Jack's 6th Birthday card: Angry Birds

My Nephew Jack is turning 6 in a few weeks! I found this fun Angry Birds punch art tutorial on pinterest and had to give it a try. I decided to make it into a wobbler so it jiggles about and looks like it is flying through the air.

 

I didn't have all the punches suggested so I improvised using Spellbinders Classic Circles, a couple of woodware circle punches, the heart from the Sizzix Home Sweet Home die, I didn't have any triangle punches or dies so I cut two squares in half for the beak and then I hand cut a 'V' shape for the eyebrows and a fork shape for his tail. Really simple.

 

The background is made with distress inks; Squeezed Lemon and Spice Marigold with Moved Lawn on the edges of the grass, a name and number, and then the - and ta da!

 

I hope he like it :)

 

*- Please not that obviously these will NOT be available in my etsy shop, because a) this is someone else's tutorial and b) Angry Birds is a registered trademark, but feel free to give it a try your self, the punch art was really simple and on it's own might make a great gift tag or party invitation.

Wedding Stationary: Sneak Peak behind the scenes

Firstly apologies for the lack of blog updates, between facepainting at the school summer fair, Miss L's Birthday and family illnesses I haven't had a lot of time for a proper update. I have been popping a few instant updates up on my facebook page for anyone following me, and thought I'd share a few snippets of 'behind the scenes' from the wedding stationary I've been working on for a friend:

 

 

Not quite sure how I will to post the finished stationary collection, as I need to protect the couple's privacy, but I will try to post a post-wedding update with lots of the little details I've been working on.

MLP Party: Rainbow Dash Party Invites

My little Pony themed Invites for a paper crafter are a little tricky .... Do you attempt to cut out a whole pony? Do you go for a general girlie invite and add a pony at the end? Cutie Marks? Or just give in and print something?

 

As those of you following on Facebook will have seen I eventually went down the Rainbow route. In this case it was for Rainbow Dash the pony, but these could easily be used for a generic Rainbow Party.

 

MLP Party: How to enlarge an image by hand for a Party 'Pin the Tail on the ...'

Planning a party? Really want a 'pin-the-tail' game and can't find the right one to fit your theme? No problem, just scale up an image and you can make your own! In fact this technique has a number of applications and will help you to copy or enlarge any image by hand. Great for cards to send into kids TV channels, posters, face-in-hole photo boards and even full scale wall murals :D



 

What you'll need:

- An image to copy

- A large sheet of paper (eg-A2)

- A pencil

- A good eraser

- A ruler

- Pencils/Paint/Felt tips

 

Firstly you need to find a good colour image of the character you want to use. Consider which item or part of them you want your guests to pin to the background image; for example; for a pony it might be the tail, for a clown a nose, etc etc. Make sure the position of this is prominent in the photo - we are not going to draw it but it helps if you can clearly see the object should be.

In sympathy cards

We had some very sad news last weekend, a family member sadly passed away. They will be very much missed by everyone who knew them. So there may not be too many updates from me for a little while, but I just wanted to share the simple card I made for some of my relatives.

 

 

It's always tricky to get Bereavement cards right, you want to keep your design simple and clean but also be uplifting. I hope I got the balence right.

 

 

Mojo Monday #287

After a really long day yesterday I was in need of some 'me time' and usually that means locking myself in my craft room or opening a bottle of wine and watching a girlie movie. However I was lacking craft inspiration and as I'm on a health kick I decided against the wine, lol. Rather than attempt to keep working on one of my current projects I decided to open my scrap paper drawer and just have some fun making a card for this week's Mojomonday competition. Here is the original sketch:

I mostly used scraps from my MME boys crazy stash, as I love the colours, and distressed the edges with Brushed Corduroy, Ripe Persimmon and Broken China. I used my Spellbinders Gears dies for the red and orange cogs. The sentiment was stamped on lined Kraft using Ranger Archival Ink in Jet Black I even experimented with my new Fiskars eyelet setting tools as the embellishment detail. I substituted the scalloped circle for a flattened bottle top to which I added a punched circle of the scrapbook paper and filled with resin for a glossy finish. Finally I added the twine for some texture. Here is the finished card:

  

Check out all the great entries at Mojomonday#287

 

New Facebook page!

I've finally launched a facebook page linking the blog and etsy shop.
 

For more informal updates, the lastest news and the occasional give away just head over to facebook and 'like' my page :)

 

And don't forget you can follow on twitter too.

Happy 1st Birthday Freddie

I can't believe it's been a year since I sent a 'Welcome to the world baby Freddie' card to Freddie's parents, but here we are on birthday number 1!

 

 

 

Again I found this fab and fun scrapbooking paper at my local craft store Sparkledreams, and picked out the rocket from the original design as a handstamped rocket on kraft. I cut the '1' out by hand.

 

 

I've refined the design a little and a similar card is now available in my ETSY SHOP :)

 

Mother's day cards

Admittedly this post is a few weeks late, but here is a look at the two variations of Mother's Day cards I did this year. Both where designed around my new Bigz Birdhouse die from Sizzix.

 

 

The cards are a admittedly little on the 'twee' side of my usual work but I like to think the use of old book pages and distress inks help give it a more vintage look.

Captain America to the rescue!

Yet another mask completed using designs from Jessica over at Cutesy Crafts :) In fact I think we have the whole set (must post them soon). This time it's Captain America, and Josh likes this one much better than the mask that came with the costume!

 

 

The only changes I made to the original were a little bit of backstitch detail on the feathers and I used xcut's Leaf die to cut the eyes (smallest die), the rest is handsewn and blanket stitched all around the edge.

 

Red Nose Day 2013 :) A quick way to make a design into a t-shirt...

J's nursery where having a 'wear red and donate £1' day for Comic Relief day and he wanted to dress up. He didn't like the official t-shirts at Tkmaxx but loved the red noses (we ended up with one of each nose, two plush toys and several pez dispensers.)

If you want to recreate an image onto a t-shirt here is a rough guide of what I did. Do beware of using images that are copyright, and keep in mind that felt does not wash or wear well in the long run, so for projects that need to last perhaps use fabric and overlock or hem the edges.

Mojo Monday #282: Baby Arrival Card

Seems like forever since I headed over to MojoMonday for a bit of a crafty challenge. I've been soo busy with the kids and I've been helping a dear friend of mine with her wedding invitations, and when I do need to make a card my brain has been a little scattered lately, so what better way to top up my crafty mojo than a Mojomonday challenge? Mojo Monday 282 to be precised. It's the last Monday in the Month so it's circle or square time :) This week's sketch was designed by Julee, and it is both simple yet striking.

 

 

 Isn't it a nice to have someone else worry about the layout while you just need to experiment with colours, patterns and textures? Often I get the colours and a vague idea about composition and have to spend the majority of my time experimenting with layout. I needed a card for a family friend I grew up with in Hong Kong who has just had a baby, and had this fab paper just waiting for the next little bundle of joy to appear.

 

 

I used the fab alphabet scrapbook paper (can't remember who it's by, might be MME) as my main feature and the added kraft card and the reverse of the gears card I used in my last post. I stamped the little feet image using Ranger Archival ink in coffee and aged the edges with Distress Inks: Broken China and Vintage Photo.

 

Please excuse the quick photoshop job on the latter half of the name, I always like to include the baby's full name as a keepsake and so I've obscured it for the family's privacy.

 



Colourful gears Card: Happy Birthday Granddad-in-law

I found this fab MME paper in my local craft shop Sparkle Dreams a few weeks ago and I've been dying to it but other projects are taking up a lot of my time at the moment.

 

 

Mr S' Granddad's Birthday is on Saturday and as this was the first masculine paper I came across in my paper stash I thought it was a good excuse as any to use it :)

 

I was inspired by the gear-like background to use my Donna Salazar dies, and added two labels. I used both 'Grandad' and 'Great Grandpa' to represent both the kids and our relationship to him, and tied them on with my trademark twine.

 

Inside the main gear I stamped a 'happy birthday' message and accented with little red gems. I think I may try another version of this card aimed more at boys, given the gears I almost want to try a robot, or maybe something simpler.



Apologies for the mess, craft room under construction

After 2 years of my expanding craft supplies, tools and paraphernalia being housed in the study/junk/guest room we've finally had a sort out!

 

Now the "junk" is less (or at least better organised) the guest sofa bed is visible and everything had been moved around to allow for my new "husband-built" desk. Here is a photo of the desk going in and my daughter with hands over her ears in case the drilling states again.

 

On a side note this is also a demo post to test the new blogger app, for updates on the go.

 

What's in your filofax Friday? #3

Just a quick update on my compulsive cataloguing of craft resources in my filofax. My distress ink colour chart from ranger is filling up rather nicely, in fact I've had to manually extend it to allow for the seasonal inks. I've also added one for Ranger's Archival inks and already linked to my memento chart in #2. I also made my own table for Canford Card colour samples, using templates from philofaxy :)

 



Happy Birthday Nan: Felt corsage broach and card

It's my Husband's Nan's Birthday next week, I wanted to make her a unique card which was a little less grungy that my more recent creations and a little more chintzy but I also wanted to send her a gift. I needed something that was easy to post, and so I reached for the felt and beads and came up with this corsage broach;

 

I have to admit I've really missed sewing, I made one sock monster and got halfway through a Shelf Elf at Christmas before we all got poorly and then Christmas cards and tags took over.

 

Somehow along the way I started designing a card around the broach, using a slightly glittery floral paper, prima flowers and paper lace, and punching two holes in the card to allow for the Broach back to be fastened inside the card.

 

Before adding the prima flowers I was starting to doubt myself but I think it works in the end, not sure my sewing is good enough to unleash this sort of design in the shop just yet, but if you can't make a special effort for family and friends who are you going to make it for?

 

 

Some old and something blue tag

Been rather busy with the kids lately (today we've been out in the snow all day today) and I'm helping design wedding stationary for a friend's wedding, as well as trying to add to the card and tag designs in my etsy shop.

 

 

I did however find time today to created a new tag based on a lovely new stamp of mine with the Bridal mantra "Something old, something new, something borrowed & something blue". It was cut with my Big shot, aged with distress inks, stamped with archival ink and embellished with diamante. It is available now in my etsy shop but wanted to share it here too. I even got to use my own personal 'something blue' for the photo shoot; my lovely (blue soled and lined) Irregular Choice 'Mrs Lower' heels :)

Back into some sort of routine and adding to my Etsy designs

A whole week back at school, and finally I feel like I'm getting back into a routine in my day to day life - just need to sort my blog life now, lol. I might be a little quiet at the moment as I'm helping a friend with her wedding stationary and trying to build my designs in my etsy shop now that the Christmas tags have been cleared up. I've had a few commisions over Christmas including items that have winged their way as far-a-field as Spain and Australia :) I'll be adding more as soon as I can. I'm trying to stay true to my deign roots with lots of Kraft and Twine, here are some of my favourites:
 



Today's Tie is...

I'm back after the Christmas & New year break, and am starting with a shameless plug :)

 

My Dad is an avid Tie collector, and first time blogger, he has challenged himself to wear a different tie to work every working day for a year - and there are seriously quirky ones in there. Keep track of his progress [HERE]