Category Archives: Kits

News and information about our Creative Mischief Kits

Hot and Fresh! Get Your Spark Kits!

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Yes, the day has finally arrived, the Spark Kits are ready to order in our store, they even have their own category to make them easier to find.

The Spark Store is now open!

The Spark Store is now open!

As you can see, each kit is $24.95 USD with free shipping in the United States!

Each of the inaugural Spark Kits includes:

  • Five (5) top-fold A2 card bases (4 solid card stock, 1 patterned paper)
  • Five (5) A2 envelopes
  • Six (6) 4 1/4 x 5 1/2 papers (2 each of 2 solid card stocks and 1 patterned paper)
  • Three (3) 4 1/2 x 6 1/2 papers (white)
  • 14-pc Sentiment Stamp Set (by BoBunny)
  • Black pen (by Faber Castell)
  • Mini Pattern Trio Stencil (custom made for The Crafty Branch!)
  • Adhesive Runner
  • Two (2) Fluid Chalk Edgers (by Prima)

Supplies are limited, so order now before they’re all gone! And tell your friends!

More Than Just Cards

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The (very) soon-to-be-released Spark Kits have a decidedly card-related lean, but what else can you do with them? I’m so glad you asked!

Blueberry-Mint

Blueberry-Mint

With our blue-green combo I used the patterned card base to make a rather nifty origami shirt (all I added was a few sticky-backed pearls to serve as buttons). A couple more card bases, cut on the fold, were transformed into foldover tags embellished with the included sentiment stamps and stencil, the cut off corners and punches holes, and a bit of baker’s twine.

Finally, I glued 4 of the envelopes together into an accordion-fold book, slipped in some of the card fronts and made decorative tabs from pieces of one of the white cards included in the kit. I stamped a bunch of messages on the free envelope flap to act as a decorative flap. This sort of multi-pocket item works well for giving a variety of gift cards, sending a set of recipes to a friend, or even a spaced-out message–like a burma shave but without the moving vehicle!

Strawberry-Chocolate

Strawberry-Chocolate

Three card bases from our pink and brown combo got their ends folded and attached to make a colorful accordion-fold book, embellished with scraps from the other projects, some stamping, and some stenciling. Two of the card fronts glued back to back, cut, and folded into a pinwheel look very cute when attached to a pencil, but would also look just as cute attached to the front of a card, maybe with a brad to let it spin. And speaking of pencils, I used some of the sentiments stamps in the kit, a white card front, and the pink card front to make some flags that would also be perfectly at home on party straws.

Cherry-Sugar

Cherry-Sugar

The diamond-patterned paper of our red and grey kit inspired a very geometric mini-garland with the addition of some twine. A red card base was transformed into a sweet little pillow box complete with stamped tag, and the scraps from the garland were made into a very Mondrian-esque bookmark.

As soon as I get them edited there will be videos of all of these projects available on our YouTube channel, with more fun to come, to watch this space for updates! And, yes, the kits themselves will be available in 2 weeks! (Sooner if you’re a newsletter subscriber: go sign up for first dibs!)

What’s Your Flavor?

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Not to be confused with Craig David’s “What’s Your Flava,” even if that’s what runs through my head every time I think about it.

Gotta love the Willy Wonka theme of that video, though, right?

The flavor I’m referring to is the options for the upcoming Spark Kits!

Choose one, two, or indulge in all three!

Choose one, two, or indulge in all three!

Unlike our deluxe Creative Mischief Kits, the Spark Kits are meant to be bite-sized bits of creative inspiration. They don’t focus on a particular technique (those this particular iteration leans more in the card-creating vein, though that’s not all you can do with it, I promise!), there’s no guided instructions, just some color-coordinated components that you can go wild with!

I am waiting on one final component before they’re ready to go. After some trials, I thought it would be a good idea to include a stencil along with the sentiments stamps (and these sentiment stamps cover so many bases) but I couldn’t find one that would do what I wanted. So I created my own just for this kit and I’m just waiting for them to come in.

Next week we’ll go into what’s in the kit and a few of the possibilities contained in their compact packages. Until then, what flavor are you feeling?

Introducing our February Kit: Print Your HeART Out!

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Print Your HeART Out is all about monoprinting with the awesomeness that is the Gelli Plate. As usual, the kit comes with everything you’ll need to get started with pulling prints from your very own 5″ plate including papers, paints, brushes, a brayer, a couple of stencils, and texture tools.

thecraftybranch_creativemischief_printyourheartout_kitcontents-1

With the Print Your HeART Out creative mischief kit you’ll be able to dive right into making prints with the included gelli plate.

The best thing about gelli printing, as far as I’m concerned, is that there’s no one right way to do it. It’s all about getting in there and trying out new things, getting your fingers all covered with ink or paint and seeing what happens.

You can plan your composition on the gelli plate or you can just layer print over print and see where it takes you–like a painted collage! And then you can use the prints you make in cards, scrapbooks, art journals, collage or anything else you can think of. By printing on different materials (fabric, wax paper, etc.) you can get loads of different effects and put those surfaces to all sorts of use.

Can you tell I’ve been having fun experimenting with my gelli plate? It might just be my new favorite thing!

Also available are copies of the book Gelli Prining by Suzanne McNeill. Now I always include instructions, tips, and examples in the kits themselves, but if you want even more inspiration and ideas, this book will give you just that–it’s a great companion to Print Your HeART Out (which is why I laid in a small supply of them).

This deluxe Creative Mischief Kit features products from Plaid, Martha Stewart, Gelli Arts, The Crafters Workshop, Deco Art, and Royal Brush and will be available to order on Tuesday, February 2, 2016.

 

Meet the Bound & Determined Kit, Right Here, Right Now!

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Here are the 2 books the kit will help you make.

thecraftybranch_creativemischief_bound-1202

The first book is a Coptic-Bound journal with a soft suede cover. Coptic binding looks really cool and complex but really isn’t all that difficult once you get the hang of it! Step by step instructions are included in the kit, as always, and you’ll have a great blank book perfect for sketching or journaling or whatever you want to use it for!

thecraftybranch_creativemischief_bound-1203

The second book is a mini book featuring hard back, cloth covered binding and lay-flat pages. It’s similar to the technique the high-end photobook companies use and this little mini album would be perfect for some mini art journaling or a photo album of insta-pictures.

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You get the tools and instructions to make those two books plus enough materials to experiment with other materials using the two methods you’ll find fully illustrated in the kit’s insert.