Calling Local Artists and Crafters in the Killarney and surrounding areas

Hi all,

We are well under way in planning the shops 2nd Birthday Bash (hard to believe it has been two years).

Friday 19th March (Evening)

We have decided for that night to turn our workshop room into a gallery and display some of our customers pieces free of charge for the night. we have a very loyal customer base and we thought this was a great way of promoting our customers work and hopefully you may even make a sale or two on the evening! This is a great opportunity to display your pieces in a new environment and meet fellow artists.

We will have to limit wall space to one large piece or two small pieces.

If you would like to display your work that evening please contact me on 0646630800 this week and I will reserve a place for you.

Cathy

Macroom Purlies Visit

Hi all,

Just to let you know on Friday the 12th March the Macroom Purlies will be coming to our Crafty Knit and Stitchers group on Friday morning from 10am to 12pm. Their will be seven ladies making their way down which should be a really fun get together with lots of knitting and crochet (and lots of chat and laughs as usual).

I know most of regulars are already looking forward to this but spread the word as everyone is welcome! Will have to get the cream cakes in!

Cathy

The Creative Journey Weekend Workhop

This is not a painting and drawing class! This is a workshop to help unleash the creativity inside you. This workshop will take you on a journey to reconnent and discover your creativity in a fun, practical and respectful environment.This course will not only benefit your creativity skills but enhance other areas in your life such as goal setting, problem solving and interpersonal skills. This course will include activities such as mind mapping, collage, art journaling and creative writing but no prior skills are needed to participate in this course.


Place - The Crafty Alley Shop (workshop room) Killarney
Weekend Course - Sat 24th and Sun 25th April
10am to 5.30pm
Cost - €140 including materials
Places limited to 8 participants.


For any enquiries please email cathy@craftyalley.com or phone 0646630800

Design Team Call for The Crafty Alley Shop

Hi all - I am looking for people for our very first Crafty Alley Design Team!

If you are interested please visit the shop's blog over at http://craftyalley.blogspot.com/2010/03/crafty-alley-shop-design-team-call.html

Thanks

Cathy

The Crafty Alley Shop Design Team Call!

The Crafty Alley Shop is looking for designers for our very first Design Team to showcase some of the amazing products we have in store and this could be your chance to become a key member! As a design team member your primary role will be to help showcase our existing and newest products. Our designer’s work will be featured on our blog and online store where products are ‘linked’ with your layouts. We are looking for individuals who are creative, committed to showing off your best work 110% of the time, passionate about crafting, can comply with deadlines, and participate actively and positively on our new message board (Will be lanuched in late March).


Design Team member responsibilities include:
* Create a minimum of 3 crafting projects a month using the supplies we provide you with. These can take the form of layouts (12x12, 8x8 etc.), minibooks, cards, altered art, tags, ATC's etc. Since your work will be linked to the products we sell we do ask that you use a certain number of supplies on each layout
* Create at least one tutorial a month to be uploaded to Youtube and / or at least one project with step by step written instructions using the supplies we have provided you with.
* Agree to a 6 month commitment of 1st April, 2010-1st October, 2010.
* Sign and return the Design Team contract. Failure to return or comply with the rules in the contract will result in termination from the team.
* Take well photographed pictures of your layouts
* Actively promote The Crafty Alley Shop on your blog and any other websites where rules allow at least 4 – 5 times a week.
* As a design team member you are an extension of our site, shop and business so you will be expected to act in a professional manner both on our site and on other sites you visit.
* Actively participate in the Crafty Alley Shop forums and blogs and promote events, special offers and new products.

The Crafty Alley Design Team Member benefits:
* Receive FREE monthly supplies. The Crafty Alley Shop will pay the shipping and handling on your design team supplies. In return for supplies, we retain the right to display your work in our online galleries after your term ends. These supplies must be used by yourself and for the purposes of promoting the products for The Crafty Alley Shop. You of course get to keep the supplies and projects you make using them.
*A special discount for the duration of your term with us as a Designer for any purchases you make from our shop and website.


We are looking for experienced crafters who have the WOW factor, are fun, committed and can prove their dedication to their craft. We also need people who are very active bloggers (blog must be at least 6 months old with a minimum of 30 subscribers) and are savy with other channels such as Youtube, Ning networks, Twitter etc.


In order to apply for The Crafty Alley Shop Design Team, submit the following by end of day on March 15th to cathy@craftyalley.com

1. Images of 4 original paper craft projects which must include the following 3 elements - scrapbooking, cardmaking and an altered project and one other project (can be another of the above).
2. Also, please answer the following questions in your email:
1. How long have you been crafting?
2. What motivates your crafting?
3. How would you define your crafting style – vintage, contemporary etc.?
4. Are you happy to try new styles and share these with others?
5. How long have you been blogging and how often do you blog normally?
6. Are you happy promoting your design team work and also the shop and website on your blog?
7. Will you be able to make at least 10 posts a week on our forum and / or blog. If not, please explain why.
8. How do you plan to keep the message board active or what types of things could you bring to the site to keep the members happy and talking?
9. Why do you feel you should be chosen to be a part of The Crafty Alley Shop Design Team?
10. Are you currently a design team member anywhere else? Please provide full details if you are.

• Please include links to your Website, Blog, Facebook, Twitter, You Tube, Online Photo Channels and any other online channels you use to promote your crafting.
• Please let us know if and where any of your work has been published? (e.g. Magazines, books etc.)

*Any falsification of the above information will result in disqualification of your application.*

The Crafty Alley Shop design team will be announced no later than March 19th 2010. If you are interested in becoming part of our team but have questions, please email me at cathy@craftyalley.com. Otherwise, please submit your work to the same email address in order to be eligible for this wonderful opportunity.


Good Luck and I look forward to working with some of you soon!
 
Spread the word!
 
Cathy

Album for Dee

As part of the Feb Scrapzville Swap. Hope you like it Dee xxx

Album from Dee

This is the album Dee sent me for the Feb Scrapzville Swap. I hope you enjoy watching it. Sorry the light and picture quality are so bad.

Thanks Dee - I LOVE the album xxx

Prima Paintable

This is the Prima Paintable I did as the example for the workshop I gave at The Crafty Alley Craft Club on Saturday. We had a great workshop and I think the ladies really enjoyed it. I will put up a tutorial soon on Youtube to show what I did. Main elements I used are a Prima Printable, gimmer mists watersoluable pencils, bling, Prima flower and embossing powders. well worth giving one a try if you ahvent already. The 12x12 sheet is watercolour quality so has great qualitites for a variety of mediums.

Cathy x

Swapzville Minibook swap from Alyson

February Craft Club

Hi all,

Well first of all I have to say I am loving being back in work and giving the workshops again. I have so much planned for the coming months and I can't wait to get started! The ladies who attend our craft club are all amazing people and I learn so much from them too. We love seeing new faces too so beginner or craft master - everyone is welcome!

We had such a lovely day at the Craft Club yesterday. First of all I worked with the ladies on Prima Paintables which although may have been daunting at first as it was all paintbrush work and not a scissors in sight I think the ladies really enjoyed it. It was a very relaxing class.The ladies also made some beautiful cards and I will try ang get some pics to post up. 

We worked with glimmer mists, prima flowers, dimensional pearls, watersoluable pencils, embosiing powder and marabu glitter liners and bling to transform the paintable from this

to this

I loved this project as it was something different and realy expanded peoples creativity by using art with craft. I think art and crafts should compliment eachother (and really are they not the same thing?) but I will leave that rant to another day!

We are now taking signups for the March club and places are limited as usual so email us or call us on 0646630800.

Hope you all had a lovely weekend.

Cathy x

My First Tag Swap

First Tag Swap

Hi all,

Here is a pic of my completed tags for my first tag swap which the lovely Louise had organised.

I was suppose to be meeting the ladies from our craft club to play tonight but my back has given way again after almost a year and a half since the first occurence of my back problems. It is so frustrating not to be at my best but hopefully after seeing physio this coming Friday I will be more mobile. I have a big weekend coming up with our craft club workshop on Saturday in the shop and my future sister in laws hen weekend so I really want to be back to myself for that. So ladies hope you had a great night and sorry I could not be there, looking forward to seeing you on Saturday.

This swap was great fun to do. I decided to make all of the tags individual for this swap although the base of them all are all nearly the same. 4 of the cards are done on a corrugated card base and one is done on plain card. All were primed using pearl dabbers, alcohol inks and glimmer mists, copper ink and distress inks. Each was embellished differently using a variety of products and techniques. I hope my tag partners are happy with them and I am going to send them out randomly by putting them all in their envelopes and putting the random names on each. I will put up a more detailed slide show too so you can see the backs which I mostly kept quite plain. They are being sent all of the world to their new homes.

Can't wait to see everybody elses tags!

Thanks again to Louise for organising.


Cathy x

Back from Brum

Well we had a fab time in Birmingham buying in lots of new lines for the shop. To read about our antics visit http://www.thescrappyknitter.blogpot.com/ but in the meantime here is a pic of Felicia and I with the wonderful  collage artist Claudine Hellmuth who has just launched her new range of acrylics and mediums with Ranger which is also home to Tim Holtz who we also met. Fab demos and products and I cannot wait for them to arrive.

Also off the page new lines for the shop I bought includes FABRIC. Yes we will finally be stocking fabric (and only the cutest and most gorgeous ones at that) in the shop for our crafters and quilters. I will put up some sneak previews over the coming weeks. Other newbie ranges include cross stitch, new jewelery range, new ribbon range, new book range and thats just for starters. Most items from the show will be arriving from mid March so keep an eye on the website and we will keep you up to date here!

Here is a pic from the trade show of Felicia and I with the amazing Claudine Hellmuth.

Cathy

I heart Claudine (and other stories from Birmingham)

So we got from Birmingham just fine and we had a great time. We arrived into the NEC Sunday afternoon and did a quick scoot around. We just happened to be walking by one of the stands and Tim Holtz was there demoing away. We were a little star struck and watched Tim work away. After doing another quick scoot we climbed into the taxi, dropped our bags in the hotel and went for a Nandos. It was a very girly night and after feeling very chilled with a nice bottle of white with dinner we hit the cinema to See Valentines Day which was just a perfect girly movie. We had a very funny happening when I was getting the tickets for Valentines Day the guy gave us 3D glasses. Felicia and I were like "Wow all films must be 3D these days even romcoms" but we realised as the usher showed us in to Avatar 3D with our tickets that the chap misheard my Irish accent and thought we wanted to see Avator not Valentines Day. How funny would we have looked if we had sat through Valentines Day with our 3D glasses on!

The next morning started off with a swim (not the nicest, the 4* hotel was manky and there was literally stuff growing on the walls). So Felicia swam with her head above the water as she didnt want to get her hair wet and I swam with my head above the water as I did not want to swallow anything that may have been floating in the water. We must have looked a sight.

We had a crazy day of buying for the shop and as well as some of the goodies you know we are getting in such as Tim Holtz new range and 7 Gypsies we bought LOTS of suprises not only for our papercrafters but for everyone! We are so excited I am going to be attacking the delivery men as they walk in over the next few weeks to see what they have brought me.

The highlight of the whole trip for me was Claudine Hellmuth. I first heard of Claudine when I lived in the UK and I was doing a lot of art journalling and training in creativity. She is a mixed media collage artist. I was not expecting to see Claudine at the show and was ecstatic when I got to meet her and and see a few of her demos. Claudine is one of the nicest people I have met in the industry and I kept thinking how gorgeous she would look on the top of my Christmas tree (is that weird...) as she is the cutest pretties thing you have ever seen. Claudine is very talented and is right up my streets in the use of mixed media in her projects. Of course I have ordered in her full range of acrylics and mediums which should be with us in the next week or two plus lots of other Ranger goodies including the incredible sticky back canvas....

So tonight I am home, exhausted but had a ball! I am also watching Tim here on QVC and wondering how he is still standing after the few weeks schedule he has. So watch out on http://www.craftyalley.com/ for the arrival of the new goodies and keep up to date here with my new projetcs. To put up this week are my TWS swap for Veronica, Scrapzville Swap for Dee and Tag Swap for my group with Louise.

Cathy x

Off to meet Tim Holtz himself (hopefully...)

Well myself and Felicia are off to the UK this morning to do some buying for the shop and heopefuly bring home lots of new season goodies for the siopa. Very excited as we are hoping to see (and maybe even participate if we are very lucky)Tim Holtz and his demos. We will be looking out for lots of new ideas and will bring them home to share with you all!

A bit worried about this snow falling and hoping we don't get stranded along our journey!

See you soon

Cathy

Off to meet Tim Holtz himself (hopefully)

Well myself and Felicia are off to the UK this morning to do some buying for the shop and heopefuly bring home lots of new season goodies for the siopa. Very excited as we are hoping to see (and maybe even participate if we are very lucky)Tim Holtz and his demos. We will be looking out for lots of new ideas and will bring them home to share with you all!

A bit worried about this snow falling and hoping we don't get stranded along our journey!

See you soon

Cathy

Melody Ross Artsy Urban Collection at The Crafty Alley Shop

Melody Ross Homespun Chic has arrived!

http://www.craftyalley.com/index.php?cPath=1238_1241

Calligraphy Class.

Saturday 27th March will see Elizabeth Kan giving one of her very popular calligraphy classes.
Time: 10.00-4.00pm
Cost: €25.00
Elizabeth is a very experienced calligrapy artist, and she gives a very informative and enjoyable class. There are only 10 spaces available so give us a call to book your place.

Altered "Treat Tin"

Hi all - just wanted to share a little project I made last week. The story was that I am officially off maternity leave but for those of you who are self emplyed know you never really take proper leave as your business is like another baby! So I decided to bite the bullet and got a lovely local girl to help me out some afternoons a week so I could get into the shop. My gorgeous 4 year old little girl is very independent and likes to test boundaries (to say the least) so we wanted to come up with an incentive to encourage her to behave for the childminder. I was reading my friend Suzies blog who had designed a gorgeous journalling jar and I decided that I would make a "treat tin" for my daughter. This was made with an empty baby food tin and altered using K&Co flocked papers, alcohol inks, glimmer misted flowers and a tag. The tag has Caoimhes name on it and some cute metal embellishment that say love and a also has a little angel! I filled it with little bits of paper that have different treats on them for good behaviour. Things she loves to do like play on the beach, plant a flower, play games on Mammys computer, dressing time etc. It has worked great - when the childminder is going home everyday Caoimhe gets to pick a treat and Daddy and I let her redeem the treat at the weekend! Lots of fun.

Back to Suzies idea I am going to make a journalling jar for myself too as I really want to get more painting and art journalling done so I am giong to make a tin for myself with different prompts for personal art projects. Thanks Suzie for inspiring me and I hope this has inspired others too....

Cathy x