Gaming and selling cards

August 15th, 2016

Over the Easter weekend I held a card stall at a gaming convention, an alternative to running a game as I had been unwell and didn’t have time to write it.  I didn’t do my usual range of cards, instead focusing on a range that reflected the themes of the games – fantasy, horror, historical, alternate history etc.  I also did a selection of children’s cards as there is a day where younger players are the focus.

I was surprised by what did sell – dragons and wizards, and Egyptian themed things – and by what didn’t (children’s cards and anything steampunk).  I might do it again in the future, but not for all four days of the weekend.  Still it was an interesting experience – and if you are interested in anything here let me know, I probably have some left…

Elder sign book marks & trinket boxes

Elder sign book marks & trinket boxes

Small cards

Small cards

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Back on the air…

February 24th, 2016

Despite good intentions, I once again got behind with posts.  This was due to a number of reasons, including:

  • making cards for the crazy Christmas period
  • making different cards for the New Year period
  • going into hospital for major surgery on 23 December
  • while I was recovering from surgery, my brother visited from the UK, bringing his lovely wife to Australia for the first time which meant I had hostess duties – plus I had to make some artwork for them too

The result of all that was that I haven’t had time to do much posting, but I will try to make good on that over the next few weeks.

To start with, here are some of the birthday cards I made in the second half of last year.  No instructions this time, as they are all variations on cards I have done before.

Aimee's bday card

Butterfly bday card

Sweet Treats bday

Sweet Treats bday

Jubilee bird birthday

Jubilee bird birthday

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Floral farewell card

May 21st, 2015

My former director left my workplace recently, and this is the card I made for her from those in my team who used to be in her area.

Floral farewell

Floral farewell

Cream cardstock folded to a square card, edged in blue ink.  Strip of blue, white and gold chiyogami paper mounted on blue metallic paper, and then placed down right side of the card.  Cream flower edged in blue and attached to the card, then blue diamantes placed in the centre of the flower.  Inside was ‘All the best’ stamped in blue.

 

Floral farewell envelope

Floral farewell envelope

There were left over bits of the metalic blue and chiyogami papers, so I used them along with another flower on the envelope to tie it all together.

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Through the Looking Glass

December 26th, 2014

Recently two of my friends had a joint birthday party, fancy dress theme.  (ok the theme was Game of thrones but I wasn’t feeling it).  I had these gorgeous papers by Kaiser Craft from their ‘Through the Looking-Glass’ paper set.  They are very floral and vibrant, but there are also the classic illustrations by Tenniel throughout the designs.  The first card was for a female, the second for a male.

In addition to layering papers, I also have the matching collage pack so there were plenty of elements to stack on (like the flowers).  I also used washi tape to tie the layers together, along with the yellow butterfly that is on both cards.

looking glass - B

Alice – flamingo croquet

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Cat birthday card

August 24th, 2014

My brother’s birthday was in July, and he is a big fan of cats (like all my family).  I have a tin of Cavallini & Co vintage cat poster stickers, and I found one that actually has July on it – a Harper’s cover from what I can tell.

Because I am trying to use up my paper pads and scraps, so I pulled out the green and blue colours from the sticker, and layered in onto a piece of white cardstock.  This was edged in blue ink, then placed on a piece of blue scrap patterned paper also edged in ink.

I then too piece of blue cardstock the same side as the A6 card, and embossed it with my new Coutour Creations small dots embossing folder.  The blue card was distressed with my distressing tool, and then blue ink swiped around the edges.  All layered onto the A6 white card, and three small pearls added to the top right side.  Inside ‘Happy Birthday’ was stamped in blue.

I was happy with it, recipient was happy with it, all is good.

Harper's cat birthday

Harper’s cat birthday

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Fuchsia wedding

August 16th, 2014

I realised that although I had mentioned making a wedding card for a colleague, I had not actually put it up here.  N was returning to Sri Lanka for a very colourful and vibrant wedding, and I wanted to reflect that in my card desigh.  So here it is – brightly coloured and using one of my favourite papers.

 

Fuchsia wedding

Fuchsia wedding

Fuchsia cardstock folded in half to A6 size.  Light pink cardstock trimmed to be slightly smaller than A6 layered on top.  Chiogami paper with pink and purple patterns (my favourite!) layered onto gold paper then onto the left hand side of the pink panel.

Dandelion woodprint by Christine Adolph was stamped in Adirondak Wild Plum ink edged with Vintage Photo distress ink.  Vintage photo ink swiped around the edges, then layered on the right of the pink panel, overlapping the chiyogami paper in the middle.  Three paper flowers of different sizes edged in Wild Plum ink, attached to card.  Purple gems added to the centre of the paper flowers and the flowers on the dandelion woodcut image.

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Card making frenzy – Day 1

June 18th, 2014

So I am on leave this week, sick leave to be exact.  I wasn’t allowed to drive yesterday or today after having an operation, and so today I decided to set myself some crafting challenges for the week.

First up, using papers and embellishments (mostly papers) that I have scattered all over my work desk – offcuts, things I liked and put there but am yet to use etc – and also the papers I often get free with crafting magazines.  Stamps and other embellishments are allowed, but no other papers (but not to worry, the pile is huge).

This evening I managed to make 8 card.  Part of the challenge was to use the paperstack (book) of Romantic Garden paper by Meg’s Garden – the papers are beautiful but the elaborate designs and square shape makes them somewhat difficult to use.  I had a similar issue with my Vintage Christmas Cards last year, you can see that each paper is pretty much an artwork in itself.  But just sticking on paper that covers the entire front is not really cardmaking to me, I need a way to make it my work.

Anyway, here are the results.

Cardmaking frenzy day 1 - Romantic Garden theme from Meg's Garden (square)

Cardmaking frenzy day 1 – Romantic Garden theme from Meg’s Garden (square)

This first card uses a whole sheet of the paper.  You can see how elaborate the designs are, and I hate to throw out any of that.  in this one the paper is trimmed slightly to fit, distressed around the edges, and the two butterflies were stamped on it.  Paper then mounted onto a square card.   I am probably going to add some gems to the butterflies, but I haven’t decided on the colour yet.

 

Cardmaking frenzy day 1 - Romantic Garden theme from Meg's Garden (C6)

Cardmaking frenzy day 1 – Romantic Garden theme from Meg’s Garden (C5)

Details and other designs are below the cut:

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Chinese wedding

May 12th, 2014

In February I attended a wedding that was held to coincide with Chinese New Year.

I decided to go with the theme, and use some of my asian papers.  I did a similar design for friends a number of years ago, but haven’t used it since (and that time I used my Luck Dragon stamp also)

Double Happiness

Double Happiness

‘Double Happiness’ (Hero Arts) stampped on cream cardstock, edged in dark red ink.  Layered onto gold paper.  Base cream cardstock edged in dark red, and then layered with gold paper and red yuzen-shi paper.  Stamped image layered on top, and cream flower with cream pearl added to the top left corner.

It is a simple design, because I wanted the complexity of the hand screen-printed papers to be the main feature.  I liked the over all effect, and I used a lot of red and gold because they are culturally considered good for a wedding.

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Flourish baby shower card

April 7th, 2014

My work colleague went on maternity leave, and before she left we went to her baby shower.  I did a card for the group present we gave her.  I have done a lot of pastel baby cards and I wanted something a bit more vibrant – I also know that S and I share a love of purple.

Purple baby shower card

Purple baby shower card

Stamp-It flourish collage stamp in Adirondak Eggplant stamped on cream cardstock, edged in purple ink.  Layered on silver paper, and then onto a purple printed japanese paper.  Layered onto more silver, and then onto cream cardstock that has been prepared by stamping flourish from same set along the top and bottom, and edging in purple ink.  White flower edge in purple added to top corner and purple pearl added to the centre.

All stamps (except Congratulations) are from the Stamp-It A5 Set 20 (code: siset020mc) by Mickey Choo, which I got for my birthday last year from Wystii and N.  As with all the Mickey Choo and Laura Koh sets, the stamps are gorgeous – full of filigrees and flourishes and beautiful little touches.  I have a few of these sets, they an unmounted red rubber set that come already mounted on cling foam from a Western Australian company.  Good quality stamps and highly recommended.

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A January Birthday

March 31st, 2014

I’m a little behind with some of my updates.  I’ll try to get them up over the next week or so.

First up is a birthday card for one of  my work colleagues.

Summer floral birthday

Summer floral birthday

I liked the background paper and wanted to make it a feature.  So I found a stamp that had a similar style flower and used that on the front of the card in black, no other colouring.  the stamped image was edged in black, as was the gold paper.

I wanted to lift the colour palette a little, and so added the purple washi tape in the two corners.  Although all the layers of paper are taped down separately, the washi tape was positioned so look like it was holding it all together.

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