New Stash, and More Lavender Sachets

New Stash

For my birthday, my friend Shaz sent me a beautiful card with white heat-embossed dragonflies on it, and I asked her what stamp it was, and she told me it was a set from Papermania, and how very reasonably priced it was, along with some others she thought I might be interested in. I promptly went and had a look, and yes, you’ve guessed it, I succumbed! Thank you Shaz!

Like Shaz, I have now cut the stamps to separate them from the original single stamp.

Now that I shall be doing more with textiles (this was my plan for this year, but so far it hasn’t materialised in any large degree) I thought I would finally get around to getting myself a decent craft iron. Ages ago I found one online but it was consistently unobtainable, and the website said they would inform me when it was available again, but it never has been… In the meantime my hubby lent me his little travel iron but I have to say it was rubbish and didn’t heat up enough! Anyway, this is what I have now bought for myself, and it’s a really powerful little iron, with steam facility too.

As you can see, it comes with its own little drawstring bag and a tiny jug to fill the water tank with (this opens via the oval rubber cover at the front end of the top of the iron).

The design is very ergonomic, and it feels very nice in the hand. All the controls are recessed below the surface so there’s no danger of operating them inadvertently.

Finally, the iron has a little clip on the front, and you can wind the cable around the iron and clip it firmly. Nice design!

I also bought myself a nice ironing mat, which has a foam back and a metallised surface to reflect the heat back. There’s no way I can carry our ironing board upstairs to my ARTHaven, and this is the ideal solution. Here it is, folded over so that you can see the back as well as the front. The foam back makes it quite non-slip as well as giving a nice spongy surface, and the whole thing can be folded away when not in use.

It is resting on one of my large ultra-heatproof mica mats from Presspahn. See my sidebar for details of these – I wouldn’t be without them, especially after warping so many cutting mats with my heat gun! They will withstand much higher temperatures than I’m ever likely to generate in my studio, even if I were to get myself a butane torch! I have now brought one of the small ones downstairs and it’s under the cutting mat on the table in front of the recliner, should I want to do any sewing downstairs which might require pressing.

The final thing I got recently was a Jones Tones foiling kit. I have a couple of sheets of gold and silver foil that I bought at a craft show ages ago, and the other night I tried stamping and foiling on some fabric to use for my lavender sachets, with complete lack of success! It wasn’t easy to find good answers online but eventually I discovered Jones Tones who do quite a few foiling and other products, and I thought this little starter kit was quite a good idea – for a very reasonable price I’ve got quite a few different coloured foils and a small bottle of glue.

You have to put the glue onto whatever surface you want to foil, and leave it to dry completely, and then place the foil shiny side up over the glue and rub it, and the foil transfers onto the glue but not elsewhere – there’s a transparent layer on the top of the sheet from which the foil is transferred.

I tried painting some of the glue onto one of my new dragonfly stamps, using a foam brush, and this is the result so far:

Not very impressive, I grant you, but we’ll see how well the foil transfers once it’s dry.

Lavender Sachets

Three more completed lavender sachets.

The one on the left is plain red fabric with a strip of quite stiff, open-work lace laid over the top. The little red checked wooden charm was in my stash, and I added some black ribbon and the signature heart charm that’s going on each bag.

The middle one ended up a bit lumpy because I had quite a job stitching down the three ribbon flowers – these wired flowers were part of the gorgeous box of crafty stash that my friend Marlene sent me for my birthday. The one on the right has a collection of wired beaded flowers and some pink stamens that were also in Marlene’s parcel, and some sequins and beads. Both these green bags have gathered ribbon around the edges.

Today I’ve done some more printing on calico using archival inks – this time utilising most of the colours that I have.

First of all, more sepia ones, this time using some small seashell stamps.

The next one is one of Ryn’s leaf stamps.

Using one of my new butterfly stamps. OK, I’ve got loads of butterfly stamps, but can one ever have enough butterflies??!!

Finally, something I’ve been wanting to do, random stamping of tiny butterflies in different colours. These two little stamps are part of a larger set that I’ve had for ages.

Time to get these new calico ones stitched and made up!

Charity Shop Stash

Last week my hubby finally agreed to take me shopping in town – this was long overdue but he has been very busy. I had to have my eyes tested and went to the bank and other boring stuff, but I thoroughly enjoyed being left to my own devices for the whole day until I ran out of steam mid-afternoon and called him to pick me up!

One of the things I wanted to do was have a good trawl through the charity shops for any useful fabrics for the T-shirt upcycling I have planned for the New Year. I managed to pick up several really cheap T-shirts, and found some real bargains in other clothes, and household fabrics which can be cut up and repurposed.

I got a couple of men’s shirts in that gorgeous striped and checked fabric – the checked shirt is actually pure linen and feels fabulous; the other is cotton.

Plenty of fabric to create panels to let into the t-shirts.

One of the T-shirts will be a shabby chic makeover with pink and cream, and I found this stunning pink pashmina-type scarf which, if you look closely, you can see has a delicate woven pattern which is in reverse on the back. For pennies I got several crocheted doilies, all in a nice cream colour. If I don’t use all these straight away, they can be used for pressing into texture paste to get some interesting results.

I wanted more lace, and managed to find what looked like a brand new petticoat made of nylon satin (quite nice) with lots of deep lace on it in pink.

I also found a small blue table runner with a deep lace border all around.

For another project (not sure yet how I shall use this) I found a cross stitch tablecloth with lots of motifs on it – this is a repeating geometric shape:

and there were also some narrow motifs suitable for borders.

At village fetes and charity shops, I’m always on the lookout for old jewellery which can be taken apart, and the beads etc. used for embellishments. On this occasion I found a charm bracelet with lots of useable stuff on it, and some chain which can also be repurposed. Some of the charms are suitable for making moulds from. I bought a couple of cheap necklaces with lots of components – shell discs, sequins, small beads.

My best find of the day, though, was a gorgeous pink and white satin counterpane quilt with an embroidered panel down the centre, consisting of three separate motifs.

There is loads of material in this as it’s double (if not king) sized, and if I unpick it carefully, there is plenty of pink ribbon and I should be able to use the wadding again, too. Here is what it looks like along the sides:

The back is plain pink.

When I got it home, I had second thoughts about cutting it up at all because it’s so pretty as it is, but I don’t need it as a quilt, and I have to be firm with myself and do what I originally intended! I will get a huge amount out of this, which can be used for all sorts of projects, not just an upcycled T-shirt.

When I go into a charity shop, I feel like my hubby when he goes metal detecting – that sense of anticipation, and never knowing what you will find!

“Bejewelled” Card Inspired by Helen Allen

Now updated with videos.

My blogging and Youtube buddy, Helen, has again inspired me to make a card after she’d uploaded one. This time it is her “Bejewelled Card” – this is not really my style at all, but I decided to try it because I needed to make a birthday card fairly quickly, and it’s always good to stretch the envelope occasionally (no pun intended!), to think outside the box, and to make something one wouldn’t usually make.

As Helen says, this card design is easily adapted to different styles, with different colours, for different occasions. I decided to make a pretty girlie version.

The first picture shows the materials I used for this card – I forgot to put in the titanium white acrylic paint.

Following Helen’s instructions, I spattered the base card and the piece for the topper (far right and centre in the following photo) to create an interesting background. I didn’t have the iridescent paints that she used, but I mixed some acrylics with iridescent medium.

The result wasn’t all that shimmery, but once the card was finished it was fine. I didn’t find the spattering as easy as Helen – I didn’t have a nice long-bristled soft paint brush, and I think my paint might have been a bit too thick. When I’d finished, I found a lot of spattering all over the stuff at the back of the work surface – I hadn’t realised I was missing the card altogether a lot of the time!! I think I definitely need more practice at this.

On the left in the photo above is a piece of the purple card, that I used to clean off all the excess paint from my palette and brush. The blue was a very strong colour so there’s very little purple in it, but I like the waves, or clouds, that the pattern has generated, and this piece will go into my backgrounds folder for future use.

The following is a closer shot of the topper piece, with its spatters.

This is the spattering on the base card.

Here’s a close-up of the waves/clouds background piece – I’m really pleased with how this turned out!

As well as creating that piece, I cleaned off the brush on my scratch paper, which is now looking like this.

It needs a few more layers before I’ll be satisfied with it!

In my stash, I have quite a collection of used gift wrapping paper – I keep this if it’s interesting, or has motifs that can be cut out. This is one of my favourite sheets, which you can see I’ve already used – it is slightly shimmery and has lots of gorgeous cut-out-able butterflies! I decided to cut some out for this project.

Here is the topper piece, complete with its sparkles – a mixture of tiny cup sequins, little silver stars, magenta-coloured gems, and Stickles. It really is very sparkly indeed, and of course this doesn’t show up properly on the photograph!

Here’s a detail of the sparkles, and they do look slightly more sparkly here.

Ages ago when I was having some fun with my Dylusions sprays, I saved some scraps of kitchen paper which were gloriously coloured with these inks, and I decided to use some of this on this project. Some of the pieces were quite stiff, as I think they have got some gel medium on them. Also in this photo, you can see the butterflies that I cut out of the wrapping paper.

Before cutting the butterflies out, I stuck them down onto a piece of scrap card to give them a bit more body, using regular matt gel medium. I painted some iridescent gel medium over the top for some extra pearliness, and then cut them out.

Before attaching these embellishments, I matted and layered the topper onto some greenish-grey shiny card. I didn’t want to use mirror card or anything to dominating, but just wanted a subtle border for the topper.

Here is the finished outside of the card, with the butterflies and Dylusions papers attached. I stuck all of these down with hot glue. I flipped the butterfly wings up off the surface, and I then added a good blob of Pinflair gel glue under each butterfly wing, to stop them getting flattened, and left the whole thing to dry overnight. (By this time the birthday was over, so I sent her an e-card and promised the “real” card would be on its way soon!)

The next day I completed the inside of the card and the envelope. For the sentiment, I chose one of the Stampin’ Up “Perfectly Penned” sentiment stamps.

After inking the edges of the inside of the card with Picked Raspberry Distress Ink, I stamped the sentiment using the same ink.

I chose three butterfly stamps from the Stampin’ Up “Papillon Potpouri” set.

I used the Picked Raspberry Distress Ink to stamp a couple of these inside the card.

I inked the edges of the envelope and stamped some more butterflies into the corners. After this I sprayed the envelope with some fixative just in case it got rained on in the post.

I made an envelope liner from some more of the butterfly wrapping paper.

Here is the finished card and envelope.

Helen – I hope you like my interpretation of your “Bejewelled Card” – I was pleased with how it turned out, and who knows, I might do this again! It was fun to do, and the result is beautifully girlie!

I have made two videos on the making of this card:

Shoshi's Meltings!

I have been keen to try some experiments in melting materials and fusing them together to make interesting "papers" or "fabrics" for use in my papercrafting, either as backgrounds or embellishments. After a false start the other day, trying unsuccessfully to melt bubble wrap in a way that was half-way useable, last night I discovered the most incredible blog (which I am now following!) by a mixed-media artist working in St. Ives in Cornwall, that mecca of artists. I am soooo impressed with this lady's work, and hope one day to visit her studio or gallery. Here's a link to her blog:

http://carolynsaxby.blogspot.com/

I spent most of yesterday evening browsing through this blog, and was totally overwhelmed by the incredible creativity of this amazing artist. She is generous with her techniques and willing to share how she does things, and this has given me the push I needed to get started with my "meltings" - and is broadening my horizons in so many other ways with my art, too.

This afternoon I made 4 test pieces using heat to fuse materials together.

For the first one, I lightly painted a piece of bubble wrap randomly with blue and green acrylic paint, with a touch of white, over the raised bubbles. Immediately, before it had a chance to dry, I used this to print onto a piece of white card. There was still some paint remaining on the bubble wrap. I then proceeded to sprinkle silver embossing powder over this, shaking off the excess. I then selected some small "twinklies" - little confetti shapes in sequin material - in blues, greens and silver, and sprinkled these on top. Finally, I laid a piece of cling film over the whole thing and ironed it. When doing this, you have to cover the work with baking parchment or the whole thing will stick to your iron and ruin it (poor Carolyn learnt this the hard way - she posted a picture of her iron after the event!).

Here's the result.

And here it is again, alongside the bubble wrap printing I did at the beginning:

I think it's a credit to my camera how well these pictures are coming out, because shiny, reflective or irridescent surfaces are notoriously difficult to photograph!

I then moved on to another piece of bubble wrap. Having washed out my paintbrush with a little water in the plastic bowl that I'd squirted a small quantity of acrylic paints into, this now contained a sludgy watery mix of the blue and green paints, which I proceeded to use to paint onto the raised bubbles of the bubble wrap. I then sprinkled it with gold embossing powder this time, and shook off the residue - unfortunately quite a few water droplets came off with it, but I was able to soak these up with kitchen paper, and managed to get the excess powder back into the pot. Again I added some twinklies, and covered the whole with cling film, and again ironed it.

This one didn't photograph quite so well - it is highly reflective.

I then tried fusing two pieces of cling film together (no bubble wrap this time), sandwiching various things between them. I used some lengths of metallic thread from my goldwork embroidery box; the coppery thread was great, because when I tried to shred it a bit to separate out the strands, I found that there was one which I could pull, and the rest rouched up, giving a slub effect. I then doused the lot with some bronzing powder, and laid a few Angelina fibres on top, and after the final layer of cling film was laid on top, I ironed it as before. In one or two places the two layers have not fused, so I need to iron it again.

In the top left-hand corner of this picture, you can see the edge of the bubble wrap printing - I used the piece of card as a convenient white background in an attempt to show this piece off a bit better - it's quite hard to photograph and it didn't show up well on my green craft mat.

The final piece is mostly Angelina fibres, in blue and pink. These fuse to themselves with heat, but don't stick to anything else. The result is a bonded, non-woven fabric with incredible iridescent hues, which can be sewn, washed, dry cleaned, glued, whatever you want! When I'd laid out the fibres how I wanted, I sprinkled them with gold embossing powder, covered the lot with baking parchment and ironed it. You have to be careful not to over-heat the Angelina fibres or they lose their colour and iridescence, but you do need quite a bit of heat to melt the embossing powder, so it wasn't certain whether this would work. As it happened, a certain amount of the embossing powder did melt, but a lot more fell through the mesh of fibres to the mat beneath. I turned the sheet of bonded fibres over and wiped up the remaining powder with it, and covered and ironed it again on the reverse side. Most of the embossing powder was then incorporated into it, and on one side, it was pretty solid. Turning it over, more of the bonded fibres were visible, with the gold peeping through between, which was a much nicer effect. Again, this is a highly reflective surface and hard to photograph, but here is the result.

I also tried melting some old blister pack which had contained tablets, thinking that the ragged foil on the back might give an interesting effect. I cut out some pieces and laid them down, bubble side up, with little gems under the bubbles, and ironed it. The result was not satisfactory - the gems did not show up well, and didn't respond well to the heat, and the whole thing looked a mess, so into the bin it went!! Oh well. Can't win 'em all... I only wasted about 6 or 7 gems.

I am very pleased with my first proper efforts at melting. Here's a picture of the four pieces together:

I think this technique has a lot of potential. It would be a good way of using up those bits and pieces left over from other projects that you don't know what to do with, but can't in all conscience throw away! I've got quite a big bag of pretty ghastly mixed sequins which I think would do well being sandwiched between bubble wrap and cling film, with a bit of Angelina fibre to help them on their way!