February - freebies and Lunch Punch

Just had another lovely meeting! Here's the news...

Cathy's back from Africa, full of news and photos. Here she is

with Maria.

That's a copy of "The Artful Bird" on the table. Awesome book, by the way, and by a lady whose blog has inspired my 15yo daughter to do some serious sewing lately.

And the book link I've given you takes you to Can Do Books, a Melbourne bookshop that comes highly recommended for all kinds of crafty books.

Louise demonstrates how to turn a plain frame into a terrific girl's gift in one sitting (hey Louise, did you know you match your project today?).

Margaret has used some vellum to make her own gorgeous flowers for a

card. The leaf sprigs come from the Stampin' Up bird punch, and the larger leaf is the bird's wing! Each flower petal has been touched with metallic gel pen for extra pop! Plus a full assortment of flower punches, of course.

Ingrid took home some freebies from my "free to a good home" basket. She was delighted!

CB brought her whole collection of punches for

sharing (I had a go with the little heart). Here's Margaret (L), Pat (middle) and CB (right) discussing the relative merit

s of these very satisfying papercraft tools.

Then in conversation, CB mentioned that her daughter invented the Lunch Punch. The what? It's an awesome thing - a sandwich cutter that makes cool shapes, but doesn't waste the bread (we've all tried using cookie cutters on bread, but they are not designed for the task, are they?).

I'm loving the frog one. I don't think I'm too old to use them, am I? There are a bunch of other designs.

CB says she might bring some along next month for us to buy!! Well wow! Until then, hit up the Lunch Punch web site and buy online, or ask your local cute stuff shop to get them in. This has been an unpaid endorsement from someone who's suddenly hungry for sandwiches.

This is what I was working on - turning an old diary into a - hmmm, what do you call that... let's call it an Art Book and leave it at that.

Much collage, old dictionary pages, gesso, paint and glue went into this page, and I have a series of about 10 all on the go at once. When I pronounce them all "done" I'll make them into a book and then ... I'll have a strange book.

Next meeting is March 26 - see you there!