Graphic Green Birthday Card

I saw this great sketch on Nicole Heady's blog last month and knew I just had to try it. I love the clean graphic lines. At first glance it looks relatively simple but it isn't as straight forward as it looks. After checking out some of the challenge submissions on Nicole's blog I found that others had some difficulties as well, so I have included a picture tutorial below for the way that I tackled the angles on this card.

I am entering this card in Flourishes' Timeless Tuesday - 'Go Green' challenge and the Heart2Heart 'Go Green' challenge.

 

Nicole's sketch

Tutorial:

1) Cut 3 pieces of paper 1/2" wide x 12" long and glue onto a sheet of copy paper (or cardstock), squaring them up along the long edge making sure to apply glue to the entire back of each piece.

2) Trim the excess paper from the strip as shown below. Cut a card base 4 1/4" h x 5 1/2" w with the fold at the top. Draw a light pencil line 1 1/2" from the left edge of the card base in the lower half of the card. (I did this on a scrap so that I could make the line darker and write the dimensions for you).

 3) Lay your pattern strip onto the card base as shown below, lining the top edge with the top right corner of the card base and the left edge of the pattern strip so that the bottom left corner of the strip touches the bottom of the card base at the point where your pencil line meets the bottom edge. Mark your strip with pencil marks at all points shown in picture below. Using your paper trimmer or a ruler and kraft knife, trim the strip at each end using the pencil marks as a guide.

4) You will now have two pieces of your pattern strip as pictured below. The piece on the right is the piece you cut above and the piece pictured on the left is what was left over. Line the pieces up as seen below and then flip the left piece on top of the right, right sides facing each other.

5) Holding the two pieces together, flip them over and use the top piece as a template to cut the angle for the other piece (make sure to keep the long edges aligned).

6) Adhere both pieces to your card and trim the left strip matching the angles at your pencil mark. Erase any pencil marks showing.

Supplies: Card size is 4 1/4" x 5 1/2" (All supplies CTMH except where noted)
Paper - For Always, White Daisy, Pear, Black CS
Stamp - Perfect Fit Birthday, Card Chatter Birthday (for inside)
Ink - Pear
Accessories - Black Waxy Flax, black buttons (fabric store)
Other - 1 1/4" punch, Std Circles Lg (Spellbinders)

Crazy For Chevrons

Chevrons seem to be pretty popular in the paper crafting world these days. I have been having fun creating my own chevron patterns using paper scraps. Here is a card that I made and below you will find a picture tutorial showing you the method I used. Again, this is a method from the quilting world (it's been years since I have done any quilting) and you will find that the possibilities are limitless.

I used this weeks Freshly Made Sketch #75

Supplies - Card is standare A2 size - All products are CTMH except where noted
Paper - Chantilly, For Always, White Daisy & Buttercup CS, Black CS (unknown)
Stamp - Thank You
Ink - Black
Accessories - Black Button (stash), Black Hemp

Chevron Pattern Tutorial:

1) The first thing you need to do is select the papers you want to use. For the card above I used five different papers and for this tutorial I used only three. You can make each paper different or use as few as two. I lay them out to see what looks good together, what effect I want and what order I want to place them in.

In the photo below you will see the strips that I have cut for this pattern. I used a green print, a pink print and a white cardstock. I cut eight of each at 1/4" x 5 1/2" (total of 24 strips) - this gives a finished trim piece of 6 1/4" wide x 4" high (5 1/4" high if you don't trim off the points). If you wanted to use more than three prints then you would adjust the numbers accordingly. You can cut your strips longer, which will give you more chevrons or you can cut more strips which will make your chevrons longer)

2) Now you will adhere these strips to a piece of cardstock (I use a lightweight inexpensive cardstock). I used a two way bonding adhesive, you can use whatever works for you just keep in mind that you need to cover the entire back side of each strip since you will be cutting the strips later. Start gluing down the first strip to the bottom left corner of the cardstock lining up the edges with the bottom and side of the cardstock. Continue gluing down your strips in the order of your pattern making sure that you offset each piece to the right by a 1/4" (if your strips were 1/2" wide which would probably be good for scrapbook pages the offset would be 1/2"). For this pattern I used 4 of each of my three colours.

3) Now rotate your cardstock piece 180 degrees and start gluing the rest of your strips to the bottom right hand corner making sure you offset 1/4" to the left and add the strips in the same order as the first.

4) The next step requires trimming your pieces at a 45 degree angle. Remember back if you will to high school math class (this goes quite a way back for me) and those little math sets with the plastic and metal bits. For the life of me I couldn't remember what any of the pieces were called and had to look it up. If you happen to have the plastic right angled triangle piece you can use that (it's actually called a 45 degree set square) or you can make your own. Take a square of cardstock (mine happened to be 5 1/2" x 5 1/2") and cut it exactly in half on a diagonal to give you two right angled triangles as pictured below.

5) Using the triangle you just created you will trim your pieces at a 45 degree angle as shown below. Line up the bottom of the triangle with the bottom of your stacked strips lining up the long side of the triangle with the offset edge moving it over so that you can see all of the corners (this is hard to explain please see the photo below). Make a pencil mark at the top and bottom. Turn paper 180 degrees and repeat on other side. These marks will be used as a guide to trim the piece.

6) Cut the cardstock close to the top strip of your first stacked strip, then using your paper trimmer and the pencil marks as guides trim as shown below. Trim off any excess cardstock.

7) Repeat steps 5 and 6 for the other stacked strip.

8) Now you will cut the above pieces into strips. These can be cut to any width. For my yellow/black card above I cut them 1/2" wide, which worked out really well since I have a full line down my trimmer that I could use as a guide since you can't butt these pieces up to the top of your trimmer. Since I wanted to cut the pink/green pieces at 5/8" wide I created a guide line by adhering a strip of cardstock to my trimmer with glue dots at the 5/8" mark. (you may be tempted to simply measure off and mark 5/8" at the top and bottom of your pieces, but believe me this will not work)

9) Now you can glue these down directly to your project or if you are making a trim piece glue them to a piece of copy paper and trim to the desired size. (I glue them to copy paper rather than cardstock so the finished piece won't get too thick). Below is my finished pattern - I haven't glued it down yet since I haven't decided what I will do with it yet. You can also just add a single chevron to your project.

I hope these instructions made sense. Have fun!

Buzz & Bumble Birthday with Seminole Patchwork

I created two birthday cards using the new Buzz & Bumble paper from Close To My Heart and a patchwork pattern from the quilting world. You will find a picture tutorial for this pattern below.



Supplies: Both cards are standard A2 size
Paper - Buzz & Bumble, Florentine, Cocoa & Champagne CS (CTMH), Classic Ivory CS (Flourishes)
Stamps - Buzz & Bumble WOTG, Happy Birthday (CTMH)
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Cocoa (CTMH), Copics - B32, 34, 37, YG93, 95, 97, YR12, 18, 20, Y21, E40, 42, 44
Accessories - Milestone Shapes, Hemp, Bouquet Assortment, Burlap Ribbon, Artisan Studs, Cocoa Button (CTMH)

Seminole Patchwork Pattern:



Cut five strips of paper 6" x 1/2" - 2 each of two different patterned or plain paper and 1 of a third paper choice that will run through the center



Glue the strips to a piece of cardstock (I used a Tombow glue runner), using the edges of the cardstock to line up your strips, as shown above. Trim away the excess cardstock.



Cut this piece into 1/2" wide strips as shown above. You should end up with at least eleven usable strips.





Glue these strips one at a time to a piece of copy paper (you could use cardstock but your piece will get quite thick) starting at the lower left corner of the copy paper lining up the edges at the side and bottom. Continue to glue down your strips, offsetting each strip by 1/2" to the right and lining up the squares on the strips until they have all been glued down.



Using a ruler and kraft knife trim off the outside triangles as shown (you can also make a mark with a pencil for the cutting line at each end and use your paper trimmer). Repeat on other side.



You now have 6 1/2" of usable trim for your project.

Super Easy Paper Flowers

I visited a website called Wild Orchid Crafts about a week ago and saw this great little video on how to make these little carnations with flat paper flowers. When I went back to link to it, the video was replaced with another one by a different designer. Unfortunately, I did not take note of the name the first time since I assumed that it was an in-house designer and that I would be able to get back to the video. If anyone knows who did this video please let me know so that I can give credit. With no link I decided to make my own little tutorial (see post below). Hope you enjoy!

WARNING: These flowers are highly addictive. I find that I want to glue all of my flowers together to make them.



DIY Light Box for Photographing Your Art

Taking pictures of your artwork can sometimes be a challenge. I found this great tutorial on Tracey Mason's blog on how to make your own light box using a cardboard box, tissue paper and packing tape. No more waiting for the sun to come out from behind the clouds for some daylight. You can also take great pictures at night. This light box cost me $1 for the tissue paper. I won't go into any more detail since Tracey does such a good job - check it out. I am still playing with my light sources a bit, but all in all I am quite pleased with the result (my biggest problem was trying to find space in my craft room to set it up).

CTMH New Spray Pen


One of the new products in Close To My Heart's Spring/Summer 2011 Idea Book is the Spray Pen (mister). Now you can make your own spray mists to co-ordinate with the rest of your CTMH products with just water and reinker, or add a little Create-A-Shade Pearl paint to give you some shimmer.



Spray randomly on your scrapbook page or card where you want colour, or use stencils, die-cuts, chipboard or things around the house (lace, wire mesh etc.) to create a pattern. The possibilites are endless.

Please note:

1. Fill the pen to the seventh line with water (some people use 70% isopropyl alcohol instead of water because it dries faster - I found the water worked just fine and the dry time was minimal), add re-inker to the ninth line, then add 3 - 5 pea sized drops of Create-A-Shade Pearl Paint (if the nozzle clogs use less paint) - shake well and you are ready to go.

2. I put a couple of small beads in the spray pen to help mix

3. It is best to hold the pen at least 8 inches away from your paper, this can cause some overspray so you may want to place your work in a cardboard box to protect your work area. I sprayed the first couple of sprays against the side of the box to make sure it was spraying evenly before I sprayed my artwork.

4. Especially when using paint in your mix, remove the nozzle from your pen when you are done, stick the end of the tube in water and pump until all of the re-inker/paint mix is cleared from the tube and nozzle (be sure to aim the spray into the water and not the wall), put the nozzle back in the pen and put the cap on. This will prevent the nozzle from clogging.

 Here is a quick card that I put together today to try out this new spray pen. I used Sweet Leaf re-inker to spray the base of my card. Although it doesn't show up very well in the picture, it gave a soft shimmery green to the background.

Supplies - All products are CTMH- card size is 3 1/2" x 8"

Paper - Miracle Level 2 Paper Pack (New)

Stamps - Bohemian Alphabet E1019 (New)

Inks - Bamboo Exclusives Ink Pad, Crystal Blue Exclusives Ink Pad, Sweet Leaf Re-Inker, Create-A-Shade Pearl paint

Accessories - Crystal Blue brads, Sweet Leaf RicRac, Irresistibles - Miracle, Spray pen, 3D foam

Paper Roses Instructions

Life has been busy this past week and I am also working on a couple of contest projects that I can't share yet, so I don't have anything new this week. What I would like to share with you is some instructions to make paper roses. This is by no means an original idea, there are a couple of You Tube videos out there.

I created these roses to decorate small gifts of chocolate bars and boxed candy. They are really quite simple to make and you don't need any special tools that you don't already have in your scrapbooking room.

Start with three squares of paper (for the small roses on the wrapped candy gifts I used 2" x 2" squares, for most of the following pictures I used 3" x 3" squares to make it easier to see) You can use whatever size squares you like to give you the size of rose you want.

Take each of the four squares and fold them in half to form triangles. Then fold each of these over to the left (or right if you are right handed) forming a smaller triangle, and then fold over to the left again (or right) for your final triangle shape.

Draw a cone shape on the triangle with pencil and cut out, using this shape as a template to cut the other two triangles. Cut the tip off the bottom of the cone of each.

Open out each and you will have three 8 petal flowers. Ink the edges of each flower.

Take one flower and cut out a 2 petal piece along the fold lines, giving you a 2 petal and a 6 petal piece. Take the second flower and cut out a 3 petal piece, giving you a 5 petal peice and a 3 petal piece. Take the final flower and cut out a 4 petal piece and a 1 petal piece (discard the remaining 3 petal piece). You should now have six pieces - a 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 petal piece.

Take the 6 petal piece and apply glue to the front face of one of the end petals. Fold the opposite end petal over top and adhere - this gives you a 5 petal flower. Do this with the 5 petal piece, the 4 petal piece and the 3 petal piece.

Take a toothpick or whatever round tool you require and fold the edge of each petal around it to curl the petals on all pieces including the 2 petal and 1 petal piece.

 After curling the petals of the 1 and 2 petal pieces, lay the toothpick along the inside edges and roll up into a small cylinder and glue as shown in the picture below.

You should now have 6 flower pieces with curled petals as shown in the picture below.

Take the 4 petal piece and apply glue to the bottom outside (I used liquid glass), and insert this piece into the 5 petal piece.

Continue adding each piece in this manner (adjusting the petals until you get the desired effect) until you have completed building your rose. Cut the tip off of the 1 petal piece to make it easier to insert.

 Making the leaves - for the 2" square roses I used a 1 1/2" circle punch, punch out two leaves from each circle as shown.

 For larger leaves use either a larger punch or another circle cutting system. Lay each leaf on a foam mat and using an embossing stylus draw a line down the center of each leaf and draw veins on each leaf being careful not to tear through the cardstock. Turn the leaf over and rub green ink over the surface with a sponge to highlight the veins you have created. Ink again with brown and then some red to get the desired effect. Attach the leaves to the rose with glue dots.

Chocolate Bar and Cany Wraps Instructions



To make the chocolate bar wraps (Hershey's Bliss) and the candy wraps (Jelly Belly) cut the following

Cardstock - 8 3/4" x 5 5/8"

Printed paper - 8" x 5 3/8"

Score the chocolate wrap at 1 1/2" , 2", 5 3/8" and 5 7/8" on both the cardstock and paper

Score the candy wrap at 1 1/2", 2 3/8", 5 3/8" and 6 1/4" on both the cardstock and paper

Punch a decorative border at the end of the cardstock piece closest to the 5 7/8" or 6 1/4" score line. Fold the cardstock and the paper along all of the score lines using a bone folder. Apply glue to the inside of the paper piece and attach to the cardstock starting at the non punched end and folding both the paper and cardstock along the score lines as you do so. If you try to apply the paper to the cardstock while they are both lying flat when you try to fold the wrap around the candy you will run into problems (when scoring the paper piece be generous with your measurements - this will facilitate the above process). Once you have adhered the paper to the card stock, run a line of glue runner to the front straight edge, wrap around your candy and adhere.

Pop up a tag on the front. Attach a multi-looped ribbon and your rose with glue dots and liquid glass and you have a perfect little gift.