I remember the first time I saw a Trollbead, it was at the Grasshopper shop and it was lovely…the price, however, was not. I have a new-found respect for these stunning beads since I started lampworking glass last month, by golly making an even round bead is hard! It is also hard to make 2 beads exactly the same size for earrings, here was my first attempt at both a Pandora type bead and identical earring beads:
What do you think? I did not have proper bead cores so I used scrapbooking and sewing eyelets, looks pretty good I think:)
I wore the necklace a couple of times but it is too symmetrical ..or something, it just ain’t right. I will be pulling it apart and trying again, maybe it’s the ribbon, I’m not sure…it just is not working for me, any ideas?
Well, I best boogie, I volunteered to decorate for the Cub Scouts Blue and Gold banquet tonight and then I am taking one of my best friends out for lunch for her birthday and I still need to slap on some war paint before I leave 😛 Thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!
Boy, it feels like it had been a long time since I just sat down and stamped for fun. Sure, I did a lot of stamping on Christmas presents and craft fair items but those were fairly planned out. This card was just playing with ink, stamps and watercolor paper:
I dusted off the old Stampmaker and made the TARDIS and police box sign stamps and then used a blueprint stamp from Technique Tuesday and the gears and winged clock from Inkadinkado. To make the card I inked up my TARDIS with 4 Distress Inks: Tumbled Glass, Broken China, Faded Jeans and Dusty Concord (working light to dark in this order) then I stamped it on watercolor paper. I spritzed it with water to give it a softer look. I smooshed the Dusty Concord pad on my silicone sheet to act as a palette and I painted a shadow. Then I took a damp brush and dragged some of the ink around for shading on the TARDIS. I chose Distress ink because it can be reworked with water, typically it is not my favorite ink to stamp with. Tip: If you are stamping on rough paper lay the stamp on your table rubber side up and press the paper to the stamp!
Then I just added some of the other stamped imagery with Stampin Up ink because I wanted a sharper look. I mounted the panel on black and hot glued the “police box” stamp in the wrong spot (!) but, it is hot glue so there it will remain ha ha! To balance it out I added some clock hand die cuts and attached them with screw top brads. all in all, a really fun card to make! Thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!
Howdy folks, I hope you had a nice weekend! My husband was on an organizing tear yesterday, he cleared surfaces, assembled shelves, moved stuff around in the basement {not touching my craft-cave of course!} and really made some progress in the house! I decided I am not going to be the “slacker housewife” today and finish up some of the projects that he started. I had the kids put their post-Christmas nightmare of a bedroom(s) in order and my son did such a good job that I offered to sew him some new curtains for his closet (I went on a kick many years ago and removed all of the luan sliding closet doors from the bedrooms-that’s why all of the surfaces in my craft room are made from doors!) He had Thomas the Train curtains that I made him when he was 3…he’s 10 now…ah, definitely time for a change, we went with desert camo, DS and I picked out fabric and I sewed him the curtains and a bolster pillow (perhaps the only camouflage bolster pillow in the world) last night…well, maybe I’m not a slacker housewife after all LOL! 😀 OK you are not here to learn about my prowess as a homemaker, you wanna see some crafty goodness…well, here is a gift set I made for a friend for Christmas:
This is an “activity” gift, you see my friend claims that she is not crafty BUT she likes to send handmade cards so I made her a kit so she can make 3 thank you cards and 3 birthday ones.
First take a card base and glue on an embossed panel…
Then add a sentiment…
And a few fancy bits (AKA embellishments) and write your message on the inside of the card and place it in the matching envie!
Look, it all fits in the altered box that I created for, and had published in, Just Steampunk 2 magazine:
Easy peasy! I know some of you will want to know what I used so here is a list:
Sentiment stamps: Stampin Up
Steampunk Stamps: Inkadinkado (Clear set)
Embossing folders: Sizzix (there might be a Cuttlebug one in there too but I no longer buy products from ProvoCraft-they are on my list!)
Ink: Tim Holtz Distress ink in Vintage Photo, Wild Honey and Broken China
Dies: Spellbinders
Oh, and here is the tag I put on the gift, the build-an-ornament stamp is from Oriental Trading, it is one of their $4 sets.
Thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!
Wow! Sometime yesterday my blog reached 2 million page views! I am really psyched because WordPress does not count my own visits (if that was the case I’d have hit 2 mil years ago LOL!) so that means that actual people are reading this. Thanks people! Well, I am still sewing up a storm to get ready for Saturday’s craft fair so I have little time to chit-chat. Here is a necklace/earring set I made a couple weeks ago. Enjoy!
PS don’t forget to sign up to win the stamp featured in yesterday’s post! On to the pictures, thanks for visiting and til next time happy crafting!
…One of these things is not like the other, c’mon can you guess which one? Woah, I’m having a Sesame Street flashback! (weird… especially since I referenced Fraggle Rock in my video on tuesday…I’m having a Jim Henson moment, if Muppets make it into my next post I’m going to be worried!) I’m feeling a bit chatty today, my apologies. As you know I have been on a tear creating stuff for my upcoming craft fair, I was inspired to make these bottle cap brooches with a steampunk flair after catching the BBC series Sherlock on Netflix the other day:
I decided to pin the brooches to ATCs (Artist trading cards) on which I had stamped a large Ferris wheel inspired by the panorama of London in the Sherlock opening sequence. I have to say, the show is brilliant! I was unfamiliar with the stories of Sherlock Holmes, honestly I did not think I could make it through Victorian British literature but after watching the first 5 episodes I downloaded some Sherlock Holmes books by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and attempted to read them (TV that makes you read…yeah, that’s good TV!) and I loved the story, I didn’t know where to start and I ended up reading the one about Irene Adler called A Scandal in Bohemia and it was interesting to see how they updated it in the episode A Scandal in Belgravia which by the way was my favorite. Then I started a reading Study in Scarlet which was the inspiration for the first episode of the Sherlock series A Study in Pink. It has been modernized, Sherlock has a website: the Science of Deduction and Watson has a blog that generates most of their detective work (I’m not too far into the books but I do believe Dr. Watson recorded the cases of Holmes.) Sherlock often is texted (not wired) by his brother Mycroft and he has a nicotine addiction rather than a cocaine habit but all in all it seems to keep true to the stories. Did I mention it’s a lot of fun? Sherlock Holmes is played by Benedict Cumberbatch and Dr. Watson is played by Martin Freeman. They couldn’t have picked more talented actors:
I really don’t want to say anymore and spoil anything for you, I do recommend you give it a watch though, it is amazing! Well, how’s that for a tangent? Anyway back to the bottle caps…. oh and the matching pair of earrings…
Would you like to know how to flatten one? It is quite easy, all you need is a rubber mallet and a hard surface. You can also use the flattened caps as picture frames in scrapbooks, they are pretty smooth when flattened so I don’t think they would damage your books and they should mail fine on a card too. You do need to get uncirculated bottle caps for this, the ones off a bottle will not flatten right:
BTW, if you want to flatten them quietly you can squish them in your die-cutter between 2 OLD plates, they will gouge up your cutting plates so be sure to use an old pair.
Oh and sushi, I forgot I mentioned that in the title! Here is a frugal fashion tip…well…maybe just an amusing blurb…I went out for Sushi (and before you ask what a vegetarian knows about “sushi” let me tell you that ‘sushi’ refers to the rice, not the fish) the other day with my friend Kathy and on my plate was a beautiful Orchid so I stuck it in my hair and snapped a photo…yes, it is still a bit fraggle like 🙂
…nice roots huh? You know, back to Sherlock, in several episodes they are eating an a vegetarian restaraunt…I wonder if the characters are vegetarians…It might be hard to eat meat when you are visiting the morgue on a daily basis dontcha think? Well, this is probably the longest post I have EVER written, I just had to share my new finds, both Sherlock Holmes BBC series and the books which should keep me occupied for quite a while…who knows maybe after that I’ll tackle Jane Austin…nah, don’t count on it 🙂 Till next time happy crafting!
Hi there crafters! I was in need of a birthday card for a guy and came up with this:
I die cut some gears from cardstock and wanted them to look like metal so I inked them with pigment ink and used copper embossing powder and heat it…but wait? Where is my shiny finish?!? My old embossing powder had tarnished from either age, humidity or both and my gears looked rusty…but wait, I like it!
I even bent the gear in the center to crack the embossing and it flaked off like real rust, score! I never thought I’d be so excited about rust LOL! In case rust is not your thing you can get a metal look too, check out these tags. The one on the left I inked with tumbled glass distress ink and swiped with a gold inkpad (I also tried it with gold powder eyeshadow and it worked great too!) then I inked up an embossing folder with brown ink (the side that will face the right side of the tag) and ran it through my big shot. Since the tag was damp with ink I quickly dipped it in clear embossing powder and heated it for a glassy shine. Since I used some gold ink it look rather metallic but to enhance the effect you can use more metallic inks, it is all up to you.
To grungify the tag on the right I did all the steps as the other tag then brushed some acrylic paint over the raised area and sprinkled my tarnished copper EP on top. I heated it and the paint cracked and the EP got all rusty, overall a great old distressed look I think!
I guess I won’t be throwing away my old embossing powders after all 😛 Thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!
Howdy folks, It is a beautiful Monday in Maine, I’m so glad to see the sun (Let’s hope it stays!) Here is a thank you card with a steampunk flair. I like the fact that you could replace the sentiment with “Happy Birthday”, “Congrats” or whatever. I have a hard time with cards for guys so this could fit the bill for many occasions:
Stamp Credits: The schematic blueprint stamp is by Technique Tuesday, the 3 men is by Tim Holtz and the “Much Obliged” is by Inkadinkado.
Tip: Ink up the embossing folder before embossing for a letterpress look as I did for the gear panel at the bottom of the card.
Allrightie, I think I need to make something pink and frilly now:) Thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!
Have I told you lately how much I love my design team? I have been swamped with custom work and planning my twins 7th birthday party this week. I’ve hardly had time to breathe but luckily my DT was hard at work creating some goodies for you to feast your eyes on! Best off all if you fall in love with the Lindsay’s Stamp Stuff products they used you can snag them for 35% off now through Sunday!
Now, on with the show! First we have Tracey with a funky card using the Steampunk SVG set:
Great minds think alike because Cindi used the same tape measure from Sew Much Fun and paired it with the School Rules set to make this great back to school card:
If you like border punches you will love Micki’s cheerful scarecrow card using the new stamp set Halloween doodles:
Don’t you wish you could add a few hours to the day…a few productive hours that is, not more endless drudgery? I revisited a stamp set I bought from Sunday International a few years ago with funny fake product ads and I loved this one for Stop The Clock Grease:
I used my ProMarkers and Air Marker to color this. I love this new toy, all I have to do is snap a ProMarker in to the airbrush system, turn on my air compressor (you can use canned air if you prefer) and spray away! It is so quick too and these last few weeks of summer vacation with the kids home from school I will take any time save I can get! I know I promised you a video on using the new Letra Jet Air Marker but realistically it will probably not happen til September and the kids are back in school 😉
Quick Tip! I wanted some vintage advertizing pattern paper in the background of my card but I had none so I did a search on the web and found lots of free vintage ad collage sheets here. Ain’t the internet grand!
