I've got a couple of very different cards to share today both made using the exact same two dies - the Dainty Blooms Cover Die from Altenew and the Big Happy Birthday Die from Mama Elephant.
For the first card I die cut the dainty blooms 3 times, from Papaya, Pesto and Pebble Hero Arts Cardstock. Pebble was the frame and then I pieced in the papaya for the blooms and pesto for the leaves, adhering it all onto a white background and leaving some gaps of white so the image reads more clearly.
Once I'd pieced it all together I blended some darker colour onto the leaves and petals with copics and then glued them all down - I won't lie - it took a while, but paper piecing is one of my favourite parts of paper crafting and I love a jigsaw so this time I did it manually one piece at a time. However you can significantly speed it up by applying press and seal to the die cut before removing it from the die, remove the pieces you don't need then put press and seal on the front, glue the back and piece them all in at once.
Once I was happy with the overall design I wanted to add a sentiment but I didn't want to cover up all my hard work so I decided to get into a little double-die cut action and cut the sentiment from the finished piece. Now this is essentially two layers of quality cardstock so it will take a couple of passes and a shim but it will cut. I mounted it to a white base card and added 3 stacked layers of black behind the sentiment to make it stand out and then finished with some liquid pearls in yellow to fill in the stamens.
Then, I had a leftover papaya and pesto frame to play with so decided to make another card. For this one I used the papaya frame but brushed some Altenew Enchanted Gold ink over the top to give it a richer finish. I then picked out the stamens and leaves with metallic markers and added the whole thing to an Antique Ivory base card.
Again I didn't want to cover the whole design with the sentiment but I wanted to stick with the same die, so this time I cut it from two layers of vellum and glued that together and over the top - you can still see the design through but the double layer of vellum breaks it up enough that your eye easily reads the words.
NEWS FROM THE STORE
We are expecting the latest mini release from MFT this week along with lots of restocks but it may take us a while to get them into store as we have a LOT of orders to process following our heatwave sale and orders always take priority for us. We will do our best to catch up as quickly as we can but other than Monday when Liz works for us - there are just two of us doing EVERYTHING - we really are a small independent store as much as you think we're hobbycraft!
We will also be getting some Kuretake paints and pens back as a new UK distributor has started to stock a small range. Zig pens won't be back as the price point has doubled.
We will have some restocks from Ranger - we are still waiting on oxides to come back into stock but hope they will have a delivery soon.
We've had lots of people asking for the Lawn Fawn ruler - we can't get it as they aren't selling it a wholesale prices. I know another USA store is selling it but they are selling it at a higher retail point than Lawn Fawn themselves as they bought it at retail prices - if we do that and then apply the import costs - it would be over £22 for us to sell it not at a loss. So.... we've found a few alternatives and they will be in store this week too fingers crossed.
We will also have a few Fiskars paper trimmers and craft knifes - we are trying to add "essentials" to store as we grow along with the USA brands you know us for - we hope this will make us a more convenient one-stop shop so if there are non-USA essentials you'd like to see in store please let us know.
Catch you later
Tara
For the first card I die cut the dainty blooms 3 times, from Papaya, Pesto and Pebble Hero Arts Cardstock. Pebble was the frame and then I pieced in the papaya for the blooms and pesto for the leaves, adhering it all onto a white background and leaving some gaps of white so the image reads more clearly.
Once I'd pieced it all together I blended some darker colour onto the leaves and petals with copics and then glued them all down - I won't lie - it took a while, but paper piecing is one of my favourite parts of paper crafting and I love a jigsaw so this time I did it manually one piece at a time. However you can significantly speed it up by applying press and seal to the die cut before removing it from the die, remove the pieces you don't need then put press and seal on the front, glue the back and piece them all in at once.
Once I was happy with the overall design I wanted to add a sentiment but I didn't want to cover up all my hard work so I decided to get into a little double-die cut action and cut the sentiment from the finished piece. Now this is essentially two layers of quality cardstock so it will take a couple of passes and a shim but it will cut. I mounted it to a white base card and added 3 stacked layers of black behind the sentiment to make it stand out and then finished with some liquid pearls in yellow to fill in the stamens.
Then, I had a leftover papaya and pesto frame to play with so decided to make another card. For this one I used the papaya frame but brushed some Altenew Enchanted Gold ink over the top to give it a richer finish. I then picked out the stamens and leaves with metallic markers and added the whole thing to an Antique Ivory base card.
Again I didn't want to cover the whole design with the sentiment but I wanted to stick with the same die, so this time I cut it from two layers of vellum and glued that together and over the top - you can still see the design through but the double layer of vellum breaks it up enough that your eye easily reads the words.
NEWS FROM THE STORE
We are expecting the latest mini release from MFT this week along with lots of restocks but it may take us a while to get them into store as we have a LOT of orders to process following our heatwave sale and orders always take priority for us. We will do our best to catch up as quickly as we can but other than Monday when Liz works for us - there are just two of us doing EVERYTHING - we really are a small independent store as much as you think we're hobbycraft!
We will also be getting some Kuretake paints and pens back as a new UK distributor has started to stock a small range. Zig pens won't be back as the price point has doubled.
We will have some restocks from Ranger - we are still waiting on oxides to come back into stock but hope they will have a delivery soon.
We've had lots of people asking for the Lawn Fawn ruler - we can't get it as they aren't selling it a wholesale prices. I know another USA store is selling it but they are selling it at a higher retail point than Lawn Fawn themselves as they bought it at retail prices - if we do that and then apply the import costs - it would be over £22 for us to sell it not at a loss. So.... we've found a few alternatives and they will be in store this week too fingers crossed.
We will also have a few Fiskars paper trimmers and craft knifes - we are trying to add "essentials" to store as we grow along with the USA brands you know us for - we hope this will make us a more convenient one-stop shop so if there are non-USA essentials you'd like to see in store please let us know.
Catch you later
Tara
