Catching Up with August

Mom's August Card-Rose Bud in Bloom

Mary's Thank You Card-Rose in Full Bloom

August is always such a busy month with lots of birthdays!  This year we took a trip to the west coast to visit with family and we got an added bonus of having my son and granddaughter get to come and visit with us too.

I took a craft magazine to read on the plane and in it was a card project of how to use your flower photos. My sister has the lovliest roses in her backyard so I took lots of pictures of them while we were there knowing that I wanted to attempt to make some photo cards.  Both recipients loved their homemade cards and were excited when told the roses were actual photos I took from my sisters backyard.

Catching Up with July

Red, White & Blue-Thinking of You

Of course it was a given that I would work with the colors red, white and blue for July.  They are actually one of my favorite color combinations that goes way beyond being patriotic. As my schedule got busier during the summer months I needed to find ways to simplify the time it took to make mom's card so this time I let the pattern paper make the statement and embellished it with a round yo-yo. Attached  to the yo-yo is a blue ribbon and three star-shaped buttons in red, white and blue.  For the "Thinking of You" phrase I used my Cricut and cut the first phrase in red and then I cut a second phrase in blue using the Cricut's shadow feature. 

Well, this has been a start to getting my posts caught up.  Right now I am being stared at by a extremely adorable black pug who is hoping I will quit writing and focus my time on him.  After all it is time for his breakfast and morning walk!

Catching Up with June

Mom's June Yo-Yo Tulips & Butterfly

This weekend I hope to get caught up on a couple of months of cards I have made and sent to my mom but I will be happy to get just one posted.  I can't believe six months have gone by since I last put anything on the blog.  I've continued to make cards each month as I think I've mentioned before that since my mom and I live so far apart the card I create and mail to her is like a small chance to visit with her. Once the card is received, there's a phone call and then we truly catch up on one an other's life.

This card's design was made with all fabric and a few different types of beads and embroidery thread. Using WonderUnder I fused the background and attached it to the card stock.  The flower pot was rubber stamped on fabric and fused to card stock and cut out.  A slit was created in the top of the pot to place the stems of the tulips in then micro beads were glued around the stems to make it appear as if there was dirt in the pot. The tulips and butterfly were made using the Clover small heart-shaped template and for the body and antennae of the butterfly I used a strand of gold beads which I folded in the center attaching the body together with embroidery thread and letting the antennae remain loose.

Happy Mother's Day & Happy Birthday

Mother's Day Card

As often happens when a birthday falls close to a holiday the two events seem to merge together.  In the case of my sister's birthday and Mother's Day I think it has worked out well as one complements the other.  That is sort of what happened when I started working on my cards.  Both are different yet they complement each other.

Birthday card with matching gift card

Several years ago I bought "Paper Crafting with Carol Duvall" and one of my favorite projects listed in the book is making cards with paper napkins and plastic wrap.  In the book Carol covers the card stock with the plastic wrap and then lays the first layer of the napkin on top of the plastic and carefully irons it to bond all layers together.  Following the books directions I get my napkin and card stock fused together and then I cut out the elements I want to highlight and embellish. Once embellished I glue them back onto the card stock giving the card a 3-dimensional look. For the matching gift card holder I used my Cricut to cut out the envelope then I cut out another butterfly from my fused napkin card stock and glued it to the front of the envelope.



Birthday Card Butterfly Detail

The butterflies on the napkins I purchased turned out even better than I thought they would.  Here are a couple of close-ups of the beaded butterlies I cut from the fused napkins.

Mother's Day Card Butterfly Detail

I hope you all have a wonderful Mother's Day!

Mom's Yo-Yo Easter Basket Card



Oval Yo-Yo Easter Basket Card

Each year I struggle to come up with a new idea for my mom's Easter card.  Last year I believe I made Easter eggs out of the oval yo-yo maker and the year before was  a bunny head using the large yo-yo maker for the head and the large oval yo-yo maker for the ears. This year I wanted it to be different again so I kept playing with the layout of the yo-yo's until the basket idea came to me.  Using my large Clover oval yo-yo maker I selected a brown print fabric to make the basket. It took me a couple of tries to come up with the handle idea but I really like the finished gathered fabric handle. With the addition of some paper grass and egg stickers the Easter basket really came together. Then while going through my supply of stickers I found some multicolored alpahabet letters and knew they would be perfect for my Happy Easter greeting.

Happy Easter everyone!

St. Patrick's Day 3-Leaf Clover Yo-Yo Cards



Mom's March Card

These little 3-leaf clover yo-yo's were fun to make. For two of the cards I used the large yo-yo quick maker by Clover and for the sweet heart teddy bear card I used the xtra-large quick yo-yo maker (Clover does have a Shamrock quick yo-yo maker but at the moment it is one I haven't purchased, yet). 

To make the 3-leaf clover I used one of my quick yo-yo makers then once I completed making the yo-yo I took my threaded needle and went down through the center of the yo-yo (gathered hole) and then brought the thread up and over the outside edge of the yo-yo and back down through the center.  I repeated this step until I had three even petals and then I took the needle back through the center one more time to the back side of the yo-yo and knotted and cut my thread. For the balloon string I used the DMC Memory Thread.  This was the first time I had a chance to work with the Memory Thread and I found it worked really well for this type of project.

From my collection of rubber stamps I pulled out my two teddy bear stamps and my basket stamp.   If you look closely at the hand of the bear holding the three clover balloons you can see that I added dimension by making a small cut and inserting the thread through the hand.

Heart Bear 3-Leaf Clover Yo-Yo Balloon Card

For the teddy bear with the heart I stamped first on a green design paper and cut out the heart and center of the ears and then stamped it again on brown paper and cut out the entire bear and then glued the heart and ear pieces in place.

For the basket I threaded a large thread with cotton pearl and did a running stitch along the top and then added a bow.  The stems of the 3-leaf clover are made with the the DMC Memory Thread.


3-Leaf Clover Yo-Yo Flower Basket

When I started this project I only intended on making one card but as I was going along and laying out the pieces it just became too easy to go ahead and make three cards.  Happy St. Patrick's Day everyone!



Yo-Yo Valentine's Day Card for Mom

Yo-Yo Valentine's Day Card

For my mom's February card I thought I would do something a little different. With my busy schedule I needed to make a card using a yo-yo but I also wanted it to be fast and quick.  Using the Clover Jumbo Yo-Yo Maker I created my yo-yo and then I used embroidery thread to make the petals by bringing my threaded needle down through the center of the yo-yo and then up over the yo-yo and back down through the center until I had five petals.  From my stash of  small yo-yo's I selected one for the center of the flower and added an iron on gemstone. Next, I created the heart and green flourish with my Cricut machine (it cuts so much better than I do). Chosing the background color is always the hardest part for me but what I do is start pulling out different papers and audition them until I find the one that makes the pieces stand out. Next, comes the glue dots or stick to keep everything in place and viola! I am done.

Mom's January Card

Although my original intent was to make a winter scene for the January card I'm really happy with the card I did make.  The design on the paper was created  using a distressed brown inkpad.  By lightly tapping it on the cardstock this cool design appeared.  Next I added just a couple of strips of dark brown card stock and then as the main accent I glued on a flower I had made using my tea dyed fabric from last year with the Kanzashi  flower maker. Then to accent the flower I added a mini yoyo.

Turning Hands

Sharing the love of turning

We were so caught up in showing our grandson how to turn a pen that we forgot to take a picture of the final product.  Although I can tell you it turned out really nice.  The snakewood piece that our grandson picked out came out beautiful and he was thrilled with it.

Mammoth Kauri Pens

The wood in these pens have a unique history. The history was written on a label that was placed on the wood. Here is what the label says . . . The Kauri forests originated in the northern island of New Zealand.  It has been scientifically proven that they were around before the Ice Age. According to one theory, they were knocked down by a giant Tsunami and buried in peat bogs where they were perfectly preserved from the elements that would otherwise have rotted them away. Through careful extraction, these logs are pulled out of the peat bogs using heavy equipment with minimal impact on the environment. Then they are sawn up and used in a variety of decorative application.

The piece we purchased and used for this pen is carbon dated to be 30,000 to 50,000 years old.  For more information about this wood visit www.cormarkint.com/mammothkauri.html. 

Don noticed as he started turning the pen that the mammoth Kauri wood is a soft wood and did not require as heavy a hand or as much pressure as some of the hard woods do.

For the pen on the left Don used the Wall Street II 24K gold pen kit and the pen on the right is made with the Wall Street II Elegant titanium and platinum pen kit.

I get to choose which pen I want for my collection and as they are both so beautiful to date I have still not made up my mind!

Happy New Year!

2011 Christmas Paw Print Ornaments

As we have recently added a pug rescue dog to our household one of our gifts for Christmas was this fun paw prints ornament kit.  The instructions were simple so we opened up the pack of impression material and rolled it out as stated in the directions.  Next, we got the dog's paw ready to put into the impression material. We were totally unprepared for his reaction as he doesn't mind walking in mud or water but when we put his paw down on the material he quickly pulled it back and tried to get away!  If he could have said "Ew!" he would have.  It took us five tries to get a decent impression - which was the extent of his patience for this project. 

We still had some impression material left over so we thought we had better include the cat as she has been feeling a bit put out by this new dog we brought into her house.  After our incident with Buck we were not sure how she was going to react.  To my surprise she really didn't mind it (although I decided we should go with her first paw impression) so although it is not a purr-fect imprint it does belong to Boots and that's all that really matters, well that and the wonderful memories we will have of making their paw print ornaments.

After an exhausting craft activity both Buck and Boots thought they needed a rest.  Of course separately as they have not gotten to be friends yet.  We are still working on it though.

Keeping her eye open for "that dog"

All tuckered out - crafting is hard work!