It's been a brain frying week

It has definitely been "one of those" weeks this week, I really feel as if my feet have not touched the ground. It started beautifully on Monday when I taught my Triple Decker class to eight lovely, lovely ladies. They all made a fabulous job of their projects and we had a lot of laughs along the way too. Then my delivery of the new colours of Tim Holtz/Ranger Distress Stains and Perfect Pearl Mists arrived. Poor Karen, she unpacked and priced hundreds of them. Sorted out all the pre-orders ready for shipping the next day  and then all the class ladies descended upon her to make their Distress Stain purchases. One of my lovely classroom girlies  flew down from Scotland to take this class and it was a great opportunity for her to meet up with some of her Tweeting buddies. Shopping done and dusted, Gillian, Jo, Gabrielle, Hels, the lovely Karen and myself all trotted across the road to our favourite watering hole for what is now known as our Tweet'n'meet!!! Think that was Gabriell who came up with that little gem....anyways....it was a lot of fun and we shall certainly be Tweeting'n'meeting again hopefully, some time soon.

Tuesday, I was playing shop keeper, sending out all the pre-orders of stains, trying to do some ordering and then all these men kept arriving in my shop with boxes....lots of boxes.....containing all sorts of scrumminess including new books, more Pan Pastels, blank journals, Tim Holtz dies, Ideaology and more.....I was completely cream crackered.

Wednesday was more of the same....more boxes....more ordering.....I had to order more stains ready for Stevenage, these babies are flying out the door!!!!

Thursday, thank goodness Karen was back. I was hard at work in my studio working on new class samples when I get a phone call from Karen that went something like.....I've been so busy, there have been loads of deliveries.....sounding familiar????? But then I get the exciting bit of news....Dina Wakley's stamps have arrived.....then the bad bit of news......only one of the boxes arrived.......we have six of the designs.....it appears the other box is stuck in customs.......I'll fix that little problem on Monday. What about the stamps?....the only thing I can say is.......they are fabulous and I can't wait to use them. They are all on line here in the Misc. section for the time being, so go place your orders now....I only have or should I say had, 12 of each.

Friday was again spent in the Studio working on classes and Artsycrafts stuff, Saturday, I was shop keeper girl again and today has been "catch up at home day...fun stuff like grocery shopping and ironing!!! I am looking forward to my roast dinner though!!! In between the housework chores, I have been popping out to my fabulous studio.....have I told you how much I love my studio????......I love my studio LOTS. Whilst out there I've been playing with my new colour Distress Stains....very yummy they are too. Everyone needs Picket Fence....it's a must! So I thought I would make a little something for a display piece at Stevenage next weekend. 

I started by cutting a piece of Claudine Hellmuth's Sticky backed canvas to fit in the niche of my frame. Stamped a Paperartsy scroll stamp randomly over the whole piece using a piece of Cut'n'dry foam to apply Honey Dew Fresco Finish paint.

I heat set this really well and then spritzed the whole thing with water to help blend the stains. I got this tip from Ellen Vargo

Whilst the canvas was damp, I applied Tumbled Glass, Stormy Sky and Brushed Corduroy Distress Stains, overlapping them so that the colours blended. What I didn't realise was that the Brushed Corduroy would turn green over the blue....nice colour too!!!

Next step...the frame.....I applied Stormy Sky Distress Stain straight from the bottle to the wooden frame, such good, fast coverage.....we like fast!!

Once the whole frame was covered with Stormy Sky, I added some of the magical Picket Fence for a shabby look.

Once my canvas was completely dry, I was able to remove the backing paper and stick it in the niche.

I'm loving it so far.....and now this is the teasing bit.........I'm going to wait for the brand new Paperartsy Hot Picks stamps to finish this piece off, I've seen a few peeks and there are a couple of images that are going to be just perfect for this......so no pressure Leandra.....hurry up and get those stamps pressed!!

Okay, that's me for today.....I have to say Blogger was a much happier chappie today and played very nicely with me......so now I'm off to check on my roast spuds.