November Mouse Tracks - Part 1

Lisa the Mousekeeper squeeking in again to present the much-loved Mouse Tracks, a review of all the incredible cards/projects created by Claire and the design team ladies to showcase the newest stamp sets! Today I'm starting with a favorite. Okay, who am I kidding, they were all favorites! But behold Vintage Ornaments in all its gorgeous glory!

By Sandie

by Anya

 by Belinda

 by Bonnie

 by Claire herself

 by Jennifer

 by Joan

 by Julia

 by Laurie

 by li'l ole me

 by Lynn

 by Mona

See, I told you they are worth waiting a bit longer for! I'll be back tomorrow with more!!!

Winners from November Release Blog Waltz!!!

Lisa the Mousekeeper squeeking in with the announcement you've all been waiting for... the winners of a stamp set of choice from the November Release Blog Waltz!

The winner from all comments left on Claire's blog waltz post (below) is Gabi Mewes-Wirth!

The winner from all comments left on Jennifer's blog is Deirdre!

Congratulations ladies! Please email Claire at claire.brennan1@ntlworld.com with your stamp set choice and mailing address, and she'll mail your prize right out to you.

Thank you all for waltzing with us this month! The response has been overwhelming. Claire is still up to her ears in shipping! LOL And thank you for your patience with the shipping of 'Twas the Night Before Christmas and Vintage Ornaments. I promise you, it will be worth the extra bit of wait!!!

Please be sure to join us for the November Friends of Waltzingmouse Blog Waltz on November 17th. Our theme is Christmas. The thread to post the link to your blog/gallery/on-line photo album is already open in the forum. Remember, you don't have to run a blog to join us... as long as you can post on the web where we can visit you, you're in! You're more than welcome to use the WMS Gallery to post your Waltzingmouse Stamps creations!

I'll be back soon with Mouse Tracks...

...Welcome to November at Waltzingmouse Stamps

Good evening and welcome to the November release at Waltzingmouse stamps. Every month we release new clear top quality photopolymer stamp sets, and if you are new to us, you have just stumbled upon a veritable feast! lol, we have a DT Blog Waltz happening right now where you can see yet more stunning examples of Christmas inspiration! We've been previewing for several days so it's worth a scroll back to see what's new!

Below is a link list of dance partners! Enjoy! Don't forget to leave comments on this post and also on the DT posts as you pass by, as usual we will draw a winner from my post here and a winner from an undisclosed DT member blog! Each winner will receive a free stamp set! Now, off you pop! Just don't forget to come back and see the new goodies!

Laurie
Lynn
Mona
Jennifer
Lisa
Anya
Joan
Belinda
Bonnie
Sandie
Julia

Store Information for the November release

Please note the slight delay on two of the sets due to a technical hitch. details below each set.

Remember - FREE shipping for orders over £50 to Everywhere, yes, you're included!
(approx $80.93US, $81CAD, $79.90AUD, €58Euros, subject to change) and if you don't think you will fulfil the £50GBP worth of stamps today you might be interested to know that shipping one set to US costs around $4.50US.

I begin packing orders as soon as they start to come in, I will begin shipping tomorrow (Monday) BUT please be aware that depending on the volume of orders, there will be delays in shipping this week!! Folks ordering on Friday night/Saturday, your orders will most likely ship on Monday as weekend posting is limited here!

Shipping notices for orders placed at release times will go out after all packing and shipping is done!! My priority is to get the stamps out ASAP during release times!! So my apologies in advance if your stamps arrive before the shipping notice...

New at the store: since last month we are now able to accept payments via credit card in addition to paypal at the store. Folks have been asking about this for ages and I am now happy to be able to implement this. Our processing method ensures that we don't have access to your credit card numbers and so we can't and don't store these. We appreciate that sensitive information needs to stay private and we invite you to view our Privacy Policy.

Our Tag you're it Grand Winner is:

Chosen by Random Number Generator, our grand winner is:
Lisa F
who made this tag.

Huge congratulations Lisa, you have just won £125 of WMS goodies!! (that's approx $199 US, $202 CAD, $202AUD, €143Euros!!!) we'll be looking forward to hearing from you to claim all of your winnings and we will be having a special blog post dedicated to the Tag challenge and all of the wonderful creations!!! we had over 160 entries!! AND there are still more prizes to be awarded!!!

And here are the New goodies for November!!

Vintage Ornaments

Please note that due to a technical hitch, this stamp set will be available for shipping approx one week from today (approx 14th Nov) You may go ahead and order and your order will be shipped out as soon as I recieve them. My apologies for the delay, which occurred after we had already started the release.
It had to be done!! Christmas ornaments for use with your Spellbinders Heirloom Ornaments dies!!! woohooo, let the festivities begin! The ornaments recall my childhood Christmasses, and I have included 5 ornament stamps to suit 3 different sizes. A feature of 4 of the designs is the centre oval, which may be stamped with the starburst design, or indeed anything you like, including sentiments! Or, you could leave it blank and add photos, or other things that you have cut out! The oval is the same proportions as the Spellbinders classic ovals for ease of use, ahhh, thats better! See all of our samples, the DT really rocked this set!!
I used a hugely popular vintage pattern, that I drew up for our Very Vintage Christmas stamp set from last year, still a firm favourite! This means I can use all of my supporting Very vintage Christmas bits and pieces to make co-ordinating backgrounds for cards and tags etc! Joy!
The small solid pattern ornament makes a fabby background when stamped repeatedly! (cheers Joan!) Two starburst centres, 3 sentiments, a mini snowflake circle and a little hanger image complete the set!
The largest ornament is 4 and 5/8 inches tall by just under 3.75 inches wide at the widest point.

Twas the Night Before...

Please note that due to a technical hitch, this stamp set will be available for shipping approx one week from today (approx 14th Nov) You may go ahead and order and your order will be shipped out as soon as I revcieve them. My apologies for the delay, which occurred after we had already started the release.

I love this poem. My dad used to read it every year, and I was working on a little set based around the idea of the window in the poem, complete with shutters! I was intending to use maybe a line or two of the poem in the set, but then a certain lady mentioned that she'd love to see the whole poem as a stamp! As luck would have it, there was room in the set for one huge stamp, containing the first six verses of the poem! I think it makes a fabby background stamp, and I can also see myself using it to make tiny scrolls for my Christmas table setting!
I used a vintage font - what else? lol and I think it really lends itself to the old world feel of this favourite Christmas tradition.
The window frame stamp works with a die from the Spellbinders labels 14 dies. It may be used as a simple frame or you can add further details such as window sashes, shutters and various other decorative items, candlesticks, baubles, a scandinavian style candle arch and even a tiny mouse and a mini wreath! OOdles of possibilities. Check out this post on my blog for detailed instructions and tips on building a window with this set. There are a total of 21 stamps in this unique set.
Through my window I would be delighted to see Santa and his 8 reindeer sailing across a starry sky!
Th poem stamp fits comfortably on to a standard card front at 5.25 inches by just under 3.25 inches at its widest points. The tiny little mouse is 5/8 of an inch long by 2/8 of an inch.

Festive Foliage

I went on a trip to Salzburg once at Christmastime, It was the best trip I ever made, Everywhere was decorated in natural greenery, simple pine boughs, natural wooden carvings. There was something so peaceful and serene about it that I began to look at my Christmas decorating in a new light. Holly sprigs and Pine boughs now abound in our house, the smell is divine!
Thought it might be nice to be able to stamp a little of that!! lol, and so here is a collection of some of the best loved winter foliage, Pine boughs, Mistletoe and Holly. 21 images to give your winter cards that natural touch.
Perfect for Christmas, or indeed winter cards of any kind, and dare I suggest even masculine cards? lol.
I have drawn the images at sizes tha make them perfect for either focal pints or background stamping. Many of the images are ideal on their own, but I was careful to include extra wee bits and pieces such as the small pine sprig and the extra pine cones so that you can build upon your foliage to customise it for your project.
I went for a natural styling on the pine elements simply because I preferred it that way. For the holly I made more stylised images, one matches the circular holly tag from the Around Christmastime. The various holly stamps are perfect for stand alone images or also for making backgrounds. there are solid images and linear images for folks who like to colour. The Mistletoe has the same options. 5 sentiments complete the set, Mwah! is my favourite! lol.
The large pine bough and cones image is just under 3.75 inches by 2.25 inches at its widest points, the Mwah! sentiment is just over 1.5 inches long by 0.5 inches tall.

Around Christmastime

8 Tag circles, 8 supporting motifs and 6 sentiment stamps combine to make this 22 stamp set a great versatile addition to your Christmas collection.
A Bumper set of Images, mostly themed towards Christmas but some of the images will be suitable for many other occasions. The Christmas pudding image in the top left is a graphic stylised image of the traditional Christmas plum pudding still popular in the UK. The 'Checked by Santa, Nice person' Image co-ordinates with last years special Secret set. Such a fun stamp to adorn a tag on a gift for somebody special! Two Nordic inspired Snowflake graphics and one of those wee woven heart designs that I have seen on Scandinavian trees help satisfy my need for quick but stylish tags in a cool clean style. The pine boughs also double as snowflake arms (cheers Julia!).
The casual styling of the sentiments make for lovely informal, fuss-less tags and cards.
The star of this set must be Santa himself tho', a striking half moon design in a solid background, colour him in or just stamp him! He makes a statement either way!
The large circular Santa tag image, is 2.75 inches diameter and the For You sentient is 1.3 inches wide by just under 0.7 inches tall.

Hope it tickles!!

...Vintage Ornaments and Festive Foliage...

So, how are you liking the previews so far? This is my last post of projects before I post the full release Stamp designs here tomorrow at 7pm my time (2pm US Eastern, 1pm Canada Central, 6.00AM 8th Nov Australia-Sydney)

You might have already visited the ladies today but if you haven't simply scroll down to the previous post for a handy link list to see what they've been up to! You will be amazed!!!

Kicking off tonight's samples I have a little Tussie of sorts for you. So very simple to make using the Spellbinders Heirloom Ornament die template, I have pics of the how to, but I will do another post on this as there are a ton of pics for you to see in this post already, expect the 'How-to post' a few days after the release.

I love Christmas tree ornaments, and the moment I saw the Heirloom die templates from Spellbinders, I just had to have stamps to suit! I grew up in love with Christmas and everything it brought. I remember one particular toy from when I was about 5, but the rest of my Christmas memories are filled with smells and sounds and smiling faces. I remember trimming the tree, or rather watching my mum trim the tree! My mum is a very artistic lady, sadly she's not been well for some time, but when I was wee, everything she did was done with the greatest attention to detail, our tree was a work of art every year, people actually did come from far and wide...lol!

There was a group of glass tree ornaments that we were never allowed to touch, they hung on the highest branches, and they were the particular shape that Spellbinders have captured in their dies.

The Vintage Ornament stamp set releasing tomorrow is destined to produce ornaments and decorations that i hope my wee folk remember when they are not wee anymore.

I tried to make stamps to match as many of the die sizes as possible, it is always a source of irritation to me that I cannot fit stamps for all of the die sizes into one set! lol, I was determined to have a stamp for the biggest die and I wanted to use the vintage pattern from the Very Vintage Christmas set, not only is this a hugely popular set, I simply love the pattern, I think it has just the right balance of light and dark, perfect for heat embossing and also colouring!

So you can see below that I used the largest stamp from the Vintage Ornaments set to create my Tussie. I love to make quick and easy projects that look difficult and believe me, this is one such ornament! Joy!



I stamped the ornament 4 times in Memento Rhubarb ink, one of my fave colours! I trimmed out the 4 images with the largest die in the set and then trimmed out another two 'blanks' with the same die. I used the point at the bottom of the shape as a guide to score two lines up each ornament shape, I will explain this fully in the 'how-to' post. I folded the shapes along the score lines and adhered the 4 stamped shapes together to get the outer shape. (I had already sponged and stamped a snowflake in the ovals (Very Vintage Christmas ). I stamped the sentiment Merry Christmas from Say it with Style on the 'front' panel. I stamped te reverse of the ornament shapes with foliage from the Festive Foliage set, out tomorrow, and sponged in greens.)


In the pic above you can see how I used the two 'blank' ornament shapes to make a divider in the centre of the tussie. The two blanks are glued back to back and the little folded edges are glued to the inside 'walls' of the tussie. Of course everything was stamped and sponged first, and left to dry, before gluing/taping.

I set an eyelet into the top of the divider before gluing it in, this is the perfect place to add your hanging ribbon.


You can use the tussie either as an ornament or, as I will be doing, a spot to stash little sweeties on the tree!! I love the two compartments and look forward to filling these up with all manner of little goodies!! You could use this to present a little gift of sweeties as well!


Do pop back after the release is over for directions these are such fun to make, there's no measuring involved, just something like a scor-pal is handy! I aim to make these in a few different sizes!!



I used another of the ornament stamps from Vintage Ornaments to make a sweet little taggy for an itsy bitsy jar of coiled ribbons that I will slip into a Christmas stocking for a crafty friend. those wee snowflake designs are the perfect spot for some bling!


I used the large Ornament stamp again to make another ornament for the tree. This one uses 3 ornament shapes, stamped, trimmed out, scored down the centre and stuck back to back. Three ovals housing the sentiment are inserted into the ornament so that they curve outwards adding further dimension to this well known style of paper ornament. Again directions for this will be in the post release 'how-to' post.

This time I stamped in black Versafine, clear embossed, and then coloured with a red copic. Colouring these is so easy! The sentiment is also from Vintage Ornaments. Two glossy bows are adhered back to back over the hanging string...which i forgot to colour with copics...



And now after all that fuss, two very simple CAS cards using Festive Foliage.


Ok, hands up who doesn't love winter foliage? very few folks I'll bet. Isn't there something so festive about glossy green leaves and red berries, the smell of the pine and cones of all shapes and sizes! I love a walk in the woods about now, to gather cones and acorns, leaves and such, I pretend I'm Martha Stewart out getting supplies for a fabulous door wreath or the like and inevitably when I get home, my bags of damp leaves have to wait 'till dinner is made, or the laundry folded...you know how it is...and so I designed a wee set of winter foliage that I can pull out at any time when I need a quick 'nature' fix! lol!



The large pine cone and needles stamp used on the card above is one stamp. Easily inked up in two or more colours. I use Tsukineko Versacolour inks when I want to blend ink on a stamp like this, I find the sponge pads are perfect for this, in a way that the material pads on my beloved distress inks are not!

When inking the pine needles, i turn the little cube so that I can get the corner of the pad right up close to the pine cones. I'm trying to avoid getting an obvious divide between the brown and green inks, I want them to blend together.



I inked up the little sprig on the card below in the same way, and then, stamped a separate pine cone, immediately clear embossed and then heated again and sprinkled with glitter! A sentiment from Around Christmastime to finish, easy peasy lemon squeezy!


Hope they tickle!!!

The schedule for tomorrow's release looks like this:

6pm (my time) - the store will close to allow me to add some final details.

7pm (my time) - I'll be back on the blog with full artwork for the new sets! We'll be announcing the Winner of the tag you're it comp!! So, pop back and see if you won!!

7pm (my time) - Out traditional DT blog waltz will be open for you to dance along for yet more eye candy, can you stand it??? And there will be the usual Waltz competition!! Don't miss out!

7.15pm (my time) - The store will re-open. All four sets will be available to add to your basket and purchase at the store, but due to our technical hitch mentioned yesterday, two of the sets, Around Christmastime and Festive Foliage will begin shipping immediately while the other two sets - Vintage Ornaments and Twas the Night will ship later in the week or early next week.

Righty ho! it's off to bed for me! Nighty Night!

...wee little windows...how-to

Good morning and welcome to the third day of samples from our November release. On Sunday we're releasing 4 new stamp sets! We've been showing samples since Wednesday so if you are new here, you might like to scroll down, see what we've been up to!

This morning I have a little guide to how to make the windows I've been showing on a couple of cards, using the stamps which will be released on Sunday.

Later on today I will have more samples for you, so pop back if you can.

Heads up
I also just wanted to let folks know that we've had a little set-back. I've spent all day dealing with a little technical hitch which has meant that two of our 4 sets releasing on Sunday are going to be unavoidably delayed. It's a bother, as I don't really feel comfortable releasing sets that I don't actually have to hand.

However, I have decided to go ahead and release the sets anyhow, because 1) My DT ladies have been working their collective socks off to make purty samples for us, and 2) there are folks who like to purchase enough sets to qualify for the free shipping and if I only release two sets then some folks won't be able to avail of the free shipping benefit, and I know that means a lot to some folks.

So, here's what's going to happen: On Sunday I will release all 4 sets. The store will take orders for all 4 sets BUT orders containing Twas the Night before Christmas and the Vintage Ornaments sets will not ship until those sets are in stock with me, that could mean a weeks delay. Yep, it's a nuisance, and I am heart sorry that it has happened but I can only make the best of it now. You'll understand that it is too late to cancel the release and start all over again.

Twas the Night before Christmas and the Vintage Ornaments sets will just be treated as if they are on backorder and will ship out as soon as I get them.

Orders for Festive Foliage and Around Christmastime and any other in stock order will ship immediately as normal. I am so sorry folks.

Don't forget to check out the DT ladies, they're waiting just for you! lol!

Lisa
Anya
Bonnie
Belinda
Joan
Julia
Mona
Jennifer
Lynn
Sandie
Laurie

Windows - How-to.
Since a picture is worth about a million words, I have photographed all the important steps involved in making one of those wee windows from the Twas the Night before Christmas set.

I start out by stamping the window image, clear embossing and then trimming it out with the Spellbinders labels 14 die template. Notice the fine inner line that frames the empty inner space.


Next I trimmed out the centre rectangle, Can you see how I have trimmed the rectangle out so that the fine line is cut away at the sides and left in place at the top and bottom? Look on the bit that I have cut out, it has the fine line clearly visible at each side. This is important if you want to use shutters, if you're just trimming out the rectangle and not adding shutters you can just trim all the way round the fine line.


Next, I stamp two shutters. I also clear embossed these. I trim them out with a little spare flap on one side, I make a left shutter and a right shutter by having the spare flap on different sides of the shutter image.


I use the back of the scalpel blade to score along the edge of the shutter image to create a crease for the fold, I find the scor-pal just a little bit 'big' for this job.


Very importantly, I make a tiny slice at the top and bottom of each fold on both of the shutters, circled in red below. I do this so that when I fit the shutters into the window frame, they make a snug, tight fit, the shutter images are a hair larger than the window frame for this very reason.


Below you can see the components of the window. The shutters have been sponged and the hearts coloured brown. The two window sashes, stamped beside each other on a rectangle of card, clear embossed, sponged and then the woodwork coloured brown with a copic. I trim the image of the window sashes quite neatly so that when I put it behind the window frame, it doesn't peep out around the edges.


Next I add the mouse, there are also, baubles, a Nordic heart decoration, and a little candlestick, all suitable for stamping in the 'open' sash.


Below, I have slotted one shutter into the frame, I adhere it with strong tape. You can just see how the tiny wee slices in the fold of the shutter help to make the fold a snug fit around the window frame.


Window frame with both shutters added, and below that, the sash windows. You can see how I added dimensionals all around the sash windows, I wanted it to be set back a little from the window frame.


All that remains is to add the frame over the sash windows, and there is one pretty focal point for your card!!!


Hope it tickles, I'll be back later with more samples!