Ribbons & Bows - Tuesday 5th February

Good morning Blog Friends!

For this month's Design Team Projects for Fantastic Ribbons we were asked to create projects with bows. I love ribbons and bows on cards, so I chose to make three cards with different bows.

Most of us use ribbons on our cards..some of us all of the time, others less often. I think a bow, either big and bold or small and simple can really give cards that finishing touch and sometimes give them that 'wow!' factor.

I had some lovely red ribbons to work with, so with it being the 'Month of Love', I have made some cards with romance in mind!

For my first card I made a bow by gathering one length of ribbon in folds all meeting in the middle and secured with a brad..this is much like you would make a bow for a gift. This particular ribbon is also wired, which makes it easy to shape as you like.The brad is hidden with a glittered 3D foam heart.

For  second card I used the same ribbon, but this time made a double bow by using two lengths of ribbon and tying them together at the same time. Double bows have to be my favourite style tying a ribbon.

Finally I used a  heart motif ribbon, folded outwards from the middle each side, secured with extra strong tape and finished off in the centre with a button.

So come on, get out those ribbons and start tying...even your little off cuts can be tied in the middle to make a simple little bow!

Carole X

All You Need is Love - Saturday 2nd February

Hello Friends,

Today's card is my Design Team card for the new Emergency Crafters Challenge..the theme is Love, but it doesn't have to be Valentine's! I'm writing this at about 7am, but scheduling for later in the hope that the new challenge will be live by then, as we are out all day...not much crafting for me today!

This card was also my group's card for our class on Thursday and the easiest way to describe it's 'construction' is to break it down into sections...sorry about the photo, I hadn't realised it was quite to dark when I originally uploaded it!

The Rose Topper

I Inked the large rose stamp (Kanban) on watercolour card (that was just my choice, it could be any stamping card) using Cranberry Adirondack ink and heat embossed with clear embossing powder.

Next I mixed  a little Victorian Velvet and Bundled Sage  distress(separately) inks with a spritz of water on my mat and using a paintbrush, coloured in the rose and leaves quickly, it just needed a 'wash'.  I then quickly ran my heat tool over the image just to dry off the ink.

Finally I  inked  the edges  of the card with Victorian Velvet before matting and layering on the pink and white card, ddd a little ink to the edges of bottom white layer as well.

The Rose Background for the Easel

For this I used a cuttlebug embossing folder  and embossed it through a cuttlebug, twice to cover the whole layer of the card. In case those of you who have followed me for a while and know how much I love my Grand Calibur are wondering why I was using a Cuttlebug, as some of you know, my GC developed 'internal' problems just before Christmas. I contacted Spellbinders in the US who were brilliant and got the UK repairer to contact me. They will repair for free, but as mine was one of the original machines and is almost 3 years old, I had to pay for the postage to send it to him, with no guarantee he could repair it. After a lot of consideration and communication with the repairer, we decided that in view of the age and possible extent of damage, it isn't worth repairing, so I'm going to have a new one for my birthday. The original is still struggling on, but the more intricate dies are just too much for it. 

A friend of mine who decided to dabble in craft and then decided that it maybe wasn't for her, had bought a Cuttlebug and hardly used it, so she offered it to me just after Christmas for a very small price...as this means I can use the Tim Holz and other thicker dies, how could I refuse that offer!

To make the background paper for the base

I used a piece of linen card cut to the size of the base. Using the Victorian Velvet, I stamped a single small rose stamp from the same set on scrap paper and then inked the card. This way the stamped image wasn't so  defined. I stamp randomly or in a pattern over the sheet, coated with clear embossing powder and heat embossed, then I inked all over lightly with Victorian Velvet.

The Stencilled Greeting

This is a Dreamweaver stencil, used with iridescent Dreamweaver Paste and Dreamwaver F/x mica powder, heat embossed until it bubbled. I actually saw Ali Reeve on TV making her own paste yesterday, something I'll definitely give a go...when I get the time!

To complete I added ribbon and a few gems and left a corner of the topper free from glue, just to turn it up for more of a Vintage effect.

Well for me I am going to have to 'fit in' crafting when I can this weekend as I have a lot of commissions to make, plus a craft fair in March that I haven't even started thinking about...but we aren't going to be home much...it looks like I'll be playing catch up with tonight's episode of 'Borgen' !!!

Hope you all have a fab weekend...please check out the latest Emergency Crafters Challenge here ("m hoping it's live now! If not, it should be in the next day or so)

Thank you so much for stopping by, I love reading your comments!

Hugs,

Carole X

Sunday Stampers week 242 - Friday 1st February

Hello again Friends,

Welcome to my new follower...thank you so much for choosing to join my tiny part of this massive, warm-hearted creative part of blog land, I very much appreciate all of you!

As promised earlier  I am back with my Sunday Stampers project for this week...this time Hels Sheridan set us the theme of including the word 'Wish' in our projects. I have a confession about this one, it's still a work in progress! I had the idea on Sunday, started it Monday night, then got caught up with all the workshop preparations, plus I've had a lot of commissions land in my email box...so it was a bit of a hurried attempt to get it posted today.

I decided to make a grungy craft wish list book, somewhere to jot down all my craft desires and this what I have come up with so far...

 The cover is just a piece of cardboard I had saved in my 'art parts' box, from some packaging. I gave it a quick coat of gesso and after it hd dried inked it with Brush Corduroy and Vintage Photo distress inks. I wanted it to look quite grungy and like  a rough piece of wood.

I then inked the printed list with a Studio 490 stamp by Wendy Vecchi and distressed the edges. The typewriter stamp and letters are from a set by Sam Poole. I stamped the letters several times to use on the cover and index sheets. The corner element is a Teresa Collins Stamp. I stamped everything with clear embossing ink, fixed with clear embossing powder.

You can't really see it in the photo, but I did use a Cog Mask and put it through the Grand Calibur, the result is quite faint but does add another tactile element to the card.

The flower and butterfly  were in my box of die-cuts I'd already made and not used and the little button is something I made from salt dough after watchin Ali Reeve on TV a few weeks ago! I coloured it with Promarkers.

I wanted the cover to me a mix of all crafty items I love using..so we have stamping, Spellbinders, embossing, distress inks, masks and I had to get the Promarkers in there somewhere! I need to add more pages and index titles, but this was a fun little project!

Thanks for stopping by!

Carole Z X

Workshop Pics! - Friday 1st February

Good Morning Friends,

Wow! I can't believe we are already in February..however, I can't say I'm sorry to see the back of a very dreary January...

Last night was the first of this year's workshops for Amy and myself and we started off really well with 16 people booked on! To think we started with 10, then said we'd have a maximum of 12 and now we 'braved' groups of 8 each and it worked really well, I'm pleased to report.

I'm sharing some photos of my group of ladies at work last night - I was a bit afraid that I'd made the card a bit too 'involved' - too many techniques. I'd designed it with a group of 6 in mind, but everyone coped really well and made really lovely cards. Please check my blog tomorrow for the full details of my card as it is also this month's design team card for Emergency Crafters!

This is the first of two posts today, I'll be back later with my Sunday Stampers project for this week!

See you later!

Carole X

It was Leanne's first class with us ..great card!

WOYWW 191 - Wednesday 30th January

Hello friends and fellow WOYWWers!

It's time to share my desk space again and join in with the fun over at http://stamping-ground.blogspot.co.uk  but I have to be quick today as there is so much more crafting to fit in to the few hours of my day off! I spent the morning preparing packs for my group at our workshop tomorrow and it took ages! I've been trying to make so quick cards for birthdays and anniversaries coming up in February and March..you wouldn't believe how many celebrations amongst family and friends over the those months! So the ones I've made so far are spread out on my desk....

The card with the corset on the right is a gift card holder, but I dropped a wet wipe on it and ruined the inking so I have to re-do that part today ( I need to post it tomorrow!). 

So having said that, I must get back to work...happy WOYWW day all!

Carole X

Pastel Heart - Tuesday 29th January

Hello Friends,

First of all, welcome to my new follower, Dee..thank you so much for choosing to join in my little piece of craft space! Thank you also for your comments on yesterday's post...when I set out to make the card I had no idea that it was going to take hours and hours to make, so glad you all seemed to like it!

Today is a simple little card, which was made in minutes and was inspired by a card in Indigo Blu's gallery.

 I covered a  6x6 card blank with dark red textured card and then stamped the Indigo Blu 'Love is" heart on a piece of sticky note paper to make a mask, which I placed in the centre of a square of white card.

I then stamped a script design randomly around the mask with Wild Honey distress ink (the stamp is from Vintage Labels by Sam Poole). I ran the heat tool over the stamping to make sure it was dry and then I inked it all over with a mix of Victorian Velvet and Spun Sugar distress inks.

To finish off I inked the stamp with purple, pink and green Colourbox inks and stamped the insert with the same inks, but very faintly so that I could stamp the sentiment across it...and that's all folks!

Thanks for stopping by,

Carole X

Ooh La La! - Monday 28th January

Good morning Friends!

I hope you all had good weekends, even if you were in a part of the Country still affected by snow. Ours melted on Friday and Saturday was a beautiful day; Sunday a little less so, but it feels so much warmer! Honest!!

Thank you for all your comments and good wishes last week - my back is much better now thank you and I'm returning to work today..the trouble with my job is that if I'm not there, there is no one else to take my place. My office volunteers are wonderful, but only one of them will come in when I'm away, so the longer I'm off, the more the work mounts up...plus I have a new volunteer today, a young lad who is going to help with our social media and this is such a crazy month there too..totally the wrong time to be poorly!

Today's card is another one of my 'takes' on a project in the Creative Expressions book:.For those who have the book, it's the "Ooh La La" card by Sue Wilson. Of course I had to use the dies and stamps I own, so it's basically the layout and general idea which remains the same!

 I used an A5 card, which I covered with a chocolate coloured textured card as the base layer. I used cream card for the next layer and using my faithful Tim Holz paper-piercing ruler made little pin pricks around the edge.

I then took some more of the textured card, cut to size and then cut two triangle shapes either side of the length. Using the same card, I used Butterfly Magic, an expandable die, for the background (the project in the book actually uses Botanical Swirls).

The sentiment, from Creative Expressions 'Antique Dressforms' stamp set was stamped in black on the textured card, using Perfect Medium  and heat embossed with clear powder. I then die cut it with Spellbinders Fancy Tags.

The dress forms are from the same stamp set: I stamped them with a trio of archival inks: a cream, brown and black and once again heat embossed with clear powder and then inked through with Vintage Photo.

To finish I tied a bow with vintage satin ribbon, added a flower stamped on Glassine and one of the buttons I'd made using my melt pot, tied with some bakers twine. I couldn't get a decent photo of the button, but I made it with clear UTEE, mixed with tea-stained Frantage  mica fragments and formed with a mini circular cookie cutter.

Thanks for stopping by and leaving a comment, I love to read them all and really appreciate them!

Happy Crafting,
Carole X