Roll on the summer ...

It might still be the middle of winter and the weather we have been having recently is so far from anything summer-like it's hard to remember what summer is like. But a crafting session making butterfly pictures and I can forget about the hurricane force winds and torrential rain for a short time.

I recently discovered affordable box frames from Ikea and have been having fun making pictures to go in them. I love the butterfly pictures I have seen in the shops and decided I could make even better versions of them.

 

I have a cute little butterfly sizzlit die which I used. The best, but most time consuming, part is playing with all the patterned papers I have and matching them with a background I think goes. They came out really well and I even got an order for a bespoke one.

I surprised the little girl by adding her name to the picture and she was delighted with it, matching perfectly with her newly decorated purple and pink bedroom!

If you like the pictures, check out my Folksy shop where you can buy them. The shop is a new venture - a place to sell my pictures and cards and allow me to expand my creative output! Don't worry if the pictures have gone though - mail me and I would be happy to create a new one just for you.

Now - back to dreaming about balmy summer days and fluttering butterflies ....

© 2014 Nicola Noble: Please observe the rules of copyright and blog etiquette. If you use my ideas or images, please link back to my blog. And do let me know - I'd love to take a look.

Summer heart wreath

I bought a woven heart wreath earlier in the year which I decorated and hung outside by our front door. I started with little Easter eggs, then changed that to spring flowers (sadly I forgot to take a photo of this).

Last week I decided to become summery with some butterflies and dragonflies, although summer doesn't seem to be coming just yet! It is our street party in a couple of weeks so I decided to be patriotic and chose red, white and blue colours for the decoration.

I used my Big Shot die cutter to cut out the butterfly and dragonfly shapes in craft foam and then painted them with glitter paint to add a touch of sparkle. I also changed the pink bow from my Easter/Spring version to a red gingham bow and then attached each shape by sewing it on with red thread.

I am so pleased I bought this heart and know I will have lots of fun changing it to suit the season.

© 2013 Nicola Noble: Please observe the rules of copyright and blog etiquette. If you use my ideas or images, please link back to my blog. And do let me know - I'd love to take a look.

I've got a new toy!

I had my little Sizzix Tag-along (now called the Side-kick) die-cutter for my birthday about six or seven years ago and I have loved creating cards with it ever since. Once I figured out what it could do, I started lusting after it's grown up brother the Big Shot but I could never justify spending the money to upgrade.

I recently got the chance to buy a Big Shot for half price (thanks to a school mum who is a Stampin' Up demonstrator) and after not very much soul searching I went for it. AND it is awesome!!!

The next thing I needed to do was get some more dies: my existing sizzlit dies still work in it but don't take advantage of the heavy-weight capability of the Big Shot so I bought some Bigz dies that can cut everything from paper to fabric and even aluminium. I bought directly from Sizzix and chose all the dies from their clearance sale (saving up to 75% on some of them!) which meant I could justify buying a few more and also didn't feel so cross over the £7 postage they charge.

I have had lots of fun over the last week playing with the new dies and creating a bunch of cards: take a look at what I've done so far ...

Dies used (in order from the top):
Sizzix Bigz die - caged bird (656634)
Sizzix Sizzlits die - butterfly #12 (656512)
Sizzix Bigz die - daisy blast (657390)
Sizzix Sizzlits die - heart, lace (657418)
Sizzix textured impressions embossing folders - flourish, dots & ribbon set (656980)
Sizzix Bigz die with textured impressions - flower #2 (657362)
Sizzix Framelits die set with stamps - flowers, doodle (657580)
Sizzix Sizzlits die set - bird set #2 (657080)

And with the extra bits from the Daisy Blast card above, I created skirts for some little fairies!

I haven't been too ambitious with the heavy duty Bigz dies yet and still have some other dies that I have yet to use so watch this space ...

© 2013 Nicola Noble: Please observe the rules of copyright and blog etiquette. If you use my ideas or images, please link back to my blog. And do let me know - I'd love to take a look.