Fun with Cards

I had fun the other day teaching a friend and her daughter how to quill. Here's what we made:



It's hard to tell who are the novices and who's been quilling for a while here, huh? I told my friend that they were both naturals and she didn't believe me. I'm hoping to convince her that they both truly have talent and get them to quill with me again.

What do you think?

Franklin Intermediate Quilling Class

Here are pictures of my students and their work from Saturday's class - with their permission, of course. Joyce left early, so we didn't get a picture of her completed project.

Above from left to right: Marti, Joyce & Helen. Small class, but loads of fun!

Above, Marti and Helen working on arranging their flowers for the wreaths.

Marti's completed wreath.

Helen's completed wreath - sorry the image is so blurry. I didn't realize I hadn't gotten a good shot until after I was home and reviewing the pictures. The wreath turned out beautifully, nonetheless!

Purple Wreath - Directions

I decided to post the directions for this wreath I'll be teaching in my class this Saturday. Please note, however, that I am horrible at writing techniques (it's so much easily just to demonstrate to a live audience) - so I'll just tell you the size strips you need rather than explaining the technique for roses and fringed flowers. If you don't know how to do these things - most good quilling books have the techniques explained. One of my favorites is Alli Bartowski's "Paper Quilling for the First Time" - it explains both folded roses and fringed flowers in it.

Supplies Needed:
5”x10” lilac (I used Bazzill Basics “Cool Heather”) cardstock folded into 5”x5” card
5/8” wide quilling strips (lilac, purple)
3/8” wide quilling strips (lilac, purple, deep violet, blue, ivory)
1/8” wide quilling strips (yellow, green)
4 ½” diameter vellum circle (printed greeting optional).

Fringed Flowers:
3 – 6” lilac fringed (5/8) with 6” (1/8) tight roll yellow centers
3 – 6” purple fringed (5/8) with 6” (1/8) tight roll yellow centers
3 – 3” deep violet fringed (3/8) with 3” (1/8) tight roll yellow centers
3 – 3” purple fringed (3/8) with 3” (1/8) tight roll yellow centers
3 – 3” lilac fringed (3/8) – no center
3 – 3” blue fringed (3/8) – no center
Roses:
4 – 6” purple folded roses
4 – 6” ivory folded roses
4 – 6” deep violet folded roses
4 – 6” blue folded roses
Greenery:
10 – 4” green marquis
5 – 8” green marquis
9 – 3” green loose scrolls
6 – 4” green v-scrolls
6 – 2” green loose scrolls

Directions:
Glue vellum circle to the card (using a clear adhesive roller) - I use a ruler to make sure it's centered on the card before sticking it down. Assemble flowers around the edge of vellum – prior to gluing them down. Assemble large fringed flowers first. Then, assemble other fringed flowers and roses as looks good to you – keeping in mind that you want to have a fairly even “thickness” for the entire wreath. After flowers are assembled as pleasing to you, glue down flowers. Finally, add greenery, again I suggest dry fitting it around the wreath prior to gluing it so you make sure you have it where you want it.

Have fun with it! The only thing I ask is that you use this card/wreath for your own personal use only. Unless, of course, you want to sell it at a local craft/art show. In that case, go right ahead! Please don't sell it online. It wouldn't be fair to me as the designer.

Purple Wreath - Mother's Day Card

I am going to teach how to make this wreath at my next quilling class - for intermediate quillers. The colors didn't photograph as well as I had hoped - although it still looks pretty. The darker blue is really a deep violet (but you can't tell in the picture). Oh well! I'm also going to be making other wreaths for my students to choose from - same amount of each kind of flowers, but different arrangements and color schemes. I will post them as they are finished - all the flowers are quilled, just not arranged yet, so they will be coming over the next couple of days. Thanks for looking - feel free to comment!

Insomnia - Sometimes not such a bad thing!

I was up with the baby at 4am this morning and then couldn't go back to sleep. So, doing what I do all too often - instead of trying harder to get sleep - I got up and quilled two new cards. I particularly like how the cream and gilded cream LOVE card turned out. If you want to know where my inspiration came from - it was another free font - this time called "Fontanessi" - I adapted it slightly for quillability. I just downloaded several more quillable fonts yesterday, so I may try more later.
I really should be quilling the Scottie dog, but as you can see, I've been avoiding it. I will repent and start probably this weekend. I still have two more cards to do for a friend and then I'll be done with my excuses. Although they aren't really valid as I could have worked on the Scottie this morning - other than fill-in work isn't all that fun. It's end result is worth it, but I guess I'm too young - feeling young - mid 30s really, but feel like I should have been born a decade later - to want to do much of it other than with my drive to earn some of my own spending money so I don't have to dip into our joint account and we can pay off student loans. Card making is much more enjoyable as I can get a card done in a couple of hours versus a couple of weeks of fill-in work (for projects as big as the Scottie which will be approximately 5"x7"). It feels more like real work and with four kids AND homeschooling the oldest two, don't I have enough work already? Like I said, money drives me - petty, I know, but how else am I going to be able to stay home with my kids and still buy fun stamps, paper, punches, etc, etc?

And, that could have segued unassumingly (until I had to open my big mouth) into....These cards will be for sale at my Etsy shop (by tonight - I promise), but once they're gone, they're gone. Those of you in the US, do you remember from Saturday Night Live about 15-20 years ago?..."If you drop your keys in hot lava, man, once they're gone, they're gone." I still think it's funny. I guess you'd have to have my warped sense of humor to think that is even remotely funny. I'll just laugh by myself at myself with myself. Obviously I need some sleep...Until next insomniac stroke of genius...

Hooray for Bartering!

Okay, so you are probably sick of seeing these different filigree heart cards, but I promise none are the same - I'm not recycling old pictures over and over again. These two cards are especially great because I bartered a sweet deal - 5 slotted tools for a few filigree heart cards. My friend Janet (see today's earlier post) had purchased the slotted tools for a quilling class I taught to the young women (ages 12 - 18) at our church. I had been just borrowing the tools for other quilling classes, but then thought I really should just purchase them from her. I tried to pay for them and being the lovely person that Janet is, she didn't want to accept payment for them. Well, that doesn't fly with me when I know that taking advantage of someone's generosity isn't something I intend to make a habit of, SO I bartered. Yep, good old-fashioned bartering! I love bartering and am thinking about starting a campaign to reinstate the system (tongue in cheek).

Three cheers for bartering! Hip! Hip! Hooray!

Cards for a Child Cancer Patient

It was brought to my attention on my "quillers" online group that there is a little girl in Pennsylvania who turned 5 last Friday who has a brain tumor and her "wish" for Christmas was to see how many cards she could get. At last count, she received over 160,000 cards! She had an MRI done on Monday (1/19/09) to see how her tumor was responding to treatment,and the results show that it has grown, instead of shrinking, so she has had her last treatment. The saddest part, is that Hannah was born early,so that her mother could receive treatments for breast cancer. Her mother died two years ago, and now the family is facing the loss of Hannah, too.

I will be sending her a couple of quilled cards. But, the cards she receives don't have to be quilled - any card will do - any theme. If you, my readers, want to participate and send little Hannah a card, you can mail it to:

Hannah Garman
704 Orchard Rd.
Lititz, PA 17543
USA

Also, if anyone is interested, her dad is keeping a journal. The link is
www.caringbridge.org/visit/hannahgarman.

Although it may not be a big thing for us to do this, it can bring little moments of happiness into this little girl's life. I know as a parent, if I were to have a terminally ill child, I would be so overwhelmed with the outpouring of love and feel immense gratitude towards anyone willing to give my little girl her Christmas wish.

Lovebirds - Filled In

I just realized that I never shared the completed lovebirds card. I decided to leave the background heart unquilled and filled in just the birds and their perch. Also, I didn't make another one like I said I would. I'm just not one that likes doing the same thing twice (unless paid for it - petty, I know, but I've got to earn some money to support my quilling habit!)

More Valentine's Cards

I got an order from a friend to make her a couple of cards, but once I got started I couldn't stop. It helped that my kids were all sick and slept most of the day yesterday so I was able to quill a lot of the day while they were all sleeping. I know - kind of sad reasoning, huh! But, since we don't watch TV, what else was I going to do with my time - dishes? Quilling...dishes...quilling...dishes - obviously quilling won out in that race!

Here are my newest creations:

And these, too (see? I told you I was quilling all day):

Love/Valentine's Day cards

I got up early this morning to make a card for Laura's wedding reception this afternoon. This is the result - its completely easily frameable and I added that in my message hoping that it doesn't get tossed, but will be framed - if nothing else but for Valentine's decorations in her new household.

And, also I made another filigree heart card for Janet - my one true fan - who is a self-proclaimed stalker of my quilling work. If there ever was a good kind of stalker, she's it. I appreciate her loyal following (*smile*).

Enjoy the quilling "eye candy" (as one of my fellow quilling friends calls it)!

Love is in the Air - New Etsy Items

Love is in the air - at least at my house as I start to create Etsy shop items for Valentine's day. I just added four new cards to my Etsy shop. All four have hearts in them - although only two are technically "only" Valentine's Day cards. Have a look...

I am currently in the process of creating another lovebirds project - same design, but completely filled with quilling. I am going to frame it in a small shadowbox. Stay tuned for the completed project hopefully sometime next week.

For a better look and more images of each card above, see my Etsy shop at http://www.iflookscouldquill.etsy.com/.

Love ya! (I couldn't resist adding that...)

More Christmas Quilling

These are my newest nativities made for family Christmas gifts. I was going to make several smaller ones for friends, but time is running out. So, friends, you'll just be getting quilled Christmas cards this year. I'm not super woman as much as I'd like to be and my aspirations continue to be larger than my abilities.

This (below) is the white poinsettia card from Super Saturday. I originally had planned to have everyone make only green or burgundy, but I thought white would be really pretty, too. Good thing my mental image was right on course. I actually think that the white cards are the prettiest of them all now that I've made some. I guess it's just a personal preference, though, because when sharing these photos with my quilling yahoo group, the vote was still undecided about which color was their favorite.

Here's all the cards we did:

It was fun teaching, but I think if I'm asked to do it again next year, I'm going to teach an even simpler card. Maybe I won't teach at all - maybe Megan can do her stamping cards. Then I can actually get the other things I signed up for finished at the super saturday. But, honestly, if asked, I'm not turning anyone down. I love sharing this art form with anyone willing to learn.

Thanksgiving Gobbler

Here's a cute little turkey that I created to teach the homeschool group quilling.

And below are some of the kids' turkey creations:

I thought the kids did really well considering the youngest was 6 years old and the oldest was only 12.

Heart Card

This is made from quilled roses. I think it's cute - I made it a couple of years ago, but have had a hard time wanting to give it away because it's too pretty to use. LOL.

Christmas Quilled Cards

I think it would be easier to view my quilled work if I pasted the photos into posts. So, this is the new format. If you happen to be one of those (and I know there are a lot of you out there as this blog isn't widely known about yet being so freshly created), ignore my new formatting words.

Here are the Christmas Quilled Cards.


I'm teaching how to make these for Super Saturday.

This design was borrowed (with permission of course) from a lady in Argentina. I taught the Laurels in our ward how to make this card. They helped me a couple weeks later teach the other YW how to make simple flower cards - I don't have an image yet, sorry.

Jane Jenkins design (expert quiller - http://jjquilling.co.uk/index.html) One of my friend's hubby thinks it looks like a bird swallowing it's young. We had to explain that Mary isn't sitting in a nest (although I can see that), but sitting on some straw.

I've got more Christmas cards to share, but need to tend to my mom duties. Will post more later.