Colour Inspiration #17 – Spring Flowers

Spring is well and truly here! :D It’s my favourite time of year – blue skies, the sun is warm (but not too hot!), the garden has come to life and is full of flowers like these tulips.  Although our garden is actually looking quite tidy there’s always lots to do – I spent an hour or so yesterday morning potting up sunflower, sweet pea and marigold seedlings…

I’ve almost run out of space on the greenhouse bench so am hoping that some of the plants will be able to go outside before the next ones need planting up.  A few years ago I only managed to get one marigold seed to come up – now I have a forest! :)

Handmade Birthday Cards

Spring is a busy time for birthdays and other card giving occasions in my house, so I thought I would share a couple of cards I made recently.

This fishy card was for my Dad’s birthday.  I used some backing paper from my set of Fish scrapbooking papers and fish from my collage sheet printed onto card.  The vallis leaves were cut from coloured paper and I made the design more 3D by sticking the fish on with foam pads.  Finally, for a bit of sparkle I used some translucent sequins…

I’ve made a few variations of this butterfly card recently (this one was for my sister’s birthday)…

I love the pearlescent pea green card blank I used for this design, unfortunately it’s a discontinued colour so I won’t be able to get any more :(  I printed one of my butterfly patterned papers onto sandstone coloured card and the butterflies and message were printed on card from my butterfly collage sheet.  After cutting the patterned background to size I coloured the edge with a gold inkpad.  The large butterfly was attached with foam pads and the small butterfly glued to the card along its body, with the wings slightly folded up for a 3D effect.  I also used some pretty yellow and blue gems to finish the card.

Have you bought any of the printables from my shop to use in your cardmaking or craft projects?  If you have I would love to see what you make with them!  Leave a link to your photos in the comments below :)

New sets of cards now in stock!

Sets of white cards with Kraft envelopes are probably the most popular sets of cards in my shop, but I love to receive a stack of coloured cards too!  I’ve just had a new order of card and paper so have plenty of different colours in stock.  A couple of the colours I used to sell are no longer available from my supplier so I’ve had to change some of the colour schemes a little, I’ve also introduced some new colour schemes (like the pearly mermaid collection).  I can make custom sets too – so if you are looking for different quantities or colour combinations not already listed in my shop please contact me.

These are the colours of card I currently stock (numbers 22-30 are new)…

Free printable gift tags!

I’ve been playing around with patterns making new printable papers and today I have a freebie for you!  These printable gift tags…

The sheet comes as a high resolution 300dpi file and measures 8.5 x 11 inches, each tag measures 3.3 x 1.9 inches.  There are 12 tags on the sheet, in 4 designs – you can download the sheet here… http://sdrv.ms/12ip7j2

Please note that these tags are for personal use only!

I’ve also been trying out some gift wrap ideas with patterned paper to match the tags.  The two packages here were wrapped in brown paper first, then a band of patterned paper added around the middle.  On the larger parcel I also used tracing paper to give a nice translucent effect over the patterned paper, all tied up with string.

The smaller parcel has some braid yarn tied around it.  I love this yarn and bought it from the bargain bin in my local craft shop years ago.  Fancy yarn is great for embellishing gifts and often works out cheaper than buying ribbon (especially when it is on sale!!)

The patterned papers I used on these gifts are from this printable paper set, which is available to buy from my Etsy shop…

Colour Inspiration #16 - White Heather

We have several different colours of heather in our garden and they’re good at attracting the bees and butterflies.  This photo was taken before our neighbour’s cat (who I call Kitty) sat on the heather while pouncing on a butterfly.  Kitty can be quite naughty!  She’s also very sweet and often comes bounding over to say hello when she sees us across the road. :)

Budgie printables and gift wrap idea

The sun is shining and it feels like spring is finally here!  It’s a good day for taking photographs, so here are some pictures of my new budgie designs printed out...

This printable party invitation is available in two sizes – 3.9 x 5.1 inches as shown here, or 5x7 inches.  The invitations feature my illustration of a colourful row of budgies and come personalised with your own choice of text.

I also have some new printable scrapbooking paper designs and gift tags featuring budgies.  Printable patterned papers are great for scrapbooking or cardmaking projects but they can also be used as gift wrap for small gifts.  You need never run out of interesting gift wrap again if you print your own!

For this gift wrap idea I printed the blue budgie design onto A4 paper - if you’re lucky enough to have an A3 printer you can print the full 12x12 inch paper to wrap slightly larger presents! The present was then wrapped in two colours of yarn and a gift tag added, which I had printed onto card.

This is the full set of printable papers – 8 designs with different budgie patterns in colour and monochrome as well as coordinating spots and stripes.
All of these printables are available to buy from my Etsy supplies shop.

6 Free Fonts

Something new I have been trying is downloading fonts to use in my designs.  Here are 6 free fonts I have recently been using…
1. Selfish   2. Mossy   3. Parisienne   4. Nautik   5. Calamity Jane   6. Mathlete
Have you tried downloading fonts before?  It’s much easier than I thought it would be.  If you want to use any of the fonts I’ve shown here, click on the links above and download from the sites I’ve linked to.  Open the compressed file and double click on the font file to open it.  You should then see a button to install the font.  (I use Windows 7 so it might be different for other operating systems.)

Lots of Budgies!

If you follow me on facebook you will already know that my latest designs include lots of budgies!

I experimented with sketching in pencil, pen and colouring digitally before deciding on how to draw the finished row of budgies above (which is in pen and coloured digitally).  There are so many different colour combinations to choose from – the blue one in the middle is a bit like my budgie Charlie.

I’m using the finished illustration to make a range of products from patterned papers to greeting cards, like the ones below…

The birthday card is printed on white popset card which has a very slightly rough surface - I can print this design with other messages too.  The square card is printed on lovely linen textured card.  These cards and other greeting cards are available to buy from my Folksy shop and Etsy shop.

I’ll be sharing more photos of the other budgie themed items I am designing soon!

Colour Inspiration #15 - Purple Crocus

It is officially Spring now but it’s still freezing outside – more snow is expected by the weekend! :(  I can’t wait until Spring is really here – the bulbs are starting to flower so hopefully it won’t be long now.  I took this bright photo of one of the purple crocuses in my garden.

How to make Birthday Bunting…

What birthday party would be complete without a birthday banner?  This ‘Happy Birthday’ bunting is made from my printable butterflies themed bunting, below are some different ideas for putting the bunting together…

The basic bunting

The printable bunting comes as 5 sheets for you to print (I have more themes in my shop for different themed parties).  Each sheet measures 8.5x11 inches (or prints on A4) and each pennant measures 5.2 x 7.6 inches.  {If you would like more information on printables – what they are and how they work please take a look at my faq page here.}

When you have downloaded the bunting, print the 5 sheets onto white card using your printers highest quality setting.  Using card rather than paper makes the pennants sturdier and stops them from curling.  Cut the pennants out.  You’re now ready to try these different ways of hanging the bunting…

1. Peg up your pennants!

Lay out all of your pennants, equally spaced, to measure how long the banner will be.  Cut some coordinating ribbon or thread to the desired length – make sure you leave enough on the ends to tie the banner up.  Attach the pennants to the ribbon using pegs or clips.  Try clothes pegs decorated with scrapbooking paper, mini pegs or binder clips.

2.  All tied up

Punch 2 holes in each pennant – one in each top corner.  Tie pennants together with ribbon or fancy yarn – you can experiment with different textures colours and widths of ribbon.

3. Thread it up

Punch 2 holes in each pennant as in the previous example.  Thread the pennants together on one long ribbon or length of yarn.  Lay all of your pennants out first to make sure you thread them in the right order (yes, I have got words backwards before!!).  In the photo above I’ve made my own cord by crocheting yarn in chain stitch.

I hope this has inspired you to be creative with your birthday banners!

I could resist Pinterest no more!

I was reluctant to join another site and have yet another password to remember and something else to spend too much time on instead of being productive.  But I’ve given in and joined Pinterest!  I decided that instead of being a time waster it could be useful in organising things I like and collecting inspiration.  I like how visual Pinterest is – it’s much easier to see things quickly from lots of thumbnails than a list of bookmarked web addresses.

I’m only just starting to fill up my boards – here’s my page… http://pinterest.com/hazelcreations/

Are you on Pinterest too?  Leave a link to your page and I’ll take a look! :)

Quick Make for Mother’s Day…

Have you remembered it’s Mother’s Day this Sunday 10th March?  If you’re still looking for something to give your Mum here’s a quick project for a little card.  It could be made as a card on its own or used as a gift tag – why not attach it to a bunch of flowers for a more personal gift…
The card is made from one of the blank tulip cards on my sheet of Easter printable tent cards – the sheet also has daffodil patterned cards on it.
1. Print the sheet of cards onto white card.  Cut out one of the cards and fold in half.
2. Cut a strip of coloured paper and glue along the white space on the front of the card.
3. Stamp (or write) the letters ‘Mum’ onto white card.  Use a heart shaped paper punch to cut out the letters.
4. Glue the hearts to the coloured paper strip.
5. Add some sparkle to the card with tiny dots of glitter glue on the pink spots on the card.