Making a rosette

There are probably easier ways to make a rosette but this is how I make them.

Apologies for the horrid papers used but daughters bf is staying with us for a few weeks until his new flat is ready and as a consequence I'm having to share my playroom and all of my decent stash hidden away. (Took me over 8 hours to tidy it up yesterday, oops) Like most of the cardweight capable punches my SU border punches don't like thin nasty paper and I would have had a better result if I'd used something thicker than cheap loo paper ;o)

Punch the entire length of 12*12 or a4 card stock and trim to the required width to create a band. In this case I used the SU lacey border and cut the black to 3" wide and the pink & white ( the photo shows the white back) to 2". Using a score board score evenly all the way across at about 1cm apart, for mine I scored at the beginning & middle of the pattern. It's worth pointing out that the entire rosette will be more than twice as large as the width you've chosen and the wider the band the more card you'll need. A 1" wide strip will only require 1 length of 12*12 whereas mine took 2 lengths of 12*12 for each layer.

Once scored fold to create concertinas taking care to fold in the same places of patterns for all the pieces.

Punch or nestie a circle of card, doesnt matter what card you use as it's going to be covered. I used a 1 3/8" SU punch which I then folded in half and marked across the centre with a pencil. If you are making a small rosette you don't need to mark the centre, this is just to help so that I get an even splay of folds. Use a very strong and quick drying glue over the edges of one half. I've gone overboard with my trusty tombow glue, not because I need to but so you can see the glue on the photo.

Start with one of the concertinas and tease into place around half of the circle. This is the time you'll wish you had a dozen fingers on each hand ;o) Hold it firmly in place until the glue dries, it should only be a minute or so if you've used a good strong glue and didnt apply too much. Mine took about 3 minutes! If you're making a small rosette and only need one strip you just need to bend the end to meet the start.

Repeat the glue on the bottom half and add the 2nd concertina, hold in place until dry again. If when you let go it starts to rise in the middle don't panic, this is quite normal and will be sorted out in a while.

If adding a second layer of folds lightly apply some glue to the top of the folds on the base layer. Don't go up to the centre or the edges, a band around the middle is sufficient. Gently ease the folds into place and push down. It can be a bit fiddly if you try to get the centre edges lined up so if need be trim away the centre edge a bit before putting into place. It doesnt matter if the top layers arent the same width because we're going to cover it. Once finished if necessary glue the ends together to neaten.

This is me teasing the folds into place, for once I've managed to hide how ink stained my fat lil puds are lol.

If you want to add a ribbon dangler glue it into place now.

Next step is to cover the centre, I'm looking for a more traditional rosette look so I've used the 2nd largest large circle nestie (black) and the next size down (pink) which has been embossed with a bug folder but any size would have worked provided it was large enough to cover the edge where the 2 layers of rosette meet. Add a strong glue to the back and position on the rosette and press down quite firmly.






As you can see from the pic it's still trying to lift up in the middle. You can hold it down for a while if you want, I prefer to just plonk one of my heavier punches on top and clear off to make a cuppa lol. By the time the tea is made and drunk the rosette will be perfectly flat and ready to decorate or use as an embellie.














Not sure what I'm going to do with this whopper as it measures nearly 6" across but the lil one I made (on the first picture and made from a single inch strip) will no doubt end up on a card at some point.

Happy Birthday Alex

It's my sons girlfriends birthday tomorrow and she loves bathtime and lots of bling so I made this whopper for her using stamps from the Flippin Women series. Made from 2 sheets of acetate it's 8 1/2" by 6 3/4". Going to have to make a box later as it's such an unusual size.

Pale lilac card, dcwv glitter card, prima flowers, MS punch around the page, SU bird punch (branch), crystal stickles & gems

promarker, ivory & blush

copic, r27, rv000, rv21, rv23, rv34, v12 v15, v09, b00, yr23, yr31g02, g05, c1

The greeting is a 3" sqre piece of whisper white and punched around with the greetings stamped with elegant eggplant, rich razzleberry & melon mambo.

Another 3d rose easel card

For those who don't know me in real life tomorrow is one of those mile stone events I never thought I'd see.

My niece was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia at age 5 then again at 11. Thanks to the Anthony Nolan trust a bone marrow donor was found just in the nick of time and although she didnt have an easy time with the transplant tomorrow she's going to be 21. NB, for all the ladies at an old egroup called papercrafts, she still has all the cards and mementoes you all kindly sent her. Thanks once again for keeping her spirits up.

Like my last easel card I've used a MS punch around the page set and have made a super sized easel card. The roses were cut with scal before having some stickles applied to the edge of a few petals and a Leone Em branch with leaves punch. I've used a Clarity flourish stamp to add a border to the base and behind the central panel. I mistakenly used a pearlised card which doesnt like ink so the elegant eggplant ink isnt a true dark purple any more but I liked the effect so I didnt start again as I often do lol. Underneath the ribbon I've added a key and padlock charm, these were made with a spellbinders die on clear shrink plastic which had been inked over with some silver alchie ink and stamped with the same clarity flourish in elegant eggplant. The detail doesnt show on the pic but I'm really pleased with them. Finally the sentiment was stamped before being punched with 2 SU oval punches then 3d'd to give a lip for the easel to sit on. I might have a go later at cutting a 21 charm on some shrink plastic with the cricut but then again I might not lol. If I do I'll let you all know how the cricut liked it.

Card box

I'm having fun making boxes at the mo. This is one made to fit 5 5" sqr cards.

I've used co'rdinations white card to make the box (not great card as it's quite thin) with SU snowflakes stamped in brocade blue (I'm seriously gutted that this colour will no longer be available after Sep 30th) with matching card stock punched with a MS around the page punch set before having a snowflake stamped and embossed with white SU EP.

The lid has some brocade blue ribbon threaded through a white cardstock buckle cut on my cricut with scal before being stickied with a zig 2 way glue pen then dipped into a pot of dazzling diamonds. A few sticky gems have been added.


Here's a very basic guide to making the box. It's suprisingly quick and easy to make and can be made from 1 sheet of 12*12 card. I'm assuming everyone knows how to make a box so I'm not going to waffle, just show the scores and where to stick.

This is the size and scoring lines for the lid. If you're using a decent weight cardstock I'd add an extra 1/8th inch to allow extra room for the base to fit. Because of the irregular size it's easiest to score at 1.5" on a hougie/ms board or normal trimmer with scoring blade before rotating 90 degrees, score again at 1.5" and repeat until the 4 sides are scored otherwise you'd have to score at odd measurements and not all boards are capable of scoring at 2 5/8ths.

Under normal circumstances I'd use my fabby tombow glue to stick the sides together but rather than showing a dozen boring pics showing each flap being glued I've just used some dst and photoed it in place.

For the box it's far easier to decorate before assembling. Don't forget the lid is going to hide the top 1.5" so make allowances while placing any central panels. When assembling tuck the small inner panel in first.














I've added a black & white jpg for the buckle, SCAL users please feel free to copy and use scal to auto trace.








If you're a novice at making boxes or my loose instructions don't make sense please feel free to email me. Please note the folding template is not to scale.

2 birds with 1 stone

I'm sure I'm not the only person that buys cardmaking mags only to put the freebies to one side never to be seen again while the mag is in the recycling box within minutes. After buying the craftstamper this month (only cuz the craftshop was sooo poor

there was nowt else to buy and it's rude to not buy a thing lol) I decided that perhaps I ought to use the freebie stamp. It just so happens that I've got several of my docraft buddies coming up to play on Sunday and I needed to find a project similar to a photobox but not using chipboard. I found a sweet atc case in the mag sooo here's my atc case using the freebie seashell stamp with some seaweed from Lavinia stamps. I used several blue & green distress inks for the background but the seaweed was stamped with taken with teal and garden green inks from SU. The seashell is stamped with versamark before being dusted with perfect pearls. MS punched corners, a brad and some sparkly elastic for the fastener. If I'd used pretty card for the base rather than getting inky it would have been a really quick project.


This is one took a lot of teeth gnashing as you have to be so spot on with measurements when using MS punch around the page punches. 2 sides were out by a teeny amount which gave me a wee bit of bother when it came to lining up the centres. Still I got there :o)

3d rose cut with scal stamped with a clarity flourish & perfect pearls before being assembled. Flourish from accent essentials (2nd time I've used a cart in over 2 years) Raffia bow with white pearls tinted with yr31 copic. Docrafts (I think) sentiment.

Dads Birthday card

It's Dads 65th birthday in a few days time and he's worse than most blokes to make cards for!!

This is the one I made for Tracys challenge, christening those unused stamps we all have lying about in the cupboards. he base card was using about 6 different distress inks in various browns and greens before being stamped with a Rhonna Farr (will double check and amend later if I'm wrong) 2 step flourish stamp. I've used a coppery gold for the outline part of the stamp and SU handsome hunter green for the filled in part of the flourish. The central image is from Clarity stamps and is using sepia versafine with a Penny Black sentiment.

I doubt Dad will get the distressed look or appreciate the work it takes to make a card from nothing but white card & ink but I'm happy enough with it.

NB. Guess who was right lol. Dad held it up portrait style and said yeh that's all right. Then proceeded to read the blank page of the insert hehe I should have said "Should have gone to spec savers" but I wasnt that quick lol just told him I thought he ought to put his specs on. Mum wasnt quite as bad but she preferred the quick cards I'd made as part of a stationary set for her. last birthday. Next year they'll both get dufex diecut decoupage (yuck yuck, blueghhhhh) ;o)

Not paper this time

While in that large Swedish store I found some plain wooden photo frames that were begging to be tarted up. They're dirt cheap (1.49 for 3) and I thought they'd be fun for when my docraft buddies come over to play.

Seeing as they're coming this Mon I thought it might be best to have a trial run, just in case I had the wrong end of the stick when catching the last 2 mins of a demo on C&C lol.







Sorry for the colours, I had to use the flash then fiddle with the settings in psp otherwise you'd just be looking at a dark mass.

I started by roughly wiping an ink pad (elegant eggplant) over the frame just to give a bit of colour incase I ended up with a clear patch.

Using versamark and some clear utee I triple embossed the frame, not be too worried about a perfect coverage.

Once the clear utee was dry I dabbed the versamark pad small section by section each time using a different colour normal ep. (fab technique as you can use up all your old and horrible powders) Once I had a pretty random colouring I went back over with some cosmic shimmer utee and ep. They arent a truly solid colour when over normal utee so some of the colours from the naff powders came through, which is the effect I was looking for.

Once I was semi happy with the colouring I used the heat tool to melt the top layers before stamping with a clarity flourish and some gold brilliance ink.

The frame's not finished yet, once the girls get here I'll be adding more powders as well as adding some embellies made by pouring liquid utee onto some stamps. So far I'm quite chuffed with how it's looking but we'll see what Mon brings. Either way even if I mess up it can just be melted and more powders added.

Playday

Some of my docraft buddies came up for a playday this week. We were supposed to be making 3d flowers but I'd cut a few tags each so we had something to put them on. Thankfully I'd kept the tags out of sight until a couple of flowers had been made because once the tags were out all thoughts of floral went out the window as the sponges got to work with some inks.

Fab day as always but made especially fun with Kay & Tanya joining us for the first time. Even though it meant taking a day off of work and a really long way to come. Hope we havent put you off coming again ladies.



This is how messy we got after just a couple of tags.








As per normal on a playday I was up & down like a jack rabbit getting more & more stash to play with. Combined with pleas for more tags to decorate I didnt get a single tag made on Mon so I made these last night.


A sneaky peek with this one, woohooo Bird on a Branch from Stampin Up. Up until next month (hint hint) this was a US set only. I've needed this set for yonks after repeatedly seeing it on Michelle Zindorfs blog.

A couple of brown distress inks & en francais for the background before being stripped back with a mist of water and some heavy duty blotting.

Bird & tree from the new set, pocket silhouettes foreground folage & lavinia leaves stamped in close to cocoa & choc chip SU ink before sponging close to cocoa and a distress ink around the base.



This is one of those times where the colours arent a patch on real life. Thanks to perfect pearls this tag shimmers in real life and the colours really catch the mood of a violent sunset.

Nick Bantock, Distress & SU inks blended with enfrancais stamped in close to cocoa. PTI flourish with gold perfect pearls. Elusive Images floral stamp embossed with gold ep, coloured with hunter green & real red ink. It's supposed to be for a topper for a mothers day card but I don't think I'll be letting it go.

Docrafts GG Challenge

I can't remember the last time I had chance to make a card just for fun and not as a sample for my stampin up or surecutsalot blog but I decided to make time today albeit using my scalloped circle easel card template.

This one is for the gorgeous girls challenge on the Docrafts forum.







Base card, "nesties" & flowers cut on my cricut.

GG coloured with Copics, bv00, 02, v95, g21, e71 41 47 Ivory & blush promarker

En Francais background stamp from SU in lavender lace ink.

Either a hero arts or pennyblack sentiment in elegant eggplant.

Flowers have been sponged with certain celery ink before the central one was stamped with a flourish from Season of Joy and brushed with purple pearl ex.

Leone em frond punch.

Angie and Sandras Box, framed card/book to fit inside

We're on the final leg now and I can recharge the poor batteries in my camera.

For each page you'll need a sheet of paper the same size as the paper you used for your box, a photo or piece of card 7.5cms sqr for 6*6 papers, 10cms sqr for 8*8 paper as well as 1 less piece if card 5cms sqr or 7cms square for the hinges. I made 6 pages so only needed 5 hinges. If each page is going to be heavily embellished or you use a thick paper 6 would be the maximum pages that would fit the smaller box. Thin paper with photos and rubdowns you would probably get about 10 pages and you can fit more pages if using 8*8 papers.


Start off by bringing the sides into the middle and folding, unfold, turn and repeat. If you have difficulty finding the centre line you can fold the paper in half first either across or diagonally but this will leave you with extra creases showing on the finished frame. I havent worried about it for the step by step but if I was making this as an extra special gift I would probably measure and score the lines with an embossing tool. Ignore all the extra creases on the pic, I'd forgot to photo it so had to go back in at the end, oops.

With the right side showing fold the corner into the middle, repeat for all 4 corners before opening out.

Turn the paper over and fold the corners to the diagonal crease line. Do not open back out.

This is the part of origami I call squidging ;o) Very carefully pinch the sides of one corner into each other while making sure that tiny folded over corner stays flat.

As the corner comes into itself you'll get a triangle popping up. Keeping a finger or thumb holding the base down use your other hand to push it flat.

Use the bone folder to make sure the edges are nice and crisp.

Once the 4 corners are done you'll have a shape like these. They will want to keep popping up but don't worry.

Very carefully slid the four corners of your photo/card into the four corner pockets. If you're using a very thick card it's a good idea to have shaved off 1mm of 2 sides of the card. I didn't bother even though I was using 300gsm ribbled card. You might find the page is now bowing, I like to turn them over and use the side of the bone folder to gently iron them flat.

Your page should now look like this and you can either decorate or skip straight to joining 2 pages together with a hinge.

Take the hinge square and fold in half diagonally, open out and fold back the other way along the same fold line. This is so the pages will fold in both directions.

Add a small strip of dst just along the side of the crease and carefull place in the side gap of one of your pages. Once the side of the page is next to the crease of the hinge squeeze so the dst sticks in the right place.

Add dst to the other side of the crease on the hinge and insert into the gap of the next page. Not sure if you can see the detail or not but the page on the right has creases across the corner. This is what happens if you found the middle of the paper by folding the paper diagonally. The page on the left has no crease because I found the middle by folding length wise.

I made 6 pages for my card and carefully inserted a piece of ribbon to the inside gaps at the back of the final page. It isnt essential but I wanted to secure the book and give something to help ease it from the box.

Finished but undecorated book/card inside the box.

Now if you don't want to make a box to hold you're book in you don't have to and you don't even have to use these pages in the same way as I have. By making 6 pages and 6 hinges you can turn the pages into sides of a cube simply by adding the hinges on all of the sides.

Huge thanks to Angie and Sandra for the day & demo. I know they'd love to see any of the boxes or books you make using this tutorial, so please leave a link. You're also more than welcome to shout if I've confused things with the step by step.

hugs

Angie and Sandras Box, base

If I'm taking photos that my fat fingers are going to be in I would normally take the time to make sure my nails were nice and clean, possibly with a bit of polish but I promised Kay I'd do the pictures complete with grubby nails and ink stains. The ink's worn off Kay but the nails are pretty bad ;o)

Anyway enough of that here's the step by step for the box. BTW the papers used are from a pretty old Branda Walton, K&Copad, Dolls House and trimmed down to 6*6.


Again remember your pattern match.

Step 1 fold the paper in half lengthways as you would to make a regular card, open out turn and repeat so you have a nice cross fold line.

Step 2 Bring the sides in to meet the middle as you would for a gatefold card, fold and open.
Step 3 You have a choice now of easy or tricky. Easy is folding the paper diagonally bottom left to top right corner and unfolding. I've shown the trickier version, fold diagonally but only crease from the bottom to the mid point before unfolding.

Step 4 Bring the bottom left corner to the middle and fold. This corner does not have a crease on the diagonal. Do not open back out.

Step 4 Bring the top 1/4 down to the middle and fold. The score line will already be there.

Hold the top fold and the diagonal fold with your left hand and with your right gently pull the bottom right corner down and underneath towards the left.

You will now have a completed corner.

Once you have the 4 corners made again carefully tuck one inside the other but only by a small amount and gently turn the box upside down

If you can see any points you need to tuck these to the inside.

Once all the points are tucked in gently pat each of the corners into each other until you have a tight fit.

Flip the box over and gently ease down the triangular flaps.

The box is finished now bar any decoration you want to add.

My next post will be making the framey card which will fit inside. I havent started it yet so it won't be until this evening. If you're in a rush there is a very basic step by step in my gallery at docrafts.