A Quick Make!!

Although I haven't blogged for a while, I have been working on a few projects - which will be revealed over the next few days, once they have been received by the people for whom they have been made. In the meantime, here is a quick card I put together.

The base card is from a deckle edge card and insert set that I've had hanging around in my stash for a while. I cut Spellbinders lacey circles from cream Bazzil cardstock, flowers from blue Bazzil cardstock using XCut Bloom Nesting Dies, and scalloped circles from the matching insert paper.

The blue fabric flowers have also been sitting around for a long time just waiting for the right project!! It's all finished off with a sentiment from a Forever Friends Easter sentiment kit (!!!) and lemon yellow pearls.

Since becoming a design team member for Crafty Cardmakers, I have come to realise just how many challenge blogs are out there, so have decided to also dip my toes into entering some of them.

So I am entering this card in

Anything Goes Challenge Blogspot - Challenge 51- Die Cuts /Punches or both

See you soon,

Cxx

Wedding Bells!!!

No, not for me - I'm very happily married already!! But I feel like ringing all the bells I can get my hands on to celebrate that I have managed to finish the Wedding Invitations I have been commissioned to make!!! I have had my ups and downs with this project which I will explain as we go, but I am really chuffed to have it complete.

To give you a little background, I was asked by a friend if I would make the invites for her son's wedding. Having agreed, I spent a lovely evening with her, her son and his fiancee, where we discussed what they would like in terms of design (whilst eating a scrummy tuna pasta bake). They decided on a simple design with yellow ribbon and daisies, on white pearlescent card. The final details they left to me.

So, I went away and spent some time finalising what I wanted to do, sourcing the materials that I would need, and costing everything up. That was a exercise in itself, and I ended up setting up a spreadsheet to keep track of what I needed and from where!!

The design I came with up for the invitations uses the X Cut Rosa Border Die, wrapped firstly with yellow satin ribbon, and then with a thinner lemon organza ribbon. Three fabric daisies are then mounted onto the ribbon, and they in turn are topped with 4mm flatback lemon pearls. The silver foiled message was also decorated with the pearls.

Both the day and evening invitations were completed in landscape format, and each required a RSVP card with envelope. These are A7 (... I think ie they are half of A6),  and this time the foiled message is mounted on the border strip to allow room for the message.

The Order of the Day has not been completed yet, as the details have not been finalised, but the design is the same - just in portrait instead of landscape.

All sounds great - and it is - but goodness me, I now know what it must be like to work in a factory and do the same process over and over and over again. I decided that I should prep everything and then assemble it all at the end. Well, the daisies came as a long string, so I have had to trim hundreds of individual daisies. Then cutting the border strips - well, as there is a lovely punched out area, as each border was cut, I then had to clean all the bits out of the die. Over 100 of those and I was begininng to lose the will to live. Then fixing ribbon, then ribbon on top of ribbon, then sticking the tape to the back of the border ready to attach to the card.

My biggest faux pas happened only this morning, when I realised that I had prepped all the RSVP's for Wedding Invitations, when half of them were supposed to be for the Evening Reception!! Took a bit of time to remedy that one.

BUT, the invitations are all done now and ready for delivery tomorrow!! And I have to say I'm rather pleased with myself!!

Have lots of projects in the pipeline, now that I've broken the back of this, so hopefully will be blogging again soon.

Cxx

My first design team challenge!!

Well, I am so excited to have been invited to become a Design Team Member for Crafty Cardmakers!! Thank you for all the lovely comments that were left on my blog. I was rather gobsmacked to be chosen to say the least - but really pleased too. I hope that my style of projects and techniques will be varied enough to bring you a little inspiration. Congratulations to all the other new team members!!

So here it is!! The Challenge is "Anything Goes!", and I decided that I would see what I had lying around in the vastness that is my crafty stash, to see what would inspire me!!

What I came up with was a black and white patterned base card from an old deckle edge card and insert pack, and the wooden shoe and hearts embellishments.  The shoe is mounted on white card, cut with a Spellbinders beaded oval die, and lightly embossed with That Special Touch Dotty Mask. I cut the tag from the same white card and inked it up with Milled Lavender and Black Soot Distress Inks, before embossing with the same mask, and spraying with Iridescent Spray and Sparkle.The matching insert paper was cut using a Spellbinders rectangle die, with a scalloped rectangle cut from the white.

I then decided to have a play with something else I found whilst rummaging - Cosmic Shimmer Mica Powders. To begin with, I squished an  clear embossing ink pad all over a piece of white card, then dusted Violet Frost all over it. Not content with that, I spied a spray bottle of Pearlescent lurking in the box so intended to delicately spritz it over the top. Well, that was never going to happen as the bottle was totally clogged from being abandoned for so long!! So, I reached for the pipettes that were lying in the same box, and settled for a more splogged effect, blotted with kitchen towel. I then cut the card to the size I wanted, and edged it with more Black Soot, then embossed with That Special Touch Swirl Mask. This was mounted onto white card to make it pop a little more.

Having punched a hole in the tag, and attached an eyelet, I finished it off with lilac satin ribbon from my stash. The tag was raised off the card with foam tape to add more dimension.

I am really looking forward to seeing what you all come up with - so go on - have a rummage and see what you can find.

Make sure to pop over to the the Crafty Cardmakers Blog to see what the other DT Members have created.

See you soon.

Cxxx

My first workshop!!

This post is rather a long time after the fact, but thought I would just let you know how my first ever mini workshop went. I was asked by Chatterbox Ladies Group if would come along to a crafty evening to demonstrate what I do and get some of the ladies involved. Ever up for a challenge, I agreed. I was extremely nervous on the day, with very shaky hands - especially when I couldn't actually find the venue!! But I think it went OK.

The first thing I had to do was decide exactly what I wanted to make with them. As I've never done this before, and I don't own lots of equipment, I had to find something that was straightforward and that I could resource from my stash without too much extra expense. Once I'd decided, it was just a case of prepping all the resources - something I'm fairly used to with my teaching background.

I decided to go back to basics for the two cards, and do some good old paper folding.

This first uses teabag folding to create the medallion. I use Papermania Antique Cream Creative Tones paper  for this sample. The ladies either had this combination of colours or a black and white version using Papermania Ivory and Black Creative Tones. I know that there are many tea bag paper designs out there with symmetrical designs, but I don't feel you have to use them to get a great effect. Any paper (even wrapping paper) will do. To add interest, to the finished medallion, I cut all the squares using a scalloped square die, and used a solid colour as a mat for the medallion itself. The brad in the middle was from my stash.

This was really successful - and, as well as this fold, I showed them a few others that they could use to make decorations for Christmas!!!

The second card was a very quick and simple card, inspired by a sample I saw in a DoCrafts magazine. The dress is made from a scalloped circle, cut from a 12x12 sheet of The Paper Company Studio Fuschia Fleur. The pink scalloped circle is cut from an old Papermania Colossal paper pad, and the purple beaded oval from a Brenda Pinnick Paper Pad. I embossed the cirlce with dots to add texture to the plain side of the card. The dress was finished off with sticky ribbon from my stash.

All in all, it was a successful evening. The ladies seemed really pleased with their make and takes, and I learnt a few things to help me make it even better (if there ever is a) next time.

And now, I need to go and finish the wedding invitations.
Cxx

Steampunk - My style!!

So, I can now reveal my other make as today is Amy's birthday and she has already seen the card. When I saw the new Kanban Steampunk collection, I knew that this was what I wanted to use for her 18th birthday card. But as I'm not completely into the steampunk concept, I did it my way!!

For the base card I used a sheet from the DCWV Luxury Cardstock Stack. I used an image from the Kanban Steampunk Catalina sheet, mounted onto brown Bazzil card, and then onto the same aqua card as the base. I the cut a rectangle of the brown Bazzil and cut either side with X Cut Rosa Border Die. The top layers of the decoupage (the top hat and the skirt layer) were glittered with Rock Candy Distress Stickles. I made the flowers in the same way as for the Carnaby Street card - circles of the aqua card cut into spirals, rolled up and glued. The letters were cut with X Cut Roma Dieliciious Alphabet die, and the numbers from an old set of X Cut lower case alphabet dies. And as ever, finished with Celebrations organza ribbon.

Hopefully next time I blog I will be able to share the wedding invitations I am currently working on.

Cxx

Carnaby Street

Just a quick post to show a recent make - it's not the best photo, but hopefully you get the idea. I was asked by my niece if I would make a card for her friend's birthday. She left it all up to me, apart from wanting her name and age on the card. I immediately thought of the Kanban Carnaby Street collection - and that, in turn, gave me my colour scheme.

For the base card I used red card from my stash. I mounted a sheet of paper from the Papermania Persimmon Collection A5 pad onto black glitter card. A quarter of a Kanban Carnaby Street Union Jack A4 sheet was firstly mounted onto silver mirror card and then onto black glitter card. The Carnaby Street A6 mat was mounted in the same way. The flowers were made from circles of card, cut into spirals, then rolled up and glued. This was all finished off with organza ribbon from my stash, and letters cut using X-Cut Smoothie Dielicious Die. The numbers are cut using an old set of X Cut alphabet dies.

Have another recent make to post - but can't do so until after tomorrow when the card will have been received.

So, see you later.

Cxx

Crafty Cardmakers - Design Team Call!!

Well, as you can see from the title, this blog is a little different to my usual. Crafty Cardmakers are looking for new design team members, and I have decided to apply. The application requires me to submit four projects showcasing my work. Now, I'm not really into rubber stamping, and often use toppers and images from companies such as Kanban and Hunkydory, so was unsure which projects to pick. But when I looked back at photos of my work on my website gallery, and also in the big piles of photos on my laptop I was surprised that I had quite a few that I was happy to choose from.

One of the project has to be entitled "New Beginnings" - and features something as yet unseen on the blog!!! Anyone who read my last blog post will know that a good friend of mine was expecting twins, and that I made a book for the baby shower in which everyone could write messages for her and the babies.

Well, on September 14th , Harley and Layla entered the world, and the following photos are of the project I created for their arrival. It consists of a papier mache blank box, which I then proceeded to cover in white, mauve and purple mulberry paper with generous lashings of PVA glue and a waft of Spray and Shine to finish it off. The inside was completed in a similar way, but using white, cream and lemon mulberry papers. The toppers are from Kanban Cutie Pies Bunny and Baby decoupage sheet. The pink and blue dotty papers came from 12x12 baby scrapbook packs from The Range, and the purple gingham card from my local market.

The lettering has been cut using the Smoothie Xcut Die-licious Alphabet Die, and both the letters, the bunnies' ears and the corner hearts on the toppers have been highlighted with Glossy Accents. The whole thing is tied up with Celebrations White Organza ribbon.

To go with this, I made two matching square cards - mostly using the same materials. Additonal pale blue, pink, mauve and purple Celebrations organza ribbons were used, along with silver mirror card.

   

I also have to choose three other projects that showcase what I can do. So, two these  you will have seen on my blog before - and one you haven't.

The first one is the red hearts wedding card from a couple of months ago. I was really pleased with the simplicity of this card - and loved using the Dreamweaver stencils and embossing paste.

My second choice is this 60th Birthday card (which does have a matching box). I blogged this one back in June 2010. I love the dimension on this one with the paper roses.

My third choice is this easel card and box. This was a birthday present for a friend. I used alcohol inks on heat resistant acetate, then stamped and embossed the butterfly on the other side. I then removed the alcohol ink from the inside of the butterfly using blending solution. I overstamped the flourish and embellished with small rhinestones, then stamped and embossed the greeting. Both of these were mounted on Brenda Pinnick papers and purple glitter card using brads. Each letter of the name was stamped and embossed individually then cut out and mounted.The card was finished with lilac satin ribbon.

The box was a small, oval papier mache blank, covered in the same Brenda Pinnick paper. The edges were sanded and inked to give a slightly more shabby look. The inside was painted in Eco-Green Aged Gold paint. Lilac satin ribbon, silk flowers and a stamped tag finished it off. And of course, it was filled with scrumptious chocolates!!

So, even if I don't make the team, I've enjoyed looking back through all the my past projects. It's reminded me of techniques and layouts that I've not used in a while. And when I get some time, I may well try them out again.

I'll let you know how I get on.

Cxx