Margaret

A dear friend of mine, (who fortunately is not a Blogger, so I'm safe to show this) will be having a special birthday very soon!

I cut out her name using my Portrait and in an effort to get the letters aligned accurately on my card, I placed the piece of card which I cut the letters from, over the panel, secured it with tape, glued each letter individually and stuck them to the panel of card through the gaps, then removed the card!

The golfer was also cut with my Silhouette. The sentiment, from Hero Arts, was positioned using my Stamp Easy from Vaessen Creative. I actually prefer this platform to my MISTI, as this one adjusts automatically to different thicknesses of stamps because of its spring action. It also allows for longer pieces of card as there is no 'well' in it, ie the base is completely flat. 

I thought I would submit it to the challenge at CAS on Friday!

NUMBER(S)

This is the third card I have made for this particular occasion, as two mutual friends also requested that I make cards for her.

Really Trying

Have you ever got into that mindset where you have an idea or a fancy for doing something new and come across innumerable difficulties in order to get there...  but you just can't give it up?

This card is the end result of one such endeavour. It began when I decided that I wanted to try to cut out a stamped image using my Silhouette Portrait.

I had to begin by stamping and scanning the image I wanted (in this case a Stampin' Up French Foliage leaf), only to find that for some reason my printer wouldn't scan to my computer. I ended up using all sorts of daft things like my phone and a QR code to get the image into my computer via Google Drive. I didn't even know there was such a thing before. Anyway it got there somehow or other. Then I had to retrieve it, to drop into my Silhouette software.  Needless to say I managed that somehow. The bit I thought was going to be tricky, actually getting the leaf traced, offset and cut was easy. So I cut five out in a line.

Next the image had to be stamped correctly onto each cut out. I decided that I wanted to use three colours of ink on each leaf so this is how I went about it.

Taking the sheet of card with the row of 5 apertures, I placed it in my stamping platform, over a sheet of plain copy paper. I put the stamp where I thought was about central to the aperture and inked with  light coloured ink.

I looked to see what the positioning was like.

As you can see, in the second picture, the stamp was not quite in the right place, so keeping the copy paper still, I moved the cut out card more centrally over the first stamped image and tried again with a slightly deeper shade of ink.

Still not quite there, so again keeping the copy paper still I moved the top card ever so slightly and tried again with yet a different shade of ink.

Happy with this positioning , I then proceeded to use the same aperture to insert each of the cut leaves in turn, to ink with three different autumnal shades of ink, starting with the lightest and stamping between each addition, I ended with the strongest shade.

I began by using the colours from CAS Colours and Sketches

Not having these exact colours at my disposal, I used Adirondak inks in Butterscotch, Hazelnut and Cranberry. I have to say that they look to be a really close match.

Inkspirational has the prompt word Day this time so my sentiment reflects that!

It was altogether a bit of a trying experience, especially as my computer decided to deny me permission to save the photographs of the stages of making this card, which I had just sent via email from my phone. It asked me to contact the administrator, which is me!!!! .I don't understand quite how they all arrived in the right place eventually, but I did learn a few things along the way... and this time I didn't give up!

 

Initial

It's sometimes quite difficult to come up with an idea for a commission card when you have no idea about the intended recipient, as in this case. All I knew was the lady's name... Marie.

I decided to go with what I thought was a safe option... an initial.

I cut out a large M on my Portrait from silver card, together with its offset image in plain white hammered card. The foliage is a pair of symmetrical garland diecuts which I simply snipped into two pieces to lay over the letter and added a few flat backed pearls randomly over the letter. The two mounts are cut with Framelits dies one using the right side and the other using the back of the hammered card. 

I hope that both the 'commissionee' and the recipient will be pleased.

Some time ago I made some of these cards for a friend to give to her Goddaughters, the Mum then commissioned one for herself and one for her husband and she had them all mounted into shadow boxes to display on her wall. I guess she was pleased!!

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge - No Stamps Allowed 

Take three colours

Our colour challenge at "Less is More" this week is to use three different colours or three shades of the same colour.

This first one uses grey, red and black.

The little digger is a file from Bird's Cards, cut on my Portrait machine. I used white card, coloured the sections with Copics and then glazed them with Anita's 3D Glaze once assembled. The scoop section was fixed with a brad so it can move up and down! The splats are from SU's Gorgeous Grunge stamp set.

The sentiment was computer generated!

This one, using the sketch from last week, employs die cuts from Cheery Lynn, inked with Shabby Shutters, Peeled Paint and Forest Moss Distress Inks. The embossed veining on the leaves is really effective. 

Today we are going to a singing day working on Bach's B minor Mass. It's such a super work and it's a while since I sang it, so it should be fun!

Use a fence

As I was sauntering around blogland I saw the challenge from Little Red Wagon which was to use a fence. Quite some time ago I bought a fence die and until today it had never been used, so I was really grateful for the opportunity!

This is merely a study in black and white with a little added twinkle.

The fence is a mini picket fence die from Poppy Stamps, the trees from a Dee's Distinctively die and the sentiment from  a freebie set from a magazine. I embossed the sky part with a random dots folder from Cuttlebug.

The dear little Chickadee is a stamp from Technique Tuesday. I was rather upset to have to pay customs duty of £3.18 as the value of the stamps in my package was 39 pence over the allowance of £15. To add insult to injury I had to pay a handling charge of £8... it is a dear little bird isn't it!

I also bought the cut  files for these stamps and this is what I used to cut him out on my Portrait! He's just gently twinkled with Glamour Dust.

The story of the tooth abscess continues!

Having had the first root canal treatment which didn't cure it, I had a course of anti-biotics, which were also ineffective. I then had a second root canal treatment, which also failed to get rid of the infection. This was followed by a stronger anti-biotic, but still the problem persisted. Yesterday I had another treatment and hopefully this time it will be cured. My dentist, who is a superb dentist I might add, informed me that the product he had used effectively for this type of treatment for many years had been discontinued by his supplier and he had tried an alternative. He now has managed to source the original product from elsewhere and hopefully it will be the end of my problems. Watch this space!