TIPS AND TECHNIQUES

Monday, February 13, 2023

2 Faced Gnome

 


It's a GNOME INVASION!!!!  I am so addicted to these guys.  As you may have already seen my husband had cut out a few (ok maybe 7) of these triangles about 3-4 weeks ago and I decorated 2 as samples for my ladies group to make as a project on our monthly crafting day. The above picture are the ones they made a week ago Saturday.  Well one of the ladies was talking about how she thought she might turn the back side to a Christmas tree since it was already a tree shape.  Which got me thinking.  Way back in 2015 I made these reversable Love/Luck blocks from 2x4's.




I love the idea that I can leave them up all of February right up to the 17th of March by just turning them around from Valentines to St. Patty's.  Makes decorating my mantle a bit easier and cuts down the number of pieces I need to store.  With that in mind I thought why not make the Gnome double sided too?  Since I had to bring the Gnome project over to one of my friends who missed our craft day I thought it would be a good time to play with the idea and she could also have the option of either leaving the back plain as the other ladies did or doing a tree on the reverse like the others in our group had suggested or going my twist by going green.  Well we decided to go green!  Here are the 2 Valentine/St Patty Gnomes.  I cannot wait for the grandkids to see this guy on St Pattys day.



So I was pretty sure I was going to take my original Gnomes that I made for samples on Saturday and paper the backs of those too.  My Daughter-in-law already has a set of those Love/Luck blocks so I think a Gnome for her is in my plan.  After I got home from my friends house, I grabbed my 2 Gnomes off my mantle and looked through my papers to find the best to go with the Luck blocks.  TADA!  I Love them!

Now I'm ready for St. Pattys Day too.  Why do I have a feeling that I am not done Gnomin' LOL.  As I said before these guys are addicting.  My poor husband has just cut out another 7 for me hahahaha.  I have a feeling everyone is getting some sort of a Gnome from me some time soon.


Til next time.............................................................................

Monday, February 6, 2023

CRAFTING WITH THE LADIES

 HAPPY FEBRUARY!!   As you know this blog is pivoting this year and even though the name is still Simply Cards it is now going to be a wide assortment of whatevers.

Today I celebrate Girlfriends.  I'm not talking about the boy/girl relationships that can get oh so complicated, I'm talking BFF'S.   We girls NEED girlfriends.  I've heard alot of people say "Oh I married my BFF I don't need to have anyone else".  REALLY????  Ok I can believe the I married my BFF part but you don't need anyone else??  I don't know what I would do with out my Girlfriends.  I'm closer to some than others but they are needed in my life and I am super lucky to have some that I can share my love of crafting with.  We have a small group of 5 and we try to gather  at least once a month.  Twice a year we even plan our very own weekend sleepover.  All of us plan a couple of crafts and card projects and we all bring food for the weekend and invade one of the ladies homes.   She just so happens to live alone and has a large home so that's where we go.  It is the best of the best of times!  These ladies are a blast.  We gather for movies and a drink afterwards during the summer/fall months and we have attended some of the local scrapbook expos.  We text alot......talk way too much sometimes and eat alot of great food that we are usually guinea pigs for.  If a recipe needs to be tried we can get 5 opinions lol.  Men seem to be able to do without the need for some one to cling to. They can sit in front of the TV alone watching sports sometimes for hours and never say a word to another real human being. They don't really seem to have this need to hug someone when they see them.  We girls want that closeness.  We want to talk to a real person who  understands our feelings just by looking at us sometimes.

So now that I've gone off on this random whirlwind of why I need my girlfriends lets get back to crafting with the ladies.

This past weekend happened to have been a planned Saturday for us to get together for some crafting.  Unfortunately 2 of the 5 of us could not attend and had to cancel at the last minute but we went ahead and just made take home bags to drop off at their houses for them.  I had already shared with you my triangle Gnomes in an earlier post seen     HERE   so I won't repeat that photo but here are the crafts we produced Saturday.


The Gnomes were a big hit.  The LOVE card was super cute but time consuming as each word was glued down separately.  But what a cool idea for all those "Love" dies you might have.  I know I have quite a few of them and might do this card again but maybe in purples and pinks.

This book card was awesome.  Took some playing with to get it to open correctly and found we needed to use pop up foam on all layers for it to work.  This could be made into a sympathy as well as a wedding or baptism card too.

Not sure what this card was called but you pull the tab to reveal a secret message.  Cute little card for a child with these papers and with different wording and papers it could be used for adults too.

This card was made with pre-printed vellum sheets that we highlighted with Nuvo Drops.  We layered it on top of an embossed sheet that we had stamped our sentiment on.  Very elegant.

Lastly a door decoration.  How cute!  Valentines Day is just around the corner and this was not too difficult.  The lady who put the pieces for this together had everything all ready for us.  The hearts were raw wood and she went ahead and primed them for us to save time.  Though I forgot to ask her where she got the hearts from (I will assume Hobby Lobby since she shops there alot) My daughter in law showed up yesterday with similar ones from the Dollar Tree that are a bit smaller but still could be used.  The words were cut from vinyl on the Cricut and so were the hearts and the felt roses we hot glued on.  We replaced the jute hanger with red satin ribbon.

Well thanks for sticking with me through this really long post.  I hope you all have treasured friends like I do.

Til next time........................................................





Wednesday, February 1, 2023

Welcome Gnome Valentine

 Good Morning!  Welcome Gnome.  Aren't these guys just the cutest?  I saw these guys on Pinterest and thought they were a craft but ended up being and Etsy item.

You can see them here.   (31) Pinterest     I thought hmmmmmm....I have wood.  I have paper.  I bet I could do this so I gave it a try and this is what I came up with.  Now I'll have to admit these guys are not hard to make and could probably be made in an afternoon if you have someone to cut out the wood for you.  Which I did.  But me being the lazy one I was actually took...ugghh...ashamed to admit....3 weeks to complete.  Yeah yeah yeah...I know.  Amazing something so easy could take so long but I had movies I wanted to watch lol.  Ok back to the project.

Here's what you need.  Wood...lol I had a board that was a 2" x 6" x 4'.  My husband cut the triangles to measure 8" tall and by the time you sand the sides (because an actual 6"wide  board is not really 6"wide it 5" and something) the bottom of the triangle measured about 4" wide.  Then you need card stock of choice.  I of course chose Valentines Day papers and a solid cream for the beard.  I also opted for air dry clay to make a rustic nose instead of a bead.  Embellish as you wish.  I made a template for the papers by tracing the triangle so I could just mass produce.  My husband actually came up with 6 of these guys all together.



I used a mat gel medium to adhere the papers to the wood.  I did not want any sheen on the paper so this was my best choice as it also does not leave brush marks when dried.  I also added very fine glitter to the hat portion.  For the clay nose I just rolled a pie and let it air dry.  No 2 were the same and when dried I brushed them with some old makeup blush.  The little hearts are actually wooden ones from the Dollar Tree.  One I painted the other I added paper to it and both I glittered.

TADA!!!  So darn cute!  I'm giving one to my Daughter in law this weekend for her mantle.  I think I might even make a St Patty's one.  Hmmmm.....maybe they should be reversable?   I'm going to think on that.


Til next time.....................................................