Trees of Three in Blue not Green!

Nearly at the end of Christmas Card making!  HURRAY! I hear you shout.    I haven’t bombarded you with them all, only the ones I thought might entertain you or, like this one today, were a bit different.  I can’t believe how late I am with the making of my Christmas cards this year . . .  and I still have family ones to make!  eeek.

Mr. Cobs is being aaahhhmazing!  He’s put the Christmas tree up all by himself.  Moved the furniture around so that everything flows. The tree still has to be decorated (lights and pretty things) but everything is in place and waiting.  He is such a blessing.  Quite frankly I don’t think, if it were up to me, I’d have bothered putting up a tree this year.  It all felt like an effort too far.  (Not me being a bah humbug, but just the back problem).

I’ve tried to keep most of the cards I’ve made for Christmas this year, very simple, and also flat enough to go into a normal envelope as I really didn’t want to be making boxes on top of making the cards.  This one fills the remit of simple and ‘flattish’.

The trees are made using the left over ‘hole’ from a die cut tree.  I used the left over cut out as a stencil in order to make all three trees.  Using three different coloured ink pads, and some dried baby wipes, I built all three trees by simply dabbing the dried baby wipe onto the ink pad and then dabbing the inky wipe onto my glass mat in order to distribute the colour so that I could gently rub the inky pad through the ‘stencil’.  Once you’ve done one tree, either find a clean bit of the dried baby wipe and use it for the next colour of tree, or simply use another wipe.  Once you’ve got all three in place, you could leave it right there if you wished to.

The sentiment reads ‘Oh Christmas Tree’ – but it looks a little fuzzy on the photo because the camera was focused on the trees instead of the sentiment.  (my fault I’m afraid because I told it to do that.  (A case of eyes wide open but without supervision,  and the brain was closed for lunch.)

The ‘snow’ effect is made used Sweet Poppy glossy white texture paste, along with Pinflair Snow – which you need so little of that I’ve had my pot of snow for a couple of Christmas’s and still have half a pot.  It goes a long way.

The sequins, in silver, blue for the trees and some clear but iridescent ones used for snowflakes, I dotted around and fixed in place using Pinflair Glue Gel.

The lovely twinkly stars atop of each tree …  I found in the crafty section of my local charity shop.  There were hundreds of them in a bag, and I couldn’t believe my luck when I found them.  I think they cost me something like 50p (I think that works out at about 60 cents USA).

To give the card a little interest on the inside,  I inked up another blue tree, using the same method I used on the others – only on this one, I used a fine nib glue pen and squiggled all over it, then shook a little glitter dust over it so that it caught on the squiggly bits, added an iridescent sequin to the top and voila!  Finished.

So … how do you fancy a bit of “Things you might not know about Christmas”?

It may not be as popular these days but in the times of Charles Dickens, and as far back as Washington Irving, telling ghost stories was a Christmas tradition.  One of the most famous – “A Christmas Carol” – was written by Dickens himself, but he’d already had some practise. In “The Pickwick Papers” (1836), his first novel, he includes  “The Story of the Goblins Who Stole a Sexton,”  a Christmas-themed horror tale.

~~~~~~

Denny’s, the US diner chain famous for being ‘Always Open,’ decided to close for Christmas in 1988 to give hard-working employees the day off.  Amazingly, it turned out that many of the restaurants actually had no locks.  Well, they’d never needed them before.  According to the New York Times,  700 branches needed to be fitted with locks so the staff could spend Christmas with their families.

~~~~~~

Wondering what to with your Christmas tree after the festive period?  Why not see if your nearest zoo wants it?  Many animals find them great fun to play with. In 2014,  a zoo in Cambridgeshire, UK,  compared the trees to “catnip for lions.”

~~~~~~

Although the modern image of Santa Claus – the “right jolly old elf” of popular culture – is now widespread, he hasn’t always been seen that way.  Earlier depictions of Saint Nicolas have him as a serious, religious man (the original Saint Nicolas was Bishop of Myra, in modern-day Turkey).  Sinterklaas, a holiday celebrated on Dec. 5 in the Netherlands, Belgium and parts of France,  portray him as an elderly man in bishop’s clothing.

~~~~~~

And finally . . . .

Queen Victoria and Prince Albert and their Christmas Tree.

Thank Prince Albert for your tree.

The Germans are credited with first bringing evergreens into their homes and decorating them,  a tradition which made its way to the United States in the 1830s.  But it wasn’t until Germany’s Prince Albert introduced the tree to his new wife, England’s Queen Victoria, that the tradition really took off.  The couple were sketched in front of a Christmas tree in 1848 — and royal fever did its work.

Well … that’s me done and dusted!

Hope you like the blue Christmas Trees card, and that at least one of the Christmas ‘Factoids’ taught you something you might not already know.  You can go off and impress friends, relatives and anyone you happen to run into today, with your knowledge of Useless Information About Christmas Taught to you in Mini Lessons from Cobs.  (And you didn’t even have to pay for the class!  lol)

Have a truly lovely last Monday before Christmas. 

Sending squidges from my corner to yours ~

 

Advertisement

A Sunny Hello!

Hello.  Happy Wednesday all!  Did you see the BIG MOON a couple of nights ago?  We couldn’t see even the glimmer of it where we are.  The sky was SO cloudy that it hid that  moon totally!  Monday’s moon event was billed as the biggest and best moon in a series of three ‘Supermoons’ this year.  The first was on October 16, the second was Monday,  and the third is due on December 14.  Afer that there isn’t going to be another till 2034.

↑  An aeroplane flies past the London Eye on Sunday.   Credit: TOBY MELVILLE

The Moon rising beyond the Spinnaker Tower in Portsmouth, Great Britain. Credit- Peter MacDiarmid

↑  A jet flies in front of the moon on its approach to Heathrow airport in west London    Credit: ADRIAN DENNIS

Anyhoooo . . .   enough mooning around, let’s get crafty…

About ten days ago (or so,  – I’ve totally lost track of time) I made a card to send to a fabulous fellow blogger in a wee parcel I was sending to her, so couldn’t post about it here on the blog, until I knew for sure that she’d received it otherwise it would have spoilt the surprise!  But I know it’s safely arrived and so can now share the card.

It was one of those lovely, enjoyable to make, quick to pull together cards that seemed to almost make itself.  I knew I wanted to send a warm smile and visual hug – and as I was sat there trying to summon up what a smile and a hug would look like on a card –  suddenly the Sunflowers I’d seen at the supermarket when I walked through the door a couple of days previously popped into my mind.  They’d me smile instantly when I walked into the store and I even commented on them to Mr.Cobs.  They kind of welcomed me in and made me feel all warm and snuggly  … so what better ‘thing’ could I put on a warm, sunny Hello card from me, but Sunflowers!

Closer up of the Sunflowers

For the centres of the sunflowers I used a lovely warm shade of brown, and on some of the petals I added Tonic Studios Nuvo crystal drops in two colours – a pretty lemon and a slightly more warm orange colour. I also added some pale green to the leaves, but to give the leaves a little ‘movement’ I sprinkled a little green Wow glitter so that it added shade and highlights in the right places as the card was moved.

Photo taken with no flash & just light from the window

I added two lots of three pearls – bottom left and top right, then some seeds in random places;  along with some ‘leaves’ flying around the card, as if whipped up by a passing breeze,  and finally the little envelope for which I made a folded tag for the envelope, on which I wrote a story about the meaning of the Sunflower.  Then,  once the sentiment of ‘hello’ was added, the card was finished and ready to go!

And that, as they say, is all there is!

Wishing you a truly wonderful Wednesday.  Play safely.  Be nice to each other, and … if you can … pray for the next person you see. (or push a wish out of your head/heart, into the world.  Hoping for something good for that person).

Have a blessed day my friends ~

 

 

A Celebration? Put it on a Pin Board!

I made a Pinboard Card for someone a couple of years ago and made it really personal to them.  I resized some photographs and made them small enough to ‘pin’ to the pinboard, along with a few other bits and pieces, so that the whole card was themed especially for this person.

I’ve been thinking about that card recently and remembering how much I loved it when it was finished,  and wishing that I’d taken a photograph of it at the time, (as usual, I forgot),  so I thought I’d make another Pinboard card, only this time I’d make it for anyone.  I’d make it in such a way that it could  eventually  be personalised by adding small photos or a note of love or … well – anything really!

This is a really easy card to make, so easy in fact that I can just give you photo’s with a few details …  you’ll see how easy .…

Made on a white 8″x 8″ white card, of a decent weight, as this has to take a few embellishments.

Mat and layer mirror board to the card, then before adding the next layer, cut your paper or cardstock to size and fix ribbons in place to make the pin board … then .. 

Next …  You have to punch holes through your ribbon and paper/card stock so that you can add ‘pins’ (brads) to the pin board.  If you don’t have a long arm punch (Mine is the Crop-a-Dile Big Bite you see in the picture) you could instead fix the ribbon in place on the cross sections using glue dots or double-sided tape, then put buttons as the pins instead of brads.  …

All my favourite brads are all by Kuretake (and I have a fair old selection of them too!).

I used to live a short distance away from the Kuretake head office and every year they would have one day set aside for crafters to visit them and buy from a large selection of their products all priced at a slightly reduced price.  Ohhhh they were the best ever days!  The people there are SO nice,  truly amazing people, full of advice and help.  Nothing is too much trouble and I can honestly say that because of these days I love the Kuretake Company.  And because of these wonderful days, I have rather a lot of Kuretake products – from specialist pens to embellishments to … brads!, and I love them all.

Aaanyway .. back to the card….   Once you’ve fixed your brads/buttons in place, you can then add your embellishments.

• If the person you’re sending the card to is poorly, then you could add a ‘fake’ little prescription and make a mini box of tablets to fix to the board.
• Or if someone is having a baby .. you could add paper booties (or tiny real knitted ones) and hang them on the board using a button.
• Getting Married?  Put a miniature card on the pin board, of their wedding invitation .. simply scan their invite and then resize it on your computer, print it out and VOILA!
• Engaged
• Anniversary
• …  or anything. (apart from sad occasions – this really wouldn’t work for those days) 

Such an easy card to make and such a versatile design.  You just choose the right colour(s) and personalise it and *there* is the perfect card!

Well now it’s time for a weather report from our new weather girl Cobs:- 

….  as I’m typing this I’m melting like the witch in the Wizard of Oz, who had the water thrown over her.  The weather here is too hot, very humid, very steamy (and not in a good way), and very sticky.  It’s the sort of weather that makes you want to get in the shower two minutes after you’ve stepped out of it.  It’s so blooming tiring too!   I was going to share the temperature with you, but I’m too worn out to walk out to the decking and check the thermometer. tsk tsk! (Is that lazy,  old,  or just heat affected?  Actually,  thinking about it,  it’s probably all three!)

I’ve had a word with God  (“Hello God, it’s me again”   . . .   is the way I usually start off and He doesn’t seem to mind me being so informal) …  and I’ve asked if He could please turn down the Heavenly thermostat which is labelled  ‘Earth’,  and so I’m hoping that things will be cooler tomorrow.

Well that’s me done and dusted, except to wish you a very happy Monday.  May your days this week be gentle, joyous and leave you smiling at bedtime.

Remember to make some happy memories as you go through your days.  Smile,  today.  Make that memory, today.   Make someone else smile, today.  Let’s do it to them before they do it to us  (smiling that is.).

Have a truly blessed day my friends ~

 

 

Save

Save

Save

🎼 ♩ ♫ Daisy, ♫ Daisy ♩ ♫ ♪ . . .

. . . .  ‘give me your answer do.  I’m half crazy …..’  . . . .  come along now.  join in!

Aw what are you like?!!  What a place to leave me hanging! – “I’m half crazy”  indeed!  Mind you,  it’s about right.  fnar, fnar.

Well, since last we met for coffee together,  many things have taken place here at the Cobweborium, amongst them:

• I had a Birthday.
• Mr. Cobs had a Birthday (it’s jealousy. He’s copying me.  He does it every year! pfft.);
• My littlest furry purry puddy-tat has been in a fight with we know not what or who, but the end result is a chewed ear, injuries on the top of her head and under her poor little neck.  However – she’s now proficient at detecting me approaching her by stealth, whilst holding cotton wool with antiseptic on it in order to bathe said injuries.  Boy oh boy can she MOVE!
• . . . and . . . my craft room computer died.  The Beast is deaded.  Totally.  Even the computer whizz kid son-in-law failed to give it the kiss of life.  I sat for days, in misery, mourning the loss of this wonderful machine.  It was the best computer I’d ever had.  SUPER DUPER fast – it knew what I wanted and had found the page before I’d finished typing the words in the search bar.  But …  brace yourself,  here’s the stoopid  …  I hadn’t backed up my stuff. [sigh – yes I know what you’re thinking because I’ve already thought it myself].  I’ve lost everything.  All my photo’s of family and friends, and pictures of things I’d made, and stuff I was working on.  Stuff for my albums, waiting for me to decorate up.  All gone.  There is a very small chance that I might be able to recover some things – and I will get some investigation done into that possibility.

I’ve now got a new computer which is an OK(ish) machine – but it’s not The Beast.  I’m loading things onto it and fiddling with it, trying to make it work for me in the way I like a computer to work.  I’m sure I’ll probably love it, one day, eventually, however, for now, it’s just a piece of machinery and I’m trying to make friends with it.

Anyway, – that’s what’s been happening in my corner of the forest –  and you’re not here to read about that, you’re here to see something crafty orientated, so I shall zip the lip and share some photographs of a card I made to keep myself out of mischief.

The Daisy, Daisy card

I started with white cardstock, cut & scored – but didn’t fold straight away, so making it easier to work on a flat surface. (This is to be an Easel Card – so an extra score line is added at the half-way mark on what is going to be the front of the card.).   I used some papers for the background which I’ve had in my stash for a good while, and printed out various bits from a CD Rom: Shabby Chic by Katy Sue – (I used the daisy set on the cd).

I fussy cut some of the daisies and a ‘postage stamp’, so that I could give depth and dimension to the card.

 Top tip  for fussy cutting:  Buy a DECENT pair of manicure scissors and use those instead of regular scissors.  The blades curve at the bottom and so you don’t end up cutting into your image.  You can hold the scissors curving in, or out – so can use them according to the ‘bit’ you’re cutting.

I got to work sticking and fixing. I ‘built’ the front of the card on a separate piece of 6″x6″ card stock, which matched the exact size of the card, but was flat and totally un-scored.

I added some cream cotton lace, in two designs and two paper doilies, and also cut a piece of grey/blue card stock, just a little larger than the postcard size, and embossed all around the edge, in a sort of scratchy, scruffy way. in gold embossing powder – in order to pick up the warm lemon shades in the papers, and also to give a nod to some Stickles, which you’ll see I’ve used, a little later.

In the ‘assembly’ stage, I added, from my stash,  some blue twine, buttons, a little wooden blue frame (from Docrafts),  and some paper butterflies cut from old book pages.

Once everything was in place, I then mounted this now made ‘front of card’ to the card itself.  But glued it only to the bottom half (below the score line I mentioned earlier) of the front of the card – in order for it to be an Easel Card.

I added Stickles – in a warm yellowy orange colour, to the centres of all the daisies (see the photo above) – to make them ‘ping’.  Once dry, it was time to work on the inside of the card.

Then, using some of the ‘daisy’ backing paper, again from the CD Rom,  I loaded it into Photoshop and copied and pasted a yellow based postcard [from the cd] onto the daisy paper.  I wanted a postcard so that the ‘greeting’ could be written on it, but I didn’t want to add depth, so doing it this way worked perfectly – as you see below: (you can click on any of the photos here and they’ll open up big size so that you can see them better)

To the bottom (roughly) third of the inside I added a strip of mottled card – again printed from the cd, but this time I fixed it in place with foam tape, so that when the easel card was opened, it would give the front of the card somewhere to buff up against, and keep it open.

The blue ribbon is rayon seam binding, the button was from my stash, and the beautiful white butterfly is actually an embroidered one, which  [I think]  I bought very cheaply from The Works (Britain’s leading discount book store – which also sells a variety of crafty things, amongst other ‘stuff’).

Yay …. an easel card is born!  Now to make a box for it to go into….

A matching daisy box – but with a difference.  I concentrated on more yellow tones for the box so that it ‘talked’ to the card, but was just different enough to make it special in its own way.  (Actually … after taking this photo above, I added a few more fussy cut postage stamps to the box, sprinkled around, in different sizes – which I felt gave the box a little more character).

Well, that’s me done and dusted.  What about you?  What have you been making or doing in the last three or so weeks?  If you’ve made a post on your blog that I’ve missed, then please add a comment to this blog post with a link to your creativeness (be it crafty or ‘bakey’, or written word) so that I can get straight to it and have a good ol’ read/look!  (And other readers can come and visit your blog too!)

Thank you SO much for coming and sharing a bit of your time with me.  I am, as always, very grateful to you for coming and when I say ‘thank you’ to you here, I really do mean it.

Sending love and squidges your way ….

You’re my kind of Purr fect!

Hello and . . .   Happy Thursday!  I like Thursdays – they always had great lessons in school on a Thursday and I think that’s why (even now, a gazillion years later) I still like Thursdays.  There’s something friendly about a Thursday.  I always (mostly) seem to find that people are in a good mood on a Thursday.  Why is that?  I wonder.

Aw, – enough of me blathering on ….

I’m here with a  gentle looking, pretty card ‘offering’ today.  This is one of those great cards which could be a birthday card,  a ‘hello’ card,  a card for a daughter, for mom, wife/husband, girlfriend/boyfriend, partner (in life or crime! lol)  …  or it could even be a Valentines Day card!  And .. what’s even better … it has a matching box!

I decorated the outside of the box (shown above) so that it pretty much matched the card inside it.  I used the same soft pink and white striped backing paper on the box lid as I did on the card, along with the same colour of my favourite rayon ribbon,  –  and the flowers and little bird, although in different shades of pink, are the same as on the card.  The little bird is bringing a tiny red love heart in its beak – so bringing the love to … the card?  The bird’s nest?  To you?

The little birds nest with the ‘eggs’ inside it;  I made by simply winding string round and round (and the use of glue to keep it in place),  and I used three pearls from an old broken necklace as eggs.   The die cut ‘Lots of Love’ was made using a die made by Tattered Lace.  (I’m very much a bunting kinda girl – so these little bunting style word dies were right up my street!)

I love to make boxed cards as they always feel more like a gift than just a simple card, and so I like to decorate the boxes – inside and out.  The inside of the box was lined (top and bottom) in 6×6″ vintage style sheet music, and into the centre of the inside lid I fixed a beautiful topper –  from DoCrafts as part of a selection of die cut toppers.

The little girl sat on the step and snuggling up to her cat is from a book of toppers made by Lili of the Valley.  I have a few of these books and love them for the delightful colours which LOTV use in their production.  I highly recommend them.  They’re brilliant quality.  The sentiment banner is one I made myself on the computer and printed it out.  If you can’t quite read it, it says:  ‘You’re my kind of Purr fect!’.

Top and bottom of the front of the card is some lovely white, cotton, crocheted lace.  The bird(s) are resin, and the flowers are paper flowers, from a selection I have.

Isn’t she just adorable?  I love her cute face, cheeky smile and want to squidge those cheeks!

All the photographs here will re-size as if by magic if you click on them and you’ll be able to get a better view then.  (but don’t forget to click ‘back’ so that you can come back to the post!)

I would like to enter my card into these fabulous challenges:

• http://www.craftysentiments.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/include-heart-challenge.html  –  Crafty Sentiments Design – Include a heart
• http://papertakeweekly.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/anything-goes.html  – Papertake Weekly Challenge  –  Anything Goes
• http://thatscraftychallenges.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/animal-magic-challenge.html  –  Thats Crafty Challenge  – Animal Magic
• http://imagination-craftschallenges.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/february-challenge-imagination-crafts.html  –  Imagination Crafts – Anything Goes
• http://partytimetuesdays.blogspot.ca/2015/02/party-time-tuesday-195-and-our-january.html  –  Party Time Tuesday

Thank you so much for coming and sharing a few moments with me and taking a peep at my card.  I really hope you like it.

Wishing you a day filled with warm smiles, gentle touches and peace filled moments.  Have a wonderful day my friends.

Just a note ~but let’s make it a little bit pretty, eh?

Although I’ve called this handmade card ‘Just a Note’ – in this particular instance the note is a thank you note, –  however, because of the design, you can easily change the ‘subject’ of the card to suit your particular reason for sending it.

The card is based around an angle fold, which conveniently gives you two tag pockets by a nifty little folding trick which I hope to ‘teach’ those of you who may not have come across this style of card before, by using step by step photographs.  Shall we begin?

You need a 12″ (inches) by 5″ piece of cardstock.  A good weight one, but not one which is so heavy that you find it difficult to fold and score.

I’ve made a diagram of where to score (NOT CUT) the card in the hope of you ‘getting’ it easily.  Click on the following photograph to open it up in a larger size so that you can read it.  (but don’t forget to click ‘back’ in your browser so that you come back here to continue reading).

I know that it might look complicated – but it’s really not.  I’ve made the lines and instructions in different colours so that it made it easier to follow the instructions.

Once you’ve got your card cut, (12″x 5″) and then scored it in the two places shown, – make the folds.  Fold along those two lines ready for making the card:

Now at this point I think I’d recommend that you now make another one exactly the same – but this time in cheaper card or paper – so that you can then cut it up in order to use the sections as templates, or ‘patterns’ to make your paper cuts.

Let’s presume you’ve done that and move on to the next step.

Using the templates (or ‘paper patterns’ which you’ve made),  cut the papers which you want to be the front and middle section of the inner parts of the pockets.  Remember that if you’ve chosen papers like mine in the photograph above, which have writing on it (or a picture) which you want to be able to read, you’ll have to cut and place the right way round so that the pattern or writing makes sense. 

Glue or adhere your papers into place and then flip the whole thing over so that you can’t see those papers anymore.

You’re now going to work on the fronts of the pockets.  The outside one, and the inside one.

Using the papers which you cut out using the paper pattern for the pockets, glue the papers in place – again remembering to place the papers the right way round, if they have a ‘right way’.

 

If you now fold your card along the two score lines, it should look something like this:

or rather . . .  nothing like that   ⇑  because you’ll have used your own card and papers!

Now comes the enjoyable part.  Decorations!  Yay!!  😀  (I love embellishments, flowers, ribbons, bits, bobs and adornments.  Can you tell?)

The metal ‘charm’ on the front of the card is from a range called Santoro, by Dovecraft.

You can put anything you like into the pockets on your cards.  In mine, I’ve used tags, but if you wanted to give a gift card for a birthday or Christmas, you could tuck a gift card into the inner pocket for the recipient to find, and maybe a tag on the front stamped up with the word ‘Birthday’ or a sentiment of that style.

You can obviously decorate the pockets in any way you choose, but I’ll show you in the pictures below what I did to this particular card.

Two tags for the front pocket – the biggest one is decorated in paper then stamped with the ‘Just a Note’, and the butterfly. I added a short length of lace, and some paper roses and leaves, and tied the tag with some blue Rayon Ribbon. The little tag was stamped on the front with a double butterfly stamp.

The backs of the tags were decorated with papers and stamps – but, silly me, forgot to take a photograph of the backs of these two tags.  tsk tsk.

Opening the card . . .

I chose some vintage looking roses paper for the inside left hand side of the card and decorated it with a small paper doily (distressed and stained with some ink), to which I added some mulberry paper flowers, leaves and a miniature post card cut from a pad of similar types of paper embellishments.  I added a rayon ribbon bow and around the very edges of the flowers I dragged a fine nibbed glue pen and sprinkled it with a little glitter dust, which brought the ‘view’ to life.

Finally, I added a twinkly, sparkly dragonfly (lowest corner of the post card) and a tiny twinkly wings bumble-bee (top right corner of the post card).

On the inside pocket, I simply adorned the pocket with a mulberry flower (and leaves) and turned my attention instead to decorating the tags inside the pocket.

The two  ~‘inside the card’~  tags were covered with various papers and then stamped and decorated in a style to suit the ‘feeling’ of the card.

Starting with the larger of these two tags:  Using a warm brown ink, I aged the tag edges to give it that ‘old’ feeling.  I then attached some vintage lace which I bought in a bag full of off cuts of vintage lace, from Ebay, about five years ago (and I’m still using them now.  There were THAT many different bits!  Such a lucky find).  I added some of the beautiful blue rayon ribbon to cover the edges of the lace,  and to that I used Pinflair glue gel to stick a short length of a double row of string of pearls,  along the centre of the ribbon,  and then tied a double bow with a short length of the same rayon ribbon and glued it in place.

I adhered some mulberry flowers and leaves and added pale cream,  pearl flat-back centres,  then finally added a little blue resin swallow bird, in flight.

The little tag:  I simply stamped a butterfly on the front, and gently distressed around the edges, to give it that vintage feel.

The reverse of the tags:

. . . .  finally the back …  and as I always say to everyone – ALWAYS sign your artwork . . .

. . .  can’t read it? . . .   here y’ go:

It was, indeed, “Hand made by Cobwebs”.

This type of card is just so versatile.  It suits all styles of cards and all colours.  You can dress it up or dress it down.  All you need to do is change the tags, and you have a card suitable for almost any occasion.

I think I might make another card using this design – but this time for something totally different – so that you have something to compare it with for versatility.

Thank you so much for coming to visit me and my blog.  I appreciate your visit more than you can imagine.  It means the world to me – so a big THANK YOU – just as the card says.

Have a trouble-free Thursday, and,  in the words of Sergeant Stan Jablonski from Hill Street Blues:  “Let’s do it to them before they do it to us!”.  

Let’s be careful out there, – my blogger friends.  (I’m really ‘dating’ myself now, aren’t I?!  LOL)

Love and crafty, squidgy hugs ~

For those who believe – no explanation is necessary. For those who don’t, no explanation is possible.

A handmade card, but with a story behind the making of it.

Last weekend I had my  cauldron  Ranger Melt Pot out with the idea of making ‘something’ (I knew not what at that moment in time).  I didn’t have a plan.  I just knew I wanted to play with my Melt Pot.  Everything was on my desk, ready and waiting for me to conjure up something which I could make in my Ranger Melt Pot category here on my blog.  But what?  WHAT?

I sat back in my chair and had absolutely no ideas.  My mojo had gone out for drinks and not invited me.  

Ah well, I said to myself,  you’ve got the thing out now, so just mess around, and who knows, something might come from playing and making a mess.  I stamped out an image of some Angel Wings, embossed and then distressed them using denim ink and lavender ink.  Cut them out and then shaped them to given them some depth and ‘apparent’ movement.  I printed out some words onto some lightweight card – thinking that I’d put the wings in the Melt Pot and mount them  onto the card.  But .. I decided that I’d do it the other way round.  So I cut out the words into a big ’round’ –  using my EK circle cutter, – and then distressed around the edges of that circle with the same inks I’d used on the wings.

Turned on the melt pot and once my crystals had melted I began to move the large circle around in the molten liquid.  I advise CAUTION when using a melt pot – keep tools in each hand so that you’re not tempted to touch anything.   I use a pair of long-handled craft tweezers in one hand and a bamboo skewer in the other.  It doesn’t stop the urge to touch – but it makes you touch in a safe way, with the tools rather than your fingers.

Once I’d coated the front of the circle, I removed it from the liquid and just let it drip for a moment, then laid it flat to let it ‘set’ and go cold.  Unfortunately – the lightweight card was too lightweight and it curled all around the edges and curved in places.  It wasn’t what I wanted.  I cleaned up and left the coated surface on one side.

Then a couple of days ago I looked at it again and told myself to try using it and see what I’d come up with.  So here’s what I did:

Originally I chose a white 6×6″ card but changed my mind and used a 6×6 craft card instead; and some white feathers.  I placed the wings on the circle where I felt they looked best, but the circle still seemed like it was missing something.  So I chose a tiny glass bottle with a cork stopper, and put the tiniest of white feathers inside it, along with a teeny pinch of iridescent glitter, just to draw the eye to the feather, as I knew it would stick to the feather and the inside of the glass jar.  It looked really lovely – so I glued the jar to the disc, and fixed the wings in place.

I felt that the wings looked a little flat, so I used some Anita’s Gloss and carefully coated the wings then put everything to one side while I worked on the card.

Using brown and a shimmering gold (not mirror) card, I cut out circles so that I could mat and layer the wings/words/glass jar onto them.

I chose some blue ribbon in a shade which echoed the blues of the distressing around the edges of the wings and the disc, and using some permanent tape, I fixed the ribbon running it over the back and front of the card, exactly at the ‘half way’ mark.

I fixed the first layer of the cards onto the front of the card.

… then matted and layered the other discs in place, sometimes tucking a white Angel Feather into the layers.  Once the wings were dry and the glued bottle was fixed in place, I fixed some feathers onto the top layer then applied the disc topper which I’d made on top, adding just one smaller feather tucked under the outter edge of the wings.

Three close-ups of the teeny tiny white Angel Feather in the bottle.  It was really hard to capture the feather – so I chose the best three photos of a large bunch of rubbish ones that I took.

Of course – there HAD to be a surprise inside the card …  (you knew that, didn’t you! lol)

On the front page of the insert is a psalm from the bible, which speaks of Angels:  I stamped it onto some white paper, and distressed it a little, then fixed it to the craft paper insert

In case you can’t read it, it says:  He Shall Give His Angels Charge Over Thee, To Keep Thee In All Thy Ways.  (Psalm 91:11).

Then on the inside, middle of the insert . . . .

. . .  a pair of white feathered Angel Wings, and a stamped image of a feather, drifting freely.

Once finished, I really like this lovely card – which began with a disenchantment with the way the topper turned out, but I’m really glad that I made it into a card.  It looks a little flat in the photo’s, but to the naked eye it has a depth and a wonderful warmth and gentleness about it.  And to be quite honest – if someone sent me this card I’d be chuffed to bits.  Seriously chuffed to bits!

I hope you like the card too.

So anyway  …  enough of me and my crafting.  What have you been making or doing?  Leave me a message with a link to your blog and I’ll come and take a look and leave you a message too.

• You can leave messages on any post or article on my blog by  . . . 
• scrolling up to the title of that article which you want to comment on and …
• looking for the little grey speech bubble to the right of the title. (Hover your cursor over the title of a post then move it to the right and the speech bubble will turn from pale grey to a deep red colour.
• Click on that speech bubble and the comments for that article or post will open up for you to read (if there are any) and, if you’d like to,  make a comment.

Wishing you a totally fabulous weekend.  May your Angels surround you and protect you from any harm.

With Love in Powder Blue ~ an elegant handmade card.

 

a more elegant card
handmade by Cobwebs

I have this love affair going on with the colour Teal at the moment, and when I saw this beautiful, teal, velvet ribbon on sale at a haberdashery local to where I live I was shocked to find that some just jumped into my basket – where it promptly held me to ransom until I’d bought 5 metres of it.  [tsk tsk.  what an absolutely shocking way for ribbon to behave!]

Made on white cardstock which has a very slightly hammered texture to it.  The powder blue edge strip along the fold line, was made using a Spellbinders Classic Petal Edgeabilities die; and the central circular, lacey type die cut, which includes the sentiment  ‘With Love’, was made using a Tonic Indulgence Semi Circle (item number: 471e).  The powder blue  card which I used for the die cuts was a huge sized piece of random card which I’ve had for ever!

Of course me being me  . . there had to be a little surprise waiting on the inside. . .

I made an insert from papers which had a sort of heavenly, cloudy effect – added another Spellbinders Edgeabilities die cut (from the same set) and made the little tag from some printed papers which I think I got free with a magazine a while ago, which I mounted onto a piece of the powder blue cardstock which all the die cuts were cut from.  But this time, instead of the velvet ribbon (which would have been too thick and substantial to use on this tag) I used a short length of teal Rayon Seam Binding. (American Seam Binding).

I don’t normally make ‘elegant’ cards.  I’m more the fun, shabby chic, steam punk, vintage type of card maker, so this card really was a step out of my comfort zone.  But I like the way it turned out.  Less is more really worked for this card.

Whoops – nearly forgot  … the flowers on the front are all from Anna Marie Designs, who you can find on this clickable link:  

Welcome

Thank you so much for visiting and taking the time to have a read.  Please have a look around while you’re here.  There are lots of categories (see the menu over to the right – you might have to scroll up to see all the categories) where I hope you’ll find something you like.

Have a really lovely rest of your day all.

Life is a Journey .. not a Destination. ~ A vintage style handmade card

 

Life is a Journey, not a Destination.

This post is dedicated to Stacey, a fellow blogger on WordPress, who came up with a brilliant idea of promoting other crafting blogs in posts.  Stacey very kindly mentioned my blog (with a link) and other crafters blogs that I hadn’t seen before  – which was enough to tell me that I too should take up her idea and promote crafters blogs on my own blog here. 

So, since Stacey came up with the idea, I am firstly promoting her blog (link below) and dedicating this post  – and this card  –  to Stacey. 

Stacey’s blog can be found here:  http://staceyscorner.wordpress.com/2014/06/01/share-sunday/  ~ go and take a look and maybe even click to follow her.

To Stacey,   a dedicated blog post and card,  for an amazing idea!  ~ from Cobs.

. . . join me on a journey through this card . . .

 

Every few days/weeks  … now and again … I’ll make what I call a ‘labour intensive’ card.  One of those cards which takes more time than the regular cards you’ve so far seen me post here.  This card – ‘Life is a Journey, not a Destination’, is one of those cards.

It’s not that these types of cards are difficult, they just take a little more thinking and working out so that you end up with the ‘feel’ that you started out knowing you wanted.  This particular card was inspired by a piece of wall art which I have hung in my bedroom, facing my bed.  It’s an iron framed rectangle with a piece of calico strung in the centre and printed on the calico are the words Life is a Journey, not a Destination, and that’s what gave me the theme for the card.

I wanted the card to have a vintage style, with a slightly ‘steampunkery’ feel to it – but at the same time I knew I wanted it to carry a message,  and wanted the message to be read as either literal or spiritual, depending on who the card ended up with, and the circumstances they were in within their life, at that time.  And ... I think I’ve managed it.

This card could be for someone who’s:-  moving house;  going on a cruise or going abroad;  it could be a simple regular birthday card (for either a man or a woman);  it could be for someone who’s starting a new job;  or perhaps for a person who needs some encouragement;  maybe some tests soon?;  or … it could be given to someone who is going through some sort of personal challenge or challenging time, and this card would be a gentle, loving way of saying that they’re going to get through this time and move on to a better place or time.

I’ll give you a list of everything I used to make this card at the end of the post, because I don’t want anyone to look at the list and think that they couldn’t make a card like this.  I might have different stash to you, and I might have different cardstock; dies; ink pads; glues etc etc … but I’m pretty sure you will have things in your stash that you could use to pull a card like this or similar together.  Just because the list of stuff I’ve used might look long – please don’t be put off.  If you want to make something like this, go and look at your stash.  You’d be surprised what you can use in order to make your own style of card.

For now .. I’ll just give you different photos of the card so that you can see things closer up….

Up up and away!  . . .

A  (working)  compass  to help you keep you going in the right direction . . .

 

 

Time passes quickly, –  so some gentle encouragement to enjoy the beauty of every moment.

 

 

As followers and readers of my blog know  …  I LOVE to put surprises inside all the cards I make.  I feel that the inside of a card is just so wasted and such a let down when you open a birthday/Christmas or any other time card, and find a big white space with a little bit of writing. 

I like cards to be beautiful inside and out and surprise the receiver when they open their card! . . . 

 

Oooo…  I wonder what the magnifying glass is for?!   ;D 

OOhh .. another surprise!   ..  now we have a lucky wish star and a ticket which gives me ‘entitlement’ to one wish!    But .. what the devil is that magnifying glass for???

 

Ah haaaa!  . . .   It’s so you can read the page from the dictionary/thesaurus!  Ok .. one mystery solved,  . . .   but  … what’s that pink ticket by the end of the handle?

 

 

Ah haaaa!  . . .  mystery number two solved!  (Just call me Sherlock.  lol)

Oh, and by the way  … the postcard inside . . .  is for you to write your message on, for the person you’re sending the card to!  See?  It all makes sense!

And that  . . . (photo above)  . . .   is the just finished card, stood on a glass cutting mat, on my desk …  and that’s all my  mess  important, essential, fabulous, well organised   {cough}  equipment and tools behind the card.  (I’ll clean it up properly at some point, so that I can take a photograph of my craft room and share it.)

 

The Recipe for this card:  I used:

• Sheena Douglass – Little Bit Sketchy – Magnifying glass stamp.
• Papermania Acetate (for the ‘window’ of the magnifying glass)
• Papermania Black Embossing Powder
• Stazon ‘Saddle Brown’ ink pad
•      ”       ‘Jet Black’ ink pad
• Memento Dye Ink Pad in ‘Desert Sand’
•      ”               ”            ”     in ‘Rich Cocoa”
• Xcut Build-a-Scene Dies – Vintage Hot Air Balloon
• Heartfelt Creations 12×12 pad – which I used some of the images from.
• Spellbinders ‘Once upon a Time’ Die
• Tattered Lace ‘Postcards’ Die set
• Heartfelt Creations ‘Time Sentiments’ stamp
•         ”               ”          ‘Journey Sentiments’ stamp
• Pinflair Gentle Blends – in Denim colour
•       ”            ”            ”      –  in Dark Khaki colour
• Graph It Glitter Ink Pen
• Compass – was in a pack of 4 I bought a while ago, from the children’s section of either Asda or Tesco.
• Dictionary page was cut from an old Dictionary/Thesaurus which was no longer used.
• Cardstock used:
• Warm Chocolate Brown 300gsm
• Plain Black 270gsm
• Orange – was scrap from my scrap draw
• White – 270gsm
• Kraft Card – 300gsm
• Extras:
• 2 x short lengths of silver-grey Rayon Seam Binding.
• Grey and white Bakers Twine
• 3 x fuzzy, funky fibre, Eyelash Knitting Yarn/Wool –  1 x length of warm brown.  1 x  length of jet black.  1 x length of a blues and purples mix.
• One tiny metal vintage looking Postcard embellishment.

And that’s all there is to it!  😀

Aw, please don’t be daunted by the apparently long list of ingredients for this recipe.   I’ve named almost everything I used here just to be helpful to anyone who wants to know where I got a particular thing, or the make of the papers or dies etc,  (named everything apart from glue .. but if you need to know:  I used Collall All Purpose, Anita’s Tacky Glue, hot glue, and Double Sided Tape) – but I bet you use tons of stuff when you craft a card and you don’t even notice what you’re using anymore.  It’s just all  … ‘stuff’ … which is treasured and loved,  and there because you use it!

Thank you so much for coming to read.  I hope you like the card!  Oh … and don’t forget to visit Stacey’s blog!

Please have a look around my blog here and check out the different categories.  There’s a list of them all in the column over to the right, – you’ll find the list of categories towards the top of that column.

Have a truly beautiful rest of your day!  ~

 

 

 

A little Something for the Weekend, Madam?

A little Something for the Weekend?

I challenged blog readers to make a card, or something, from their stash this week.  Anything at all, so long as they didn’t have to buy anything to make it  … and I thought I’d better take up my own challenge and make something from stuff I had hanging around my craft room.

I dipped into my scraps drawer and found some bits of left-over papers which toned nicely together, but had a slightly vintage look about them.  I took a card ‘dress form’ (mannequin)  – from a selection which I’ve had for about 12 months and only used one of,  and aged/distressed it to give it the right ‘feel’.  I knew I had some sewing themed stamps in my unmounted stamps collection, which had come free with a magazine last year – so grabbed those and chose the ones I wanted to use for the card.

My pinking shears from my sewing box came into play to cut out the little squares of paper – in order to make them look like fabric which I’d quilted and sewn.

I stamped the sewing machine, first onto some craft card which was also in my scraps drawer,  then cut it out and mounted it onto a scrap of black card, then cut round it again – but making sure to leave a tiny border of the black card visible,  to make the sewing machine stand out and not get lost on the card.

Stamped sewing machine, mounted onto black card

The little card with the sewing thread wound around it, was again a stamp which was part of the sewing stamp set which was a freebie with a magazine.  I was really surprised at how well these stamps worked.  Normally stamps that you get free with magazines aren’t that well cut, but these were fabulous!

I knew that I wanted a short length of measuring tape to wrap around the dress form (mannequin), but didn’t have any of that ribbon which is printed up like a measuring tape.  So I took a short length of Rayon Seam Binding and using black ink, I stamped a ‘rule’ stamp onto the seam binding.  It looked exactly what I wanted, so I wound it around the mannequin and pleated it a little to make it look just right.

stamped Rayon Seam Binding

The addition of some teeny-weeny tiny little buttons, in vintage colours, and the front was finished.

But … I hate to leave cards without something of a surprise, – so I drew and cut out a little Something for the Weekend, from another scrap of card and added it to the inside….

Little surprise ... Something for the Weekend
which I ran up on the sewing machine.

Hung from a tiny wire coat hanger –  a little dress! …   Made from some of the same green and white dotty card which I’d used on the front of the card.  I added a belt from a scrap of paper left over from the squares on the front of the card and all that was needed then were some pale green teeny, mini buttons down the front.  Voila!  Something for the Weekend!  All made from stash and scraps.

Have a fabulous weekend!