the real edges. I used the cricut 'elegant edges' cartridges that I downloaded, to cut a 6x6 papermania spotty paper into a fancy edge circle. I cut this in half and attached 1 half to the folded edge of the card. The flowers were cut using an xcut flower punch and DCWV textured white cardstock. 9 of the flowers were arranged randomly in the bottom right hand corner and the other 1 in the top left corner. I then added spotty green, orange & purple card candi to the middle of the flowers. The blue ribbon came from my crafty stash and was tied simply into a large bow and attached with glue. The finishing touch was a white square tag that has a silver metal edge that I've had for at least 5 years, and a blue button, threaded with the same ribbon as the bow. As the card is not for a specific occasion, I have added a generic 'Have A Great Day' silver peel-off message and star embellishment.

Proof, if ever it were needed, that we HAVE to buy new things otherwise we might never use the old stuff!

Hunkydory- A Sparkling Season

Haven't had the chance to post for a while as I've been really busy sewing & selling at some local Christmas craft fairs so I'm going to try and make up for it a bit with more posts than usual for a while (hopefully).

Months ago, I got the Hunkydory 'A Sparkling Season' kit from C&C. There was a topper kit with shaped cards as the main pick of the day, but I also bought the inserts set & 6x6 papers. So far, I've only used elements from the inserts and topper kit but I haven't used them exactly as expected (of course). I've got much better value out of them!

I've made about 6 cards so far-

All of them are made using the inserts which I have cut in half with my paper trimmer. The left hand side of the insert has been trimmed and then mounted onto mirror paper/card before being placed onto an A5 card blank. This has created my own backing paper which I have embellished with glitter, foil & pearlescent glue drops (to look like snow). I've then added toppers from the main kit and peel-offs (coloured with promarkers) from my crafty stash. The first card has some stamped houses added to the bottom of the card which are from a Kanban mini stamp set that was part of an old qvc kit.

I then used the right hand side of each insert (the side with the message on) as an inner for each card. I again trimmed the paper insert, mounted it onto mirror paper/card and then layered onto the inside of the card. This meant that both the inner and the outer of the card was made with just one insert and they co-ordinate perfectly.

This is the outside (left) and inside (right) of the pink fairy/angel card,

and this is the same for the Santa & Rudolph card.

The pack of inserts had about 40 in it for about £10 which is great when I'll be able to make at least 40 cards out of it just by adding a few toppers from the main kit. I haven't even started on the 6x6 papers yet but they have some beautifully foiled designs that can almost just be stuck straight onto a card, add a message & it's done.

A great kit, that's a little bit different in style and a bargain (my 2 favourite things!)