MTL Blog

Here is some great news for all of our online customers !  If you couldn’t get into the store for our Stocktake Sale – don’t panic as we will be putting various items on sale for you on our website over the next few weeks. This week we will begin with 30% off our range of Basic Grey products. This includes stamps, chipboard stickers, paper pads as well as the papers.

But get in quick as the sale is for 1 week only for products in stock. No backorders. Online orders only.

Well our first TwiddleyBitz demo was a success, with Sherry demonstrating some great ways to decorate these items.  Below are some photos of just how beautiful these products can look when decorated with the right products.  Also one lucky customer – Dennise Evans – walked away with our lucky door prize, the prize was a mini shadow box, we hope that Dennise enjoys her prize.

Well at MTL we are very lucky,  Sherry has agreed to come back tomorrow (Saturday 27th) to once again demonstrate just how versatile  TwiddleyBitz products are.  We know just how busy everyone is during the week so we thought a Saturday was the perfect time to take some me time, pop into the store and do some shopping and catch part of the demo.

Sherrys Finished products

Don’t forget while in store our Stocktake Sale finishes tomorrow, there are some great savings – for example:-

*  $5.00 off all Cricut cartridges

* 30% off all Bo Bunny & Basic Grey Paper – (excluding any new lines)

*40% off all Christmas stock

*  SRM stickers off the roll all now $1 each

* Kaiser shaped Bling  is  now only $1

*15% off all Kaiser Paper

Hi ladies, just letting you all know that our Kaiser Rhinestones shipment has arrived which means that we once again have a full stock of all your favourite colours.

Did you know that Kaiser are releasing 6 new paper ranges on 1st July?  If you would like to have a sneak peak at the ranges before they arrive at the store go to Kaiser’s website – www.kaisercraft.net- and click on Sneak Peak, once there click on each individual range and drag your cursor over the word Sneak Peak for a glimpse of that range.

Great news everyone, starting at 10am on Saturday 20th June we will be having our Stocktake Sale, but be quick as it will be on for one week only.

Discounts will range from 10% to 75% off the original price.

To ensure you get the best bargains pop in early as it finishes at the end of business on Saturday 27^th June.

Don’t forget ladies, tomorrow from 10.30am we will be having Sherry Mendoza in our store demonstrating how to use and colour TwiddleyBitz.  So if you have a chance pop in, have a cuppa and see just how great these new products are.  Sherry is very talented and designs and teaches for TwiddleyBitz so I am sure she will have some great ideas to share with you and if you are lucky you might even pick up a prize. She will be demonstrating Thursday 18th June from 10.30am till 2.00pm.

We recently ran a class where we painted some chipboard using Jo Sonja’s Burnished Copper Micaceous Pigment mix paint, which gives a metallic finish.  Once the paint was dry we then covered the chipboard with Glossy Accents/Dimensional Magic, we discovered that as the Glossy Accents dried the chipboard turned from the Burnished Copper colour to a green/blue colour which we think is due to oxidization.

Through trial and error we discovered that if you paint your chipboard, let it dry, then seal the paint with Mod Podge, you can then cover it all with Glossy Accents and the oxidization will not occur.  Thus allowing the original paint colour to show through.

We hope this little tip will help when using this or any other Metal based paint.

We all have our favourite manual cutting machine whether it be the Cuttlebug or Bigshot machine, however, we are sometimes unsure just how well they interact with each other.  I personally have the old original red sizzix machine, which I must say never gets used any more, and I also own a Cuttlebug which I absolutely love.  It’s easy to use and I can still use all my older sizzix dies in it.

However, Sizzix recently brought out a new range of dies called Bigz and Bigz XL dies. While the dies fit though the Cuttlebug machine without any problem, the acrylic matts don’t.  I found this frustrating as there are some really lovely Bigz dies on the market.  Well we had a lightbulb go off whilst playing in our workshop last week !!!

You can use the Bigz and Bigz XL dies with the Cuttlebug B plates instead of the Bigshot mats. The process is still the same – sandwich the die (rubber-side up) with your paper/cardstock between the two B plates as normal and whack it through the machine. Voila – goes through with no problem. The only “limitation” is with the Bigz XL dies – and this is because the B plates are not long enough to cover the whole die – so it works best with designs that have more than 1 shape on them eg. Album dies, tags, invitations.  Just place your paper over the shape that you want to cut first and then place your acrylic matt over this area and roll through as usual.  The rest of the die not covered by the acrylic matt will just roll through as normal.  It might take a little longer, however, if it’s a die you really love and don’t want to buy an extra machine just to use these dies, here is your answer. Enjoy !

Ladies – if you were still deciding whether to do Jane’s Kaiser page using  the Garden Arabesque paper on Saturday 20th June there is only one place available so it’s first in best dressed.

In store we often have customers wanting to do off the page projects for the first time and the most commonly asked question is “How do I adhere my paper and photos?”.

It can be daunting when you’re trying to tackle a project for the first time, however, that’s where we come in, we are always there to help you.  When doing these types of projects we like to use Mod Podge.  Mod Podge is a sealer, glue and finish for all surfaces.

I have, in the past, trialed different ways of adhereing my paper to the project, however, when using a glue stick or double sided tape I found the paper would sometimes lift after awhile, or if I then tried to seal the project the paper would bubble and become unattractive.

So, here is the best way we have found to adhere your paper to those wood or chipboard projects.

1.  Cut your paper to the correct size.

2. Cover the back of the paper generously with Mod Podge and attach to your project.

3. Using a brayer (mini roller) or even a rolling pin, gently roll over your project – this will get out any air bubbles and help the paper to attach to the wood.

4. Always let the project dry completely before proceeding any further.

5. If you are attaching photos, these too can be attached using Mod Podge.  Now you can also seal your project using Mod Podge. This helps stick everything down and also makes it easy to wipe over your project when you have it on display.

6. Lastly add any lumpy bumpy embellishments, these don’t get covered with the sealer.

Now before you stress, yes you can cover your photos with Mod Podge, it goes on a little cloudy but will dry clear.

Mod Podge comes in two sizes and several different finishes, including satin and matte and they have just released a silver and gold. Also the best way to apply this product is either with a paint brush or sponge applicator always going in one direction.  Mod Podge can be cleaned up with water while wet, however, once dry is usually can not be removed.

We hope this helps make doing your off the page projects a little easier, however, if you’re still unsure, drop us a line or pop in and we will help you get started.

Ok ladies we have scheduled our first Scrap your Crap class where you provide the products and we provide the inspiration.  The class will be on Thursday16th July from 10.30am to 1.30pm and it’s a great opportunity to gather together all those left over bits and pieces and scrap papers and complete a lovely “Book of Days”.  We will use the Zutter to create the spiral bound book, and all your scraps to decorate it. In this lovely book you can note down all those important dates you need to remember or alternatively you can use it as a journal or sketch book for your scrapbooking, the uses are endless.

Keep an eye out on our class calender as we will be bringing you some Scrap your Crap page layouts in the near future.