In Living Colour

Last week I used an old idea from about twelve months ago and this week I am using the same idea, but in a different way. The idea struck me when I was writing my blog last week; it doesn't always work that easily..... I wish!

Valentines is only a couple of days away so this could be a great quick make idea if you are stuck for inspiration. Failing that, you could resurrect it for Father's day or any other occasion where a masculine themed card is required.

I used one die set to make this card namely the Tags, Rounded Framelits set, one of my personal favourites and it's on sale as we speak so don't delay! I also used striped paper from the Lovebirds collection by Doodlebug Design.

Those of you who read last weeks blog will be familiar with the first three steps, I started by cutting a rectangle of striped card measuring about  9 x 6cm before using my craft knife to trim between each stripe along half the length of the rectangle. Next, I used my tweezers to grip the end of each stripe before curling them into different lengths.

I chose two of the rounded tag Framelits dies and cut shapes with the larger one from wood effect card, corrugated card and silver card ( all of which came from the good folks at Inspire Me Papers. Click on the link, the wood effect card in particular is stunning!). with the smaller of the two dies I cut only the wood effect card.

I took the large wood effect and silver die cuts and trimmed each to size, attached them together and secured with eyelets. With the smaller wood effect die cut, I punched a hole near the end and added a large eyelet. Next, I attached them all together using my trusty glue gun and a large 3D foam pad to attach the corrugated card (bristles!). Finally, I laced a length of cord through the handle.

My base card is cut from Kraft card and measures 17 x 10.5cm, onto which I printed the legend 'You bring colour to my life' before adding the striped paper at a jaunty angle. You will notice I have trimmed away one corner where I'm attaching the assembled brush.

And here it is, the finished card with the brush attached using 3D foam pads. All this leaves is for me to wish you a happy Valentines Day! I'm off to the Stitches trade show in Birmingham with the rest of the gang on Saturday, I'll let you know how we got on next week.

Chasing Rainbows!

I want to share a lovely story with you all, which happened last week while I was reading my 3 year old daughter (Pictured below in Daddy's glasses) a bed time story. As I was reading the book and ploughing through my full repertoire of facial contortions and silly voices she pointed straight at me and said 'Daddy, a rainbow!'. 

There is a moon shaped light on the wall behind me and I thought that she was talking about the light shining through what is left of my hair.

She continued to repeat 'a rainbow, a rainbow!' until she reached forward and lovingly traced each line in my forehead with her finger.

What a wonderful way to describe wrinkles, I hope they got there from smiling and not frowning!

So..... This week I decided to take rainbows as my theme, Sadly we don't currently make a rainbow die so I reached for my old friend the circle Framelits and I used two sets which provide me with every size I could ever need The sets are Circles and Circles #2.

I picked out 6 circle dies which, for the instructions, we shall number with 6 being the largest and 1 being the smallest.

I chose my rainbow colours from quality heavyweight card stock (Inspire Me Papers are super quality) and cut each one in turn I also used circle #3 to cut a hole in the centre of the red, orange, yellow and green circles. The blue circle is cut using die #2, with die #1 used to cut the hole in the centre. Next, I matted them together using PVA glue before cutting the concentric circles in half using craft knife and steal ruler (Don't discard the other half!)

To make the little clouds I used the smallest Framelits die in the Scalloped Ovals set and cut two from white card, before trimming away the bottom third of each die-cut with scissors and re-attaching it with 3D foam pads to appear like overlapping clouds. Next I attached the clouds to the base of the rainbow using the pads.

Finally I made a 'Rainbow quote search' on my computer before settling for the words of wonderful Maya Angelou. I printed the quote onto a white card blank using my PC and attached my rainbow...Easy-peasy!

As I was getting ready to post my blog I noticed the other half of the rainbow sitting all by itself on the edge of my cutting mat. There can be no sadder sight than a discarded rainbow, that is, if it wasn't for the fact that it sat upside-down creating a beautiful rainbow smile.......