A Crafting Necessity: The Brightech Lamp

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Have you ever received something you didn't know you needed, then wondered how you ever lived without it? Such was the case for me and my Brightech lamp. It is AMAZING!

I received the LightView XL Magnifying Glass Light 2-in-1 Floor Standing-to-Table Lamp to try out back in late November. For the past six weeks, I've been wishing I'd bought one years ago! I love everything about it. It's easy to adjust and provides beautiful light right where I need it. The huge rectangular lens magnifies 2.25 times, which has come in very handy for my aging eyes. (No more calling Trevor over to read fine print for me!) I've used the magnification without the light, the light without the magnification, and both together.

So how have I used my lamp? I used it to fix my REACH tag when the rub-ons didn't transfer completely.

I used my 005 Micron pen to dot in the places where the rub-on was missing. Piece of cake with the magnification!

It's great for sewing, a frequent activity for Scout parents.

I can thread needles again! (Note to self: Schedule appointment with optometrist. Clearly, it's time for glasses.)

Steve has taken my lamp out to his electronics desk in the garage. 

I'm not sure it would be possible to solder such a tiny circuit board without the light and magnification.

My mom used the lamp to read more comfortably and is planning to buy her own. She often reads holding a magnifying glass. No more!

Obviously, I highly recommend the LightView XL Magnifying Glass Light... even if your eyes are still young! It's allowed me to do precision crafting at night, which I'd never done before. It provides amazing hands-free magnification. It provides white light exactly where I need it. I could go on and on.

If you received any Christmas money, treat yourself to a Brightech magnifying lamp! There are a lot of different styles, so visit their website to see which is best for you. They offer free shipping over $50 and free returns if you're not happy with your lamp (but I can't imagine that being the case).

If you already have a magnifying lamp, tell me how you use it. There are probably a dozen more uses I haven't thought of yet!

The Blue & Gold Cake (aka, Adventures with EasyMold)

Along with the Super Scout table decorations, Trevor also made a cake for the cake auction at the Cub Scout Blue & Gold. In past years, he's made a Snake Cake and a Pinewood Derby themed cake (which didn't actually make it to the Blue & Gold... story in the link). He was having trouble coming up with a design for this year's cake, so I told him to look at his pins and other awards to see if there was one that would be fun to try to make. Success. He sketched out a design that of a diamond-shaped cake with the Cub Scout insignia. Here's the proud Scout with his completed cake.

It's hard to tell from this photo, but it's a 2-layer cake covered in white frosting, edged with yellow licorice, with yellow sanding sugar on the top, blue and yellow Candy Melts shards on the sides, and a large blue Candy Melts fleur-de-lis on the top. 

That fleur-de-lis is where the creative part of this project comes in. Together, Trevor and I brainstormed a bunch of ways to make the insignia on top. Piping it with frosting? 'Drawing' it with candies? Making a stencil and adding blue sprinkles? Suddenly, I remembered this:

I'd received this box of food-grade silicone mold material as part of a class at CHA 2015 and hadn't needed it in 13 months. It would be perfect to make a mold for candy! I'd recently bought a chipboard fleur-de-lis to use keep on hand as a tracer or mask and hadn't used it yet. That would be ideal for making the mold. We read through the instructions and prepared to make the mold.

It was really easy. Equal parts white and purple, mix until combined, flatten it out, and press the fleur-de-lis in. 

We left it alone for a few minutes, then removed the fleur-de-lis. The mold didn't look great, but it did look functional. Next time I'll take an extra second to roll out the silicone properly and trim the edges before it sets! Newbie error.

We wanted the chocolate to unmold in one piece, but it was obvious that it was going to break into a top and bottom section, so I carefully trimmed out the protruding bits from the center allow the finished piece to be one solid piece. I knew that wouldn't give a completely clean look, but no matter. When the chocolate came out of the mold (in one piece!), I told Trevor that we could carve out the excess to make it look a little neater, but he was happy with how it looked. Sounds good to me! Here's a bird's eye view of the top of his cake.

Now that I've tried the EasyMold, I'm eager to try it again! I don't have any ideas of what to mold though. I'm open to suggestions!

My Favorites, Inspired by The Scrap Gals Podcast #61

I'm continuing to work my way through episodes of The Scrap Gals Podcast. If you haven't checked it out, you should.

I'm now caught up through March 2015, so it shouldn't be too long before I'm hearing the episodes as they're released. I really enjoy the variety of topics, the interaction between Tiffany and Tracie, and the pace and length of each episode.

Episode 61 is titled "Our Favorites" and it is 55 minutes of Tiffany and Tracie answering readers' prompts about all their scrapbook favorites. As usual, I find myself one part Tiffany (the photo-driven, journaling-heavy part), one part Tracie (the planning, want-it-to-be-just-right, organized part), and another part neither of them. I thought it would be fun to answer the same prompts they did, so I took notes during the episode.

Some of the categories I've already answered in a blog post. My favorite adhesives haven't changed, nor my favorite tool. I still love Echo Park paper (with Simple Stories a very close second), Bazzill cardstock, my Fiskars bypass trimmer and Simple Stories' stickers. With those out of the way, let's move on to the rest of the questions!

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Favorite place to have photos printed:

This is a tough one. I've tried most of the mail-order ones and have had mixed results. I don't like waiting the 5+ days to have them show up, so 99% of the time I just get one-hour photos from somewhere in town. I've tried most of those, too. Occasionally I'll find one that is GREAT and keep using it until all of a sudden it is lousy. Believe it or not, Walmart has the best 1-hour printing right now, but only when a certain employee is working. He is a perfectionist (not something you see at Walmart very often) and CARES that my photos look good. If I need photos during a time he isn't working, I use Costco in the next town over. They're almost as good and right next door to Trevor's ice skating lessons, so it's convenient as well.

Favorite album:

Another tough one. For a long time, I used Mrs. Grossman's Perfect Album, but they've been discontinued for years. I've tried a bunch of others and don't love any of them as much. 

Favorite technique: 

Hmm... maybe inking edges? I love Chestnut Roan ink on pretty much everything! 

Favorite subject to photograph:

That has to be Trevor. I also like taking selfies of Steve and me together. 

Favorite journaling technique: 

I like handwritten paragraphs that tell the story. I write in 1st person and try to work in the details that make the memory special. 

Favorite approach to scrapping:

I'm photo-driven. I always start with the photos when designing a page. The photos illustrate the story I want to tell and dictate what supplies I use.

Favorite colors to scrap:

I use a lot of earth tones in my scrapping, mostly because they look good with our skin tones and don't draw too much attention from the photos. But I really like using other colors if they don't fight with the photos. I'd say my favorite colors to scrap change to be whatever colors I haven't used in awhile!

Favorite go-to page design:

I'm all about the grid. When in doubt, line things up.  

Favorite part of the scrapping process:

I LOVE taking a newly-printed stack of photos, cropping them down and piecing them together on a page, thinking about where my title and journaling will go. It's like a puzzle.

Favorite place to buy scrapbook supplies:

We haven't had a local scrapbook store in ages and I'm not crazy about the selection at the big box stores, so 99.9% of my shopping is through Scrapbook.com. They carry pretty much everything, have excellent customer service, offer frequent deals, and ship things out very promptly. Not to mention the excellently-written product descriptions! (If you see a description in the Superstore that has grammatical errors or is just plain weird, that's not one of mine.)

Favorite place to find inspiration: 

Blogs for sure! I follow most of the manufacturers' blogs, as well as many of my fellow crafters' blogs. I see inspiring projects every single day. 

Favorite people to be inspired by:

Tough question. There are so many people who inspire me. I'm not going to name names, since I would surely leave out too many! 

Favorite time to scrap:

I'm a morning person, so I am most productive then. And I strongly prefer scrapping with natural light, so definitely daytime. But the time I scrap is much less important to me than the conditions under which I scrap. My favorite is to have an entire day, alone in the house, with no interruptions. It's part of why I love National Scrapbook Day so much.

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So how about you? I'd love to hear how you'd answer the same questions.

Scrapbooking on a Desert Island

I enjoy listening to podcasts, particularly scrapbook-related ones, while I'm doing chores. Sadly, of the four scrapbook-related podcasts I mentioned in a March 2014 post, only one remains. Fortunately, it was my favorite of the four. I do listen to podcasts other than scrapbooking ones, such as the foodie-favorite Spilled Milk, Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's Adventures in Arting, Katrina Kennedy's photography-related Capture Your 365, and, of course, the outstanding Serial. But I was in the market for another great scrapbooking podcast. I did some Googling and came across The Scrap Gals.

After listening to the most recent episode, I was hooked. I went back to the beginning (which, oddly enough, is Episode 2, not Episode 1) and started binge-listening. One of my favorites was Episode 14, "Scrapbooking on a Desert Island." Tiffany and Tracie each chose the limited scrapbook supplies they would bring if they were stuck on a desert island. As I was listening, I started making a list of my own answers with plans to leave a comment. But after a full page of notes, it was clear that I had a blog post on my hands, not a mere comment.

I won't go through what Tiffany and Tracie chose to bring with them to the hypothetical desert island, as you can listen to the podcast and hear for yourself. Instead, I'll share my own pick for each category they discussed.

Paper

If I could only scrap with one manufacturer for the rest of my life, it would be Echo Park. I own most of their Dots & Stripes papers and use them frequently as backgrounds or accents. Tiffany and Tracie split their answers between 12" x 12" and 6" x 6" paper pads, but I'd still choose Echo Park's Dots & Stripes regardless of size.

Cardstock

I'm a Bazzill loyalist. I love their color and texture options and the quality is second-to-none.

Project Life

I don't do pocket-style scrapping and have never bought products intended for Project Life or related systems. I've been given some product from various manufacturers that I've used here and there, but I haven't used any enough to form opinions.


Embellishments

I have a very minimalist style and don't use a lot of embellishments. I'm very particular about what I use as embellishments - they can't be too large, they can't add bulk to a page and they have to actually make sense with my page. Some people think nothing of putting an owl, or an anchor or a bicycle accent on a page, but I am such a literal person that I would have to actually be scrapping about owls, sea travel or cycling to use any of those. Consequently, I don't buy a lot of embellishment packs, since 99% of them aren't relevant to my scrapping. I do use stars, arrows and hearts fairly often. I also use a lot of holiday- or birthday-themed embellishments. Some of my favorites are the Icon Stickers by Simple Stories.

Letter Stickers

I'm obsessed with Simple Stories letter stickers and would definitely sneak them into my desert island packing, but I'm going to have to give the official win to Jillibean Soup Beanboard Alphas. Technically they are not stickers, as they don't have adhesive, but they're still my vote for best letter stickers. They have everything I love about chipboard letters without any bulk.

Tools

Tiffany and Tracie lumped adhesives and journaling pens into their tools selection, but I need dedicated categories for those. My #1 dry adhesive is Tombow Mono.

My favorite wet adhesive is Martha Stewart Glittering Glue.

My favorite journaling pens are Marvy's Le Pen.

I have to mention my favorite ink, too. It's ColorBox Chalk Ink, in Chestnut Roan.

Now, on to what I actually consider must-have tools. I love, love, love my Fiskars Bypass Trimmer. I'd need to bring along a larger trimmer for my 12" x 12" paper. I wish this one came in a 12" x 12" version. I can't tell you how much money the words "self-sharpening" have saved me over the last decade or so.

Finally, my beloved Fiskars Microtip Scissors. I love them so much I made a layout about them.

And that concludes my desert island packing list! What would make onto your list? I'd love to hear!

The Verdict Is In... We LOVE Twisteezwire!

Before leaving for the Craft and Hobby Association trade show, I looked up all of the nominees for the 2015 Hot Products Award. I was most interested in the kids' crafts category. My pick for the winner (and Trevor's pick also) was the Twisteezwire Mask Kit. It looked so fun, equally appropriate and interesting for boys and girls, with tons of room for creativity. You can see a video about it here. 

On Saturday night when I returned to the hotel room after opening day on the CHA show floor, the first thing Trevor said was, "Did you get to see the Twisteezwire Mask Kit? Did it win?" I reminded him that the awards would be announced Sunday night (while I'd be at Disneyland with him) and that I wouldn't find out until Monday morning. On Sunday night, there were at least ten times that Trevor said something to the effect of, "I really hope the Twisteezwire Mask Kit wins! Can you get one for me when we get home?" That really says something if a kid who is at Disneyland is thinking about a craft project he wants to do at home!

As soon as the show floor opened on Monday morning, I zipped over to find out the winners of the Hot Products Awards. The Twisteezwire Mask Kit was a runner-up, but did not win. I was surprised how disappointed I was! I'd never used it and had only first learned about it four days earlier, but I was already 100% convinced that it was one of the coolest things to hit the kids' craft market in awhile. 

I went to the Twisteezwire booth to tell the exhibitor how disappointed both my son and I were that their mask kit did not win 1st place. We chatted a bit and after a little while, she asked how old my son was. I told her he was 8. She then did something I absolutely did not expect - she handed me a Mask Kit and said it was for him if I promised to review it on my blog. 

As you've probably noticed, I don't accept a lot of free products to review here. Most of the products I review are things I bought and loved and know that my readers would love too. I would feel terrible if I accepted something for free with a promise to review it and it was awful. Obviously, I would never say nice things about a product just because someone gave it to me, so I am very careful with what I promise. I'd done my research about the Twisteezwire Mask Kit and I knew I would love it. Trevor knew he would love it. I was completely confident that there was no chance my review would be less than glowing, so I accepted it. 

I snapped a few photos of some other Twisteezwire projects before leaving. Check out these cool glasses! 

I love the birthday cake. And the snowman!

These baskets are incredible!

I got back to the hotel room on Monday night before Steve and Trevor did. I hid the Mask Kit, waiting for them to return, certain that Trevor would ask if it won. Sure enough, it was the first thing he asked when he came through the door! I told him it did not and he was so disappointed. But his disappointment turned to euphoria when I pulled out the kit and handed it to him! He wanted to play with it then and there in the hotel room, at 9:00 pm, the night before we were leaving. Um, no. He wanted to play with it in the car on the drive home. Also no. 

After we got home, out of vacation mode, and back into our routine, I invited my 8 year old goddaughter Kylinn over to try the Mask Kit with Trevor. Before school was out, I opened the kit and took photographs of the contents. It includes a detailed instruction book, fifty 30" Twisteezwires, buttons, beads, feathers, markers, and dowels. Plus, the box itself becomes one of the supplies! You supply your own coat hangers and scissors. That's all you need. 

When I picked Trevor up from school, he was so excited he could hardly stand it. He was DYING to play with the Mask Kit. As soon as Kylinn arrived, I sat them both down and explained that they had a very important job: to play with the kit and let me know their honest opinions about it. I handed them the instruction booklet, which they studied carefully. 

Kylinn's wearing the ribbon barrettes I made for her! Tutorial here.

They were so intent on studying the instruction booklet that they didn't notice me taking their photos until the second-to-last page!

I put all the supplies on the kitchen table and they got right to work. I took this one photo of them getting started before I went upstairs to leave them alone. I really wanted to see what they would make on their own and whether the kit was truly appropriate for kids as young as 8.  

I could hear the kids chatting and giggling as they worked. They worked for exactly 90 minutes before they came and got me, both wearing their masks with the biggest smiles you've ever seen. I had them go outside where the light was better so I could take their photo. Kylinn proudly showed off her zebra mask. Trevor was equally proud of his rabbit mask.  

Both kids said that the kit was AWESOME! They said it was great for 8 year olds - not too easy and not too hard. They liked the way the box was one of the supplies. They thought it was really fun and that other kids would love it too. So there you go! The verdict is in... we LOVE the Twisteezwire Mask Kit!

It's really unusual that I don't do a craft alongside Trevor. I really wanted to make a mask, but I thought it was important to see what 8 year olds would make on their own without being influenced by something an adult made. While the kids ran around out back playing Zebra and Rabbit, I went back inside to clean up. I was delighted to see that there were still a lot of supplies left. Plenty for me to make my own mask the next time Trevor wants to play with the kit! 

I highly recommend the Twisteezwire Mask Kit for the 8+ crafter in your life! You can buy bundles of Twisteezwire, as well as see lessons and their amazing gallery on the Twisteezwire website. Expect to see more Twisteezwire projects from us in the near future!

CreativeLive

I'm taking a break from sharing the layouts I made on National Scrapbook Day to talk about CreativeLive.  I discovered CreativeLive about 5 months ago and I'm in love.  According to their website:

CreativeLive empowers you to unleash your potential by bringing the world’s greatest experts directly to you, live. Featuring workshops in photography, video, design, business, audio, music, and software training, CreativeLive unlocks previously closed doors by making dynamic education accessible to everyone. 

Anyone can watch our live online workshops — for free — and interact with instructors in real time. The future of education is interactive, free, and live now.

If you're not able to watch a workshop live, or if you want to be able to watch it repeatedly, you can purchase the workshop.  I've watched portions of several workshops on the Maker & Craft channel and they have all been outstanding.  I've been watching their calendar for upcoming workshops and there are quite a few that I'll try to catch.

There's one upcoming workshop that I know I won't miss... because I was chosen to be one of six people in the studio audience!  The workshop is called "Scrapbook Your Story" with Lain Ehmann. I am so excited!  I've never taken a class by Lain but I understand she is an outstanding instructor.  Here is Lain's introduction video.

My friend Jennifer (Luvmyfam on Scrapbook.com) was selected to be in the studio audience too, which makes it even more awesome!  The workshop will be broadcast live starting one week from today on Monday, May 19 and also on Tuesday, May 20, both from 9:00 am to 4:00 pm Pacific.  You can watch some or all of it for free by either going here to RSVP or simply showing up on the site when it is live.  You can watch or listen passively, or participate in the live web chat. Answering questions from the at-home audience is a huge part of each show.  I'm a little nervous about scrapping live in front of thousands of people, but I'm much more excited than nervous.  Wish me luck!

My All-Time Favorite Collection?

Do you have an all-time favorite paper collection?  There are a lot of collections I've loved over the years, but there's one that I have on more layouts than any other, saving every tiny scrap to use somewhere.  I've used this collection for a huge variety of topics, as it seems to go with practically everything.  That collection is Crate Paper's Lemon Grass.

These layouts are almost 100% Lemon Grass. 

 

 

These use Lemon Grass embellishments.

And these use some of the neutral papers in the collection.

I'm down to one sheet plus some tiny scraps, and a few embellishments, so I'll probably be able to squeeze one or two more layouts out of that.  

Do you have one collection that you've used more than any other?  I'd love to hear what it is!

Copic vs. Prismacolor Showdown

I absolutely love Prismacolor markers. When I blogged about how much I love them, a friend commented if you compare Prismacolors with Copics, the Copics win hands down.  Ever since then, I've wanted to do a side-by-side comparison to decide for myself.  I finally got the chance when my friend Jennifer brought her Copic Sketch markers with her during our recent scrappy get-together.

The first thing I noticed is that the basic nibs of the two brands are quite different.  The Prismacolor's wide end is somewhat wider than the wide end of the Copic, and the fine tip of the Prismacolor is significantly smaller than the fine tip of the Copic.    

 

I should mention that Copics can be refilled and the nibs can be replaced (or exchanged for different sizes).  Neither of these is true for the Prismacolors.  But my goal was to compare the two brands as they are sold.  While I'm sure that there are many people who switch out the nibs on their Copics, I'd guess that there are at least as many people who use the Copic exactly the way its sold, especially given the cost (between $5 and $8 per pen).  

People who love Copics rave about how well they blend.  I was curious to see if there was a noticeable different in blending between the two brands.  I drew lines, colored designs, and filled in some images. I did not find much of a difference between the two.  What I did notice is that it was much easier to fill in tiny parts of a stamped image with the fine tip of the Prismacolor compared to the brush tip of a Copic.      

 

Next, I did a word art project, inspired by Artisan des Arts.  There's a tutorial on her post.

 

I made a second project, filling in all the spaces to see how it would look and to really give the pens a chance to show what they can do.

After all that experimenting, I came to a conclusion: I actually prefer the Prismacolors, mostly because of the fine tip end (which can be bought separately for Copics).  I can see a lot of reasons why the Copics are so beloved.  They are an excellent product, and the environmentalist in me really likes that they are refillable and the nibs can be replaced without having to throw out the whole pen.  The price tag of a Copic Sketch is daunting at double the cost of a Prismacolor, but for serious artists who go through pens frequently, they are probably more cost-efficient in the long run.  

What about you?  Copics, Prismacolors or a different brand of alcohol marker?