Two of a kind

The current phase of my ongoing decluttering is sorting through old craft magazines, making projects inspired by those that inspire me, trying techniques that are new to me and then giving away or recycling the mags, depending on their condition. So these two cards are inspired by an article in the July 2013 issue of Making Cards magazine.

I've used all sorts of bits and pieces on them - a lovely butterfly paper that came in a RAK some years ago, papers from a Craftwork Cards goodie bag and a K & Company 6x6 pad both of which are many years old, my old faithful Cuttlebug butterfly die, a Spellbinders butterfly die, the beautiful Butterfly Garden die that I recently won in the Snippets Playground, scraps of ribbon, gems, stamps, border punches..... it really was time to get everything out to play!

I have to confess though that while making them I made the classic boo-boo on one of them, I stuck the front panel on upside down. But before cutting it off and attaching it the right way up to a new card, I had the presence of mind to grab my phone and take a snap. Why? Because on April 1st, the lovely Darnell is going to be holding a one-day-only event for us to link up our card boo-boos. A sort of April Foolishness event. So do please dig out photos of your boo-boos ready to join in on the day - you can read more about it over on Darnell's blog.



Anyway, enough about what went wrong, let's have a look at the finished cards.

 

I am sharing these with:

Craft Rocket Challenges - Anything Goes
Clear It Out Challenge - Patterned paper over a year old
Alphabet Challenge - B for Beautiful Butterflies
Fab 'n' Funky - Spots and stripes   

Something else to play with!

OK, there's no card in this post, neither is there a recipe, but I've just got all excited about a piece of rubbish! My husband has just received a parcel, and instead of the usual bubble wrap or bits of polystyrene, the goods were protected by a piece of brown paper that had been cut all over into tiny slots and then opened out, like lattice pastry.

Just think of the possibilities that presents! I'm picturing inking it, stamping on it, stencilling through it, using it as an embellishment, even cutting bows from it.....

Graphic 45 pop up card

This is a card that I made for my mother, using papers from the Graphic 45 "Artisan style" collection.

For the pop up inside, I trimmed cream card to slightly smaller than the A5 outer card and scored the centre fold, then measured the peacock panel and the border strip I've used on the tiny upright piece, and marked a line each side of the centre so the panel would fit between the lines. I scored between the pencil lines where the bottom of the panel would come to, and the same distance above the centre, then scored again the width of the border above and below each score line. Then I cut the pencil lines from the bottom score line to the top one. Finally I scored 5cm each side of the central line to make the side steps. It all sounds a bit of a faff, but when you have the papers there to guide you it seems a lot more logical!

I've balanced the dragonfly panel in roughly the place it was going to go, because I wanted to write a personal greeting before sticking it in place. It would have been far too fiddly to write when it was stuck down!

Another make with my new stamps

Hello again - today I'm sharing with you another card I made using stamps from my Mothers Day present. This time I used the Water Wall stamp from Katzelkraft along with a very grumpy looking cat from the Les Chats Russes sheet.

I stamped the cat, coloured him with Promarkers and fussy-cut him. Then I covered the aperture panel of a tri-fold aperture card with brick effect paper (printed out from the CD The Best of la Pashe 2012) and stuck behind the aperture a piece of acetate on which I had stamped the water wall with black Staz-on.

The curtains are scraps of real fabric which I stuck down above and to the side of the aperture, using a little ribbon for "tie-backs".

On the inside of the flap that folds inwards, I covered the page with wallpaper print paper from a V&A paper pad, then positioned some woodgrain paper horizontally to make a window ledge for the cat to sit on, stuck the cat in place so that he was framed by the curtains, and then stuck the fold-ver panel down with high-tack double sided tape - because of the fabric and the number of layers, it was quite bulky and I don't think standard tape would have held it in place.

I just love the miserable look on his face - I think we all look like that when we want to be outside but there's rain lashing against the windows!

Speed at Cardz 4 Guyz

This week's challenge at Cardz 4 Guyz is Speed. This could, of course, be anything fast from a motorcycle to a cheetah, but I love to watch motor racing so I went for a motor racing theme - with a twist!

I've used the "Full Throttle" decoupage sheet from the CD "The best of La Pashe 2012" along with the red speedometer background, provided on the decoupage sheet, and a chequered flag background printed from La pashe's "Something for Everybody" CD. The sentiments are from the decoupage sheet and the embellishment came from the bargain goodie bag I got at the Make It Show.

I love the details on this picture - the gentleman has just been shopping and has his mobility scooter flying along at top speed so he can get home to enjoy his wine, bananas and newspaper! I see that it's a pink newspaper. Does that mean he's a Financial Times reader? Or is there still a newspaper called the Sporting Pink? I think he looks more of an FT type to me.

The Christmas Jumper

I always laugh when I see this image, from the La Pashe CD "The Wrinklies at Christmas"  - this rosy cheeked old gentleman seems very happy with his oversized Christmas Jumper, but that may have something to do with the empty wine bottle by the side of his chair!

The background is embossed to give a knitting style effect, using a Crafters Companion embossing folder, and I've used twine to attach a little "hank of yarn" charm, which I think was a magazine free gift.

I am sharing this with

Winter Wonderland - use a charm
Christmas Card Challenges - Anything Goes
Glitter and Sparkle - Use some Green

Third time lucky!

When I first started making CAS cards, I found it a real struggle, and often shared the things that had gone wrong in my posts. I've gradually come to regard CAS as one of my favourite styles, and have far fewer disasters now, but even so, things don't always go according to plan.

For this card, I wanted to use one of the pair of sentiment stamps that I won recently in the Snippets Playground. Both are about sunshine, so my plan was to use a die cut negative to sponge a sunshine in one corner of the card and then stamp the sentiment further down the card.

So off I went, masking off the edges of the card and sponging the sunshine in Mustard Seed and Spiced Marmalade DI. I removed the die cut and started to sponge in a few rays, but I dabbed the sponge a bit too hard on the inkpad and......... BLOB

I'll save that - the fiery sunshine might make a good background for a space rocket themed card.

I started again and this time was MUCH more careful with my ink. I sponged a little green along the bottom for grass, and stamped one of the sentiments above it, and finished it with a couple of stylised dragonflies using a Rubberstamp Tapestry stamp.

Much more successful, but a touch wishy washy. The sentiment is in quite a delicate script that looks unbalanced against the bold sunshine, and the "ground" looks out of place. Also I think the sentiment is too low down.

Back to the drawing board, but this time I used the second sentiment on the sheet, which is in a much bolder style, and opened my new set of abstract stamps from The Gentleman Crafter, using the brush stroke oval to create a grassy border and adding tiny dots of colour for flowers. A much bolder dragonfly, from an Indigo Blu set, highlighted with a trace of Stickles, finished the scene. At last, I was happy!

And now the card is finished, I am sharing it with

Less is More - One layer, sentiment as main focus
Crafty Creations - Sentiment as focal point