Dyeing Sequins Part 1

Sequins seem to be pretty hot in the card making world these days. I bought a huge bag a month ago of "shiny" sequins at the craft store but the ones I am seeing are light and iridescent in color. Ellen Hutson had some pretty ones in her store but I couldn't decide on the "perfect" colors so I just bought the plain white and vanilla ones. I started to regret that this weekend.

I decided I was going to do an "experiment" and dye my own. I did a Google search for dyeing sequins and came up nada. I was very disappointed. I didn't let that stop me. I took out some re-inkers from Paper Trey Ink and a bottle of alcohol and decided I was going to make alcohol ink. I figured that might work. (I apologize for the horrible photos. I need to a) learn how to take photos off auto and b) get a light box!!)

I literally just poured the alcohol in the cups and put as many re-inker drops into it as I thought would get results. I put the most ink in the yellow solution, thinking this would make them yellow. My whole room smelled nasty!! I didn't even realize it until Charlotte came in and remarked on it.

I even added a fourth solution of alcohol and pink dye after I took these photos. I used my white sequins and left them in for about an hour. I wouldn't say this was a total success. Below is how they came out.

The lightest sequins are supposed to be yellow but look more ivory. Like I said, I used the most ink in this solution. The green were OK but they did not evenly dyed. They were all flat in the bottom of the container, none on top of each other so that should not have happened. I don't like the effect.  The blue and the pink came out pretty good. So the I guess the result of this experiment was 50/50.

So my conclusion is that alcohol inks are OK for some colors but I need something stronger for others. I did a search on dying buttons AFTER I did this experiment and found a tutorial at the RIT website. I am going to try using RIT dye next time. I will let you know if it works!!

Nora

Simon Says Stamp Challenge

This weekend I was FINALLY able to play and one of the things I did was to create a card for the Simon Says Stamp Challenge for this week.

This weeks challenge is Travel/Cityscapes. Come look at some of the cool cards the designers created here. Here is what I came up with:

This was a huge challenge for me because I have very few travel stamps and almost nothing for cityscapes. The whole inspiration for my card was from a piece of patterned paper from the "Here and There Collection" by Studio Calico. I built my card from there. 

I die cut a tag from green paper and then ran it through my Big Shot Machine again to cut the house out. I combed through my stamps and found a teeny, tiny tag stamp I had from Maya Road. I stamped it over and over again and then punched holes in it using a tiny whole punch. I stamped the "merci" sentiment with stamps from Avery Elle. The finishing touch was to use Stickles Diamond Glitter Glue in the stars and in all the windows of the houses that were inside the die cut. You can see this better in the view below.

The last step was to add the sequins. I am really happy with how it came out since the subject was a stretch for me. Thank you for looking!!

Nora

Mojo lost and found

I have not been enjoying my craft room as of late. I thought it might be that I needed new supplies. I went shopping and bought some, but that didn't seem to help. I thought that maybe I needed to take more photos but that did not inspire me either. I then pondered that I might just not be "into" crafting anymore. I did not seem to have the time I once had and if I "wanted" to add exercise into my life, something was going to have to give. (I hate exercising so it is more of a "need" for me.) Of course I didn't say anything to my husband because he would have flipped. Do you know how much I have invested in my hobbies? (Yes-I have more then one unfortunately!!)

I think the event that put me back into the "swing of things" as they say was having a friend over this week and teaching her how to make a few cards. It was invigorating to me. I didn't realize I missed the social aspect that I sometimes get from being a crafter. In fact, I plan out cards and scrapbook pages before I go to a crop because I cannot "think" when I am with people. I enjoy talking too much!! My creative juices don't flow. I used to teach others but it has been a long time and I never felt confident in my ability. I am not a huge fan of getting up in front of people.

So I want to thank my friend, Kristin, for helping me get back into my groove. She made two beautiful cards and I sent her away with a few stamp sets and pads to play with. I am hoping she will want to come over another time to do it again. In fact, I need to get more people hooked so we could make cards as a group.

I guess the whole point of this post is that I got my Mojo back this week and had a BLAST finishing two scrapbook pages and making some fun cards. I am also presently experimenting with dying sequins this afternoon but that is a whole different post!!

Today I wanted to share a step by step process of one of the cards I made this weekend. I had so much fun playing with my new "It's All Good" Hero Arts stamp set and dies. I even made two versions of the card and think I will make a few more to put away as gifts.

The first version was for a challenge over at Scrapjazz.com. It was to create a card using the color orange. This wasn't very hard for me as orange is one of my favorite colors.

Don't you love how it turned out? A close up of the details is below. I love the added touch of the sequins and gems on this!!

I decided that I wanted my next card to be a different color. The first thing I did was to drop some pink mist spray on a 4" by 5 1/2" piece of white card stock. I could have used the actual sprayer but I wanted a less-is-more effect.

 My next step was to die cut a word balloon from white paper and stamp the sentiment on it in blue ink.

On step 3, I played around with some of the other balloon shapes on the card to see how I wanted to use them. This is why I LOVE clear stamps. I like to play with placement and it is difficult to do with rubber stamps.

I stamped the word balloons  in green and pink ink on step 4 and in the next step, I played around with sentiments from some Paper Trey Ink sets that I have that would fit inside the empty balloons. I then stamped them in the same color as the unfilled balloons. 

For step 6, I folded a piece of 4 1/4" by 8 1/2" of white card stock in half. I cut a small strip of patterned paper from my new Basic Grey "Knee Highs and Bow Ties" 6" by 6" paper pad and adhered it to the edge. I LOVE this paper!! I wish I could have some bedding made in this pattern. It would be loud but no louder then the orange comforter I have in my bedroom now. (I told you I liked orange!)

For the next step, I adhered the misted and stamped piece of paper to the front of the card. I was going to use a pop dot and give this piece dimension like my first card, but I made a boo boo and had to cover it up. I didn't cut the patterned strip big enough and I didn't feel like ripping it off to start over,  so I went with plan b-covering the mistake up!!

What was my magic trick? To layer a piece of glitter tape over both the patterned paper strip and the white cardstock to mask the mistake. Layering is a wonderful thing!!

My last step was to adhere the blue word balloon onto the card with pop dots and add a few pieces of bling. I think I might like this card even more then my orange one!!

Now all I have to do is make a few more!! Thank you for joining me today. I hope you have a good week!!

Nora

So much for being a good blogger...

It has been two months since I have written anything. Lots of things have happened. I had a birthday, we have had two vacation weeks off, one of which we drove to Florida and back. I guess I will have to go back to the drawing board in how to keep this up. If anyone has any suggestions, I would welcome them!!

Valentines!!!

I am struggling with insomnia again so I figured I would write another post tonight. If my grammar or spelling isn't perfect, it is because I am tired. I have been working on Valentine's goodie bags for some of my friends' at work and I thought I would share. 

I had a hard time figuring out what I wanted to make this year. I browsed tons of blogs and Pinterest to get my mojo going but no "brilliant," original idea came to me. Instead, I filled glassine bags with Lindt chocolate and decorated them.

The image is a printable that Papertrey Ink made available during their anniversary celebration last year. I was hoping it would eventually become a stamp but it didn't. Being a printable, though, helped make the assembly line process go a little easier.

I printed about 15 bees on a sheet of white cardstock and punched the images out with a circle punch. I then colored the them in using the copic marker colors above, black stickles and a red Spica marker. The edges were inked with Vintage photo ink and the heart wing was created by using a heart punch and a pop dot. Aren't the little bees cute?

My next step was to die cut the scalloped circles out of yellow and the doilies out of red patterned paper. I was then ready to put all the bags together.

I went through my patterned paper scraps and my stash to find paper that would fit with the Valentine theme but also coordinate with my bees. My first pick was a 12" by 12" sheet of heart paper but Echo Park. I only had one sheet so I cut it into 6, 2" by 12" strips. 

I placed each strip around the bag so the open ends would be in front. I then stapled the two ends together. I covered up the staple by layering the doily, the scallop and bee image on top of each other.

I did the same process for all the other pieces of patterned paper I chose. Below is a group shot of some of the bags I put together. I only wish I could have made them for everybody in the department!!

I hope you all have a happy Valentine's Day!! Thank you for stopping by!!

Nora