Dragonfly card (Double-sided stitching & tall skinny box template)

ETA:Sorry guys, haven't been well enough to post. Migraines. Hoping it'll let up so I can post tonight. Hugs, mel

ETA: taking a sick day (Sunday)

I'm SOOOOOOOOoooh excited about somethin' to give all of you for Christmas (or for just plain fun for all of you who don't celebrate Christmas...) I'm going to try and post a new template every single day for a month! Here's the first one: a tall skinny box. :O)

Are you guys are tired of this card/look by now? Hope not, 'cause there are a couple-few details that were out of the norm for me that I wanted to share with ya. This card was a fun one to make because of its curvy shape, but also because of the stitching (which is double-sided because it shows on the front & back of the card instead of having to be under layers of mats.) The ends of the thread are hidden under the dragonflies.

Of course, if you don't do sewing, you can skip that part & just make the box...if you like. :O)

You can download the
Template for the tall skinny box here

It is originally from SU but I could not get their PDF to print fully at all & I didn't want all the score lines to show, so I messed around to resize it & remove the lines. When finished, it measures a lil' over 1 inch by 5.5 inches.

Ways to dress the box up, before assembling it...

1) Create liners for the flaps by tracing them onto text paper (text available in jpg here.)
2) Pierce & stitch the flap liners with turquoise thread (ends are hidden on the back of the liners)
3) Pierce & stitch a trail for the dragonfly
4) Create the curvy bit at the bottom (With the same curve as the card. Details & template here)

The flower stamp is called Victorian Single Flower. It's stamped on Basic Grey's Recess paper & this is my favourite way to colour it...

Silhouette Colouring: A) Emboss in black B) Outline in black marker C) Fill




This is the back of the card.
Here's how to get the stitching to show on the back too:
(with no messy knots)



Step 1) Pierce where you'd like the stitching to be



Step 2) Place dragonflies where you like for your design (they'll hide the stitching ends...see that little turquoise mess of threads on the very right of that pic up there?) :O)



Step 3) Adhere the ends of the thread on the front of the card where you had decided your dragonflies (or other image) would go.

Step 4) Stitch away

Step 5) Stick your dragonflies on. These ones have lots o' bling since they're painted with Shimmerz ("Angel Wings") and the gems are Swarovski crystals, shiiiiinnnny! ;O)

For how to make the dragonflies click its picture...
(same for the box & flower)

Thank you for stopping in!

Happy belated Thanksgiving to anyone who is in the U.S. of A. (I missed my Canadian one bein' sick too. How lame am I?)

Happy Craftin!
:O)
Mel

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Curvy Bracket-Shaped Template Tut

The shape for this card was inspired by this stunning card by the amazingly talented Peet. Here's how I made the curvy bracket-shaped template (and the card) in case you'd like to make your own shape...

(sorry for the sucky photos...)



Step 1) Take a piece of copy or scrap paper & fold it in 4



Step 2) Cut a curve until you have a shape you'd like. (You can draw it on first if you like) You're aiming to draw or cut 1/2 of the finished line that you'd like...



Step 3) Once you have a shape you're happy with, create a template by sticking it down onto cardstock with repositionable adhesive (this is Dotto)



Step 4) Trace the shape onto your template cardstock
Step 5) Cut the cardstock out & label it if you like
Step 6) Trace onto good paper for your project & cut it out.



To make this card...

1) Cut a piece of cardstock to measure 6 inches by 9 inches
2) Score the card at 6 inches to create the fold
3) Trace the curvy shape at the end of the small flap created by scoring
4) Adhere the patterned paper shape to this card
5 Use the template again or just cut freehand with the curvy patterned paper as a guide

Here's a jpg template of the curve I used here:

to use it just right click, select view image (or just click the picture whichenlarges it) then save file as...print on cardstock, cut & trace. :O)

"Creative Process" Text here (after the 50+ giftbag link list)
Bucket handbag template here
Flower deets in yesterday's post

Tomorrow, the other card details & the template for the tall skinny box that's just peeking in at the side of that photo up there...

Thanks for stoppin' in!
:O)
Mel

P.S. Anyone else's blog signature on the fritz? That's a lot of posts with no signature now, harumph!

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Make old Stamps over into brand new Die Cuts! (Stamp on the back of schtuff)

Migraine made a new friend: Flu (or Food Poisoning?) Whoever he is, I don't like him.

Here's a pre-prepared post (that makes it sound like the instant mashed-potatoes of the stamp world, LOL but hopefully it'll be useful to ya)....

Economically, times are tough, but we get tired of the same ol' same ol' stamps, right? Well... You know me, always looking for cheap ways of trying to make old stamps do new tricks. I'm especially twitterpated about this trick 'cause it can stretch your budget BIG time! (I sound like a used car salesman,* I'm sure, but I am SO stoked! heehee)

'Backwards Stamp & Cut.' (A silly way to say: stamping on the back of paper & cutting it out.)

The only problem with this technique is that it'll make you not want to sell your old sets. But it's a snifty way to use up your scraps of patterned paper. I'm always wishing for new flower die cuts, but don't have the moulah (and die cut selection seems so limited anyhow.) It's fun with a beautiful vine stamp, and it's even easier with flowers.

Can you guess the stamp set that the flower up there was made with?
Hint, it's from Stampin' Up!

DIY die cut shapes
with old stamps

Supplies you need:

any ink
any shape stamp
any paper (great way to use scraps)
scissors
any embellishments you like

Supplies you don't need (heehee):

a die cut machine & die-cuts or templates...



Step 1) Take a piece of patterned paper (or better yet scaps!)

Of course, you can also use plain cardstock, or stamped, embossed, printed from your computer.....



Step 2) Stamp your image on the backside of the paper
(Any ink will do. You won't see it later)

Ever notice that the details in the styles of stamps seem to be the quality that does them in them trend-wise, while the shapes stay eternal. You hafta love the shape of this Doodle This flower but I've gotten bored with the details. Stamping it on the back of plain or patterned or stamped paper gives you the look of a brand new die cut.



Step 3) Cut the shape.

I like to rough cut first (at left) it makes the fine cutting easier (at right.)



Step 4) Add details.

The stuff on here is wee faux stitches in black marker, with clear gel pen over it for some fun gloss & then Copic marker around the edge.



Step 5) Add any embellishments you like.

I used white flowers from Kaiser, which I have to blab about because for $1.99 (for 50 flowers) they made me exceedingly happy... I'm very fussy about my paper flowers, and I was particularly impressed by Kaiser's brilliant packaging. Often these types of flowers arrive crumpled, but not these! They're stacked attached to each other and come pristine: Clever! Better yet, you can colour them while they're stacked and your colouring won't wreck their shape. (You will get bleed-through, potentially, but I find I can always use more than one of a colour anyhow... and preserving the pretty shape is worth it to me. There are medium sized paper flowers too.

There's a punched flower (Cornflower from Martha Stewart) and a glass bead sewn on there too. The leaves are vellum:

Potential ideas for embellishing your flowers:
(saving all that money on stamps & die-cuts means we can splurge on the essentials right? hehehe)

• More layers of different Backwards stamp & cut flowers
• Center shapes punched or cut (circles squares...)
• Regularly stamped/embossed flowers
• Punched flowers
• Felt flowers, silk flowers, or primas...
  
• Heat embossed, Cuttlebugged, or dry embossed flowers
• Beads, brads, buttons, eyelets, gemstones, pearls, fun flock, glitter, flower soft, dew drops, Stickles...
• Homemade thickers (paper glued on fun foam & die-cut)

I am all revved up for reviving all my neglected flower sets & using my DP scraps.Of course you don't have to stop at flowers. Imagine trees, animals, houses what ever... and you could doodle on them too, which is a hot look now...

In the next post: how the shaped card in this tut was made & a template...

Hope you're all doing wonderfully,
:O)
Mel

* Not that there's anything wrong with used-car-sales-people. They're good for the enviroment! :O)

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Trekking the "Winter Neighbourhood" (my first slider)

This sled slider was my very first slider card and how fun it was. These little guys go for a walk when you pull on the snowball. I lurrrrve those houses and that little snowman. The artist of all these images, Holly of Eat Cake Graphics fame, is my favourite stamp illustrator.

You all know too well how I adore the cling mounted indexed stamps from Paper Garden Projects madly ('cause I never shut up about their loverliness) but I exraspecially love the mounting for this Winter Neighbourhood stamp since it's a little over 6 inches wide & the registration makes for perfect placement whether you want the whole neighbourhood or just a coupla houses...

Supplies:

Stamps: Wyatt Builds a Snowman & Sarah Pulls Nicky and Otto & Winter Neighbourhood stamp

Paper:
8.5”x11” sheet of Wedding White Cardstock
8.5”x11” sheet of Bazzill Icy Blue Cardstock 8.5”x11” sheets of Bazzill Bling Sugar Daddy cardstock

Embellishments: Holographic glitter

From your stash or Paper Garden Projects:
Tombow adhesive
Oh so Sticky tape
Black Versafine or other waterproof ink
Copic markers or other colouring medium (I've used Putty, ...

White & brown thread, paper piercer & needle
Scissors

How-to:

Cut cardstock pieces to measure:

1) Cut Icy Blue Cardstock to measure 10 1/2 x 6 2/8 inches & fold in half to make the main card.
2) Cut Bazzill Bling Sugar Daddy mat to measure 6x5 inches
3) Cut 2 Icy Blue Cardstock mats: #1 to measure 5 1/2 inches x 3 2/8" & #2 to measure 3/4" x 5 1/2 inches
4) Cut 3 pieces of pieces of Wedding White Cardstock: #1 for the houses 3 inches by 5 2/8 inches #2 for the snow at the bottom 5 2/8 inches x 1 inch (tear the top so that it is about 5/8 of an inch high.) #3 should be 4 1/2 x 5 1/2 to fit in behind all the bits of the slider.

Stamp the images & colour:

Stamp houses onto the 3 by 5 2/8 inches Wedding White Cardstock.

These are coloured with Copic Markers in a two-toned monochromatic scheme with these blues & browns (Proof that you can have fun colouring with only a couplefew Copics!):

Frost Blue B00 , Nile Blue BG45, Warm Grey No 3, Putty YG-91, Clay E44 & a Colourless blender 000 (Those Copics are all on sale too!...In case you (or Santa) is in the market for some Copics.) ;O)

Stamp images (Wyatt Builds a Snowman & Sarah Pulls Nicky and Otto) with Versafine in a row on a piece of Wedding White Cardstock. (Emboss if desired) Cut around them leaving a footing of snow to attach to the slider.

& then build the card. Here's a video for how to make a slider card by Laura (this one is put together a little differently, but it's a great video that shows the dime & dimensionals.) :O)

And that's all. Sorry if this was a bit scattered. I am on day number i-dunno-know-what of the migraine that never ends. PURE Evil.


Thanks for checkin this out &
Happy Stampin' You Stamperific Peoples You!
:O)
Mel

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Kelly Bags from Hermes (templates)

Made a sample to show you how the Kelly bags from Hermes look assembled. (These are from the Hermes site (US under travel the world of Hermes) They are found under "surprises" there's a purse icon that says "I want it." Click on that and the purse templates should load.) You need cookies enabled though. :O)

Size & Assembly:
They're smaller than they might look in the photo: they end up being 4" wide at the bottom, 1.5" deep 2 3'4" high (4" with the handle) A little finicky to get the belt parts in & the top closed nicely, but it was so cute it was worth the fuss n muss. You can cut an extra slit in the band around the front to make it sit tighter & hold the flap of the purse down (that's probably clear as mud now, but will make sense if ya make one of these.) ;O)

Here's a shot of it open:

You can download the PDfs
here & here & here.

The sweet tree pattern on this is actually on the PDF (though it comes out looking like fancy designer paper!) :O) I printed it on Naturals cardstock from SU, since i like the heft of it for boxes...There's a plain version of this too, for stampin,' and other of funky styles.

Happy Craftiness!

P.S. Like purses? There's a whole pack of 'em hangin' out here.

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Itchy embossing in Nature's Garden (& frindge from embroidery thread)

Nope, not poison ivy...scratchin' embossing. Yup, migraines turn me into (even more of) a raving lunatic. Thank you all so much for your sweet well wishes. No need to worry though, the neurologist says they're just headaches... it runs in the family. It's been around so long that it's almost like a pet. Well, a really awfulbiteygrowlymean pet whom you'd like to give away, but you can't....heehee.

So anywho... I've been wanting for ages to to make a special card my sweet sweet Nana with this {Nature's Garden} set from Little Paper Shop. Gardening is one of my Nana's many passions. (She has the greenest thumb on the planet!) :O)

Today's techniques are a coupla twists on 2 of the fun basics...embossing & sewing. First, a weird way to distress embossing. (Stamp in dark ink, emboss in silver e.p., & just scratch it like its itchy.) Second, a fringe made of nuthin but embroidery thread on sticky tape.

The Stampin'...

The Nature's Garden set has the cutest little wheelbarrow, and flowers, and a wee spade, and a wateringcan. I wanted to make the tools look like they were aged metal so here's how i doctored 'em up...

Distressed or Etched Embossing

Step 1) Stamp in a dark ink & a light metallic embossing powder
(This is Black Craft ink from SU & Silver ep by Ranger) But it looks really neat with turquoise ink & copper scratched too...



Step 2) Heat emboss the dark ink with metallic embossing powder



Step 3) Colour in with a Silver Zig Painty pen. (The texture of the watercolour paper kind of ends up looking like galvanized steel when you colour it silver, but also like the heft of watercolour paper for holding it's shape when you cut little details out.)



Step 4) The Zigpainty can easily be scratched to make a neato texture. You can use the tip of your scissors or a paper piercer... I like to draw on cross hatch lines...





Step 5) Now the itchy part: Scratch away areas of the embossing powder. You can use the side of your scissors or sanding block, but I like an exacto blade; I have one of those razor window scrappers painters use, for when I want to distress big areas of embossing....



You may get some smuding of colour on your paper, but we're cutting this one out.



Step 6) Cut the fiddly bits out first with an exact knife (hobby blade)



Step 7) Trim around with scissors



Step 8) You can get some interesting effects with Copic markers on embossing powder (they'll stay on it and tint it a little but the Zigpainty repels the marker so you get fine details without having to be too careful.)

Embroidery Thread Fringe:

Another cheap trick for you to try if you like...embroidery thread fringe. I was really excited about this one because it's tactile and soft looking with the sheen of the thread. It also looks more difficult that it is (maybe?) and I have a whack of embroidery thread. Also, I find ribbon hard to use in layouts, but I crave fabric-y-ness.

It's really easy & relatively quick. You could probably finish it in the time I've taken to blabber about it! ....and speakin' of blabbering... for some reason this fringe makes me wanna make a teensy tiny little hand woven area rug with fringe (i've had way too much advil, lol.) It'd also make cute grass (which contrary to what you might think, I do not partake of...even though I do live in BC, ROFL.)

Supplies: Embroidery thread, sharp scissors, good stick tape.




Step 1) Start with a piece of cardstock and adhere a strip of really sticky double-sided tape on one edge of it. (This piece is a Basic Grey cardstock cut to 2 7/8 x 5 7/8 for this 6x6 gatefold card. It has a piece of Basic grey paper stuck on it & I pierced it & stitched it. I like that the fringe ends up looking like it comes from the stitches somehow...



..to make the fringe...



Step 2) Stick the end of embroidery thread down on the sticky tape (i stick it on with my left hand & tamp it down with the back of my thumbnail...)



Step 3) Trim the ends with a very sharp pair of scissors. (These actually cost me only 50cents at the dollar store (2-4-a buck) but they are still sharp since they are the only pair outta a gamillion that i never cut paper with, heehee) You can use the previous frindge to line up your cuts.



Step 4) Flip over occasionally to check if it is straight. I like the randomness, but you could also give your fringe a haircut with your scissors so it's nice n even.



Step 5) To finish it, add a second strip of sticky tape & press well. Then stick your cardstock onto your project and the fringe will hold quite nicely. :O)

You can seethe two colours of fringe on either side of the gate that folds over the inside of this card:



It's kind of nifty 'cause the two fringes brush against each other when you open it. (Things no one every notices but us crazy cardmakers, huh?)

The sentiment is the sweet saying from {Make a Wish}: it says "May you have A day that is Perfect in Every way"

The Gate Fold:

I dunno about you, but I always have to remind myself to try a different fold out. This one is an easy one. To get it just...

1. Cut a piece of 12x12 cardstock in half (you'll be left with a piece of cs that's 12x6 inches.)
2. Lay it horizontally in your scor-pal & score it at 3 & 9 inch marks (or simply Score it 3 inches in from either side)
3. Fold the two sides to the front & you have a 6x6 gatefold
4. Stick your image & bits on whichever side you like
   

Other card details:

Image: Image Stamps are all from {Nature's Garden} coloured using Faux Watercolour with Stampin' Up! markers & a Niji Waterbrush. Flowers embossed in silver & coloured with Almost Amethyst & Lovely Lilac, Yoyo Yellow, Certain Celery markers. They're knotted with matching embroidery threads. Sentiment stamp is from {Make a Wish}

Patterned Papers: Basic grey LilyKate line (Wisteria & Mia); SU Cardstock: Very vanilla (card) Basic Grey (Mats) Almost Amethyst (sentiment); Flowers: Small white paper flowers coloured with SU markers, Stamped with Silver encore ink Script stamp, Layered with 3 for You punched vellum flowers (that were outlined with a silver Zig Painty pen) & then fancy Swarovski crystals (from my WAY too generous M.I.L. Thanks Esther! XOX)

Thank You so much for taking time out of your busy day!

Check out the LPS design team peeps for some inspiration...
(thumbnails in the sidebar)-->



P.S. If you want the fringe extra fuzzy you can brush it. :O)

More examples of Fringe here:

embroidery thread Fringe grass & area rug fringe

....

(click the pics to go to those posts)

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