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Showing posts with label coffee. Show all posts
Showing posts with label coffee. Show all posts

Monday, 8 June 2015

...Introducing Scalloped and Stitched rectangles with more Coffee!


Good Afternoon - Welcome to our release countdown - tonight at 7:00pm all the new goodies will be available at the store - I so hope you like them as much as I do - I'm a little addicted to coffee and doughnuts lately...

Quick schedule

The store will close at 6:30pm this evening to allow me to add last moment live links etc. 
The release post with the full reveal of goodies will go live at 7:00pm here on the blog.
The store will re-open at 7:15pm

7:00pm my time today is approx equal to:

USA - Utah - 12:00pm 8th June
Malasia - 2:00AM 9th June
Canada Quebec - 2:00pm 8th June
Germany - 8:00pm 8th June
Russia - Moscow City - 9:00pm 8th June

I have a card for you just now ahead of the release post that shows you how our new Stitched rectangle dies mat together. There are two sets of stitched rectangle dies - one with scallops and one with double stitched lines. The two sets work great independently, but I am ALWAYS looking for that extra usability factor and so I designed them to be compatible - check out the sample above to see how the scalloped rectangle provides a lovely mat for the plain stitched rectangles. 

The scallops are sized to co-ordinate with our Picot Panel die and Pretty Circles dies.

I love fine detail and sometimes I love neat narrow mats! In the past I have worked with die sets that were designed to mat with each other, but I  felt that sometimes they were aimed at folks making scrapbook pages, which can be a much larger format than a standard size card. Sometimes I don't want a quarter inch mat....


So - how do you like my coffee set? - I have everything to match, which so does not reflect my real life situation - all my cups are mismatched at the moment, we had a few breakages during the move,  - I'll get around to picking up a matching service at some point, but for now at least I can match in craft land! I adore this little coffee set - I stamped it all in red (Memento Rhubarb) and then I went in and added some pencil shading - I darkened down the handle of the coffee pot to make it look like one of those old retro bakelite handled pots. I'm in matchy matchy heaven with this card.

There is a co-ordinating die set with 10 dies for all of the main stamps. There are 48 stamps in this set, just couldn't squeeze a die for all of them....

Ok gotta run - loads to do - hopefully chat to you later!


Sunday, 7 June 2015

...Introducing Coffee Set and a Mini Coffee bag 'How-To'


Warning - Long post -  many pictures...

Good Afternoon! Welcome to the third day of sample previews for our June Release. All of the new goodies I'm sharing over the last few days will be available at the Waltzingmouse Stamps Store tomorrow. The release will go live at 7:00pm my time.

We are releasing 6 new stamp set sand 6 new dies - and I still have oodles to show you so I'll get on with it...

My samples this afternoon are made with the new Coffee Set stamp set. This is a 6x8 set and it is chock full of coffee goodness. If I told you there was 48 stamps in this set would you believe me....

The set features a retro style Coffee set, complete with different styles of cups, a creamer and a grinder, a sugar bowl a cupcake, some floral motifs, coffee beans, the list goes on. There are 21 sentiment sets within the set and you can be sure you will be covered for every eventuality.


This coffee pot has been rolling around in my head for a long time now and when I finally got my hands on the stamp - the first thing I wanted to do was create a toleware style coffee pot. I stamped the coffee pot in black versafine ink - and immediately clear embossed it. I picked out the floral detail with brighly coloured copics. (BG34, YG23, YR16 and R46) I absolutely adore this look. I think it really captures something of the essence of tole.  Here's an example I found at Z&K Antiques on the web. Toleware is basically painted metal, usually kitchenware items. It's a little folksy, very collectible and vintage without being stuffy.



 I set out my Coffee pot and footed mugs on a simple white background and then added a frame. I made the frame using a spellbinders circle die - which I partially cut but just making sure that the top plate of my die cut system was lined up on the area of the circle where I wanted the cut to end.


 The mini gingham table cloth was made by stamping Mini Pinstripe stamp onto aqua coloured cardstock. I stamped it once and then turned the stamp 90 degrees to get the mini gingham. I edged my tablecloth with some white lacy edging - this is a strip of white card cut with the Picot Panel die. I cut one little strip of the scalloped edging and divided it in half. I then cut each end at 45 degree angles and butted them together to get the point.

The 'Little Something' to go with my card is a Mini Coffee Bag filled with a little coffee infusion - you could add tea bags if your 'person' is a tea drinker, or a hot chocolate sachet, or cinnamon, or sugar...the list is endless. I'm more than happy to put a tea bag directly into a paper bag that  have made from fresh clean patterned paper - but you can wrap your tea bag in a little cling film if you are not happy with your tea bags having direct contact with your paper.

I co-ordinated my baggie with a matching snippet of the tablecloth and also a little die cut footed mug in the same pattern as my card.



Of the 21 sentiments in Coffee set, I think this is one of the cutest - 'Cheers to the Happy Cupple' and this would work great for either coffee or tea drinkers. I made a confetti card for my wedding  card sample. 

 I paired the sentiment with two of the little coffee (or tea) cups in the set - each of which was die cut with the matching dies (also available tomorrow). The Mini Coffee Bag hooks onto the front of the card for display but is easily removable if you want to get the confetti out. I used some peachy toned sequins for my confetti.

I simply attached a little rectangle of card to the reverse of the mini Bag. The folded down portion simply hooks over the circular cut out portion of the card. Simple pimple.

The mini Bag was decorated with some tiny paper blooms and a little tiny doily - which is a piece of white card cut with the Pretty Circles Die set. I just trimmed a little bit off to slide up under the top fold of the baggie.


Mini Coffee Bag How-To



 I think these Mini Coffee Bags would make adorable party favours, among other things, and I have a  little info here that will help you to get the most of of them.

The first thing you should know is that these are small bags, but it is surprising just how much you can fit into them. The finished size of a mini Coffee Bag is 2.75 inches tall, by just under 1.5 inches wide, by 0.75 inches deep at the bottom.


Pic 1. This picture shows the mini Coffee Bag die and a piece of patterned paper that has been die cut. I like to put my patterned paper on to the die with the pattern facing the die and the plain white side facing out. I find it easier to make the folds when I have done it this way.


Pic 2. The piece of die that creates the window of the baggie is attached to the main body of the die by three thin pieces of metal. This is so that you have the option to remove the window piece with a pair of metal snips, to create closed bags with no window. I prefer the look of the bags with a window, so I'm going to leave my die intact, but you do have the option to create plain bags.


Pic 3. This is the die cut from Pic 1 flipped over right side up. You can see which folds should be mountain folds and which should be valley folds. Also you really only need two pieces of tape to form the bag. You can see the long strip of double sided tape down the far right flap. You will need one piece of tape on the reverse of the largest of the flaps along the bottom - I've folded it up for this pic so you can see where to place it.


Pic 4. If you are adding a clear window pane, now is the time to add that. Depending on what is going in your bag you could use a little snippet of the clear bag that your WMS stamps come packaged in, or you could use food safe film from discarded food wrappings. I got the plastic for these bags from a clear plastic bread bag that I was able to snaffle when I got the bread home and popped it into the bread bin.


 Pic 5. Your bag is nearly finished and you could just fold the top flap down in half, and then fold it down again and adhere at the back, but I have an idea that might tickle. - To Turn your little coffee bag into a proper tin tie Coffee Bag try this: add a little fine wire into the fold on the top flap. I get my fine wire from those little tin tie bag fasteners that you get with plastic lunchbags, like these ones below that you can buy from Lakeland. I strip the plastic off them (carefully, using my craft knife) to use in these coffee bags - they would be too bulky for the fold otherwise. You could also use fine florist wire, fine jewellery wire, fine fuse wire, etc.



 Pic 6. Shows how I position my tape on one side of the fold. I popped the wire on towards the centre of the fold on the top flap.


 Pic 7. Once you have folded over the top flap the bag is now finished, ready to be filled and sealed by simply folding the top flap forward once and pushing the side pieces round towards the back of the bag - just like you would with a 'real' large coffee bag.


   
Pic 8 and 9. Just a note about papers. All of the Coffee bags I made with good quality papers worked a treat with the thin wire. You can see the corners at the top of the bag are nice and clean and I could re-open and re-close these bags with ease without the wire showing through the top flap. I noticed that if I used a cheap thin paper that the wire can begin to poke through at the corners, the bag still works well, but for weddings and special occasions I would stick to good quality papers if using the wire. If I'm not using the wire, and just adhering the bag closed, it is not an issue.

For Food safety I would recommend using foodsafe papers such as Bacofoil Lined Parchement, or wrapping your food in clear food film before placing in any paper bag that you are unsure of.

Hope it tickles! I'll be back later today/tomorrow with more samples and a schedule for release day also!

Friday, 5 June 2015

...Coffee Lovers Summer Blog Hop!


http://wp.me/p5K3PQ-1y

Good Morning! I have a set of coffee themed cards to show you this morning for the Coffee Lovers Summer Blog Hop! It feels a bit like the stars have aligned today because I am just, today, right this moment, kicking off my samples for Monday's release and what should we have releasing here at Waltzingmouse Stamps, but some coffee themed stamp sets!

To find out more about Coffee Lovers hops - check out their blog here.
To play along or to see the other blog hop entries click here.

There are over 30 Super Sponsors for the Summer Coffee Lovers Hop and anyone is eligible for a Super Sponsor prize if they link up a newly (June 5 or later) created Summer Themed Coffee, Tea &/or Cocoa project. Waltzingmouse Stamps is delighted to be one of the sponsors for this hop!

My little bunch of cards for today's hop are made with a combination of two upcoming sets now available- We Go Together and Coffee Set. Both sets will be are available now on Monday, but I have a load more samples to show before then, so if coffee sets are your thang, and even if they aren't, pop back later today/tomorrow after the hop to see more previews (it's a big ol' release...6 stamp sets, 6 die sets...).

 The images on these cards are from the up-coming new We go Together set. The neat thing about these Coffee cup and Doughnut images is that the faces are separate stamps - so you don't have to create kawaii style cards every time. I wanted some cuteness today and so I added the faces! I coloured these with copics and added plenty of matching sponging to my front panels. The background coffee bean and word patterns were stamped. I also added sprinkles and some glossy accents to my doughnuts. My kids loved these, I'm making a mental note to pull these out for class valentine treats. Matching dies make these super easy to trim out.

I used some black paperclips found at Ikea, and some toning ric-rac to finish off these simple cards. My panels were trimmed out with stitched rectangle dies, due in the store on the 8th.


The sentiments are from the upcoming (Mon 8th June) Coffee set stamp set.



Many thanks for visiting today - I hope you have a great time at the hop!

Thursday, 4 June 2015

...mmmm...coffeee anyone!



I'm down to the last couple of peeks - will show you another later on and then I hope to begin showing you actual crafty makes tomorrow, featuring the new goodies - I'm also taking part in a blog hop tomorrow, so today is super busy - gonna need a coffee....

Thursday, 29 April 2010

...Say hello to Afternoon Tea


ED - Joan, I use a scalpel, surgical grade. I haven't found a craft knife yet that can compare, BUT be warned folks these things are sharp! Hand on Heart I couldn't recommend it, It's totally your own decision and if you do for goodness sake keep them out of reach of everyone, especially children and gadget minded husbands!!! I hear good things about those wee finger knives, intending to try them. Also I have a wee pair of really sharp embroidery snips, better for corners.

Today I'd like to show you a set that I absolutely love, you'll have guessed by now that I have a bit of a leaning towards vintage and this little old fashioned Afternoon Tea stamp set is now such a favourite! Actually there are two sets, Afternoon Tea and Afternoon Tea Sentiments.

But before we get started I must tell you who else is previewing today! Be sure to visit Julia, Bonnie, Lisa, Belinda, Lynn, Anya and Laurie today for more fabulous samples, these ladies are the bees knees!!

And - just one more thing, scroll down to the previous post to see details of the BIG CONTEST, it's a challenge and there's not a whole lot of time so do it now!! lol

My first card uses a kettle image from the Afternoon Tea set and a sentiment from Afternoon Tea Sentiments. The kettle image comes in two options one for solid stamping and one outline drawing for colouring and paper piecing, as I have done here. I popped on a little bead over the lid handle for extra interest and added a little shading to the kettle with a very pale grey copic marker.

The tablecloth background was made using one of the fat plaid stamps from the pic nic patterns set also releasing on Saturday, how I love plaid!! I used a teeny tiny cup image from Afternoon Tea in between the plaid stripes and also in the sentiment panel. Can you see the tiny steam above the tea cup? lol!!



I made a matching Tea Bag Baggie!! A cute little gift bag which houses some gigantic and fun, (but not pretty, lol) tea bags! The bag itself is in the shape of a tea bag and comes complete with a tiny label on a string. I made it from vellum and it has that nice linen texture, just right for a tea bag. If you think this is something you might like to make, pop back to the old blog here on Saturday, the FREE template will await you!

The template includes the bag and little tiny label, which is just the right size for a couple of the stamps in the Afternoon Tea set. I have used the label stamp "Soothe away the day" for my little label on this bag, there are a couple more options in the stamp set.


The mini kettle shape comes from the Afternoon Tea set and the sentiment is from Afternoon Tea sentiments. I have used both sets together a lot in my post to try to bring you as many sneaks as I can, there is so much to get through, but I think you will be pleasantly surprised at just how many stamps and options are in each set.

Afternoon Tea has 30 stamps, 12 of which are sentiments. Afternoon Tea sentiments contains 25 stamps, many of which are longer sentiments, the focal images of this set are the large tea cup and the separate posy of pansies, which could be set into the tea cup using masking or used alone, I hope to bring you a sample of that if time permits.


Today's final card uses my favourite image from the Afternoon Tea set. I am a sucker for labels of all kinds, especially vintage and the design for label has been floating around in my head for ages!! I absolutely love it! lol. If I had to pick a desert island stamp, this just might be it.


The whole image including the frames and kettle and cups is one stamp so there's no worries about lining things up. I stamped it repeatedly here to make the background, using Rich cocoa, memento. Much sponging and distressing.

the focal image was stamped in Versacolour pinecone and clear embossed so's I could colour some of it with copics. the main part of the label is a very pale lilac, kinda hard to see in the photo but pretty IRL.

I cut it out with a craft knife and popped it up on some dimensionals. The pink band behind is sponged and blinged. Vintage Barbie...?


Hope it tickles!!