MTL Blog

Have a look at this great Sizzix project.  Our talented design team member Kylie has used her Cupcake Sizzix die to make this beautiful gift bag, what a great and different why to use your dies.

I don’t know about you, but after every birthday I end up with yet more gift bags, and like any good recycler, I carefully put them away for later use.   So when I was shown this bag, I immediately thought what a great way of using up all those plain coloured bags I have.  Next time you are busy making some cards to hoard away for use when needed, why not make up a matching bag to really impress your friends.

Everyone here at MTL is excited to annouce that for the third year in a row we are  Finalists in the 2009 Liverpool Leader Business Achiever Awards.  Stuart, Anne-Marie and all the staff would like to extend a very big thank you to everyone who voted for us this year.  Our customers are important to us and it’s nice to know that so many took the time to fill in a nomination for us.

So once again a big thank you to everyone, it’s now up to us staff to WOW the mystery shopper, lets hope we can do  it.

There are some great new products in store at the moment, including several paper lines we haven’t stocked before.  These include Graphic 45, Webster Pages, some lovely transparancies  and glitter papers by Best Creation Inc., Prima and of course some lovely new ranges by Bo Bunny.

There are also new embellishments from Kaiser, they now have bling and pearls in short strips, you get a packet of 4 strips for $2.50, so they are great value for money.  My new favourite is Kindy Glitz 3D, it comes in slick white (which looks like your white gel pen), Gem Clear and Crystalina, the bottles have a super fine nozzle for easy application and when dry they have a beautiful 3D effect.  Whats better it drys really quick.

I hope last months sketch gave you some inspiration.  This months sketch is once again from the book Scrapbook Page Maps.  See how this time Larissa has only used two photos on her page insted of three like the sketch – you have to love sketches because even though we start with the basic idea of the sketch there really are no rules.

For all you Scrappers addicted to your Sizzix machine and dies, good news, our Sizzix shipment has arrived in Australia and should be in the shop within the next couple of days.

The order includes lots of new dies  and a restock of some of our old favourites, and if you’re in need of any consumables, they will be in the order as well, we are also getting in a selection of the new Sizzix Embossing Folders.  But wait, hear is the best news, those long awaited Big Shots will finally be here and available to those scrappers who have had them on order.  We know they have taken awhile to arrive, but once you pick them up and start using them, I’m sure you will agree that the wait is worth it.

Provo Craft have just released their new range of  Cuttlebug folders.  There are 8 new backgrounds, 3 new borders and 3 new cut and emboss. To help celebrate their arrival in store, for one week only, we are going to give you 10% off, this includes the entire Cuttlebug range new and old.

So ladies don’t delay pop in and grab yourself a bargain, or hop on line and place an oder, as this sale will end Midnight Sunday 23rd August.

This week we would like to introduce Rita. 

Rita is married with two young children, Adam almost 6 and Chanel 3. Rita says her children are not only her inspiration in scrapbooking but her inspiration in life.  She enjoys listening to Pussycat Dolls and eating Italian.

Rita has been scrapbooking for six (6) years on and off, and has been working at MTL with Anne and Stuart for the last four (4) years.  Rita is in the store on Tuesdays and almost every Saturday and together with Ivana runs the night classes on Wednesdays and Thursdays.  So now hopefully if you don’t get into the shop too often you can at least put a name to the face when you ring.

Well, we have held our first Scrap your Crap class and it was a great success.  I think all the ladies enjoyed bringing in thier scrap papers and half used embellishments to complete a project.  In these times we all still want to be able to do our craft, but less face it, we probably all need to do it on a budget and what better way than to use up all those half used bits and pieces you have laying around in your stash.

We have decided to run a second Scrap your Crap day on Saturday September 26th from 10.30am to 3.30pm.  On the day we will have approximately 10 – 12 sketches with completed layouts on display as ideas for you, and we will be here to help you tweak your pages to make them just right for you.  So all you do is come along with all your own supplies and scrap as many or as few pages as you like.  The day will cost $20 and this fee will include a pizza lunch.

What a great way to get some pages done and have a good long gossip with your friends.  So get a few friends together and come along for a fun day out.

MTL Retreat – Kiah Ridge Tahmoor

What a great weekend!!  We arrived mid afternoon to start preparation for our 4th Annual retreat and by early evening the shop and scrap room were ready and there we 44 eager ladies ready to scrap and card make the weekend away.  By 8pm everyone was settled in with some women frantically trying to complete as many pages as possible, while others seemed to only appear when food was served, and there was plenty of food served.  As the night grew colder more and more scrappers opted to jump into their PJ’s and scrap in comfort.  Note to self – next year pack big cuddly dressing gown and slippers.

Everyone seemed to enjoy all there was on offer, we played games including bingo, match the staff member to the pet – everyone was curious as to who owned the picture of the mouse in a trap as a pet, and some of the ladies even had a go at Sing Star.  At this point the staff would like to apologise if anyone found their singing offensive, luckily we scrapbook better than we sing.  Congratulations to Dawn who spent much time and effort trying to fill her Bingo card, luckily it paid off as Dawn was our major prize winner of the weekend.  Congratulations Dawn.

On Sunday we had Rachel Greig attend our retreat and run a class using Darkroom Door stamps, which she designs, and white crayons.  All the ladies enjoyed the class which they said was relaxed and fun, there did seem to be a lot a laughter coming from the room which was good to hear.

After all the positive feed back received, we have decided to return to Kiah Ridge next year for our retreat.  Ian and Debbie always make us feel welcome and Debbie’s food is all home cooked and tastes fantastic.  The retreat will be held on the 6th, 7th and 8th of August 2010 and we already have 14 people holding spots so if you’re interested give us a call or pop into the store and put your name down, once we start to get larger numbers you will need to put down a $50 deposit to hold your spot.

We thought it would be a nice idea to introduce you to all our staff members and Design Team over the coming weeks.  First off the rank is Ivana.

Ivana is a wife to Ivo and mother to Sandro aged 7 1/2, who keeps her busy with school runs and soccer games.  Sandro and his cousins are her main source of scrapbooking inspiration. Ivana has been working at MTL for around 2 years and you will find her in the store on Mondays and Tuesdays and often here running classes on Wednesday and Thursday nights.  She has been scrapping for four (4) years, and her favourite style of layouts are ones that are very structured.  Ivana loves using Kaiser products within her layouts and her favourite new toy is her Cricut Expressions machine.  So next time you’re in the store make sure you say hello to Ivana.