Happy New Year!

As the last few hours of 2012 tick away I'd just like to time some time to wish everyone a very happy and healthy New Year. 2012 has been an eventful year for Total Papercrafts, we met some fabulous new friends at shows and classes and had a lot of fun. We have travelled a fair few miles to share our passion for Scrapbooking and it has always been a great time.

As we start a new year I'd like to thank everyone for their support and custom over the past 12 months. We have had such a great year and look forward to growing and developing throughout 2013 with everyone.

Wherever you are as the click strikes midnight I hope you are surrounded by love. Have a great New Years Eve and we'll see you in 2013!

Out of touch for a while

We are taking a must needed few days away and leaving the young adult in charge of things at Total Papercrafts Towers. We are so out in the wilds that we don't have wifi connectivity and therefore we are out of contact for most things. I'm sure there won't be a paper-based emergency while we take a break but I'll try to check emails at least once while I'm away. Enjoy these few days before the new year begins!!

Wishing you a very Merry Christmas!!

The big day is finally here and everything is pretty calm and under control so far. All of the gifts were wrapped well before lunch today, the veg is prepped, we've been to Midnight Mass and even managed to toast each other with a wee tipple on our return!!

With all that lot done I have the time to relax and wish everyone here on my blog a peaceful and happy time over Christmas. I'd like to thank you all for you support in reading my blog posts, following us on Twitter, subscribing to our YouTube channel, following us on Facebook and posting on here. Thank you for being such great customers both inline and in person and for all of the laughs we have during our classes, on the phone and via email. I am so lucky to have your support and extremely grateful that I can follow my passion for teaching and design as my job.

I hope you are all on Santa's 'nice' list and that your day brings you everything you'd wish for yourself. Enjoy this special day and I'll catch up with you when we are all wearing joggers because we ate too much!! Lol.

Merry Christmas from Karen, Dave, Jack and of course Miss Molly & Miss Lily - the cats who secretly run Total Papercrafrs when no-one is looking!!).

Final bonus layout

Ok I've had to call it a day with designing with the December kit despite having loads of leftovers!! Here's a peek at the third single page layout I have created. The page is full of little things to discover as you look at it such as scraps of lace, paper doilies, keys, a lock, paper flowers and more.
I love this photo of my sister and brother-in-law at Winter Wonderland as it evokes loads of happy memories. This attraction in Hyde Park has become another of our traditions, it really makes you feel festive!

I haven't yet added the picture and instructions to the password protected page but I'll get to it as soon as I can. Hope you are enjoying all of the designs we have created with this amazing kit. I think I have a little project that I might also put together which will be perfect for those who are following Claire's design instructions as she has quite a bit left in her kit. I'll sort that out after Christmas and may even do a little video to go with it too!!

There's more......!!

Even with all of the madness of Christmas we are still cranking out bonus designs using our December kit!!  This one just keeps going on and on, there's so much in it!

To tease you I've added just a peek here of the latest one to be added to our bonus design page.  This time I opted to record a relatively new tradition in our family, grabbing a Starbucks coffee when the Christmas flavours are released in the red cups!  We do it every year now and I didn't realise how much the red cups changed, its a fun and silly aspect of the build up to Christmas but still worth recording and remembering.

If you look closely you can see stitching on this layout, it takes a while but is so worth the effort.  You can find the instructions for this and more of our bonus designs by clicking on the link at the top of this blog and entering your password which you will find in your kit.

Another bonus design using the December kit

I've added a little peek here of another of the bonus designs we have for everyone who has our December kit.  This time its a Winter page rather than Christmas which demonstrates just how adaptable this fabulous kit is.  We didn't get an awful lot of snow this year but it didn't stop the kids wanting to go out with sledges and so I just had to scrapbook the photos!

I have a cute little technique to go along with this page and I think I'll make a YouTube video demonstrating just how easy this is.  The results are great and it's sure to be something I use again.

If you want to see the full page and the step-by-step instructions for this layout then simply click on the December bonus designs page at the top of the blog and enter the password you will find in with your kit.  I have even more in my kit and am working on more layouts so be sure to keep dropping in!

Christmas canvas

At the beginning of this month I had a Masterclass with my lovely local girlies.  It was something that I had designed earlier in the year with a garden theme but when the girls were round for the class in October they had seen the sample and asked for the more seasonal version.  I ran with the idea and went a bit mad with the new Teresa Collins 'Christmas Cottage' collection!

Its hard to see everything but this is an 18" x 12" canvas with a Tim Holtz binder clip, lots of pocket pages, a bunting across the top and 'configurations-style' boxes across the bottom.  I used a selection of Tim Holtz Sizzix dies in creating this along with Tim's gorgeous stamps.

I love the fact that this is so interactive, you can flick through the pages, pull tags from the pockets and even add more pages if you want to.  Its not as much pressure as the December Daily I have done for the past 2 years, I can add whatever I want whenever I want to without there being an obvious missing entry.  This looks really super up on the wall and I've started to add our photos to it from all the wonderful Christmas things we have been up to this month.  I have a feeling that this will be a regular feature in our home as each year I can make some new pages and pop them in - easy peasy!!