Thank You Card for a Nurse

I needed to make another thank you for card for a nurse again, but felt the need for a change from the ones I've quilled in the past (1 and 2). So instead I used my much neglected die cutter to cut one that I could shape and sculpt instead.

Starting off with her initial, I shaded the edges with an ink pad and adhered foam dots on the back, just to give it a bit more dimension. Everything was cut from metallic paper, so you'll notice a hint of sheen catching highlights. Adding the sculpted die punched flowers at the top left was easy, and just gives a bit of character to the initial.

It's the stethoscope that I enjoyed making most. I envisioned a doctor hanging their stethoscope around their neck or on some equipment, signifying they were done for the day. So that's what I did on the corner of the letter. Letting the tube wrap around itself was pure fun. It's hard to see here, but the circle holding up the heart is raised a bit because I added some hole punched circles under it.

Dotting glue in targeted locations is the key to making it seem like it's just swaying. It's the overlap of the tube that I placed the most amount of glue to really secure it. A tiny dab in the remaining touching areas was enough to secure the loose ends, yet let it still be airy.

Yes, it's subtle, and does one really notice? But it's these little things that I enjoy making most because it gives a lively sense without using a sledgehammer.

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Jack O' Lantern Pumpkin Party Favor Box

Who has their carving tools ready? It's still a bit early to start digging in for Halloween, but this Jack O' Lantern doesn't need any gutting.

His perky stem comes with spiralling vines for extra fun.

There are three friendly faces to choose from, and when cut from yellow paper, appear to have an inner candlelit glow.

The pumpkin itself offers a decent size for ghoulish treats. It's easily cut from just two sheets of 8.5"x11" in green and orange, attached simply by two orange brads. So fun to assemble with little ones. It's now available in my shop.

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Die Cut Elephant Card

When I am imagining a project, I am often surprised it turns out how I see it in my head because I don't feel that way about my illustrations. When it works, it feels like the planets have aligned and it just feels good. This isn't one of those times. I hope posting this will help others learn from it anyway.

Since I had such success with making my own paper flocking, I wanted to do it again for a birthday card for our nephew. I used a double-sided adhesive sheet. You can see here how I'm peeling away the two sides to access the sticky inner sheet.

After cutting the elephant, I removed the bottom sheet and unwanted sticky areas, then applied to my card background.

Next came the fun flocking making and the start of my disappointment.

Although the adhesive sheet grabbed onto the paper fuzz, it was in such a patchy fashion, it made my elephant appear to have some kind of skin problem. Plus you can see just at his feet there, that it was kind of see-through, which is not what I had wanted.

I also thought I left a great leeway for the letter and saddle details to show through, by keeping it quite simple and large. However, I didn't like how I can't see the serifs and subtle skewing of the letter.

I use Adobe Illustrator to create my designs. Here are the settings I used to skew the letter to make it appear like it was really draping along the saddle. I know it's not that big a deal, but for me, these subtle details make a project sing.

Since I ran out of time and couldn't make another plain paper version, I had to buy a card {gasp!}. Why does my brain only kick into high gear when I have just 2 hours to go? Now that I look back on this project with calm eyes, I could have simply crumpled the blue elephant to mimic the elephant's skin and saved myself time. Oh well, next year!

Has anyone been working with paper flocking?

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Die Cut Happy Birthday Cards

I had several birthdays to celebrate this month and wanted to make them with my Silhouette SD. I thought I would make one design and customize to match the recipient's favorite colors. This pink and purple one is for our niece who turned 13.

I have long admired paper cutters who cut by hand with a craft knife, but any time I think about trying it, I run the other way because I just don't have the patience for it. I finally drew a cake without measuring a single thing - no rulers or straight lines or grids or pre-thinking it. The fine lines are a delicate piece to remove from the adhesive mat and I manually thickened some areas to make gluing easier, but this is still not something I'd want to make many times over. My laziness is quite the task master!

I dabbed a glue stick like a bingo card - up and down, not rubbing across, or else the glue goes underneath the paper and would show in front. Again, the fineness is a hindrance.

As you can see, there is not much gluing surface here and a little too far on one side means you'll see it from the front so some fussing with the lines are needed.

In the end, I love how the thick black paper feels on top of the metallic colors below. It's a tactile thing that isn't quite the same if I put the colored piece on top, which would have been much easier.

Does anyone else come across this dilemma? Which do you prefer to do - difficult and tactile with challenging gluing OR larger, easier to glue pieces that go on top of the black?

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