Sunday, November 29, 2009

Chistmas Memories

I'm sorry we only got six photos of our kids with Santa when they were growing up. The folders holding these photos were getting bent and torn, so I bought a 9" folder with 8 pages to turn them into a Memory of those early Christmases in our family. I was able to used papers, stickers and rub-ons left over from previous years.

Christmas Card

Last year for Christmas, my DH gave me a set of Tonic punches, so I decided to use one of them in creating cards for him to send out this year. I used sparkly papers and a wide fabric ribbon.

Flower girl dress

Glad to get this done before my son's wedding. This is for my granddaughter to wear at the wedding. She will continue to wear it after the wedding as a princess dress. Front:
Back:

Spanish cards

I'm glad that some stamp companies are now making stamps with greetings in different languages. My Spanish is very limited, but I want to express messages in Spanish to my new-to-be Spanish speaking relatives.
My friend Peggy showed me how to make dimensional flowers out of circles punched from double sided paper. I started with eight 1-1/4" circles and folded them as seen below. These were then adhered to a 3"x3" piece of paper in a larger circle. Layered the flower onto coordinating papers and glued a large pink button in the center of the flower. Stamped saying to bottom of card.
The next card will be sent out of country, I wanted dimension while keeping the card flat to save on postage. I cut out floral shapes from left over paste paper bits and punched out small circles for the floral centers. The edges of all these pieces were colored with a red marker. Glued them on to some patterned paper and stamped the saying with red ink.

Thursday, November 26, 2009

Happy Thanksgiving

Oh, give thanks to the LORD, for He is good!
For His mercy endures forever 1 Chronicles 16:34

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Grungy Butterflies

Signed up for a Butterfly swap on DreamCreateInspire. The only requirement was to make freestanding butterflies between 3 - 6". We could specify a color, one person requested purple, but the others were open to any color. I wanted to make butterflies that were grungy, so I grabbed my pile of previously made paste papers and a butterfly die from Sizzix.
To add iridescence to the inner wings on the front, I made strips of fantasy film using the technique I learned from Debbie last month. Instead of adhering the strips to red line tape, I adhered it to a sticker sheet, as I didn't want the paste paper to show through this part. The skeleton part of the inner wings were cut out of contrasting or complimenting paste paper and layered over the fantasy film strips.
Used more paste paper to make the butterfly bodies. Rubbed glitter glue along parts of the outer wings and bodies. Glued on rhinestones. Here are the fronts:
Wanted a different look of the back side of the butterflies. Glued two pieces of iridescent gift wrap together with pva glue (Elmer's), then ran through a Cuttlebug texture embossing folder to give it some depth, then cut the skeleton part of the inner butterfly wings out of this paper. Then laid the skeleton part inside two pieces of colored Fantasy Film and heat set, then cut out inner wings shape and ran these pieces through the same textured Cuttlebug embossing folder.These were glued on to the back of the butterflies (and more rhinestones and glitter glue added as on the front). With the added texture to the fantasy film, it really changes color with the light even with the slightest of movements. Hope to get these in the mail this week and off to the recipients.

Sunday, November 15, 2009

Christmas Card

Decided to use the Faux Dichroic Glass Ornament I made on a Christmas Card. Used a piece of paper that had lined my spray box, liked the colors and shimmer. Stamped on Snowflake flourishes with dark blue StazOn and silver Encore! inks.
Also stamped on messages with the StazOn ink and colored the edges with the Encore! ink. Layered onto a dark blue card and attached the ornament with a snowflake brad.

Faux Dichroic Glass Ornament

For basic instructions on faux Dichroic Glass see this post. Started with a piece of chip board that already had fantasy film adhered on both the dark and light sides. Punched a hole near the top. On the light side, stamped a message with dark blue StazOn ink and snowflakes with silver Encore! ink and heat set.
Used a bamboo skewer in the hole to prevent the embossing enamel from closing it. Stamped fantasy film with VersaMark ink and then covered in three layers of Opals Franklin Embossing Enamel, melting each layer with a heat tool. Used a small amount of blue Macquarie embossing enamels in that third layer.
While the embossing enamel was still hot, pressed in an image of an angel that had been inked up with VersaMark ink. Removed stamp when the embossing enamel had cooled. Colored the raised areas of embossing enamel with silver Encore! ink to give the piece some contrast. Colored the edges of the piece with silver metal leafing pen.
Added beads and a jump ring.

Saturday, November 14, 2009

Punched Copper Charms

When I was able to punch the brass with my star punch (see previous post), I wondered if I could also do so with the thicker copper that I had used to make the Hammered Copper Christmas Ornament. Success! I was able to do so when I used the Power Punch tool.
I pounded the backs with a hammer, stamped on words with dark blue StazOn ink and added some small pieces of turquoise and beads.

These were pretty easy to make, next I need to see what other punches I can use with my scrap metals.

Hammered Copper Star Ornament

I'm signing up for a Christmas ornament swap on ccswaps. I saw this fabulous star ornament idea on the cre8it blog and decided to make some slight changes. I had a piece of copper sheet I wanted to use. Drew an asymmetrical star shape, cut it out, filed the edges and punched a hole near the top.
Used blue alcohol inks to color the back for the contrast.
Used the hammer to pound the copper. Found I had to hold down the edges to keep the copper from curling backwards, while trying not to pound my fingers.
I had a thin sheet of brass (I think) that I was able to punch out two stars. I hammered them for texture and punched in holes to hang them.
Stamped words on the stars with dark blue StazOn ink and allowed to dry.
Added beads and wires and curled the ends of the arms. Hope my swap partner likes it.

Family Book for my Granddaughter

We will soon be getting together for a family wedding, want my granddaughter to feel comfortable with relatives she hasn't seen in over a year. Made a book to remind her of all the people who love her, those close and those far away.

Book of Colors for Ian

Made a fun book of colors and family for my grandson:

Sunday, November 8, 2009

Autumn Card

Wanted to make some autumn cards for stamp club this week. As I've been playing with fantasy film, decided to use it in my cards. Inked a leaf stamp with dark brown StazOn ink, laid down two pieces of Fantasy film, placed down parchment paper and heated with an iron. Trimmed off the extra fantasy film.
Close up of the Fantasy Film leaf:
To finish the card, stamped fall floral flourish with Copper Encore! ink on a dark brown card. Layered on the Fantasy Film leaf on light gold metallic paper and then onto a dark gold metallic paper.

Mini Faux Dichroic Glass

Before I forgot what Adrienne taught me during her visit, decided to play with the Faux Dichroic Glass technique again. I cut black mat board into 3/4" square pieces and glued on a variety of Fantasy Film colors with Elmer's glue.
These were heat set with an iron over parchment paper on top of the pieces. I love how the fantasy film changes color with heat.
Covered the pieces with VersaMark ink and then Opals embossing enamel and heat with a heat tool. Added two more layers of Opals, heating with each addition. Because these pieces are so small, instead of laying the stamp on top of the pieces, I laid the hot piece down on top of the stamp (inked with VersaMark) and lightly pressed down. These set very quickly.
I love how these turned out, all the different colors are fabulous. Used a gold leafing pen to color the edges of the pieces. See how the colors change as the pieces are in a different light?

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

More Oozed Friendly Plastic Play

I found some metal cookie cutters to try out the Oozed Friendly Plastic technique that Adrienne showed me when she was here for a visit last month. I also used some of the mesh fabrics Adrienne found at Joanne's. The star has a dual color look, because one of the pieces of friendly plastic was gold on black and the other was black on gold. I think the star cutter is a bit big for me to use, I wasn't able to give it enough of a push from underneath to make the friendly plastic ooze up through the mesh. But over all I think they look good.