Card making again

I've had a pile of new craft goodies for cardmaking but no time to enjoy them.  I decided to do something about that today and had a bit of a cardmaking binge.  Mind you, for me a binge is only four cards but that's a lot in one sitting for me since I always make it up as I go along.

So here is are the finished cards.

Memory box tree die with glitterflakes as the background

This is where I played with brushos for the background after embossing with white embossing powder.  The peacock was stamped with a Kalidescope ink pad and a bit of glimmer added to the tail with a wink of stella pen

I love Lawn Fawn stamps- I played with the 'Sending Hedgehugs' stamp set and tried my hand at masking to get him standing on the stump.  The leaves were made with glimmer flakes on sticky tape then die cut out

This is another Lawn Fawn stamp set with the background embosed from a folder I got in a magazine

I'm not a big card maker but it will hopefully work for a few upcoming birthdays!

Cardmaking

These cards were all made back in April but since the people they are for may see them on this blog (well Mum will, anyway), I've deferred posting them until now.

First up, a birthday card for my Dad.  No plan on this one other than wanting to play with some bright colours and to try using some hexagon dies (sizzix) because I'd not used them before.

Next up are my two attempts at waterfall cards.  I've never played with moving cards before but flipping through a magazine it looked cool so I gave it a whirl.

First up has a nature feel. The idea is that you are looking further down as you pull the tab.

The other one was to use some new stamps I got- one set was dragons and the other was a cute little unicorn (but I totally was reasonable as I only bought those and not the other set that contained four other unicorns- see?)
Ahem.  Anyway, so while I am not totally happy with the end results (my clouds and were hand cut and look a little dodgy) it's a cute idea.

Inside is a stamped message that says 'you're more awesome than unicorns and rainbows'.  This one may end up being a birthday card for my niece.  We'll see.

Thanks for reading!

More Christmas cards

So I've been on a card making extravaganza- I want to make sure I have enough cards to see me through the season as I'm moving in two weeks and need to pack up the craft stuff.

Oh and then there are these, which include two of my favourites... The dandelion one is absolute favourite which is funny since there isn't any Christmas specific parts to it (aside from the Merry Christmas sticker)

Lessons learnt?  Dies don't like mirror card very much and if it's looking lovely and perfect it's because the gremlins are waiting to put a fingerprint somewhere.  The bottom of the shaker card wasn't going to be like that but the gremlins put a big smear right along the bottom and some emergency additions were needed.

Just a few to go, mainly to use the bits up that I have already cut out.  Then it's back to the fun job of packing boxes... two weeks until moving day (eep!).

Tis the season to be carding. Card making? Oh well. I've made some Christmas cards

Hello strangers,
As I've hinted in previous posts, I've started to get into card making a little more.  Well since I will need quite a few cards fairly soon, I've been experimenting with the Christmas stuff I've accumulated.

Of course some of these I'm happier with than others and there are some that... lets just say that no one will ever know of the horrors lurking off camera... :P

Playing with stamps and glossy card

Guess what!  I've had a chance to finish some craft projects so you get two posts this month.

First up, a beading project that I have had in the queue for some time.  When I finished another project (topic of a future post) I wanted a quick job so I got the beads out.  This is a cute little kit from The Bead Shack, and not a bad price (particularly if you get it when the shop had a sale, as I did).

It comes in a few different colour options and is simple enough that if you wanted to give beading a try and like the look, this would be a good project to go for.

The other thing I've been doing is playing with some stamps that I got from my local Craft Alive, a region craft fair that is in various cities around Australia's eastern states (and SA- I'm never sure if you guys are counted as an eastern state or not!).  I can't speak for all of them, but they are a nice change when the only craft places you can visit locally are Spotlight and Lincraft. While there, I saw the amazing examples at the Eclectic Images stall and did more than a little bit of shopping...

I needed to make something for an exchange with some fellow Discworld fans.  After sifting through about 5 different ideas, I settled on a postcard from XXXX since it let me play with my new stamps and inking onto glossy card to decorate them.  While the top left is dreadful (it was my first and I learnt a lot of what NOT to do with it) I'm fairly pleased with the other three I have ready to go.

The skys are a bit to blobby, but I think that was in part because I was trying to improvise with whatever tools I could scrounge up.  Now I have an idea of what is needed, I can go and get some brushes that will work the way I need to.  I've still got a few more to make before I can post my cards, so I'll show a few more in the next week or so, I hope.  I may also add  something more to the front, so they may appear again.

(note- all the links are just so you can check out the pages if you are interested.  Sadly I am not a big time blogger and the only payment I get is the odd comment that people make- the nice ones, not the spam, mind you!)

Happy official birthday, Liz- cheers for the day off!

Hello Blog readers!

It is the Queen's Birthday holiday and that means I have been able to get a bit done this weekend.  Hooray!

I've lots of projects in progress at the moment but I've finished a few things recently.  My first is a mohair knitted scarf.  It was made using a fine 2ply-ish wool, knit double with two different colours, one cream, one a more brown colour.  Looks lovely after blocking and you can hardly tell where I had to go and fix where a thread was accidentally cut (argh!).

The scarf- pay no attention to the pile of marking on the table...

I've also succumed to the dark side- I've started to buy supplies to get into card making...
Here is my first attempt, using an old shadow embroidery piece that I made years ago.

The only down side is that I was a bit of an idiot and tried cutting some of the circles out AFTER mounting the embroidery.  It wouldn't have mattered except the whole pesky fact I had some glass beads on the piece.  Had being the operative word for several.

After this card I was on a roll.  I went to go on and play with some of the embossing folders and dies that I had acquired.  Then there was a little problem.  The die cutting machine that I had (a hand me down from my very much card-making mother) decided that it was done in a rather rash way- the gears inside shattered (plastic gears it turned out) and was so locked up that it took the embossing folder I had tried to run through it at the same time.  Sigh.

Since I had already now purchased many dies and embossing folders it has meant that I bought a new toy- a new die cut machine- to replace it.  The upshot is, expect to see some more cards in the future.  Well unless they are intended for my Mum who reads this blog, anyway!

Finished stuff- September doings

I've finished a few things recently that I want to show off, but since I bought them as kits I can only provide links, not instructions.  Still, it's nice to have a wrap up of the end of the month craft doings.  Sorry for those for those looking for projects.  But they are really awesome kits so if you do like them, feel free to go and by one.

First of all is this lovely bracelet I bought, a Chainmaille crystal weave bracelet.  Little fiddly to get the hang of the maille technique but once you do the results are great.  I think the bracelet looks a little bit like a honey bee- I'm tempted to get some small black links and try modifying the pattern to make a honey bee bracelet.  If I do, I'll post some instructions.

Next is a part of a birthday present for my niece who will be turning 3 next week.  It was going to be something she could play with a bit but it turned out to be just too impractical for that.  The small pots and such are too unbalanced so had to be glued down.  But it's pretty and I know her Mum already made a few for the wall of her room because we bought the kits at the same time for... wait for it... $5 each!  Bargain or what!  No online link for it, but if you are in Melbourne then Theo's Discount Craft in Boronia (outer eastern suburbs) is well worth a visit.  They have lots of import stuff, mainly jewellery findings and sewing stuff but also a random mix of other stuff too.

Next, I didn't make these but my Mum is an awesome card maker and my go-to stop for card supplies.  I need a few thank-you cards I need to give in a few weeks to my awesome teaching placement mentor teachers (I have to go back to finish my time at the end of the month).  She made these this week and they were so pretty and suitable I nicked them on the spot:

And now to wrap this post up, here's my procrastinating owls in progress.  I've done the body and one sleeve up to the armpits so I'm just about to cast on for the second sleeve.  And in terms of assignments I now only have one large evil one left (total blank so I guess I'll start it next week) and a few smaller pieces that I'll get around to eventually :P

Probably the only card posts I will make

There are those that find joy in making cards.  Those who find delight in finding just the right paper.  In stamping or drawing or cutting or punching or brayering or embellishing or [insert any number of other techniques in here].  In adding ribbons or distressing or embossing.  In sort, creating disposable* pieces of artwork to give to another.  I am not one of those people.

Which is odd really, because both my Mum and my sister are.  My mum has a room devoted to craft, 99% is for cardmaking.  The other 1% is all the bits left over from her dabbling in a wide variety of other crafts that I raid when appropriate (why no, I have no idea where I got my crafty genes from :P).  My sister is following in her footsteps with only her smaller budget and three small children to keep her supplies and output smaller.  I'll see if I can convince them to let me show some of their pieces in future posts.

Myself, I just make cards when I need to- which basically translates to when I need to give either Mum or my sister a card for birthdays.  When I'm giving a card to someone else I just go and take a card from their finished boxes.  It has become something of a running gag in my family when I do make a card (once I wrote 'DIY card' on a plain card and enclosed it with the pile of craft supplies I bought Mum for her birthday).  Other times I get lucky and use a card to mount something such as a piece of embroidery such as the embroidered card kit I made a month or so ago.

So basically my point is, this is not going to be a blog that talks about card making a lot.  But yesterday my sister held a Stampin' Up party (for those not in the know this is a company that operates on the party plan model, like Tupperware, and sells card and scrapbook supplies).  So partly to be a supportive sister, partly out of curiosity I went and I made two cards.  So without further ado, here are the only two classic cards I'm likely to post.

The first one I like- it's a nice birthday card that's not terribly kiddy or gender biased.  The Happy Birthday was stamped and then the letters water-coloured in.  The penants were made using a stamp and punch combo that look pretty but would cost $100 to get the set (and since I'm not into making cards, that would work out to a very large cost per card so no, I didn't buy them).  And the paper, ribbon and embellisments are also from the company.

The second card was more of a gift tag and... well let's just say that I made it later in the night and the concentration was well and truely gone.  So after stamping the back, I turned the card over and stamped the front.  Upside down.  So then I tried to fix it by using snowflake stamps. And then the glue splurted out.  And I tried to colour in the stamp with the thick end of a pen.  And... 

 Oh well, perhaps I'll end up using it for a Kris Kringle card or something.  Or bury it deep in a secret location and never speak of it again!

So while I did make one nice card, the party did not convince me that I really would like card making if only I gave it a chance.  And even if I did, the stuff was far too expensive for my tastes (a typical set of rubber stamps was around $40).  While nice quality, that's too rich for my blood.  If I spend that much money on a craft at one time I'd like to see more stuff or know I'll get a lot of use out of the stuff.