Mug Makeover

Just a quick post today, with a share of a coffee mug makeover.

We picked up a couple of these mugs at the end of a conference when the exhibitor just wanted to get rid of them all. They are a decent size with a well-fitting lid, but had an advert on them which I decided to cover up.

I acquired some adhesive vinyl then used my Silhouette to cut both a circle large enough to cover the original advert, and the initial A in a stencil font sized to fit the circle. Quick and simple, but I now have a personalised mug rather than carrying an advert around with me.

Before and After

I've never used vinyl before, and don't know how well it will stand up to being washed. Hopefully it will last at least a few months and won't all peel off straight away.

Tote Bag Makeover

If you are a regular around here, you'll know that we like a cruise for our main holiday each year. Our sea days have a fairly predictable timetable and there are certain things that I like to carry around the ship with me, but I don't have a suitable bag and I've been 'making do' for years. This summer I started to look for something that would suit my needs, a bag with enough pockets to organise my paraphernalia, including a spot to keep a drink bottle upright. I failed to find anything I liked and was planning to make my own when I went to a conference and was given a tote bag that was about the right size, but was branded and still lacked the pockets I wanted. 

However, I decided that this bag was a good basis for what I wanted and that it would be much easier to adapt this one than to make a new one from scratch.

I raided my fabrics box and found an offcut of cotton canvas which I could use for the internal pockets, and the quilt cover that I made for our son when he was a toddler (he's now 27), which I decided to cut up and repurpose. The farmyard print may have been bought for a child's room but I don't feel that the colours and pattern are themselves childish.

Internally, the bag already had one pocket, shown at the bottom of the photo above. I added a large one suitable for my puzzle book and kindle with a small one for pen and pencil on the opposite side, and a sleeve at one end to hold my drink bottle. The main body of the bag still has space for a jumper or cardigan, something that didn't fit in my previous bag and I often ended up carrying separately.

At this point, the stitching for the pockets showed through to the outside of the bag, but that didn't matter as I intended to cover it. I used the original bag as a template for the cover and attached the two together with a double line of stitching around the top.

My sewing is a bit wonky in places, but overall I am very happy with my new tote bag and looking forward to using it this summer. 

February Pages

Time for my round-up of this month's pages. I started February with the intention of completing my 2023 annual album, but I had to edit and order another batch of photos first. That lead to me tackling the backlog in my 'Parkrun Continued' album while I waited for the prints to arrive. This album is 8x8 which gave me a quandary for page numbering this year. Should they count as whole pages when they are less work than their 12x12 brethren? I decided to count them as half-pages as their total surface area is 64 square inches while a 12x12 page is 144 square inches; less than half the surface area but they still need all the elements to be a finished page. Six parkrun pages later, and half-way through the month, I picked up the 2023 pages again (but still haven't quite finished the album).

12. Walking with The Snowman
Technically this was from the first weekend of 2024, but it's probably going in the 2023 album as it feels like it belongs with Christmas 2023.

Supplies: Cardstock - Papermania; Paper - Vicki Boutin Color Study, Pebbles Merry Merry; Letters - Doodlebug, EK Success; Wood Veneer Stars - Studio Calico; Paper Tape & Enamel Dots - Unknown

12.5 V25

My first February DT page for Twilight Crafts, using their Triangle Arrows Background cut-file to mark the 25th time we volunteered at our home parkrun.

Supplies: Cardstock - DCWV; Paper - 7 Dots Studio Illumination; Letters - American Crafts; Enamel Shapes - My Mind's Eye; Cut-File - Twilight Crafts

13. North Yorkshire Water Park

A spot of parkrun tourism, made using scraps.

Supplies: Cardstock - DCWV; Paper - My Mind's Eye Wild Asparagus; Letters - EK Success; Enamel Heart - Marianne Designs

13.5 Parke

Following a challenge in the Snap Scrap Repeat Facebook page to use a black background, mixed media, yellow, patterned paper and a heart.

Supplies: Paper - Craft Sensations Chalkboard, Make & Create Moments; Label Sticker - Tim Holtz; Journal Card & Washi Tape - Unknown; Enamel Heart - Marianne Designs

14. Killerton

More parkrun tourism and more scraps, using the February sketch from For the Love of Pretty Paper.

Supplies: Cardstock - Bazzill, Papermania; Paper - K & Co Studio K; Letters - October Afternoon; Gems - TPC Studio; Puffy Stickers - Unknown

14.5 We're Back!

Going back to 2021 and the first parkrun after Covid restrictions were lifted, with a tic-tac-toe challenge from Snap Scrap Repeat where I chose arrows, rainbow and green.

Supplies: Paper - Unknown Stripe; Numbers - Fancy Pants; Letters - Simple Stories; Border Sticker - Ruby Rock-It; Rainbow Die-Cut - Heidi Swapp

15. Milestones and Tourism

This is the opening page of my 'Parkrun Continued' album and uses the Bike and Tree cut-file (without the bike) from Twilight Crafts as the tree is a lot like the one in the parkrun logo.

Supplies: White Cardstock; Paper - Simple Stories, Unknown Green; Cut-File - Twilight Crafts

16. Slices of the Southern Upland Way

Documenting my husband's 6 day walk on one of Scotland's Great Trails.

Supplies: Paper - Pinkfresh Studio Good Times, Pinkfresh Studio Happy Holidays, Jen Hadfield Warm & Cozy, Maggie Holmes Chasing Dreams; Letters - October Afternoon; Word Sticker - Studio Calico; Enamel Dots - Carta Bella, My Mind's Eye 

17. Cruise Scandinavia

A summary page for our summer holiday (which has its own album too). This was my second DT page of the month for Twilight Crafts, using their Covid Memes Polaroid cut-file with the wording removed.

Supplies: White Cardstock; Paper - Studio Calico Heyday, Amy Tangerine Stay Sweet; Letters - American Crafts; Stickers - Tim Holtz, Studio Calico; Unknown Washi Tape; Pearls - Mark Richards; Cut-File - Twilight Crafts

18. & 19. South West Coast Path 11

A double page for the final instalment of my husband and father-in-law walking the 630 miles of the SWCP (which they started in 2008). 

Supplies: Cardstock - Bazzill, DCWV; Paper - Craft Creations, Flair Design; Letters - American Crafts, Glitz Design; Phrase Stickers - Tim Holtz; Pearls - Artoz; Enamel Dots - Freckled Fawn, My Mind's Eye, Carta Bella

I've also made a couple of cards, both based on this month's card sketch from Stick It Down,

and finally, a cute little box which I made following a video by Helen Ding for Hey Little Magpie.

Disclosure - I receive digital cut-files free of charge from Twilight Crafts as part of my DT role. All other supplies are my own.

Travel Notebook

Before

Whenever we cruise, I use a small notebook to gather together relevant information about each port of call all in one place, e.g. arrival and departure times, currency exchange rates, notes on public transport, entry times and price for museums, etc. I have a few travel-themed notebooks, but this time I have decorated an old one that was past its best.

My original notebook had a geometric print with glitter details, but the glitter was flaking off so I decided to rub it all off and recover it. I started by covering the spine in washi rape, and then cut a 6x6 paper down to cover the front. The paper had a few stamps and tickets printed at the bottom, to which I added some stamping and a few clear stickers.

Supplies
Paper - My Mind's Eye Hello World
Washi Tape - Unknown
Stickers - Maggie Holmes
Ink - Ranger, Memento

Tools
Scrapberry's Compass Stamp
Studio Calico Word Stamps

Travel Document Wallet

These month we've had a collaboration between For the Love of Pretty Paper and Paper, Scissors, Story over on Facebook. Cal Summers has offered four free classes for two mini-books, making a waterfall on a page and a 12x12 wallet.

The first project that I chose was the wallet, but I've adapted it to be 9x12, a little bigger than A4. I plan to use it for my next cruise to hold all the maps and leaflets that I accumulate at each port we visit.

The 12x12 version uses four sheets each of cardstock and patterned paper but my smaller version only needed three (so long as I cut carefully). I made the wallet from grey cardstock, and picked the blue papers from a travel-themed pad by Simply Made Crafts to cover it. 

I don't have any matching embellishments for this pad (I don't think the company produce them, just the paper pads) so I looked at a couple of other travel collections for pieces to decorate the front of my wallet.

I started with the suitcases and the frame which I backed with grey patterned paper, all from Pink Paislee's Atlas collection. I also looked at Simple Stories' Travel Notes stickers and picked out all the clear passport stamps to add to the front of the wallet. The stickers all had cities that I'm unlikely to visit in the next couple of years so this seemed like a good place to use them up rather than have them stick around in my stash forever.

Finally, I made a co-ordinating piece for the top flap on my wallet. I die-cut a ticket from the same grey paper as I had backed the frame, and looked for red, yellow and blue stickers to pull the suitcases colours up here. The pennant and car stickers are both from Travel Notes and I chose washi tape for the yellow.

Supplies
Cardstock - Stampin' Up!
Paper - Simply Made Crafts Travel Keepsakes, Pink Paislee Atlas
Frame - Pink Paislee Atlas
Stickers - Simple Stories Travel Notes
Washi Tape - Dovecraft
Ink - Ranger

Tools
Big Shot & X-Cut Ticket Stubs Die
X-Cut Corner Punch

A Box of Promise

Our son would like a new board game for Christmas, but production has been delayed and it won't be released until sometime in 2020; that means that we gave him a promise to buy it later for Christmas, and I made a small box to contain that promise so that he would still have something to open today.

It was a simple box to make, being a free design from the Silhouette store (Snowflake Box - Design 309553), which I resized and cut in two colours of cardstock. My blade's getting worn now and it didn't cut all of the design, so I left part of it just as an outline.

A piece of advice - should you choose to cut this box (or any other 3D design), I'd suggest that you use cardstock with a coloured core. My red cardstock had a white core which is really obvious around the edges, though it was also quite useful where the design didn't cut fully as you can still see the outline.

Chocolate Tin Makeover

I generally get my photos printed in batches and then keep them in separate envelopes (one per planned page) until I scrapbook them. Until recently, those envelopes have sat in an untidy pile on my desk, threatening to topple over at any moment, but a couple of weeks ago I rediscovered an old tin which was once filled with chocolates, a tin that I hadn't thrown away because it looked like it could be useful, but it hasn't been useful for the past three years judging by the 'best before' date on its base.

I've been trialling it as a photo storage tin, a home for my teetering pile of envelopes and it's working well. I wasn't sure at first, but now that I am thinking of it as my photo tin rather than just a tin I know that this is a permanent change, and I decided to decorate the top.

I chose the letter stickers first - old ones that I don't generally like for titles as the letters are a mix of upper and lower case (though that didn't bother me here), and then went through my scraps box for a piece of paper that was large enough to cover the lid and that would work with both the cream tin and the black letters. I found this spotty one, added a strip of washi tape and stuck down my letters before finishing off with the last of a pack of black pearls.

Washi Tape Storage

My washi tape storage solution is dead simple. A couple of years ago, I altered a tin for a challenge, and my washi tape has been stored in it ever since. It's decidedly low-tech, and I need to tip them all out to get to any but the top few. However this means that I am regularly looking at my tapes, and I have a good idea of the colours and patterns that I own.

Recently though, my collection has expanded beyond the capacity of that tin, and I have little stacks on the shelf next to it, little stacks that are easy to knock over and then I have to hunt them down from wherever they roll to.

Being the hoarder crafter that I am, I not only have another tin, but I have another sheet of the bird paper. However, when I went to use it I spotted a floral from the same collection and decided to cover my new tin in that paper instead.

I used a glue stick to adhere the paper to the tin, and covered the join with washi tape (what else?). 

I'm happy that my washi tape rolls can't escape any more, I've used a tin that I was keeping 'in case it's useful', and I even have room for a few more rolls. However, I think that two tins should be my limit. They hold about 25 rolls each, and no-one needs more than 50 rolls of washi tape, do they?

Ink Applicator Pad Storage Booklet

I used not to see the point of the Ranger ink applicator tool; I was quite happy inking my papers directly from my ink pads. Then I got some Distress inks, and found that the ink pads were firmer than my Docrafts/Papermania pads, and that made them harder to use. Then I bought a new Docrafts pad and it was too 'juicy', giving me streaks of ink instead of soft edges. 

So when I won a Papermaze gift voucher last autumn I treated myself to the tool, which came with two foam pads. It did actually make inking the edges of my papers considerably easier and I wished I'd bought one sooner. I kept the two pads for black and brown ink, and stored them in small plastic bags when not in use. Most of the time though, one was in use; the tool has practically lived on my desk since I bought it.

Last month, I bought a set of refill pads for use with other colours, and gave myself a new problem. Just where was I going to keep all these pads? And how would I know which one was which colour? I considered some kind of plastic pocket system, but didn't really want to buy something new. Finally I hit on another idea, one which would use up some old supplies, and I made a mini book with velcro pieces to hold the foam pads.

I started by covering a pair of chipboard album covers with paper on both sides, running washi tape down the spines. I used old, thin paper for this as it's easier to manipulate:

Then I  added small squares of self-adhesive velcro in a grid. My covers had space for 12 foam pads, six each side, and I added a small label to each place for the colour names:

I then cut down a piece of square scalloped chipboard, and added it between the covers. I didn't cover this piece; it will lie against the inky sides of the foam pads, and will absorb the ink better that way:

Finally I decorated the front cover, keeping it quite simple as I didn't want anything bulky or that would snag in use:

I am really rather pleased with the way it turned out, and now I'm looking for other things to alter to match.

Supplies
Teresa Collins Bracket Shaped Covers
Scalloped Chipboard
Self-Adhesive Velcro
Papers - K&Company Sea Glass
Washi Tape - Queen & Co
Labels - 7Gypsies
Ink - Docrafts, Ranger
Craft Creatives Alphabet Stamps