Altered agenda

There's a real trend right now in altering agenda's and the good old Filofax is back. Actually I've never stopped using one, I'm a real 80's babe. I love the latest trend though in personalizing it and treating each day/week like a mini pocket page planner.

I was overjoyed when I found this planner in my local store. It's just what I was looking for with clear pockets to hold things and spaces for notes etc. but it needed the personal touch.

That's where I turned to my Sarah Hurley supplies, papers, stamps and embellishments. I had great fun in decorating the front and you may think  'that's not going to last too long knocking about in her handbag', the book does come with a clear plastic front cover which I flipped over for the photo.

My book already came with a band around it but it would be so easy to add one to your own book. I love the page tabs hanging out marking sections.

I used my Real Life Daily stamp set throughout.

Are you using a planner or agenda?

Jaine x

Mini Valentines Day Cards

Hi all,

It is Nicole here today to share a fun project for Valentines day, using the super cute Sarah Hurley Be Mine digi kit. I created two 3x3 card layouts digitally on the computer and printed them out on some nice textured card stock. I then cut these out.

I inked the edges of the card fronts with festive berries ink to give them a nice finished look. This helped them stand out on the card base.

I made card bases from black card stock for the cards, leaving a nice 3mm frame around the edge of the card front to frame them nicely.

 I took some red twine and tied it around the first card around the bottom of the card a few times.

 I added some wink of stella glitter shimmer to the birds and hearts on the cards too.

 On the second card I used my hole punch to add two holes in the top of the heart so that I could thread the twine through into a bow.

 This is a lovely quick way to make some mini cards to send to those loved ones. They are perfect for in lunch boxes or slipping into school bags too.

I hope you enjoyed!!

Cloudy Day.

Hi, it's Carol here today! Hope everyone is well and looking forward to the new week ahead of them. Exciting times for some of us #TeamHurley girls as we are all heading to Birmingham at the weekend for a meet up...totally hyper in this household...anyway I digress.

Today I am going to share a  card I made using the stunning new Large Tiger Butterfly stamp,  Doodle Home Stamps and Sentiment Stamps. I even got out the Distress Inks and got inky!

1 Stamp the gorgeous butterfly using embossing ink, cover with clear powder and heat. Take a piece of 5 3/4" square card and stamp with the 3 different clouds from the Doodle Home set, cover with embossing powder and heat.

2 Look out the colours of Distress Inks you would like to use and get inky!

3 Fussy cut the butterfly, add to the card using 3d foam. Stamp a sentiment onto some card, punch it out then distress the edges. I popped some wee sparkly gems on the antennae of the butterfly and the sentiment.

Ingredients

Large Tiger Butterfly Stamp

Doodle Home Stamps

Sentiment Stamps

Perfect Medium Ink Pad

Beacon 3 in 1 Craft Glue

Distress Inks; Picked Raspberry, Peacock Feathers & Broken China.

Punch

Gems

3d Foam 

Thanks for popping by today, why not have a look at some of the other posts from my fabulously talented teamies, and remember to pop by soon for another new post.
Carol xx

Crafting on a Budget - Introducing colour and texture

Hello, and thank you for joining me (Claire N) again. I am hoping that you enjoyed my last post where I introduced new crafters and cardmakers to a basic list of supplies to get started.
Here is a quick recap of that list.

• Simple card blanks
• Free download papers
• Paper scraps & offcuts
• Small embellishments & ribbon
• One stamp set & ink
• Double sided tape
• Cutting Stationary (Sharp scissors or craft knife, steel ruler and self healing mat)

 As this title suggests my aim is to show you how to craft on a budget, and therefore the cards I make will 

1. use the basic supplies (above)
2. Introduce on new element and I will offer suggestions on what to treat yourself to (more often than not a stamp set)
3. Challenge myself, and encourage and spur on seasoned crafter's to use up scraps and supplies that have been pushed towards the back of the draw.

So today I have used standard white 6x4 inch card blanks, the sentiment stamp set (from last post), the black ink pad and scraps of the free downloadable dotty paper printed last month.

The items I have introduced this month are

1. Coloured pencils and felt tip pen- everyone has colouring pencils available, and some may have watercolour pencils (in which case grab a small paintbrush too)
2. Needle and thread - again another everyday item
3. Picnic in the Park stamp set by Sarah Hurley - this is a fantastic set to treat yourself to and offers you lots of opportunities to make cards for all occasions and techniques.

Method

1. Cut a piece of white cardstock to 5.5 x 3.5 inch and draw two feint parallel lines in pencil, between which you can pencil in the word 'hello'.
2. For those who enjoy stitching, you can take your needle and thread now and stitch the word 'hello' - using the needle to prick the holes first.
• If you are not a stitcher, I have also made an alternative card for you, showing you that faux stitching with a marker pen is as effective. 
3. Stamp the flower and leaf stamp, from the newly introduced set, and stamp with the black ink. Stamp also the butterfly with the twirly trail.
• TIP 1- ink the stamp with the black ink and stamp once on scrap paper, before stamping on the card. This just takes away the intensity of the black.
• TIP 2 - Look at elements of individual stamps too. To embellish card, ink JUST the twirly trail and stamp randomly over the card.
4. Colour the stamped images with the coloured pencils. If you have watercolour pencil, you can use a barely damp paintbrush to blend the colour too.
• TO chow the comparison, I have watercoloured the stitched card. I actually quite like the look of the untouched pencil colour.
5. Stamp the sentiments in black.
6. Using a ruler,the same marker you traced the letters with, draw a thin border around the outside edge.
7. Using double sided tape, add a layer of dotty paper direct to the card blank, before adding the stamped layer.

Thank you so much for joining me today, I do hope I have given you a few ideas, and shown you that you don't (initially) need bundles of supplies to make pretty cards with lovely sentiments.

If you are new to the craft, we would love to see what you have made.

See you again next time x

Journal page

Hello and welcome to the Sarah Hurley 365 blog.

I'm (Clare) back and once again  I have a journal page to share, so much fun!

I'm not quite sure where the inspiration came from, it's certainly not a reflection on the weather. You see we had a heavy snow fall the previous day so everything is white lol. Saying that I love snow and playing in it is awesome so perhaps the bright colours are more of a reflection on my mood. Seeing my boys happy makes me happy and they were smiles all round when building snowmen and having a snow ball fight hee hee.

I just adore Sarah's Charm Street Cuties and are just a joy to colour in so out they came to play!

Here's how a created my journal page.

1 - Stamp the girl from the 'Flower Girl' Charm Street Cuties stamp set directly onto the page.

2 - Mask the girl and add colour to your page. I used Tim Holtz distress inks in the following colours,      picked raspberry, broken china and mowed lawn.

3 - Stamp the banner from Flower Girl' Charm Street Cuties stamp directly onto the page. Add            some stripes and colour in. I used Kuretake Wink of Stella glitter pens.

4 - Using black ink, stamp and colour in the heart stamp from the 'Thinking of You' Charm Street            Cuties. Again I used Wink of Stella pens.

5 - Using black ink stamp a scallop border from 'Wish Upon A Star' Doodle Doll stamp set.

6 - Using picked raspberry distress ink stamp the mesh back ground stamp from 'Princess Girl'               Doodle Doll stamp set, directly onto the page.

7 - I wanted to overhang the clouds so I stamped a few on white cardstock, fussy cut then stuck them      down.

8 - I also realised at this point I wanted my banners to pop out more so I stamped some flags onto            smoothe white card, then stuck them down.

9 - Next I needed some journalling so I used the sentiment from the  'Princess Girl' Doodle                    Doll stamp set. This sums up my four nieces just perfectly.

10 - Finally I coloured the Flower Girl using Promarkers and the flowers using Wink Of Stella.

Products used

'Flower Girl' Charm Street Cuties stamp set

'Thinking Of You' Charm Street Cuties stamp set

'Wish Upon A Star' Doodle Doll stamp set

Princess Girl' Doodle Doll stamp set

Hope you have enjoyed today's post and be sure to check back again for more inspiration from me and the rest of the design team.

Clare x

Using Up Some Scraps

Good morning, folks, it's Susie here today. I love to use up my scraps in new projects, which is just as well given the amount I have!

So, for today's card, I started with these scraps from various different A Few of My Favourite Things kits:

• I cut the striped paper into a square and matted it onto the navy card.
• The teal card was cut into a smaller square and also matted onto the navy card.
• The turquoise house was cut out and windows from the cream house were glued into place.
• The grey card was cut to fit across the card and small scraps of navy added to either end of the grey. (There was no navy piece long enough to match the grey, but the squares we're going to be placed on top so that wasn't a problem.).
• Some small flowers were punched from the teal card and my favourite gems were stuck to their centres.
• I added some Platinum Stickles to the grey and navy strip and to the house roof and left it all to dry:

Once the Stickles had dried, I stuck it all together, with foam pads behind the house to add interest. 
The greeting is a rub on that I have had for years and was pleasantly surprised that it still worked!!

So, from some scraps of paper and card I now have a cool New Home card, suitable for male/female/couple. What scrappy projects can you come up with?

Susie x

Cameo Creations Episode 1.

Hello, it's Carol here today and I can't believe it is a new month already! Which means it is almost St Valentines Day, so I thought I would share another love themed make.

In my last post I spoke about my "10 Minute Makes" and the other mystery makes...it can only be "Cameo Creations" using Sarah's files from the Silhouette Store. 

This is quite a photo heavy post, so you may want to grab a cuppa and a biccie!

First I picked the file I was going to use, Circle Heart Page Mat, and adjusted it to suit the size of the card I was making. I opted for 8"x8", which is unusual for me, but good to do something different.

I then chose the colours I wanted to cut the shape into.

I make two different mats so that I can mix and match, this will be clearer in later pictures. Pop out all of the wee hearts and keep for later.

Roughly cut pieces of contrasting card and glue them over the back of the hearts.

Once you have as many as you want in place, use LOTS(I used 50 odd) of 3D foam squares to give your card lots of dimension.

I used Kraft Card and a contrasting colour for my matting and layering and popped some inverted corners onto the Kraft card too. 

I also popped some more wee hearts inside the cuts to add some more colour and interest to the card.

Here are the two cards side by side, complete with some of the extra hearts from the cut outs. These will be popped into a wee box and used as confetti in the cards.

I hope you have enjoyed my post, and that it inspires you to dust off your cutting machine and get crafty.  I love using Sarah's Silhouette files as they are so versatile that they can be used for a 12"x12" Scrapbook Lay Out, a 4"x4" card, Project Life, or for whatever crafty project you are working on. Over the next few weeks I will be making lots of different things using Sarah's Files and showing just some of the unique creations that can be made. I look forward to seeing you soon.

Thanks for popping by, Carol x