Alcohol Ink Painting

I like so many other crafaters have a good collection of rangers alcohol inks, that more often than not sit on the shelf waiting to be used...Well I like messy play and found a group of artists that love painting with alcohol inks so I decided to give it a try, and this is what I ended up with...

Ok so its not the greatest painting in the world but its my painting and I love it! I used a white glossy tile alcohol inks and a little bit of spectrum noir pen work....it was very messy and very fun...and at least I now have another craft to use my inks with.....

My friend Shirley  Young has a lovely blog and is giving away a very nice file for christmas, why not check out her blog and have a looksee, she does some great work and gives very generously her files ....heres a link to her blog...http://shirleystemplates.blogspot.co.uk/

Hope you have a great day...Im off to see the nurse for bloods tomorrow so I may not come visit

Thank you for looking
love debby xx

Fabric Ink Kit

One of the kits I have been lucky to try, for the Design Team of http://www.graphtecgb.co.uk/shop/default.asp?category=20111026112735_GRAPHTEC  the main suppliers of cameos in uk., is the fabric ink kit.

At first I was a little apprehensive as I have never done anything like this and thought I would really mess it up. How wrong was I...it was the most fun Id had for ages...
Well as with any kit, the first thing to do is unpack., and heres what the kit contains..

It also had a sponge applicator which for some reason when I took this photo I left in the box...
after watching the video which came with the kit, I felt ready to face this challenge...

I went to the local store and bought a cheap nighty and a cotton bag, both of which I wouldnt mind if I ruined them...I figured practise pieces can go in the bin if need be, but I didnt credit how easy it was to do!!

So having my items to Ink up, I then had to choose some designs.....now that took longer than anything else!! I just couldnt make up my mind for the nighty!! The bag was pretty easy as I had seen some words in the silhouette store and decided they were appropriate!!

I used one of the downloads that came with the kit, some words and eventually chose an Owl for the nighty..Now I was ready to begin...

I cut the template material on the cameo, on the same settings I would for vinyl, blade 2, speed 8 thickness 9...Then weeded out the bits I didnt need..

I then used the low tack transfer paper that was in the kit...

I gave it a good rub over to make sure the vinyl would all lift, the scraper that was included was very sturdy and had just enough flexability in it and is so much better than the old credit card I usually use!
I did remember that I needed something to block the Ink from going onto the back of my creation and found the most useful tool....hehe...

in this instance a pizza box...but it was just the right size for the bag and also slipped nicely into the nighty! and so it began...
I lined up my template to where i wanted it to be and again rubbed the transfer paper until the vinyl was stuck to the bag and then I removed the transfer paper. If you have done any vinyl then you will know exactly how to do this..

I then got the paint and squeezed a little into the palette, and used the sponge applicator, but found very quickly that with my arms limited use i couldnt control this very well, as will be evident when you look at the owl later and see his little tail! The sponge as it came was so big that i could barely hold it in my hand, so out came the scissors and I chopped off a bit of the sponge and found that to be the best method for me., because the sponge is a natural sponge you can get a little texture with it too..bonus!!

a dabble motion worked very well with the cotton bag, but i had to be a little more careful with the nighty because the material was a little stretchy. The paint was quite thick, so wasnt as messy as I had thought it might be. It went on really well, but I did wish I had more colours, so if you do buy the kit consider buying one or 2 more colours too.

I left them to dry for an hour then removed the templates and left them again to dry overnight. The next day I gave them an Iron with a hot iron to set the fabric ink you need to do this with anything likely to need a wash.

Hope this post gives you the inspiration to try this yourself and have fun...
It opens up another gift idea for the christmas stockings!!

Thank you for looking
Love debby xx

Im back...

I have not been able to get into my blog for a little while as you can see, by how long its been. I have now managed to sort may problems out yay!!

quite a lot has been made in the mean time and i havent blogged about them..but hey thats life..
First off I would like to say woohoo our Kelly made the Silhouette America Design Team., Im sure she will be a great asset to them. To see her blog go here: http://findingtimetocreate.blogspot.co.uk/

Kelly has been an inspiration to so many all ready and now she will have a bigger audience to view her creations.

My youngest son has left home,...so now its just me and hubby and the furbabies!! The upshot of this is now I can have a double bedroom for my crafting room and hubby and i are in the process of moving all my craft stuff into it, so I cant do as much crafting as i would like yet but cant wait to be fully operational.....

There are 2 more shows on create and craft tv before christmas and so i have been making bits and bobs for my dt work, its so funx

Thank you for looking
love debby xx

I love receiving parcels :)

Today I had 3 parcels arrive all at once and I felt like it was christmas...

The first one was a new blade for my cammie so hes happy now....

The 2nd one was from Karine at Graphtecgb and contained some fabulous goodies for me to play with...I have some printable foil, (Ive been wanting to play with that for ages so am very pleased to see that in my parcel) I also had the double sided adhesive kit, which is fab, I loved the colours of the flock in there and look forward to using them., and I also got a set of the silhouette glitters which look very fine to me! i THINK iM GOING TO HAVE FUN OVER THE WEEKEND...

The next parcel was from supersavvyme, and contained a bottle of lenor and loads of samplles for me to give out to my friends and neighbours,.. and some forms for me to do a survey on it. It is the new Lenor with the new technology!! All I know is that Ive used some already and it smells nice...and theyve sent me money off coupons too...result!!

I think Im off to Pinterest now to get some ideas for my new stuff, and then ill be ready to play tomorrow as Im then on holiday from monday for nearly 3 weeks so dont worry when you dont hear from me...ill be at the seaside enjoying myself!!

Thank you for looking
love debby xx

photos onto canvas

This week I have had fun putting photos onto canvas ready for christmas stockings,. It is so easy to do and such fun...

I stumbled across a video for it on youtube whilst looking for something else and figured that I just had to try.

Here is a link to the video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lqg04pO-_9k

I had some gloss medium so used that, and it worked great,. I left the canvas to dry overnight before attempting to remove the copy paper., here are the results of 2 that I did for my children and their partners,. a cheap but personal christmas box item!!

It took a few times to remove most of the paper but i let it dry inbetween attempts otherwise as you can see in the 2nd photo in the right hand corner you tend to remove the ink too!! Although I have not perfected the tecnique quite yet, I love the results that Im getting and will definately try this again..

Thank you for looking
Love debby xx

wedding invitation

This is a simple looking wedding invite that can be made using Kraft Card.

The lacy border was made by combining 2 borders from the silhouette store. The top one is called abstract border and the bottom one was in a group simply called 3 borders.

The beauty of the silhouette software is that you can cut, manipulate, divide, turn and whatever your imagination will allow you to do to a file to change it into what you want. As the abstract border was really a joined up mirror image and i only wanted the top area, so I used my knife tool to chop off the bottom area

After that I deleted the parts I didnt want, and selected the rest and grouped. I then put the other border back onto my mat and drew a rectangle the size of the top border

 After I lined them all up I selected them all and right clicked on the box and grouped them. I used my rubber to rub out the top line of the rectangle.

This is what I ended up with and I was very pleased with the result, it was just what I had visualised.
and thats just one way you can play with any files you have...why not experiment and see what you end up with??

So I cut my file added a little ribbon and a heart ..simple but good??

Thank you for looking
Love debby xx

2 Cards one sketch...

I took ages making this sketch in my silhouette software, therefore I want to use it as much as possible,..simple economics!! Here I will show you 2 totally different cards, in different colourways,one very easy 5 minute make the other takes a little more effort but is well worth the extra time spent if you have it!

Card 1 a simple sketch card, a quick and elegant make

The beauty of this sketch is that you can make it simple and quick and depending on the words you put onto it fancy or more plain as this example or you can really jazz it up....

Card 2 The same sketch with a bit of bling and fluff

2 Cards one sketch!! the choice is what you want to make it...

Thank you for looking
love debby xx

A Steam Punk romance

One of the missions for the DT was to use the Designer Edition of the software showing the use of the knives. After pondering what to do, this card was born...

This is a simple easel card, the file for this is in the silhouette store. I have had the file since the last big sale and hadn't found a reason to use it until now... The background of the card was a simple rectangle that I drew in the software, fitting it to size.I did a fill in it. I then used the knife tool and used the Dovetail cut and did 2 different fill patterns on each of the pieces. The clocks fill was one that I bought from the silhouette store, the brown was in the software already.

The border was one that I made up using 2 borders from the store and combining them, more of which I will show you in my post for the wedding Invites! The silhouette was from the sil store and so was the cogs. The frames were cut on cammie and a little bling in the screw headed brads and my card was finished...

Thank you for looking

Love debby xx

My Daughter

I made a frame for my daughter for christmas last year and she loves it, and so when I was asked as part of the DT to do something using the sketch feature I rather liked the idea of trying to replicate this frame completely in Silhouette studio, because last time I used craft artist platinum to make the background and only used the sketch in silhouette to write the verse. So having never tried to make a photograph transluscent in the silhouette software, I was astounded at how easy it was!!

Heres the finished frame.....

 

This is the photo that I started with before I took it to silhouette studio software.................

 

As it was a jpeg and I have designer edition of the software it went straight onto my mat. I then drew a rectangle onto the mat the size I wanted the finished frame and stretched the photo to fit. I then opened the fill window...

 

 

 

 

When you open this window, down on the bottom right there is an Advanced Option. I clicked on this and opened the next window

 

There is a transluscent button at the bottom and I slid it up to 80% so that there was just a shadow of the photo for my background,..you can play with this slide until you reach a transparency that you are happy with. I then printed this out.

I  chose a verse to write over the background.

 

When you are doing a verse it is nice on the eye to have the words centred and this is easy to do in silhouette software, by going to the centre button then clicking on all on your work space, go to the Align Centre button and it will do it all for you.

 

I chose to do this on the silhouette using the sketch feature, this way I get to choose what colour pen I would like to use and as silhouette have a range of metallic pens I have a great choice. In this instant though I chose to make the frame monochromatic....

 

I hope this is easy for you to follow

Thank you for looking

 

Love debby xxx

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now you've ordered your cameo....

Being a design team member now means that I have to work on my blog and make it interesting for others to read, or so my hubby tells me...so as I am still waiting for my craft space to be finished (which Im hoping it will be all up and running by tomorrow) I thought I would do a post for the real newbies that want to learn out there....

So you've uummed and aahhed and finally decided to buy a Cameo,( or maybe you are frightened of taking that final step because you have heard that theres software to learn and that can be pretty scary I know that, so to help you make up your mind) whilst you are waiting for your cameo to arrive did you know that you can download the software and start playing around and familiarising yourself with it?

The latest version can be downloaded from here..http://www.silhouetteamerica.com/software

You can play around and watch videos on youtube, go to blogs with tutorials (of which there are hundreds) and get a start on feeling comfortable with the software before the cameo arrives.....You can even start collecting files from around the internet....

So the day arrives and your new machine arrives....everyone is so keen to make the first cut and say look I did that....but theres a few things you should know before you start...

Once you have set up the cameo to your computer , you will want to jump in feet first as it were, but please DONT....theres nothing like disappointment to colour your mind, and this is a fabulous machine and I want you to love yours as much as I love mine.

The very first thing to do is find your cutting mat, peel off the cover, now doesnt that feel great?? but now is the part most people forget to tell you..you need to Desticky your mat or anything you put on there now will be ruined!
The process of destickying your mat is easy so dont worry. I use an old T-shirt of hubbys, and dab that all over the mat until its about half as sticky as it was to begin with...

For the first few cuts on the mat DO NOT use paper its best to use a card around 250gsm'ish because if you use your paper you will end up in a sticky mess.

Now you are feeling ready to cut, my advise to you is to cut something simple like a square or circle for the first few cuts because you have to get used to blade thickness and speed. Which sounds far more difficult than it is! You will quickly become used to the settings you will need most!

Oh No I hear you cry, Ive cut right through the mat...dont worry we all do it!! My first mat was a casualty to many a mistake! You can always buy a new mat! In the mean time I have been known to selotape the back of my mat to use it one more time!(Though not recommended by Silhouette!!)

Once you have cut a few layers and squares then its time to venture out into the world of creating...good luck and enjoy!!

Heres a few blogs with good tutorials for you...
https://www.youtube.com/user/doodlingdebbie1?feature=mhee   This is Doodling debbies youtube site with her excellent tutorials....she started the silhouette plus forum for us all to learn our machines and it is a great resource for oldies and newbies alike....here is the link for the forum..http://s15.zetaboards.com/Silhouette_Plus/index/  you have to sign up to this forum but its free and there are many members from all over the world here and they all are so helpful...

This blog is Krafting kelly she has also done some really good tutorials....http://findingtimetocreate.blogspot.co.uk/p/tutorials.html

Next is Kay, she has a huge list of fonts and a series on print and cut well worth seeing..http://cleversomeday.wordpress.com/

theres just a few to get you started and of course there are many groups on facebook which are there to help you learn! Hope this helps for now

Thank you for looking

Love debby xx

My craft area

After telling my hubby that I have accepted a place on the Design Team for Silhouette UK he decided to revamp my craft area! At the moment my Cameo is on top of the wardrobe along with the ebosser, and my guillotine is in the kitchen! My living room is filled with boxes containing various stamps card paper and Inks....well betide any burglar! He'll wonder just what hes walked into!!

I was pretty bemused when he finished working yesterday as I had noticed that I had no workstation...but today he has been busy building and Im in awe! Now hes says it will be a few more days and then I can start putting things where I want them.....I think Im going to be in heaven!

The thing with spring cleaning/revamping/renewing your craft area is that it always has the added bonus of you finding bits and bobs you forgot you had...I mean who knew I had so many buggy eyes?? not me!!

Thank you for looking

Love Debby xx

Shoe

Hello!

I had a notification come up on my facebook  page telling me about an offer of a free file from svg cuts http://svgcuts.com/blog/2013/08/06/make-a-3d-high-heel-shoe-earn-a-gift-card/ They have done this offer before where they gave away a file for a bag and if you made it up and posted a picture they would give you a gift certificate! Well I happen to want one of their files so this way I get it for free!!

I downloaded the file last evening and this is what I came up with...

I made the base of the shoe with card from Lidl! I had a nice lipstick red colour and thought that would look good and it went together really well.

The paper I used for the panels was from  American Craft crate paper range in the Pink Plum collection

The ribbon was from Poundland! and is quite cute!! a couple of pearls and it was finished.

Before I started I had visions of feathers, glitter, flowers and charms but in the end I like the more simplistic look!

Thank you for looking

Love debby xx

well it seems like ages since I blogged

It seems like quite a while since I blogged but Im back with a vengeance! I have been busy making more samples for the wedding invites because the Bride to be hasnt really gone 'oh thats the one' so we have been looking at pinterest and etsy to find something and we have now found 3 for me to make up for her as best i can.

I am a member of several forums and facebook pages and have realised that although there are tutorials out there and some excellent ones I may add, some information is lacking, to newbies, although us oldie cameo users are well aware of the info so in the next few days Im going to make a few hints tips and notes for the newbies coming along...

I have also been making some frames and borders but they are on my laptop and my daughter has borrowed that for a few days so it maybe a little while before i can upload them for you all.!

I have also been acepted to a design team for graphtec gb and am very excited by this..

See I did have loads of news!

Thank you for looking

Love debby

Oooh my dishwasher has a rash....

I was bored ok.....

Well I started with the dishwasher ...then the rash spread to my:-

Fridge
Washing machine
Tumble dryer
Freezer.............

My kettles hiding just incase heheehe.... I bought the bubble file from the silhoouette store in the sale back in January because I knew it would come in handy one day....
My daughter walked into the kitchen and jjust froze, went wow I want some mum for my kitchen...must bhe a hit then...

Thank you for looking
love debby xx

mum and dads anniversary card

Next week it is my parents 58th wedding anniversary, so I wanted to make them a very special card. I dreamt glitz and glitter and fluff...then I came to my senses and remembered my Mum hates glitter!
After a rethink this card was born as a compromise.....

I used a basic card blank in white and cut a piece of 200gsm weight card to fit the front then used a die in my ebosser to give it definition. I cant remember the name of the die but it is a criss cross with a heart!

I cut a scalloped border that I had downloaded from http://www.birdscards.com/free-digital-cut-files/borders/ (she has some fabulous files that she shares freely) if you go to her site and download dont forget to say thankyou!!

The label was from a die that I recently bought in a sale and was out of its packaging so I dont know what it was called ( I know Im useless!) but they do have several similar cuts in the sil store..

The flower was from the silhouette store and was called tattered rose...the green wisps were from the sil store too.

Thank you for looking
love debby xx