Mother's Day Card in Pastels

Hello, dears! Today I'd like to show you my recent card for Mother's Day. In many countries over the world it is still to be celebrated in early May.

I really like the subtle pastel palette of this card. Even though I'm always excited to celebrate spring with an explosion of bright and juicy colours, my eye rests on a combination of peach, beige and teal. Just like here :) These colors are among my forever favourites for any occasion.

    

The Artist Sees - wooden book

For this make I chose to decorate an MDF lockable box kit - wooden pattern book. Like most kits this takes a little bit of working out when it comes to construction however it is not complex. I started by constucting the box and my recommendation is that you add the hinge elements to the box lit first and let them dry BEFORE you then add them to the base of the box. The hinge pieces that go thorugh the box lid itself have to go though the box lid outer and then the panel for the inside of the box so they look strange as they are shaped to do this in layers. The rest of the box goes together in a very obvious way apart from teh locking mechanism  - there is a larger piece on the front as seen above and inside the box there is a samller piece and a little triangle - it is the little trianngle that locks the 3 pieces together and allows the lock to be slid in and out.

Having consturcted the box I then painted it all with white gesso and left it to dry. Once dried I covered the front and side of the box with plantarium rice paper and thhe inside box part with a second complimentary rice paper - the manuscript, botanical or bicycle rice papers would all work or a second piece of the planatrium paper - you will need two A4 sheets so bare this in mind when ordering as there is nothing more frustrating than finding part way through you don't have enough product. I used decoupage glue and varnish to attatch my rice paper but watered down PVA will also work - it needs to be the consistency of single cream or thinner if you are using the pva method.

For added details I then used Vintage Photo Archival distress ink and applied it thorugh Christmas Stencil 153 - it is so worth buying more generic stencils as a swirly one labelled Chiristmas can be used all year round making stencils a hard working tool in your crafty stash.

To decorate the front of the box I added a little piece of lace (there are lots in the haberdashary section of the website) with chipboard botanical floral chipboards, mint gilly flowers and a sentiment from the Da Vinci papers as these toned really well with the vintage photo ink. I added a scattering of chuncky glitter and then distressed the hinges, lock mechanisum and the flowers with umbra antique paste.

The world of rice papers is so worth exploring, the texture means they blend with the surface beautifully making them ideal for covering MDF but also for backgrounds on mixd media canvas project.

 

Hallo Spring Week - Garden pop up card

 Today for a Special Week I'd like to show you another unusual card. Spring is the beginning of the season for gardeners. After winter there is a lot of work to do. So my idea for Spring Week is greenhouse garden pop up card, which you can fold and it fits in the envelope.

Hello Spring Week - Pastel Cards

Hi Loves!

Spring is here and I am so happy! Blooms everywhere and fresh weather. 

I had this paper lying around for some time, and decided I will do spring cards, this collection is very Easter themed but like any paper collection you can mix it around and get something different!

Hello Spring Week - Diorama

I love Spring with the emergency of all of the spring flowers as the earth comes to life again and thought I would celebrate this and replace my Easter decorations with a piece that celebrates these feelings. I took an arched window mdf shape and small stand and painted both with country blue paint (any pale blue will work as you really are not going to see much of it by the time you have finished). Once the blue paint had dried I applied Pentart Vintage Effect medium to areas that I wanted to distress and once this had dried painted over everything with nimbus which is a green shade (country green will work as long it has a contrast with your base paint). Once the second layer of paint had dried I sanded back the surface - the areas with the vintage effect medium rub back easily to reveal the base colour.

 For decoration I hunted in my stash for papers that had a spring feel choosing Bloomville an old collection by Mintay but still instock. I cut out the large wreath from the front cover as the base to decorate the window along side lots of other elements from the papers. 

Mindful that the piece is viewable from the back and the wreath whilst pretty on the front had the cover text on the back I added some cheesecloth frayed at the edges to the frame and then the paper piece. This way the cheesecloth hides the back of the paper when the whole piece is viewed from the back. On top of the wreath I then added a chipboard wreath (forestry wreath will work well if you can't get the exact one I used). On top of this I then layered paper elements tucking in spring flower leaves some rainbow mixed paper flowers and dried reindeer moss.

For the base of the upright I added small wood slices, fuxxy cut elements, flowers and moss adding in some extra chipboards - wild meadow set tucking these inbetween some of the wood slices and adding the taller elements to the back of the frame until I was happy that I had created a spring meadow.

I hope you enjoyed your Easter break and can now look forward to spring and the warmth of the coming seasons.

Hello Spring Week - Wreath Card

 Hello, dear friends!

This year I'm keeping my promise and dedicating more time to spring and Easter projects. This beautiful and inspiring time of the year definitely deserves more attention. Here is my vision of a very spring-like card: it must have yellow flowers, pink tulips and green leaves :)

Shaped card for 70 birthday

Lately I am experimenting with different forms and shapes of cards. And these number shaped cards are amazing! 

But I must say cutting patterned paper to a shape of this card wasn't easy, especially for me, where everything has to be perfect. There is no shortcut way of doing it. Before all the trimmers, guillotines or dies we had to cut all the shapes using only scissors. And cutting patterned paper for this base was like back to the basic.