Monday, June 22, 2009

My Art - June cardmaking -

Here is another quick and easy card!! The front features double sided cardstock which happens to be some I printed myself but there is a wide variety of double sided paper/cardstock in stores which can be used instead. The image is stamped in a coordinating colour, the edges are ripped and it is mounted with 3D foam tape to add dimension. The corner is folded over to reveal the other side of the cardstock and held in place with spiral clip! I bought these at a garage sale but have bought them at Staples in the past for other projects. I used double sided tape to keep the clip in place because most of it is on the front. There is room for a small greeting in the lower right hand side to quickly customize this card for a special occasion!!

Therese

My Art - June cardmaking - gel card

I must have been in a turquoise mode! I see that I have three cards that feature teal colours!!
I made the background paper for these cards! Total blast! I combined glitter glue (old and not very runny), fabric paints and inks!! Just plastered on the colours and glitter in washes until I was happy with they way they looked!! Once dry I cut down the letter sized sheets into quarter sheets and ran them through my Cuttlbebug with the D'vine Swirl embossing folder to give the look of water and ocean. I colour printed the fishes from some clipart from a word processing program. Created a window using two punched out holes and mounted my gel filled ziploc baggies (4 small drops per bag) behind them. Added the fish last so I could position it just the way I wanted it to show through. Found the "best fishes" greeting a several cards on the internet so colour printed that as well and added it below the layer.
A really fun card for the summer!! Best to mail these off with a little protection and not when there is a chance of them freezing!

Therese

My Art - June Cardmaking - altered book page

I applied walnut ink to book pages to make the altered paper for this card. Some of the girls did not want to put the words upside down so just put the altered paper on the other side instead. Works perfectly!! We used staples to attach the short ribbon pieces to the blue layer.
Thrifty tip: attach short pieces of ribbon with staples!!
There were a good variety of images and colours for this card set that all coordinated with the brown layer - pink, blue, purple and green!! Once the ribbon was stapled the layer is glued to the brown and then to the card front.
Nice to have a few quick and easy sketches for cards!!

Therese

My Art - June cardmaking - baby wipe card

This card is the result of a challenge I set myself at my All Occasions card class. Several of the girls were using baby wipes to keep their fingers from getting too sticky while they were creating. At the end of the class the pile of used baby wipes was headed to the garbage and I decided instead I would see if I could create something art worthy with them. I brought them home and rinsed them out to get any leftover solution out of them and then applied inks to them while they were still damp. The inks ran very nicely and as I stacked them one on top of each other they ran into each other as well. Made some very interesting background material. They are very light and airy and I decided to use an iron to hurry them along - NOT a good idea!! They are very sensitive to heat and melt quickly. So I thought that using the heat gun would be a better option. Only a very slight bit better. The heat did melt the babywipes but I did find that it took a little longer and it was more controllable so you would get some neat effects by melting in some areas and not in others. Not what I needed for this project so in the end, they were left to air dry!!
On this card the top part is a piece of cardstock that has been embossed with a Fiskars texture plate using a silicone mat and my Cuttlebug in the right sandwich. Happy with the way it turned out. Somewhat more subtle than using the embossing folders just because of the nature of the tool. The bottom part is altered baby wipes. I just ripped the top edge and then glued it to the card front and then trimmed it to the card edge. I added a silver embossed image on pearly cardstock which I coloured in with watercolours. Some of the girls used chalks and that worked very well too. I expect markers might be Ok as well. Added the pearly flower which is table confetti sold at Michaels in the wedding section. They are sold in a little bucket in a variety of colours. I thought the white was most versatile because they can be coloured with markers, inks, etc to suit what you need for your project!! Used my distressing tool (SU) on the edges of the layers for the image.
If you use baby wipes for cleaning your stamps yours are already altered by the time you are finished using them. Consider using them in your art!! I expect these would be very nice included in fabric art as well because the material has a nice texture and I expect it would sew up nicely.
Challenge yourself to use or repurpose some items that you use regularly in your home into your art!! Maybe cardboard packaging from a tissue box for ATCs, clear plastic packaging for making clear accents on your cards, etc. Use your imagination!!

Therese