Sara's Blog

I think this is so amazing, I have to share.

Susanna Tobias is one of my colleagues in the craft industry; she works for CardMaker magazine. Last summer, she traveled to Thailand and Cambodia on a volunteer project, to teach crafts to girls aged 8-15—all of whom had at one point been considered at risk of being sold into prostitution. Yes, sold. As in slavery. Aged 8-15. Just think about that for a minute and try not to get furious.

Susanna was kind enough to share not only her time and energy working with these girls, but also generous enough to share her story here. Take a look at her photos and the newspaper article…

It’s actions like these that make me hopeful in our busy (and sometimes selfish) world. So, thank you Susanna—not only for your generous spirit in helping these girls, but also in sharing your story.

On a totally different note, don’t forget—this weekend is the CKC show in Bellevue, Washington November 5-7. Paulette will be there with tons of fabulous Hot Off The Press goodies. Check out the Creating Keepsakes website for more details and to get your tickets. Hope you can join in!

 
 

A big thank-you to all who joined me at the Aquila classes in South Africa! I had a great time and loved meeting everyone—Antoinette, Henriette, Elmi, Wilna, Barbara…it was so nice to spend time with you all. And of course a big thank-you to Hennie and Erika for organizing the event.

After the weekend of classes, I took a few days to visit the Ezulwini Game Reserve in Hoedspruit, just an hour’s flight from Johannesburg. It was the perfect way to relax after so many busy classes, and I can’t recommend the reserve highly enough! (Even with the 5am wake-up call for the morning game drives…) We were lucky to see a lot of animals on the drives—lions, giraffe, zebra, and even a leopard cub!

 
  

And if you live in or around Seattle, Washington, please be sure to stop by the CKC show in Bellevue on November 5-7. Paulette will be there with tons of fabulous Hot Off The Press goodies. Check out the Creating Keepsakes website for more details and to get your tickets. Hope you can join in!

This week I'm enjoying the brilliant thunder and lightning storms in Pretoria while teaching at Aquila Scrapbooking! It's a bit late tonight so this post will be short but for those of you in the Jo'burg area, hope you can join us for classes and demos all weekend long!

Thanks everyone for participating in Stamp Camp last week! The Super Savers are still available if you haven't taken advantage of them yet. In the meantime, check out some of the projects we featured in Stamp Camp! Click on the Project Gallery link on the left side of the Webisodes page.

Monday - Chalk Popping, Dove Blending & Markers	Tuesday - Distress Inks	Wednesday - A New Way to Color	Thursday - Dyeing & Inking with Alcohol Inks	Friday - Tags, Twinchies & ATC's

Thanks to all who joined us for Stamp Camp this week! We had a great time (can you tell by the length of the segments?!) and from the comments posted on the webisodes page and the number of emails I got this week…well, it looks like you all enjoyed it too!

So….I did have a couple “frequently asked” questions emailed to me this week so I thought I’d answer them here!

Question-- Will these webisodes become part of the archives so I can refer back to them?

Yes, each segment will be archived so you can go back to them whenever you want. We keep the segments up even after (when/if) the product used becomes unavailable, so you always have that resource.

Love your current segments even though I’m a scrapper not a card maker. I have two questions to ask of Sara.

• Where would I find craft sheets to buy?
  
• Where would I purchase the glossy paper used for a masterboard?
  

The craft sheet that I mentioned is from Ranger and you can get it at Paper Wishes. It’s $17.99 and the best investment I’ve made in papercrafting...ever! You only need one (although I have two!) because you can simply wipe away spills, glue, ink, paint, etc and re-use the sheet. I bought mine, oh, five years ago or more and it’s in perfect condition even though I abuse it quite a lot.

http://www.paperwishes.com/products/7259330000

The Glossy Cardstock is also available from Paper Wishes. I love it and use it a lot. Here’s the link:
http://www.paperwishes.com/products/7509930000

It’s glossy on one side and matte on the other and the glossy side works brilliantly for stamping and alcohol inks.

Your designer tip says don't use the brayer with alcohol inks. Also, Sara 'refreshed' some dried ink with a spritz of water, does that mean they aren't permanent? I would hate to have the inks on my card run if it gets wet.

The alcohol inks will cause the rubber brayer (or rubber stamps) to crack over time...they’re just not good on rubber at all! Of course, you certainly can use them with your brayer but just be aware of what might happen.

And yes, you can refresh the dried Distress ink with water. They’re actually designed to be blendable with water. If you’re concerned about your card getting wet, then I’d advise trying some of the same techniques with a permanent inkpad. You’ll get some different looks, but that could be fun too.

Great ideas and wonderful explanation. What type of ink did you use to stamp the stamp so that it does not bleed into the watercolor paint?

I find that my trusty Staz-On is the perfect ink for this. Just stamp your image, let it dry, then color!

Thanks again to everyone for watching and joining us!