Cottage 6 Studio

Joyeuses Paques

I'm really loving easel cards lately.  The size of the main panel is the same A2 size that I'm used to working with, but presented in an impressive way that is easy to put together.

Here is the newest one which I've already sent out to Donald's cousins.

As I said in my last post, I struggled a bit with the darkness of the background in the photo, but I found that when I used the black and white designer paper (that was still out on my worktable from my mother's birthday card) as a matte and then surrounded it with this delicious vintage wallpaper from Donna Layton, it wasn't an issue.

The fact that the vintage ribbon matches the decoration on the egg in the photo was just another piece of luck and I'm really happy with this card.

See you soon,

Anna

Easter Easel

Exam or no exam, Easter Sunday is only a week away, so I had to get a couple of cards done yesterday.  Here is the first which is for Don's parents.

I struggled a little with this one.  I had printed the image over a month ago when I was printing out some other vintage images for St. Patrick's Day, in the meantime, whenever I thought about the Easter cards, I had trouble getting past the dark tint for a holiday usually associated with cheery colors.

I'm not in love with this one, but I'm happy with it and I love the way the crystal embellishments (more beauties from Donna Layton) mirror the color and shape of the egg in the photo.

I'm not going to show my second card in this post.  This card will pale by comparison.

So I'll be back in the next couple of days with that one.

See you then,

Anna

A St. Patrick's Day Easel Card

My mojo is back!!  I have to tell ya, I was not too happy with the last few cards that I have made, but with some inspiration from fellow bloggers, I am really happy with this card that I made for Don's parents.

I was looking for a good fold technique that I could use that would give me a card-front with the same dimensions as an A2 card and I thought of an easel card.  I found a tutorial here on Splitcoaststampers with measurements for a vertical A2.

I started playing around with different backgrounds and ended up finding a 4 x 5 1/4 piece of cream cardstock in my stash which I had already distressed around the edges with my seam ripper.  I decided to age it with some Tea Dye and Vintage Photo Ranger Distress Inks, embossed it with the Textile CB folder and then used the Cuttlebug Highlights technique from Technique Junkies to make the embossing really pop.

I knew the card needed some embellishment, and decided I wanted to try my hand at some paper flowers.  I had seen a really cool tutorial here during the OWH blog hop (which I just saw was featured on Tutorial Tuesday on the OWH Stars & Stamps blog today) and a further search led me to this video.

Ages ago, I bought some scalloped-edge circles punched from old dictionary pages and they were already on my workdesk, so I got to work cutting, curling and gluing.

But, they needed some color.  Tim Holtz's "Pearlized-Distress" mist spray came to mind, so I found the recipe on his blog here and made some using Shabby Shutters reinker and Perfectly Gold Perfect Pearls.  For the red roses, I used the only shade of Glimmer Mist I own, a nice cheery red.

Aren't they cool?  I'm really happy with the way they came out!

This piece of lace from Dollar Tree keeps the easel card standing open and this sentiment from Inkadinkadoo, stamped in Vintage Photo Distress Ink is the only stamp on the whole card.

Well, its time to get this in the mail.  I'll be posting again in the morning for What's on your Workdesk Wednesday.

Anna

 

Two Quick Cards

I am getting ready to send my Easter cards to Operation Write Home tomorrow, so I thought I would make some quick general cards to go along with, since they are always needed.

They are nothing like what I intended when I started out, but isn't that the story of my crafting life??

This card was inspired by a sketch on the Paper Crafts Magazine blog, which you can find in this post.  I started out thinking I would use the sketch featured there, but I've been dying to use this designer paper, which sent me in a different direction.

My next card was supposed to be basically the same; just different card base and without the border punch on the bottom.  That is, until I forgot to attach the flower before I attached the paper!

I tried gluing the flower but hated it, and then I found this image in my stash.

I don't hate this card, just not thrilled with it, so I'm not sure it will make in into the package.  And BTW, the image does not pop off the card this way in real life.  Not too sure what it's about, but I have to say its a little bit creepy.

By the way, OWH has a huge blog hop going on right now starting here and many of the participants are having giveaways in addition to their inspiration.  Also, if you'd like to send cards to Operation Write Home, the deadline to mail Easter cards to the shipper is March 18th and the Mother's Day deadline is March 31st. Those are the absolute last day.  The shippers have a lot of work to do to get our cards ready to send overseas, so sooner is definitely better.

I'm hoping to get to work on some St. Patrick's Day cards later once dinner is in the oven. If I do, I'll be sure to share them with you tomorrow.

Enjoy your Sunday!

Anna 

Zig-Zag Accordion Valentine

Happy Monday!

I hope everyone is recovered from Super Bowl Sunday.  We're a little disappointed in this house, but "there's always next year" and hey, pitchers and catchers report to spring training in only a week!

And on that day, this little card better have made its way down to Florida to Donald's parents.

There are two techniques here from Technique Junkies; the Zig-Zag Accordion fold from the new CD (you'd think I have stock in this thing) and the Neutral Shadows technique from the newest issue of the newsletter (on the flourish above the main image).

This is another super-easy fold, but I bet the recipients will be impressed!

The flourish is from Purple Onion Designs, the frame of hearts is the Heart Deco set from Rubber Stamp Tapestry as are the single roses on the wires attached to the front panel.  The little guy is from Inka Stamps which is now Altered Artifacts, so I can't say if she still has him in her Valentine sheets.  The sentiment is from Inkadinkadoo and the heart is from Stampington.

OK, time to get this in the mail so it can get there for next Monday.

I'll be back tomorrow.

Anna

Yay, another card, and it only took me five days to get to it this time!  My mojo seems to have returned.  Phew, I was worried there for a while!

This is another Christmas card made for family using pictures from Christmas 1914 from my Grandfather's photo album.

One of Grandpa's gifts that year was the camera he used to take this picture, so this may even be the first shot he took with it.  Here are his father, brothers and sisters.  Granny was probably working on Christmas dinner.

I made two of these and will be sending them to second cousins, children of two of the people in the picture.

I cut the sheet music using my Fiskars shape cutter and aged the edges with Tea Dye Distress Ink.  The red cardstock was distressed using a seam ripper.  The sentiment is from one of those $1 polymer sets from Michaels.

I do have another card done already, so I'll be back with that on Friday and I'll also have a post later tonight for Vintage Thingie Thursday.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Anna

VTT - A Favorite Haunt; Antiques at Camelot

OK, I'm not really using the term correctly, but with Halloween only a few days away, I couldn't help myself.  Besides, I would haunt this place if I could.  Unfortunately I'm in downstate New York and Antiques at Camelot is in Bennington, Vermont.

For the last several years, my mother and I make an annual trip to New England.  Our primary destination is Tanglewood in Massachusetts to see Prairie Home Companion perform their weekly radio show there the Saturday before Independence Day.

 Here are Garrison Keillor and Arlo Guthrie from last year's show (Arlo was a surprise guest, scheduled guests were Martin Sheen and Steve Martin.  This show will be hard to top!)

One year we decided to head to Vermont the next day for some antiquing and we found Antiques at Camelot - oh my word!  Its a huge place with many quality vendors and every vendor has something to ooh and ahh over, even if they are not things I would necessarily buy.  Now we go on every trip.

We didn't make the trip this year, but I thought I would share with you a few of the things I have found in our previous visits.

You may remember this card game which I shared in an earlier post.

 

This beauty is part of a larger collection I've been waiting to share until they are in a new spot.

 

 

A beautiful vintage hankie.

 

 

Bone Buttons

 

China Buttons

  

A gorgeous trade card.

And here are some small cabinet cards that I found a few years ago.

 An adorable baby.

An adorable girl, and I love her collar and those stockings, but look at that expression.  She looks like a cool customer, doesn't she?  She'd look perfect in some Halloween art.

As soon as I laid eyes on this woman and her stern expression, I knew I'd be using her image in some Halloween projects and here she is.

 

 

This display isn't vintage, but it is thrifty.  The lace came in a bag of lace, all for $2.  The tree was free, the jack o'lantern lights are about ten years old, I scored the witch two weeks ago at a thrift store for $1 and the frame and raven came from Dollar Tree.

And finally, since I know that so many of you who stop by for Vintage Thingie Thursday love Sunbonnet Sue, I thought I'd share one of my mother's cards that I just love.

Happy Halloween!

Anna

A Halloween Scene

Very, very busy here.  I had time to create this card yesterday and then it was on to other fair business.

I thought of listing all those tasks here for anyone who might be interested in doing fairs, but I thought it would be a bit boring to just list them here with no reference.  Instead, I'll do a post after the fair, with pictures of our displays and some narratives of anything that isn't self-explanitory.

I love this card.  I wish I had the time and materials to make a dozen more and send them out for Halloween.

Given a little more time for this card, I would have tried the faux paneling technique from Technique Junkies to add to the look of a wall behind the witch, but I'm happy with it the way it is.

The Poe image is from a collage sheet, and the hat and cat are from another.  The "witch" is a scan of an original image from my personal collection.  The sentiment is from Purple Onion Designs and the candelabra is from Oxford Impressions who, by the way, just came out with another fun Halloween collection.

If I have the time, I may turn this into wall art as well.  We'll see, and I'll see you again soon.

Anna

Masculine Birthday Card

Another birthday card to show you today; an adult card this time, for a Dad.

Again I turned to the photo of the 1914 Hudson from my Grandfather's photo album.  I love it, and I think it works so well for a masculine card, especially paired with the Distressed Frames technique from the TJ newsletter.

The sentiment is from a set of Father's Day stamps by Cornish Heritage Farms.  I had wanted this set and their Mother's Day set for some time, but always put it off until "next year."  Then I heard that CHF was going out of business, so I got right on Ellen Hutson's site, but they were gone ALREADY.  Luckily I found them on Amazon through a Google search - whew!  I just love the sentiments on these sets and I realized that they'd work well on birthday cards too.

The cardstock and dp on the front are distressed with my most expensive crafting tool...not...my seam ripper.  And I used scalloped edge scissors to create the ticket punch look for the sentiment.

OK, things are really heating up here but I have lots to show you so I will be back again soon!

Anna 

Uncle "Pin"

Hi there.

Posting a bit later than planned today.  The dog was having his usual afternoon sunbath on the bed earlier and I decided to join him.  What I thought would be a few minutes turned into a couple of hours.  Not a bad way to spend a Sunday afternoon, though.

Earlier, I finished this Christmas card for my Godmother.

The little boy in the picture is her father, my Great Uncle William "Pin."  The photo comes from my grandfather's photo album and was one of the first that he took with the new camera he got as a gift for Christmas in 1914.  I realized a few months ago that his picture would be perfect to use in Christmas cards for my Godmother and her brother.

After yesterday's cardmaking fiasco, I was going through the Splitcoast gallery for inspiration and came across a link to a blog called Instead of Ironing.  Wow!  Fabulous cards and tons of inspiration.  So much in fact, that I CASEd the layout from this card.  Gorgeous, right?

My card is A6 size - 4 1/2 x 6 1/4.  This was dictated by the size of the photo which got lost on an A7 and took over an A2.  I used stamps from Rubber Stamp Tapestry's Holly border set on the strip of kraft cardstock near the bottom and the sentiment is from Stampendous.

Back to the art room to put away the paper that exploded in there earlier.  I'll see you tomorrow.

Anna