Wintery Bookmarks

 I made these wintery bookmarks as part of my Christmas present to the children I work with.

 I used a mix of stamps to create these scenes. The rabbit is Lavinia stamps Pipin. The twigs are also from Lavinia stamps. 

The snow flakes are from an old S.U. set called Beautiful Blizzard. The Merry Christmas is from a retired S.U set called Seasonal Greetings. 

 The tiny pine trees and deer are from Inkylicous.  

To make the slip pocket, I cut a piece of grey card down to  5x 7  1/2 inches .

Scored length ways at  2  1/4  and  4  1/4 inches.

 Then scored on the short side at 1/2 inch.

Cut away the bottom section  (see photo. below) and mitre the opposite corners to create the glue tabs.

Using a circle punch,  I punched out the finger notch on the top front edge.

Fold all score lines and apply glue to the tabs  and fold to seal .

This where I decided to heat emboss the front. It would have been easier to do this step before gluing the cover together.

I cut the front panel  of the bookmark to 2 x7 inches. 

 Once I had finished stamping, I mounted the panel onto white card leaving 1/16th inch border on all sides.

I then mounted those two panels onto a grey piece of card, leaving a slightly wider  border of  1/8th  of an inch.

The last thing I did was to punch a small hole in the top of the bookmark  and threaded through a ribbon.

Winter treat bags

More gift bags made from  6x4 inch envelopes.

I stamped the snowman and masked him off before blending in the background using torn paper and a blending brush with next to no ink on it. Then I stamped the trees over the top of the masked off snowmen.

I coloured the snowman with Copic markers. I remembered to slide a sheet of card in the envelope before I began colouring to prevent the ink bleeding through to the back of the envelope.

Then I stamped the foreground foliage and added touches of glitter.

 

Origami box

 This origami gift box is  easier to make than you may think.  I used a 12 x12 inch sheet of DSP to create this box and Christmased  it up with a more seasonal tag. I am not going to include instructions for this as my upline, Amanda Fowler has made a video on making this box which you can find on FB or Youtube.

 I wanted this box big enough to hold a ring box  and  some  shredded tissue to stop the box moving around.

Happiness abounds card

I used the Happiness Abounds stamp set to create this card.

I stamped around the edge of the card alternating the floral and foliage stamps, and masking off the images as I stamped. 

Then I coloured the images with Copic markers.

The green background was  coloured with copics in between the flowers, but I did use a blending brush and lemon lime twist  ink pad and blended a little ink in the centre.

I stamped  several sentiments  onto a piece of acetate to see which sentiment would look best in this floral arrangement, before I  decided on which sentiment to use. 

Coffin treat boxes

 I made these coffin treat boxes for Halloween . I know you can buy them pre made,  but I decided to have a go at making them myself. I started by down loading a template I found on line. but it was a bit smaller than I wanted and not as robust as I would have liked. 

So I drew up my own design several times. You may notice the coffins in the photo are all different sizes and depths.

 I am not going into complicated details on how I made the coffin template as I made three different ones in the end. But I will include a photo of one of my finished templates and a couple of photos showing how it goes together. 

There are quite a few variations of coffin templates online that you can print off and experiment with.

The depth of the base is 1  1/2 inches.  which was the width of my rule which reduced the amount of measuring I had to do.

I made the lid  1/8th of an inch longer than the base, but only  1/2 inch deep.

Once you've drawn  your coffin template, score all the lines and fold inward.

Once cut out I began by gluing the  bottom together, first by sticking the tabs together then gluing and folding the end over twice encasing the tabs. This gives a really neat finish to your project.  Do the same at the top end. 

Gluing the top and bottom first will help you form the shape of the sides .

Apply glue to the triangular tabs and adhere the sides together on the inside. 

Then add adhesive to all the outer panels and fold inwards to conceal the small tabs.

To decorate,  I die cut  three skeletons in ivory card and stuck  them all together in a pile and lightly inked the edges with brown ink.  I glued this one inside the coffin.

Then I cut  three black skeletons and stuck those together in a pile.

I rubbed some gold gilding wax over the bones and then adhered  it to the lid of the coffin. 

The R I P was done the same way.

The ornate trim on the sides of the shallow coffin were made by die cutting an ornate frame several times and layering them up to give it more dimension.

 Then trimming it down to fit each panel.

 Gild before adhering to the coffin.

My finished coffin measured 6 inches long  by about 3 inches wide at the widest  part.  You can see they hold quite a few treats.

The gold molding on the coffin below was made using  sugar craft molds and  Hearty air dry clay.

Because the air dry clay takes  about 24 hours to dry, it does make the process of decorating the coffins take longer.

It's best to make a batch of moldings  a day or two before and paint them black before you begin making your treat boxes.

 You can gild them in advance too.

If you  use moldings you'll need to make your coffin at  least 1  1/2 inches deep and your  lid 1/2 inch deep. 

 Another  option would be to make the lid  1  1/2 inches deep to completely cover the base, then  adhere the moldings to the sides of the lid.

Recess Card

 I had the need for a speedy recovery card last week. I didn't want a  Get Well Soon card  as the recipient was not what I would call  sick,  but  recovering from an operation.  I had an idea to put the cone of shame on this dog, but I was concerned it would get flattened in an envelope and look awful  by time it got to the recipient. 

I remembered  a card I designed many years ago, that just might help solve the problem.    

A card with a recess.  Most of the cone sits in the recess.  A little of the cone  still pokes out but not enough to squash and crease the vellum.

 I neglected to photograph the making of the dog  card, so I made the base again. 

 I did change the shape and depth of the recess for this second version. 

 Changing the size, shape and depth of the recess is easy once you know how it's made. The recess on the dog card is 1/2 inch deep.  For my tutorial  the recess is 1/4 inch deep.

The stamps sets I used for this card were stampin up , Pampered pets, Grassy grove and bunch of fun.

  

So here's how I made the 5 1/2 inch   by   5  1/2  inch recess card .

...

Cut a base card  that measures 5 1/2 inches by  11 1/4 inches.

Score on the long side at 5 1/2 inches and  5  3/4 inches.

Using a square die  about half an inch smaller than the item you want to sit in the recess and cut an aperture in the front panel.

Measure and mark  1/4 inch  twice on each side of the aperture.  Draw  a frame  1/4 wide around the aperture. Joining up all marks.

With a rule and  a ball tool score over the pencil lines.  

Here's a quick diagram showing the sizes  I used for this  project.

Snip into all four corners on the diagonal from the cut corner to the drawn corner. see the photo below.

Fold all sides towards the inside of the card and burnish for nice crisp folds.

Make a box the same size as the aperture with 1/4 inch added to every side. 

Score at 1/4 inch on all four sides.

Snip the corners as in the photo below.

Glue the corner flaps so they sit inside the box.

Apply glue to the outside of the flaps on your card base.

Place the box over the flaps.

 Flip the whole thing over and push something like a pad of post it notes  under the edge of the card.   Use the side of the post pad  as a buffer,  push  the glued flap and the side of the box against  the pad  firmly . Using the pad makes it easy to adhere the two together.

The base is now complete.

 If you wish to add a liner to the  recess cut a piece of card of your choice and do exactly the same as you did for the box, but don't glue the corners. Instead of snipping the corners cut a small wedge out.

Before you glue the liner in make sure it fits  well. The liner may need a little adjustment.

Once you are happy with the fit you can fold down the liner sides add glue, then push them back in place. It's best to glue the sides with the tabs on first.

Now you can  fold the first two score lines you drew and fold the fold the card so it stands up and you can now add your 3D embellishments, this is idea for  more delicate 3D floral displays.

 I won't be adding anything to this card, in fact it's already in the bin.

Blended snowy scene

A couple of quick Christmas cards today. Just Blending and stamping so these don't take a lot of materials or time.

I used a blending brush and Starry night ink pad to blend in the night sky,  the snow and for stamping the trees.

I punched out a circle from the sticky edge of a post it note and placed it where I wanted my moon.

I loaded my brush with ink and started blending the ink along the top and downwards.  Blending over the post it to create the moon.

You want the most intense colour at the top, as you work downwards there will be less ink on the brush giving you a softer graduated  look, which helps to create depth in your scene.

Remove the moon mask and with a brush that has virtually no ink on brush  around the edge of the moon lightly. this will give the moon a more rounded appearance.

Stamp the trees using first and second generation stamping. Which means load the stamp with ink and stamp a foreground tree  ( 1st generation) then stamp another tree further back without re inking the stamp. (2nd generation stamping) The tree will be lighter in colour, this will push the tree into the distance.

 For the foreground take  a torn strip of paper and a brush with very little ink on it and lightly brush over the edge of the paper to form snowdrifts and shadows under the trees.

I used Pretty peacock ink on my second card, but I think you could probably use any colour to  create these scenes... well maybe not yellow and orange. Purples look great too and I'm on the verge of trying pink to see how it turns out.

To create the falling snow I took a white Posca pen and after shaking it well, I basically bashed the hell out of the barrel with a stick, while holding the tip of the posca over the scene until the paint splatters over the card front.

I also dotted on some stickles glitter glue on the trees for a little sparkle.

Rustic Harvest

I don't often copy the inspirational cards featured in the catalogue but  the moment I laid eyes on the sample card, using this DSP  I knew I just had to buy it. I rather liked the sentiment  on the sample card too, which meant  I had to buy  the stamp set, the DSP and the coordinating die set, which makes this a very expensive card, especially if you only make a couple.

Retiform card

 Hubby came home last night and said I need a card for my boss's birthday tomorrow, something with tools on it or golf stuff.   I  did him a golf card last year, so it was lucky for him, I had  recently bought the new Vintage Tools Stamp set. 

Last night was spent creating this 8x6 inch card. The technique is called  The Retiform Technique, if I remember rightly. It's been a very long time since I've done this technique. The last time I did it  I used navy blue and nautical themed stamps. So it was good to do it again using different colours and stamps.

 I'm sure, I would have done a better job if I hadn't been in such a hurry. To create this card you use post it notes to mask off different areas and brush ink over the edges of the post its.

 Then stamp images  over the area you have inked before moving the post it  to the next area. It does take a little bit of thought and planning to achieve a good result.

 This is not the best example of this technique. 

Perhaps my next tutorial should be on this technique?

A stamp for all occasions...Maybe?

 Just a little late posting this  Halloween card. This gorgeous dog stamp is by Nellie Snellen. It's quite small but it has a lot of detail. When I first saw this stamp  I  thought, he looks a little sad and in need of a home, so I gave him one.

This Stamp would be great for several types of card.  Pet loss, missing you, I'm sorry, and thinking of you cards  all came to mind immediately. My thought process is ...if you can think of more than two occasions you can use a stamp for ... buy it.  

Once it arrived I started stamping and colouring the images in different colours to see how he looked in various colours. I masked him off and blended ink around him to give him a colourful background.

 I had some witches hats floating around my desk, left overs from the broomstick projects I'd been working on the previous week. Which gave me the idea of giving the dog a hat. He certainly has a reason for looking unhappy now. This then lead to me creating a Santa hat for him.

I cut a piece of red card into a shape that roughly resembled a Santa hat and brushed some ink over the edge of a piece of scrap paper to give the impression of creases and folds in the hat. Then cut a white sausage shaped piece of card  for the furry trim and flocked it and stuck  it on the hat with thin foam pads for a little more dimension.  I added a white pompom to the tip of the hat to complete the Santa look. The sentiment  on this card is from  last year's  Stampin up mini winter catalogue, I think.

I got a little carried away with him. Here he is without his hats in golden tones.

 Then I decided to find out what he'd look like as a chocolate spaniel.  The red background may have been a mistake with the browns on this one. The red background seems to bring out the red tone in the browns making him look quite red, more so in this photo .

For this last one I decided to leave the background white.

 Such a sad looking puppy. I thought I'd include this close up so you can see just how much detail there is on this stamp.