napkin and foldy flower cards

I was asked by the local ICA to do a little demo on Wednesday night. Not sure of what to do, I decided on some frugal crafting - rather apt given our countries current situation and used cheap copy paper that I had printed "foldy flowers" onto and a patterned paper napkin, leftover from St.Patrick's day about 4 years ago - despite my best efforts I do hoard!
The foldy flowers are a free digi download from the talented Tracy Lynn Miller at www.fred-she-said.blogspot.com - followed her site when she first started blogging but had lost track of her recently but she now has a digi store and her designs have been made into rubber stamps. She is worth hopping over to for a look - her colouring is divine - although I used precoloured flowers for this card.
So the card is a square blank with one panel of the napkin spray glued to it - you just use the thin top layer with the picture printed onto it. Normally each napkin has 3 layers - use the other 2 for cleaning up any mess! Smooth the image down onto the card either with your fingers or a wallpaper seam roller will do the job effortlessly. The embossed napkin edges will disappear when you burnish them sufficently.
Make up the foldy flowers according to the directions and then use a hot glue gun to attach on top of the napkin leaves. Finish flower centres with a diamonte or a button glued in place.
For the candle I simply tore the image from the nakin panel - you want gentle feathered edges - spray glue on the reverse, centre and smooth the image on the candle. Glue more completed foldy flowers onto the image to add dimension and finish with some stick on diamontes.
I then simply used a scrap of designer paper (Basic Grey) to cover the brand name on a paper bag, added a tag made from a scalloped circle nestability and finished with another foldy flower.
Polka dot pink ribbon finishes the bag and the tag.
There it is - a matching set - and it cost cents - and no leftover stash to try to find room for! (Which is just as well , my room is overflowing with junk that had no other home and I desperately need a sort out. I need someone to organise all my stuff in something other than the teetering piles I favour.

Memory wire Jewellery

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I have decided that this year I will find time to make the handcrafted gifts that I always want to have made but run out of time - I have a room packed to the rafters with all kinds of materials, so it is time to use some of it. Saying that to make this, the first thing I had to do was go shopping....
2.5 turns of memory wire - this stuff is as cheap as chips - and you get enough for several bracelets in a pack.
I bought some fancy beads from the Galway Bead Shop and soon racked up €25 for a teeny griplock bag of beads - then discovered they had elastic bead bracelets 3 for €2.50 in Penneys and 10 little tubes of seed beads for €2 in the euro shop - so that is what I used on my bracelet. I just added 6 sparkly beads on head pins to accent the piece and then used a silver shoe charm as the focal point. Total cost is less than €4 - pretty good for a one off piece of jewellery.
The pillow box is a Daisy D's diecut box - so quick to do, the tags come on the sheet as well, just added a bit of lace and a button.
This is heading off as a gift to my mum and I want to try a green themed one for myself.
tfl

local interest cards

There's a quirky little cafe in Gort that has lovely artwork on the walls and really friendly staff, it bakes its own bread, gives you tea in big ceramic teapots - so much nicer than a solitary Lidl teabag paddling in an inch of water inside a metal pot, that is all too commonplace when you ask for tea these days. And they make the yummiest scones that I have ever tasted - the carrot cake is divine as well - in fact if they opened a craft shop within its walls I would be in heaven (and never home).
Anyhow, I digress. They have a a super quirky lady riding bicycle on the outside wall, with her peering into the upstairs window - I took some pics of her and on Sunday wondered if I could approach her about selling some cards and that perhaps some local interest cards would be a hit with the tourists.
So a couple of my photo cards with a little bit of overstamping and embellishing, cos we do like the personal touch.
tfl xxx oops forgot the pics... will update later

last scallop entry (honest)!

I told Kerry I'd do card & a LO for her scallop challenge and while I managed a few cards my scrapping mojo has deserted me. Finally set around to it last night - not easy to do a scallop challenge with no nestabilities - I've lent my Big Kick to a friend and I've yet to succumb to my desires for the Fiskars threading water punch and the Martha Stewart punches (I had hoped Dovecraft or DO would have produced their own version by now, as they are always cheaper ; -0)
Anyhow - I used a sheet of Making Memories scalloped patterned paper for most of this LO - the stamp is the Hero Art euro stamp again (getting my moneys worth out of this one!) The scalloped white edge is card embossed with a cuttlebug folder - a scrap bit I had floating around and the word paper I bought years ago when I first started cardmaking. I had never even heard of scrapping in those days - I just bought any patterned paper I could find, which in the West of Ireland wasn't much. Amazing how it has all changed in a few short years.

Hero Art stamped card - Thankful

Another one from the stamps I bought from Kerry - the leaf stamp cost me a euro, I couldn't believe it had not been snapped up during the week of the sale at An Siopa Bui. It is such a versatile little stamp - it reminds me of a similar Woodware punch that I have hankered after for a long time. The word and border stamps also cost a euro & the main flower image is the free stamp from the current issue of Creativity Life (first time I've bought it and in honesty it would have to be a front cover freebie that would tempt me to buy again - the content was ok but nothing inspirational - oh I'm being tough!). So altogether this was my "bargain bin" card but I think it looks quite chic - I'm a lazy stamper and the whole thing is sepia versafine & the papers are Crate. The ribbon I recycled from my Easter chocs & I'm winding down on the scallops and there is just one on this card.
TFL - if indeed anyone is!

I got these 2 little hero arts stamps at the An Siopa Bui sale, 3 euro for the two. So pleased was I with my bargain that I actually showed my purchases to OH rather than sidling in & stuffing bags behind the couch!
Papers are DCWV nana's nursery and Crate baby bee, die cut daisy and some odds n bobs - scallops again, hey, there's nestabilities to be won! Check it out at challenges at www.anblogbui.blogspot.com

scalloped shadow box

Quick little post - I'm waiting for the carpenter - he said he would be here at 8.30am. What is about "tradesman time" that it bears no correlation to the real world.
Another entry for the An Blog Bui scallop challenge. The box actually has acetate over the scallop aperture but it kept giving a reflection on the photo, so I took it off for the pics. The box is 11cm square and I made a shadow box filled with die cut daisies in the lid, inside are 6 little notecards with ribbon and scalloped circles. A quick and easy little gift, add some stamps and a verse inside the lid ET VOILA, a perfect little present.

quick page

A fave pic of dd in a simple LO using Pink Petticoat printable papers.

stamping bella

taking my cue from Phil (cannonball filly), I decided it was time to dust off my couple of Bellas. I bought these nearly a year ago and admit with shame face that this was the first time it had come out of the packet.
Coloured with my dd's coloring pencils that were on the table and dressed up with some buttons she had been playing with (she is obssessed with my button jar - I keep them in old glass jar with a screw top lid & it will surely get broken if I dont replace it with a toddler friendly one - she insists they are her buttons and has even tried to take them to bed!
Nothing crafty going on here this week, having all the woodwork in the house replaced this week, so sitting here in doorles chaos at the mercy of the carpenter. Hopefully it will all be done by Friday and I can embark on a mega clear out (tempted to ask him about floor to ceiling shelves for one of the walls in my craft room) - Im off to Dunnes for more banana grass boxes tomorrow, they look so much better than the Huggies boxes I have been using to store my daily use stash in & at half price are pretty good value.

I went to An Siopa Bui last week for a crafty evening - thanks Helen for the lift. I took the smally with me, so I didn't get to make much but had a play with a melt pot - it's one of those fun to play with things but I found the results a bit hit and miss - I'd be happier triple embossing and stamping for a similar result but like everything it probably needs practice. I can see potential for jewellery - you'd be able to make stunning little micro slides, key fobs and those little Tim Holtz frames, great if you wanted to do batches of them to sell at craft fairs.
It was great just being out - I tend to pass up on going out since Brianna was born, seems like too much hard work but I was so glad I made the effort. Kerry is having a ceramic painting evening next week, I wont make that one but it prompted me to find my ducks( or are they geese?) out of the cupboard and they now have pride of place on my kitchen window sill. I used to love ceramic painting, just do not have the time and acrylic paint and toddlers don't mix - or rather they do.... and mix enthusiastically.

The Ressurection

I had planned to ressurect this blog on Easter Sunday (with my tongue in my cheek) but I got lost in a frenzy of Cadbury chocolate and pop up card making, then the moment was lost.
So here is the main reason for my lack of crafting, blogging and my general departure from the world at large.
My long term Work of Art!

Brianna