Paper Dolls Birthdays

Two members of our team, Hazel & Joanne, have had birthdays this week, and I am hoping that Joanne has got her card, otherwise this post will spoil the surprise!

Here is the card & gift bag I made for Hazel - the card for Joanne was similar but I used slightly different colours.

The card blank is Soft Suede with mats of More Mustard and Spice Cake Designer Series Paper.  The buttons in this product suite are really big, but I decided to make a real impact with a rosette behind using some Pool Party Designer Fabric.

To make the rosette, I punched out a circle of card and covered it in sticky strip.  Then I tore some of the fabric into a 1" wide strip and pleated it around the outside of the circle, making sure that I caught the fabric on the sticky strip.  I carried on working round the circle towards the centre.

For the middle of the button, I stamped one of the images from the Spiced Paisley stamp set and punched it out with the 1 1/4" circle punch.  I then pierced holes through, aligning with the holes in the button.  The fabric circle was positioned behind the button and holes pierced, again aligning the holes through the button.  Linen thread was sewn through all the layers and stamped & punched tags tied to the thread.

The 'bag in a box' I made to match was adapted to hold a couple of ink pads. 

Hope you both had lovely birthdays ladies?!

Just one thing before I go, Me & Sara are doing the Langsett Barn craft fair this Sunday.  If you fancy coming over for a crafty natter, here are the directions from Sara's website.

Jan x

Big Top Lion

Happy Sunday!
How is your weekend going?  Mines been lovely, I went to see Sara (my SU Mum) and Hazel (my SU Daughter) and the lovely Jean from Busy Bees yesterday, so I am really chilled out.  Im also going to see a lady about signing up this afternoon, so I am buzzing with excitement!!!

Dont, forget - if YOU fancy getting £300+ in products, plus all the benefits of joining Stampin' Up!  You have until 31st March to get the extra free products so contact me NOW to get your starter kit. 

There are more details here.  Remember, there are NO TIE INS and you can stop at ANY time.

Well, a quick post today as I need to shoot off.  I have decided to start making my cards A5 in size as for some reason they seem to be more popular with my customers.  I made up some 'spare' punched animals a few months ago and have been making up some cards to sell at work and here is one of my favourates.

The Designer Series Paper is from Big Top Birthday - not one I would normally choose, but it is perfect for kids cards.  I trimmed it to fit the card but the bottom of the paper was a peach shade which just wasnt right with the rest of the card.  So all I did was trim it off - carefully cutting around the seals flipper and the strongmans foot.  I then mounted it onto a mat of So Saffron, just a little smaller than the folded A4 card blank.

The lion is made from SU punches and the banner is cut from Petal Cone die, stamped with a sentiment from Under the Big Top.

Customer Thank You Cards

Well, to be honest I am so glad to see the back of February.  Its been a month where nothing went right!

The buyer we had for the house decided to pull out of the sale (5 weeks in they decided to look for other houses?!).  I only found out this morning that they have definately decided not to buy - thank you for leaving us for 3 WEEKS to find out.

I had a puncture when on site in Stoke on Trent last week (it took an hour for the AA to arrive) then my microwave exploded.  I noticed some weird posts on my Facebook wall that I knew I hadnt posted - it appears that my account has some sort of virus so I have closed the account.  Anyway, enough of my whinging. lets get on with what you have come to see...

The best parts of February have been the workshops I did with Ruth and Julie ( ***waves*** ).  Here are a couple of photos of the thank you cards I made for all the ladies who ordered Stampin' Up! products from both of the workshops and my Stampers 10 group.

This one is my favourate - and I dont normally like paisley!

 

I made 10 cards using the paisley design and then another 10 with a different design of DSP.  Unfortunately, I didnt calculate the amount of ribbon I would need so ended up having to use a different sort for some of them.  Also, have you noticed what I have used behind the ribbon - its some of the SU fabric!!!  

 

Strips of the fabric were torn (yes, torn, I know!!!) and then I just gathered the fabric along some sticky strip to look like it was pleated.  The Triple Treat flower was inked with Versamark before being heat embossed with White embossing powder - the white stands out so much on dark coloured card.  I even used some of my antique brads - these are normally only used for special cards but I was feeling generous.

I loved making these cards - I definately needed some therapy after the last three weeks. The colours remind me of the spring for some reason.  And it was so easy to match everything colourwise as its a Product Suite from the SU Mini Catalogue so everything is designed to match.

Here is what I used:

Pool Party card blank, Spice Cake Designer Series Paper, Spice Cake Designer Fabric, Very Vanilla and Soft Suede cardstock, White Embossing Powder, More Mustard Scallop Dots Ribbon, Antique Brad, the Modern Label Punch for the sentiment and Fancy Flower Punch.  The stamp sets are the Triple Treat Flower and Curly Cute.

Well, Im off to do some cleaning & ironing now I have to go back to having the house tidy.

Have a lovely weekend

Jan

x

Dinoroar Workshop

As I promised earlier this week, here is some of the items my lovely hostess, Julie from Rotherham, received for having her workshop.  She also got a ribbon sampler - but I forgot to take a photo of it (Doh!).

Julie wanted something like a box, suitable for boys (or girls) as the make and take and as Easter is coming up, we decided to go for a folded basket.

Some of the ladies who were coming to the workshop liked to use alcohol markers for colouring so I suggested a set we could do some watercolouring with Dinoroar, which is perfect for colouring - but its one of those sets that you dont have to colour in if you dont want to.

Although there werent as many people there as we had hoped, we had a ball!  The ladies were so lovely, it was a pleasure to be with them.

The colours used are Certainly Celery, Old Olive and Marina Mist with the dinosaurs being stamped onto Whisper White card in black Stazon.  We used both ink pads and Watercolour Wonder crayons with aquamarkers for the colouring.

The size of the cardstock used to make this basket was 7.5" square but I have made this basket before - here is a link to one made using a 12x12" piece of card.

Thank you, Julie for letting me do the workshop - see you soon!

Jan
x

Easter Blossoms Card

Hi everyone!
Hope you had a nice weekend, mine was really busy with moving boxes, packing and sneeking in some preparation for a workshop on Thursday! 

I also made a card for my Mums sister, Auntie Val (she hates me calling her 'Auntie' tee hee).

 The card blank is just some white card from my stash but as my Auntie Val loves pink, I used Melon Mambo for the main colour, with Pink Pirouette used on the mats, behind the vellum cardstock (with the scalloped edge) the sentiment and behind the punched corners of the Melon Mambo card.

The vellum mat was stamped in Whisper White Craft ink using the little girl image from Easter Blossoms set and then white embossing powder was sprinkled on before heating to set.  Then I stamped the blossom image in black Stazon, turned over the vellum and coloured in the blossoms with my Melon Mambo marker.  Some of the centres of the flowers also had Bravo Burgundy ink dotted to the centre to give a little bit of depth.  I haven't used this technique for ages (thanks for reminding me about it Sara!).

The mat of vellum was matted on the Pink Pirouette card (I used the Scalloped Trim and Scalloped Trim Corner punches with white brads to secure it in place.  On the bottom corner, I added some tags from Tiny Tags, punched out with the jewellery tag punch.

The sentiment is from the Curly Cute set and was stamped in Melon Mambo ink onto Whisper White cardstock and then mounted onto a mat of Pink Pirouette.  The little flowers at each side of the sentiment are made using the flower Punch from Itty Bitty Shapes Punch Pack, the small 'eyes' from the Owl Builder Punch and Basic Pearls were added to finish off.

Bob back later in the week to see what I am doing at the workshop with Julie in Rotherham on Thursday...!

Jan
x

Cake Boxes

Hi everyone

When Me, Sara, Hazel, Joanne & Mari did the Don Valley Craft Show last month, Joanne had made some gorgeous cake boxes for people to open if they booked a workshop.  It went down a storm and I just had to make one!

Each box is made from textured card stock (Basic Black and Very Vanilla) with panels of Mocha Morning Speciality Paper.  To make the carnations on the top I punched out 6 Scallop Circles for each box and dipped them in a glass of water (only very quickly dipped in though - they don't like water!!!).

Then I layered them up, made a hole in the centre and threaded a brad through - scrunching the card stock tightly.  Once all the layers were in place, I gently opened the flowers up and then they were left to dry.

Once dry, the tips of each flower was dipped into wet glue before Dazzling Diamonds was sprinkled onto the glue.

I loved how the 'cake' turned out and everyone at Ruth's workshop today (***waves***!) commented on how nice it was.

Grow...

Sorry my posts have been a bit sparce (to say the least!) but there's been so much going on at home and work I dont know wether I am coming or going - I know, no change there then!!!

The 'Sold' sign has gone up outside the house - so all the neighbours know now (tee hee) and we have been sorting out the financial & legal stuff this week.  I just want to move now.

Here is a card I made the other day (whilst DH was packing boxes - shhhh).  Its using a stamp that I got at convention in Paris last year.  The stamp is exclusive to demonstrators and is one of those 'so true' sayings that I just had to have it when I saw it.

The colours are Whisper White, Pear Pizzazz, Concord Crush and Peach Parfait cardstock.  The flower is die cut from Blossom Party using Concord Crush card with Pear Pizzazz Designer Series Paper and the stem is just a small scrap of Lucky Limeade Ruffled Ribbon, twisted around to give some dimension.

The 'Grow' stamp was inked in Versamark, stamped onto Pear Pizzaz card and then white embossing powder sprinkled on top before heat embossing.  I trimmed the card down and matted onto a slightly larger piece of Concord Crush card.

The leaves on the Top Note die cut mat are from Pocket Silhouettes, stamped in Pear Pizzazz ink.

Hope you dont have too much of a problem with the snow this weekend.

Jan
x