Celestial Cards

gold leaf, acetate

This is my first attempt at using gold leaf.  I have had it for some time, but kept putting off trying because it is so delicate.  The one real essential is talcum powder to keep your fingers from sticking to the delicate gold leaf.  This particular card used the heat treated gold leaf, which gives the dramatic flaring of colour.  The images on this card came from MCS Celestial Horizons CD, and were first flipped to print them on acetate.  Then the background and the topper were cut out and sprayed with adhesive (Crafters Companion Stick and Stay) before applying the gold leaf.  Both were mounted on holographic mirri card, and mounted on Majestic card from PDA Cards.  The Leo banner across the bottom was first printed on white card, then flipped to reverse it and printed again on acetate.  I ran the acetate through the Xyron and matched it up carefully with the card version, which makes the words really pop out.  You could add tiny gems to pick out the stars in the constellation, but I felt that the gold leaf was enough to add drama.  It is quite a simple card to make, but does rely on good straight cutting and careful matching up of words and edges.

I am chuffed!!!!!

Having been taken on as a sample maker for My Craft Studio, I was so pleased (serious understatement) this week to see 6 of my 8 submitted samples shown on the shows this week.  Three of them were even singled out for special mention.  That was really good for me as it was a parchment program, and I have only just started to play with parchment.  I think mine were shown as examples of what a beginner could do, and what you can do with the images without using parchment at all.  Working on this program and watching the experts demonstrating, especially Sandra who is a true parcher, has given me the courage to have a go and extend myself playing with designs, both from the CD and using my old embroidery designs.

Pilkington Christmas - What excellent customer service

Having put out a plea for anyone who knew how to get a set of the Pilkington Christmas Scenes, I finally found a web site selling lots of other Pilkington stamps and emailed them yesterday (Sunday) to see if they could help.  The stamps were not shown on their website, but I had a reply today (Monday) giving me a link to the correct item, despite the fact that their site had gone wrong and lost the picture.  They are now ordered and hopefully on the way, just in time to do Christmas.  So if anyone wants superb customer service, just try www.clevercut.co.uk (link shown in my favourite ones).  I have also got a shipping order in for Clarity Stamps, having watched Barbara Gray for 2 hours.  She really is brilliant, and I have recorded her show to watch the techniques again and again and again...........