Design Challenge Frame Valentine Cards

Over at the Silhouette Plus forum there is right now a design challenge going on. There is no prize but I thought I would dip my toes into the Design pool. I have not really done a lot  of designing with either the free version of Studio or the Designer Edition so I thought this was a great way to get started. The challenge is to use a letter in a design by replicating,rotating,welding,etc. This is what I came up with using a lower case s. I love this frame. I did have to weld a small rectangle at both the top and the bottom where the two letters did not totally touch. Otherwise there would have been a partial slit.

This was the frame cut out as it was designed with only that small modification I mentioned. The Victorian lady was more of a challenge as I had to take her into paint.net and modify the graphic so I could do a good trace on her.She is pop dotted on the card as is the panel that has the frame adhered to it. The hearts are left over foil confetti from last year.






For this card I took the frame and because I could not get it to just cut out the outside edge even after I picked cut edge only I traced it and then clicked trace edge only. I took my Brillance red gold ink and used a sea sponge applying it on the frame in a pouncing motion. When cutting the panel I cut it too short so put it on the diagonal which made it necessary to cut the edges on the side. The heart which is a Silhouette file was cut out of a scrap of the background paper. I love how I can use tiny scraps with my cutting machine. The backing is a scrap of ribbon which I glued on and then after the glue was dry carefully trimmed it. Where the rhinestone is was a tiny hole in the pattern. When using small gems like this I place a dab of glue where I want it and then the gem. Since these are I rock gems I then use the hot tool to affix the gem. The glue just helps to keep it in place while I'm using the tool.  The hearts in the corner are foam hearts which were left over from last year.

If you have Studio or Designer Edition  and haven't played with it for designing I challenge you to take a letter and play with it. It is a great way to learn the software.

Do come back I will be sharing a flower shaped card I designed when I get it made. I also have several other projects in the works. Also thank you for stopping by.

Scrap Ribbon\Trim Valentine Card

I don't know about you but I hate to throw things away. So what do you do when you are drowning in scrap ribbon and trim. How about using it in a card.  A frame or window card to be precise. So here is the card I recently created using scraps of ribbon,lace and trim.

The first thing I did was to go into studio and start a new file. I drew a rounded square. Then went to the library and opened the heart and resized it. Using the knife I cut off the curly q bottom of the heart.  Then I placed the heart where I wanted it to be cut out. I then went and did an internal offset for the square shape. Changed the line to a dashed line and edited the corners so that it would look more like stitching. Then selected the heart and ungrouped it. Then I changed the outside solid line to a dashed line. Changed the color of the line and made sure that the box to print selected lines was checked. Oh since I was printing the lines I used the registration marks because I wanted to make sure it was going to cut right. After it was printed and cut out I  went through my scraps trying to decide what I wanted to use.

Then I traced the heart on the front of the card after I decided where I wanted it to be on the card. I decided to have the panel off to the side instead of centered. Then using a tape roller I adhered my pieces of ribbon and trim to the card base.  This is what it looked like.  You can see the pencil through the lace if you look carefully. I did have to trim the ribbon a little bit along the edges but since I used a repositional tape to adhere them with it was no problem. Next time I won't be so adhesive happy and will stop  just past the line.

I added buttons to the panel in the corner. I like to play with buttons and thought I would make an abstract heart with them. Then I pop dotted it onto the card base. Took a scrap piece of card stock and tore it to make the tag and heat embossed the Valentine sentiment. I was just going to stamp it but my white chalk ink did not show up as crisp as I wanted. I forgot that chalk inks are more transparent and softer. I found Wednesday at a store the Simplicity gems on a string which are self adhesive and since the gems were pink I had to buy them for making cards. Of course I had to use them. LOL!

You could of course use any shape you wanted. I think this would be pretty done with the cut out of a flower or a butterfly.

Thank you for stopping by and looking. Do come back as I will be posting  next week how to make embellishments using scrap pieces of ribbon.

You Can Never Have Too Many Bookmarks

I think you can never have too many bookmarks. Besides that if you do you could always use them in a collage or something I guess. Anyway I was going to make bookmarks for a book club I'm in for Christmas but never got around to it. Well this week I'm hosting the book club and since we will meet again after Valentine Day I thought I would make some Valentine theme bookmarks to give out. I was in luck as Florabella Collections had a free Valentine download and in with the freebies was two bookmarks. I used the back side  bookmark file for the pink and the blue one as the front side one had the to and from on it.

O.K. I was having a terrible time taking pictures. I finally got some really good pictures only to discover that they were taken on the internal storage of my camera which I have not figured out how to retrieve pictures from. The bookmarks kept falling off the book stand just as I snapped the picture after I got the card in the camera. So these are not as artistic pictures as I took them just lying flat on a book.

I originally took one of the png files of the bookmarks into Studio and traced. That is when I discovered that the gingham edges were jagged. Not wanting to mess with the file in a graphic program I used the png files as a fill pattern. That way I also was able to get nice rounded corners which I find more pleasing. I decided to make these smaller than the original ones so I could get three to a page instead of two. They still are a nice size I think.

I was going to buy mini rickrack to put over the rickrack that was printed. It is an off white color and to me just doesn't look right. Then decided instead to make tiny heart banners.   After the heart banners were cut out I painted them with fingernail polish. I love the fingernail polish on the pink bookmark it is actually glittery.

While the fingernail polish was drying I used my clear star dust roll on glitter pen to out line the heart and the x's and o's inside the heart. Originally I was also going to do the letters but I changed my mind. After the fingernail polish dried I glued the banners on.

O.K you will notice one thing missing they have a hole in the top but no ribbon or cord. The reason being that out of all the ribbons and cords I have I don't have white or a color I like. Actually lol I just wanted an excuse to go craft shopping  before the end of the week but we won't tell anyone.

 The original file didn't have a hole in the bookmark but I like to add beads on a cord or ribbon so the bookmark will hang out of the book without the actual bookmark getting bent. Also then if a person wants to hang up a bookmark they can.

Thank you for stopping by. Have a Great crafting day and don't forget to pick up digital freebies when you find them. You never know when they might come in handy.