Wednesday, November 9, 2016

Kitchen-y cheer in a birthday card

Someone very special has a birthday coming up. I don't have a stamp that says exactly how I feel, and all of that love and happiness would never fit on one small card anyway. What to do? Pull out my file of Lawn Fawn stamps and dies! I love their entire line of products.

I used images from both Baked With Love (LF805) and Sprinkled With Joy (LF1214) and stamped these images while thinking about what to include on the card. That is a cookie sheet on the left side, upper row and a decorator bag of icing on the right in the next row.
I colored these images with a combination of Zig Clean Color markers and Prismacolor pencils. The paper is from a pack of white cardstock from Michaels or Joanns.

I don't claim to have truly original ideas (someone already invented the wheel and sliced bread) and I tend to either be so focused on detail or having so much fun while working, I don't stop to take photos at various stages. Coloring these images was just simple coloring.  I used a tiny print paper to make wallpaper in the background, a beige paper to represent a counter top, white cardstock for the cabinet facing with additional white cardstock cut for the doors and drawers (initially drawn on but that looked too flat) and a strip of dotted navy paper for the flooring.
The handle of the oven is 3-dimensional. The towel is a die cut that is folded over the handle and attached with a glue dot. The mixer is on a dimensional to move it forward on the counter. The cookie sheet, star-shaped cookies and bag of flour were cut from dies from the set that coordinates with Sprinkled With Joy, die set LF1215. The butter and mixer were cut free hand. Some of the other images in the first photo weren't used as I ran out of room. Cute, right?

But wait....there is more....the reason for the "Open Me" tag is that the door opens! An additional die set LF1271, provides the oven door that opens, the 3-D oven handle and the towel that hangs on the door handle.
On the inside of the card, I stamped a chef image and Happy Birthday from a set called Bon Appetite. That is no longer available as the company, There She Goes,  no longer exists. "You Make Life Sweet" is from Impression Obsession MC181
One more shot from an odd angle in an attempt to show the mixer and oven door handle as being dimensional.
I saved the unused images, knowing that I will make this card again. If my real oven were so much fun to play with, we might have home cookin' around here!

Who am I kidding...cooking cuts into craft time!

Sunday, November 6, 2016

A mini book attempt

Recently I made a house out of paper that wasn't strong enough to handle scoring without splitting. In this case, the paper was a heavier gauge and became rather bulky when folded and glued.

The idea is still a good one and while this wasn't finished to the point of using it as greeting, practicing with images from Stampin' Up were fun and this might just become something for my granddaughter to look at and play with. Here is the cover of this mini book that, with covers, could hold 8 images.
I began with a sheet of 11 x 8.5 inch card stock, trimmed to 11" x 7.5"  I'm not sure why the directions I used (and now cannot locate online) called for the paper to be trimmed by one inch. The measurements I will give here match what is photographed.

The trimmed paper, with the shorter side at the top of the score board, was scored at 3.75 inches. Rotate the paper to landscape view and score at 2.75",  5.5", and at 8.25"
 
The middle section of the paper needs to be cut as shown. I used my Stampin' Up paper cutter, inserting the blade at the 2.75" mark on the long score line and cutting down to the 8.25" mark. To be clear, I made that cut before using a bone folder to emphasize the scoring shown in the right side photo above.  
How you choose to adhere your pages is up to you. My first attempt followed the directions I had read, but without good results. From previous experience, I did not want to use liquid glue or a small tape runner. Sometimes glue warps paper and while I love the convenience of a Tombow style tape runner, it doesn't always hold well. I used Scor-tape, in this case, Sookwang. Turn the paper to landscape orientation and apply tape runner or Scor-tape inside the scored rectangles shown.
If you have worked with Scor-tape, you know it is very sticky and holds immediately. The directions I used said to remove the backing on all of the tape and then fold and assemble the book. This is where my disaster struck. You are NOT folding and adhering the entire upper half of the paper in the above photo to the lower half, you are ONLY adhering the end panels.

Confused? Remember that the paper is slit along the horizontal score over the two middle panels. That slit allows you to pull the middle fold on the lower half into a valley fold while pushing the upper half into a mountain as you adhere the end panels into this configuration. The reason you did not apply tape to the third panels from the left on top and bottom is that the second panels that are taped are going to adhere to them in a moment.
 
After my initial disaster of having the Scor-tape attach to paper before properly aligned, I removed the backing only on the innermost crease (think of it as the binding side of a book) as I folded those pages into place. I then used a paper piercer to ease the tape off of the other lengths of Scor-tape to finish assembly.
Wow, what a lousy photo....but it shows what you have before folding the pages into a traditional book format. 
 The size of your decorative paper or photo for each page is a matter of choice. I decided to use 3.5" x 2.5"
 
The print papers used are from the HoHoHo Collection by The Stamps of Life (a 6x6 pad). The oval dies used are from DieNamics (Double Stitched Ovals Stax) and the images are from Stampin' Up.
 Santa is from the Cookie Cutter stamp set and Cookie Cutter Builder punch was used to cut him out.
The bear is from Fa La La La Friends, the fox from Cozy Critters. The bear was die cut using Bear Hugs, the fox was cut free hand.
Reindeer is from Cookie Cutter (cut with same named punch), Llama is from Fa La La La Friends, cut with Fiesta Time die.
The owl is from Cozy Critters, cut with Owl Builder punch and the gingerbread man is from Cookie Cutter stamp and punch.
The back of the card has layered ovals, ready for a stamped greeting and signature.

Zombies!

Yes, it is past Halloween but still before the election....and that is scarier than Halloween!

I had fun with Zombie stamps and phrases from Art Gone Wild! The specific stamps are named Vegas Zombies (L-2801); Punk Zombies (L-2779); Zombies Beach (L-2661); Zombie Wisdom (SC-2800); and Zombie Truths (SC-2799). While not to everyone's taste, I thought these would be funny for my one son to take to work to share with his department. His work is serious but management tries to infuse fun in many ways, including themed events and dressing up for Halloween.

I filled 24 short plastic test tubes with mini M&Ms and added the Zombies. Most were cut to better fit the tubes. All were colored in pencil, some with a bit of Wink of Stella or a Gelly Roll glaze added.