Monday, February 15, 2016

WILD Birthday Tri-Shutter Card

I was supposed to use this long (Family Day) weekend to develop the three Tri-Shutter cards for my workshop later this month. Well, I got 1 of 3 done! This one I made for my father-in-law's birthday. It's not always easy to come up with cards for men. So, as this design came together in my mind, I decided to make it a Tri-Shutter so I can use it in my class!

I knew I wanted to use an oval on one of the Tri-Shutter cards, so that was the first idea. I really liked the little raccoon from the last card I made, so I wanted to do another little animal. That was the second idea. I was trolling around for inspiration and I saw this card on the SplitCoast Stampers. That gave me the idea of how to suggest a simple ground and sky design. (Mine is pretty faint in the pictures but visible in real life!)

With those three bits of inspiration, I made this (click for larger view):

I water-coloured the fox by colouring directly on a solid stamp. I coloured the whole fox red, the scarf in teal and the present in a pale purple. Then I went over the areas I wanted to with a black sharpie pen.

The inside, I wrote on a tag I designed and cut with my ScanNCut:
Tri-Shutter cards don't leave a lot of room for sentiments, so this one was short and sweet. However, if you really wanted do, you can use the back panel for additional sentiment space. It is completely covered when the card is shut.
Although I coloured directly on the stamp, I did take an ever-so-slightly damp paintbrush and smoothed out the red a touch. Red is pesky if you make a mistake so I had to exercise extreme restraint and just touch it up a little - not to perfection.

The fox stamp was from the Michaels' sales bins. The sentiment is from a Close to My Heart set and the "WILD" die cut letters is from a very old Quickutz alphabet called Eliza. The ovals are Stampin' Up! dies. The Tri-Shutter base is my Accucut Craft die. I do know how to make one from scratch, but I'm hit and miss with an exacto knife, so having the die is a real plus!

I have an idea for the second Tri-Shutter design for the class. Now to make it happen and to find a third idea!

Saturday, February 6, 2016

10th Birthday Shaker Card - Give a Poem a Home

Here's my latest creation! My nephew celebrated his milestone 10th birthday in a quiet affair with cake and gifts at home. As there was no theme this year, I could use anything in my crafting stash. I decided it was time to break out the Woodland Cuties stamps set I got from Your Next Stamp at Scrapfest. I was so eager to have it and yet it has taken months to actually use it!

Here's my shaker card, using the raccoon.

I looked at how some of the design team coloured the raccoon to do mine. I used my Copic Markers in cool greys. The balloons are just circle punches on metallic and glitter papers, affixed with twine strings. (I guess I could have glue the strings on top of the hand.)


I made the shaker using a a pocket I made from a regular, office supply, page protector. I used a wood burning tool to seal the pocket but, since all the edges are concealed, I could have just used tape to seal the pocket.

My two favourite images from this stamp set are the raccoon and the fox. So sweet! Here's the poem I composed for the inside. It's gender neutral and you can use it for any birthday with a single syllable year!

It's your birthday!
Oh me! Oh my!
10 years gone
In the blink of an eye!

10 years of love,
Family and fun
And 10 years of wishing
Many more to come!


Hope you enjoyed today's project and poem for a 10 year old.

Wednesday, February 3, 2016

(Healthy) Distractions

Sorry it's been quiet on the blog. Here's why!


We adopted this 6-year old girl and she's been filling our schedule with walking and petting. I've hardly spent any time either in my craft room or at my computer. I do have a card to post but isn't this cuter?

A crafty post next time - promise!