Waving goodbye to 2012

This was a very lean year for crafting for me for various reasons. I kept up with the crafting world, but didn't sit down and create. Maybe I just needed a break. Who knows? 

But when the holidays rolled around, I felt the need to jump back into it. I've been a longtime member of an internet fan club devoted to Diana Gabaldon and her Outlander series. For the past several years, many of us have participated in a holiday card exchange, and it's great fun to send cards and receive cards from all around the world. I've always made my cards and decided that I didn't want this year to be different. So, I started brainstorming, and this was the first card that I came up with.

The Penny Black hedgie image was fun and has a humorous connection to The Books. I got to use an embossing folder (Sizzix) and my Vagabond that had been sitting and gathering dust. (GASP!) I've always liked the look of the kraft card stock  I liked the card, but I didn't love it. Plus, I thought it was kind of the same old thing that I'd done before, from a design standpoint anyway.

It was back to the drawing board... but wait! I'd been "saving" cards that caught my eye on my Cards to CASE board on Pinterest. I knew that I'd been attracted to the simpler and cleaner designs lately. I browsed the board to see what else they had in common and to see if I could find some inspiration. The following card is what I came up with.

I went the cleaner and simpler route with a panel of color on solid white card stock and the sentiment in the lower corner. Since I was making a large number of cards, I opted to go with a panel design that would allow me to make many in one fell swoop. I ended up doing a resist on glossy card stock using Perfect Resist and dye inks, then stamped over the whole sheet with black and navy blue permanent inks, collage-style. All stamps used in making this card front were by Scottish Borders Stamping, by the way. I cut out the strips, mounted them on black card stock and adhered them to the fronts of the cards, later adding score lines and the sentiment.

This is a closer look at the front panel. I liked it! The whole design felt more up-to-date.

But after looking at the card a bit more and trying to decide how and where to add just a bit more embellishment, it occurred to me that the center panel of the card front could double as a bookmark, for when the holidays were over and the decorations and cards taken down. On subsequent cards, before adhering the stamped panel, I added a couple perforated score lines that I tried to show in the above photo, taking care to run my adhesive between them so that the panel could be detached easily. This in mind, I added the ribbon to the edge of the panel using a mini stapler. Done! Happy! Finished in time to send them out in timely fashion, too.  :-)

So, this is my 2012 post. I hope this gets my creative juices flowing again. To those still checking in, I wish you a Happy 2013 with lots of time for creating and doing all of the things that let you relax and recharge.

SURPRISE!

Yes, here I am, appearing out of the crafting void. Life has been keeping me busy doing things other than stamping and cardmaking, but I had to make cards for the holidays!


Here's what I made for this year's holiday card exchange (at an author fan site of which I've been a long-time member):

Since I knew that I'd be making a bunch of cards, about forty, I tried to keep it simple. HA! Never works out that way. I just had to keep embellishing and adding small touches here and there. I do like how this turned out though.


So I started with precut and prefolded cards from Michael's Recollections line, conveniently already on clearance. The snowman was made using a Sizzix Bigz die and embossing folder combo (Snowman & Hat)—make your die cut then run it through your machine of choice inside the embossing folder. Worked great! I'll just add in here that I used the Sizzix Vagabond machine for this part of the process and it made it extremely quick and easy. I even cut out the hat from black cardstock in the same pass. I just laid the white over the snowman and the small piece of black over the hat and ran it all through. The snowman was embellished with Glaze pens for the eyes and carrot nose and then a snowflake from the Martha Stewart line of punches. I added the silver hat band with a silver metallic marker and dabbed on a spot of Frosted Lace Stickles. Another Martha Stewart punch, this time a border punch, helped me create the plaid border. Martha's baker's twine formed the scarf. The final touch was a couple of spritzes of Perfect Pearls Perfect Pearl Mist. Love that added shimmer and snowy look! 


Happy Holidays!

out of the deep freeze

This week I got to experience a first--I've lived in the Midwest all of my life and am used to seeing winter storm watches and warnings. The blizzard warning was a new one for me! Now as it turned out, I live just far enough east that the worst of the storm missed us. It left some snow and ice though, which look rather pretty.

This photo struck me. I happened to catch her just as she was taking off from her rather snowy perch.

In a way, that's the way I feel about this blog. I've been frozen in the same spot for a while, now it's time to take off again.

So, here's what I worked on today.

This is a Pop-Up die by GEO-dies. It looks like a sun or a sunflower, so it appealed to me.

I used it with my Big Shot like I would any other wafer-thin die, between the two clear cutting pads on top of my multipurpose platform, tab 2.

After turning back and folding the cut outs, I adhered it to the yellow cardstock and put it through my Big Shot inside the Sizzix Flowers & Vines textured impressions folder. I inked the embossing using Memento dye ink then embellished with a Prima flower, some bling, and a sentiment by Studio G.

Here's a closer view of the embossed pop-up die.

This technique is a twist on inlaid embossing that I've seen done several places. It's been done with simple die cuts and with Prima flowers. It struck me as being similar in concept to Cuttlebug quilting. Here I liked the added visual interest that the pop-up die cut lends to the design.

Cuttlebug embossing plus

When I first heard about this product, I was intrigued. These folders sounded a lot like the embosslits by Sizzix and I wondered what Provo Craft would do differently. After playing with a couple for just a bit, I now have a better idea.


Here are a couple of the CB emboss plus folders as they'd arrived after I ordered them. The larger one is the 5 X 7 Brocade Window. The smaller one is the Elegant Ellipse.


Removing the folder from the packaging takes a bit of care. Don't tear or cut any of the plastic. The clear plastic makes up the outside of the folder, just like in the home-made embossing folders that I've described here on the blog, and like the modified CB folders that I described here. All you need to do is unsnap those two pairs of green buttons and slip the folder out from under the cardboard flap.


This is the folder once it's been removed from the packaging. This is the front view.


This is the folder opened up. The green parts that you see are thin metal dies that do the cutting and embossing.


If you flip the folder over and look carefully at it from the back, you'll see that there's a flap that's been cut out of the plastic. This flap can be lifted out of the way so that this side of the folder can be used as a stencil. Clever! This is a plus over the Sizzix embosslits.


The smaller folder works exactly the same way.


This is the back. You can see that there's a rectangle outlining the design of the embossing folder. That's the outline of the flap that I was talking about up above.


Here I'm lifting the flap away. It can be tough to see if you don't know what to look for.


Okay. So let's see how these actually work. I like the minimal packaging. Here you see the back of it. They show how to run the folder through, use it as a stencil, and use it as a die. Wonder why they didn't say what the stack should be though? Seems like a big oversight. For CB users, I've read that it's the A plate, then the folder between the two B plates. As usual, we Big Shot users will get to experiment. :-)


So, I have a nice big folder, let's try a nice big card. I think you can see that I already have a dilemma. That's a 5 X 7 inch card with the fold on the side. It's the design of the embossing folder that is 5 X 7. If I want to die cut and emboss my card front, I can't do it. The folder is too big.


See what I mean? Usually I place the card front inside the folder and wrap the rest around the back. Can't do it. The design will be way off. The other method that could work would be to put the card front inside the folder and run it through sideways. That won't work with these larger folders either. They're too wide for the opening of the machine. I've always felt that was a drawback with the larger sized folders. It cuts down on versatility. Hate that.


Here I've settled for trying this out on a half-sheet of white card stock.


This is the card stock inside the folder, sandwiched between the two clear cutting plates, on top of the multipurpose platform open with No Tabs. Roll it through. It wasn't a super tight fit in my machine. It rolled fairly easily. And don't be alarmed if you hear cracking noises as the die goes through. I've heard the same sound with the Sizzix embosslits. It's fine. Nothing is cracking.


This is the folder opened up. You can see the debossed design. You can also make out where the die has cut through to make the window.


Here I've removed the center and poked out the other pieces that had been cut. It's also flipped over so that the embossed side is showing. This could now be trimmed down to fit the front of that 5 X 7 card.


I wanted to give you an idea of the quality of the embossing.


And here's a look at the debossed side. You may also be able to make out the fact that the window cuts were not perfectly clean. You can see some bits and pieces hanging on the edges of the opening. It's nothing that a bit of fine grit sandpaper can't remove, but it's an annoyance. I'm not sure if a thin shim might help eliminate this, but I'm also not sure that I want to add a shim since the fit was already fairly tight.


This is a photo with the card stock back in the folder. Again, this is a view from behind with the flap lifted so that you can use this side as a stencil to pounce chalks or inks or whatever you'd like to use to add some color to the embossed design.


Since I didn't get to emboss my card front with that bigger folder, I thought I'd give it a try with the smaller one. This is an A2 size card. I'm placing the front inside the folder and wrapping the back behind. I like that the plastic folder allows the die to reach close to the center of the card front. I used the same stack as last time. From the bottom up: multipurpose platform using no tabs, clear cutting plate, embossing folder with card front inside, clear cutting plate.


After rolling it through and again hearing some cracking noises, here's the result.


It's nicely cut and nicely embossed, but there are a couple of issues. I left the photo a bit dark up there because I wanted you to be able to see that there was some buckling of the card front below the embossed design. I'll have to play with that to see if it can be eliminated.


I left this photo dark, too, so that you can perhaps see that the top edge of the die left a crease in the card stock up above the design. That's a second annoyance to try to minimize. Just not a great look, you know?

Overall, it was a nice improvement made by Provo Craft over the embosslits by Sizzix. The construction of their folders show the thought that went into this and added some versatility. I like the fact that they can reach the center of a card front. I like that you can fully emboss the front of a 5 X 7 card edge to edge. I also like that you can use part of the die to stencil.

There are drawbacks though. I still find the larger size to be limiting (as in the folder cannot be run through these particular machines--Cuttlebug and Big Shot--sideways), and the fact that the folder itself extends beyond the design makes it problematic to emboss and die cut a card front. Then there's the pesky problem again with the creasing and the buckling of the card stock, at least with my Big Shot. I'll give it a whirl with my CB and see if the results are better. If not, it'll be time to do some tweaking unless I decide that I really like cutting and adhering layers to my card fronts.

Hope everyone is enjoying the Labo(u)r Day holiday, if you're celebrating where you are. :-)

Fiskars Continuous Stamp Wheel

I don't think it will come as a surprise to anyone who reads this blog that I'm kind of hooked on tools and gadgets. They're just so much fun! Well, we had a brand new Joann's open not too long ago. It replaced the old grungy one and was big and bright and beautiful, occupying the space that was once a Circuit City. I'd browsed through there once just to take it all in. Okay, yeah I bought some stuff, too. I'll admit it. But the last time I was there, I had a coupon that just had to be used on something. That something ended up being the Fiskars Continuous Stamp Wheel. I was curious, and with the coupon, the price was right. The original price was $9.99 USD.


So, pictured above are the Continuous Stamper and a couple of clear stamps made for use with this tool. I liked the stamps, even if the stamper might be a bust.


This is the stamper out of the packaging. It's small and lightweight. You can see the roller that the stamp will be attached to. There are also some plastic guides on the housing, front and back, (one is near the tip of my thumb) to help with aligning your design. Simple really.


Here's a view of the bottom.


And here's how the roller looks when it's been popped out by a simple push from above.


Those two orange knobs pull away from each other to unlock the roller and allow it to open up. Once open, you can see the small square hooks that hold the ends of the stamp in place. My left index finger is conveniently pointing to them.


Here you can see that holes at the end of the stamp that fit over those hooks.


Above you can see that I've attached one end.


Now I've wrapped the stamp around the roller and am attaching the other end to the hooks. There is a slightly raised edge on each side of the roller to help align the stamp.


Now the roller is closed.


This is just a view of the other side so that you can get a sense of that raised edge.


Pop that roller back into place. By the way, it takes a lot longer to explain this than to actually do it. :-)


The starter kit comes with a black ink cartridge that's shown above.


It has a couple of knobs that fit into a couple of notches. To help make sure that it's loaded correctly, one set of knobs and notches is bigger than the other, so take a good look before trying to force something that might not be lined up properly.


This is the bigger set.


Here's the smaller pair. The fan-like grooves will be what lock the cartridge in place.


Click the ink cartridge into position.


Remove the cover over the ink roller and set it aside. Don't throw it away. You use it to cover the ink again when you're finished. Rotate the cartridge to lock it into place. Now you're set!


Here's the tool all prepped and ready to go.


It's time to roll! I'd advise using your dominant hand for this. I'm using my left hand because the right one is taking pictures.


I have to say that this was easy to roll and keep straight, even left-handed. I've seen better ink coverage though.


And here's how the design looked after I made a second pass.

What do I think of this? It is a little work to set up, but I like the idea of continuously stamping and not having to reink. That's a plus over using these stamps with clear blocks. Now I didn't really prep the stamp that I used, and to be fair I should probably do that before saying the the image quality wasn't the greatest, but I have liked results better using other inks, like Versafine or Memento which tend to cover better. This system does force you to use their ink. Clean up was a little messy, too, but not bad. They recommend removing the ink cartridge and then replacing it with a damp towel and rolling on scrap paper. I just "stamped off" the ink after removing and putting away the ink cartridge. You're also limited in the colors that you can use, though they do offer several colors to choose from. I haven't had this long enough yet to know how long the ink will last.

So, for the price, I think that this tool can be very useful for its specific purpose. If I'm making a bunch of cards and using similar designs on all of them, I could see pulling this out and having it be a time-saver. Would probably be fun to stamp in multiple colors and perhaps even combine some of the designs as well. I may have to give that a try. At this point I only have the black ink though, so that'll have to wait--at least until my next trip to Joann's. :-)