Triple-Embossed Get Well Card

The second of two posts for today.

Feeling much better today, I was able to spend some time in the studio (two sessions!) and I made a get well card for our neighbour who had a serious accident some weeks ago.

I am making up a little basket of goodies for her, to cheer her up as she goes through a long recovery period. So far I have completed the little purple box which will contain a lavender sachet.

I had several sheets of boring printed paper in my stash which I gave the Dylusions spray ink treatment and I am using these for this project.

I have recently been re-exploring die cutting, something I have done very little of since I first started, and decided to make a double-embossed card front, using an embossing folder and an oval scalloped die to make a plain panel on which I could stamp the sentiment. This is a very effective technique and fun to do.

You begin by cutting two sheets of chipboard (I like using those card envelopes you get sent by Amazon) – it mustn’t be corrugated – to the size of the card you are going to emboss. You use a die to cut a window in them – if you run both pieces through, the die will cut the top one and leave an impression on the bottom one, which is the guide for placing the die to cut it. The window on each piece is then exactly lined up, and you can stick the two layers together. Hang onto the “positive” pieces because they are used later to help with the embossing. I used a Spellbinders Nestabilities scalloped oval die.

You then put your card in the embossing folder, and put the chipboard with the window in it on top, and run it through your die cutting machine (with the appropriate plates). The chipboard piece acts as a sort of mask – it presses down on the embossing folder and the card comes out embossed, except where the window was.

You can leave it like that if you want, but it looks much better with a bit more definition, so you run it through again, this time without the embossing folder, with the die with the cutting side away from the card, and using the tan embossing mat, and with the “positive” shape lined up on top to help give a good embossed impression.

There are lots of Youtube videos and tutorials giving details for individual machines so you can find out the sandwich you need for your own particular machine. I used my Cuttlebug.

That’s the “double embossing” bit completed. I then did the “triple embossing” – the third embossing is heat embossing. I rubbed my Versamark pad over the raised embossed surface of the card and heat embossed it with clear embossing powder to give a shiny, more defined surface, and also to act as a resist for further inking.

I used Dusty Concord distress ink with an Inkylicious Ink Duster, all over the embossed surface. I held the “positive” shape cut from the chipboard over the plain window to stop any ink getting there. Once this was done, I went around the edge with Chipped Sapphire distress ink, using a home-made blending pad.

Then it was time to stamp the sentiment. I chose “Get Well” from the “Perfectly Penned” stamp set by Stampin’ Up, using my stamp guiding tool to place it exactly in the centre of the plain, unembossed oval. I used Chipped Sapphire distress ink to do this.

Next came the matting and layering. The purple shiny paper is something I’ve had in my stash for ages, and it was a bit dog-eared – I think it may have come from a box of chocolates or something – it’s not great quality but a nice shiny metallic purple which I chose to go with this project. I matted and layered the card front using this, and some gold mirror card, each with a 1/16 in overlap.

I inked the card base with a combination of Seedless Preserves and Picked Raspberry distress inks, using the Inkylicious Ink Duster, and finished it off with a narrow inking with Dusty Concord distress ink, using the home-made blending tool for a bit more definition, before sticking the card front down onto it..

Now for the embellishments. I punched out a butterfly using part of the paper-glued-to-card that I’d used for the box, and some of the shiny purple paper – I put these two together and punched, because the paper would have been too thin to punch properly. I chose my Stampin’ Up butterfly punch for this.

I stuck the shiny purple butterfly down onto the card and then took the other butterfly, and inked the back with Chipped Sapphire distress ink using the ink blender, and then wrapped some gold coloured wire around the centre, twisting the ends together to anchor them, and cutting them to the correct length for the antennae, and then bending the ends into small circles with my round nosed pliers. I used the stamp from the Tim Holtz “Bitty Grunge” background stamp set that I used for the box, to heat emboss some texture in gold. I bent up the wings, and attached the butterfly over the shiny purple one, using hot glue. Once the card was finished, a put a little Pinflair gel glue under the wings to stop them getting flattened.

I chose two small hibiscus flowers from my stash that I’d made ages ago, and attached them to the card, on the opposite side of the oval from the butterfly, again using hot glue.

Here is the completed card.

Here is a detail shot of the embellishments.

On the inside of the card I inked the edges with Seedless Preserves distress ink and an Inkylicious Ink Duster, stamped the sentiment again, this time with Seedless Preserves distress ink, and added a bit of extra text with a dark blue Marvy le Plume marker pen.

I cut an envelope to fit this 5 1/2 x 5 1/2 in square card, using my Envelope Punch Board. I used a piece of 80 gsm A3 printer paper which is unfortunately not very good quality. I inked the corner which would become the envelope flap, using a mixture of Seedless Preserves, Dusty Concord and Chipped Sapphire distress inks, and then used two butterfly stamps from the Stampin’ Up set “Butterfly Potpourri” which I stamped with Dusty Concord and Chipped Sapphire distress inks.

Here is the envelope assembled, showing the lining with the stamped butterflies.

I then turned it over and realised my mistake in using such grotty paper! The stamping had come through to the other side! It didn’t actually look too bad and I thought I’d just leave it. Here’s the flap closed. I inked it with Seedless Preserves and Dusty Concord distress inks as before.

The stamping showed through on the front as well, but I thought it looked quite cool, so I continued with the inking, and added some Chipped Sapphire distress ink with the ink blender to finish off the edges.

Next time I shall remember I need to make a separate lining for the envelope if this isn’t going to happen again! I have to use this paper for envelopes because it’s the only paper I’ve got that’s big enough, unless I raid my 12 x 12 in stash, and this paper is rather thick.

Watch this space for more purple goodies to cheer up our poor neighbour! Here’s what I’ve done so far.

Priming Clear Stamps

The first of two posts for today.

I recently acquired some stamps from Inkylicious, a set called “Simply Trees.” Their website wasn’t terribly clear, and while some stamps were listed as “clear polymer stamps,” some were not described as rubber or clear, and I assumed that those not labelled “clear” would be cling-mount rubber stamps. When they arrived, they turned out to be clear. I am not normally a great fan of clear stamps because I’ve never got such good results with them as I do with rubber stamps – not only was the impression a bit ill-defined, but I have had awful trouble with the ink balling up on the stamp and giving a mottled result.

I knew you were supposed to prime them in some way but apart from rubbing them with a pencil eraser, I didn’t know much else, so today I decided if I am going to use these stamps and make them work as well for me as possible, I’d better find out how to do it.

I found some videos on Youtube and some tutorials on Splitcoast Stampers, and following their advice, I stamped at each stage in order to compare the results.

Most people seem to think that Versafine ink pads are best for clear stamps but I don’t have any, and I love stamping with Distress Inks – people say these are not suitable for stamping but I’ve never had any problems with them – I think they are brilliant! I grabbed one of my new DI pads that arrived with the stamps – Blueprint Sketch (OK, perhaps I should have grabbed a green one since all the stamps are trees lol!) and ended up stamping a series of blue trees. Oh well, the experiment worked, at any rate!

My first stamping was with the stamp straight out of the packet, with no treatment. It was OK, but I could definitely see an improvement after I’d done some priming.

The first treatment was with Stazon Stamp Cleaner. I was a bit reluctant to try this even though it was recommended by one person, because I’d read somewhere that this stuff could damage clear stamps and was designed only for rubber, so I only tried this once, and abandoned this treatment thereafter.

The second treatment was to rub the stamp all over with a pencil eraser, clean off the residue and stamp. To clean off the stamp, I used my stamp cleaning pad which is like a large flat kitchen scrubber on a foam backing – a brilliant tool.

The third treatment was to rub the surface of the stamp gently with a nail file – this file has sapphire dust stuck to the surface and is quite fine. Again I dusted off the residue using my stamp cleaning pad.

The fourth and final treatment was to rub over the surface of the stamp with an anti-static bag, again cleaning off any residue.

I was very pleased with the result of all this priming, so, omitting the Stazon stamp cleaner, I proceeded to prime the rest of the stamps in the set, using the pencil eraser, nail file and anti-static bag, and printed them all off to see how they came out.

The stamps looked much less transparent after priming, but they are still clear enough to see where to place them accurately.

Another piece of advice I found was not to put too much pressure on the stamp when using it – they are a lot softer than rubber stamps, and you can squash them a bit if you press too hard, which gives a less clear result. Also, it is good to stamp using a foam pad underneath the cardstock – a friend recently sent me a lot of stash and it included the pink foam pad you can see in the photo below – it feels exactly like fun foam but is much thicker. If I remember, I think I may use this with normal rubber stamps in future, too, because it worked so well.

I got very good results indeed, following all this advice, and may be on my way to becoming a convert to clear stamps! They do tend to be cheaper than rubber ones, and have the advantage that you can see where to place them with a high degree of accuracy. Maybe it’s time to dig out my old clear stamps that I got when I first started, and give them a new lease of life.

In the photo, you can see that the stamps now have a somewhat milky appearance as a result of their surfaces being roughed up.

I hope others find this information as helpful as I did.

WOYWW 328

Yesterday was the first day for ages that I’ve been able to get in my ARTHaven and do anything. In the morning I tidied it, which took me ages as it had become a complete dumping ground again, as always happens when I am not using it.

Anyway, yesterday evening I spent some time in there, working on some purple things – I need to make a get-well card and present for our neighbour as she recovers from an accident she had several weeks ago – she knows my situation and that I haven’t been able to do anything so she will understand why this is so late!

Here is my desk today, anyway. You can see the little box I made last night, together with the other papers I prepared ready for making her card, and a couple of other cards too. On the left is my box of dies. I got some new ones recently, with one lot left still to arrive – basic frame shapes to help me make some quick cards.

Behind the opened box you can see the white box template. I made a whole lot of these for my fellow chemo-ites and each one contained a lavender sachet. The lavender was given to me by our neighbour last year and I have wanted to give her some produce from that for ages. I am also going to give her some of the lavender oil I made, and possibly some soap if I’ve got the energy to make it!

Scroll down to my previous post to see the making of the little purple box. It’s great to be using up some boring stash that just wasn’t shifting – I am determined to use up stuff that I don’t like! With a bit of altering, I end up liking it, so it’s worth it in the end.

Here’s the little box.

It will contain a lavender sachet, probably made from purple fabric with possibly some gold embellishments on it. The box has butterflies inside – she loves butterflies, and I shall put some on her card too.

Healthwise, not been doing so well since the last treatment, despite the reduced dose (although very glad to be feeling quite a bit better today) – my mood took a nose dive over the past week which was a bit alarming as I am now so close to the end! I think I’m back on track again now though. It wasn’t helped by a tummy upset last week, which set me back, and I also had some bad nights not sleeping properly. I just got fed up with feeling ill all the time and desperate to get my life back again! My poor hubby had to put up with me which wasn’t very nice for him so I am going to try to do better.

To help me get through the final month, I have made a countdown calendar to post daily on my Cancer Diary page on this blog, and seeing the days being crossed off one by one is helping. I finish in exactly one calendar month! Then the recovery period but that won’t be so bad, knowing that I won’t have to go through it again.

Also trying to remember to count my blessings and be grateful that compared with our lovely Shaz, my journey has been a relatively easy one. I have been following her hubby’s new blog where he’s been keeping us up to date daily with news of her progress in hospital What a rough ride she’s been having, and we do wish them both all the best! Today she went up onto the ward which is a huge step in the right direction. So delighted to hear this!

It’s nice to be back creating again. Have a great creative week everybody, and happy WOYWW.

Purple Stuff

For the first time for ages, I felt well enough to spend a little while in my ARTHaven doing something creative! This morning I actually managed to tidy up in there, and it really needed it, as it had become a dumping ground again. After that I was too tired to do any more, and had a visitor this afternoon, but this evening I decided to make a start on a project I’d had in mind for a while.

Our neighbour had an accident a few weeks ago and when she first came home, I wasn’t well enough to make her a get-well card but decided better late than never! I wanted to make her one of my lavender sachets in a little box, as I did for my fellow chemo-ites when I first started my treatment. This is what I have made.

As well as making her a get-well card, I also have a couple of other cards to make, and decided to do it all as one project. Ages ago I was given some stash by somebody, which included this rather uninteresting pink and purple paper with flowers and butterflies on it – it’s fairly heavy paper but not quite thick enough to be called card, and in my opinion extremely dull, which is why I haven’t yet used it! I thought now was the time to get it out of my stash and on the move, so with a bit of alteration I was sure it could be improved.

I sprayed the first sheet with Crushed Grape and Bubblegum Pink Dylusions spray inks.

Blotting off with the second sheet.

Both sheets blotted and dried.

Preparing to spray the third sheet, this time with Crushed Grape and London Blue Dylusions spray inks.

The sheet sprayed.

After spritzing and blotting off, it joined the first two sheets, dried and completed. The pale pink one (which had had flowers punched out of it) was also spattered with water droplets and blotted off.

I took the darker sheet with butterflies on it (which had been so covered up with ink that they were now extremely subtle! – i.e. virtually invisible!) and stuck it down onto a sheet of plain white card with spray adhesive to thicken it up a bit and make it substantial enough to make a box. I used my box template to draw around, and cut out the shape.

Here is the reverse side ready for inking with distress inks.

I used the two paler colours (Shaded Lilac and Salty Ocean) to go all over it first, using Inkylicious Ink Dusters. I wasn’t too bothered about getting a very smoothly blended finish because it would be covered up later.

Preparing to stamp with Versamark and heat emboss with clear embossing powder to act as a resist.

After the butterflies were stamped, and preparing for the second inking.

After the second inking with the darker shades, and buffed to clean the ink off the embossed butterflies, which now revealed the lighter shades of the first inking.

Preparing to gold-emboss the outside of the box. This stamp set is Tim Holtz’s Bitty Grunge set of background stamps – unfortunately the corner of the box is across the name of the set!

After gold embossing. I wanted a nice random, mottled effect.

The final step was to go around the outline with my gold Uniball Signo pen.

The completed box, closed.

Partially open.

Unfortunately with all the heating involved during the embossing process front and back, the layers started to come apart a bit, which wasn’t helped by the flexing of the flaps to close up the box, and you can see a slight crease on the flap that is open in the above photograph. Before finally assembling the box I ran over it vigorously with my brayer again, and I hope it’s going to stay stuck together!

Here is the box fully opened.

I shall use the rest of the paper to make some cards, which will be part of this ongoing “Purple Stuff” project. Watch this space!

WOYWW 327–Adult Colouring

Well, better late than never! I wasn’t thinking of joining in WOYWW this week because there’s nothing on my desk to show, and I’m feeling rough in week 1 of my 6th cycle of chemo.

However, the other day I downloaded a free pdf taster for an adult colouring book and today I decided to try my new Sharpies and colour it in. My hubby kindly printed it out for me on his laser printer.

This is more WOYSRT (What’s On Your Sitting Room Table) than WOYWW this week lol!

Here is the original printed drawing.

Colouring in the fish.

Colouring in the water.

Forgot to photograph any further intermediate stages, but here is the finished picture. I coloured the waterlily leaves with different shades of green, and added a touch of pink to the flowers. The final touch was to colour in the edges of the background with grey, shaded to black at the edges, and to add a tiny touch of shading here and there.

Quite fun, eh? Hope you like it.

I know that we on WOYWW have all been thinking a lot about Shaz this past week. She went into hospital a week ago today for major surgery, and has been having a tough time since. Just in case you don’t get to see the link elsewhere (I know that Jan – LLJ – has posted it, and she has very kindly emailed me with some updates over the past couple of days), Shaz’s hubby has started a blog about her journey, so that we can follow her progress.

http://birdshospitalstay.blogspot.co.uk/

We are thinking of them both so much at this difficult time, and wish Shaz a very speedy recovery, but it is going to be a long stay in hospital. We send our support to her hubby too – it is so hard for them as they feel so helpless, watching what is happening and feeling powerless to do anything, but as I told my hubby today, just the fact of their being there and being supportive and loving is enough. Shaz and I are both so fortunate in our hubbies – they are cast in the same mould, and have wanted to be fully involved and supportive throughout our respective cancer journeys. I count myself very fortunate that my journey has not been as arduous as Shaz’s, and I can never forget the amazing support she has been throughout this year, as she has trod much of my path before and has shared the wisdom of her experience. Get well soon, dear friend!!

Happy WOYWW everybody.

Commission for a Zentangle Book

The second of two posts today. – Edited – picture of book cover.

I have been approached by Jane Marbaix, a UK Certified Zentangle Teacher (CZT), who is writing a new book on Zentangle – she already has more than one in print – she had found my tangle “Y-Ful Power” and wanted to feature it. She asked me to submit the step-outs for it, and also a piece of art using this tangle, and some text giving details of the inspiration behind it. She asked if the art piece could somehow reflect the story of my cancer journey this year, as the publishers were keen that the book should inspire people.

I was a bit daunted at first because the deadline was so short, for which she apologised; she said she needed it within three weeks, but effectively for me, that meant by the end of the week, because my next chemo treatment is due then, after which I will be fit for nothing for another fortnight. Her timing was actually very good because I was just starting to feel better for my third week in the cycle, and I’ve been able to pull out all the stops and get it done in time!

I felt a bit daunted for another reason too, which was that I have very little experience in expressing my thoughts, feelings and experiences in the form of art. This is definitely something I have felt the need to work on for some time, because I have been wanting to get into art journaling. Hopefully next year after the chemo is finished and I am getting my life back, this will start to happen, and it’s good to get in a bit of practice in advance!

I feel extremely flattered to be invited to contribute to a published book. To be sought out like this and invited to take part is very exciting indeed, and I am so pleased that Jane is so delighted with what I’ve come up with – I wanted really to do this thrilling project the justice it so richly deserves. Jane is one of only a small number of UK-based CZTs and it’s very good to be able to support and encourage her in this way, and to give her a bit of publicity.

My original thoughts on a suitable design for this ZIA (Zentangle-Inspired Art) came to nothing and got chucked out – my thinking was too literal, and my initial sketches were a disaster! I spent most of that first morning trawling the Internet for inspiration until I decided to look on my own Pinterest boards to see if anything struck a chord, and I found this image of the most amazing and beautiful spiral staircase.

I have no idea where this staircase is located. I have always been fascinated by spiral staircases and the intriguing shapes they produce, and in this context, I could see this as a picture of my journey – a journey of the heart from darkness to light.

Here are some pictures showing the progression from initial pencil sketch to the finished drawing.

 

 

The initial pencil sketch shows the spiral staircase emerging from a 3-D heart, both of which feature prominently my tangle “Y-Ful Power.” I wanted the bottom part of the picture to be dark. The small heart on the right is an attempt to get the perspective right – I had some trouble with this!

The next picture shows how I began the first tracing of the shapes, using my light pad – a flat panel illuminated by LEDs for the purpose of tracing. This is an extremely useful tool which I acquired a few months ago on Ebay, and had yet to put through its paces. I have wanted a light box for many years, and am very glad that I did not invest in one at the time because these new panels are so much more convenient – lying flat on the table with very little thickness, and the LEDs do not make it hot.

The next picture shows the first tracing complete.

 

 

I have drawn a pencil grid over the spiral staircase and the heart, for the placing of the dot grid to construct Y-Ful Power, which you can see complete on the first draft I made from that tracing, on plain paper.

 

 

I was still not happy with the heart, which looked rather flat, but which I thought might be improved with some shading. I made several attempts at drawing the heart, using different grids, until I was satisfied.

Here is the completed draft.

 

I didn’t like the overlap of the rays of light from “Footlites” on the left, and these needed to be altered.

My first “fair copy” of the drawing did not pass muster because the bottom of the heart was very dark, and there was not enough contrast with the background, into which it appeared to merge without trace! It looks better on this photo than it does in real life. I had put too much in the way of embellishments on the Y-Ful Power on the bottom of the heart, and this needed to be reduced. I wasn’t keen on the way that the embellishments followed the line of the handrail of the staircase, either. There were some other problems too, such as the hole in the centre of the spiral coming out too small and losing the impact of the spot of light towards which the butterfly is moving. Also, I didn’t like what I’d done with “Finery” on the bottom right – the black embellishments were too strong. (I edited this scan and made it come out a bit too dark – the shading isn’t that strong on the original.)

So I re-drew it, yet again. This next photo shows the final drawing complete, or so I thought until I realised that I had left out some shading that I wanted to put on the underside of the spiral staircase. (The rest of the shading shows more true to the original than on the previous photo.) I was a lot happier with the heart, “Finery” and “Footlites,” in this final rendering.

 

By this time I had scanned the image, and done a bit of digital tidying up, and I didn’t want to do all that work again, so I printed it out, and attempted to add some shading to this scanned image, which I then scanned again. This was a mistake because the result came out very grainy, so it was “back to the drawing board” as I had to decide what to do. To save myself a lot of work I decided to add the shading digitally, to the underside of the spiral staircase. This is the final drawing.

 

 

I was a little concerned at how blue the shading (real and digital) appeared in the image – I tried desaturating it and converting it to greyscale but the result was the same. I am hoping that the printers will get a true greyscale image when they prepare it for the book. I have now sent the files of the drawing, the 2 step-out sheets for Y-Ful Power, and the text to accompany the drawing, to the publisher as well as to the author, and the publisher says that the scans are fine, so presumably the picture prints out OK in a true greyscale.

Looking at these pictures, superficially they appear pretty much the same, but it’s a bit like those “spot the difference” pictures! There are subtle differences which probably only my perfectionistic nature would fuss about, but this is going to be published, and I wanted it to be the best I could make it – I’d never be satisfied knowing that something I had drawn was being published, that I wasn’t 100% happy with.

A Word about Shading

In the past, I have always shaded my Zentangles with a soft (4B) pencil and then blended it with a paper stump. However, being graphite, the shading didn’t usually photograph or scan very well because it is slightly reflective. I have wondered for a while about suitable alternatives, and recently discovered soluble graphite pencils – watercolour pencils in shades of grey that can be applied and then blended with a water brush. I bought a Derwent Graphitint pencil recently in Warm Grey (Shade #19), one of a range of greys that they produce, which I think probably doesn’t have any graphite in it because it is completely non-reflective. Blending with the water brush is easy, and the results are very good, so this is going to be my shading tool of choice for the future.

The symbolism in the picture

You can see that there is an emphasis on upward movement throughout the picture, from the dark beginnings to the light in the centre. The symbolism is best expressed by quoting an extract from the text which will accompany the image in the book (this may be edited by the publisher for length):

“My piece of Zentangle-inspired art depicts my journey from my bowel cancer diagnosis in January 2015, which is essentially a journey of the heart – it is all about attitude. It is not the circumstances and events in our lives which define us, but our attitude to them – we can either cave in under them and complain and be miserable, which will affect everyone around us in a negative way, or we can face them head on, and make use of them, to help us become a better person, which will have the added bonus of inspiring those around us. This second choice is the one I have made. Only once, on the day of my diagnosis, did I say, ‘Why me?’ and immediately afterwards asked, ‘Why not me?’ A positive attitude also helps towards a positive outcome to the illness and its treatment…

“This has been a wake-up call and a life-changing experience, which I have attempted to express in my art. The upward journey has not been a straightforward one but has taken some circuitous routes. From a relatively dark and cluttered existence I am rising towards the light; the butterfly represents metamorphosis from one state to another, taking flight from a lowly existence into the brighter light of hope and joy. Before this event, my life was going on much as before, in a fairly chaotic fashion, and looking back I realise just how much time I was wasting, and how little I was doing for – or even thinking of – others. This journey has changed my priorities.

“The upward journey is from a heart full of gratitude, and a desire to make a difference in the lives of others. My new motivation is to help others, to inspire them, and to become a better person…

“Where will this journey lead? Who knows? Hopefully to a cancer-free life, but to have made a difference is all I ask.”

Tangle Patterns Used in the Piece

I included a list of the sixteen different tangles that I used in the piece:

Y-Ful Power, Cvetic, Lily Pads, Lotus Pods, Footlites, B’twined, Miander. Copada, Bilt, Intwine, Finery, Zinger, Verdigogh, Float Fest, Barber Pole, and Heart Rope. I wonder if my fellow tanglers will be able to spot them all!

Details of the Book So Far 

The book title will be “Inspiring Zentangle Projects,” and will be published in May of next year, all being well. Jane has now sent me a jpg of the cover. She says that between now and publication, this may be changed, but this is the working version.

 

 

It is being published by Arcturus Publishing – I visited their website today and they’ve got some very intriguing titles on there, including several adult colouring books, and to my great delight, an adult dot-to-dot book! I used to love doing these as a child, and the adult ones look highly complex and interesting. Definitely something to try! I expect you could colour them afterwards, too. They do quite a few art and craft books, and one of Jane Marbaix’s earlier Zentangle books is in the catalogue, too – “Mandala Zentangle.”

I hope you will all buy a copy of her new book when it comes out!

Blogging Problems Sorted

The first of two posts today.

After struggling since Tuesday, with both laptops suddenly deciding I couldn’t publish blog posts from Windows LiveWriter to Blogger, which proved that this wasn’t a Windows 10 issue as I’d originally thought because the old laptop has Win7 on it, I spent some considerable time yesterday, searching for solutions online. Eventually, after reading numerous comments on a forum which contained quite a few useful links, I found a link to this blog, which had a quite excellent step-by-step tutorial on how to resolve this issue.

I am posting about this in some detail, in case there are others out there, tearing their hair in frustration and not knowing where to turn. I hope this post will help someone!

It turns out that recently, Goggle changed the way that people log into their Google accounts, from a one-step to a two-step process (for added security) and this made it incompatible with Windows LiveWriter, Microsoft’s excellent blog post composing software. Thousands of people around the world love this program, as I do, and were endlessly frustrated by the lack of action on both Google’s and Microsoft’s part to resolve the issue – both of the giants were busy blaming each other and sending frustrated customers from one to the other, while issuing airy promises that “action was being taken” and promises that it would be fixed “in a few months’ time,” none of which was any use to the users who required action NOW! There really isn’t an equivalent piece of software that measures up in any way with LiveWriter, and what there is, also experienced the same problem since Google changed its rules, leaving us with only one alternative, to compose our blog posts in Blogger itself. This part of Blogger, I have to say, is total rubbish. The formatting is all over the place, and what you get when you compose the post, is not what appears when you publish it. If you try composing in the LiveWriter html page, and copying and pasting the code into Blogger, none of the pictures are transferred across, and the formatting is again all over the place. Total nightmare.

People were demanding that either Google got its act together and provided us with a decent authoring program attached to Blogger, rendering LiveWriter unnecessary, or that Microsoft honoured its somewhat vague promise of some months ago to release LiveWriter as an open source program, so that the techies out there could get their hands on it and make sure that these problems never arose again – and give us an even better product. Neither of these scenarios looked set to happen any time soon, and we were all left in the lurch.

What I don’t understand is why this didn’t arise in my case much earlier than this, and the only thing I can think of is that starting with Windows 10, it brought it to the forefront, but that doesn’t explain why my old laptop, running Windows 7, also refused to upload blog posts last night.

Anyway, I followed the step-by-step instructions to set up the two-step log-in process introduced by Google, and then added a special password for LiveWriter, which is now permanently attached to it. After I’d done this fix, I tried uploading a test post, and IT WORKED!!

However, when this first happened, immediately after I set up my new laptop with Windows 10, I did some sort of fix – I can’t remember exactly what I did because I tried several things, but I think it was to allow Google to be less secure – something which flagged up a lot of messages from Google, so I set it back to its original state. After this, it wouldn’t work again.

Having read some of the comments following the step-by-step tutorial, where people found that the fix worked to start with, and then reverted to its non-working state again, I am not quite ready to put out the flags just yet. I am hoping this is a permanent fix, until Google decides to change its rules again in its characteristically arrogant and high-handed manner – I am pretty fed up with Google really, because they don’t listen to their users, and they are notorious for publicising our personal info, and they’ve also taken over far too much of the Internet for my liking – if your account goes down, there’s a load of stuff you can’t access until it’s sorted – for instance, Blogger and Youtube. If you try to get help on their so-called “support” pages all you get is multiple choice questions, and if your problem isn’t there, well, you just have to go jump in the lake for all they care. There is no way to contact a real person by email or by phone or whatever, and your only resort is to find some more sensible and generous people on the many forums out there, who have found out how to do things and are prepared to give us the benefit of their wisdom.

Rant over. Let’s hope the wretched thing stays working! I could do without the hassle.

WOYWW 326 and an Art Exhibition

The second of two posts today.

I am currently experiencing major problems publishing blogs from Windows LiveWriter into Blogger. According to a forum on the Microsoft website this is due to changes by Microsoft and Blogger and nobody seems to be doing anything about it. Until it is sorted, I am copying and pasting from WLW into Blogger's own (awful) "Compose New Blog" so if the layout comes out all wrong, I apologise. It appears to be impossible to get consistent paragraph layouts with this and it's a real pain.

I’m afraid that yet again I don’t have anything to show you on my desk this week. This is because all this week I have been working on an exciting new project which I am not yet at liberty to show you. I was approached last week by someone who is writing a book about Zentangle and she has asked me to make a contribution, using one of my own tangle designs. I have completed a drawing, which she asked should be inspired by my cancer journey of this year, because the publishers want the book to inspire people, and judging by everyone’s amazingly supportive comments over the past 8 months, I seem to qualify for this – not that I feel particularly inspiring – I have just got on with what had to be got on with!!

The author of the book is contacting the publisher to see if there will be any copyright issues if I publish pictures and details on my blog, and I have yet to hear, but here’s a sneak peek:

You’ll have to be satisfied with that for a while!

We went to an art exhibition yesterday in which a friend had several paintings. We were both very impressed with the standard of work, the bulk being pictures, but there was a long table full of different crafts as well.

There was also a collection of exquisite textile art boxes, mostly with a cat theme, and my hubby bought me one for a belated birthday present when I reminded him that he hadn’t actually got around to getting me anything – we have had rather a lot of other things to think of this year!

The cats on the boxes are all inspired by cats that the maker of the boxes either owns now, or has owned in the past (when I say “owned,” what I really mean is “is enslaved to” – cat people will understand!!) and this particular box is based on Laurence and Leo, two exceedingly handsome lads.

(I have propped the sides up on a couple of small bottles to make the proportions of the picture better, but in reality they fold out flat)

Please scroll down to see more pictures of this exquisite object.

It being week 3 of my current chemo cycle, I am feeling considerably better and really enjoyed going on an outing before the whole business starts again on Friday, with treatment #6, after which I will be 3/4 the way through!

Please spare a thought today for our own Shaz, who is undergoing major surgery all day today. She will be in hospital for about a fortnight. I am sure you will all join me in wishing her all the best for a successful outcome and a very speedy recovery!!

Happy WOYWW everyone, and may a fulfilling and creative week be had by all.

A Beautiful Gift

The first of two posts today.

I am currently experiencing major problems publishing blogs from Windows LiveWriter into Blogger. According to a forum on the Microsoft website this is due to changes by Microsoft and Blogger and nobody seems to be doing anything about it. Until it is sorted, I am copying and pasting from WLW into Blogger's own (awful) "Compose New Blog" so if the layout comes out all wrong, I apologise. It appears to be impossible to get consistent paragraph layouts with this and it's a real pain. 

As this is the final week of my regular 3-weekly chemo cycle, I am feeling considerably better (just in time to feel horrible again after Friday!) so the timing of this was perfect: on Monday my hubby agreed to take me out for a bit – I have hardly left the house these past weeks and months, except to follow that well-worn path to the hospital and all its attendant joys!

One of the friends I gained while in hospital had contacted me to tell me that she had several pictures in an exhibition held in Dunsford Church over the weekend. Dunsford is a very picturesque village in the Teign Valley, and every two years they put on an art exhibition which is open to all comers, and my hubby and I are both keen to enter something next time! We spent the afternoon in the church having a good look around and meeting some interesting people, and we were very, very impressed with the standard of work, in all media. The bulk of the exhibition was pictures, but there was a large craft section with items laid out on trestle tables the entire length of the church on the further side. Wood carving, embroidery, quilting, stained glass, pottery, etc. etc. At the further end of the table there was a special section showing a collection of the most exquisite textile boxes, many of which featured cats in the design. They opened in the most intriguing way and I fell utterly in love with them! The lady who made them is called Suzanne Shave. She doesn't seem to have a website (yet) which is a shame because it would be great if you could see her other work.

My hubby was as taken with them as I was, and he offered to buy me one! I reminded him that he never did get around to buying me a birthday present this year (there being plenty of other things occupying our minds!), and he agreed to buy my favourite box from the collection, and it now graces our sitting room mantelpiece. Yesterday I took some photos of this beautiful object to share with you now.

The cats on the boxes are all inspired by cats belonging to the lady who made the boxes, either currently or in the past – or should I say, cats to whom she was enslaved? This particular box is in honour of two very handsome cats, Laurence and Leo.

Here is the side view of the box. Suzanne told me that she sources her materials from wherever she can find them – charity shops a lot of the time – she buys scarves and cuts them up. You can see the combination of hand and machine embroidery on this box, and the addition of clusters of small gold beads.

A view from the top, showing the fastening which keeps the box closed.

Underneath, the box has four dinky little stumpy feet! Not strictly necessary but they add such charm to the piece! You an see that they were constructed from rolled up fabric, like the toggles on the closure thread.

The box, open. For the purposes of the photo, I put a couple of small bottles underneath the sides to stop the box form opening fully. Normally the sides would rest on the table.

Looking inside the box, you can see what amazing attention to detail Suzanne shows, with the quality of her finish.

I told my hubby I thought it would be fun to make a few little textile cats to go inside this box, and he suggested taking a leaf out of Suzanne’s book and making representations of all our ktities, past and present! What a lovely idea.

It would be fun to open the box and find it full of cats! I attended several courses on fabric box making back in Plymouth days when I belonged to the Westcountry Embroiderers, and the amazing teacher always said that a box should contain a surprise.

Having had experience of making boxes, I know just how much work has gone into the construction and embellishment of this one. Suzanne said she was delighted it was going to such a good home – to someone who appreciated the work, and who was also a cat person!

Isn’t this a beautiful object? I love its construction, the unusual way it opens, its bold colours and the stylised cats which seem to fill both sides of the box. Happy cats!