Well hello there. Since my last post I have found out that our new house is now completing on March 11th, so it's even more go go go than it has been already. I haven't 'worked' as such since moving to Chris's house in Warrington last August, to help Maggie get settled into the area and high school. We also fairly quickly found this new house that we thought would be good to move to as it has a garden and this house doesn't and there are more bedrooms and bigger. The lounge isn't as big as this one but there's always compromises to make. It's still close enough to Maggie's school and to Chris's kids' home, so it will be fine for us until we can get the country home we'd like in years to come. We've been painting the house and sorting out stuff ever since August really but particularly so since January. Yesterday we also thought that we had a tenant ready to sign up for this house but that has now fallen through, which is highly annoying but there's always another person out there. I've been buying material and making curtains this week but I've also made a Mother's day card. It's a bit early for that you might think but what with the move I would rather be organised now, so no last minute panic. Chris has now asked for me to make one for his mum too, so it's all busy. This is good for me though and I do so love being lost in my cardy, sewing world. On the front of yesterday's newspaper (Chris gets the Telegraph for the crosswords; I can't stand newspapers or watching the news on tele as it's invariably depressing or just nonsense), the main headline was about some cricketer who has declared that he's gay - what a lot of stuff and nonsense! Who cares? What difference does it make? None!
Ok, enough of my rant but I had to get that off my chest. It's little wonder I prefer looking at my crafty things and reading inspriring blogs from lovely people.
As a result of watching Debbi Shore on Create and Craft, I started doing some log cabin patchwork with some material I got in Abakhan in Liverpool. Maggie and I spent hours in there with the lights failing at one point after flickering for ages and a staff member getting stuck in the lift as a result of the power failure. It was my first visit to that store. When I used to live in Llandudno I used to go to the store in Mostyn and I loved that. The Liverpool store feels different but it's still full of loads of great stuff, including wool which I'm buying a bit of lately as I made some 'loopy' scarves at Christmas. Anyway, I digress as ever. That one square of patchwork wasn't brilliant but I went on to make three more and so I sewed them together to make a 49cm square. I then realised that I wanted to make it fit a cushion pad already in use but currently covered in a cover I made years ago which wasn't finished to a high standard at all so was ripe for 'renewal'. This meant that I had to add 16cm of material as a border round the patchwork, so Maggie and I went for our first visit to T.P Textiles in Latchford, close to Warrington. We found the glorious blue cotton almost immediately and since the curtains Maggie has spotted have blue/turquoise circles on them, I thought that colour would be great as it also matches some blue in the patchwork. I also found some material for temporary curtains in our new house; which we'll be moving into around March 25th; it was only £1.50 a metre so an absolute bargain and a unoffensive colour and good flowing material. The tassles happened as a result of a visit to Ikea believe it or not. Maggie and I went with my sister Shelley, my mum and step-dad George. I saw some cushions I liked the look of which has tassles, which got me to thinking that I could do that. I had a quick look inside the cushion and yes, it was do-able by me. I bought the wool for the tassles in T.P. Textiles and then watched a quick video on youtube; http://contributor.yahoo.com/user/204/emma_salk.html about how to do them and the rest as they say is history. I must also give Debbi Shore the credit for reminding me of the basics as I bought her dvd 'Sew what?..Cushions' which is excellent and helped me through parts of this project.
What a good weekend craft wise as the weather certainly hasn't been helpful to a positive mood at all. We were meant to go on a walk somewhere today but the day started miserable as sin and raining, so we decided to just go for hard drive shopping and Asda shopping which Maggie avoided like the plague. I'm quite glad we didn't go in some respects as yesterday Chris and I went on a breezy walk to the house and we certainly got red cheeks as a result. Anyway, I'm meant to be telling you about the card I've made. It's for Graham's 50th birthday. The main images are taken from my new 'you're never too old' cdrom from Card Creations Plus. I got the cd in the Manchester Stitches and creative crafts show (for a brilliant price) in February and I knew straight away who I intended to send the first creation to. Graham has got a good sense of humour so I can only hope it makes him giggle. He does all the cooking when him and Viki have a barbecue (Viki does all the prep work and organises everything else, which needs to be said incase she reads this and I get into trouble for not stating her important role in their barbecues :-) ).
This is the card I made for Chris in 2011. It might look big but it's a perfect size for this event as it's 11cm by 14. It wasn't my design; it was Mary's and I've included the hyperlink for her youtube page so that she gets the credit she deserves. It's so so helpful to have such videos and instructions so readily available, as the measurements are often what takes all the time when you're designing Cricut based cards. My card is slightly different to hers as I didn't have any black polka dot ribbon, so I created the ribbon effect with card and then embossed it with the Swiss dots folder and then stamped gently over the dots with Ranger's worn lipstick distress ink and I'm really happy with the result. I also chose to put the 'from ?' message inside for tradition's sake; I used the lyrical letters cartridge for that and the loop dee loo creative feature on my Gypsy and welded the letters.
http://www.wonderhowto.com/how-to-make-love-ya-valentine-card-using-cricut-paisley-295896/
Since I'm trying to just photograph cards as I make them, then here goes as this photo shows the card I just finished yesterday. I don't know who it's for yet but it's intended for one of Maggie's friends, so whenever she tells me, the night before inevitably, that one of her friend's has a birthday, then I don't need to panic. All I have to do is reach into my 'bag of wonders' and pull out a lovely suitable card! Ta dah! It's not very personalised but I highly doubt the girls would appreciate much more effort anyway.
This card was made using my Forever Young cartridge. I started it off as I particularly wanted to practise the decorative frame shape and the card just developed from there. It's rather basic in design but I was really chuffed with the way the layers were cut out and how I've used the same 'colour ways' as I hear them mention on t.v and youtube so often.
The envelope made also used my Crafter's Companion Ultimate Pro and it's made from a pearlescent paper of the same colour as the main card. I used the U.P to ensure the gatefold lines were exactly right as well.
On February 3rd mum and I went to the Creative Crafts show in Manchester Central which is what they're now calling the G-Mex centre. I had a brilliant time and the cards shown were created during the 'Fancy folds' workshop I attended there, which was run by Nancy Watts, whom I have alot of respect for. The designs were taken from her Fabulous Fifties cd rom, which I have since ordered from Create and Craft as I love the look and that polka dot paper is gorgeous but it has yet to arrive much to my dismay; I must remember to ask them where it is this week. I went on the train and met some lovely ladies going to the show as well and I caught the same train back as them, so we had a great natter. Mum bought a nice skirt there and I finally got a red coat I've been wanting, with help from the Christmas money mum gave me.
I've only shown the envelope for the last card as the other's were only white ones, which I didn't decorate either.
I've got so many cards that I have either on the computer photographed or here in a bag 'ready to go' which I'd love to share but there's only so much time in the day, so I think I'll have to be strong and try to remember to photograph them as I finish them from now on and then share them on here.
It's Pat's birthday (Chris's sister) on Tuesday but I forgot to take a photo of the card I sent her. The photo is of the card I sent her last year. It was made with an image I retrieved on the computer and the border is from a My Craft Studio cd rom from memory. She loves cats, so this year's card was paw shaped with the help of my Cricut and Gypsy (using one large circle with four ovals 'welded' onto the main circle as the toes); I was really pleased with it but without a photo it's very hard to describe. I used a picture of a cat taken from a Jayne Netley Mayhew cd rom from Joanna Sheen and I put glossy accents on it and I used a tiny version of the face on each four of the oval shaped 'toe' sections. Inside I used decorative tags with the letters on to create Happy Birthday. Like I said, too difficult to explain but this just helps remind me about it but not much help for anyone else.
