I'm travelling into a new way of working, a new country, a new language, and a new hobby which I'm passionate about. Come with me for some of the journey...

Saturday 16 March 2024

New YouTube Episodes at Words and Pictures

Hello all, I'm just popping in to let you know that there are new episodes of A Few Minutes of Fun to enjoy over on my YouTube channel, Words and Pictures.

Hop over to take a look, and if you enjoy what you find, do subscribe for more fun in the future!  Click the link below the picture to watch whichever one you fancy... 

A Few (More) Minutes of Fun - Collaging Tags


A Few Minutes of Fun - with PaperArtsy Printed Tissue and watercolours


A Few Minutes of Fun - with Distress Inks - Spritz and Flick

I hope you'll come and join me at the craft table for just a few minutes of fun (or a few MORE minutes of fun in the case of the extended collaged tags edition!), and happy crafting all!

Creativity is intelligence having fun.
Albert Einstein

If you're not having fun, you're doing something wrong.
Groucho Marx

Do anything, but let it produce joy.
Walt Whitman

If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun.
Katharine Hepburn

Tuesday 27 February 2024

Brand New Stamps at PaperArtsy - with a whole new look!

Hello all!  I'm thrilled to be revealing my brand new stamp sets with PaperArtsy, as well as some Designer Tissue Paper of my very own.  It's so exciting!  The new stamps are heading in a new direction - they are Botanical Textures, with a sketchier style and a focus on texture, which work both for clean and simple style stamping and also in a more mixed media style.  




You can see the sets in full, and the tissue paper too, as well as lots of samples over at the PaperArtsy blog.  And of course you can also watch the Live Launch on catch up here.



I do hope you'll enjoy all the many possibilities with these new stamp designs, and that you'll have as much fun with them and the tissue paper as I've been having.  As always, do let me know if you are creating anything with my designs - I love seeing what people get up to with them.  Happy crafting, all!

Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all.
Helen Keller

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.
Marcel Proust

Sunday 25 February 2024

Come and join me on camera...

I seem to be spending a lot of time in front of the camera at the moment.  This post is to let you know about three separate sessions where you can come and join me at the craft desk... and there's another (very exciting) one still to come on Tuesday 27th.  February really is going out with a bang  - the photographic sort... "flash, bang, wallop, what a picture!" - moving pictures, in my case!  (I'd completely forgotten there's a Shakespearean verse in Tommy Steele's ditty!)

First up, you can join me for some Friday Fun, which was originally live on the PaperArtsy People Facebook Group on (guess when!) Friday.  It was a really special Friday Fun - some sneak peek playtime with a product which is not even launched yet... but I couldn't wait to share some of the fun I've been having with it.  (You may think you recognise this blossom branch, but it's not what you think it is!)

Then there's the second episode of my new weekly YouTube series, A Few Minutes of Fun.  This will come out on Fridays or Saturdays, and this week it obviously had to be Saturday so as not to clash with the Friday Fun.  (It's not live, but there's only so many videos I can cope with publishing at one time!) And I think I might stick to Saturdays from now on in any case.  After last week's gypsophila gel printing, this time I'm having a few minutes of fun flipping stencils, using some Distress Spray Stains.  Nothing complicated, just genuinely a few minutes of fun...

And then there's the third episode of my monthly YouTube series, Sunday Swatching.  This time I'm sort of swatching, but mostly colour mixing in a small grid of three paints, and then having a little watercolour playtime with doodles and a sketch.  If you enjoy it, it would be lovely if you subscribed to the channel, and comments and likes all help me to build a following there.

So take your pick... or join me for all three.  You don't have to listen to me talk, of course - turn the volume down and put on some of your favourite music instead, and just enjoy the meditative processes of combining pigment, paper and water.

I hope you'll enjoy joining me at the craft desk for a bit of playtime.  Hopefully, you'll be inspired to go and play yourselves.  And watch out for Tuesday's big news... Thanks so much for stopping by, and happy crafting all!

For me, the camera is a sketch book, an instrument of intuition and spontaneity.
Henri Cartier-Bresson

A film is never really good unless the camera is an eye in the head of a poet.
Orson Welles

Friday 16 February 2024

A Few Minutes of Fun

Hello all - hope you're all doing well.  I'm here with a quick heads-up to let you know there's a new series starting today on my YouTube channel called A Few Minutes of Fun.  Something to add to the monthly Sunday Swatching videos.  (Yes, my New Year's resolution to build the channel is still on course and we're nearly at the end of February!)

My aim for this series is to share a few minutes of art and crafting fun once a week, either on a Friday or a Saturday - usually somewhere between five and fifteen minutes, depending on what we're playing with.  Look at what I've been up to in the craft room today...

For this first episode, I've been playing with some Gypsophila stems on the gel plate, using some of my favourite colours of PaperArtsy Chalk Acrylic paint.  Why not start the weekend by joining me at the craft table for a little bit of printing inspiration?  It's great fun seeing these prints come to life.  

And while you're there, I hope you'll choose to subscribe to the channel.  Likes and comments also help me with the YouTube algorithm, so if you feel the urge...  But mostly, I just hope you enjoy the fun, and take away some inspiration.

Have a great weekend, all!

Do anything, but let it produce joy.
Walt Whitman

It is a happy talent to know how to play.
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Friday 26 January 2024

January Joy in Fodder School

January in Fodder School has been glorious... and that's not an adjective I often apply to January!  The wonderful Megan Quinlan shared some classes which were definitely up my street, and I had a fabulous time shopping my stash for stencils and stamps which had been neglected for far too long, as well as current favourites.  Here's the inspirational deck that emerged on my craft table...

Amongst other things, Megan encouraged us to create a deck whose theme would have personal meaning for us.  

You won't be surprised to learn that I dived straight into nature.

These cards will be a reminder to me of how important it is to keep sacred the moments of stillness, solitude, and heart-opening beauty which nature offers. 

Time spent in nature is what allows my creativity to breathe and flow, despite the troubled times we are living through.

These were the backgrounds, created in the Make Fodder sessions, before adding the Use Fodder detailing which came later.

There are 32 cards in total in my deck, so here they are broken down into groups of eight so that you can see them more clearly...


You'll spot plenty of my own PaperArtsy quotes in action, as well as some of my botanical stamps, mostly from the Fodder Berry and Rosemary Editions.


There are other PaperArtsy stamp sets, as well as some by Seth Apter for Impression Obsession, and lots of Donna Downey stencils, as well as some of her stamp designs for Unity Stamp Co.  


The paints used are almost all PaperArtsy too - mostly from my Background Blues collection - with some added Daniel Smith Moonglow providing those haunting purple tones. 


If you want to see individual close-ups, I'm afraid you are going to have to visit me on Instagram for that.  It would be a massively photo-heavy blogpost!


It really has been an extraordinary month in terms of creativity - with phenomenal inspiration decks appearing from my fellow Fodder School teachers as well as the participants... so much beauty on Instagram and in the Fodder School FB group, which is a really supportive and informative environment (hate to say nice things about FB - but this is down to the people in there!).  I offered up a little bonus session to add to Megan's classes, as did several other teachers.


If all this tempts you to join in the fun (there's still so much more to come, including my own teaching month!!), then just follow this link to find out everything you need to know about joining up for Fodder School.

I hope January has brought you some joy too.  I know it can be a hard month, but I have found real solace in creating my deck, and I know it will continue to bring me a sense of calm and beauty throughout the years.  Thanks so much for stopping by, and I'll see you again soon.

Feeling a little blue in January is normal.
Marilu Henner

January is the month for dreaming.
Jean Hersey

January, the first month of the year. A perfect time to start all over again, changing energies and deserting old moods, new beginnings, new attitudes.
Charmaine J. Ford

Thursday 4 January 2024

Farewell 2023

Happy New Year, all!  I know I haven't got around to sharing any December Fodder School creativity yet... stamp releases and Christmas got in the way!  I'm already in the middle of January's classes, so I will catch you up with all of that soon.  But for now, here's a little look back at last year's journey.

I like to take the time each December to see where my creative journey has taken me over the course of the year, identifying new directions as well as continuing passions. 

Obviously Fodder School has loomed large, but I have also done three PaperArtsy stamp releases this year - Spring Botanicals, Summer Botanicals and the Festive Minis, six full size sets and eight minis in total.  Those PaperArtsy designs have been a real creative engine underlying my year, and you'll see how they play a huge part in my work now.  All in all, it has been quite an eventful year so I gathered together several "collections" of highlights rather than trying to whittle it down too far.

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So the first batch is Dimensionality and Watercolours... 3D projects, including plenty of recycling (Camembert cheese boxes for the win!), and some glimpses inside my watercolour journals.  Lots of my stamps in action here too.

Nature is the linking theme in all of it, as well as in my ongoing watercolour explorations. Texture, dimension, recycling, and organic inclusions all continue to be core elements, but I can see that the colour palette is expanding.

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The second collection is Tags (of course!). I don't think I'll ever stop creating tags, and looking over the year I can see more continuing passions than new directions as far as tags go.  I still love working in duos and trios, balancing the composition, and the colour palette is as you would expect. (There were other colours in my tags - even some yellow ones - but they didn't make the favourites list!)

Nature is the linking theme here too, along with texture, dimension and natural elements. And of course as well as my own PaperArtsy stamps, there are always heaps of Tim Holtz products - Idea-ology, Stampers Anonymous stamps and stencils and, above all, Ranger Ink Distress products.

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Next up, Botanical Panels - a whole new category for 2023!  I found great joy this year in combining my PaperArtsy botanical and ephemera stamps with the Tim Holtz 3D embossing folders... so much joy, in fact, that I found I had a whole grid of nine just with these projects!  The Tree Rings, Brickwork and Pine Branches folders by @sizzix make the perfect backdrop for my botanical sketches and ephemera labels.

In some of these panels the botanicals are layered over old book covers or real bark backgrounds, but in almost all cases they're all combined with plenty of Idea-ology ephemera and Sizzix diecuts, as well as natural elements - twigs, moss, pinecones and so on.  Nature is absolutely at the heart of these makes, of course, along with texture, dimension and the natural elements. And they make me happy, so I'm making no apologies for having a whole extra grid dedicated to them!

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The fourth collection (appropriately for number four) is Quartets and Sets.  This remains one of my favourite ways to create - in sets and collections and quartets. Some of my favourite works of the year are here - minimal collages on watercolour and mixed media backgrounds. Backgrounds are at the heart of my creative process, and sometimes I just don't want to cover them up much!


Lots of my PaperArtsy stamps are in action here, with Tim Holtz dies, stamps, stencils, and Idea-ology elements of all kinds, and as always texture and natural elements are a vital part of the creative process.

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And finally, here's grid number five, Journalling and Journals.  As you might expect from someone who calls herself "Words and Pictures", books continue to play a huge part in my creative journey, whether that's art journalling, altered books or handmade ones.


Most of the journalling here is done in an old hardback book - and where would my page spreads be without the Tim Holtz Paper Dolls and Photobooth snapshots?! The tag books are based on the fabulous class shared by Megan Quinlan in the Fodder Challenge back in July; and I had to include the Coptic bound, handpainted book with my PaperArtsy stamps, made in the first month of Fodder School thanks to the lovely October sessions with Di Venter. 

I think you've probably got the idea about the recurring themes and elements in my work by now - nature, texture, and I'm going to add storytelling to the list too... this grid really captures it all, I think.

Thanks so much for stopping by today.  I hope 2024 will bring a little more peace and compassion into the world (though I'm not holding my breath), and that all of you will enjoy a creative year ahead, full of whatever gives you joy.  Happy crafting, all!

And suddenly you know: It's time to start something new and trust the magic of beginnings.
Meister Eckhart

Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow.
Albert Einstein

Monday 11 December 2023

Sunday Swatching

Just popping in very quickly to say that I'm starting to build more regular content on my YouTube channel, Words and Pictures.  The first step is a new series called Sunday Swatching, and the first episode went live yesterday evening.  Watch it here!


I'll be swatching various mediums in various ways, often watercolours but not always.  Sometimes they'll be new ones, sometimes old favourites in new combinations.  I'm aiming to post at least once a month... on a Sunday (who could have guessed?!).

In this week's Sunday Swatching, I'm playing with some brand new (to me) Art to Basic handmade watercolour paints.  You can explore all their beautiful colours here on their website.   I ordered six of these paints, and one came as a bonus... I wonder if you can guess which one was unexpected!  All will become clear in the video. 


I hope you'll pop over to take a look at the first episode, and consider subscribing to the channel. I won't always be talking - sometimes it will just be pigment, water and some musical accompaniment!  And in the New Year I'm planning other new series and one-off videos, so do come and join the new journey.

Also just a heads-up that if you're after some last-minute gift tag or giftwrap inspiration, I shared some tips and tricks with my new PaperArtsy Minis and the fabulous new Just Walnut Infusions in a special Festive Friday Fun edition on the PaperArtsy People FB Group.  

You can catch up with all the festive fun here and watch these grungy gift tags come to life on the craft mat.  You shouldn't have to be a member of the group, I think, in order to watch...

Thanks so much for stopping by today - I hope your preparations for the festive season are in good order.  I'm way, way behind... it's all this filming!!  Have a great week everybody.

Create your own visual style... Let it be unique for yourself and yet identifiable to others. 
Orson Welles


Tuesday 28 November 2023

Brand New - my first ever PaperArtsy Minis collection

I'm thrilled to be sharing my latest stamps designed for PaperArtsy... and they're Minis!  I've created a collection of festive words and pictures, with botanical sketches, ephemera backgrounds and carol lyrics.

They're perfect for as card toppers or focal points, for zhuzhing up your gift-wrapping, adding tags, and even for creating beautiful presents and gift sets.  But they'll also work through the year to celebrate nature, music, theatre, books, and good food and drink!

I hope you'll hop over to PaperArtsy to see the new stamps and some of the things I've been creating with them - there's a lot of inspiration there for the festive season.   And I've also been playing with some other new PaperArtsy products, so you'll get a sneak peek at those in action too.

And you can join me in the PaperArtsy People Facebook Group to hear more about the inspiration behind the designs, which is now available any time on catch-up.  

I can't wait to see what you think of them.  Happy crafting, all!

Oh, and while I'm here...  I want to say a huge THANK YOU to everyone who has left comments here recently... I've only just found them (I forgot I had to put comment moderation on because of a lot of spam), and have had a lovely time reading them - and they've all now been moderated, accepted, and published.  I also found over 100 comments dating back right to the start of the blog that had been marked as spam by Blogger for some bizarre reason - so my apologies if you've ever felt that I've ignored a comment of yours... sadly, I just didn't know it was there!  Again, all published now...

"He compounded some hot mixture in a jug with gin and lemons, and stirred it round and round and put it on the hob to simmer."

From A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

Thursday 23 November 2023

Fodder Folders

Hello all!  It's all go round here at the moment, and it's high time I filled you in on some of this month's Fodder School 3 creativity.  We've had a great month of classes from Tiffany Sharpe, and several bonuses - including one from me - and here's some of what I've been getting up to with the mixed media folders and watercolour elements she shared with us.

I actually created two batches of the folders, as I was in a different colour mood when I painted my watercolour elements, so then they didn't really go with the first folder batch... so I needed to make some more!  Here's the first batch... don't get me wrong, I love them.  


The colours were what I wanted that particular day - and in fact, all these colours come from my Fodder School/PaperArtsy curated paint sets.  Mostly from the Background Blues set, but a couple thrown in from Botanical Basics and even one from the Berrylicious Brights.  (All those paint sets can be seen here, and are available from PaperArtsy stockists worldwide.)


I love the texture created by Tiffany's method, and it's great to be making good use of leftover packaging and junkmail... a really inspiring class for the first half of the month.


But then, as I say, when I did the second part of November's sessions, I was in a completely different colour frame of mind, and here are the watercolour elements I created...





I also felt that the blue green folders were done - I didn't really want to add anything extra to them - so now I needed to make some new folders to complement those watercolour botanicals.


I went with neutral tones, mostly greys, and again mostly PaperArtsy Fresco paints.  Because the colours were all much closer to each other in tone, I got a very different look to my folders.


But they were the perfect setting for my watercolour botanicals... and I provided a bonus class sharing how I created those twine closures (they're a little different from Tiffany's closures) as well as that 3D collaging.  





If you'd like to know more about how all of this was made, you can sign up to join in the Fodder School 3 journey at any time.  All the details are here, and I'm pretty sure you won't regret it!  


It works out as less than $20 a month for lifetime access.  You get several hours of mixed media teaching each month from the main teacher as well as surprise bonuses from the other Fodder teachers for the year - not to mention lots of additional inspiration, support and advice on various platforms.  

I hope you're all doing well.  Watch out early next week for some EXCITING LAUNCH news coming your way... I can't wait to share with you what I've been up to behind the scenes for PaperArtsy!  Have a great weekend once it gets here...  Happy crafting, all!

The glory of gardening: hands in the dirt, head in the sun, heart with nature.  To nurture a garden is to feed not just on the body, but the soul. Share the botanical bliss of gardeners through the ages, who have cultivated philosophies to apply to their own - and our own - lives: Show me your garden and I shall tell you what you are.
Alfred Austin