While I was off being uninspired, I thought maybe I could use some help with ideas, so I browsed through some books at Michaels, and finally decided to purchase one. Treasuary of Tips and Tricks by Paper Crafts & Stamp It! has over 650 projects and ideas in it, according to the little snippet on the front cover. I have barely made a dent in looking at all the stuff in there, but wow, there really are a lot of neat things! Did you know that you can make scented cards by adding Kool-Aid mix to your embossing powder?? Neither did I!! But I do now! Anyway, I think being able to browse through some of these ideas helped kick-start my creative juices again, and now my brain is overflowing with ideas! Ah, if only I had more time. Well, at least I have some direction now. I've branched out into experimenting with stamping and heat embossing, and that has been fun! I had a little mishap with my first heat embossing tool when I first started out, though. I bought it a few months ago at Craft Warehouse, but had not had a chance to try it out. I got a new stamp that I wanted to experiment with, so I stamped my paper, sprinkled on the embossing powder, and turned on my brand new, just out of the box heat tool. I held it over my stamped image, and just as the embossing powder started to melt.....the tool made a clicking sound and seized up. I used it for all of 15 seconds, and it burned itself out. Fortunately, the folks at CW are very nice people, and even though I had NO idea where the receipt would be, they let me exchange it for another one. I finally got to use it this weekend, and I am happy to report that it worked just fine!
So here is what I did with it. This is for another card swap for the PBS Swappers group- for basically any type of card. I always seem to do birthday cards, so I wanted to do something different this time. I picked up a package of stamps for pretty cheap at Michaels, one of which is a "Best Wishes" stamp, and decided to use that one. I also found this really neat wildflower stamp, and thought it would be perfect for what I had in mind. I had seen a sample card at Michaels awhile back that I really liked- it had puffy white dandilions silhouetted in white against a mottled blue background. So that is what I used for my inspiration. Here is the result:
I used watermark pigment ink to stamp the image onto white card stock, then heat embossed it with clear embossing powder. I then dabbed on two colors of stamp ink with a sponge dabber to create the mottled blue and green background color, then just wiped the ink off of the embossed image with a paper towel while it was still wet, to keep it white. Then I added the Best Wishes sentiment with the stamp, using the same blue ink that I used for the background. I added the dragonfly as an afterthought, but I really like it! I had been experimenting with dabbing the ink onto vellum, so had this piece of scrap vellum with the blue and green ink on it. I punched the dragonfly out of that with a MS dragonfly punch, then dabbed on some silver pigment ink over the blue/green that was already there. I made the flower using various flower punches and used a white pearl for the center. I am really happy with how it came out! Here are some close-ups:
And here are all of the finished cards.
And OH! I just rememered that I never shared about my new crafting space! Ever since I started crafting, I've had to use the kitchen table. My supplies were stored in various places around the house, whereever I could fit them, and it was pretty inconvenient whenever I wanted to craft, since I had to haul my stuff in from other rooms. I dreamed of a crafting room all to myself, but when you have 2 kids in a 3 bedroom house, it is just not to be. However, we had a playroom for the kids. The kids are not little anymore though- my son will be 15 this coming week, and my daughter will be 11 in September, so they really didn't have much need for a room full of toys that they never played with anymore. My husband was given a mini pool table by a friend, and as he's always wanted a pool table, I agreed to it on one condition: that it does not take up an entire room all by itself, just to play pool. I wanted to find a way to use it for multiple purposes. So my clever husband built a tabletop for it. It is the perfect surface and height for my crafting! Plus, he found a removable net that can be put on it to play ping-pong- how cool is that?! The kids are thrilled with their new game room, and I am thrilled with a place to keep all my crafting stuff in one place, as well as be able to spread out and work on my projects. Here is the finished room:
Some of my storage space:
We're still doing some organizing in there, so hopefully someday I will be able to have entire shelves to myself and not have to share with ping-pong paddles and the like! I have only done two projects in here since it was done, and it was soooo wonderful to be able to have everything at my fingertips!
Well, that's all for now! I just joined another card swap for next month, Christmas in July, so get to start thinking about holiday-themed cards next! I already have a few ideas, so am looking forward to playing with them a bit. See you next time!
