I am a Honey Bee

All about my adventures with cooking, crafts, and travel

amy tangerine

And Point! – LO

I tried to keep this layout fun and light because it features a fun time for us, well specifically Pricer. Once, when we went into the city we stopped by the Today Show to see the morning taping of the show and when we were there Price got to take a photo with Linny. If you didn’t know, Linny is a Today Show staple, he is outside EVERY DAY in the crowd. Crazy! But we love getting to see him point to the camera after the break return at 7.30.

 

As ‘simple’ as this layout is with just 1 patterned piece of paper for the backgrounds and photo, I tried to have fun with the embellishments. I used chipboard pieces that I painted and inked. I used the tag to create a spot for the title, that I made with alpha letters. I stamped and used used a brad. All of these things were pretty small so they didn’t overwhelm the page. My favorite thing I put on there was the heart shaped paperclip. Adorable!

Spark The Event: Day 2 Recap (and Giveaway!)

Our first day of Spark was jam packed of fun classes but it did not stop there since we have a whole other day of more classes, a blogger panel, and another musical performance.

 

We had missed the Dear Lizzie boutique set up at Spark the first day so we stopped by first thing the in the morning. I picked up some gifts there. 🙂

Margie gave a run down of the day’s events for us during the Welcome session. She is so hilarious that she everyone cracking up. But she is best at inspiring everyone and connecting super talented women to create a great event.

 

Our morning class that we attended was the first Mixed Media class with Donna Downey. For the “From the Heart” class, we used pan pastels on canvases to create a mixed media piece layers the pastels with stamps and tags.  I had never worked with pan pastels so i had a lot of fun using a new medium. Did you know you have to create a porous surface for it to stick to? how do you do that on canvas? Well, adhere a piece of tissue paper to it of course!

Here Donna is showing my mom and other Spark women how to create shadows on our hearts by flicking with the applicator.

We had a free hour in the morning which allowed me to catch up on my reverse applique shirt. Brioche, my traveling gnome bun, chilled out as I documented his travels.

 

There was a group of the sweetest women who came all the way from JAPAN. Yes, they came from JAPAN! They had met Margie when she went over there to teach some classes so they all stayed in touch and then came over for Spark. They took photos of everyone using Instax cameras and added our pics to mini books so we could right msgs right there.

During the process of my mom making her shirt, a little pull was created on the patterned fabric part. Instead of my mom having to redo the entire thing Amy just showed my mom how to fix it by adding a little fabric flower. Lemons… lemonade!

After lunch there was a blogging panel. April was the moderator for hour as we got to ask the 4 panelist (Allison Czarnecki, C. Jane Kendrick, April Atwater, Brittany Egbert) questions about blogging. Of course I ask the boring technical/legal questions. Whatever.. that interests me instead of asking about what to do with negative comments. (ignore them- duh!)

 

Group A headed back up after the blogger panel for the 2nd mixed media class. Christy Tomlinson taught this class which was a take off form her She Art class that she offers online. We used paints, paper, inks, rub-ons, on canvas to create a unique piece of artwork. Ofrouse I decided that I did not want to have a girl on it so I put a big heart that I stitched together with rub-ons. Different but fun. Still a work in progress at this point.

I don’t think I could get tired of that view…

Our last class of the day, and of Spark(!), was about felting. Emily Falconbridge, hails from Australia, but now resides in NH- so need to hang with her in New England!- and she is a fibers maven. She taught us how to felt soap using some wool, soup, water, a felting needing, and our hands. It my seem weird to cover soap with wool but wool is naturally anti-bacterial so it is a great soap cover.

Our closing dinner was fantastic but shall also be known as the cupcake incident… you had to be there.

 

 

After the dinner we settled in for closing announcements where Margie thanked everyone involved who helped pull off such a great event. Of course tears were shed, esp when Margie thanked her daughter Megan for all her help.

 

Ending out Spark, we enjoyed a performance from Sarah Sample. I had beenlistening to her music at work since I heard that she would be at Spark. It was so great getting to have such a fantastic, intimate performance. Best was that we sat with Sarah on Friday during lunch and got to chat with her about her music, recent move, and family. She is so sweet, funny, and talented.

Said bye to Amy!

 

Mom and I headed to Dear Lizzie for the after party. We hung around there for a bit, got lost going back to the hotel because of a detour, then had a ‘midnight’ snack at Sonic!’

Check out a quick video I did from the performances we had in the main hall. This brought back memories, as well as reminded me to record much more! I think I was just lost in taking it all in!

And last but not least… A Giveaway!!!

Well I have 2 giveaways in fact!

Between my mom and me, we sorted out some great goodies to part with since we have SOOOO much stuff. We have some scrapbooking paper, chipboard pieces, a mini book, rub-ons, and other embellishments to giveaway. Since there are 2 giveaways and we did not exactly have 2 over everything to spare, there will be some differences in the kit. But this is the general idea of it. Plus I’m sure I’ll be able to sort through my person stash some more and add to it prior to shipping.

 

To win…

1) Leave a comment telling me how you are creative, how you keep you spark lit.

2) Tweet “I’d love to stay creative by winning some great @sparktheevent swag from @iamahoneybee http://wp.me/pzEAP-1BB” about the giveaway. And come back and leave a separate comment!

Contest Ends midnight on Friday 10/4/11

UPDATE: 

winners are Jamie and Sierra!

 

Spark the Event: Day 1 Recap

I had the pleasure of attending Spark : The Event this year. This was the 3rd Spark, so I will often affectionately refer to it as Spark #3. Every since I learned about Spark from Liz Kartchner’s blog from the first event I knew that I would have to make it out to Utah and get to get my creative juices flowing and have a lot of fun.

I will save you all the horrendice details about my trip to Utah. In summary it involved  a cab ride, tears, lots of photo calls, texting (which I hate), stress, running, and 2 plane rides. We arrived in Salt Lake City 3.30 east coast time so my mom and I were very tired but VERY relieved to be there. We were able to enjoy our Thursday in SLC, Park City, and to have a great photo session with the super talented (and funny) Collin Kartchner– to be shared later.

So that brings up to Friday- the first day of Spark….

Registration started at 8 but we were up bright and early!

Noah’s Event Center was the facility that housed Spark. Margie and Team did a lot of hard work decorating entire building. Out first glimpse at Noah’s was this entry with the book paper lights and vintage luggage.

 

Welcoming decor greeting all the attendants.

The Main Hall was  elaboratly decorated with ribbons, yarn, pom poms. fabric wrapped hoops, and sewn paper garlands.

Margie explained how all the decor has been reused from her own stash or old from second hand stores. She also said that when they break down the event the pieces will get a new life when it is transformed for another Spark.

Each table had a center piece, which had been used and transformed previously! Giving something old a new life makes that piece so much more special. Each setting had a box and note book for us to use during and after attending Spark.

 

After checking out the Main Hall, we went back to the 2 vendor halls to check out the shopping we could do. Each vendor was special in their own way from specializing in handmade shirts, vintage clothes, baked goods, an

 

At one of the tables I found this amazing vintage pink metal cake carrier. Such an amazing find for jsut $12!!!

And then we began! Margie came up and talked to us about what Spark really means and how we get to become Spark Sisters from the event. We get to make special connections with other creative women who each bring a different skill and perspective to the table.

Mindy Gledhill took us on an activity that had us writing down goals, people we admire, and things that make us happy in our new Spark journals. She also serenaded us with some songs. I really love her music so you should check it out too! Love the song Anchor.

We all broke up into our groups to attend the morning classes. My favorite morning class was the jewelry making class taught by Cathe Holden. We made nest necklaces. We used shimmery beads to represent eggs and wrapped around them with wire to create the nest. I used to different colored wires for an extra level of detail. Lastly, I stamped on a metal tag to complete the necklace.

Group A also took the stamp carving class in the morning taught by April Meeker. This class was a bit more difficult but still rewarding because it was something completely new for me. Knowing how the pressure of the carving tool, as well as what you carve out, allows you to create a unique handmade stamp.

 

Then all the groups broke for lunch. Mom and I grabbed our lunches and immediately headed outside to enjoy the beautiful view.

We had a post lunch update where Margie introduced Amy Tan. In addition to having her own business of designing handmade shirts, she has her own scrapbooking line with American Crafts.

I loved the 2 hour long junk journal class where we took an old book and began to transform it to create an album for a scrapbook. I had altered a book previously for a Liz Kartchner class but this was very different and fun. I love how you can start with an old book and apply various techniques to alter it to get such different effect and finished product. I am going to complete my junk journal and use it as the scrapbook for the long weekend in Utah.

After the junk journal class we had our session with Amy to make hour reverse applique shirts. I love the process and I can really see myself making more shirts for gifts and myself. I love hand sewing so the process was fun and relaxing. The best part of the class was hearing about Amy’s vast experiences as a small business owner of a fashion line called Amy Tangerine, who creates specialty reverse applique tops. She explained how she was discovered, she started the shirt alteration business with a vendor market fair in NYC and how the rest became history.

 

After dinner we particiapted in make and takes from 7-9pm. There were several stations throughout the building that had different designers and product manucturers set up having us do quick crafts. My favorite was the earring station on the roof because I liked the pace of the craft and the look of the earrings. Friskar’s set up was also really fun because we made Halloween flags. I’m so predictable and boring that I only used orange and black to design my flag. Of course mom used all the color possibilities on her flag.

And that was DAy 1 of Spark the Event #3.

Stay tuned for my Day 2 recap!

Mini Book: Weekend Escape

I recently took an online workshop about mini books from Amy Tangerine. I was so glad that she offered this class because I was so interested in her style of scrapbooking. Most of her scrapbooks are these minis that she creates, often by sewing the book together. While the class taught how to make these books, I decided to get the class kit anyway. The kit included a sewn mini book and embellishments for it.  Sweet!

During the class I made another book, well 2 that I combined. I’m using that as a gift later on, so more on that when the time comes. I used the provided kit, with some additional embellishments, for this past weekend Price and I spent in upstate NY. We went to visit family and going to wineries- this was the perfect opportunity to use this book because of the size. Additionally, Amy taught about her process in packing and preparing for scrapbooking on the go. She makes herself a kit that allows her to scrap, even on planes!

The most exciting thing about this is that I am done with my mini book. That is really record timing for me. Very impressive considering I only worked on it for a a bit over the weekend and at random points during the week. Pretty cool considering how hectic my week was with staying late, going in early, creating my Halloween costume, and a crocheting class. I do look forward to the point when I get it done even fast. Still very excited it’s done within a week since I still have not finished my DC book from our June trip. I’d say that this trip mini book experience has been a great success. 🙂

It was the first time that I scrapbooked on the go as well. My kit was much, much larger than Amy’s example but it’s a start. On Saturday night I sat down and started to map out and journal some pages. I’m a big planner so I realized that my future kits will need post it’s in it to block out picture locations, until I have them printing.

Aside from the ‘scrapbooking-on-the-go’, I enjoyed this class because it made me try new things. Typically, I don’t include souvenirs or write so much, but this class featured that scrapbooking style. I felt ‘safe’ doing those things in a mini book since it is a bit more whimsical compared to my 12×12 pages. This approach was really nice because I was able to toss in bits and pieces from the different wineries we went to. Even the sticker from the bakery I went to went into the book.

Overall I enjoyed the techniques I learned during this class. One of the big things is that I will sew text and embellishments into layouts and books in the future. I love the look and the process of it. I can also hand sew some mini books in the future.  Time to experiment and do some more scrapbooking!!!