Design Team Call!

I can't believe we are nearly at the end of the year! Where has 2011 gone?!

I have lots of exciting things planned for next year including a new year long project along with the monthly challenge blog and monthly kits!

Sadly Julie has had to leave the DT and I have decided that I would love for 2 more people to join us for 2012.
Being part of the team will include creating 2 projects a month and occasionally being sent some goodies to play with and create a post for the blog. All DT members get a 15% discount code that can be used in the shop as much as you like!

So are you interested in joining us?

Please email me at sales@trulymadlycrafty.co.uk stating your interest in being part of the 2012 design team. Please send a link to your blog if you have one and 2 or 3 of your favourite pieces of work (any craft project is fine) Please also let me know if you are on any other design team (or have been in the past).

I look forward to receiving emails and can't wait to organise the 2012 team.
Hugs and periwinkles,
Maxine

Christmas Planner #2

Finally here are the instructions and printables for the 2nd Christmas planner. This one requires no chipboard (unless you want to) no hole punching and no book rings!

You will need:
2x 12"x12" pieces Cardstock
Printer paper/light card
Christmas papers (scraps can be used)
Bone folder (or something to score lines with)
Brads
Chipboard (optional)

1.Take a piece of 12x12 cardstock that you want to use as the base for your planner. You will need to make 4 score lines. 1 line at 3", 1 at 6" and 1 at 9". Then rotate your cardstock 90 degrees and make another score line 4" in from the edge.

2.Now fold the bottom edge of the cardstock on the 4" line into the middle. This will be the pocket.

3. Concertina the card on the other lines. Fold in half at the 6" line (so the pocket section is on the outside) then fold inwards on the other 2 lines.
You will end up with something that looks like this:


4. From a different coloured piece of cardstock cut 4/5 pieces measureing 2 3/4" x 7 3/4". These will be the inserts for the pockets.

5. Now you need to print out the calender, gift, card list etc pages.
You can find 8 different printable pages here. Choose the 4 that you want to use and print them on a light weight card.

6. Trim each element so there is 1/8" on the sides and approx 1/4" from the top and bottom. This will ensure that they fit onto the card inserts you previously cut. Attach the pages to the coloured card inserts with a brad so that you can swivel the pages. I stuck my calender pages onto 2 separate pieces and put 1 behind the other in the first pocket.

7. Now you can decorate your planner.
I kept mine quite simple and just stuck some patterned paper on the pockets and added a title with my dymo.


8. For the front cover I covered 2 pieces of 3" x 8" chipboard but you could just use some card or patterned paper to decorate the front if you don't want to use chipboard.

9. Add some ribbon so you can tie the planner closed and you are finished!

I hope that you have enjoyed this little tutorial. If you create one of these planners we would love to see! Feel free to link a picture in a comment here on the blog or come and share with us on our Facebook Page.

Hugs and Periwinkles,
Maxine

Re-usable Christmas Planner Tutorial & Printables!!

Welcome to our Free mini tutorial on making a re-usable Christmas Planner! With only 47 days until the big day and shops showing all the Christmas decorations and presents it's a great time to start getting organised!

For this project you will need:

- 2x 6"x6" pieces of Chipboard
- 2x 1" book rings (you can also use 2" depending on how big you expect ypur planner to get!)
- Christmas Papers
- 1 sheet of 12"x12" Acetate (or several smaller pieces!)
- Letter Stickers (I used mostly ones that came in my Echo Park collection kit)
- Plain white Card
- Printer
- Hole Punch (I used my cropadile)
- Optional Ribbon & Embellishments

Here is my example created using left overs from my last years Christmas paper collection. You can use any Christmas papers you may have in your collection (my papers were Echo Park) or we have a whole Christmas section in the shop here.



Step 1: Cover your Chipboard with your chosen papers (I was using part sheets so my front and back covers are different!).

Step 2: Trim your acetate down to size. You need at least 4 6"x5 1/2" pieces. I had printed acetate so used this. You can use plain acetate or create your own pattern acetate by stamping Christmas images onto it using acrylic paints. Your pages will be 6" high and 5 1/2" wide.

Step 3: Create tabs for each of your acetate pages by cutting a small piece of paper to approx 1 1/2" x 1 1/2". Fold in half and round the corners. Then attach to either side of your acetate piece. Repeat for each page but line up your tabs one below the other.


Step 4: Now punch your holes in the covers and acetate pages. I punched mine at 1 3/4 " from the top and bottom and 1/2" in from the side.

Step 5: Now you can decorate your acetate pages. I kept mine simple and just made a title block for the middle of each page. You will need a 'Gift List', 'Card List', 'Menu' and 'Shopping List' title. Also add a word to each of your side tabs so that you can easily jump to a section of your planner.



Step 6: Create or buy a small envelope. Mine measures 5" x 5". Punch holes so that the envelope is central in the book and add a 'Receipts' title block to it.


Step 7: Now you can print your inserts. I would recommend printing on some light card (I have used a plain white cardstock pack from Wilkinson!)

The following printables are PDFs and are sized to fit this album.

Click here to go to the website and print the FREE printables!

Step 8: Trim down your printed elemants so that you have 1/2" on the right hand side of each table and 7/8" on the left hand side. This will ensure that your pages will fit perfectly behind each acetate page divider. (also make sure the height of each page is no more than 6"!) You only need 1 each of the calendar pages but you can print off as many of each of the others as you need.

Step 9: Now add your pages to your album using your book rings. You can choose the order you wany your pages to go but for an idea mine is:

Calendar Pages
To Do List
Gift List Acetate divider
Gift list Pages
Card List Acetete divider
Card List Pages
Shopping List Acetate Divider
Shopping List Pages
Menu Divider
Menu Pages
Receipt Envelope



Step 10: Finally decorate the front of your planner. I simply took some card and layered it up with a snowman sticker and some alphas. I stuck this down with a piece of ribbon threaded through the middle so that I can tie my book closed and added some ribbons to my book rings.



By using acetate as your divider pages this will make your planner more durable as you will be likely to be turning pages quite a lot if you used paper/card they would be more likely to rip.

Using book rings ensures that you will be able to put in more pages as you need them and for future years all you need to do is print more of the pages and you can use the planner all over again!!

I really hope that you have enjoyed this mini tutorial and that the planner and our printables are of use to you. If you make a planner we would love to see, feel free to share on our Facebook page or leave a link in a comment here.

Maybe this planner is not your style? Then watch out for next Monday when we will be having another mini tutorial on a different re-usable style planner with no need for hole punches, chipboard or book rings!!

Until then, hugs and periwinkles,
Maxine

UKS Blog Hop - Button & Paper Flower Bouquet

Welcome to our tutorial in the UK Scrappers Blog hop!

If you are participating in the blog hop, you may have come here from Scrap Revolution. Make sure you check out the thread on UKS here to see the full list of blog links and info on the prizes!

As a little extra from us everyone who stops by our blog and comments on this post can get 15% off their order with us up until Friday 4th! (This is only open to UK residents and those who comment on the blog, code can only be used once per person, if you do not comment here but use the code your order will not be processed and you will be refunded). To get this extra 15% off simply comment below and then used the code UKSBLOGHOP in the box upon checkout!

For our Project we will be showing you how to make this pretty Button and Paper Flower Bouquet.

For this project you will need:
-Buttons in various sizes (you can find a selection on our website here)
-Wire (needs to be strong enough to hold the bottons up when you stand them in a vase, I got mine from a garden centre)
-Pipe Cleaners
-Double Sided Patterned Paper - 1 12x12 sheet will make 3 flowers (You can see our Paper here, I used the Echo Park Dots and Stripes Candy Shoppe for my flowers)
-Wire Cutters/scissors
-Glue (I used Glossy Accents)
- Mica Mists (you can see our range of colours available here)
- Glitter Glue (I used Diamond Stickles)

Making the Button Flowers

Step 1: Make up piles of buttons going from biggest to smallest (5 or 6 buttons works best for these flowers)

Step 2: Cut your wire to double the length that you want your finished flowers to be. Mine measured 18". And fold in half.

Step 3: Start to thread your buttons onto the wire starting with the smallest first.


Step 4: Twist the wire close to the bottom button a few times so that they stay in place.

Step 5: Repeat for however many you want to make. I made 16 for my bouquet.


Making the Paper Roses

Step 1: Cut 3 4"x4" squares of paper. Fold each square in half on the diagonal 3 times (to create a small triangle)

Step 2: Cut each triangle into a petal shape and snip off the points.


Step 3: Unfold and you will have 3 - 8 petal flowers with a hole in the middle.

Step 4: Ink the edges of your flowers if you desire.

Step 5: Cut the flowers as follows:
Cut 1 flower in half, cut 3 petals off the second and cut 2 petals off the third.

Step 6: Now you need to start gluing your flowers. Apply glue to 1 of the end petals on the 6 petal, 5 petal, 1 of the 4 petal pieces and the 3 petal piece. Fold the other end petal over the glued one and hold until it sticks!

You will end up with the following:


Step 7: Now take your 2 petal piece and curl the ends back. I used the end of a paint brush.


Step 8: Curl the petals around the paintbrush (or your choice of pointy stick!) and glue in place. Make sure you leave a big enough hole in the middle so that you can fit the smaller single petal inside it.

Step 9: Take the half flower that you have left and cut 1 petal off. Now curl the end back and around your pointy stick as above. You will now have the following:

Step 10: Curl the petals back of each of the flowers.

Step 11: Now you can start to stack your flower. Start with the 2nd largest petal piece and apply glue to the bottom around the hole. Then place into the larger flower and hold until it has stuck!


Repeat the gluing until you only have the 2 smallest pieces left. Apply glue to the smallest piece and push into the other piece. Before you apply glue to that piece check to see if you need to trim it down by placing into the centre of your flower. If it sticks out the top too much just trim a bit off the end.

Now your flower is complete!



Step 12: Now you want to make your flowers shimmer and sparkle! I used a Mica mist to spray each of my flowers then added some stickles. Apply the stickles to each petal and then spread with a paintbrush or your finger!



Step 13: Now you need to add your pipe cleaners to the flowers. I started off with 12" ones and trimmed them down to 9" to match my button flowers. Make sure the hole in the bottom of your flower is big enough (you may need to trim it slightly) and thread your pipe cleaner into it. You can simple leave like that or apply some glue to the top of the pipe cleaner to hold it in place.


Step 14: Now arrange your flowers and buttons in your vase and you have a beatuiful arrangement that won't die and that you can make to match your decor!


I really hope you have enjoyed this tutorial and if you make a bouquet or some flowers we would love to see!

Don't forget to check out all the other blogs in the hop by visiting the UK Scrappers thread here.

Have fun and happy crafting!

Hugs and Periwinkles,
Maxine