Space Themed Name Plaque

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Last weekend my youngest had a birthday party to go to. I decided to make a name plaque for the birthday boy.  I know he likes football, but I wanted to go with something different. I had the Star Studded font in mind and so a space theme seemed like a good fit.

For all the components I glued 4 layers of 280gsm Kraft card together using PVA glue.  When the glue dries the resulting stack is nice and stiff and has the feel of chipboard or MDF.  I left them under something heavy while drying to prevent warping.

I started by creating the plaque base with my Brother Scan N Cut by welding rectangles and semi-circles together on the mat.  Rough dimensions were 20 x 10 cm rectangle + 25 x 7.5 cm rectangle + 2 x semi-circles with 50mm diameter.  Added 2 x 0.5cm holes at either end for hanging.  I also printed out the space background from a digital download collection from Creative Fabrica and cut one plaque shape from that.

I then cut the letters and saved the starry waste to use as small embellishments.   The actual font was a little more squat than I wanted so this is a slightly elongated version to fit the plaque better.  I used silver acrylic paint to cover the letters and stars.

The moon and planet were from the library of files that come pre-loaded with the Scan N Cut machine. Again I used acrylic paint on those.  Then it was simply a case of assembling the components.

Resources:
Star Studded Font
Space Watercolor Backgrounds

Floral Friends Box Frames

I bought a few of the girls from the Tattered Lace Floral Friends die collection - Lily, Jasmine and Poppy.  I've been calling them flower fairies, but I think that they are actually just girls wearing floral costumes.  I do like the idea of them being fairies though so maybe I'll just stick with that.

The dies are 3D decoupage dies, which means that they have multiple layers that can be stacked together to give the finished die cut added dimension.  I bought them with the intention of using them in box frames to make cute wall art and I finally got around to putting a few together.

          

It was difficult to capture in the photos, but I've added some glitter accents to some of the dresses and flowers. These would look really sweet in a kid's bedroom.  I'm going to make a couple to my nieces-in-law for Christmas.  They are dancers and  I think they would love these.  All four are now available in my Folksy shop.

Halloween Tea Light Covers

I don't really do Halloween, but the kids enjoy it and so I thought that it would be nice for them to have some Halloween decorations this year.  Even though I've had the Enchanted Forest Bundle from CraftBundles.com for a while, I'm still working my way through it.   One of the collections within the big Bundle is Enchanted Spiders, which I had completely forgotten about.  But then my friend asked me to create a poster for her kid's school's Halloween disco and that's when I rediscovered it.

There are a few files that I thought would lend themselves perfectly to being made into tea light covers.  One of the designs worked straight out of the box so to speak, but the others needed some adjustments (which I did in Canvas Workspace) to make it easier for the panels to be stuck together.  I added vellum to the backs of each panel.

I resized this one so that it was about 10cm (4in) wide and then cut four. Then I folded the decorative elements over and glued each panel together at those points to create the tea light cover.

This one is similar, but I had to modify the spider and web so that there were no gaps between the elements and the panel could be lifted off the mat in one piece.  That was fairly easily done in Canvas.

For these I simply welded a rectangular strip to both the left and right sides of the panel in Canvas to act as the adhesion point.  I really like the way the branches stick out in the first set.

Unfortunately I couldn't find my LED tea lights :( so I couldn't photograph them in action, but I'm pretty sure that they'll look great.

As an added bonus, I was able to make use of the waste as well by sticking double-sided tape to card and using that to lift the waste off the cutting mat.  I then sprinkled silver and gold glitter over the surface. The results could be used as toppers on greetings cards or on bunting or garlands or for other decorations.

Lantern "waste".
(I just couldn't capture it here, but they really sparkle in real life.)

These are only a handful of the 46 images in the Enchanted Spiders collection, which means plenty more choice to play around with.  And with 280 images in the whole bundle covering birds, butterflies, bears, deer, foxes, fairies and unicorns there really are a multitude of options and possibilities.  At only $9 including a full commercial licence it's a crazy bargain! Get the bundle here.

*This post contains affiliate links.  If you click on the link and make a purchase later I will receive a commission at no extra cost to you.  However I bought and paid for this bundle myself and I'm recommending it because I really like it.

Crafting on the Go

We went camping a few weeks ago and I wanted to take something crafty with me; something portable that wouldn't take up too much space.  I found some old card that I had embossed using some Darice embossing folders, which were perfect for colouring in.  Along with my watercolour palette and a water brush I had enough to keep me entertained in a nice, compact package.  This roses image is so pretty and I love the end result.  It would look beautiful on the front of a card, or simply displayed in a frame as a piece of art.

Snowflake Christmas Card

Every year Christmas manages to sneak up on me! You'd think by now I'd have cottoned on, but come the beginning of December I'm always astounded by how close the big day is.  I have managed to make a few Christmas cards though.

This card is based on an old design that I made with white and Kraft card.  The snowflake is actually a doily (Couture Creations Cecily Doily), but I thought that it looked very much like a snowflake and would look great against a snowy background.

I cut the doily in half and placed each half at the top and bottom of the card.  I added a few pearls to some of the circles within the doily for a bit of extra prettiness.  The "Merry Christmas" sentiment is from another Couture Creations set - Merry Layered Stars.

This design, although simple does take a bit of time to complete because of adding small dots of glue to the doily die cut and sticking on the pearls, but could easily be modified to make it quickly reproducible.

• At first I created the background using paint splatters on blue card, but to save time I used a graphics program to create my snowy background. Download it here. 
• Use a double sided adhesive sheet with the doily die cut or a brayer to apply the glue to save time
• Use self-adhesive pearls or pearl enamel drops (much less fiddly than loose pearls).

I have an extra Cecily Doily and Merry Layered Stars set on eBay if you'd like to recreate this card:

Get the Cecily Doily Die
Get the Merry Layered Stars Die Set

Redbubble Holiday Card Design Challenge

A few weeks ago Redbubble hosted a series of design challenges and I decided to enter.  The brief for Week 1 was to create a vintage-inspired card or pattern artwork.  This was my submission:

"Eat, Drink & Get Hammered" Greetings Card

...and I was chosen as a runner-up!  You can read the post on the Redbubble blog here.  Or better yet, head over to my Redbubble listing and take a closer look.  Buy multiple greetings cards (they don't all have to be the same) and get a discount of up to 50%.

This post contains affiliate links.  If you click on a link and subsequently make a purchase I will receive a commission at no extra cost to you.

Freebie Friday - So Special Card Front

This post contains affiliate links which means that if you follow the links and then make a purchase I will receive a commission at no extra cost to you.

I'm a bit of a craft supply junkie - whether it's physical or digital products my house and my hard drive are chock full with supplies that I love, but hardly ever use, but shopping for craft supplies is only half the fun.  There's joy to be found in the making too, so I'm making a concerted effort to use what I've got.

A little while ago I downloaded the graphics pack 'Herbaceous Greens'.   It is a set of watercolour greenery - branches, foliage and individual leaves - as well as 9 seamless patterns.  I used it to create this lovely A6 card front, which you can download for free from here (personal use only please):

You Are So Special A6 card front - Free Download

If you like the look of the set you can get the complete pack for just $1 (until the end of October) from The Hungry Jpeg.