Summer time and a jar with flowers from the garden on the table to brighten the room and fill it with lovely scent.
The other day I picked up my recent Stampin' Up order from the new catalogue from my dealer.. err demo's house. One of the items I had ordered is the bundle Jar of Love with jar stamps and dies along with some other related shapes. I've been looking forward to getting a set like this for some shaker cards and other things.
Supplies
Putting It Together
This card felt like didn't take very long to make but still had a lot of involved steps and techniques.
I had actually made the flowers for a different project in May (French Confection) when I was debating on which colour to use for that project. For this project, I used the lighter blue flowers.
The flower shapes are die cut from coffee filters. Yup, standard coffee filters that you might use to make coffee, if you use paper filters and not a gold mesh re-usable filter. After cutting the shapes I used Distress Ink to add colour to the filter paper and my fingers, too (it took 2 days for the dye to completely fade from my fingers with lots of washings *laugh*).
To add sparkle and more blending, I heavily misted the flowers with water with Perfect Pearls Confetti White. Then I heat dried them. After I decided to use the darker blue flowers for the other project, the lighter blue ones were set aside for a future project which ended up being the Jar of Summer Flowers.
To give the flowers longer petals, I snipped at each scallop in toward the centre.
For shaping, I use a bead mat and a clay shaping tool. I do have an actual flower shaping kit on my wish list but these work for now. With the smaller ball, I shaped the outer petals by rolling the ball on them. Then flipped the flower over.
With the largest ball I roll around the centre.
The flower parts are held together with dots of glue in the centre. Two of the flowers have 3 parts but I only had 2 for the third (and didn't want to make any more flower parts for this project).
I added a 6mm pearl to the centre of the flowers. These are my abstract generic 'flower' :)
I used a pale blue, slightly green lightweight cardstock for the jar and stamped it with a similar colour ink. I wanted to have the impression of a lightly coloured jar. I used clear embossing powder on the jar stamping to add glassy gloss.
Using the dies, I cut out the jar with a window and a solid back.
I stamped stems and leaves on the same paper and die cut them out.
I dry fit the stems and leaves into the jar between the window piece and the back (which I stamped with 'water' in Distress Ink Salty Ocean on an embossed background I made early in the evening while just 'fooling around' while pondering ideas.
The embossed background was made by adding a couple Distress Inks to the embossing folder before sending it through the Big Shot with some light cardstock and then sprayed with Perfect Pearl mist.
At this point it was midnight and I try to go to bed by 11 *laugh* So I had to leave this to the next day after work. Before I picked it up again, I realised I could put the 'second' stem (with leaves) behind the jar with stems inside the jar matching them up to give the illusion of a longer stem without having a double stem.
After thinking about the project while I was at my day job, I got the idea to do a shaped card using a die to cut the card base. I dry fit the jar and flowers in the largest die of a set to see if the idea would work. I had also decided to just use a stamped lower stem and cut new leaf stems from green light cardstock.
Dry fitting showing the illusion of the stems. Only die cutting the leaf stem also allowed me to flip one over to go in the other direction.
I cut 2 pieces of the heavy Neenah Solar White cardstock one of which was cut to be a bit longer than the height of the die I was going to use to shape the card. I used the groove on my Fiskars trimmer to score the heavy cardstock for a fold line just below the top of the shape. This flap will be glued to the card front with the rest being the card back.
I die cut the embossed panel using the next smaller of the nestable dies. Since it's a Spellbinders die with 'self matting' I also embossed it to have the matting edge. I die cut the card front with the largest of the dies in the set and also embossed it with the matting edge.
For the back of the card, to have the flap, I did a partial die with the fold I scored earlier below the top edge of the die. I meant to have a picture showing the partial die cutting process, but.. umm.. drat.
Basically, you put the item on the cut plate so the edge of the cut plate and the edge of where you want the cut to stop are aligned. You only need one of the two cut plates to be off the rest of the paper. Without a cut plate, there is no pressure from the rollers and thus no cutting from the die.
Because of the weight of the cardstock, I ended up trimming the sides of the flap with a scissors to follow the curve of the card back.
The back of the card has a flap that attaches to the front. This flap is visible on the inside of the card. I could have left it that way or.. I decided to cover the inside of the front with the same light blue as the jar. I die cut it fully and then lined up the back on it so I could draw a line where the fold is.
I cut the top of the inside pane so it would fit under the fold, over the flap, and cover the whole inside front.
To line up the front and back for gluing, I used Post-It tape on the bottom edge to hold them together.
After gluing the flap to the front, I used more Post-It tape to hold the front and back together to let the glue dry.
White the card base was drying, I still used it to dry fit the jar back and flowers to position the leaf stems. I marked in pencil, below the jar line, to note where the leaf stems should go.
I laid the jar front here to show how the illusion works.
I die cut more of the jar windows and glued them together. I sandwiched a piece of acetate recycled from packaging, also die just with the jar die, between the front of the jar and the glued stack of windows to create the shaker container.
To see if the stack was high enough, I put a few beads in and held the back in place to see if they moved freely. They did, to fall all over my desk. But, I did need to cut a few more window jars and adhere them to the stack.
NOTE: It is wicked hard to keep acetate from getting smudgy on a messy workspace. I cleaned my window several times.
When I thought the container was thick enough, I poured in a small pile of beads. To make it easier to build the shaker, you want to put the shake materials in which ever side you made with the walls...
... and then put the flat piece, the back for this project, over the container when you glue it in place.
Since the jar was an element on a background and not integrated to the background, making the shaker as a single piece like this was a lot easier. At this point it was one item and I didn't have to worry about getting beads strewn all over (again).
I used my Xyron (love it!) to add adhesive to the backs of the leaf stems.
I put them in place where I had marked earlier so they'll line up with the stamped lower stems in the jar.
I used a lot of tape runner adhesive on the back of the jar so it won't budge.
I lined up the lower stems with the leaf stems and adhered the jar.
I used Glue Dots on the flowers so the petals can have movement.
I put the flowers in place on the background panel. The two side flowers are beside their leaf stems. It's all about illusion, not real flower construction.
And this finished the decorated panel.
After working on the decorated panel, the card base was dry. Here you can see the flap on the inside of the front.
And now, after using adhering the blue panel, you don't see the flap on the inside of the front. I could have used white, but I thought the blue would give a nice look when the card is opened. It also adds negligible weight to the front of the card.
I decided to adhere the front panel directly to the card base and not pop it up with foam since there was adhesive from the Xyron on the backs of the leaves sticking above the panel. I used tape runner on the back of the decorated panel.
I fit the decorated panel in place, lining up the notches on the sides. Because I used a heavy (110lb) cardstock the card stand up quite well.
And done!
The flower shapes are die cut from coffee filters. Yup, standard coffee filters that you might use to make coffee, if you use paper filters and not a gold mesh re-usable filter. After cutting the shapes I used Distress Ink to add colour to the filter paper and my fingers, too (it took 2 days for the dye to completely fade from my fingers with lots of washings *laugh*).
To add sparkle and more blending, I heavily misted the flowers with water with Perfect Pearls Confetti White. Then I heat dried them. After I decided to use the darker blue flowers for the other project, the lighter blue ones were set aside for a future project which ended up being the Jar of Summer Flowers.
To give the flowers longer petals, I snipped at each scallop in toward the centre.
For shaping, I use a bead mat and a clay shaping tool. I do have an actual flower shaping kit on my wish list but these work for now. With the smaller ball, I shaped the outer petals by rolling the ball on them. Then flipped the flower over.
With the largest ball I roll around the centre.
The flower parts are held together with dots of glue in the centre. Two of the flowers have 3 parts but I only had 2 for the third (and didn't want to make any more flower parts for this project).
I added a 6mm pearl to the centre of the flowers. These are my abstract generic 'flower' :)
I used a pale blue, slightly green lightweight cardstock for the jar and stamped it with a similar colour ink. I wanted to have the impression of a lightly coloured jar. I used clear embossing powder on the jar stamping to add glassy gloss.
Using the dies, I cut out the jar with a window and a solid back.
I stamped stems and leaves on the same paper and die cut them out.
I dry fit the stems and leaves into the jar between the window piece and the back (which I stamped with 'water' in Distress Ink Salty Ocean on an embossed background I made early in the evening while just 'fooling around' while pondering ideas.
The embossed background was made by adding a couple Distress Inks to the embossing folder before sending it through the Big Shot with some light cardstock and then sprayed with Perfect Pearl mist.
At this point it was midnight and I try to go to bed by 11 *laugh* So I had to leave this to the next day after work. Before I picked it up again, I realised I could put the 'second' stem (with leaves) behind the jar with stems inside the jar matching them up to give the illusion of a longer stem without having a double stem.
After thinking about the project while I was at my day job, I got the idea to do a shaped card using a die to cut the card base. I dry fit the jar and flowers in the largest die of a set to see if the idea would work. I had also decided to just use a stamped lower stem and cut new leaf stems from green light cardstock.
Dry fitting showing the illusion of the stems. Only die cutting the leaf stem also allowed me to flip one over to go in the other direction.
I cut 2 pieces of the heavy Neenah Solar White cardstock one of which was cut to be a bit longer than the height of the die I was going to use to shape the card. I used the groove on my Fiskars trimmer to score the heavy cardstock for a fold line just below the top of the shape. This flap will be glued to the card front with the rest being the card back.
I die cut the embossed panel using the next smaller of the nestable dies. Since it's a Spellbinders die with 'self matting' I also embossed it to have the matting edge. I die cut the card front with the largest of the dies in the set and also embossed it with the matting edge.
For the back of the card, to have the flap, I did a partial die with the fold I scored earlier below the top edge of the die. I meant to have a picture showing the partial die cutting process, but.. umm.. drat.
Basically, you put the item on the cut plate so the edge of the cut plate and the edge of where you want the cut to stop are aligned. You only need one of the two cut plates to be off the rest of the paper. Without a cut plate, there is no pressure from the rollers and thus no cutting from the die.
Because of the weight of the cardstock, I ended up trimming the sides of the flap with a scissors to follow the curve of the card back.
The back of the card has a flap that attaches to the front. This flap is visible on the inside of the card. I could have left it that way or.. I decided to cover the inside of the front with the same light blue as the jar. I die cut it fully and then lined up the back on it so I could draw a line where the fold is.
I cut the top of the inside pane so it would fit under the fold, over the flap, and cover the whole inside front.
To line up the front and back for gluing, I used Post-It tape on the bottom edge to hold them together.
After gluing the flap to the front, I used more Post-It tape to hold the front and back together to let the glue dry.
White the card base was drying, I still used it to dry fit the jar back and flowers to position the leaf stems. I marked in pencil, below the jar line, to note where the leaf stems should go.
I laid the jar front here to show how the illusion works.
I die cut more of the jar windows and glued them together. I sandwiched a piece of acetate recycled from packaging, also die just with the jar die, between the front of the jar and the glued stack of windows to create the shaker container.
To see if the stack was high enough, I put a few beads in and held the back in place to see if they moved freely. They did, to fall all over my desk. But, I did need to cut a few more window jars and adhere them to the stack.
When I thought the container was thick enough, I poured in a small pile of beads. To make it easier to build the shaker, you want to put the shake materials in which ever side you made with the walls...
... and then put the flat piece, the back for this project, over the container when you glue it in place.
Since the jar was an element on a background and not integrated to the background, making the shaker as a single piece like this was a lot easier. At this point it was one item and I didn't have to worry about getting beads strewn all over (again).
I used my Xyron (love it!) to add adhesive to the backs of the leaf stems.
I put them in place where I had marked earlier so they'll line up with the stamped lower stems in the jar.
I used a lot of tape runner adhesive on the back of the jar so it won't budge.
I lined up the lower stems with the leaf stems and adhered the jar.
I used Glue Dots on the flowers so the petals can have movement.
I put the flowers in place on the background panel. The two side flowers are beside their leaf stems. It's all about illusion, not real flower construction.
And this finished the decorated panel.
After working on the decorated panel, the card base was dry. Here you can see the flap on the inside of the front.
And now, after using adhering the blue panel, you don't see the flap on the inside of the front. I could have used white, but I thought the blue would give a nice look when the card is opened. It also adds negligible weight to the front of the card.
I decided to adhere the front panel directly to the card base and not pop it up with foam since there was adhesive from the Xyron on the backs of the leaves sticking above the panel. I used tape runner on the back of the decorated panel.
I fit the decorated panel in place, lining up the notches on the sides. Because I used a heavy (110lb) cardstock the card stand up quite well.
And done!
Challenge
Simon Says Stamp blog 6 June Monday challenge: Summer Garden
The song running through my head while writing the blog post:
I hadn't listened to Sublime in a long time and had forgotten they had done this song until I did a Youtube search. I also forgot they came from my old (junior and senior high school) stompin' grounds of Southern California. Half listening to lyrics in some other Sublime songs as I worked on the blog post, I kept hearing places and events from the early to mid 80s. It was nice remembering this song and the group. Has it really been -that- long?
great work! This coffee filter flowers are incredible! Love them! Beautiful card! Thanks for joining us this week on SImon Says Monday Challenge Blog! Barbara
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