 Hi everyone! Mary here at Espresso Press Design. Thank you for stopping by. Today we're going to do a couple of things. I assume probably like a lot of you I am in cleanup mode. So today I'm going to junk my calendar and if I have time quite some time ago someone posted a comment that they couldn't see precisely how I made my shabby flowers. So I thought that might be if we have time I'll quickly do a couple because I'm going to be needing I've used almost all of them with the print on them and it's coming up to making hearts time. I'm going to make some heart things and ornaments, hang tags, little things you can hang in the window or on a cupboard or whatever. So I'm going to be needing some of those. Is it too early to make hearts? That's what I was going to do today and then realize I didn't have enough of those so I'm going to junk my calendar instead. But first a little um this is a newest ephemera pack basically. This is printed on presentation paper and it's just beautiful vintage valentines in my collection. This is printed on plain paper. It's six pages. It's PDF only and you know I collect these little things. These are authentic valentine greetings on postcards from somewhere there was a date on here. One is from 1914 and I think one was from 1904 or 1909 and I just um you know made a design on them. A couple of collage sheets just a fun little thing that you can play around with. Make some valentines. That's called my vintage valentine. It'll be at the end. So a little review. Last week I told you I was cutting up old sketchbooks. This is just one stack that I've gotten so far. I have several sizes. Two sizes. Well three. Five by seven. Card base and four by six. And I probably have at least 10 more to go but this is fabulous. I'm going to be using these for all kinds of things. These are just a few things I made from my little strips. Some kind of like calling them dog tags and I just repainted. They already had some watercolor on them and I just went over them a little bit. Stamped on top, punched a hole. I'm gonna be doing more things with those strips. These are some more leftover pieces. I'll be using those for something. I don't have my longer strips here but here's some more tiny strips. I'll be using those for something probably. Possibly those might get discarded but I've turned all of that into reusable stuff and I'm very happy to be reducing the paper clutter in my basement. So on to junk my calendar. This is one of the type of things I keep on my desk and it just holds. It's mostly pockets, envelopes, and it just holds waste so my desk doesn't end up looking like my side here which if you could see it's cluttered with paper. I don't really plan. I don't really do any of that kind of stuff like you would usually think. I use old planners to write notes in like when I'm doing something and I don't want to forget how I did it but this year I do want to start being a little more organized instead of just writing lists and keeping lists piled up on my desktop and then I have to thumb through them every time I want to keep track of what I want to remember. So I went to Dollar Tree. I found several planners. Wasn't sure which one I was going to use and then I decided on this one mostly because of the size and it has the function that I'm going to be looking for. So I wrote down what I made a plan of how I'm going to modify it to suit my needs. I wrote down what I am going to make to junk this. It's generally not going to be any decoration today. I'll do the decorating part later and then I'm going to just do that today because then like I said if I have time I'll do the shabby flowers. So I'm going to trim these book pages if I need it. I think I'll get two out of that but I'm not sure. Okay my pockets I'm gonna measure in a minute. I'm going to use, let me put everything I need over here. I have these old card bases lying around and I'm going to use those for my pockets and belly band I think. Well one belly band. I forgot to get something else to make two belly bands. But this I wanted to show you. This is glue stick. I'm quite sure this has been sitting there for two years. See that came off. I'm a hundred percent sure I use scotch create which is considered to be a good glue stick and it's peeling off. So if I want to use that I'm going to have to re-glue it and emboss it. That's just another example of I think everyone should go back and check old work and make sure their glue stick is actually gluing and keeping things glued for years if that's your intention to keep things intact for years. I personally don't think I'm going to use glue stick as much in the coming year. So let me measure what I need for my belly band. Cut that three and a half. Okay I saw be smart to do it on one of these and this one's going to be the thickest. I saw this somewhere else. They didn't do a tutorial but when probably two and a half, one and a half, and one. That's what I'm going to go for. They didn't do a tutorial so I don't think I should be at the liberty to be sharing this but thought it was a good idea and I'm going to because it will allow me to talk things about adding a lot of bulk so that's why I'm going to do it. So these have to be different sizes. One and a quarter. It's about the same size. I think I want one of these to be a little smaller so I'm going to go down to three quarters or maybe one. This is where senior Susie tip of using a pusher would come in handy but I got it. Okay so then these have to be and they're going to be off but I don't care. This is this is functional unless I want to take the time of being precise. What is that? I think that's four and a quarter. If I let off each side I try to get that triangle centered. I don't think it really matters. I did that before. Well that's going to be a little off but whatever it's going to. That is three and a half. Three and a half. Three and a half. Ooh I'll be saving those. Okay set that off for a minute. I think I'm going to put this. I hope I'm in. I'm going to put this probably about right there but I think I'll assemble the other pieces first and then do that. Where's my glue? Okay so happy New Year everyone. We don't need that there. I hope everyone had a nice New Year's Eve and a nice New Year. What a difference a week made. We went from freezing blizzard to spring like weather. Another reason I didn't didn't have much planned. I wasn't home yesterday. Took the little guy to be neutered. I didn't sleep all night because I was worried not that I would necessarily normally worry about a neuter but he's been on medicine now for almost a month. That would be his second sedation. Normally have a little decoration in the center. I'm gonna let that set a moment and then I'll show you how it works. So okay that went there. I want two pockets on the front cover. This is for holding junk. Let's see. I think that'll work and again I'm not gonna... I think I'm just gonna mark this because it says three and a half but I wanted a little wider to find my pencil. Don't you hate that? Where'd you go? Are you kidding me? Yes I lost it. So we took the little guy to be neutered and of course they didn't call until the very last minute to go pick him up. Now what? Now why is that? Okay there we go. So what is that? That's four. So I'm just gonna cut that and have it too. So I was just worried about him. I didn't sleep and then I paced the floor all day. In top one I didn't paced the floor but mentally I paced the floor until they called and said to come pick him up. I'm gonna put a little notch in there. See if I can do two at once. But he's doing well. He goes back to check the abscess. Oops, on a Friday it's going down substantially. I hope they think enough. Make sure I can close that because for holding junk. Then I thought I'm just going to use these corners to separate the sections and then I thought I would do a belly band around the calendar and writing part. That way I can just see my day and flip to my day immediately and go to each section easily. I could have done tabs but I decided on corners instead. I'll redo them into tabs if these don't stay in place but I also thought maybe I could make some little something pretty to dangle off the edge of a paper clip. I'm not quite sure yet. I'll decorate as I get time. Okay so I think if I need anything more of those I'll grab another one. Let's get our pockets, corners. Okay I'm gonna do the famous Annie Trump. I love these corners, bookmarks, totally functional. Always sit nicely on the corner. They always stay in place. I made a bunch of these for my husband for Christmas. So I went down Sunday downtown. I wanted to get some pictures of the beautiful semi-new Christmas decorations we have downtown because they've kind of been restoring our town. I don't live in one of those beautiful. Generally Pennsylvania has beautiful little historic towns with the main street in my town burnt down more than once. So while we have a few beautiful old buildings they're not as old as the surrounding towns and we don't look authentically historic like they do. So it's kind of been a hodgepodge of design through the last century and so they've been trying to rectify that and they've been doing a pretty good job. We have some new. The lighting around downtown is on old-fashioned lamp poles and then that's where they put the new Christmas decorations and when you go downtown at dusk it's quite pretty. So I went downtown to take some photos of that and I guess because it was Sunday I hope because it was Sunday I might try again today. All the shop lights, all the shop Christmas lights weren't on so I didn't get the full effect. I think it will be okay. 30 minutes already. I don't know if I'm gonna have time to do the chamois flowers. I do not want these to be long this year. I really don't. I'm going to be rethinking my shops. I'm definitely going to be redoing, rethinking my product offerings. I don't think I'll be doing as many kits in the future. I think I'll still be doing the create with me but I generally think most of the people who are doing junk journals know how to create pockets and tags and they don't need everything pre-made so I'm going to be rethinking my kits to attract these highly creative people and what and various things they might like to use a kit for. It will still be kind of a kit is my plan but not not the typical kit that's generally being offered. These are going to be for a wider audience. Okay so let me just show you how that belly band is going to work. I'll just use this one tuck, two tuck, three tuck. I won't be taking up a lot of bulk but I can still tuck a lot of things in there. I don't think I'll be. I'm going to glue some of those pages together and make a couple pockets for inserting loose papers. I don't think I'll be taking the time to do that because that's what the book pages are for. To reinforce these flimsy pages before I make a couple of pockets here in the back I don't think I'm going to take the time to do that but that's what I'm going to do. Glue them together, put a little notch and then I have two pockets, two page pockets and let me get these glued in and I have something what I really need. I'm also going to make a bunch of little notebooks, scrappy notebooks. That's what I need because I can't tell you how many times I've thought of something before I fell asleep and then forgot it and I didn't want to forget it so I need a notebook by my bed so that I don't forget something because that's when I get some of my best ideas. I'm sure that's a common thing. I used to have, I used to keep some meditation books on a tray by my bed but my cats have a tendency to knock things off. So here we go. One, two, those are going to hold little scraps, business cards, things like that and make sure I can close that so let's take these paper clips out and see make sure I'm not getting too bulky. That's what I, there are some pages I can remove in here if need be but okay that's not terrible. I can live with that. Okay I think so there I can flip to my section. Have a little storage. I'll have more storage with a couple of pockets. Let's see if that plan works. So there I jumped my calendar. I can also tuck things in here if I can find a way to glue them and so keep the pages turnable which I don't think is possible. So okay did that. Let's see 38. Oh boy do you want to stick around five more minutes? I really had intended to do that to show that person. Doesn't take that long. Okay you'll need some paper. Generally you can stamp your text on there. It can be coffee died, whatever. You'll need some various circles. I'm using a glue cap. I have them in five sizes because I usually make three or five layers. You'll need some ink. You can use your ink squares whatever if you want. I'm going to use alcohol ink. You'll need some water. Hopefully I'm going to choose one here that's already opened. This is alcohol ink. I'm going to choose Ruby. This is the part they said they couldn't see. And why do I do this? Because I can't tear a circle to save my life. I'll do it on the white. Let me get a little piece of foam. She said it's drawing already. My little pokey tool. Oops. Did you see that? This is what I don't like. This makes such a mess. You can never get it off. So I swirl my circle little thing. Let it sit there a minute. You need more water. This one's very thin so it doesn't leave a lot of puddle. You know what I mean? I need a puddle. Here we go. Just let it sit there a minute until it soaks through. Then I tear it out. And what I like about these are the little fibers. And that I can quickly get a circle. And I'm using the lightest. This is 20 pound because it generally works really well for shaping. And then I go on to my next size. This is a glue top. I just look around my room for different sized circles. And this way I get my edges inked. I get my circle. It doesn't take forever. I'll do a whole sheet of circles. Well I generally do those one or two at a time so they don't dry out before I have to poke them out. This is something I learned from scrapbookers. How to do easy and quick tearing. Kind of like when you want to tear something out of napkin. And you don't want to want to keep your tear kind of controlled. Okay there's five. Let me quickly shape that and glue it. I didn't get to talk about anything. I've been watching people sharing their end of year journals and reflections and it's been very interesting. This one's a little large. I don't usually need a. I do have one that's a little better but I can't remember what it was. So I just grabbed that. I hope I'm paying attention to that either. See that's a little it's a little too large. I don't know if I'm gonna use that one. I'll just do four. Now I can't remember. When you get down to these you kind of have to keep track of what order you did them so they all fit. Those are too similar. I think I have them backwards. I try to make this smaller. Which one do I do? You put whatever you want in the center. I think I'm just gonna leave that at three and there you go. Those beautiful shambles flowers with your text in them. You can glitter the edges. You can do all kinds of things. So again take your paper. You can use this foam if you want to give it a little press but I'm finding it's really not necessary. Let it soak a minute, a second. Pop that baby out. There's your nice little shabby circle all inked around the edges. I'm making a bunch of these. Also probably gonna do some with my handmade paper. Okay see that? I'll just do a couple here on this. I tried to assimilate this to coffee dye but I think I got the right color. So yeah generally I do this on coffee dye paper and I stamp my text but for time's sake. I just did it like that. Okay 49 minutes. Oh good god. I'm gonna see if I can speed through some of that. Okay we jumped our calendar. We caught up a little bit. I'll have something next week. Happy New Year everyone. Thank you for your time. Thank you for stopping by. Have a great week. Bye.