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I hope you enjoy reading my posts, and please leave me a comment. I always enjoy reading them, and will try to visit you in return.

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You are welcome to copy any of my designs, as long as you do not take credit for them yourself. I am very happy for you to sell them. If I have used anyone else's design, I always try to give credit where it is due. If I have missed anything, please let me know and I will put things right.


This is intended to be mainly about my crafting stories, as a personal record of what I do. However, I interpret crafting quite widely, not just paper crafting but other things too. I have a butterfly mind and like to change from one thing to another depending on what I feel like on a given day - knitting, crochet, cross-stitch, cards, baking and several others, including my favourite right now, parchment, both traditional skills and Groovi, very relaxing and calming to do.

I have decided to put some structure into my blog so that each day will have something of a theme.
Monday- for Mindfulness; Tuesday - Tidy Up Day; Wednesday - What's on Your Workdesk Wednesday; Thursday - Technique and Tips; Friday - Finish Off Day; Saturday - Start Something New; Sunday - Anything Goes
These themes are not hard and fast and will be changed if I feel the need.

Monday 21 January 2019

A very quick follow up after yesterday's marathon.


You might have seen the earlier stages of this piece on the table at Hazel Edwards' lovely Groovi classes in yesterday's blog.

Here, you can see a further development, more perforating and snipping done, and a lot more still to be done.  The first stage of perforation round the outer border has been done, but now the embossing of the design is finished, every single hole must be re-embossed to give me good holes for cutting.

I followed my own rules of re-perforating a small section and snipping it before moving on.  That ensures the holes do not have time to close up again as the parchment relaxes.


This is the completed piece with all holes and snipping completely.  The dragonflies are double layered and were snipped after perforating with the two needle split tool.  This tool was supposed to produce a picot like edge, but is nowhere near as good as using a two needle tool and snipping.  If you push it right down, it roughly cuts the parchment - not very tidy.

However, because the needles on the two needle split are closer than the two needle fine, it can be used to perforate round tiny items like the dragonflies.  If you only perforate VERY shallowly, and then use the one needle fine to open up the holes a little, it works well.

I coloured this piece with the Perga Liners, sharpened to wicked points, which enabled me to colour on the front and then I added extra colour with the pens on the back.  That enabled me to get the depth of colour I wanted but still keeping it fairly subtle and soft.

Thank you, Hazel, for lovely classes, perfectly designed to suit all levels of experience.  Looking forward to the next one.

7 comments:

Lynne Bishop said...

Beautiful Maggie. I like the two needle split for the little items but as you say not quite as neat. X

ShazInOzCardsCalligraphy said...

Brilliant work, Maggie, could see it would be from Hazel’s classes, and knew you’d do a grand job.
Love the colouring,
Hugs Shaz in Oz.x

{Calligraphy Cards - Shaz in Oz}
{Wonderful Words Of Life - Shaz in Oz}

Jane said...

Good morning Maggie.
It's a fantastic card that you have made at Hazel's first class. And I do like how you have added your own twist on the initial design.
I am just watching Paul as I type. He is good to be able to stand in and it's great we get more good tips and techniques from him.
Hope you have a great day! Hugs xx

Sue C said...

love your finished card, it is really pretty. Thanks for sharing the tips as well x

Chris Kelly said...

Your finished card is lovely Maggie. II would like you to show me the two needle split tool at our group please. Your tip about re perforating has made such a difference to my snipping. I have realised that you can't rush parchment craft. X

Sarah Brennan said...

Absolutely beautiful Maggie. Thanks for the perforating / snipping tips.

Pat S Witney said...

Great work Margaret,
I loved this design when I saw it. I wish I was able to go to Hazels class in Evesham. Love your work.