A baby sweater and another pop up box card

Knitting baby or toddler items is such fun. They are cute and quick to complete. A friend is expecting her first granddaughter soon. I sent her daughter (already a mommy to two adorable boys) this sweater in a color that is similar to the deep pink they chose to use with white in the baby's room. I am sorry that the only photo I have is the one they took when they first opened it in their car on the way home from the post office. I know I took photos before I sent the sweater, but I can't locate them this morning.

Here are photos from the pattern magazine, the Spring 2014 issue of Creative Knitting:

          

I used Sirdar Baby Bamboo, a yarn that is 80% bamboo, 20% wool. The only thing I did differently was using a single button at the neck. The button I used had a daisy like flower in nearly the exact shade as the yarn. 

I'm still having fun making gift box cards. This is the card that accompanied the sweater.

A few of the stickers, such as the stork, were a bit heavy for a thin strip of cardstock to support them and have them stand up straight. I sandwiched an unused twist tie between two strips of paper and that worked beautifully! This is a fun way to use up odd stickers and embellishments.

The first card that I made in this fashion is here. The instructions and cutting dimensions from Split Coast Stampers are here. There are other variations online with slightly different dimensions. Search for Pop Up Card Boxes or similar phrases.

I may be late to the party among those who enjoy Sizzix brand Susan's Garden floral dies, but I think I'm going to be hooked. I bought one die set recently, unaware that a specific tool kit is a good idea for shaping the petals after they've been cut. Undaunted, I cut out petals from yellow card stock, used a stylus-like tool with a blunt end and a chop stick to shape them and this was my first attempt at a rose:

More petals could have/should have been used, but perhaps this is the last rose of summer....in March! With all the snow, ice and bitter temps (a wind chill of -22 degrees  this morning!)  any rose is a pleasure to see.

Stay warm. Stay happy. Keep crafting!

Birthday Card

My younger son has a birthday on Monday. He will be 34. If that isn't bad enough, his brother will be 36 in two months. Good thing I'm not concerned with lying about my age. I mean I might if I could pull it off, and more importantly, if I could remember what age I claim as my own. I know someone on Facebook who took 10 years off her age. Does she really think family and long time friends don't know how old she is? It's just a number, and as the saying goes, the more birthdays you have, the longer you live. Profound, right? That's me.

I need a lot more birthdays to get through all the crafts that I have pinned on Pinterest. One pin led to this card. It measures 5.5" wide and 6.5" tall. Flat, it is mail-able but I think it would require extra postage. I didn't make an envelope for this, it will just be handed to my son. Without further ado, here it is, first flat:

And here it is standing, table high view:

Looking at from above:

And from directly overhead:

A paper cutter and scoring device are handy but not absolute necessities. Chances are, if you make cards or play much with paper, you already have these tools.

The directions and a video guide to making this are available at Splitcoaststampers I don't recall if you have to be a member to see this or not, but there is no cost involved and I do not get unwanted emails, etc from them. They are safe.

The two photos that are at odd angles to the left and right on the opened card are glued to narrow strips of acetate. I recently organized all of my cling style rubber stamps, most of which came packaged with small sheets of clear acetate. As I put the stamps in their new home, I couldn't toss all that acetate that might be useful. For once, I was right!

The back panel of this card should have had the black paper on the back side and striped paper (the lining of the box) visible from the front. Oops. That panel and a plain one on the back are cut longer to keep the rear flap of the box upright. In this card, the back panel is solid black and I wrote our son's birthday greetings in metallic ink.

I will definitely make this card again.

Countdown to Christmas Tree

This began as a plain white structure, bought on a clearance table post holiday early this spring. The miracle isn't that I completed it, but that I didn't store it away so safely that I forgot about it or couldn't find it.

The faces of the drawers are 1.5 inch squares. Most of the blue background images came from a single sheet of scrapbook paper. The others are miscellaneous bits I had on hand. The back and sides of the tree were painted red. I used a silver pen on the open edges of the structure.

Numbers were done with the same pen on black circles punched from scraps.

Corrugated paper Tiki-ish decor

I love Pinterest. I hate it too.

My son and daughter-in-law are having a luau themed party. I saw Tiki-like décor made out of corrugated paper. Not corrugated cardboard that has a flat finish on both sides, corrugated paper. This paper has one finished (smooth) side and the other is hills and valleys. The site on Pinterest did link to a source for this paper, but I thought (hoped) I could find it locally since time was running out.

Craft stores, office supply stores and shipping centers were unsuccessful searches. I settled on 12x12 sheets of scrapbook paper from Michaels that was the right construction, just not the size I had hoped for.

This is what I made from the paper, red foil and dark brown distressing ink on the edges of the cut outs.



I'm not sure that they will be used, but I had fun making them. I like the texture and the contrast of adding layers with the corrugation running in different directions. I would have done more detail, but the store only had four sheets and I used all but a few slivers to get this far.

If I had been able to make a column out of the paper, I would have put the red foil on the rear interior and used a battery operated candle inside, below the mouth of each one.

Do I really hate Pinterest? No. I never would have thought this on my own. It isn't Pinterest's fault that corrugated paper isn't sold locally in rolls. If I ever do find it though, I am buying some. If that happens and I still haven't opened it 13 years later, I hope someone will remind me that I thought this was a good idea.

Shoo-shoo-shoo Sugar Town*

Was your Valentine's Day sweet? Mine was. Grandson Colton was here. We played trains. We played in the play house. We napped in my bed which truthfully meant I balanced myself on the edge of our queen sized mattress and wondered how one little person can take up so much room and throw off so much heat.

 

Everyone bought candy for everyone else. Hershey's, Mars, Whitman's and Russell Stover all made money last week. Pepperidge Farm did too, as Goldfish are one of Colton's favorite snacks. I had a strip of blue cardstock that was the same width as the small Goldfish carton, so I wrapped it around the carton, creasing the edges and taped the top shut. The fish were stamped on solid green and on green plaid papers and given air bubbles of green glitter glue.

 

Another thing my grandson loves are the characters from Disney's Cars. I found this idea on a Disney site. The bodies and tires are two layers of cardstock. The tires are glued at the top only and sandwiched between layers of the body. With the bottom open, they are somewhat splayed so they will stand up. The eyes and mouths were printable downloads along with the body and tire patterns. I colored the eyes with Copics. This quick project was a big hit.

 

Lightning McQueen read (on the back) that Colton "auto" be my Valentine. 'Mater's said that he "wheelie" loved Colton.

It is never to early to teach a love of puns, is it?

Colton's mommy got Cherry M&Ms in a tube with a card that had an opening for the tube, and baggies with the remaining M&Ms and rapsberry Kisses. She got them for being berry sweet and always cherry....er, cheery.

My boys are "da bomb" so they each got 3 Rolos wrapped in red with a gold pipe cleaner fuse.

Hubby's card used a stamp that featured the character Tina, made by AI (Art Impressions). The inside stamped greeting read "Of course I love you...who else would put up with me?"

 

Now it is time to concentrate on birthdays again. Hubby catches up to me today (for 5 months I hear about being so much older than he is), followed soon by Colton's and his daddy's birthdays. Throw in a few cousins and a sister-in-law and we'll be eating cake until summer arrives!

 

* (from the post title) Anyone have Nancy Sinatra (or Zooey Deschanel) humming in their head now, singing Sugar Town?

 

Creating without Photoshop

One of these days I will get Photoshop  or a similar program and learn to use it. Until then, I manage to manipulate photos using Word, Picasa and/or Photobucket. Obviously this has limitations, but I can usually achieve my intended goal.

I made a card for my younger son’s birthday. I had taken a photo of him on Christmas day wearing a hat that was a gift from my other son and daughter-in-law.

I knew I wanted to print use black and white for the graphics in the card, adding a touch of color with colored pencils. I used Picasa to crop his face and to create a pencil sketch version.

 

I wanted to superimpose his head onto other figures, but I wanted to accomplish this easily (for me) without a learning curve of a new program required. I know “layers” is a term used in photo manipulation programs, but to me, layers refers to how tall a cake might be, or how many shirts and sweaters I need to brave cold weather.

It is easy to change the size of a photo in a Word document, either by clicking on the corner and moving the sizing dot in and out, or using the format photo box and specifically addressing height and width.

The various bodies I used in the card were all from internet searches. I placed those images in Word under the photo of my son and played with sizing both images until I got something that I liked. The images were printed and then physically cut and pasted, not merged or magically cut and pasted in a program. This isn’t perfect, but for a humorous card, the process works.

For display here, I’ve blocked out the sentiments on each page using Photobucket, the “doodle” option, changing the color to gray. You can also do this through Picasa. The card was a hit with my son. The images supposedly depict how he sees himself, how his brother, friends, nephew and lastly, how his parents see him.

           

The back of the card had this stamped image ("Just think, with every birthday you're even closer to being more like your parents" - hehehehe)

The front of the card has this 3D sticker that flashed when a button was pressed

 

I hope this shows others what is possible using programs on hand (Word) and free programs (Picasa and Photobucket). Go forth and have fun!

Copic coloring fun

I am really enjoying coloring with Copic markers. I've been going to monthly Copic Club events at a scrapbooking store called the Happy Scrapper. In October, we made Halloween themed cards. I didn't think to photograph my own before giving them out, but here is the store's sample.

And these were extra prints that I colored but didn't finish as cards. They were tucked into shelves and peeking out amid other Halloween decor last month. They might become cards next year or might return to the shelves.

There is glitter glue on the witch's fingernails and crystal ball that doesn't photograph well but added a little something fun. The stone in her ring was a clear crystal that was colored with a Copic marker. I didn't know you could color crystals with Copics...that was a fun and useful thing to learn.

The stamps used in this project were Northwood's Spooky Eyes and Witch's Crystal Ball
Copic colors used were
B91, B93,
BV000, BV000, BV01
C1, C2, C3, C7, C8
E21, E23
FY1
V09
YG03, YG05, YG06,
YR15, YR16

Uh-oh....a new addiction: Copic Markers

There are a few crafts that I have never done, or at least never done at home, despite thinking they would be fun to do. Time, money for supplies and room to store supplies have all been factors at one time or another. This explains why I haven't thrown clay since high school and don't have a kiln. I've never had a class in stained glass but am okay with that as I don't want to store pieces of glass among all my other craft supplies.

The list of classes I've taken is long and I don't regret any of them. Saving odd bits of left over kit supplies in case I ever made something else in that craft became a problem, one I'm continually reassessing. Reassessing meaning sorting, donating and tossing. I'm never going to needle tat again. What, you've never heard of that?

Image from Wikipedia

I'm not doing macrame, quilling or frying marbles either. I did read about baking marbles, but relax, I am not buying marbles to bake them so that they crack internally. I'll wait until Colton is old enough to play with marbles and leaves a few behind.

I'm not likely to smock again unless Colton ever becomes big brother to a little sister. Yes, smocking can be done for all babies and some little boys do wear smocked garments, but that isn't the norm up here in SE Michigan. Also, Colton is big strapping boy. Putting him in a smocked garment would look almost as silly as putting one on his dad or grandpa. I can't get to photos of garments that I made years ago but here is a sampler from my smocking days. Sorry about the photo quality and angle, I was trying to avoid window reflection and glare on the glass.

 

 

My point (yes, I do have one!) is that I've stopped collecting fabric, yarn and other supplies while trying to use up or donate what is on hand. I've sworn off learning new crafts that would require more tools as I try to declutter my home and my life. So what is my new addiction?

 

Copic Markers!

 

I have always liked painting and coloring. I have always had markers in the house. I have also grumbled when a reached for a marker that hadn't been used in a while and it had dried out. Same reaction to one that was used up, usually a sign of a favorite color, and who knows which store carries that brand now.

 

My kids gave me some Copics last Christmas and I played a bit with them but realized there was a lot I didn't know. Last weekend I went to a Copic Seminar. Woohoo! We learned the advantages of Copic over other markers (for one thing, they are refillable), how to shade, how to blend, which colors work well together, what those numbers on the caps mean and also how to achieve a few special effects.

Basic coloring plus how to texturize the bear.

Shading for dimension and blending unlike colors.

A bit more detail in blending and shading.

 

If you are a Copic Marker junkie user, I would love to hear about it, including your favorite blogs, websites and You Tube tutorials.

 

Color my world warm (furnace and hot water are in and working!) and artfully blended, Copic style.

 



 

Graduation card, made, not found

I still haven't found the graduation cards that I moaned about in my last post. I fully expect they'll show up the day after the party.

I think I wasn't supposed to find the cards so that I would use my new Sizzix die. For those of you who do paper crafts, do you use a die cutting machine, and do you love it/them? I have a Sizzix Big Kick that I use 98% of the time and an original model Cricut.

I recently bought a Mover & Shapers Die, #657586 labeled Card, Circle Flip-Its.

 

The card I made is for a teenage boy that I don't know all that well as far as his tastes, sense of humor, etc. When it doubt, KISS (Keep It Simple Silly {nicer than stupid}) always works.

 

Here is the card I create, first flat, than standing:

I added a piece of cardstock to the back to create a pocket to hold the check we're giving him as a gift.

I think I found a spare envelope that will fit this card while I was looking for the missing purchased cards. Now if I can just find it again.....

If not, I will make one from the paper that has the graduation caps printed randomly on it. That might not happen until just before we leave for the party if procrastination sets in.

Why don't I make cards in advance and have them ready when the occasion arises? Probably because I'm busy ready blogs and Pinterest! It's all your fault...yours, and yours and yours too!

 

A few finished projects

Another odd week in the Knitty house, not be confused with a nutty house.

Yesterday I was working on a post for here when the power went out on our side of the street. It was out for a little over two hours. I switched gears and did things not requiring electricity and returned to the computer mid-afternoon. My post was really messed up and after 20 minutes of trying to fix it, I decided it would be quicker to delete and start all over. Before I got that far, I tried to Google something but Firefox wouldn't allow that to happen. I can't quote the message now, but it was a security issue and appeared that something about Google wasn't up to date.

Hmmmm, that didn't sound good. My immediate reaction was to search for that message online, but I couldn't.... Duh!

I found the message through my iPhone but was still worried until I came across someone saying to check your computer's date and time. Aha! The power outage had reset my computer to a date in July of 2003. Once I reset that and the time, everything was functioning as expected on my computer.

My day and week were rapidly getting away from me so yesterday's post is back in my idea file and today I am showing you my completed vest. The length of time I worked on this is not indicative of  the pattern being complex. It really isn't hard, it is a 4 row repeat. I limited my time working on it to knitting sessions in the store. I don't have an issue with the rule about using yarn purchased at the store during knitting sessions, but I have so much yarn waiting at home from ...shhh...other shops, I needed to slow this project down.

The pattern is called Tampa Vest, designed by Julie Gaddy. It was published in the July 2009 issue of Creative Knitting Magazine. The yarn is a worsted weight silk blend. The name has escaped my mind and I can't find the tag anywhere at the moment. Rather than get frustrated though, I will look for it at the yarn store and make note of pertinent info including laundering instructions. Within 48 hours of getting that info, the tag will miraculously show up here at home.

  

 Here is a close up of the pattern. Please ignore the rectangular color variation. That isn't the yarn, that is how it photographed against a door with panels.

The other long-in-the-works project that was completed this week was a scrapbook of our Hawaiian vacation. Most of the photos were shown here already and some of the pages have info that I'm not comfortable sharing here (last names, an address, etc). I bought a scrapbooking pack of papers and stickers on the cruise which made this project simple once I finally decided which photos to use and sat down to work. These are the first and last pages:

I see beautifully formatted scrapbook pages in shops and online but they often only have one picture per page and a lot of design detail. My books are not designed to win any contests or impress anyone. They are for my enjoyment (hubby might look at this one more time in the next 10 years) and will take me back to a warm, wonderful vacation when I am freezing in Michigan next January.

I have one more room to dust and vacuum before I call it quits for the day. If you drop in over Easter weekend, you are welcome in any of the main floor rooms but don't you dare go upstairs! The beds will be made but I can't guarantee that bunnies won't be up there to greet you, and they won't be the Easter variety. I think this one has become a permanent resident but I don't remember buying her that coffee mug.