Crafty As L

In the Veteran’s Group where I volunteer, we will be celebrating three 100 th birthdays this year; indeed, the event today was a joint do for Sybil’s 101 st and for Henry’s 100 th birthday. How amazing is that?!   Today’s post is the card I made for Henry who is a cheeky chap and I thought the sentiment (from Clearly Besotted   Laugh Out Loud Again)   suited him well. To begin, I stamped Mama Elephant’s Three Amigos , adding numbers from Lawn Fawn Claire’s Alphabet.   They were stamped in Versafine Onyx black and clear heat-embossed. Using a variety of alcohol markers, I coloured the critters and the grass.   I didn’t know what colour to do the background so opted for a pale-yellow glow. After assembling the card, I felt that more background was needed so stencilled some clouds and sky. I added the birthday sentiment at the bottom and matted the panel on gold foil card and onto a dark brown side-fold DL card blank.

I recently attended a workshop locally to try out something completely new to me.   We received tuition to create a wire and bead heart and was run by Helene at Craft Works @ The Yard . Helene had already made the heart bases for us from 2mm aluminium wire so the first step was to select some beads in our preferred colour scheme. We were issued with 0.4mm wire for the first stage, which was securing the beads onto the frame.   The aim was to avoid being too symmetrical!   The beads didn’t feel that secure at this stage but we were assured that they would be after the next step. The next stage was the decorative wire work, which was done using 1mm wire.   It was attached to the frame by wrapping and then it was just a case of winding and creating collars around the beads, which held them in place. This process was repeated until the entire heart was decorated and all the beads were collared. The tail on the heart was for making the heart into a plant stake but I...

Welcome to my DT post where my brief was “Spring Birthday” on a DL card.   I wanted to use the Golden Daffodils stamp set so having the DL card in landscape format suited my plan for a field of daffs.   When I started the card, it was sunshine and blue skies but as I’m writing it up, it’s torrential rain (again!) so the sentiment seems even more appropriate. After cutting a panel, I stamped and clear heat-embossing the flower bunch, varying the height for interest. The single daffodil head was stamped in the spaces, and I masked one so I could stamp the stems and leaves from the main bunch beneath it. As I’d clear heat-embossed the stamping, I was free to choose my colouring medium so I decided on selection of alcohol markers. I fancied the background being a bright blue to contrast with the daffs and was going to watercolour it but, as I’d chopped my panel to the required size, I couldn’t tape it down.   Instead, I found a couple of little used alcohol markers a...

For today’s cards, I fancied doing some die-cutting so dug out a couple of Spellbinders sets to play with.   For the base of the arrangement, I die-cut the one of the Essential Circles and the pierced circle.   I appreciate that I’m using a circle and the post refers to corners but you get the idea! For the floral element, I used some left over die-cuts from Be Bold Blooms, adding to them as required.   For this card, I decided to add a silver accent using silver foil card for the foliage. After silver heat-embossing the sentiment from MFT Greetings Galore I arranged the foliage and flowers and then glued them in place, attaching the final flower with thin foam tape. I was going to mount the circle on a 5” square black card blank but my first attempt at drawing a border with a white Posca pen was awful where the paint had run under the ruler.   The silver Edding pen worked much better so I chopped the card blank in half and used the back as the mat layer. ...

A couple of weeks ago, our cats were fascinated with watching the falling snow.   From inside, that was - they weren’t that keen on it when they went out!   That’s what inspired this week’s cards but I’ve also added a fox into the scene too. To begin, I taped down some watercolour card, wet it all over and then randomly daubed various shades of blue and grey paint onto the damp card.   Whilst the paint was still damp, I sprinkled a few grains of salt on each panel and set aside to dry naturally. It’s a bit hit and miss as to how it turns out as if the paper’s too dry, nothing will happen.   If it’s perfectly damp, lovely snowy effects will appear. If the paper’s too wet, the blooms will spread further so the snowy effect is lost. As I’d used watercolour paper, which is a bit textured, I used my MISTI so that I could repeat stamp the images to get good coverage.   I used Lavinia stamps - Mooch and one of the foxes from Set 1. To ground the animals, I li...