Spring Daffodils

Well the clocks have gone forward so it is officially Spring time and to mark this happy event I have created some paper daffodils to hang from my lovely white tree.  I have a die to make these in miniature form but since I wanted them a lot bigger I found a design I could download from the Silhoutte Design Store for $0.74. The beauty of having my lovely Cameo Silhoutte is that after the initial outlay, it is very cheap to make what you want with it and to whatever size you require. Since purchasing a few weeks ago I haven't had to buy any new dies and I have even had a go at creating my own fancy cards shapes.  

Hope you like my large daffodils.  

As I said before, I have the ability to create these daffodils at any size and here are some more I have created which are a medium size.
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Crafty hugs from Crafty Tashx

Wicker Easter Bunny!

Easter is finally here and it is lovely to enjoy some crafting time amongst other things planned for the Easter break.  

I have been playing with my Perfect Partner dies today but I am not quite ready to reveal what I have been up to just yet!

I would like to share with you today my decorated wicker bunny that I purchased from Hobbycraft.  I decorated it with some flowers I made using the Serenity paper kit from Craftwork Cards and then used my glue gun to secure them. I particularly love the tones of light blue. 

Have a great Easter, crafty hugs from CraftyTashX.

Some bunny loves you

Easter is almost here and of course I am excited as it means not only will I have some time with family but also more time to craft.  I am looking forward to putting my Easter display out which I will show you in my Easter post.  However, this weekend will be spent making Birthday cards for family members.

In today's blog I thought I would share with you some of the Easter cards I have made using my Cameo Silhouette this week.  I am getting on really well with it as you will see.

This first one has an embossed background called Woodland Glade from Tattered Lace.  I love the little images of an owl, fox pigeon and hare.  The Easter Egg is a die from Tattered Lace.   The Happy Easter, grass and Easter Eggs were made from a design from the Silhouette Design Store.  It did a great job cutting out the grass.

This next is made for the lovely man in my life, my husband. I have used another Tattered Lace embossing folder called Love Bird Berries which is appropriately named!  I downloaded this image from the design store and resized it in my Silhouette Studio to fit a 7x5 card.  

I decided to work with three copies of the image so I could cut them out separately in blue, green and brown.  The first was cut in blue.  Then before I cut the next in green I used the rubber tool to erase parts of the image that I didn't need to cut so it left the upper frame with the leaves on.  The purpose of this was to save wasting card.  Then I repeated this so I could cut out the bunnies.  Once they were all cut out it was just a case of layering them up and assembling the card.  The sentiment chosen was perfect.

Here is a sneeky peek at the inside of the card.

 and finally, a card shaped as an Easter Egg.  Again, another image downloaded from the Silhouette Design Store for about 50p!

Enjoy your weekend crafters everywhere.

CraftyTashx

What can I make with my Silhoutte Cameo

Well they say the possibilities are endless and I am inclined to believe this.  The cameo has a 12x12 cutting area which is perfect for creating scrapbook pages and it does a lot more besides.  

I toiled for weeks over whether to purchase a Brother Scan and Cut, a Cricut or this machine and opted for this little beauty because it offers the crafter the most flexibility in the way they want to craft.

Now that I have my Cameo I can cut elements for my cardmaking to whatever size I require unlike the conventional way with dies. 

I can cut around my own stash of images or those available in the Design Store with the option of cutting around the edge or adding a slight border.  I can even turn my craft stamps into images for printing.

Vinyl decor is becoming a popular way to decorate your home and with this machine it is easy to cut and length is not an issue.   

Changing the blade to a sketch pen adds the drawing element.  My cameo will also cut fabric and heat transfer material meaning I could design my own tee-shirts and do etched glass.

This machine will revolutionize the way crafters craft in the near future.

Since my Cameo arrived on Saturday I have been getting acquainted with it.  It wasn't as hard as I expected to use and already I have created a couple of tags, cut out an element for a card and made a card.  All easy to do through online tutorials available on YouTube and Craftsy website.

Here is what I have made in the first 24hrs of using it.

  
First I cut a tag which was available as a free image with the Design Studio software.  All I had to do was re-size appropriately before cutting out.  

I wanted to use my Foundation Card which I purchased from Joanna Sheen's website.  It is the same card used by Creative Expressions and is 200gsm. All I needed to do was place the cardstock onto the 12x12 cutting mat and load this into the machine. I used a blade setting of 4, one up from that recommended, due to the weight of the card.

I left it on the mat after the initial cut because I then wanted to sketch the hearts onto it and would reload the mat when I was ready. This would ensure the hearts were drawn where I expected them.

The next stage was to add the sketched image (again free with software) to my tag and then switch my blade out and replacing with the sketch pen before sending it through the machine again.

What I have learned from this experience is that you can identify different areas of an image to cut, or not cut so it means you build the complete card then select what you want to do with it at the end.  i.e. select the area you want to cut or sketch.

This time I created a tag from scratch by drawing a rectangle and a circle and welding them together to create one uniform shape.  I then added the word "love" to the edge of the tag and welded that together.   Finally, I wanted another go at the Sketch Pen so I added a word "you" in the middle.

Here is one of the free images I chose to cut out.

And here is my first purchase.  This Easter Egg image was 65p.  Much cheaper than purchasing a die and as I said before, I can make this to any size within the parameters of my 12x12 cutting mat.

and finally this was the last project of the day.  Here I cut direct onto an 8x8 card which was quite heavy so I set the cut speed down and checked the box for a double cut.  

Kanban Shabby & Chic

I simply adore this paper craft kit from Kanban.  It is a kit that works well with any haberdashery dies and ribbons and pearls.

I have been working on it for the last week or so so haven't worked my way through all the kit as yet but would like to share with you some of the cards that  have made so far so that I can offer you some inspiration.

I have used some parchment paper and put this in an embossing folder to create interest to the background.  

Similarly I have created the same card but made this one into a Mother's Day card and used some pearls to adorn the mannekin.

I have made this card using a pre cut central stepper card that has a nice shape at the bottom and my haberdashery dies.

On this card I have cut into the rose edge so that the topper slides underneath the edge.  It just needs a sentiment to finish it off.

I have added some decoupage roses across the front of the card.

This just needs another sentiment to finish it off.  Do you see how I have used my pearls to make a bracelet and necklace on the topper.

I have used some more parchment paper on this card.  Firstly to make a background to mount the Happy Mother's Day on and secondly to make a butterfly.

Some decoration using my pearls.

Good use of my parchment butterflies.  I knew they would come in handy.

Another parchment butterfly to adorn this card.

Watch this space as more cards will follow.... and a week later, I am sharing with you my entire collection of cards made using this papercrafting kit.

It's funny, now that I can look at them as photos I have a few more ideas for adding some additional embellishments here and there!

Paper Flower Wreath

The most enjoyable aspect of my recent visit to the Craft4Crafters show at Westpoint was visiting the Pink Frog Crafts and Card stand where I found a tiny plant pot filled with little paper snowdrops.  I was shown how to make these and took this photo as a momento in case I forget what they looked like.

However, these were not the only paper flowers that had been created by the demonstrator, she had made a lovely heart shaped wreath covered in lots of tiny handmade paper flowers.  They looked so beautiful that I wanted to try this for myself.

I was suprised to learn that the majority of the flowers made on the wreath came from one die.  It is available on their website and called a medium multiflower Rose Die (024).  I already owned this die but hadn't tried making anything other than roses and fuchsias with it. However, with this one die you can make roses, daises, fuchsias, aquilegia, poppies and sunflowers so it is really good value for money.  So all I needed to purchase was an additional die for making daffodils.  

With these two dies I made the majority of the flowers you see below in this wreath.

Here are some close ups:

The daisy is one of the easiest to make.  First cut out some flowers.  You need two for a daisy but of course you will make more than one.  Take your ball tool and run this around each flower to give it a curl.  Then take your pokey tool and fold each petal in turn over it to give it extra shape.  Now put a blob of glue in the centre of one and place the other on top slight offset.  Finish the centre using flower soft.

The daffodil couldn't be easier.  With the two cut petals first shape them with your ball tool and then place a dab of glue on one and sandwich together, offsetting them. 

With your pokey tool pierce the centre so that your sepal will push through.  

Take the final piece cut from the die and use your largest ball tool to shape it.  As you approach the shortest edge, force it to curl with the ball tool so that when you glue it in place it has an a larger surface edge to glue to the rest of the flower.  Now glue the seam together.  When dry apply glue around the narrow edge and hold in place until it grabs.  Your sepals should already be in place at this point!

The aquilegia was made using the MultiFlower Rose Die for the outer petal and a tonic die punch for the centre.  

I learned a very interesting tip at the show on how to pinch the edges of the outer flowers. First shape your flowers with the ball tool and then using your pokey tool hold it along the longer edge of a petal and wrap the petal around the pokey tool to crease it. 

Place a tiny amount of glue at the tip of the flower and hold this firmly with your round nose pliers.  Gently push the pliers toward the centre of the flower and this action creates the lovely pinched edges you see on the flower.

The Chrysanthemum was made using multiple layers which were shaped before gluing into place.

The pink carnation was made using the same die but I used scissors with a special edge to create the effect on the edge.

and finally the Gerbera Daisy.  I have a punch that I used to create the centre of this flower.

I had forgotten how much fun it is to sit and make paper flowers.  I think the best advise I can offer is to use your ball tool to shape your flowers and have handy your pokey tool and round nose pliers.  Glue with quick grab is helpful but not essential and flower soft makes great centres for your flowers.