Creative Workshops with Jane

Creative Workshops with Jane Certified Powertex Tutor and creative mixed media artist

29/05/2026

Sooooo, why is it that a package containing antique documents dispatched from south west France on the 26th May 2026 can be delivered safely this morning and yet a copy birth certificate that I ordered on the 20th May and which was subsequently dispatched on the 22nd May still hasn't arrived????

We were still a couple of ladies down on Tuesday night but the rest of us enjoyed a very productive evening!I love to se...
28/05/2026

We were still a couple of ladies down on Tuesday night but the rest of us enjoyed a very productive evening!

I love to see everyone enjoying the decorating part of album making. The construction part, where concentration is required, has been completed and the more relaxing stage of 'jujjing' our album bases can begin!

We even formulated a plan for decorating the covers!

Following an earlier comment I took the photo when 'someone' was missing - just to see what their reaction will be 🤣

Last night was an absolute hoot! The double entendres kept coming thick and fast!We may have been missing a few ladies ...
20/05/2026

Last night was an absolute hoot! The double entendres kept coming thick and fast!

We may have been missing a few ladies but we made up for it with lots of laughs. Honestly, they have my life! I say something totally innocent and I just get met with giggles.....

Our pages are all constructed and ready for decorating next week and nobody folded their covers before class! They do listen to me...... well sometimes!

There was also a sneak peek of our next project as well....

Despite some absences on Tuesday evening and my dodgy knee playing up we made really good progress on our albums to go i...
14/05/2026

Despite some absences on Tuesday evening and my dodgy knee playing up we made really good progress on our albums to go in our cabinets.

We wrapped our covers and inserted the hinge - with strict instructions not to bend until class next week! We'll see how many resisted the urge 🤣

We also cut all of our cardstock ready to construct our pages next week. In spite of everyone using a paper trimmer - which you would expect to be safer than crat knives and metal rulers - we still ended up with a casualty sporting a cut digit!

We had our usual giggles although there was no chocolate this week.....

For the most part - the cabinets are done! There are a couple that still need completing and we will get them finished ...
08/05/2026

For the most part - the cabinets are done! There are a couple that still need completing and we will get them finished off in between constructing and decorating our albums.

The different decorative papers that people have chosen make them all look completely different - even though they all have the same hardware! Don't they all look fabulous?

Thinking about our next project now......

Last night, although not perfect, was much better than the previous Tuesday! That said, everything was made better by a...
29/04/2026

Last night, although not perfect, was much better than the previous Tuesday! That said, everything was made better by a 'donation' of Hotel Chocolat chocolates!

We actually got to decorating our cabinet! I just love how our projects are transformed once we add our lovely papers. One lady has spent an enormous amount of tie creating digital papers so that the design flows seamlessly around her cabinet! It's looking soooo impressive. We will complete our cabinet next week and then start our albums....

We were so busy concentrating - and eating chocolate - I didn't take any photos so I thought I would share an image of the prototype I made initially based on an original by Kim.... There is space in the drawer to store some treasures and the album, stored safely behind the doors, can hold plenty of photographs!

I had a very challenging time at class last night..... nothing to do with the lovely group of ladies; it was all just me...
22/04/2026

I had a very challenging time at class last night..... nothing to do with the lovely group of ladies; it was all just me! Nothing went right, I was the slowest in class completing tasks, glue went everywhere, things didn't fit etc. I should've stayed at home....

Fortunately, I was on my 'A' game on the previous Saturday when I'd been asked to host a private workshop to celebrate a special birthday - I will do another post about that later in the week....

Back to last night where we constructed our drawers to go in the bottom of our cabinets and we prepped our doors. I even missed an important first step out which, luckily, one lady picked me up on it! To be honest I'm surprised we got as far as we did!

I promise to do better next week......🤞

You wouldn't believe how many times I've drafted this post.... just trying to convey the essence of the discussion in cl...
16/04/2026

You wouldn't believe how many times I've drafted this post.... just trying to convey the essence of the discussion in class without revealing too much!

To say that we laughed soooo much would be a gross understatement. At one point I thought I would need to stage an intervention! One lady had to leave the room and I was literally crying with laughter. All of this because of a revelation that had us all shocked, worried and laughing at the ridiculousness of it - until the oracle that is Google was consulted. To be fair, once we realised that the topic of conversation was a recognised 'thing' we were much more supportive, though it didn't stop the hilarious comments. It's a good job we know and trust each other...... I will never look at 'Cliff' in the same way ever again! Nuff said!

Anyway, amongst the giggles we cracked on and completed the construction of our cabinet. We will add the drawer and doors next week before decorating. Then there will only be the mini album to complete.

....and we're back! After a couple of weeks' break and my 'holiday' to Cyprus (just don't ask) weekly classes started a...
09/04/2026

....and we're back! After a couple of weeks' break and my 'holiday' to Cyprus (just don't ask) weekly classes started again on Tuesday.

It was lovely to see everyone and so exciting to start our next project! This time the emphasis is on construction. We're building a cabinet that houses a little mini album with a functioning drawer to store treasures. The best thing about this project is that we've already had our chipboard elements cut to size! This is all down to one of our lovely ladies' dear Dad! He's absolutely brilliant and even spotted a typo which would've meant we were 2 mm out. This means there will be no sore hands from cutting out the many elements and no need for me to worry and take plasters just in case anyone's knife slips......

We got all of our pieces labelled and started on the construction. They're gonna be fab!

I set off with the usual lesson plan for Tuesday night but very quickly I realised I needed to throw it out of the windo...
05/03/2026

I set off with the usual lesson plan for Tuesday night but very quickly I realised I needed to throw it out of the window and just go with the flow.....

We had soooo much fun experimenting with inks and various types of fabrics which will be used in our journals. I took the usual precautions of gloves, a box to keep the inks localised and warned everyone not to wear their best designer outfits! I am happy to report there were no issues whatsoever! The results were some absolutely fabulous dyed sari silk ribbons, hombre lace, seam binding and gauze.

Then came the creation of wax seals...... just look at the concentration on Sarah's face! Everyone had so much fun and what made the session even better was the sharing of supplies and equipment that some of the ladies had brought along with them.

Next week sees us putting all of the elements together and decorating the front cover.... can't wait to see them!

In between all of this we also managed to judge our tag challenge.... I will do a separate post as that deserves it's own spotlight!

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Hartlepool

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Tuesday 10am - 4pm
Wednesday 10am - 4pm
Thursday 10am - 4pm

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