A 'bloomin' marvellous day at the Craft Barn...

Yesterday I taught for the first time at The Craft Barn - I've demo'd there a few times but yesterday was my first class.  The 9 lovely ladies made this (and another project):

I luuuurve this canvas!! - so cute'n'pretty!  Here are a few of the ladies working on their canvasses - up to their elbows and well covered in PaperArtsy Fresco Finish paints - love those paints!! They painted the flowers (Claudine Hellmuth 'Blooms') onto Claudine Hellmuth/Ranger sticky back canvas which means that sticking all the flowers down onto the base canvas is a doddle - just peel of the backing and stick down! Sticky-back-canvas - another product that I love!

The classroom is great: light, airy and in the roof space of the Barn which means there is a bloomin great big horizontal beam running through the space - I managed NOT to hit my head on the beam (which is covered in several 'mind your head' signs but even so more than once my head was only about an inch away from the beam before I saw it! lol)
Thanks to everyone who came to the class - great to see some familiar peeps and meet some new ones.  It was a good day - I'm looking forward to teaching at the Craft Barn again soon - but before I do that I'll be demo'ing there on the 3rd December - projects with a Christmassy theme - Oh Yes - Christmas!!! its only about  8 weeks away!!!!

Whoosh!

No, that's not the rate at which I'm getting through my to-do list (though I wish it was!).. Whoosh! is the training centre in Chelmsford where I'll be teaching a Christmas themed course in couple of weeks.
I'm really looking forward to running this course - getting ready for christmas & making lovely fabric stockings ready to be filled with even lovelier presents... but have you been naughty or nice?? 'cos Santa's got a list and he's checking it twice .... but I don't mind what side of Santa's list you're on - it'd be great if you could come along for a bit of festive crafting.  I'll bring christmas tunes & maybe even mince pies!!
Hope to see you there..
Here are the details:

Get Ready For Santa!

Christmas Stockings & Decorations!
In this wonderful 2-week course you will learn how to sew your own Christmas stockings (small, medium and large) and tree decorations for family members to hang by the fireplace, at the end of your bed or wherever Santa may be expected! From baby's first Christmas, to children's and grown-up designs too, you can have fun creating your own beautiful and unique handmade designs. All learners will be required to purchase a basic starter kit direct from the trainer on week 1, to which you can add your own embellishments, adornments and ribbons from home for week 2.
CODE ART12E05

Where: The Whoosh! Centre, Chelmsford (Blue Room)
When: Saturday, 05 & 12 November 2011
Time: 11.00am - 3.00pm
Cost: £20.00
You will also need to buy a basic starter kit direct from the trainer at £7.50.
Call to book:  01245 256079

Class at The Craft Barn!

On Sunday - 30th October - I'm teaching a class at The Craft Barn - I'm really looking forward to it - here's a sneak peak of one of the pieces we'll be making.

So if you fancy getting all painty with me ring the shop and see if there are any places left, the more the merrier!

Helloooooooooo... is there anyone there??? Helloooooooo???

Are you out there still?  If you are then thanks for popping by, sticking with me because its been a disgracefully long time since I last blogged - shameful!  Just over a month!! Shocking.  I've missed blogging- missed interacting with all you lovely peeps out there on the www - I shouldn't have stayed away so long!

But I'm back, quite a few things have happened and quite a few things had to be put on hold because I was not a 100% but I'm better now so here's a quick round up:
I've.. erm... welll I .... hmm its a bit hard to know where to srart so I'll ignore all the little things and move straight onto the big stuff:

ArtsyCrafts with Lynne Perrella!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
omg - how much of a great time did I have at Lynne Perrella's workshops?!?!?  Bloomin' marvelous!!
An 11 hour, 400 mile round trip to get there - & it was worth every single mile & moment!
I went for 2 of the 3 days - made 2 projects - which I'm still tweaking - yeah yeah yeah - I know, me tweaking a project, who'd have thought - but they'll be finished very soon and when they are I'll put up pictures - the PaperArtsy site and video has pics of them as works in progress - I'll leave you to guess which are mine...
Here is me with the FANTASTIC Lynne Perrella - she is a fabulous, funny, talented teacher - really generous with her ideas and time - brilliant.

She showed us how to get the most out of stencils & photocopies of vintage photos & illustrations, I barely touched a stamp during the whole weekend!  We collaged, stencilled, glued, repurposed & painted. 

A brilliant weekend.

This is Lynne P's demo desk on Saturday night when she was showing how to add colour to a picture (of Edgar Allen Poe) with a bespoke stencil - I love how she effortlessly adds colour to alter the tone of a picture.

It was a really fabulous weekend - I learnt lots of things that I'll use on future projects- but mainly I'll take away that you don't have to have all the latest this'n'that - rummage through drawers, repurpose things, paint things, & photocopies are versatile (I know that already but it was well worth revisiting) etc etc etc...

Finally 'Thank you' to my lovely hubby who bought me the weekend as a birthday present!