The 'Felt' connection ....

Ta Daaahhhhh!!!

For someone who doesn't sew this was what I made on Sunday - felt cupcake keyrings!

Admittedly, I didn't dream up design from scratch. Instructions were chanced upon while trawling through the various scrapbook/craft blogs for ideas (http://www.mookychick.co.uk/diy_ethic/indie_craft_felt_cupcake_keyring.php). That was weeks ago, possibly even a month!

The main reason why I took my time trying out the idea (don't get me wrong, it was a fantastic tutorial!) was due to the fact that I didn't know HOW to 'blanket stitch'. I did learn how to sew various stitches in school once upon a time ago ... but that was at least 25 years ago and sewing isn't exactly on my list of interests.

But somehow ... some inpirations just egg you on, demanding that you experiment. Demanding you venture out of one's comfort zone of techniques and preferences.

That's what those pieces of felt did sitting in my cupboard that I bought a while back with the intention of turning them into 'felt flowers' scrapbook embellishments.'No sewing needed' - so i thought ...' Just glue 'em together ...'

But instead of sticking felt flowers, I surprised myself and SEWN together cupcake keyrings - complete with blanket stitches!!

I guess when inspired, one never truly forgets how to blanket stitch after all ...!!

Waste not, want not ...

Spent the weekend putting together bits of leftover papers from previous card making project. Manage to make meself a mini-card of 6"x4" - All put together in no time at all!!

Materials used included:-

a) Leftover of green and white polka dotted DCWV printed cardstock
b) Leftover of green A4 paper (90gsm)
c) White ribbon
d) 2 Off white buttons
e) Embroidery ribbon flowers
f) 2 mini green brads

First sale ...

Its been suggested many many times whenever I present someone (usually friends or a family members) with one of my home-made cards that I ought to consider selling them. As much as I enjoy the design and actual realisation process of these cards, selling them cards is an entire 'ball game' altogether. Apart from the actual product at hand (in my case cards), one's also got to think of pricing, placing, promotion ...

I know me cards are unique. Differentiated from all the mass produced cards out there ... Handmade with various rich textures making cards one of a kind. As much as people may appreciate creative efforts like these they may not necessarily buy them ... esp. when inflation is rising and economy of the world is in the state of gloom.

Having said that, I made my first sale this week. The apple green polka dotted card was purchased by a friend of mine for RM13.00 (plus.50 postage). What a thrill of it all !My very first sale!

Now i understand why some people thrive on selling handmade things ... to know that products are in demand is a real sense of achievement!

The convenience of it all ...

The new stash of polka dotted papers arrived today. They are as lovely (if not lovelier) as the pictures put up by the local online scrapbook shop.

Am more than thrilled that this 'remote' scrapbook enthusiast (more accurately card-making enthusiast) from Borneo finally has access to 'scrapalicious' papers. Having said that, its amazing how much has changed in such short time too. Not too long ago the few ways of purchasing scrapbook bits were either usually long and tortuous efforts. It was either to:-
a) order from online scrapbook shops in the US (and pay and arm and a leg for shipping charges) b) order online from scrapbook shops listed on ebay - and wait just about FOREVER for scrapbits to arrive, IF they ever arrive that is ...!!
c) Fly - either to Kuala Lumpur or Singapore - the two nearest cities where ALL the scrapbook specialty shops are located but unfortunately do not sell online ...

Now with local online scrapbook shops like scrap-n-crop, as soon as one makes an interbank payment transfer for items ordered, one's scrapbook papers and embellishment are soon at one's door step in a mere few days.

Now that's accessibility and convenience!

Digital loss ...

Its confirmed. Nothing can be done to retrieve data stored on my cranky old laptop (am presently using the new one as i type). I find myself grieving somewhat ... all those pictures (admittedly some weren't very well taen) taken over the years, snippets of precious oh-so-fleeting moments, stored in digital format ... all gone! :P

Then there's all those marvellous digital scrapbook files I downloaded at a price ... it was a sort of experimenting. My trying to figure out what suited me -traditional scrapbook or the digital art form. But with my then cranky ol' computer, the only digital scrapbooking I could do was print out pictures that were minimally edited (used the automatic correction alot!). Did try for a while though to figure out the features of Adobe Photoshop ... but it was all really a stab in the dark kind of effort. The uncertain clicking of buttons, not quite sure what the effects would all be. And with a machine then that froze ever so often (something about not having enough virtual memory) I usually gave up in frustration - never quite seeing the end results of my experimental 'clickings'.

Of course, there are those scrapbook projects in the pipeline. I had either painstakingly pick and chose pictures (using MS Word) and saved them under a certain project title or saved the journaling that went along with the pictures ...

Its all gone now.

Got only myself to blame. This silly goose NEVER bothered to back them up! :P Now with the DVD-RW that comes with this computer I intend to put that feature to FULL use. Digital back-ups is the way to go!

Anyone know of anyone who owns like a CSI type of computer lab...? Am not quite ready to give up quite yet - although the tech-guy here tells me that my hard disc is 'kaput, gone, dead, unsalvageable ....' Am sure with the right kind of equipment the documents on my hard disk (I only want MY DOCUMENTS, the rest can be thrashed) can be retrieved ...

Dotty about Dots

I realise I have a thing for dots (see recent and previous birthday cards creations) - polka dots of various shades and hues ...

I don't suppose that has got to do with the fact that the scrapbook book of papers that I got a few months ago came with a few lovely pieces that's surreptitiously lead to my current dotty fancies ...(?)

Apple green - one of my favourite colours ....

Inside of card

Made couple more birthday cards today. Its another one of what I would term as 'mixed media' cards , with floral laces, buttons, ribbons and sheer frills added to embellish the card. Stuff I found from browsing through the local mom and pop sewing-ribbons-buttons wholesaler that I occassional pop into to stock up on nifty looking bits to add to my paper creations.

The latest nifty bits that I found are those sheer like frills they use to show at the end of sleeves or neck-line. Its a kind of ' frilly mini skirting' - (admittedly am not too familiar with sewing terminology nor sewing ...:P) used to soften the edges of the card (as seen in photos). I thought initially that the only way to adhere fabric bits to card was by sewing (blanched at how much I had to sew ... not forgetting how bad I am at that!) But like all creations, there is always an 'alternative method'!

All fabric bits were adhered to paper with SUPER glue!

Was careful not to glue fingers together ... ;)

These cards have a long postal journey to make - once their envelope is finished ... hopefully them floral/button/filly bits glued survive the tough journey.

Transforming 'croc box'

Inspired by Snazzy Jazzy's boxes transformations - I thought i could do the same for this particular shoe box that I've not had the heart to throw away. Its an 'ugly but beautifully recycled box' (as written on the back). I've been using box to store my ribbons that never seem to stay neat for long ... :P (you can actually see bits sticking out from box in the picture)

I didn't have a clue as to transformative design. The only idea I had in mind was the colour scheme. The girl-ish pastels of pinks and greens, a personal favourite - mainly because I've not had much chance in indulging in. (Presently with all nephews and godsons in my life - been working alot with baby blue). Began the project yesterday night by digging out whatever bits of paper that were of that colour scheme - including small scrapbits that i don't have the heart to throw away ... From that glorious mess you see (doesn't that remind one of hamster's nest?!?) I came up with this ....

Wasn't fussy. It was after all a creative experiment. So not having things matched our cut out to size wasn't much of an issue. Paper were off different textures and thickness - from flimsy wrapping paper to cardstock like. Also, I finally found some use for those some of the many fancy paper punchers that was acquired last year to make simple paper accents to embellish box. This is how croc box looks like now ...
You could say its a girly over-kill. But am quite please ... having enjoyed the rigours of experimentations and using up my scrap paper bits. :)

More August Projects : - Recycling bits ...

Been slowly (but surely!) working on compiling a 8' x 8 ' D-I-Y photo album of one of my vacation trips. The photos are of the album covers - made out of recycled cardboard boxes. This is how it all looked like before work is done ...

Cardboard taken from some packed item (if not mistaken it was from bedsheet packaging)

The front cover of mini-album presently looks like this ...Perhaps more embellishments and accents will be added later when inspiration strikes.

Front cover

Back cover

August creations

Some of the creative bits that were completed in August - just not been able to blog about them.

Yummy looking Birthday and Thank you cards

Grandma, the receipient of yummy looking birthday card

Leftover of birthday cake(s) - baked by yours truly ...

Finally ....!!!

My computer - on its last legs - coughed and grasped its final breath last month. They weren't joking when they allude that blue screen to one of 'death' ...

Hence the silence.

I thought i could resuscitate the laptop -more out of sentimental reasons (the machine's been with me through thick and thin for at least four years!) than anything else.... That's how much of files (and junk) that's been stored in its hard drive. And finally, when the tech guy could finally slot in the time to deal with yours truly's broken down pathetic machine (he probably thought it was more worth its while to to bin the machine), for hours he tried every trick up his sleeve, but alas to no avail.

The machine was truly dead.

Kaput.

That's when i finally realised that holding out hope for a revived laptop was one in vain and spent the weekend browsing through the computer shops and studying laptop brochures. Trying to figure out what the specifications that suits my needs and my budget. It was all quite fun - these days, one can get a whole lot more for much less! For a bargain hunter, that's really encouraging!

So here it is. My spankingly new HP laptop. I've got one with a dedicated graphics card - so can work better and faster with graphics - rather than push integrated graphic cards to the limit only having computer to frustratingly stall on me.

That's all in theory though. This new machine has yet to prove itself. Until the laptop proves how much it can do with this NVIDIA graphics card, I'll get down to writing reviews. ;)