Beaded Whipped Back Stitch Swirls By Kim Dellow

Hey guys, I thought for my tutorial that I would show you some hand-stitching on cards. But I wanted to do something a little different for decorating your papercrafting projects so I've used a whipped back stitch and added beads to give it that extra bling. The stamp I've used in this project is the Whiff Of Joy Santa Reading List stamp.


If you look closely at the swirl you will be able to see this blinged-up stitch! It is very easy to do and will add that personal touch to your makes!


Materials:

You will need:
A piercing tool
Thread
Needle (thin enough to take beads but thick enough to take your thread)
Beads
The object to be decorated!
Some sticky tape would be handy too

Step One -

If I'm doing some hand sewing on card or paper, I always prick out the stitch pattern with my piercing tool beforehand - if you try doing it with your needle you might end up with sore fingers!

Step Two -

Stick the end of your thread onto the back of the card and bring the thread through the first hole to the front of the card.

Step Three -

Work a back stitch or a close running stitch, whichever you prefer, along the pattern you have already pricked out in Step One.

Step Four -

When you have reached the end, bring the thread back through the last hole to the front of the work and pass the needle under the nearest stitch. Pull gently tight.

Step Five -

Pick up a bead with your needle and push it to the end of the thread, near the project.

Step Six -

Now thread the needle under the next stitch along and again pull gently tight. You can move where the bead lies by loosening or tightening the thread.

Step Seven -

Keep wrapping the thread around the stitching in this manner and adding beads as you go along. Remember that you don't have to add beads and you can space the beads out how you like. Also experiment with different numbers of beads to alter the look.

Step Eight -

Keep working this beaded whip stitch until you reach the end and take the thread through the last hole to the back of the work and stick the end down.

Thanks for looking and I hope you have fun with this stitch.
Kim

Mounting and indexing rubber stamps by Bev

This tutorial was done for Katharina a few months back as Whiff of Joy are now stocking Mounting Foam and she has asked me to post it here as a reference for those that want to use it so I am just lifted it off my blog to post here.

I always mount my stamps onto foam as I get a far better image when stamping with a foam mounted stamp (unless they are clear stamps then don't bother and instead use a foam pad underneath the paper to get a crisp image). I have started to index them as well, this makes it so much easier when masking as you can see exactly where you are placing the image.

Step 1. I use Stazon to index (stamp the image on the back of the foam) and sharp straight scissors to trim around the image.

Step 2. Mounting foam is sticky on one side as has a static surface the other side. Establish which is the sticky side (leave backing on for now), place stamp on top face up and line up. To make it easier to line up later I trim a corner of the image (rubber stamp and foam).

Step 3. Flip foam over, remove backing off the static cling side. Ink up the stamp.

Step 4. Place stamp face down on the cling side of the foam, ensuring that you line up the corner that you cut as close as possible . This will give you the image print on the back exactly where the image will be once the stamp is adhered to the sticky side.

Step 5. The indexed foam ready to be adhered to the rubber

 

Step 6. Flip foam over so the sticky side is facing up and remove backing paper. Line up the rubber to the foam (again ensuring that you line up the corner that you cut as close as possible) and stick down in place. Apply pressure to get a good bond.

Step 7. Now trim off the excess around the image, using sharp, straight scissors and make straight cuts. Try and avoid making rounded corners as this can undercut the foam.

 

Step 8. One mounted and indexed stamp. If you are not bothered about indexing your stamps then just follow steps 6 and 7.

hugs Bev x

Easel Card by Jacqui

Hi Everyone, today it is my turn to show you how I make an easel card, I have had lots of requests for the measurements etc, so I hope this helps.

Here is a list of the tools and card I used to make this project

Dark Brown card cut to 12" x 6"
Dark Brown card cut to 6" x 6"
2 pieces of co-ordinating card (I have used cream) cut to 5.3/4" x 5.3/4"
2 pieces of Backing Paper cut to 5.5/8" x 5.5/8"

Medium and Small 6 petal Daisy Punch
Martha Stewart Leaf Branch Punch

Double Sided Tape, Memento Ink, Versamark Pad, Embossing Powder and Whiff of Joy Images of your choice.

Score and Fold the longest piece of base card at 6" and 9"

This is how it should look once folded

Apply double side tape at the edge and 2.1/2" up from the edge to the 6" x 6" base card

Mat and layer your co-ordinating card and chosen backing paper and apply to your base cards as below

attach the 6" x 6" square to the base card

This is how it should look from the side

Now to make some very simple but I think effective flowers, punch two medium 6 petal Daisys and one small flower

Distress the edges of the flowers with Frayed Burlap Distress Inks

Turn the flowers over and score up the middle of each petal

Turn back to the right side and pinch the edges of the petals together, they should look like the flowers below (this is the most fiddly part of the whole card)

Layer the flower up as below (make two of these flowers) and punch out two leaf branches with the Martha Stewart punch, edge the leaves with glue pen and add glitter

Here is the complete card, I have used one of the lovely Willow Images from The Elizabeth Bell Winter 2009 Collection from Whiff of Joy, she has been coloured with Copics and has been cut and and 3d onto the fabulous Whiff of Joy Tree Stump which has also been coloured with copics and 3d onto a base card, that has been stamped and heat embossed with Snowflakes from the Same Winter 2009 collection as Willow and distressed around the edge with Frayed Burlap Distress Ink.

The sentiment was stamped onto plain white card and I used Oblong Nesties to cut out the sentiment and frame, the frame has been applied to the card with 3d pads, this keeps the back from slipping and staying upright.

I hope this has been helpful to you

Hugs Jacqui

Poinsettia Flower Tutorial by Dawn Wheeler

Good morning girls Girls its Dawn here (All pink girl) and its my turn today to show you a little tutorial on how i make my poinsettia flowers ,
i am really nervous as this is my first ever tutorial and some of you know i am word challenged (so please stay with me lolxxx )
before we start here is the list of all the equipment that you will need to make this flower
1 Large retro flower punch (mine are from Hobby House)
1 Medium sized retro flower punch
small embossing tool
embossing mat
glue or sticky dotts
3 pearls
and a pair of scissors Next you need to punch out
2 large red flowers ,
2 large green flowers ,
and 1 med red flower


Then you need to emboss each flower from the centre outwards and then emboss little lines off of each centre line to create a vain like affect ,i have used a white pencil on the flower on the right to help you see the patteren you need to emboss and show up a bit more for you

Then you need to turn each flower over and pinch along the line from the centre of each of the petals to create dimetion

Then using your scissors you need to snip each pettal at an angel so to give more of a pointylook ,

do this with each flower ,plus also at this point you could also ink the edges of the petals if you wanted more of a vintage look

Next you need to add the pearls to the centre of the mediun flower ,by adding the pearls now will help when assembling the flower

Next glue the other two flowers togeather and add the top flower to assemble ,at this point you can also pinch the petals again if you need too

Then to make the leafs , you need to cut away some of the petals (like shown) as this will give more of a natural shape to your finished flower

Then like before when you made the flowers you need to emboss the leafs in the same way and not forgetting to pinch them down the centre and snipping in to each leaf

Then attach the leafs to the bottom of the flower for the finishing touch ,you can also add any glitter at this point too

And here we have the finished flower

hope you like my tutorial for today

Dawnxxxx

Sepia colours with Copics, by Fran

Hello, it's Fran here. It's been tough trying to think up of things I can show you when I'm surrounded by uber talented group of ladies on the DT. So, after much head scratching thought I'd do what I love most . . which is colouring!
Well I know Copic tutorials are everywhere but it's always interesting to see how everyone colours I think, and for mine I thought I'd do a specific colour palette and show you how I achieve a sepia coloured look - great for vintage style cards. So here we go . . .

Materials:

• smooth coloured cardstock of your preference, for this I have used a cream cardstock (I use a 200gsm smooth coated card from Rymans stationers which comes in White and Ivory cream colour. I find it's smooth enough and doesn't bleed and it's readily available to me in the UK, so is my card of choice. Plus it's inexpensive which is a bonus)
• Memento ink 'Rich Cocoa'
• Copic colours E40, E43, E44, E47, E49 (E02 optional)
• Stamp of your choice (I've used 'Melinda Christmas Angel') plus all your other bits needed to make up your card

Colouring:
I've put together slideshow of how I've coloured her. I've tried to take a photo after each bit and listed the colour I used. Basically the way I colour is pretty much always the same;

• I imagine the light source to be coming down from top right hand corner


• take small sections (always do my face/skin bits first) at a time


• work out where the darkest bits are and colour using my lightest shade (kind of a marker so that if it doesn't look right it doesn't matter). Usually bits to the left/under the light or if it's behind/below something. Conversely, bits at the right/top, sticking out like nose, or curved bits of head will be the lightest.


• Will then move to my darker shade and recolour the bits I have just done then go back to my light shade to colour all of the area and soften/blend the darker bits as I go.
  If certain areas need darker shading I will either use the same dark shade again or a shade darker and repeat process of laying down bit of dark and then blending out with the lighter shade. How much 'blending' will depend how much shading I want to achieve and how 'smooth' I want it to look. I'm not one to blend out all lines as I think it gives more texture/depth if you leave some visible breaks in the shading or even white areas for the lightest bits.


• to minimise lines try light feather stokes where you lift nib off the page right at the end of your stroke as you colour - all in the fingers/wrist and with practice!

Right enough waffle, here's the slideshow, hopefully you can see what I mean;

then to finish:I then cut out image with 'labels 8' nesties, and with the die still on, I sponged around the image with distress inks 'antique linen' and tiny bit of 'weatherd wood' (to tie in with my background dp) and to make it a bit more 'old' looking, like so (yes, I tear out pages from old phone book to line my work when I ink etc then it goes in the recycle bin and I use cheap make up sponges for sponging - they feel same as cut n dry foam ;)) -
I've then matted image onto bit of kraft card (by cutting around the die - I run this through my cuttlebug as if I was embossing it which leaves nice impression for me to cut around & saves me tracing round it with pencil). Add some papers from MME christmas stack, bit of ribbon, lace, roses & embellisments, touch of faux stitching and voila, my finished sepia coloured christmas card (click on photo for closer view) Hope it's been useful. Any questions/feedback or requests for future welcome - just leave a comment. Thanks for visiting.