Boy am I getting through some ink!

Well here I am again, one day closer to my Create and Craft debut and a whole lot of ink lighter! I have been printing example papers..not just a few papers though..reams and reams of them!! I have also been spending most of the day trying to arrange the papers in an attractive way for presentation. Whether I have succeeded will be judged by the viewers I suppose!
As well as printing papers I have also been designing an advert to go along with my card design which will be included in the next edition of 'Designer Cards' to be given away with Simply Cards and Papercraft magazine, but not until next February I think so don't go looking for it anytime soon!!
I really should carry on working this evening but I think a nice cup of tea and a sneaky watch of the last part of Silent Witness that has been on Sky+ for ages is more appealing!! Well 'tomorrow is another day' as Scarlett O'Hara once said and I have loads more things to get done. I'll let you know how I get on tomorrow!

Sorry it's been so long since I last posted!

As you can probably imagine it's a bit of a mad house here at the moment as I now have less than 7 days to finish off getting ready for my debut on Create and Craft. My craft room looks like a bomb has hit it! There are half made cards and half ideas all over it. When I will finally decide which demos are the ones I am going to be settling on is anyones guess..probably Sunday morning as we are packing up to go down to Peterborough!! I'm afraid I am always better when I haven't got too much time to change my mind 50 times..

I was a sight to be seen this morning when I took a whirlwind shopping visit to the metro centre to get some last minute paper supplies from good ole' WH Smiths (copier papers) and the trusty Papermill shop for my craft card and paper. In the end I was carrying what equalled five reams of paper through the shopping centre to get back to my car. As I only have one good hand for holding anything, I looked like some hunched up poor old woman stopping every ten steps to rest my arm!! Thankfully the lass behind the counter at the Papermill shop let me put the copier paper behind her till so I had hands free for spending in her shop, maybe it would have been better if she hadn't..I wouldn't have bought so much!!

Wish me luck for getting everything ready, I think what I will try to do is update you on my progress each day this week..you can tell me off when I am slacking!! Until tomorrow!

Thanks Cheryl for nominating me for the 'You make me smile Award' !



Now I have to nominate 10 other bloggers who do the same for me..this might be hard as this tag seems to be everywhere at the moment!! But here goes, everyone on this list makes me smile everyday, enjoy your award!
Samm
Lyndsey
Amanda
Incywincytogs
Lisa
Lou

Oh dear didn't do that well..only six but that's better than nothing I suppose!

Happy Birthday Daring Cardmakers !

It's the wonderful Daring Cardmakers Blogs birthday and they have challenged us card makers to make a card with a Friends theme, here's the full challenge:
The subject is, as in our original dare "friends", but this time the title is
CIRCLE of FRIENDS and we'd like you to incorporate at least one circle into your card.

I really enjoy joining in when I can with the challenges and get lots of inspiration from the wonderful cards that the other darers create so I couldn't miss out on this special one now could I!



I am frantically making cards and designing demos for my impending Create and Craft debut and this fitted wonderfully into an idea I had had earlier in the week. The papers are from my CD Funky Seasons they are from one one the summer collections. I used three different papers two to layer up as backgrounds and I cut a large circle from the third. I decided that it needed to be a bit more interesting so I cut around it with some fancy scissors, it ended up not being as circular as it originally was due to my bad cutting skills but with a bit of inking and faux stitching it fit the bill! The letters are cut from the matching large Alpha that goes with the paper collection that is going to be released on the new updated versions of the CD to be launched on C&C.
My parents are visiting us this weekend so I have loads of cleaning up to do..bathrooms are calling but so is my craftroom.. I wonder which one will win??!!

Di Hickman sketch

This is the first time I have joined in with the sketches on Di Hickmans blog but I needed some inspiration to make a birthday card for my friend Lisa and this sketch was just what I was looking for!



It's very plain and simple just three circles cut out of papers from my CD It's Funky Too I inked the edges and then added faux stitching with a grey Sakura Souffle pen. The flowers are Prima with a large papermania brad. I hand wrote the Happy Birthday sentiment just to keep it very plain. I am happy how it has turned out..hopefully Lisa will like it too!

Life here at Funky Hand Towers is frantic at the moment with trying to keep up with orders and designing demos for my Create and Craft live show. Wish me luck I have three weeks left and so far have only come up with one decent idea! That leaves me with about 5-6 left to do... best get back o it!!

My big news!

I've been hinting that I had something exciting happening for ages and I can finally let the cat out of the bag! On the 5th November at 1pm I will be guest presenting on a live show on Create and Craft Shopping Channel.

On the show I will be premiering three of my CDs
It's Funky Too, Funky Seasons and V Funky

I've been working hard over the last month updating the CDs content and I have added lots of great new extras and papers. The new updated versions of the CDs will be launched on Create and Craft and then on my website.

It's been such a busy time getting everything ready over the last few weeks and then last Friday I had to go down to the Ideal World studios in Peterborough to do a screen test before my appearance was confirmed. I was pretty nervous but, thankfully, it all went well and you will have the dubious pleasure of seeing my ugly mug on the telly talking about my CDs and doing a few card demos in November!

I thought I would share the card that I designed and made for my screen test, unfortunately I wont be able to use my Bella stamps in the live show as I don't have the copyright to do so..and Create and Craft don't sell them so I will be using other things but for the screen test I could do what I liked so this is what I came up with.



I now have to start designing cards and scrap pages for the show so wish me luck!
Luckily for me though I have had some amazing help with making the cards as examples to have on the show and I would like to say a really big thank you to Samm Livett (see her fantastic blog By Samm) and Shirley B, for creating the most fantastic cards with the papers from my CDs. Having these great examples will make me much more confident about showing my designs to the crafting TV viewers!

I'd also like to thank my wonderful techy partner Ian for all his hard work since we started the business, I think he got a little payback on Friday when we were sat in the Green room at the studios waiting to be called for my screen test and three models came in and sat next to him on the sofa..next time he will be taking his camera to have his picture taken to prove to all his geeky work mates what he was upto on his day off.. bless!

I never seem to be able to catch up with everything that I need to get done.

Well that's how I have been feeling but today I seem to have been able to find time from somewhere and I have been able to join in with last Fridays Daring Cardmakers challenge. Here are the challenge details:

This week I’d like you to use a FRAME or FRAMES on your card. You can use any type of frame you so wish. How about a die cut frame or a hand cut frame. You can frame your card with brackets or flowers or how about some doodling - the choice is yours.



I hand cut a 'frame' (hence it not being perfectly straight but I thought it would just add to the card!) from a paper from my CD V Funky I used the same paper to cover the chipboard letter that I used as the main letter of the 'angel' sentiment. The chipboard letter is from Maya Road. I finally got round to using my new Tilda stamp 'Tilda with a Heart' which I coloured using twinkling H20 paints. I finished off the frame and letter with prima flowers. It's a pretty simple card but..that's the way I do them!!

It has been a real surprise to me how many entries I have already received for my competition in Card Making and Papercraft magazine. I was worried that I wouldn't get enough entries to cover the prizes available.. now I am beginning to worry where I will keep them all as they just keep coming and the competition doesn't close until the 30th October!! My postmans face was a picture this morning as he had to come back to my door when he realised that he had a separate bag just with postcards for me and the two boring bills he had already posted through the door were not the only thing I was getting this morning!!

Here it is.. my first competition in a craft magazine!




This is Issue 45 of Card Making and Papercraft Magazine, in the shops on the 2nd October but subscribers will have received it this weekend. It's pretty exciting to see my papers all laid out. I advertise regularly in mags but it's different when it's not just an standard advert. I hope you will try out for the competition! I'm giving away 11 sets of all 5 of my CDs they are already sitting here waiting to be sent out to the lucky winners at the end of the month!

I have a super busy week ahead of me..and I hope I will have some exciting news to share with you next weekend..we shall see! Ian is working away at the moment fine tuning the new version of my website which hopefully will go up this weekend, it has a great new look and customers will be able to create an account and track orders they place. With this new website I will be able to start to move into lots of new areas like downloads etc..so keep your eye out for all the changes over the next few days!

I am hoping to be able to get some crafting done this afternoon, if I do I will share my creations later. Enjoy your weekend!

I received my new Bella stamps last week and today is the first chance I have had to play properly. I couldn't resist this 'Click-a-Bella' stamp when I saw it as I'd like to think this is just how I look when I am designing!! (I wish!) She's even left handed just like me!!



The image is stamped with black ink and embossed with clear embossing powder then I coloured it with Twinkling H20 paints (that never really show up that well in a scan) The backing paper is from my CD V Funky I inked the paper and the image and added chalk around the edges to grunge it up a bit. The ribbon has been attached with a brad from a set that I won on Ebay last week. I don't know who they are by but they have a little ring off the brad head where you can tie the ribbon through. I was a little fiddly but I like the effect!

I had an entertaining morning this morning as I was helping out a friend who needed a lift to get his car to a garage to be mended. I needed to visit our local Hobby craft..as you do.. and Neil was kind enough to let me go there before dropping him back home. He'd never been in a craft store before and I was worried that he might be really bored. Actually I think he quiet enjoyed it.. though I don't think I will be getting a new card making buddy just yet! I spent rather a large amount of money on stash that I 'needed' of course. It's getting a bit stupid in my craft room at the moment I can hardly move! Right I had better to get back to it my other Bella stamps are calling me and I need to clear up before Ian gets home!!

I know you have probably all done it. Started a craft project with lots of excitement and enthusiasm only to want to throw your project in the bin after two hours of crafting from hell!! This morning I decided that I was going to try Iris folding for the very first time. I am not the most dexterous person ever as I have a dodgy right hand but I convinced myself that as long as I took my time it would be OK. All I can say is it's a good job there are no children in this house..the air has been blue all morning!!
I didn't give up but I really wanted to! Here is the result of about two hours hard labour.



I'm not particularly proud of it but as I have wasted most of my morning trying something new I thought I would share it with you. I think I need to have some late lunch and chill before trying to go back in the craft room again today!!