My blog is moving here to be rejuvenated and show more images - its still being developed but the aim is to feature more cards from my many storage boxes!

In amongst the Christmas post today was the latest issue of Let's Make Cards magazine and kit. My teabag folded card is on the front cover, but they made a better job of photography than my effort below!

Several of my quilled cards are in Papercraft Inspirations out now

A get well soon message to Betty and Sue who were unable to make todays workshop, we all hope they make a speedy recovery.

The group made an excellent selection of Christmas cards and all worked hard in the short 3 hours. Everyone was impressed with Phyllis, who at age 84 (hope she doesn't mind me mentioning it!) is learning new crafts inorder to show others. I think we all looked at Phyllis and hoped we would have her spirit when we are in our 80s!  

Lovely day in London last week and as the weather was so warm the leaves have not dropped from the trees yet, making the St James Park look lovely. Of course I didn't have my camera with me but plenty of others were snapping away. Then in traditional format the day is ended at Paperchase to see whats new and have a sit down in the cafe.

Christmas is everywhere and especially in crafts, here is my card on the cover of the latest issue of Let's Make Cards. The kit is designed by Sally Moret with lots of red and white folk style pieces in the kit.

I was very sorry to read in the local paper today of a fire at a crafting store "Papermaze" in the village of Otley, one of my favourites. It is a tiny shop in a unit on a farm run by the shop owners husband. Whilst small, the shop is packed full of papers, punches, ribbons, stamps etc as they run a very successful mail order business. It is not surprising that the fire ripped through the unit in minutes as it was all flammable stuff. The very thought had occurred to me this year and I have invested in fire extinguishers for my craft room as it would also be a paperblaze. It might or might not be useful in the event but better to be safe than sorry.

My oriental-paper-folding-Christmas-themed project is on pages 44 and 45 of this months Crafts Beautiful magazine. It is sometimes a challenge to meet a brief set but then it does push one in to new avenues that might have been overlooked. Combining Washi papers and teabag folding worked very well and is something I probably would not have considered!

A straight forward kite fold was used for tree decorations.

(C) E MOAD2011

As every inspired by the seaside so close by, the quilled version of seagulls is taking place, but a small catastrophe today as I've lost a seagull leg. Its less than 1cm long and about 1mm wide so just hiding somewhere around the place.  

The Suffolk countryside always looks its best on a bright sunny day and a trip out to Snape Maltings and Aldeburgh was in order to make the most of it. Snape Maltings has a lovely coffee shop, gift shop, kitchen shop but is best known for the concert hall. Then on to Aldeburgh for lunch, not the famous fish and chip shop though, as the prospect of queuing for half an hour or more does not appeal! To walk along the beach in teeshirts at the end of September in the warm sunshine is pretty good.   

What a lovely way to spend a Saturday meeting and talking to quilling enthusiasts from all over the country and a few from further afield. Plus the AGM was held in a school I used to attend, so it was an added bonus to revisit somewhere I haven't been to for well.... a number of years.....

Wonderful displays as ever, and the Japanese "white flowers" were all amazing with such neatness, inventiveness and so small.

oh dear I was only given 9 out of 10 for a quilled first day back at school card, 7 year olds can be quite critical.

28 pints of my blood donated to the nation so far - hope its appreciated by everyone! it only takes 5 minutes for the blood to flow out but the whole donation process always takes an hour and a half from the starting paperwork to end cup of tea. Whilst waiting I always think of the artist Marc Quinn who made a frozen sculpture of his head using 9 pints of his own blood, and rumour has it the art collector Charles Saatchi kept it in his freezer amongst his frozen peas.... one day I'll mention it to the others having tea and biscuits at the end to see how many faint away.

Well a big surprise to see that three of my cards are featured on the cover of the latest craft book from David & Charles publishers called "The Cardmakers Bible." This book will be available in September 2011 and at 192 pages its quite a volume! It uses projects from previously published books by myself, Julie Hickey, Dorothy Wood, Francoise Read amongst others. The chapters are divided in to the usual celebrations such as Christmas, Valentines, New Home but also teen birthdays and mens cards.

A train journey always seems a good opportunity to sit down to some crafting but I forgot the reality. The practicalities of folding squares of paper with a bumpy, irregular motion is not easy. Few were done and then I resorted to looking out the window at damp English countryside! 

As usual the sun came out just in time on saturday for Selina and Alex's wedding, and when it did the temperature rose pretty high, even for an English summer. The Bride and Groom had thoughtfully made enough fans for all the guests so we could have a few wafts to cool down and then check the schedule printed on the fan to see what we were doing next! What a fab idea!

A busy day with 12 ladies on an all day workshop, however one proud display of 5 cards and a noteholder by Janette! We tried diamond top folded cards with peel-off stickers on to acetate, multiple step cards embellished with punched shapes and a form of teabag folding to make pretty rosettes. a successful day all round.

Yes it is still July 2011 but the latest magazine from Crafts Beautiful is the September 2011 edition! The zingy orange cover features my card with folded flowers. Colour Burst is found on pages 23-25 of the magazine and shows the flowers made by rubber stamping plain circles of paper and then using teabag folds to make the shapes. 

Always a pleasure to see one of my creations on a magazine cover and here a double layer concertina card I made for the current issue of Let's Make Cards! is on the front. Lets Make Cards is a craft kit and magazine full of ideas, so for this issue I was challenged by the editor to focus on making paper flowers using different techniques.  

Little Wings is the title of my project in the August 2011 issue of Crafts Beautiful magazine, pages 23-25.

After many years of leaving bits of peel-off stickers on the sheet, once the outline has been used, we finally solved the problem in class. Simply by using strips of masking tape the left over bits were picked up from the sheet, in the pattern, and then transferred to card or acetate successfully.

Quite a grand week so far hobnobing with an OBE holder, (thats Order of the British Empire and not Others B***** Efforts as it is also known as...) who couldn't talk long on the phone as "in the middle of advising the government on a white paper." However this was soon eclipsed by the bargain of the year found in the local craft chain store. Now when a bargain is spotted I immediately have to count how many are left that are on offer as I am shopping for 10 workshop ladies plus me, as I have to make a sample up. The number of times there are 8 of one thing or just 7 of another and I have to reluctantly walk away. But great joy when a pack of 3 peel-offs were reduced to 50p (a saving of at least £2 per pack)  - not only that but they were lovely designs and not rubbish! A quick rush to the till to double check prices, back to load up with 22 packs in my basket as decided they will all want two each, back to the till before they changed their minds on pricing... saving about £44 on the original prices.

Jump in to the car with my OBE: Outstanding Bargain Excitement.

Busy getting to grips cutting out things using Photoshop and my Bamboo tablet. The tablet has a pen which is used instead of a mouse to control the pointer or arrow. Not being a Mac user its not easy on a PC and whilst digitally cutting out is very clever, I much prefer a pair of scissors.  

Here is my papercraft project in this months Crafts Beautiful pages 23-25 called "Star Turn" which uses the technique of rolling cones of paper and making flower shapes.

Often in workshops when introducing a new technique, there is a general frustration as people don't grasp it first time. A perfect result is expected by everyone after I have demonstrated it with apparent ease. What I constantly remind the group that I have spent many, many hours and more hours getting the hang of it, and believe me it never goes right first time for me. The latest project for the magazine is an example and after a total of about 8 hours over the course of several days I have almost perfected the technique. There are generally seven stages of a project

1) inspiration 2) hardwork 3) disappointment 4) rejection 5) partial success 6) deadline looming 7) success 

which depending on the time can span a day or a week.

Many of the craft magazines have a long life and are passed on to other crafters to read, so the actual readership numbers are much greater than the actual sales figures. However I didn't realise how long the magazines lived on until a reader contacted Crafts Beautiful about the small butterfly punches I used in a project. I looked back and that project was featured in the magazine over two years ago ! Luckily I found a very similar punch (thank goodness for internet shopping) and could suggest an alternative.

Perfect Pleats can be found on pages 37 to 39 in the June issue of Crafts Beautiful magazine out now. Here I have punched circles from the patterned teabag sheets and then folded the circles. This was the first time I had folded circles instead of squares and thought the evening class group would find it difficult. However a quick poll at the end of the class surprised me as about half found the circles easier than the squares, so a big hit!   

oh dear, well the local butcher has got in to the spirit of the Royal Wedding tomorrow, and is offering "Champagne sausages" advertised outside his shop. I can now imagine groups of people toasting the happy couple by clinking sausages in the air.....

Certainly glad I live close to the sea when the holiday weekend looks like it could be a sizzler! 

Wednesdays class did very well with the new and difficult technique that we call "cone flowers" as the petals are formed by cone shapes (see Sunny Side up post below). For the preceding 3 weeks I had instructed them all to look at home for items that could be used as "molds" around which to shape the circles of card to create each cone. I use a small bottle of glue, with a very fine and pointed tip at home but I had been scouring the shops looking for alternatives. A suitable pointed shape was found on tubes of bicycle oil so I showed the class the other week and told them to look in their sheds! The result was quite varied in class with several pointed objects such as pens and long handled quilling tools used. Bottles of oil from sheds were discarded as too dirty!  

Here are my spiral flowers on the cover of Crafts Beautiful magazine this month

 An easy start to the new term with stacking decoupage from Small Beauties.

I am very pleased to hear that this year the Quilling Guild AGM will be held at Ixworth Middle School here in Suffolk. It will be on Saturday 17th September and in the afternoon the displays of quilling are open to the public to see.

On sunday the 18th September there will be a shared skills day where quillers get on with some quilling to pick up new ideas and techniques. More info about the events can be found on www.quilling-guild.co.uk

well one has to have the right circle punch for the job, and here is a line up of the circle punches I have collected over the years, which doesn't include 3 Fiskars mini punches I have just remembered...

 This months article of mine in Crafts Beautiful - available now in the shops. I use  circle punches to form cones, then arrange in to flower shapes. Alot of effort but for once I was pleased with the cards and tags.

After carefully selecting a large sheet of very delicate Sanwa Tissue at Paperchase, I took it to the desk, I folded it neatly in half, in half again, and again, in front of the young cashier girl, only for her to shove it in to a plastic bag crumpled! Oh dear, non crafters of this world just don't understand !

A very quick finger printed Valentines this year

Generally in Sainsburys I will scan the magazine section (crafts of course) to see what the covers are featuring, and if people are browsing, see what they go for. So it generally comes as a surprise to see my design on the cover, as it was yesterday when I saw my quilled valentines card on this months Papercraft Inspirations. As it happens there is never anyone in the isle to hear me say "thats mine" pointing at the magazine, and probably for the best as its hard to tell if they would believe me until I opened the wrapper and then showed them my photo inside, and actually that wouldn't help as I really do not look like the photo....

My project can be found on page 38 of the latest edition of Crafts Beautiful magazine. I have used brass embossing templates for a subtle raised effect.

Everytime one of my books is taken out of a public library I get a few pence, which is a rather nice benefit of being an author. I just have the stats in for the year July 2009 to June 2010 and they are as follows, with the number of times each book was borrowed from a library :-

The Papercrafters Bible 1741

Quick and Clever Christmas Cards 1684

Thrilling Quilling 997

Cards For Lads and Dads 720

It is always nice to think that crafters are still reading my books, and hopefully gaining a few ideas. Also for those out there that might worry the likes of JK Rowling are getting even richer through this PLR system, there is an upper limit, so when the income from PLR reaches a certain limit in a year, they don't get any more. No I haven't reached this upper limit! 

After a very good pantomime, Cinderella, it was time to get crafting, however economy is not at the forefront of a young mind when the creativity buzz is going... when three circles are needed from craft foam, for a pencil topper project, they are naturally cut from the very centre...made me laugh when I saw the careful cutting to reach the centre! I can't comment as I am not the most thrifty crafter and would always prefer an excellent craft project at the end of the day rather than worrying about a few pennies wasted.

Yes Father Christmas was kind enough to bring me some new crafting gadgets to experiment with next year. The Dremel multi tool is waiting ready to drill through the mountain of sea glass collected and hopefully then made in to a variety of projects....unfortunately the craft room has not had its promised tidy up so where to put these new things....

A very pretty angel sits on top of my tree this year.

A better effort at a snowman this year as had more help - a rather scary looking snowman with a shell for a nose and plastic chair castors for eyes as no coal around here. However he is now staring back at me as I look out of the kitchen and I feel that I should bring him in from the cold....

Thank you to the workshop ladies who visited my house yesterday afternoon for tea and mince pies. (Quite few mince pies left over as I catered for two each!) As we all know each other pretty well by now we are never short of chat and as always its good fun to show them the mess that is the craft room. As I had just finished a project for Crafts Beautiful that morning the craft room was in its post deadline chaotic state. I now think of my friends French husband when he saw the room for the first time and whispered to his wife "Cabine de Ali Baba"  - which I think is an apt description except the contents of the room aren't stolen!

yes its snowing here !

Quilled snowflake cards can be found in this months edition of Crafts Beautiful magazine on sale now. I have use the husking technique to make the basic shapes and then glued and pinched the paper to make these snowflake tendrils, full instructions in the mag.

Yes 2011 is just around the corner and my New Years cards (including this one) can be seen on pages 47-50 of issue 37 Lets Make Cards! available now. It is a party themed pack this time with flocked papers and lots of motifs for the New Year. For detailed cutting, such as these numbers, I use a Fiskars finger tip knife for more control. Not everyone gets on with these small knives but I have come to depend on mine. 

A very interesting day today with a tour of Bertram Books in Norwich. Bertrams are a wholesaler to the book trade and operating behind the scenes moving books around the country. Many independent bookshops have a facility to place an order online to Bertrams for any book in the system, and if the order is placed by 5pm, then Bertrams guarantee next day delivery to the shop. The warehouse have three shifts of workers to meet this guarantee and it was fascinating to see the books being selected, automatically scanned and then on conveyor belts to be packed. As there are 200,000 books in stock there wasn't an opportunity to ask where my books were in the warehouse.   

With the wonderful Google analytics I can see where visitors to my website live, well the country but not their street addresses don't worry! In total crafters of 67 countries around the world have looked at the site but so far the top ten countries for visitors over the past 2 months are

Quite a few moans about Christmas items in the shops already but I am enjoying it all this year and picking up bits and pieces regularly. Having been in Christmas mode all year its no change for me to seemlessly move in to the real festive season, and I was pleased with my Magic Snow Powder this week. I was rather sceptical about it "expanding to 100 times original size"! but in actual fact when water is added it is quite realistic. So I have a small pile of snow on my desk now and I am watching it to see if it melts or returns to 100 times smaller.

The Crafts Beautiful Christmas Special is available now with 130 pages in the magazine plus a 64 page papercraft collection. There are a variety of designs in the papercraft collection with Sharon Bennett's pretty motifs and some unusual  Christmas cats by Emma Schonenberg.

My tea bag folding is featured on pages 14-15 of the magazine and the crackers are seen on the cover.

September 2010 Let's Make Cards! Issue 36

Several of my cards are featured on pages 42-46 in this months edition of Let's Make Cards! and two are on the front cover. I made a simple quilled letters for "snow" and used a motif from the kit for the "o" which was handy as "o"s can look wobbly with quilling. Then the Lace circle card is just above the snow card on the cover.

There have been alot of cards made with a gap cut and then punched or die cut flowers, butterflies or shapes glued across the gap to make a lacy design. These cards are very effective and I made few attempts of my own. They are quick to make and sometimes to get the creativity flowing its best to make a few cards fast and then review what you've done.

realised I hadn't counted two large storage boxes of quilled cards that are under a bed, dare not count the contents!!

It has been a long over due job but I have sorted out all the cards I have. Generally I keep all the cards from magazine projects, books and workshops. Over the years this has accumulated to quite alot so I bought alot of stacker boxes a couple of years ago to store these cards in. This weekend I had a good session organising the boxes and arranging them in to craft technique ready for the next batch of evening workshops. I find that in workshops, whilst I am demonstrating one card we will make, the group always like to see a range of ideas from other cards I have designed, so I end up taking alot of cards to each workshop.

Final count of 8 storage boxes - 725 cards. Yes I was surprised! I've been telling people there were only a couple of hundred in there.

A fellow quiller, Ann Martin, has kindly featured my new book on her blog All things paper and is offering three copies as a giveaway. Ann is a talented quiller and amongst many other things decorates marriage certificates with beautiful quilling, requiring level of carefulness that I don't possess! I always drop glue, a quilled shape glue down or something on to the item I am making, just as I am close to thinking its about finished!

Lacey Days

These two cards are part of my project featured in the latest issue of Crafts Beautiful magazine. Using Lace templates to cut intricate designs these are a favourite of mine.

As the harvest continues the fields around here are soon ploughed, with huge areas of brown soil taking over from the wheat. I have used wheat weaving techniques with paper, see earlier blog post, but I have never tried using actual wheat. It is on my "to do" sometime list so I was pleased to pick up a small example of wheat weaving from a local gift shop at Monks Eleigh.

Its not very easy to drill tiny holes through pieces of sea glass, as the 1mm drill bit, which is now in three pieces shows...

August 2010 Crafts Beautiful Magazine

Hello Petal Folded roses are my quilling project in this month in Crafts Beautiful magazine pages 59-61. 

(Crafts Beautiful magazine available in Sainsburys, Asda, Tescos and many more good newsagents!)

Folded paper roses are possibly the hardest thing to teach in a class as it is such a frustrating combination of turning the quilling tool, folding paper and then pulling it upwards. Just like learning to drive too many things to do at once. Generally the roses come out very tight as people grip the tool and paper, then the tension of them not turning out takes over and there are always disappointed sighs. Often with some coaching the technique is mastered but then once at home peoples logic takes over and again the roses don't work. It is certainly a technique to only half concentrate on and then the roses bloom!

There are frequent entries on crafters blogs about storage and how to cope with the mass of bits and pieces we need! See http://craftystorage.blogspot.com/ for alot of very organised and large craft rooms, plus good ideas.

I recently made a trip to IKEA and bought a small plan chest for my special papers. These papers were previously on a shelf and some were being crushed in the mass. The handmade papers, vellum, origami patterened papers and teabag papers are all very pricey per sheet and when this is added up its (like the cottons!) a shock to realise how much one bundle it worth. So it was very relaxing to sort out the specials from the regular 12x12 sheets.

Bit of a shock today when I went to the local fabric shop for pink thread for this long over due sewing project. A reel of thread had gone up in price and then I went back to look at the amount I had at home in terms of cost, and it was a significant amount... still I did finish the bag and that was the aim

Another sunny day for the craft fair held at Clare Priory in Suffolk. The tea and cake tent did not disappoint and there was a large selection of crafts for sale with new comers and many regular exhibitors. Regrettably the entrance price has increased and I wonder if this will significantly reduce the number of visitors, it certainly seemed quieter this year.

Weaving vellum is the theme for this card. Strips of patterned vellum are cut and then woven in and out to create a solid square. Using paper or vellum to make a woven pattern is very straight forward but it is a technique often overlooked. The paper doesn't have to have a special design for this to work and it is a good way of using up leftover pieces. Ribbon can also be woven in to the design to add texture.

all designs and images © Elizabeth Moad

July 2010 Crafts Beautiful Magazine

Pots of Style! this month in Crafts Beautiful I have two projects. The photo left uses a product called Flower Soft to make the flowers and is on page 37 then my quilled gardening items are on pages 25-27 and photos posted soon. 

as ever when I make a trip to London the shops I like to visit are all in one area on Tottenham Court Road: Paperchase, Habitat, Heals and Confetti. These fab doillies were from Paperchase and will be combined with rubber stamping somehow on my craft workshop day 21st July. And these butterfly favour boxes were a must have from Confetti and are just asking for some quilled embellishments.....

This castle card is still one of my favourites from my book "Cards for Lads and Dads." It was a card that came together very quickly and was almost right at first attempt. A variation for a girl is made by using pink card (of course) and changing the style to include more turrets, like a Disney castle.

all designs and images © Elizabeth Moad 2010

June 2010 Crafts Beautiful Magazine

These are my quilled butterflies on this months cover of Crafts Beautiful magazine available in Sainsburys, Asda, Tescos and many more.

  These are my butterfly designs on the cover of Crafts Beautiful magazine, which use the "husking" technique where paper is wrapped around pins to create delicate shapes.

and yes its a wet one of course!   this afternoon a friends annual BBQ which usually has dry, sunny weather was a wet affair, the washing has been brought in and the sandals put back in the cupboard. Although, and a bit controversial, I'm quite pleased its bad weather, after a busy week its a chance to stay indoors and catch up, with yet another round of tidying the craft room. I try to work my way systematically around the room to sort and tidy up, however it is along the lines of painting the Forth Bridge, by the time I have gone round the room I need to start again. Still looking forward to a birthday party tomorrow - I hear iPods are the vogue for the party bags nowadays....  

Stitching and collage are the theme of this birthday card. It is a variation of some cards featured in Crafts Beautiful magazine earlier this year. The flowers are three layers of vellum stitched on to the card blank along with the green vellum stem. Collage is a wonderful technique as it allows complete freedom and to make something unique. 

all designs and images © Elizabeth Moad

all designs and images © Elizabeth Moad

It is often the case that crafters are given high accolades for their card designs when they haven't been involved in the design process of the patterned papers and embellishments used in their cards. There are a great many who can make a wonderful card given the raw materials, but there are few who can sit down and design the raw materials. Its the talented graphic designers and illustrators who are not named on the packs of papers in stores or a big name takes the credit, when often its a group of others who have actually done the donkey work!

So hats off to the likes of Jackie who have the initial creative idea, then translate it in to a product and then make it available to the rest of us. 

May 2010 Let's Make Cards! Magazine

This is one of my "technique-tastic" cards in this months Let's Make Cards Magazine pages 26-29. The card is a stitched border around a motif provided in the kit with the magazine.

As I gather my thoughts ready for another series of 8 evening classes at the Ipswich Institute I realise this is now my fourth year of teaching for them. It certainly doesn't seem that long ago since my first class however as I look back at the variety of cards we have covered over the many classes, and we have achieved alot!  I think it must be about 100 workshops now in 4 years which has kept me on my toes and the creativity on the ball as I work out new ideas for the group to do. Its always a pleasure to see the gang again and hopefully a few new faces in the group.

well its more scrabbling around under the workdesk trying to find something just dropped, always very small such as a gem stone or a quilled shape. As there are substantial piles of papers, frames, boxes and much essential stuff under and around my desk it isn't easy to locate what has been dropped, however that never stops me from searching. The search always takes longer than finding another gem stone, making a quilled shape etc. and is only successful 50% of the time.

Only once did I get totally defeated. I was working with a kit from Lets Make Cards! magazine and for that I have to use only the items they provide me. As only one kit is sent I have to take care nothing goes astray. I had made a card which spelt out "summer" using individual letters except I had lost an "m" and knew it was around in the vicinity of my desk, just had to be found. Well the cards had to go in the post to the magazine and a card with "sum er" was included with a note asking the editor to pinch an "m" from some other designers card and stick it on mine! And of course a week later I found the "m" when I wasn't looking for it so I popped it in an enveloped to Holly the editor with another note "I've found it!" - made her laugh...

I've just received a packet of mini Christmas baubles which I am very pleased with. These glass baubles are less than 2cm in diameter as the picture shows in relation to a penny. Yet another reason why the internet is so essential now, as I needed tiny baubles for styled photos of Christmas cards, and hey presto within minutes three packets ordered! 

Easter 2010 Let's Make Cards!

This is one of my quilled Easter cards in Issue 31 of "Let's  Make Cards!" out now. The kit is all themed around Easter and I added a few quilled highlights to the cards, seen on pages 18-22. 

April 2010 Crafts Beautiful Magazine

This is one of my quilled cards which features in the "Oriental Spice" project in this months Crafts Beautiful magazine out now. 

The April 2010 issue of Crafts Beautiful magazine shows my design of quilled eggs on the cover. These are polystyrene eggs covered with tissue paper and then quilled shapes. More of the project is shown on pages 34-35 of the magazine.

During my wednesday evening classes its all quite informal and as everyone has their heads down working I generally give pointers, advice and general chit chat. Here are some classics I have heard myself utter:

1) Just a minute Meg I'll give Leanne two black eyes and be right with you (this was refering to beads)

2) Now if even Jenny can do this anyone can  (Jenny has never forgiven me for that)

3) Janet I don't have regular tea will Earl Grey do? (how posh is this?! as we have a tea break half way through) 

4) I've just remembered what I have forgotten (a regular statement from me)

5) You must always do it like this, except when I say not to

A workshop lady brought an article in to class from a Sunday newspaper about a very modern doll's house called "Clearview". This really is a doll's house with a difference, ultra modern as it was inspired by a trip to Miami. The designer, Elaine Shaw, sells these kits (www.miaim.co.uk ) and it has always been on my wish list to have a modern doll's house. I made quilled plants in pots several years ago for dolls houses and as I always work on such small scale in quilling it fits in naturally. However thats another project on the "to do" list.

 A busy morning folding squares of paper ready for a Crafts Beautiful project. Stage 1 is where I cut out several sheets of squares ready. The photo is stage 2 where I have folded in half, then diagonally to form these pyramids. Stage 3 is then taking these pyramids and adding more folds and assembling. I find that this way I can make better designs with lots of folded pieces to hand. Well sometimes I just get carried away with folding and then realise I have to do something with the trillions of shapes!

A very quick quilled card idea for Valentines Day which only takes minutes to make! 

February is National Heart month for the British Heart Foundation  and as I donated a pint of blood this week, red is the colour of the month!

Even though I have been contributing projects to Crafts Beautiful magazine for about 8 years now (just had to check and my first article was in the November 2002 Crafts B mag), it is always a buzz to see my name and work in print. This month I used paper weaving strips from Small Beauties  http://www.smallbeauties.co.uk/ for these cards and pencil pot. Unfortunately my scanner isn't working so apologies for the image! Jackie Henshall of Small Beauties takes photographs of flowers and then digitally works them in to paper designs. These are then produced in squares for tea bag folding sheets and then co-ordinating card for borders and weaving. Jackie has really good colour schemes and the quality of the paper and card is excellent.

After spending ages making cards and creations they then needed to be posted to the magazine HQ for photography. This is always the biggest worry incase they get lost or damaged. Just as bad is things dropping off that were glued on securely at this end, but the shaking and movement has caused them to come loose by the time they arrive. The latest case is a balloon motif that looks lopsided on a card I made for Lets Make Cards. I was please to see the card on the front cover of the current issue of the mag but I knew it didnt appear as it should!

There have been numerous cases of cards being photographed on their side, upside down or with some glaring fault in prominent postion at the front. One hopes the readers never notice but it is amusing to see what happens!

Yes Father Christmas kindly gave me some new crafting gadgets to experiment with next year - the Dremel multitool is ready and waiting to drill through the small mountain of sea glass that has been collected, with hopefully better results than last time. Sometimes we can blame the tools and it is a good excuse to ask for more !  

I was scanning the shelves of a well known chain store yesterday, looking at gift bags, when I spotted a Valentines card with lots of quilled coils on an heart. Naturally it caught my eye and I looked closer, the coils were handmade but not very neat as would be expected if they are being made by the thousands. What shocked me was the price at £4.50 (about $7.3) !! I guess that as I have made my own cards for so long now, about 10 years, I just cannot imagine parting with £4.50 at a till for a card, but there must be people out there who do! I get so many comments that I should sell my cards but I know that if I was to charge this amount at craft fairs there would be very few customers, plus I am more than happy to keep to the design side rather than the mass production side!

It's not often we get this much snow and we have all been out taking photos when the light has permitted - this is the favourite one I took. If my snowman had turned out better he would be here aswell but he looked quite frightening in the photo! 

It has been an effort over the past month, and massively behind schedule but at last I have finished the enormous quilt project embarked on about 20 months ago. It measures 2.4 metres or 8 feet square, so covers a double bed easily. I haven't kept a tally of the amount of material but it was 3 Jelly Rolls (quilt term for co-ordinating strips of fabric) of the really pretty "Shangri La" fabric by Moda, plus alot of panic Internet purchases as local shops stopped stocking the fabric.  My faithfull sewing machine did well but I did envy a friends super slick Bernina that has so many useful functions. There are a few sewing bits to tidy up on the quilt but it is a relief to have it on the bed at last, although it is so precious now it might become a wall hanging to preserve it forever. This is my fourth quilt and is going to be my last for the timebeing as I embark on my big quilling project in 2010.

A fair blanket of snow covering Suffolk this morning. As I am fairly well organised this year I am now using spare moments to make cards from the trillions of scraps on my desk. Too good to throw out they make quick cards ready for those last minute panics where a birthday is almost missed!

It was our festive lunch yesterday at the Ipswich Institute which was, as expected, good food and good fun. We swopped handmade cards and many were of the stitched variety. I think these stitched cards were the hit of 2009 in workshops and I will certainly include them in to next years programme.

I even made a few myself and adapted a design from www.stitchingcards.com. I simplified the snowflake design to save time and used red embroidery thread. On a few cards I added a clear bead to the points. Whilst this is quite a relaxing technique, at 25 minutes per card to make, please don't be offended if you were sent a bought card from me this year!!

Last Friday and Saturday a very generous lady opened up her house for a "bring and buy" sale in order to raise money for the Christina Noble Childrens Foundation. The aim was to raise money to replace a very dangerous bridge in Vietman that children need to cross to get to school. The fundraisers had volunteered for the charity in Vietnam and so it was a cause close to their hearts. I donated alot of quilled items that I had no space and no longer needed. So I was very pleased to hear that altogether £1,150 was raised over the 2 days, which is absolutely marvellous.

Well Ok it was only to the NEC at Birmingham and back the other sunday to the HobbyCraft show, but it felt like a marathon road trip! Sunday is the best day to travel to the show to avoid awful traffic however it is the last day of the event so the exhibitors and demonstrators are exhausted after 3 whole days. 

Due to the recession there were certainly fewer stands and fewer customers, but I was most impressed with those shoppers carrying flat pull-along trolleys in from the car park, and then trundling full trolleys back at the end of the day. So there is a strong element of die hard crafters buying their goodies. I didn't need a trolley as my purchases fitted in to my backpack (along with my coat and jumper) but I was pleased with my new Nestabilites die cuts for my BigShot. I was so impressed I showed the Wednesday evening class these new wonders from afar. By Friday lunchtime I had an email from a Wednesday class regular to say she had not only ordered her Nestabilities, but they had arrived and Ann was using them, less than 48hours after I had shown the class! Impressive.

What was also most impressive was my pal and co contributor to Crafts Beautiful mag, Jill Alblas demonstrating glass engraving at the NEC. On Sunday afternoon she still had a smile, a voice (often lost after 4 days of non stop talking to customers) and enthusiasm for the product she was selling, although the shoes had come off and Jill was barefoot! 

Since June kindly posted my work and tutorial on the Folding Trees  website on the 1st Sep 09 I have had over 700 hits on my website, this is about 10 hits per day which is a considerable jump from what it usually is. Whilst the world wide web has many faults it is pleasing to know that a tutorial can be ready by anyone, anywhere in the world. However I do have to tidy up my website if there are this many visitors!

5 comments you don't want to hear if you make and give handmade cards that you have spent alot of time on :-

1) you used really good quality card as I couldn't fold it to put it into recycling

2) was it one of your rejects?

3) a bit fell off but I stuck it back on

4) even my husband liked that card and he doesn't usually like them

5) do you want it back?

My two happy Gnomes were looking cheerful in their faces but their clothing was looking quite faded and dull. This week I decided it was time for them to have a makeover and revitalise their attire. So out came the red paint for the hats and green for the trousers in true Gnome fashion! So now a much happier chap greets me when I come along the path to my house and an even happier one looks in from the garden. 

Today is unique day as it is the first time I have made a birthday card for somebody who will be 100 years old. Yes it was a quilled card with frilly flowers (my trademark)  and I made quilled numbers for the 100 from narrow black strips. It is quite sobering to sit and think what Marion has seen and experienced in her lifetime, since1909. Whilst we often joke about how old we are and how old we look, it was a surprise to learn Marion's age as she looks a few decades younger!  

One of the perks of teaching cardmaking classes is that when one moves house there is homework set that week - guess what, to make a New Home card for the teacher! And I'm pleased to say that all the cards on my windowsill are homemade - much nicer than shop bought.

Yes its that time again when you can vote for the 2009 Craft Awards. I have been nominated in three categories: Best Crafts Beautiful Designer, Best Let's Make Cards Designer and my book "Thrilling Quilling" for the Best New Craft book of 2009.

Vote on the Crafts Beautiful  website or using the form in the magazine.

Thursday was a busy day preparing for my talk at the local Women's Institute  (WI). The subject was glass painting and I had this booking in my diary for over a year. A lady who came to one of my glass painting day workshops last summer, contacted me and as their schedule is published for the next year, they book speakers 18 months in advance.

So whilst I had a year to prepare, I wasn't sure what to expect. This WI group has 60 members so I was going to have to play it by ear as to how the evening would pan out. As it happened about 48 ladies came along, and I saw some faces I recognised which helps alot. I spoke for about 30mins and had taken alot of cards I had made where I had glass painted on to acetate, which were easily passed around so the group could see what I was referring to. Then I set up a demonstration area where the ladies could watch me outline, use the paints and ask questions. It all went very well which was due to the very friendly group. There was considerable interest in glass painting and I feel confident that several will go home and try out the kits they already had.

One of the highlights of the evening was being presented with a small posy which was beautifully made. The other highlight was being complimented on my loud and clear speaking voice. One lady said she rarely heard what the speakers said due to a hearing impairment and was so pleased she had hear all my talk. But I explained that my voice has a shrill, piercing note to it now, developed over many years, to communicate with a very deaf parent!   

I am very pleased that you can see a tutorial and an example of my work, just posted today on the website Folding Trees.

The aim of Folding Trees, created by Eve and June, is to collect the best tutorials on the net, inspire others by highlighting amazing paper creations from talented artists and crafters, and share their own paper crafts and tutorials. It is a website well worth a visit!

CraftFail This is a refreshing website where the public admit and upload evidence of their crafting failures. It made me laugh at some of the disasters people show and I could add quite a few of my own to the website. It did make me wonder how readers get on with my magazine projects and if anyone will post a quilled creation that didn't work out like it should!

Yesterday I had a rare day out and went by train to London. I met up  with a group of friends for lunch, in the shop "Paperchase" on Tottenham Court Road. For those that might not know Paperchase it is a mecca for crafters with its modern stationary designs to inspire us, and upstairs a huge array of handmade papers. I even remember when I was young having day trips to London with my family and always asking to go to Paperchase. Tottenham Court Road is a good spot for some shops we don't get in this part of the country such as Confetti, Heals, Habitat, Muji. Then it was along to Oxford Street for John Lewis and Selfridges which also have good stationary departments. I wasn't too laden down on the train home which was fortunate as it was packed tight with holiday people - at least the trains ran on time.

This paper plaited and quilled card features in this month's edition of Crafts Beautiful magazine- regrettably it was placed in the centre of the spread so it fell in to the spine of the mag, unless you take apart the magazine its not very clear. So here is the card which I am reasonably proud of as it took a considerably long time - its not just the final version which is time consuming, it's the 3- 5 attempts which are discarded in the design stage which add to the hours. Things never come right at the first go when designing a new card, its like drafting a letter, bits always needs tweaking.   

Christmas certainly seems to be getting earlier but July is the earliest I have had to make Christmas cards for the magazine. This means that the festive season will run for 6 months with magazine work, workshops and my own cardmaking.  Still its the same in other creative industries as the gift wrap designers have their 2009 wrap signed off and printed at the start of the year and they are now working on 2010 designs. We hope the magazines don't make their deadlines a year in advance!

Last year I made Christmas cards with hot colours reds, oranges and pinks but with the rainy weather they might be soggy blues and greens this year.

All cardmakers get requests to make special cards and we usually manage to accomodate birthdays, anniversaries and most occasions. One of my workshop ladies, Ann, came to class with a list of 17 cards to make for a friend. The class was most amused with the card request for "Barry age 62, swans with eight cygnets." This was perhaps easier than the one for a "friend aged 90 loves flowers, she has an alloment and loves whisky & ginger."

It was last year about April time that I was contacted by Swarovski through Quick & Crafty magazine. They had seen my papercrafts in the magazine and invited me to submit a design for their sales catalogue. Swarovski invite designers from all over the world and it was a strict contract of confidentiality I had to sign.

So the theme given to me was Scandinavia and my snowflake box design was approved. I made five quilled snowflakes for each side of the box and lid and decorated these with Swarovski crystals. The crystals were superglued in the quilling and the worry was they would fall out enroute to Austria. The deadline was monday 7th July 08 and I posted it in time. Unfortunately the Post Office made an error and the parcel was returned to me 2 days later. It was too big to be sent by the standard method, it would have to be sent by courier. However the deadline meant that the only option to guarantee it arrived in Austria by the deadline was to DHL the box. In order to DHL the box for next day delivery it would cost £107. It had to be done so I took it to the DHL office and as it had to be inspected before the parcel was sealed the chap was quite surprised such a light box was worth it. It was sent 4pm on the Thursday from Ipswich and it arrived by 12 noon the next day to Swarovski HQ in Austria.

Luckily Swarovski refunded the cost of DHL and so I was no worse off. The finished Swarovski catalogue arrived yesterday and I was very pleased with the photography of the quilling. The whole range of designs are of a high standard and I hope it is a great success.

well fame in a village school in the Cotswolds when my niece gave a presentation about me...

It was a sad day when I had a call from Lynn Martin editor of Quick & Crafty to say the magazine was folding ( excuse the pun!). Lynn set up the fresh new magazine back in 2004 and it was first called "Quick & Easy Crafts."   The idea was that the craft projects   were easier and quicker than those featured   in Crafts Beautiful magazine and they used modern designs and materials. I enjoyed making projects for this magazine and I'll miss it. All copies from 2004 are on my shelves and I realised I have had a project in almost every month since the magazine began.

However, I do have a confession to make regarding the "time to make" put next to each project. There were a number of projects where I did somewhat under estimate the time to make inorder not to put readers off...

This week I am planning stitched cards for my Wednesday evening workshop, which is going to cause some to groan loudly and audibly and some to sit with a happy face. By pricking the holes in card and then using regular cotton stitched through the holes, simple line patterns can be made. For those new to this idea or looking for inspiration I can recommend

www.stitchingcards.com

some patterns are free and most you pay to download. The Charles Rennie MacKintosh roses will be finished soon and a picture posted.

the above pattern is copyright www.stitchingcards.com

Wednesday was the first time I have had to cancel a workshop, ever - but due to being really poorly I had no choice and was glad to stay in bed. As I must have run over 100 workshops by now and I have been teaching at the Ipswich Institute for over 3 years, I don't think its a bad record. Back to normal (ish ) now. 

As mentioned on my home page a new book from David and Charles publishers, in conjunction with Crafts Beautiful magazine, is available to buy called "Ultimate Celebration Cards." It features over 200 card designs and is a follow up book to "The Ultimate Cardmaker."    

I only just received my copy of Ultimate Celebrations today from the publishers, and flicked through to find my cards (we don't get proofs nor advance copies!). There are five of my designs in the book two in the Halloween chapter and three in the Mens chapter. But I was most surprised to see my hands on page 10 in the Basic Techniques page - the same photos from my book The Paper Crafters Bible have been used !!

The wonders of the internet have allowed a quiller from Brazil to email me about my book "Thrilling Quilling." Natilde Andrade has been quilling for some time and her excellent work can be seen on her website at :

http://nati-quill.com.br

Isn't this a refreshing change for somebody to simply email me to say that she liked my book. A testament to the world of crafts and especially of quilling I think?

There are a few blogs which I do enjoy looking at and reading on a regular basis and "Steady On!" is one of my favourites. It helps as I know the blogger, Sharon Bennett, who is a veteran magazine designer, graphic artist and author for David & Charles. As I had lunch with Sharon the other day I realised I was quite up-to-date with her life through reading her blog!   

RUCraft  is a new website from the team at Readers Union, which is affiliated to David & Charles Publishers. It has books and products for sale online with many special offers. I've just had a quick scan over the site and both my "Thrilling Quilling" book and "Cards for Lads and Dads" can be found on the site.

After more than three years living here and at least 6 bird boxes in the garden, a pair of bluetits have finally decided to nest in a box. Actually they look like they are still deliberating, discussing and arguing over this box and another one close by. As I can just look out from my craft room window and watch them zip around, its quite nice company. But this morning I realised the bird box they are interested in is the one closest to my washing line!

And here is another of my projects on the March cover of Crafts Beautiful ! This time it is quilled Lilly of the Valley.

My young niece (4yrs) who has already featured on this blog, was praised at school by her teacher Mrs Rogers, for her craft abilities. As Isabel spends a long time at her own craft table drawing colouring and sorting out I am not surprised. We had good fun one sunday afternoon badgemaking and paper folding. The sequence of folding the pretty paper squares, and then slotting them together appealed to her and we spent a good session making cards. Although I think the badge maker did win overall that afternoon in the favourite craft category as its always a big hit with my nieces and nephews. 

Working at home for alot of the time the radio becomes an essential accessory. I am a fan of Radio 7 and know the programme sequence from 7am to midnight by heart. Unfortunately the Crime and Thrillers hour starts at 9am so as I sat down to make fun beach themed cards for Crafts Beautiful I was listening to a gruesome murder story. I can then flick channel until the next programme begins and Dick Barton Special Agent took a bit of getting used to!  However I must admit to enjoying a saturday morning in my craft room listening to Jonathan Ross - whatever his faults it is cheerful listening. 

Well it has taken 7 years to achieve this but one of my projects has made it to the main feature on the cover of Crafts Beautiful magazine. This edition of March 2009 shows my tea bag folded project using Small Beauties printed papers.

As it is sold in the shops in a wrapper with a mini card booklet on the front the main project is obscured from view until it is opened!  

It is the third year of this blog and whilst only updated about twice per month, it's been interesting to read back over what I've done and where I've been. The trips to the USA in 2006 and 2007 were great fun and I didn't go to the CHA show this year but I hear reports it was half the size due to the down turn in the USA market. There has been a mixed response here as many craft shops have closed but others are reporting good business. The craft magazines are certainly upbeat and going strong at the moment.

Makes me wonder where I'll be in three years time?!

This morning I drove down to the magazine offices in Colchester to drop off a quilling project for Crafts Beautiful. This was a very delicate Lilly of the Valley that I had been working on over the past few days. It had taken a few attempts to get the bell shaped flowers right with the curled petals at the end. Not wanting to risk posting in it and things fall off in transit I jumped in the car. The magazine offices are not as glamorous as might be expected and it is full of people at desks, piles of magazines, more piles of boxes and general paraphanalia! I had a quick meeting with the editor in their "office" which is a corner of the room, with a tiny table and two folding chairs, facing a stack of empty cardboard boxes.....

As we start the new year the magazines are now asking me every week for tips on saving money - they were intrigued to hear my tea bag folding using tomato soup labels. In my enthusiasm to show them how to use these labels I had to stock up on the well know brand Heinz, which is not the cheapest, the economy was false in my case! So my cupboards are once again full of blank tins, which I must put labels on...  

although I write in magazines that I am organised and make my Christmas cards months in advance don't believe everything you read.. even though I have cut the number of handmade quilled cards right down I'm still making a couple of "specials" ...

Yesterday was the last thursday afternoon workshop in this series and as I'm not running the afternoon class next term it might be the last for a while. We all had a festive lunch at the Institute before the class to get in to the Christmas mood. I then cracked the whip and we all got on with rubber stamp heat embossing for two hours to produce some lovely poinsettia cards, with only a short break for some excellent mince pies at half time. So many thanks to the group for their gifts and as some ladies have been to almost every thurday afternoon class for two and a bit years, it was a sad farewell. 

yes it was a workshop of 41 attendees last night at Needham Market, just west of Ipswich. This is the most I have taught in a single session with the record being 20 earlier this year. I only had an hour to convert 40 (one lady already quilled) to the fine craft of quilling.Most had never heard of quilling nor seen it so were keen to look closely at the cards and samples, luckly I took loads. Nearly all managed to make a card by the end and apparently it was rare that this happened so the evening was deemed a success.    

I'm working on a project using bits of denim and luckily Felixstowe has an abundance of charity shops (there must be at least ten and it only has one main street) so I had a good selection of colours and styles to choose from. When I hit my fourth charity shop they had a sale on all the denim but the colour and size I wanted was in the childrens. I felt a bit mean when I got home cutting up small denim trousers - all in the name of design!

Today I was in Norwich at The Range demonstrating glass painting for a manufacturer. These days are good fun and with a steady stream of customers the day flew by. Most people were interested in using the glass paints for cardmaking and so I used peel-off stickers on to acetate and then painted them. I know from many workshops that these go down well. However I always get a few challenging questions and one lady and her daughter wanted to paint wine bottles for a party but when I showed how hard it was to paint a round surface they changed their elaborate design to a more simple design!

my niece (4yrs) sent me a picture and I think she is most definitely a craft designer already. These dancing girls are on my fridge and are very cheerful every time I open the fridge door to snack!  

I have finally finished the ring I started making in a Swarovski workshop back in August ! Beading is more tricky than it looks and needs a fair bit of patience, however I think this is going to be yet another technique I get in to - so much to do and so little time!! 

Today was blood donation day at the Church hall up the road. The process seems to take longer each time as new procedures are introduced however as it was my 25th donation it is worth the hour or so to get my badge. The chap next to me got his 75th donation badge so I have a few years before I get that one!. 

I purchased a set of three seagrass baskets last week for my craft room and they may have to be disposed of already due to the overpowering smell of, well not freshly mown grass as suggested on the internet, but old socks. There is a question on WikiAnswers "what is the smell of seagrass?" This question has not been answered yet, probably due to the fact no words can describe this awful whiff. The pong has not decreased, faded nor improved over time. Every morning I go in to the craft room and the smell is there, I do forget about it until I leave the room and go back in. Now I will have to write to some consumer organisation so they print a warning label on the baskets.

This week I'm trying to get in to the festive spirit for two magazine projects. Its pretty hard out of season ( even though it is wet and miserable outside!) to get any Christmas cheer. A way round it for me is to use hot colours such as pinks, reds and oranges to have a warm but festive feel. Although I just read somewhere that many crafters have already made their 2008 Christmas cards and the shops have begun stocking Christmas crafts so maybe others don't have a problem with out of season crafting?!

The things we crafters do - today is an example. I needed a tin to decorate for my forthcoming book and so I scoured Sainsbury's for suitable tins. Golden syrup is ideal with the 907gram tins, but as I lifted out each tin everyone was slightly dented. As it was on the bottom shelf I had to lift them all out to inspect them but none were any good.

I was very pleased when in Tescos, to scan the magazine section and see my sandcastle card on the front of the "Let's Make Cards" kit. As I am sent a copy of the magazine only, but not the whole pack, I don't get to see what is on the front of the kit as its sold. So after a busy day of sorting out a puncture and many jobs it cheered me up in Tescos - especially as when sent the kit I was asked to make cards for men and boys. Seeing the bikini shape in the kit I improvised and turned it in to flags for the sandcastle! 

post script to yesterdays entry - I closed the craft room door, left it all and went swimming in the sea at Felixstowe. It was hot and sunny and after the initial freezing water it was much more fun than jobs. 

The summer term workshops are all finished now (except for a one day glass painting at the Ipswich Institute in July). The thursday afternoon group have been great as usual with new faces mingling with the old timers, sorry "regular" members of the group! Three of the gang have been to all my sessions at the Ipswich Institute right from the start, so are clocking up a long service award. I have estimated that in the past two years I've run about 80 workshops in total, which has been a lot of hard work in preparation and it can be exhausting, but it is also very enjoyable. This last session we used colour magazines to make cards using collage and punching techniques. Cutting bits of paper is always relaxing and a good way to get over any creative block. But now I have to sort out all the equipment ready for when they start again in September as it soon comes around. I made a list of everything to do over the summer "break" and it was over two pages so I put that away out of sight.

This week has been a busy badge making week using my favourite gadget. I saw my niece and nephew on monday after a meeting at Bristol and we had time after tea to make a few badges. They do the drawings on paper, we cut them out and in to the badge maker they go. With a few turns of the handle, out pop very professional badges - the only problem is stopping for bedtime.

Then yesterday I had an excuse to use it again, as friends visited and brought two little ones along. They also enjoyed it and apparently the Christmas Elves have already been asked to find one!

Just sorting out (and recovering) after an all day glass painting workshop at the Ipswich Institute. There were eleven in the group so we just fitted in to the art room. We started at 10am with painting using peel-off stickers as outlines, to get the hang of the paints, and then moved on to outlining using the tubes of outliner. The lunch was excellent as ususal at the Institute and then we had until 3.30 to continue with the projects. I got the feeling that many didn't want to leave and I think we could have all stayed a bit longer as it was so comfortable.

The April sewing project has been making a mini quilt for a friends baby. The idea of a baby changing mat or lay-upon was given to me by an experienced quilter, and this is a good size project as it is achievable in just a few sewing sittings. This picture shows the front made up of square blocks, and inside is polyester for easy washing. The colours are lilac and green with little butterflies on which hopefully matches the colour scheme of the babys room. Unfortunately as the baby is living in France I might not get to see the quilt in situ for a while!

Just sorting out after demoing at a craft store, Tindalls, in Colchester yesterday. I was showing glass painting on acetate for card making, and had a very enjoyable day. Although it does take some getting used to sitting in the middle of a shop carrying on painting as if I’m siting at home! But there were lots of people to talk to and show the glass painting products so I wasn't alone.

Bank holidays don't mean alot to the self-employed other than emails are quiet, so a snowy and wet Easter didn't bother me at all. In fact I have got on with loads of jobs being confined to the indoors. I finished proof reading the pages of my quilling book on Friday and found one terrible mistake where the wrong photos were next to two steps. I don't know how I missed it first time round but luckily I caught it in time, then I had to go through everything again to make sure nothing else slipped through. After this reading it was great to get on with sewing and I started on a new quilting project - photos later on as its a gift for a friend.

It has been a relaxing day glass painting, a technique I have not done for a long time and have just re-discovered. With so many new gadgets, embellishments and stuff to try its nice to get back to straight forward painting. The glass painting technique uses an outliner to trace the design and then special paints to colour the design. Its something that can take as long as you want and currently I'm decorating jam jars! 

An eventful morning today with the East Anglian Daily Times photographer coming to my house to take pictures of me in my workroom. I was up early to tidy my room of some of the clutter, which involved scooping it in to a box and carting it upstairs out of sight. The photographer called to ask if he could come early which threw me in to a very quick hair drying session and only managed a bit of make-up before he arrived. Then the photos were all over – done and dusted in 9 minutes! He sat me in front of my cards holding my books with the pot plant in the background looking as if it protruded from my head, then into my craft room where I had to pose with some quilling. None of the craft room other than the desk featured so no point in tidying! Before I could say "cheese" he was gone, off to photo the suspect of the murder trial coming out of court. I hope they get the right photo next to my article in the mag!

Just back from visiting the NEC for the trade show Craft, Hobby   + Stitch. Its been a busy 24 hours but the workshop I ran yesterday for 20 retailers went well and the demos on the David &Charles stand were also good fun. As always its nice to see the familiar faces and to meet new ones like Susan Niner-Janes and Paula Pascual whos work I see in the craft magazines. The highlight was being taken out to lunch by my publishers, a sandwich and drink in the NEC canteen!! - its a glamorous life I lead with lots of perks!

The epic journey to Newton Abbot (7 hours) was to take the quilled items for photography. This is for my fourth book with David & Charles "Thrilling Quilling" which is out later this year. I didn't want to risk posting the quilling incase it got damaged and as the styled photography, where props and backgrounds are carefully arranged, is so vital to the look of the book. The photographer used for styled shots is based in Totnes, with a studio above a fudge shop in the main street. As the styling takes so long only about 6 to 9 photos are taken in one day! 

I've just noticed it is the 2 year anniversary of this blog - how time flies!

It has been a busy time proof reading and checking the first pages of my quilling book, available later this year. The design team at David & Charles publishers mock up the pages with the text and the photographs as a first draft. These are sent to myself and the editor to amend. Some text doesn't fit so it has to be shortened and some has to be added to aswell as all the corrections. The editor has the hardest job as she does not practise all the crafts of the books she edits. So for her one week might be editing a cake decorating book, then a beading book etc so to get to grips with quilling I have sent a kit to her as some things are very hard to put in to words! 

It has been a noisy weekend looking after my niece and nephew in the Cotswolds. The journey was eventful with a snowfall resulting in an unexpected stay at a pub called the "Hollow Bottom" and because it is a racing pub my room was called "Mrs Muck" !  When I did make it to theirs, saturday was building a moderate size snowman and using the rest of the available snow to have a snowball fight.

It has been an eventful few days culminating with me in my sick bed. Wednesday I visited my nephew (and sister who was by his side) in hospital which was fine and although he was wired up he wasn't too bad. Thursday afternoon I had an appointment at BBC Radio Suffolk to talk cards but due to the BBC embargo on prizes and competitions I wasn't allowed to give any books away. Georgina was sitting in for Luke and set me a challenge to make a card on air – it certainly was a challenge as I was given a folder, bubble wrap and brown tape to work with! I did not succeed at the challenge! However as I was stricken with a stomach bug later that evening ( caught from my nephew on the Wednesday but his parents strenuously deny he was the cause) I can claim extenuating circumstances I think, as I was clearly not on top form! Although my nephew was out of hospital for his first birthday on Saturday, unfortunately I had to miss it and stay at home feeling sorry for myself!

Yesterday was my Christmas lunch and being self-employed it could have been quite lonely with nobody to pull a cracker with! But with just a few organising emails I met three other designers, Jill, Sharon and Amanda for lunch at a Bury St Edmunds. We all work from home and write articles for the same magazines but as we have our own specialities we are not in competition. It was a great three hours of nattering and felt like an office party!

This morning was an early start as I went to an upper school in Ipswich to sit in on two art classes. Monday morning is usually a quiet sorting out time for me so it was a challenge to get to school for 8.30 to be in the classroom ready. The year 7's were the first group in and were continuing to work on a project. They started by colour mixing and then drawing an apple. At the end was a mini crit, just as at art school, where the group look at each others work and comment. Merit stickers were given out by teachers and students. I was pleased to give a Van Gogh inspired apple a merit sticker and made somebody's day. The year 9's were more of a challenge with college work but not as terrifying as I had expected. All in all the morning was very interesting and really enjoyable.

From the publishers of Crafts Beautiful, Quick and Crafty, Let's Make Cards! there is now another magazine called Let's get Crafting, just launched this week. This in a similar format to Let’s Make Cards! with a magazine and kit (available from all good newsagents and supermarkets). The kit this month contains sequins, festive foam stamps, stickers, card blanks and patterned papers. You can see my projects on pages 8-10.

Friday was a sprint up to the NEC for the Hobbycrafts show. It was beautiful weather in Suffolk and then just as I was approaching Birmingham a dark cloud blocked out the sun! Still I made it in to the show in the dry, and had a quick whizz around before my meeting. I did manage to buy several items in a very short space of time and I really enjoy watching the demonstrations. I do sympathise with the lady demonstration glitter sprays to be used with rubber stamping, as I stood in front of her just as she was about to a take a break. These demonstrators work very hard during the four day show and still manage to keep smiling and to be enthusiastic. I much prefer to attend as a shopper!

My evening workshops are underway at Suffolk New College. This was formerly called Suffolk College but it has split in two with the creation of a University so they have added the word "new" to the college title! My workshops are held in the old college block which will be pulled down when the new buildings are finished. And I won’t be sorry to see it demolished as its an ugly building not conducive to teaching. The college and university are building on several sites and there is so much development here in Ipswich it is constantly changing, especially down at the docks. Even when I drive around Ipswich several building have gone up a couple of stories in a week so its all good for the town.

Last night I was invited to run a quilling workshop at a house in Ipswich for a small group. It had been in my dairy for several months and I had it all planned. I had not met the lady whos house it was going to be held in but I had driven past previously and found the entrance. All ready and eager I arrived, was shown to the room, and started to unload. As we got chatting I was checking what time I should finish when I looked at my watch I had a moment of horror as I realised I had arrived an hour earlier than planned. The lady and husband had been far too polite to mention this fact and thought I might need an hour to set up for the workshop! So a tad embarrassed I drove home (only 4 minutes away) and returned at the correct time. However, the evening went very well and I believe I have converted a few more to quilling, but I must remember to check the little hand and not just the big hand when reading the time...

The Pilot Pen halloween project can be seen on the front page of the Pilot Pen  website along with downloadable intructions and templates.  

Today is being spent sorting out after a day of photography yesterday. My craft room looks like it was hit by a tornado and burglars simultaneously. I use every inch of floor space and shelving to lay everything out and then the night before its a frantic search to find essential items as I pack the boxes ready to load in the morning.

Yesterday, at Felixstowe was the annual "Art on the Prom" event which was well worth a visit for the chance to see (and buy) original, local art displayed outside on a lovely sunny day. This one day community event is run by volunteers and supported by local businesses in Felixstowe. All forms of art from textiles, sculpture, prints and paintings, were displayed along the beach front from the Spa Pavilion to the Pier. The art was for sale and given that about 15,000 visitors attended yesterday I hope the local artists made some money aswell as had a good day at the beach! 

This week I have been without a computer as my PC went in for servicing and updating. Not having emails when working at home is quite odd as it might be the only contact I have with the outside world during the day! And not having the internet to quickly check things was like having a limb chopped off! However as my niece and nephew were in Suffolk visiting it was a good opportunity to spend a day with them. We had an excellent morning on Felixstowe beach playing and as their Dad (he got the blame) had not packed their buckets and spades, we improvised and used our hands and feet to build sandcastles.  

Yes this weekend has been halloween in the house. Pumpkins, black cats, owls, ghosts and bats have been made out of paper and decorated with gold and silver pens for a project which will be displayed on the Pilot Pens  website in October. The pumpkins were great fun to make with differing sizes of wiggly eyes that I picked up in Tescos recently – the craft section and childrens craft section of Tescos have some good items that are always worth a look. Pumpkin invitations, place cards, a mobile and tags were all made in bright oranges and I was very pleased with the bat drinking straw decoration, which when put in a glass of Ribena, looks as ifits drinking blood!!

This week was certainly busy with two all day workshops. The keen crafting group is serious about learning so we work pretty hard with new techniques and using various tools. Thursday was an all day workshop at the Ipswich Institute where we had plenty of time to get stuck in to making cards. On our regular Thursday two hour slots I rush the group along and suddenly the time is up - they hardly catch their breath! but yesterday we had time to chat and relax. We also enjoyed a lunch in the restaurant at the Ipswich Institute which was excellent – its worth joining the Institute for the restaurant alone!

The weather held out for Clare Priory Craft Fair today and I hope it does tomorrow. This craft fair is worth a visit as it is held at the Augustinian Priory in the pretty village of Clare, near to Sudbury.

Clare Priory is one of the oldest religious houses in England situated in the shadows of Clare Castle, on the banks of the River Stour, Suffolk. Established in 1248, at the invitation of Richard de Clare, it was the first house of the Austin (Augustinian) Friars in England. It has had many owners and uses until the Augustinian Friars purchased the house in 1953 and returned to their origins in England. Clare Priory today acts as a Parish and as a Retreat Centre. See http://www.clarepriory.org.uk/

It's the time of year for the Norwich Art School final degree shows - it's now two years since I graduated so it was good to return and have a look around. I saw a few familiar faces belonging to people who were First Year students when I graduated. The standard and the layout of the work was very good this year. I also managed to pop in and see a fellow artists studio. Brigitte and I were in the same printmaking group at Norwich and she has developed a working silkscreen printing studio for her large pieces of work. I was most impressed with her set up and her work can be seen at www.brigittehague.com.  Brigitte has had a number of successful exhibitions since graduating but it has still been hard work. I don't think many people visiting galleries or exhibitions realise just how hard it is to be a full time artist and I certainly didn't appreciate it when I first began a creative career. I think it was lucky I didn't think about the practicalities too much or I never would have gone to Norwich in the first place, so there is alot to be said for ignorance in bliss!

Work on my newest nephew's quilt has been hindered by some design problems lately. I decided to make it up as I go along only to be unpicking quite alot. The excellent treasure map fabric found at Quilters Haven started the theme along with wanting to get him in to the sailing/pirate spirit early on. I went along to Wickham Market to pick up more supplies on Saturday only to find a coach party from Hertfordshire had taken over Quilters Haven for the day. These serious quilt makers put me to shame as I had remembered the colour swatches but forgotten to take the measurements I needed.

Just recovering from a short trip to visit the David & Charles crowd in Newton Abbot. Sundays drive down was mostly in the wet but there was a short spell of sunshine, before more rain as I reached the hotel. This is my fourth visit and I think it has rained every time. Still it is always good to go in to the David & Charles offices and actually meet the people that I speak to on the phone. We had a "flat plan" meeting which irons out some of the details of the initial book planning with the commissioning editor, desk editor and layout designer. So now I can get on with preparing the advance material, and try to make all the things I said I could…

Alder Carr is a farm shop, tea shop and a few other shops, located at Creeting St Mary near to Needham Market, here in Suffolk. It was two of my workshop ladies which told me about this place and one afternoon we had a trip out there to visit in particular the textile shop.

Whilst in this fantastic shop, Vycombe Arts, I got chatting to the owner, Gem and this has led me to run a cardmaking workshop in June (see workshops ). The shop is full of fabric paints, dyes and lots of items for textile arts. Not only is it full of tempting products it is located in the beautiful Dove Cote, a two story tall wooden building where all space is utilised. Gem is passionate about textiles and I came away inspired and buzzing with ideas. So I have now gone full circle back to textiles where I began with the Open College of the Arts back in 2000!

This morning was a fun but intense session learning how to airbrush at the HQ of Let's Make Cards! magazine in Colchester (also the home of Crafts Beautiful, Quick & Crafty mags). The Air Brush Company provided the equipment and four of us had fun playing around to achieve the various techniques. I'm a beginner on Photoshop so I have used the airbrushing tool on a computer but it was a very different experience to use the actual gadget and required quite a bit of co-ordination. The results were pretty impressive and I will certainly be trying out a few of these effects at home – they may well crop up in future magazine articles!

The week before Easter was pretty hectic finishing off the order of services, menu cards and place cards for my friends wedding. However everything made it over to France safely ready for the wedding on Easter Saturday. The ceremony took place in the town hall, and the bride was able to walk there from her house in bright sunshine. The town hall was packed and although only held 50 people I counted about 100 in the room and not including those on the stairs. So I was certainly glad I had made extra order of services!

Whilst I am very lucky to now have a dedicated craft room it seems it just isn't big enough. I stopped in at Ikea yesterday to buy more shelves and even though these have now been built and installed, they have been filled with craft stuff. So now I am planning to buy the next set of shelves to reach the ceiling and maximize all space available.

Recently I was asked by the magazine if I used any recycled products or ethically produced materials in my crafting. This set me to thinking quite a lot about our craft industry. Recycling has cropped up before but I couldn’t really put my hand on heart and say I used ethically produced materials. I worry about the ready made quilled items imported from China, because quilling requires a lot of dexterity and good eyesight, repetitive strain injury will be a very real problem for the workers making these items. And whilst I am glad to see quilling on cards in major highstreet shops again I worry about the ethics of manufacture. However, this week I eased my conscience a little by getting stuck in to papier mache. Using old newspapers, cardboard boxes, sweet wrappers, balloons and plastic bottles was a completely different mind set to usual but a very welcome one. I enjoyed the challenge and I hope to become a bit greener in my crafting.

Yesterday was a run over to Birmingham to the NEC for a craft trade show, and for those who know me no I didn’t take my Morris Minor, I borrowed my Dad’s car! It’s a long journey over but once inside the hall it makes the effort worth while. After a few years in this business I know quite a few people and it is great to walk along the isles and then spot a familiar face – although I must say Ali and Jenny from David&Charles claimed not to recognise me, muttering something about my change of hair colour! Since the D&C head offices are in Newton Abbot I generally don’t get a chance to see them face to face other than at these shows. So after a couple of quick meetings I rushed over the Crafts Beautiful stand to get my certificate for runner up Favourite Book 2006. A few photos later and I headed back to the car park. Unfortunately I had committed the classic error of not noting where I had parked the car. NEC car parks don’t have many landmarks and so it was a good 20 minutes until I found it. And yes I will do as one helpful man shouted out "put a balloon on it next time" !!

Craft Awards 2006 The results are In!

Last week I was lucky enough to pop along to the CHA (Craft and Hobby Association) show held this year at the Anaheim Convention Centre in Orange County, California. Arriving at my hotel late Friday night I was beginning to think I should have stayed at home but Saturday morning was sunny (and dry) so I decided to beat the jet lag and get the bus to the beach. The bus journey turned out to be alot longer than I had anticipated however I saw a good cross section of Orange County and a considerable amount of fast food places. Once at Newport Beach I had a quick paddle in the Pacific and a walk along the coast enjoying the sunshine.

Whilst many shoppers moan that as soon as Christmas is over the supermarkets fill isles with Easter eggs I am always glad of this early promotion. As Mothers Day projects had to be in to the magazines before Christmas, due to the long lead times, January is then taken up with designing Easter projects. So when out at Tescos the other day I was stocking up with mini eggs to use in some way in a card or possibly a decorated Easter gift. It would make sense to save some eggs from last year knowing that I’ll need them again however it never quite works out that way!

Many people often tell me I should sell my cards at craft fairs, eBay or parties etc but I always say that batch production of identical cards is really monotonous and I prefer the designing side – however I have just completed 110 wedding invitations for an old school friend and I have quite enjoyed it!

Its been a busy afternoon with my first "Open House" session - which I thought was a huge success and I hope my visitors thought so too!  So many thanks to all the ladies for coming along - I hope you all enjoyed the afternoon as much as I did.

Thank you to my second group of card making ladies at the Ipswich Institute workshops. Everyone did extremely well and there were some wonderful cards made. Rosina must get a special mention for not only decorating the front of her cards with all the techniques, she then extended the decoration to the reverse and inside of the cards, so the theme was carried through with great effect - well done!

My good intentions have started reasonably early this year – I usually aim to make my Christmas cards and even a few presents in October/November time. This never happens as I faff around and it is usually mid December before I really knuckle down to anything. So this year, having completed my Christmas card book and preaching how people really must start early, I decided I had better put my words in to actions! On Saturday afternoon I went along to a bag making workshop at Quilters Haven in Wickham Market, not far from Ipswich.

Its been a busy few days after moving house at the weekend and then yesterday Sarah (editor) and Anthony (photographer) from the new magazine "Let's Make Cards!" came along to my house to photograph me "at home" in my craft den. This was good timing as the only occasion my numerous belongings are tidy is just after I have moved house and tried to have a sort out.

It took about 3 hours to take quite a few photos of me so I hope at least one turns out well. I impressed myself with three costume changes in this time so there was some variety to the photos. Although I was pleased with how my craft den looked, it was stylised and tweaked a little bit for the camera! All will be revealed in Issue 2 of "Let's Make Cards!" out in December.

Today was the last card making session in this series and I was sorry to say goodbye to my group of ten ladies at the Ipswich Institute. Thursday afternoons have been action packed as I whizzed the group through six techniques :-

I was simultaneously impressed and put to shame by my workshop ladies today. In the first workshop at the beginning of the course, back in September, I gave out a small square of kitchen foil, cocktail stick and tube of PVA glue to each attendee. I have found it easiest to tell the group to squirt a bit of glue out on to the foil, apply it with a cocktail stick and then at the end of the workshop I can throw both foil and cocktail stick away, avoiding any mess. This week when I started handing out fresh pieces of tin foil, half of the group got out their foil from several weeks ago which they had folded and kept neatly not wanting to throw it away. They had also kept their cocktail sticks ready to re-use. Whilst I was very pleased with their thriftyness I realised just how I should be recycling more!

Yes my patchwork quilt has finally been finished after eight months! I thought I was about to finish several times only to find I was short of material as the top and bottom layers didn’t match up, the top was several inches larger than the bottom layer. An emergency trip to Quilters Haven at Wickham Market for half a metre was needed and I zoomed out there on a mission not just to buy what I needed but to make sure I wasn’t distracted into purchasing the material for another quilting project. The bolts of material are very seductive which I resisted, but I did buy some fluffy wool to start some knitting which I'm not too good as but as the nights get longer knitting seems appropriate.

I had hoped to be further on however progress has been made with the top is finished and the cotton wadding quilted on. I decided to make the bottom layer with larger blocks in order to make it faster to sew and when laying it out found I was half a metre short. So another trip to Quilters Haven for more supplies which I think makes it one shopping trip per month since January. However, the end is in sight and this has been a good exercise for me as a contrast to making cards which are generally designed and made in a day.

From the publishers of Crafts Beautiful and Quick & Crafty! a new magazine will hit the shelves next month. It’s a new concept for a magazine in that not only card ideas are provided but also the papers, card blanks and items needed to make the cards are included. This makes the magazine a bit more pricey than the others but it seems a good idea to get both inspiration and cardmaking kit in one go. You will find my contribution to the mag on the "dilemmas" page where I answer readers questions and offer advice alongside two other card designers.

Well the cards and tags are finished, the manuscript was sent off to the publishers, David & Charles, last week and now I must start the awful task of tidying my craft workroom. I brought a couple of Dutch friends who are visiting England to my house yesterday and showed them around. All was normal and tidy in the house until they reached the craft room and then Mieke and Nol were a little amused that they could not see what colour the carpet was because it was covered with papers, tools and equipment. They had to view the room from the door and peek round. However I’ve got used to it and I have accepted this is the way I work so I don’t even try to tidy anymore until it really gets to the stage I can’t even get to my chair.

I’ve just returned from another chat on BBC Radio Suffolk, with Luke Deal who presents the afternoon slot. This time it was quite scary being on the radio because I followed a very interesting interview with Sir David Frost talking about the Two Ronnies, so I hope listeners weren’t too disappointed with the change of subject to "Cards for Lads and Dads"! Unfortunately those people stuck on the A14 in a traffic jam probably didn’t have much choice but to listen to me. And I do wonder what the competition winner made of the two prizes he received; a Two Ronnies DVD and an advance copy of my book.

The blog diary has suffered during this heatwave, so has my general craft production with the 90degree heat in my craft workroom from 10am until 10pm, but usual service hopefully resumed soon.

Open Studios are a great way to meet artists at work as described in the previous blog but degree shows are a way of seeing the work.of the next generation of students.  The degree show is where final year art students from all disciplines, exhibit together and the art school is open to members of the public. Many pieces of work are for sale and students will be only too pleased to sell to start paying off their debts!

Every weekend in June over 130 artists living and working in Suffolk open their studios to the public. This is a great chance to see artists at work in their natural environment, to buy original art and to be inspired. Last Saturday, as part of Suffolk Open Studios, I was at Gainsborough’s House Print Workshop in Sudbury. This is a museum, art gallery and busy print workshop at the birthplace of Thomas Gainsborough. As a member of the print workshop I went along to demonstrate wood engraving and answer any questions visitors may have had. There were a number of printmakers there using different print techniques and quite a few visitors streamed in at lunchtime. The workshop is a great place to meet like minded people and to pick up tips, hints and ideas on printmaking but if you are visiting it is a great way to see behind the scenes to processes such as etching, screen printing or relief printing which you may only know by name.

Yesterdays workshop at the Ipswich Institute was another rewarding afternoon. In two hours I managed to introduce 14 ladies into the not-so-secret craft of card making. The Ipswich Institute is a very friendly place located in the centre of town with great facilities such as café and restaurant but they also have a varied selection of courses.

Well I didn’t need another craft to become addicted to but I found quilt making over a year ago and resisted the pull until January this year. After purchasing ten "fat quarters" of a co-ordinating set of fantastic fabrics I set about making my first proper full sized quilt. I had made my niece Isabel a fish themed small quilt and so I knew the basics of fast piecing however I decided to make up my own pattern so it would be truly unique. This has been an advantage and a slight time delay. I have nearly finished the top and so I am almost ready to add the cotton wadding but this is proving to be an expensive hobby so I’m spreading the cost out over several months – hopefully I’ll post a picture here shortly!

Last week was taken over by preparations for a days photo shoot in London for "Quick & Clever Christmas Cards and Tags". It takes me at least 3 days of preparation for one day of photography as I have to have every step of a propject pre-prepared ready. This involves making several itentical items as the project is built up through the steps. I travel down to Karl the photographers studio in the East End of London as I find it easier to go to his studio than him bringing all the lights, backdrop and table to my house – plus I don’t have enough space here for it all. So I catch the train (which is much easier now I live in Ipswich) and carry my large plastic boxes containing all I need, with me. The commuters give me a passing glance but no more! At Liverpool Street I jump in to a black cab and head off to the studio.

Easter Sunday was exciting and scary as I had a 5 minute slot on BBC radio Suffolk with presenter Georgina Wroe. Georgina asked me on to her show to talk card making and had set me the task of making a card from the items found on an office desk. This unusual challenge had kept me busy before the show but I did manage to make a card using bright Post-It notes folded tea-bag style (see gallery) and another using a hole punch to make a dotty background. These proved quite difficult to explain on radio but it was a fun few minutes seeing behind the scenes of live radio, and well done to the lucky winner of my book!

Working from home has many perks but the main disadvantage is apparent during cold weather. These past weeks the arctic weather has been a trial to those of us who cannot justify putting the heating on all day. I have found a pair of old ski trousers works very well and when talking on the phone the other person cannot see how many layers of clashing colours I am wearing. Unfortunately, in the summer the reverse happens with my craft room over heating. Fans are on with window and doors wedged open to create some draft but not too much or papers blow around.

The craft magazines I create projects for often set me a "designer challenge" whereby I am sent a bundle of papers, ribbons, sequins, beads etc. and my challenge is to then create cards and other items from this bundle. Occasionally this has proved more of a challenge than I expect but it's always interesting to try out new products.

The past week was dominated by checking and double checking the proofs of my second book. Even though my contractual deadline for the photos and text was last October the process certainly doesn’t end there.

Back to my usual Monday morning after a fun week in Las Vegas at the CHA (Craft & Hobby Association show) show. Held at the Las Vegas Convention centre (a more appealing version of the NEC) it was an Aladdin’s cave of crafts. It is a huge trade show with suppliers and buyers from all over the world. I went along to have a look around but also to demonstrate papercrafts on the F&W Publications booth. This was a great opportunity to chat to crafters and other authors – something I miss when working at home.