1st Birthday Card

Pink and Girly. That was my friends instructions to me to make her Granddaughters 1st Birthday card. 


As anyone knows, I have great difficulty with 'baby' cards, this was no exception, but I did decide to let the inside be fairly plain this time.


I used a Vintage French postcard in the center, and basically anything Pink I could find. The envelope, I totally covered in crystal organza. Annabella was embossed onto vellum. What I did was printed out the name in the font, reversed it, embossed the vellum on a piece of firm sponge, using the print off as a direct template.


I used lots of fabrics on the front, made my own flowers as usual. Shame the whole thing is a bit 'blocky' all squares and straight lines, inspiration was lacking. 


The lady who ordered it has asked me to make another card, so she couldn't of been too disappointed with this rather uninspiring (I think) effort.

Friendship fabric book now finished!!

Hoorah, the cover was finally done today, so thats it, I'm done! It has taken me about a month to complete the whole thing but I have enjoyed every minute of it. I did not rush it, only a couple of hours a day, sometimes more sometimes less, I just went with my 'mood'


The closure is a glass bead which I removed today and placed a brass keyhole thingy on it and then sewed the  glass 'button' back on. I wrapped fine copper wire around the Sun ornament, placed it onto a flower I made ages ago as the colours were right, then onto a horrid gold sequinned star which has nice fibre and gold sequins bursting out of the edges, then a couple of white feathers and an odd bit of fabric left over from making the closure. Oh yes, and added 2 blue roses with a bit of bronze coloured mica painted on.


The 3 little roses type flowers I made by twisting odd bits of fabric and organza that were left over, still have'nt got the hang of this method yet.


The spine: I photographed the word 'Friendship' from my Dictionary, photoshopped it then sewed it over with bronze organza, which I then edged with some  lace. Topped off with a couple of antique style brads.
And, that is about it.
Tomorrow I am going to make some fancy wrapping for it before I post it to my friend on Monday.


The whole 'book' is quite sparkly, which really does not show on the photos. These latest photos, I messed around with alot, blurs, textures, masks thanks to an inspiring site: Kim Klassen  Great and really simple tutorials on creating these effects. I am still surfing her site. Some PS sites with tutorials are not very relevant I find but most of Kims tutorials are things we'd all like to do with our photos.

New baby Card

Here it is then, the card from hell lol. I just could not get it together with this card, so much so that I get more pleasure knowing it is finished than any whilst making it. It rankled me so much, I do not even want to describe how I made it, I do not want to remember, the aggravation it caused me. Me and babies just do not mix.

Baptism project/keepsake

I am really disappointed in these photos I took of this, they are very very grainy. That's what happens under low lighting conditions. I've spent weeks making it, and now I am unable to show it at it's best. Oh well, c'est la vie.

Shut up and move on eh?

Some of the graininess of the actual people photographs is because the lady who took them forgot to use zoom, so I had a real job on my hands trying to improve them when they were cropped down so small.

For some reason the text has ended up highlighted, and I cannot get rid of it.

I think I'll give up for tonight and go to bed  lol

The white lace butterfly top left, I took off of a vintage brooch. The top right and bottom left flowers and elements were donated to me by Malikas' parents from the table decorations at the party. (Except for the 2 round pink flowers which I made)

Malikas' parents, (on the right), have a nickname for her: 'Princess' so I added the 'crown' to her photo, and the background, as she was in someone's arms in the original photo. This 'page' is my favourite.

As you can see, I still have not learnt to stamp straight...grrr!

I zigzag stitched the heart shaped photos onto ........Yeah! Wallpaper! cut into hearts.

I do not know if you can see, but the flower centres under the Ladies photo are tiny tiny mother of pearl buttons only about 5mm across which I picked up in a job lot of buttons recently. I do not 'do' cute, as such, but these buttons are definitely 'Cute'

I am not all that good at arranging photos, but obviously these had to be in 'relative' order. Apologies again for the poor photo quality.

The Above is from the afternoon party, I copied some elements that were on the tables. The cake in the shape of a bed is a traditional design for French Baptism cakes. The peachy and cream background of the cake picture I made from paper decorations they had hanging round the walls. The picture frame, is a chipboard oval I made and I wrapped ribbon round it, put an acetate sheet over the photograph.

The Disney elements come from a box of almonds that I was given by them as a souvenir. Bob ate them as I am now allergic to nuts...nuts!  The pink garish 'rose'/flower I made from donated petals that they had spread over the tables.

This project just looks so much better in real life...honestly!

Upload problems, Anniversary card, free images

Before I start, I just want to say that I have spent most of tonight trying to post this. Images would not upload, it was driving me nuts. In the end I resorted to using Internet Explorer. Normally I use Google Chrome, and have never had problems, except for tonight. So I tried Firefox (I have all 3 of these browsers) and that would not have it either.
So if you too have been having the same difficulties with your Blog Posts, try using a different browser. Remember that Googlechrome and Firefox browsers are generally more efficient than Internet Explorer, and they are also FREE!

25th Silver Anniversary card.

It does not open up, there is only a front and a back because the lady who ordered it wants to frame it, so there was not much point in having 'pages' that would end up being hidden. Hence the back is fairly plain too.
 
Because of this 'restriction' I made it an oval shape.  The 'embossed' heart is in fact  part of an embossing stencil, then reversed to create the heart shape. I've been wanting to emboss on shiny cardstock for ages! The little purple spots are left overs from a silver sticker border, I just dibbed a bit of purple in the middles.
 
The white flowers on the left, hanging down (above photo) I cut from a silk flower bouquet.
 

I made all the flowers myself, fabrics and vellum, except for the large flower which is made from parts of a silk flower with paper flowers in the centre.

By the way, I chose Lilac as the secondary colour (from silver) because Irises are the flower for 25th Anniversaries. I couldn't find any suitable Iris images but went with their colour anyway.

The background paper is wallpaper which I also used to make the envelope....of course :o)
As it was, believe it or not, the actual card is simplified down to what you see, from all the 'stuff' I wanted to incorporate!
 

 

All edges of the envelope have been inked, with ordinary ink, which stuck surprisingly well to the wallpaper.
The little bit of gauze at the top of the tag was a mistake. It was on my worktop when I was making the tag and it accidentally became stuck to the tag. I quite liked it so left it on.

 

The small metal silver embellishment on the front of the envelope came from an old pair of earrings I had, as I had already used the beads as a dangly embellishment off the lilac flower, on the card, right hand side.

The dates 1985 and 2010, were made in photoshop and stuck inside the 'flap' thing on the tag. 'Robert' the same, also done on some nice bits of soft textured paper I had.

I edged the back cuts with silver border stickers, and added a ready made 3d heart

Finally, the back of the card, created in Photoshop. The full poem/verse can be read on a previous post. I made it up myself, and is quite traditional, except for the last line.
 
 
 
 
Here are your  Freebie images afterall! More of them tomorrow.

Nearly the weekend! Hoorah!

Curved Window Card

I fancied having a crack at making a curved window card. I didn't do a fancy shaped window, or even frame it, I just thought I'd keep it straight for simplicity....maybe another time be a bit more adventurous.


I did have to reinforce the inside with some thick plastic, which cannot be seen with ordinary viewing of the card, but can be seen here because of the angle of the photos. I could of covered them in paper but then that would have blocked out the light.


I made the cherub from air drying clay in a silicone mould. Sentiments created in Photoshop, printed onto textured watercolour paper. The same for the photograph inset into the clock, but on ordinary paper. I butchered up some silk flowers for the card. I did make my own, but they are on the 'pillow shaped' envelope, which I will photograph tomorrow.


I think thats about all I can tell you about this card really, the photographs speak for themselves. The 'technical' bit was creating the envelope, designed so it curves out.....you'll see it tomorrow...I hope.


Thank you for looking.

Dartboard Cabinet Card. Gatefold

I think this has to be the simplest card I have made to date, it certainly seemed easy to do.
My friend is big fan of Darts, won a few trophies himself. Therefore as it is his birthday this week I thought I'd make a Dartboard cabinet card.
The cabinet itself is covered, both sides, in wallpaper. The hinges are flourishes which I got cheap from Maya road (eBay), cut them down, inked them in gold and walnut stain. The 'handles' are metal buttons which I filed off the shanks at the backs with my handy Dremel tool. After that, just a case of sticking padded tape into the backs.

I made the dartboard in photoshop, changed all the wire numbers so it reads 'Happy Birthday Symon 44' (that's his age), added his birth-date at the top to match the 'Champion' lettering.
To get the angle of the darts, which happen to be: 1 in where 19 should be, and 2 in the number 6 = 1966...smart eh? I wonder if he will suss that?
So I took a photograph of an actual dartboard with the darts in those places, printed them off and cut them out onto chipboard. The flights have a bit of foam behind them to give some dimension, whilst the tips are glued straight onto the board..

Chalk boards made from matt black paper, written on with a white oil pastel crayon.
And that as they say is that.
By the way, the front of the envelope is a photo of Phil Taylor, THE top English Darts player in PDC, I know Symon is a huge fan of his. I distorted the banner he is holding in Photoshop, then glued it into Phils Hands.