Blue card

I began by thinking about making a tag, maybe one that folds, perhaps including one with a bit of Vintage French lace and a bit of a vintage French postcard.........and so it went on. By then I'd got the bit between my teeth and ended up making a proper birthday card! 


Couldn't stop myself...........

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.

Fabric Friendship album & thank you card

I thought you might like to see the packaging I made for the Friendship book. I used oven paper and a vintage French embroidery magazine, all sewn together as a wrapper. I stuck some cut out words all over it.


Then I tied it up with some plaited braid I made out of all the scraps I had left over from making the book.


This time I made a tag too, again with paper and fabrics and other bits and pieces.
You can get the general idea of the size of the book by the photo of me holding it in my hand.

The other day, someone did me a favour so I made this quick thank you card, took me all of 20 minutes! Which makes a change!

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.

Friendship album page 'S' and Feline CRF

The S page revolves around black, silver and white. I used embossing powders on the letter S, in silver so that was my start point for the 'colours'.
The background paper is handmade, not by me, swirls of greys white and blacks. The 'left' side metal pars are composed of old necklace parts. Both pages contain vintage Chantilly lace. There's also a square of Black velvet under the 'S'.
The last page 'H' I have started to compose, but I dont think I will be able to get it completed for a couple of days as my Cat has taken a turn for the worse, he has CRF, need to get him to the vets quickly, and spend time with him as he has become very clingy. It saddens me so much to see him so poorly, I have to concentrate on getting him reasonably normal again. He was diagnosed 4 years ago, so between us, we have done well to keep him fairly well up to now.
If you have a Cat with CRF, you'll understand. I found a great website for info: http://www.felinecrf.org

Fabric Album 3 pages done

It is New Years Eve, and I cannot believe that my last posting was December 17th, prior to Christmas, ages and ages ago!
So I thought I'd better start showing what I have been doing all this time.
For a long time I have wanted to make one of those vintage tattered fabric albums or book. Only one way....get on with it.
This one is not yet complete, I have only finished 3 pages of 6. It is going to be a friendship book for someone I have known for many many years. She and her family visited in 2010 and I did not realise just how much I missed her company, I have'nt seen her since moving to France in 2004.


The idea is to make a page for each letter of her name, 5 pages plus the cover.
Today I am going to show you the first page.


T is for Turquoise, Time and Treasure

'Simple' Birthday card

Do you remember I made a 70th card for my French neighbour? I also made a Baptism card/keepsake box for his daughters baby. Well I was asked by the 'daughters' Mother if I would make a birthday card for her daughter this month. 'But more simple than the others' she said. I understood that French perfectly. 


It's my interpretation of simple that is the difficulty!  Simple does not seem to be in my vocabulary, this is about as simple as I could make it. It only took me an afternoon, which was fast for me, and in my eyes simple!


I have tried a couple of times to take it round her house, but her daughter has been there every time, so have been unable to show it to her. Just as well her birthday is not until the 20th ;o)


As usual the one and only stamp I used on the front is not stright, despite my best attempts. The main birds in the flowers were taken from a pre-cut glittery decoupage sheet. I made the flowers myself, they took the longest and are in holo, glitter and mirri papers to match the colours. 

Above: I found a rather pretty vintage button, irridesent dark fuchia/purple

  

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.

Fast Hippy thank you card

I made this card very quickly as a thank you to a male friend who did us a small favour. The lady on the front was taken from a calender I picked up with 70's photo's in it.
Flowers and the rest made from paper scraps.

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!