Book mark card

 

Here’s a neat little idea I’ve used a few times for when you want to give a person a little gift and a card… well here it is – all in one! a card with a detachable bookmark!

Mine was shown to me by my upline’s, upline… so thanks Louisa! stamperlousplace.blogspot.com

I just use a normal C6 card blank and cut the front in half and perforate the back half to form the tear off bookmark.

This was then decorated using chocolate chip ink and the stampin’ around wheel ‘Forever flowers’ – very handy for when you want to make a card quickly! The central image is a stamped flower from the Mr and Mrs Stamp set. Scallop oval and normal oval punches form the tag at the top with some ribbon through. If you want to add a little something more, then it is easy enough to slip a pocket on the back to add a gift card for a bookshop!

 

Have fun making some!

Commissions…

 

I’ve recently been asked to make cards for a specific purpose (normally I just have a stash to let people choose from and I make personal cards to give to people from myself), this is whole new ball game….

oh the pressure that comes with it!!! I love the excuse of ‘I MUST craft…’ but being given creative freedom for someone else comes with a little stress! I was asked to make a welcome card and matching gift box with the theme tropical island!!! hmmmm…. I decided to go for Whisper White with my new stamp set ‘bird on a branch’ used in shades of bright pink and aqua blues. (the wing on the bird is also stamped with the bird on a branch stamp set in choc chip)

Card used: Whisper white, Pink Passion and tempting turquoise.

Scallop punch to make roof, 1 3/8’ circle punch, XL 2 step bird punch.

Non SU – clips from Tesco (25 for £1)

Hopefully this will be ok!

My upline Claire, gave me a fab tip which I’ll use on future birdhouses of cutting the flaps at the bottom in a slight V so that they sit neatly on each other. Also take care not to make the hole for the birdhouse too close to the top, else the join will be weak and your gable will refuse to go in the other direction without bending the cardstock.

Am also waiting for the UPS man to visit with my new goodies to come – have ordered the tiny tags and matching punch! Looking forward to having a play with them! Will be back later to show you what I did!

Men’s cards…

 

Here is my take on a idea I found on http://ustamp4fun.com/ Amy Celone’s Blog.

I’d been asked to do a 70th Birthday card…. not normally my ‘thang’ but hey… thought I’d give this a go :)

Am quite pleased with the overall look, I need to play about with the colour combos but to be honest I was using up bits that I had left over that might be manly!!

So… a really rust cardstock base, bella bleu paper for shirt, Night of Navy DSP (Hostess level 1 gift set), brass effect brads for the buttons (non SU) and the stamped images are 2 from Circle circus.

I have a tag punch on its way to me courtesy of a swap over at ILWS and I’ll be using this to add a pocket (turn tag upside down), may even add a ribbon hanky!

What do you think? Know any granddad’s who might dress like this?

Apologies…

I’ve been neglecting my blog… no sensible excuses, just been busy with work, things going really well at the moment with Mini IQ, however this has left me less time to craft!!

Our recent workshop went well, 3 good friends, here til midnight crafting! great fun! We made these adorable birdhouses (see Jo Dumbleton’s blog http://www.stampin-n-stuff.blogspot.com/) which proved a massive hit which I’ll share with you later on tomorrow…

Also we looked at making these lovely vellum cards with pocket silhouettes stamp set.

and also had a go at making some items from acetate… it is really hard to get good pictures of these cards as the light that you need to get a good picture just glares…

For both cards I went for a monochromatic look… I’d just ordered a pack of neutrals :) (loving Kraft!!), the above card uses the flower images from Itty Bitty Buds stamped with white stazon. The insert is matted and layered whisper white and basic grey with a grey stamped flower. Although there is no photo, there is an identical background layer cut in grey and stuck on the back of the card to disguise the adhesive.

The above card is super easy! It is a 3” x3” notecard which is a great size to knock out quickly from a 12” sheet. I used my scallop punch to punch from window sheets and 2 stamped SAB vintage label images stamped in basic grey. I also fed the stamped images back into my 1 1/4’ circle punch to remove the middle – one of which became the insert.

Front of card: scalloped border of vintage label, centre removed

Reverse of front: stick down window sheet, use second scalloped border to cover adhesive

Inside card: apply glue to circle, then line up image with front of card and close card to adhere.

ILWS and swaps

Recently did a trade with the lovely Deborah I ‘met’ off ILWS (deborahodonohoe.blogspot.com/), am really impressed with this as a method of expanding my stash with little expense!

We ended up having a good ole chat about all things crafty and having listened to a more experienced demo-er I realised that I need to take part or even organise (hmmm) some swaps on ILWS to get myself some new ideas. I’ve just made my very first card fronts for a swap – 15 of the same for a SU training event that I’ll be attending on 15th May. I decided to keep it terribly simple, hopefully people at the swap will still like it! PS the ribbon came unstuck – noticed after I took the pic, they’ve now all been trimmed and tidied up!

 

I may also look into doing some blog hops… not too sure how this whole blog thing works to increase traffic… I know I seem to read masses of other people’s blogs, but I need to grabble with design so that I can list them all in my sidebar instead of just having a big list in Google Reader! I’d also like to learn how to add things like the mini catalogue to my blog… if anyone wants to contact me to talk me through it, feel free!

Itty Bitty Buds

I received this set when I held a workshop – it is not available for order and is a hostess freebie… I love it! it is so useful and lends itself well to decorating papers to then be used in projects. Recently I was speaking with a lovely lady through ILWS who was saying she doesn’t know what to do with this stamp set, so here are a few things that I’ve done!

I used it to create a background for my FIL’s 70th birthday card. it’s always difficult to make cards for men I find, so I stuck with quite earthy colours and a natural theme – maybe it was just an excuse to use my SU XL Bird punch!!

Hopefully one day I’ll get the hang on stamping in a straight line – even with the stamp-a-ma-jig I find I’m making mistakes…oh well practise makes perfect…

Colours used:

Choc chip, close to cocoa and creamy caramel for the card layers, green galore, choc chip and mellow moss to stamp.

I also recently held a workshop to create items for Easter… guess that seems ages away now! However, we made these easy peasey boxes… the large one is made using the backing card that comes with DSP and covered in Bella Bleu but the smaller one is made from Mellow Moss card and stamped with choc chip Itty Bitty Buds again. The sentiment is from a SAB set which is no longer available and cut out with scallop circle punch.