A card for Aunt Beulah . . .

I heard that another of the cards I’d made for a blogging friend who lives in the USA arrived on time for Christmas and so I can now share the card with you.

I know that to some of you, you might think that I’ve made the same card that I sent to someone else, (Rabbit, at The Rabbit Patch),  but I haven’t.  (see below) 

I made a card for Rabbit at The Rabbit Patch – which had a similar look about it – but it was different, and the insides were completely different from each other too.  This was the card I made for Rabbit – which I shared with you a few weeks ago:

… this (above) was the card I made for Rabbit – at The Rabbit Patch – but it’s completely different from the card for Aunt Beulah.  The flowers, the pearls, the leaves, the backgrounds – everything is different.  Even the hanging hearts are different.  😀

But this (below) is the card I made for Aunt Beulah . . .

All the cards I made for blogging friends were made using things which had something from my home about them.  On this, Aunt Beulah’s card, – the little Pine Cones – came from my garden, where the four 100 foot tall pine trees in my garden had dropped their cones.  (I reckon those trees are in a competition with each other to see which one of them can trip me up and leave me flat out on the decking!  tsk tsk).  Of course – I had the professional help of my assistant,  Little Cobs,  in the collecting of the pine cones, and he was paid his pocket-money for helping.  (He’s going to end up with more money in his money-box than I’ve got, at this rate!)

The background, wooden planks ‘look’ paper …. well now that’s actually cut from a spare roll of wallpaper.  I have this wallpaper on the wall behind my big wooden bed in the bedroom.  I kept around half a roll of the wallpaper  *just in case of some accident or other* – and I wanted to ensure that I sent a little bit of ‘me’ in the card,  so I cut a square of the paper to make the card look like it was a timber wall.  It’s great paper, as it has a texture of old wood.  Very soft and gentle, but it does have that look about it.  (I have no other wallpaper in my home – just that on the one wall.  I saw it and fell in love, so ordered it there and then!).

The hearts were all handmade by me out of very light weight clay, and coloured up using Buff-it,  which is made by Pinflair. (Highly recommend this product – I would use it on every card if I could – I love it soooo much!)

The string of red pearls are pearls that I used to use on one of my own Christmas Trees, but every time someone walked too close to the tree, those pearls would jump off the branches in an attempt to make an escape bid for the floor … so I said ‘no more’ and decided that I wouldn’t use them again.  I didn’t know what I was going to do with them, but I took them to my craft room and squirreled them away in there, knowing that at some point, I would use them.  And … I did.  For the first time – I cut a length off the long string and decorated the card for Aunt Beulah with them.  I antiqued them up a little using some silver wax – which I simply rubbed on with my finger, to give the pearls a shimmer.

The flowers, red and white berries and the dried corn …. etc,  all came from my stash of flowers, and I touched them with a little ‘snow’ and dusted them with ice crystals to make them twinkle.

Finally … I stamped the sentiment onto a length of card which I manipulated so that it bent and ‘travelled’ over the page in a pretty way,  – popped it into a memo pick and fixed it to the card.

And that’s all there was to it!

I was SO relieved to hear that the card had made its way to Aunt Beulah, and that she liked it.  If you would like to find out why I love this fabulous lady so much, please just click on her name and her blog will open up in a new window for you.

Aunt Beulah ~ thank you for the wonderful reads that I find on your blog.  Thank you for the thoughts, the smiles, the joy and sometimes even the tears.  Thank you for being the person you are, for the person you are is totally incredible.  Sending you much love for the New Year, and wishing for you – contentment.  May a blanket of contentment come to rest upon your home and wrap itself around your heart and life. ~ love ~ Cobs. xxx

Thank you too, reader, for being who you are.  I thank you for coming and spending time here with me on this blog and hopefully enjoying the read too.

Happy Tuesday.  May your day be bright and may the sun shine enough to melt any snow that’s hanging around, and melt the ice on your car windows.  May you find something to smile about, and may love wrap itself around your heart and keep you warm inside.  Even if it’s only the love I send you here….  because love is love is love.  It’s all good!

Take care out there …  much love and plenty of squidges ~

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Victorian Christmas ~ a handmade card.

I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that I’d been making some cards which were being sent to the USA, and I was a bit worried that none of them would get there before Christmas.  Well … I had an email a couple of days ago telling me that the one card had arrived at its destination!  So I’m thrilled to pieces to finally be able to share one of them.

This particular card was made especially for Beverly of More Ink Please.  Beverly is a fellow crafter.  She makes the most incredible cards – some of them are amazingly intricate and so, so pretty.  She is also a very talented hand-made book maker.  But … she has but one fault.  She never finds time to blog about them!  She will chat with me about some things that she’s making, but even though I push her to take a photo and pop it onto her blog …. she’s a proper rascal and never does!  tsk tsk.

I decided back at the beginning of November what sort of card I wanted to make for Beverly.  I wanted to make a card with a very Victorian feel, with lots of layers.

The Poinsettia flowers are all handmade and although I cut the centre (black) stamens from cardstock, I gave the flowers their yellow centres by adding some tiny glass beads.

The tiny pine cones you see on the card (covered in [fake] snow) are actually from my garden.   I put Little Cobs to work during the summer, and asked him to collect me some fallen pine cones, but, I told him,  “I want the teeny, weeny, baby ones, because Grammy wants to craft with them and put them on cards”,  and, Bless his little heart, he took his bucket and went around my garden, picking up pine cones and either putting them in his bucket or, after doing a spot check, declaring them  “Too Big!” and discarding them.

He then helped me to put all the baby Pine Cones inside a plastic bag, and zipped it up for me, so that I could force out any insects and part company with them.

I’ve put him on the payroll, and he now gets paid weekly, in cash.

Well look ….  a week before Christmas and I’m only just posting a Christmas Card. Sorry about that  … making them all is taking time and by the time I’ve finished making one, I’m onto the next ‘making’ and … well, time just runs away from me.  It’s that things fault.  Time.  It’s times fault.   Awww, let’s not get into Time and it’s horrors. grrrr.

Thank you so much for coming and having a coffee with me while I chatted away.  I love seeing you.  Especially on a Monday morning before Christmas.  😀

Have a blessed rest of your day my fabulous friend  ~ 

 

Little Fairy Shoes ~ once owned by Lady Lillie Fairy!

Looking through my photos on my camera I found these photos which I took ages ago and totally forgot to share them. What a dope!

These fairy shoes belonged to Lady Lillie Fairy.  She’s rather a big deal in The Land of the Fae.  She’s the Fairy equivalent of our Dame (a title bestowed only by the Queen (or who ever is the Monarch at the time) in the UK).  She’s well-respected and treated as a high-ranking Fairy among those who reside in the Land of the Fae.

She has her clothes made by Fairyland Designers, and shoes made by a Cobbler called Cobwebs.  (Yes, I know, how incredible is that?  Me=Cobwebs;  Cobwebs=Cobbler! Who woulda thunk?!).

Possibly made from the petals of a Lily which one can find only in Fairy Land.  (or they might have been made from Polymer. [cough])  Can you see the teeny tiny stamens – which don’t leave any stains on your clothes – peeping out from the insides of the inner petals of the Lily?  They’re made from the same stuff.

The decoration which you see to the front of the shoes are teeny tiny green glass beads, which are hung on copper wire.  These beads give the most delightful tinkling noise as the shoes are moved, which makes every step taken ring out in an ethereal, magical, almost imagined sound,  – but it’s not imagined, for you really can hear it  – as you would expect from a Fairy!

The copper Penny sat next to the shoes in the photographs is there for reference, so that you can get an idea of the size of the shoes.

Of course, no shoes were stolen in order to share these shoes with you.  These shoes were left under a Fairy toadstool, in a place which is clearly labelled  “Sharing the Shoes” – so that a passing Fairy might stumble upon them and try them for size, or a human, with an eye for Fairies, might find them and either add them to a collection (as I do) or might begin a collection.

 

These Fairy Lillie Shoes were brought to you by Cobwebs. 

Have a spiffing Saturday!  Be good to yourself, and be lovely to anyone you come into contact with.  The Fairies would approve.  😉

Squidges ~

 

 

Drucilla Penny’s Fairy Rose Shoes

What’s in the Box?!

Cobweb the Cobbler is the Shoemaker to Elves, Fairies and all in the Land of the Fae, and inside this tiny box are a pair of shoes that the esteemed Cobbler is secretly rather proud of.

Made for  a young, sweet, impish, dis-orderly,  tousled haired and ever so slightly rumpled, teenage, 140 years old Fairy who recently discovered that she kind of likes the Goth scene – only without the grumpy bits.  She has the blackest of black hair, which, if she’d only stop back-combing it, would be long, sleek and shiny.  She has a variety of fairy wings – but does favour her black insect wings which were found among the autumn leaves last year and fashioned into fairy wings by Drucilla herself.

She wears (mostly) her much-loved, slightly raggedy, black Fairy tutu, teamed with her very most favourite top in the whole world – a cream and black stripe top with long sleeves which droop down onto her hands.  The sleeves are just loose enough for her to hide her fairy wand up them, but tight enough to hold the wand there safely.

Onto her top she pins the thing she’s known for best ….  a red rose brooch pin which was made for her by her Grandmother.  Whatever she’s wearing, whatever the day, time, or occasion, she is never seen without that red rose.

But … she was in need of some special shoes for her ‘look’ to be complete, so Cobweb the Cobbler came up with an idea, and the Drucilla Penny Red Rose Fairy Shoes were born.

The tiny 2″ long shoes were rather difficult to photograph, – you see … they’re actually the darkest of black, but they have a very special silver dust finish to them which makes them twinkle madly – however the camera has picked up that shimmery twinkle and made the shoes look as if they’re a steel grey.  They aren’t.  They’re truly black!

They have a gold, hand-made buckle on the front, and red roses on a vine which winds its way around the shoes.

On the edges of the shoes, just where Drucilla puts her feet into them, are round, amber glass beads on golden wires, which arch gracefully outwards, with the amber beads loosely suspended from them so that the amber glass ‘tinkles’ and makes the most wonderful sound as they move against each other when the shoes are worn.  (Imagine a small bag of coins being gently shaken – but then turn the sound down so that it’s really gentle and only just audible.  That’s the closest I can get to describing the sound!).

Drucilla Penny loves her new shoes and can’t stop looking at them.  Pausing over ponds and lakes so that she can admire her shoes in the reflection in the water.  Aw, bless her heart.

Where Did Drucilla Penny get her name from?

Many years ago I was a big Carpenters fan and had almost all of their records.  One of the songs on one of their albums was a fabulous little bit of fun called  ‘Druscilla Penny’,  and it was this song which I was singing to myself as those fairy shoes (above) were being fashioned.  Once finished, I decided that they’d have to be for a fabulous fairy called Drucilla Penny (different spelling), in honour of the song.  And that’s how the Fairy Shoes came to ‘be’.

I found a video of Richard and Karen Carpenter singing the song and I did originally put the video here, but I found it was (for some reaon) attracting tons of spam messages,  apparently from some very odd WordPress blog sites, so I’ve removed the video.  But if you visit youtube and put ‘Carpenters’ and Druscilla Penny’ in the search bar there, it will give you a choice of a couple of videos you can watch and listen to.

 

Lyrics   –  so that you can sing along if you’re in the mood!

Druscilla Penny, what a name
Are you sure you didn’t make it up yourself?
Youre very pretty, yes you are
But with all the junk you wear, its hard to tell

Man you must work hard to get your hair to look like that
I don’t need a horoscope to tell me where you’re at
Your family’s probably given up on you
Since you began to follow groups of long-haired rock ‘n’ rollers
I can hear your mother crying for her daughter

Druscilla Penny, what a girl
Where’s the purpose to the crazy life you lead?
It doesn’t matter after all
You’re so sure that instant love is all you need

I’ve seen your face at least a thousand times
You’re always standing there behind the stages at the concerts
Waiting for an offer to be with someone after

Druscilla Penny, how’s your head?
Do you ever wake up lonely in the night?
It isn’t easy for a girl when she can’t decide if love is wrong or right
I hope I live to see a change, could you ever really love?
Ever really care? Ever really get it together? No.

Thank you for coming to visit my blog, and for taking a look into the fabulous world of Fairy Shoes.  I loved making these shoes.  They’re so detailed, and I really love those little details in art works – whatever they’re made from!  Hope you like them too.

Have a wonderful weekend, and a truly blessed rest of your day!