Getting Back to Normality

Hello there, how are you today?

Can you hear that? It's a lack of noise, H is back at school, Hubs is back at work and I'm alone here in the Crafty Alchemy Lab, well not quite alone, Bailey Dog is curled up on my chair snoring loudly, it's nice to be back working hard in the peace & quiet, I've achieved a lot over the Summer, new products, new connections and a new plan, a big one. I'm rather excited. 2015 is going to be one busy year for Crafty Alchemy.

My personal crafting time has all but evaporated at the moment but I'm confident things will even out over time.

I've got a little layout to share that I made a while back, H has often sat watching me knit, both Mum and I have tried to teach her, but she was never that interested, but back in June she showed an interest again so out came the little knitting needles and a bag full of yarn, and off she went, she seems to have picked it up, she talks herself through each stitch - "in through the back, wrap yarn around, pull it through & off" - it's quite amusing to listen to, but she's doing really well, she's keeping it easy at the moment and knitting a blanket for the bears. 

It was one of these Sunday mornings when we were at Mum's when I snapped this photo of her concentrating really hard on her knitting...

I used an assortment of paper from a Quirky kit, I love the yellow and pink colour combination. I've doodled around the edge of the cardstock and coloured my doodly border in with a Rose Pink Promarker, I also doodled stitching around the scalloped edges of the pink paper. The little cork hearts are actually cork stickers. The journaling is in a pink 3d frame and says " Hermione at Nana's house, concentrating very hard on learning how to knit"

I wanted a knitting style embellishment but would you believe I had nothing knittingish in my stash - I know shocking isn't it! So I got some yarn and wrapped into a teeny little skein of yarn and stuck 2 heart topped pins through it to look like knitting needles, I used a blob of glue to attach it to the page. I also used a few little stickers attached with 3d foam pads for a bit of dimension, such as Staying Focused, Let's do something amazing today and Happiness is Homemade.

Well that's all from me for today, I'm tackling the To Do List (It does deserve capital letters) continuing plans and trying to remember who I was meant to email.... It's really bugging me, I can't for the life of me remember who I said I'd get back to despite going through my inbox, oh well, I'm sure I'll sort it out.

I'll be back later in the week when it's my turn over on  the Sarah Hurley 365 Blog.

Take care & hope to see you soon.

Claire xx

Scrapbook Layouts - Picking Cherries

Well hello there, how are you today?

It really wasn't my plan to leave it a whole week before blogging but I've been a  bit preoccupied with Crafty Alchemy stuff this week, it's all good though, the kettle has been brewing none stop when I've been at home and the last 2 nights I've been working through lots of paperwork, notebooks and notes until the wee small hours.

Now this is where I need your help, I have a few ideas for the blog, sharing more from Crafty Alchemy Labs and a new blog series is amongst them but here's what I'd really like to know....

What do you guys want to see on here? I really really would like to know so please share your thoughts, would you like to see more crafting, less chatter, more techniques, tutorials? You suggest it and I'll do my best to make it happen, there are lots of things going on in the background here now and things will be changing considerably for the next 12 months and I would like you all to be a part of it... my amazing readers! If you'd like to suggest something you can leave a comment below or you can email me if you'd like just use the "contact us" button in the side bar, I'd love to hear from you.

Now then, I believe I mentioned a scrapbook layout about picking cherries, well here it is...

We have a huge cherry tree in the back garden at Mum and Dad's house and picking the cherries each year to make jam is a family affair, this year we happened to have some scaffolding up at the bottom of the garden  (which is an entirely different story) so we used that to get the cherries from the top of the tree that we wouldn't usually be able to reach... extra cherry jam ... yum!

To create this layout I cut 2 large scalloped circles out of 2 pieces of 12 by 12 cardstock, I used a template I'd made from a shaped piece of cardstock to do this, then I used the lid from a tin of Roses chocolates to draw the circle in the centre of the pink cardstock then I carefully cut it out starting off with a craft knife then finishing up with scissors, the pink cardstock is attached to the white cardstock using 3d foam pads so it's more like a frame. All of the paper used are from Quirky Kits and I also added some stickers and Thickers for the title and 3 large American Crafts Rose brads.

Well that's all from me for today, I've already crosses several things off my to do list but have several more to go, wish me luck and productivity (and cake, always wish me cake :D)

Take Care & see you soon.

Claire xx

Welcome to the Start of a New Adventure

Well hello there and a very warm welcome to the new Crafty Alchemy blog. Come on in, don't be shy, pull up a chair, the kettle's on and there's cake in the kitchen - feel free to help yourself :)

I'm Claire, the founder of Crafty Alchemy.

I guess I'd better start by explaining to my fabby followers old and new what is going on here...

I started blogging as Curlylocks Pics and Pieces back in 2009 so that I could share my crafty creations and ideas with other crafty people, things have changed a fair bit over the years since then.

In 2011 my blog had a name change and a facelift and became The Crafty Alchemist and in 2012 I decided blogging wasn't enough, I wanted more craftiness in my life, after much thinking, planning, making notes and muttering wildly to myself The Crafty Alchemist became a business, starting with an Etsy shop selling embellishment kits for all kinds of crafty projects

And more recently clear stamps and hand stamped notebooks

  I then opened my Notonthehighstreet.com shop in 2013 and it was this that brought about the change from The Crafty Alchemist to Crafty Alchemy, partly because it trips off the tongue a little easier and is easier to remember for all of my lovely customers too.

Whilst quietly working behind the scenes on all this I decided it was time to say goodbye to my original blog, I was struggling to get out of the habit of just posting my crafty creations rather than sharing all of the good stuff that goes on here in the Crafty Alchemy Labs (this is what my studio space is known as by my friends and family) so rather than trying to make the old blog fit in to this new era I decided to start again from scratch.

And here we are, a shiny new beginning on a shiny new blog.

I'll still be sharing my crafty stuff, hopefully in a little more detail than previously along with exciting developments and new products from the Crafty Alchemy Labs and this time it's not just me, Jennie aka Mum has joined the Crafty Alchemy Team and will be contributing on the blog from time to time. We may also have one or two guest bloggers in the future as well (please ping me an email to craftyalchemy@gmail.com or you can us the contact section in the sidebar if you're interested, we'd love to hear from you)

Thanks so much for stopping by to say hello, I really hope you come back again and join us on this exciting new adventure with Crafty Alchemy, I'm really looking forward to sharing all of the things we've been working on and are planning for the future.

Take care & hope to see you soon

Claire xxx

p.s I'd be thrilled if you followed me... just so you know ;-)