Pink butterflies!

I created this card for someone special who is becoming a teen!!!  I used paper strips in two different pink patterns and glued them to a layer of white cardstock trimmed to fit on my pink card front.  I added faux stitching to the left hand side with a white gel pen.  I trimmed notches into all the ends for a cool look.  I punched the butterflies out after I had glued down the strips which was not very convenient.  Next time I will position and trim my strips, mark where I would like holes and then punch each strip individually before I glue them down.   I added tape to the back of one of the punched holes and applied pink glitter to the front.  I applied glue through a stencil (punched shape in cardstock) and applied glitter to the glue.  Not the best result because my substrate was a bit too thick to get good glue coverage but it does add a bit of sparkle. I punched a few white butterflies and added them.  Also glued several of the pink butterfly punchies to the white layer and added some dots with a pink gel pen.  I added a window punchie greeting (SU) using two white brads.
I am really happy with how this card came together and I love the the look of it.
I started out wanting to use up some of my scraps - 3/4" strips which I had cut out previously for making paper beads for one of my classes last year.  I will be working on some other cards that feature strips in the next little bit!!

Therese

Light house card

The last card I included in my set of gift cards.
I started with a navy card, added this cool piece of paste paper which I created years ago, added a strip of distressed yellow cardstock, wrapped some coordinating yellow fiber around the card front then added my layered light house photo (taken in PEI).  This greeting matched perfectly so I trimmed it, layered it onto navy and attached it with 3D foam tape.

I am enjoying making "one of" cards!! I can use supplies from my stash of images, papers and fiber to create some unique cards!!

I forgot to take a photo of the wrapped cards.  I used a square of decorative paper folded into an envelope and tied with fiber.   Check out this posting to see another example and a template.
Quick and easy!!

Therese

Colourful flower card

My third card for the set!!  I started with this double embossed background from my stash and tied on a bit of fiber that coordinated with my image.  It adds some great texture. I layered my image onto yellow, bordered punched (SU) the bottom edge and pierced the scallops.  I attached the background to my navy blue card front and then adhered my image using 3D foam tape just over lapping the fiber.
The image was stamped over a hand made transparent acrylic paint background with black pigment ink and embossed with black embossing powder.  I really like the way the high contrast silhouette of the image works with the background and how the fiber adds some softness.
An any occasion card!!

Therese

Angel card

Another card for giving!!  I found the angel (laser printed on transparency) in my stash.  This blue glittery hand decorated paper I made a while back worked well with the image and I found this greeting that did the same.  I attached the image to the decorated paper using black mini brads, tied on some black fiber and then glued the whole element to a black card front.  I ripped the edges of the saying, chalked them then added it to the card front using 3D foam tape overlapping the fiber.
It was fun to work with fiber again!!  It is amazing how many options there are for decorating cards!!

Therese

Cat card

I have been working on a set of cards to give a good friend who has been taking care of my garden (four tomato plants, some herbs and an orphaned spruce tree) over the last few months.  I so appreciate her willingness to help me and really wanted her to know it.
This is the first card I made.  I received both images in swaps years ago and always thought they would go well together.  I trimmed the stamped image of the cat (unknown) and used a black permanent marker to add a nice layered look to the edge.  I trimmed the fish bone background (Magenta), layered it onto red and then added it to the black card front.  I glued the little laser printed greeting that I found in my stash to the back of the cat image and glued it to the front of the background.  I really considered colouring the image but in the end decided I liked the simple look of black and white with one colour.
I would highly recommend giving all your non cardmaking friends some handmade cards!!  They are useful creative gifts which can give as a unit or sending along to their family and friends!!  It is a win-win gift!

Therese

Handmade paper

Our last day we made some handmade paper!!  I had brought the paper pulp ready to go - blue and yellow.  We started with the blue and chose the additions from a variety I had brought along and made a few small sheets of paper (3.5" x 4.5").  We drained off the blue from the vat and added the yellow pulp to which we added a variety of paper napkins snippets and made a few more sheets.  We then added the left over blue pulp to the yellow we had in our vat and made the "green" ones.  They are not as green as we were expecting and certainly were looking quite unappetizing when they were wet.
Not sure what she will do with her sheets!!  I may see if I can make some Christmas cards with my blue ones because they have some nice gold scraps in them.  The yellow ones are nice and bright and lend themselves nicely to floral cards.  The "green" ones will need some creativity to turn them into cards.  They may get a wash of colour to help them along at some point!!

A week of fun and creativity!!

Therese

Serendipity and more cards

I introduced my young cardmaker to serendipity!! There are always little pieces of paper around when you have crafters and their house is no an exception.  I had brought along a variety of gold, red and green scraps (gift wrap, decorative paper, tissue paper, candy wrappers, card fronts, handmade paper, hand decorated paper,etc) which I culled from my stash. I had already ripped them into small pieces so all that was left to do was to glue them down onto quarter sheets of scrap cardstock. It matters not at all what the cardstock looks like

because in the end it is completely covered with scraps so you can easily use pieces that were botched with stamping or incorrectly printed or even junk mail if you want.
I made three pieces of serendipity paper and used parts of the third one to make these two cards.  I cut one strip of about 3/4", then trimmed it into squares which I layered onto several layers of coordinating cardstock to create the accent for this card.  I distressed the edges of the layers and added texture to the card front using pencil crayons.

For this card, I trimmed a large piece of serendipity into strips and layered them over two pieces of red cardstock on a yellow card front.  I discovered this ART stamped image which I coloured to coordinate with my colour scheme and then highlighted the letters with pencil and the black pencil crayon.  I added a little self adhesive vellum greeting on the lower left hand side.
She loved making serendipity sheets and cut different shapes out of hers.
Just goes to show you that even with basic supplies you can create some interesting and effective cards!

Therese

Cards with basic supplies

Here I coloured my image before I scoured the pile of card fronts and was left having to put my accent piece onto a green card front. It works reasonably well but I think pink or purple would have been better.  The digital image is from Beccy's, and laser printed.  I used coloured pencils to colour it.  I taught my young friend to distress the edges of the cardstock layers using the cutting edge of the scissors.  She liked that a lot!!  Here I distressed the edges of my layers and added a bit of detail to the greeting as well.  I used pencil crayons to add texture to the card front in several colours that worked well with the image.

 For this card I coloured the heart, added dots in black pencil crayon to simulate small brads on both the image and the greeting and again embellished the card front with several different colours of pencil crayon to add texture.

 Here I coloured the bear and knowing that I had red scraps to layer the image coloured the ribbon and heart in red as well.  I distressed one of the red scraps and added to my card front below the greeting.  I highlighted the bear using a pencil and black pen to give it more definition and that really helped with the eyes as well.

 For this card I found this coloured image and found the decorative paper in the recycle bin which I was very happy to find matched very closely.  I trimmed the binding edge off of one of the cardstock pieces and used it as a design element below my layered image.  I hand trimmed the greeting and layered it twice to help it stand out.
I found a scrap of adhesive fun foam which we cut up and used instead of 3D foam tape to pop our images.
I used the pencil crayons to add colour and texture to my decorative paper as well as the cardstock.

Again, I used the decorative paper which we found in the recycle bin.  It has been creased so I just decided to wrinkle it up completely and then used pencil crayon to highlight the folds. knowing I had a blue card front for this card I decided to colour the scarf in similar colours.  The image is from Melonheadz Illustrations!!  Again, I simulated brads using a pencil crayon and added a trimmed binding as a design element.

We had a wonderful time and made a few other crafts as well.

Therese

Young cardmaker!!

 I spent the last week with two of my grandchildren and it was wonderful to spend time with them.  The oldest loves to craft so we made cards together several times.  Here you can see the great cards she created!!  She is an inspiration!!  She does not second guess herself, she is not afraid to try (she cut out the little red embossed heart - inside and out) and she does not give up.  She makes art in all different sizes - you can see a little one there is a passport.  She was adding a drawing and an address on the inside.
We had basic supplies - her box of pencil crayons which included a few markers, a couple of pencils,
some wax crayons and one black pen, one pair of safety scissors, glue sticks, a few cardfronts and a small stack of cardstock pieces along with two clam shell cases of images from my stash and one of greetings.  No fancy machines, no embossing folders, etc and we had a wonderful time making cards!!

I am looking forward to many years of time spent creating with her!!

I hope you take the opportunity to craft with young people when they present themselves!!  They are so willing to try and we just need to let them be - no judgement or advice about our visions of their projects!!

Therese

Quilted Christmas cards

Another set of Christmas cards I made when my sister was visiting!!  I was thinking Christmas trees when I came up with this cutting design but did not fully appreciate that more balance was needed between the two colours for all of the green ones to look like trees though it was serendipity that the blue ones looked like mountains and that worked just as well with my design.  I layered two different blue decorative papers and two different green decorative papers over each other (4" x 5.25"), held them together with bull clips on the edges and started making cuts - seven in all - using my paper cutter.  This is called "Stack and Whack" in the quilting world. With all the pieces in stacks I started creating individual layers - like a puzzle - using the different coloured layers. Once I had pieced together the four layers I glued them to red quarter sheets of cardstock by putting just a small amount of glue in the middle of each of the pieces and then used my sewing machine with white thread to sew all of them to the red layers.  I also sewed around the outside edge.  Glue and sewing needles do not mix well which is why I only glued the pieces in the centers to avoid having to stitch through glue. I found the laser printed greetings in my stash, layered them to red and then to my decorative stitched layers.  I trimmed the red edges close and then glued the mountain ones to blue cardstock and the tree ones to green card fronts.  I have another stack of decorative papers which I will cut with a different pattern to give me four more cards.
This design works well with 12x12 decorative papers because you are cutting your layers to 4 inches. Really love the graphic quality of these cards!!

Therese

Poppy card for a swap

On AFTCM, I joined a card swap with the theme of cascading dimensional blossoms in red and yellow.  I first decided to create the paper for the flowers using coffee filters and fluid acrylic ink. Love the vibrant colours I achieved!!  I cut half circles from the filters, added glue to the straight edges and gathered them to create my flowers.  I used a black marker to add black centers and then thought it would be cool to add black seed beads as well so I just added some clear glue, sprinkled on the seed beads and left it to dry.  I created the background using a variety of blue paints on white cardstock and then stamped on a script (SU) background in a very similar colour to add subtle texture.  I glued down my flowers, drew on stems with a black sharpie, added a double tied piece of white seam binding and attached the whole accented layer to a black card front.
This is a large card and I love how vibrant the colours are!! It has been mailed off to my swap partner!!

Therese

Christmas cards - Stockings

My first Christmas cards in quite a while!!  I do need to get started so I will have what I need come the beginning of December!!  I used three little stockings on these cards which I hand cut from a gift bag I received a while back.  They look enough like 3D stickers that I am submitting them for my sister's August Christmas card challenge!  It is a great time to get started on your Christmas cards and you can check out her monthly challenges here if you need some inspiration to get started.
I stared with a white card, layered on a red embossed layer (SU - Northern Flurries) on the bottom edge and a plain red strip at the top, added a scalloped green layer (SU - Scalloped border punch).  I tied white fiber to a purple rectangle which was distressed on the top and bottom edges to which I glued the three little stockings using 3D foam tape.  Found these round punched greetings (SU) in my scrap bucket and layered them over green and attached them to the front of my card with 3D foam tape.  I have about 4 of them complete and 5-6 with all the pieces cut that just need to be assembled.
It was fun to have my sister over for the long weekend and I did get a few cards made to add to my Christmas card stash.  Making a date to craft with friends is a great way to make the time to get some of your projects started and/or finished!!

Therese