To take a break from card making I got into needle felting some gnomes ( I had bought a kit for these whilst on holiday with nothing taken to do). I then tried adjusting the technique for Santas and a gnome and a tree. Need to work on these a little more but they are a good project to do in the company of others.
Each year I have used a new die from JND with his box die to produce a lantern cube. This year we hadn't got 2 layers as in the previous 2 years so I put colooured parchment behind instead of acetate which gives a lovely effect.
I have a stack in the shop of the different lanterns done and alongside these I have used different inks to decorate a bottle to put light inside.
and then I decorated a couple of boxes I had cut ready to add small gifts. Plus of course there is the decoration with3 poinsettias on top of the lanterns which could be used for all sorts.
I showed you last month the winter scene cards but to make them special I 3D'd them. They look great but I don't think the picture does them justice.
I found these lovely stamps on the crafts too website and purchased them for the shop. I then had to have a play with them for additional workshop cards. Some you may have seen in other settings where i was showing the frames in different uses
Inspired by the stepper die JND have bought out I have done some cards with this die but others using the idea and the strip dies most of which are also from JND. Some ideas worked better than others and there are improvements I would make but when things don't work it acts as a discussion point for workshops.
I picked out the gnome with a tree to try out since the tree could be separated from the gnome and used in different ways as shown below
I missed out on getting some of the new dies but looking at what I had left to sell I decided to see what else I could do with them. Here are the results so far. I have done some more but obviously forgot to take the pictures so they will follow later.
I tried a few ideas with the new double edger papercuts as you can see below. Love using these and there will be more ideas later
I have also been asked about making flowers. Many of these ideas you will have seen before. Some are from card others from flower foam and a few from clay.
I find these are the sort of thing it is useful to make a number in advance so they are ready for any project I want to put them on
Here I have used a tile background stencil and overstamped or used another stencil over to give the pattern. The coating with clear embossing powder to give a glossy tile effect. Another idea suitable for any time of the year. A lot of these samples still need mounting but I thought top priority was to get the idea out.
There are new stamps from woodware with lots of circles in so I thought this would be a good way of using up some card candi and had and all the the circles I keep saving from die cuts. I did also try just painting the baubles or using pearl drops.
Apologies for not having put these on earlier but we have been without the internet for 10 days and only just got it back. In month's workshop we will look at some new papercuts edgers as well as birds from last month and some from last year's Christmas. I have used metallic gilding polishes to colour and pixie powder backgrounds.
This are the new edgers
Other topics to follow
This set of Dies and matching stamps came form Sue Wilson's collection. Here are a few ways of using them. Another idea for August workshops
Jon next door recently bought out a set of stamps and dies of butterfles which can be used together or on their own in other projects. There was also a butterfly frame. Again this will be part of what is on offer in August for workshops.
Yet more lovely papercuts - this time of birds. Here are a few of the examoles I have done ready for August's workshops. Colour birds or backgrounds or both!
This month's focus on workshop looks at different ways of using a die and embossing folder. For those doing a free gift workshop I have used a nestability die that can also be used as a flower and a standard embossing folder. For others we can use any nesting die and separate flowers as well as looking at the methods with deep embossing folders. Ideas are to show uses rather than making intricate cards.
Ways with dies look at using them for partial cutting (easel card), shaker cards, tunnel cards etc as well as standard matting and layering and using them to make flowers.
The embossing folders are used with various inking methods and pastes with debossed images. They are also used on acetate, parchment, color core cardstock etc. as well as using them with adie to get an embossed centre.
to celebrate the arrival of our first granddaughter (after 3 boys) I made a memory box with pictures and info about the baby on the inside card.
Over the last few weeks we have been doing a "Focus on Stencils" double workshop. Initially we focused on what we could do with plain glossy coloured paste to change it's appearance. The idea was then to move onto other methods but we ran out of time so the "NON paste" options I will cover as a workshop this month. We will look at using stencils like we would solid stamps with inking and using embossing powders.
These are cards and samples of what we can do with glossy paste and a single die.
The shutter cards are shown in detail on the 2nd Jan 2021 post but here is a reminder of full board since we are covering these in July's workshops.
We will also revisit the slider cards from last year which I know a number of people missed
I have done a few other kinetic cards - sorry missed out on photographing these but the above 2 are my favourite methods at the moment.
Sorry to anyone waiting to see what is on offer for June workshops that I didn't put these up earlier. As I said the Animal transport can be seen in the February blogs
I have used just one of Sue Wilson's stampcuts in a variety of different ways to explore what use we can get out of it.
I have also used some of the stencil words and numbers from "John Next Door"s range
So sorry just realised I hadn't put these on.
The 3d animal transport cards can be seen on 1st & 28th Feb blogs. I'm afraid I can't find the stampcuts so will take some more tomorrow
Assuming we can start workshops later this month and since there will only be 2 weeks left in the month I have picked ideas that extend what we were doing last year with new dies / ideas, so w few samples will have been shown before.
Background Dies - Board 1
