Happy 2014

Welcome to 2014. I will have to say that 2013 was a great year for me regarding crafting, creating, and blogging. As for the successes, I am the most proud that:

(1) I finished the sketchbook project (click on the NYJournal link below to see all of those posts);

(2) I finished all 26 Iron Craft 2013 projects (click on the IronCraft13 link below to see all of those posts);

(3) I shared 52 handmade greeting cards throughout the year (one per week--click on the WeeklyCard link to see all of these posts);

(4) I shared my collection of craft books (click on the BookReview link to see all of these posts);

(3) I blogged every weekday for the entire year;

(4) I blogged all 31 days of October for the Halloween Challenge;

(5) I started linking my posts to Facebook and Pinterest

I will share some of my 2014 resolutions with you tomorrow. Happy New Year and I send you wishes for a great, fabulous and prosperous New Year.

Week 52--Happy New Year

For the past three years, I have been making a New Year's card based on the Chinese Zodiac. The original reason that I started making these cards was that I didn't have time to send out handmade Christmas cards one year because I had too many commissions. Rather than not send out anything or sending out belated holiday cards, I decided to send out cards that celebrated the Chinese Lunar New Year. This gave me an extra couple of weeks to make and send out cards.

Now, I send out separate cards to people on my list for both occasions--holidays and New Year. Obviously, 2014 is The Year of the Horse.

On the inside of the card, I will provide a short history and explanation of the characteristics of this sign.

This completes this year's series of 52 cards in the Card a Week series. Please click the label WeeklyCard to view all cards in this series.

Week 51--Christmas4

I always make a non-traditional card very year in my cut out series for those people who want something different. Although most people don't use a square card because of the extra postage required, I always try and offer at least one square card every year. This is a 5 inch by 5 inch card that just makes me smile.

This is my final Christmas design this year.

Week 50--Christmas3

I have struggled over the years to make an ornament cut out card but this year is the first time that I have been able to make one that I truly liked. The difficulty with this type of card is that there are so many possibilities of needing connectors that just don't make much sense. I was very happy with the way that this card turned out. I will probably make this in black and then place colored vellum as the liner.

Card #49 Redux

Not all of my cards turn out the way that I want. The card above on the left (which was this week's card explained here) just didn't seem right to me. I really couldn't place what I didn't like about it but I kept on looking. When I woke up this morning, I realized that the tree seemed lopsided.

I added an extra branch and provided a little more separation between the branches and the ornaments to get the card on the right. I think I solved the problem.

Week 49--Christmas2

Here is another in my cut out Christmas card series for 2013. This is based on a very popular stencil that has been making the rounds over the past several years. I always enjoy making business sized holiday cards because they are so unexpected.

I usually don't use red card stock but this is a fun shade of red so I thought about using it. I still haven't found a nice shade of green to use this year but I am still on the hunt.

Week 48--Starting Christmas

Today, I wanted to share one of my holiday cards with you. I don't know how many of these I will make but I like the stencil used for the card. While the cutting is a little finicky, it takes a little longer than I would like to complete the cutting. Maybe, I can simplify the design.

I hear the sleigh bells ringing . . .

Thanksgiving Place Card. Week 47

So after weeks of trying, I have finally been able to cut a miniature version of the turkey that I have been working on. This turkey was glued to a pumpkin colored card stock and will be used for place cards for the holiday table. This turkey almost made me lose my mind.

UPDATE: This is a makeup card for the card that I missed on March 25th.

Week 46

This is the invitation for my friend's Thanksgiving dinner. The theme of the party is Turkey Pardon where we will not have a single turkey dish. The theme of the party was decided when a local newspaper mentioned the limited supply of fresh turkeys this year.

The menu will include pork, beef and fish. The turkey stencil was purchased at stoneykins.com and is adapted from one of their pumpkin carving designs.

Weekly 45

This week's card is another in my script series. I always find it difficult to make good Thanksgiving cards that can also be used during other times of the year. When my friend asked me to make some invitations for her Thanksgiving dinner, I decided to make this card as part of the festivities. Although we won't be using this card during the dinner, I think that it is a good all around card that I will be able to adapt for a later use.

Week 44

Front of the card

This week's card is another in the edge card series. While this card doesn't exactly wrap around the edge of the card, it has the same  effect. I am still working on finding a font that will allow me to wrap over the edge of the card.

I think part of the problem is the salutation that I am using. The letter "y" in birthday doesn't really allow for the works to be stacked on top of each other but I will keep trying.

Inside of the card

Week 43

Front of Card

This week's card is a variation on the folded greeting. Previously, I showed how to make a folded greeting in which both words of the greeting appeared on the front of the card. This card is the same concept but the first word (Happy) appears on the front side and the second word (Birthday) appears on the inside front flap. The words are folded on the front edge of the card so I called this new series--Edge Cards.

Inside Left of open Card

I still have some logistics to work out but I like the concept. I want to see how it looks with a different font and a different greeting. The major problem that I have is that the word birthday is a little difficult to read with this particular font. I want to see how it looks with a different font.

31 Days of Halloween--Day 28; Week 42

This is the last card for the October challenge and I wanted to finish with something that was a little more challenging. This design, as were the last two cards, was from a pumpkin carving book. This card has a horizontal fold (opens top to bottom) rather than a vertical fold (opens right to left). Because of this, I chose this image to cut. While the image is a little more delicate to cut, I was able to complete the card without severing any fingers or knuckles.

31 Days of Halloween--Day 21; Week 41

This week's card is another in the pumpkin carving series. These designs were taken from a pumpkin carving book and was transformed into a greeting card.

31 Days of Halloween--Day 14; Week 40

This week's card was inspired by cards that I found at Target when I was shopping for these challenges. I mentioned the cards in this post.  The image was taken from a pumpkin carving book that I translated to a greeting card. In other words, look everywhere around you and see what you CAN do rather than what you CAN'T do. Inspiration can come from anywhere.

31 Days of Halloween--Day 7; Week 39

Today's card is an easy card and an easy project. The materials are readily available and easily accessible. The basic card is a store bought fold over card (5.5 by 4.25 inches, for a A2 envelope) in orange. The image is a EK Success Jack-o-Lantern punch.

The card is a place setting card or can be used as an invitation in its original size. The finished size of the card is 4 1/4 by 3 1/8 inches. The card is cut to size. The top layer of the card is punched. The card is then lined with a piece of scrap black card stock that has been adhered to the card with double sided tape. The name of the person is written on the outside and you are finished. Total time spent was 5 minutes.

Finished Place Card

Week 38

Final Variation (Front)

Final Variation (Back)

This week's card is the final glitter variation of the Happy Birthday Daisy card. As you can see, I kept the solid center daisy and used them alone or with a background. The one's without backgrounds were glued directly to the card stock. The ones with backgrounds were mounted using small glue dots for dimension.

I then changed the Happy Birthday salutation so that it took up less of the card and so more flowers would show through (as compared to the first variation--see below). I am not totally happy with the glitter which shows you what happens when you use a white background with jewel tone glitter. Also, this is what happens when you use a crappy glitter. The greeting was mounted using large glue dots.

The card stock is the Duplex combination of chartreuse and ivory.

Original Card (front)

Original Card (back)

First variation (Front)

First variation (Back)

I don't know which is my favorite card but I am leaning towards the original card. I have a lot of leftover materials from making these cards so I will have to determine what to do next.

Finally, I hope that you will follow along my 31 Days of Halloween journey. Everything starts tomorrow. I hope to see you then.

Week 37

New Daisy Card Front

New Daisy Card Back

Last week, I shared a new Birthday Card that I had given my friend on her visit to New York City. That card is shown below. One of the problems that I had was that I had very little space to write on the back of the card due to the salutation.  

For this week, I changed the design of the daisy so it would have a solid center and therefore, I could use glue dots under the centers to provide dimension. The daisies for last week's card had to have solid border backgrounds cut out so that the glue dots could be used.

For this week's card, I also moved the salutation to the front of the card but mounted the same salutation on a border background so that it could be raised from the card and over the daisies. The new card has three layers--layer one is the red daisies mounted directly to the card stock; layer two is the lavender daisies that are mounted with small glue dots; and layer three is the salutation that is mounted with the largest/thickest glue dots so that it is raised higher than the lavender daisy cutouts.

Last Week's Daisy Card (Front)

Last Week's Daisy Card (Back)

I don't know which I like better. I might try one last variation where I use the new daisy but put it on a border background. I do know that next week's variation will involve glitter.

Week 36

Back of the Card

This week's card is a Birthday card for one of my favorite people in the world. She is definitely a girlie type of girl so I wanted to so something special for her. The back of the card has the salutation and has enough room to write a short message.

The flat is made from Duplex card stock that has a lemon yellow on one side and a chartreuse on the opposite side. For the front of the card, I wanted to do a selection of daisies. The bottom layer of daisies are the blue daisies glued directly to the card.

The middle layer are the yellow/green daisies and the red/pink daisy. They are mounted using small sized foam dots.  The top layer of daisies are the yellow/purple daisies that are mounted with larger/thicker sized foam dots. 

I wanted to add some dimension to the card especially since I knew that I was going to hand deliver the card to her in NYC. All of the daisies on the middle and top layers were mounted to contrasting background card stock and the backgrounds were cut to add the border. 

Front of the card

The vellum envelope was fully lined with pop art paper featuring a different style of daisy. The card was designed based on the liner paper

Fully lined envelope

In the future, I think that I will design the daisy with a solid center so I don't have to mount them on the contrasting background. Overall, I am very happy with the way that the card turned out.

Week 35

Just sayin' Hello

The goal of this week's card was a neutral card for people to send to others. A "Thinking of You" card so to speak. Another aspect of this week's card was to practice for my Iron Craft Challenge that is due tomorrow. The first version of the card is simply a cut out hello made from green card stock that was mounted on a flat card made from the Blue/Ivory Duplex Stock.

Since the theme for the Iron Craft Challenge due tomorrow is "sparkle," I decided to practice with some shiny card stock/paper. The first "sparkle" attempt was made from mirror card stock. This card stock has a blue mirror film laminated on a piece of 35 lb card stock. While I am not completely happy with the results--especially since the film seems to separate on the curved cuts--I think that it will be suitable for the Iron Craft project.

Version 2

For the final version, I decided to use some "glitter paper" that I found on sale at Target for 99 cents a package (for two 12 x 12 inch sheets). I wanted to try this paper to see how it cuts and how loose the glitter is applied. I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised at how well the paper handled. While the glitter still got over my work surface, it will be nothing compared to how the glitter will spread when I hand glitter items for tomorrow.

Version 3

I was happy with the way these turned out, in all versions, and I will probably start selling the original and final versions.