The Challenge: a Swing Dancing Wedding Card!

This request is from my daughter who will be attending a fellow college students' wedding that has a swing dancing theme.

It's been a while since my last wedding card, and the pic above is my first mock-up of the design. Next up is to make any changes before I make the final card. I think I'd like the design to be all about the swirling skirt, which needs to be bigger. I'm thinking nice, upgraded papers, with real lace trim as the petticoat, and tulle for a possible added veil. Stay tuned...

Time Travel

The finished product - finally! The woodburned covers are coptic stiched to parchment pages, and postcard printed paper is added as dividers. This, I think, would make a terrific travel log.

Rising Candle Pop-up

tip: use the print of the paper to express design elements. I could have used solid colors for this cupcake, then scored in the cupcake paper ridges, but why do that when striped paper can imply those ridges? The same point here can be made for the cupcake 'icing' paper choice.

Work in Progress: Woodburned Journal Cover

I've got these clock faces burned in, but still have to sand, paint the edges, and varnish before assembling the guest-book sized journal.

Upcycle your Plastic Packaging

A while back, I bought a stamp centering tool called a Stamp-a-ma-jig. It essentially is a mini t-square with a sheet of clear plastic, and it worked great! As time went on, the plastic sheet started to scratch and turn white, mostly from age and my washing the ink off after each use. You can buy replacement sheets of plastic, but why do that when you can just hit up your recycling bin?

I used the security packaging from printer cartridges. Whatever you use needs to be fairly thick. Using only your ***OLD*** blades and scissors cut out the flat part of the packaging into a rectangle. Voila! You're finished! And the best part: I don't wash my new upcycled sheets: I just make a sheet for every four stamps (You can put one stamp design in each corner), then file them away. Be organized, and put all your birthday designs together, then it's pretty easy to see which stamp will work best for the card you're creating.

Easel Backs

The only requirement for easel backed cards? They must fold flat! Here is a mini collection of different ways to do it. Double-click on the image for better viewing, as they are in a print friendly format.

Changes in Color

new larger flowers, assembled from smaller flower punches. The goal: to use up all my scraps!

Refillable!

I've been making these for a while (without the tray) and it's always bothered me to glue the pads in. With the tray, a new post-it pad can be popped in easily!

Points on Bull

The dartboard cabinet could be the card itself without any background, should you choose to make it larger. The board inside is 3" in diameter in this card.

Happy Easter Everyone!

Our new indian runner ducks: named, of course, by my 15 year old daughter!

Swinging Pendulum

Inside the grandfather clock, the pendulum swings freely.