Shabby Chic Birthday Gift Set

Hello,

Today's project is something that I did back in early January but never posted due to the combined effect of travelling, laziness and a bunch of not so great pics. I finally decided to post it today because the guilt of not keeping up with my blog won.:-)

Back in December,I got an order all the way from the US from a guy who wanted to send a surprise gift for his close friend.Like most men,he had no idea what exactly he wanted. He just wanted pretty things and this is what my interpretation of pretty was. I made quite a few items. I sure hope she liked them.

First up is a box that I altered and a simple mini album that goes inside.

I used some gorgeous papers from the DCWV Mariposa collection. I love how the alphabets on the box look, if I say so myself.

Next up are an altered photo frame, a birthday card and an explosion box. I was in such a hurry to send out the parcel, that I forgot to take any decent picture of the inside of the box or of all the items in one pic.

Here is a not so great pic of all the three together

That's it.Hope ypu like the project.

See you soon,

Cheers
Pals

Last project of 2014! (Photo Heavy)

Hello!

First of all thank you to those who visited and commented on my last post. I am humbled that you still took the time to comment even though I have been rubbish at supporting you.

Today's post is a quick one to show the last project I did in 2014.I did a set of custom themed door hangers for a client who wanted to give them away as Christmas gifts. She had very specific requirements and knew exactly what she wanted, so that helped a lot.

Starting with my favourite out of the lot.:-)

 

The second one is for a newly wed couple who are in love with purple. I love the texture on this one. It does not show up in the picture but its all shimmery. I used the Prima color bloom sprays on this one and some gold flakes.

 

 

This one is for a little girl obsessed with pink and fairies and butterflies.:-).This is also textured and sparkly. I used my Crafter's workshop stencil and glitter paste on this one.

 

 

This one is double sided. One side for a book loving new mommy.

 

 

and the other for her new born baby girl

 

 

On to some for the guys

 

This one is for a travel loving guy.

 

 

Another for a stylish party animal.

 

 

Last and my least favourite. Something for a photography buff. I had the hardest time making this one because I was all burnt out after finishing all the others within a very tight timeline. The paper in the background has some photography related words on it and I bought some digital elements for this one but for some reason it does not make me very happy. Thankfully the client liked it otherwise I was all out of ideas.;-)

 

Okay,that's it.Hope you don't mind the photo heavy post.I will see you again when and if I am inspired enough to make some other project.Till then,stay blessed and stay happy.

 

Credits :

The labels on the first two hangers are free graphics from Free pretty things for you and The Graphics Fairy 

The chair in the Mommy hanger is a digital image I bought from Bugaboo stamps

The Car in the travel hanger is a free digi from Digital Two for Tuesday

The Photography elements(The paper and the cameras are from a digital kit I bought from StudioKitch at Etsy.

The model silhouette is a freebie from snap2objects

 

Cheers

Pallavi

 

 

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I learnt something new!

Hello ,

First of all happy Friday! I love the end of the week and Fridays are my favourite.:-)

Today I want to show you something which has been on my pinterest to-do items for a while but I could not find a decent enough tutorial. I am talking about Dream Catchers. I love those things. Finally, I found a tutorial on youtube and gave it a go. Here's how it looks

Of course, the actual dream catchers are not made of yarn. They are actually made of willow hoops and sinew and beads. The story behind the dreamcatchers is very interesting. They are actually supposed to get rid of bad dreams and all the components of a dream catcher have some significance. The nightmares pass through the holes and the good dreams get caught in the web and slide down to the sleeper through the feathers. How fascinating is that! If you are interested, read about it here

I don't think my dream catcher would do any of this.:-)I used an embroidery hoop and white yarn. The centre embellishment is  a snowflake from Craftslane and  I used MDF letters to spell out dream. Here are some closeups. I kept it super simple. Just wanted a red white and gold colour scheme.

Hope you like this and give it a go. It's super easy to make, I promise. Here's a link to a tutorial.

Happy weekend and see you soon!

Cheers
Pallavi

 

Contd.. Fridge Magnets

Hello,

Back again with the rest of the magnets.Not going to talk much.Forgot to tell you that almost all the magnets are sealed with mod-podge, so they last a while.Let's see how well they weather the elements.:-)

Paint, stamping, Dimensional magic, Pattern paper, Glossy Accents

This is my favourite and not my original idea.I had seen some magnets with burlap bags and stuffed with flowers during my visit to Malaysia, so I tried to do the same using some lace scrap and some leftover paper/fabric thingy that came with a flower bouquet..I decided to attach the bag to a larger piece though.

Wooden heart, punched flowers, paint, perfect pearls

Die cut from a paper collection,and some beads and charms

This is the last one.This was my attempt at being funny.Tell me if you get the joke.My husband didn't.lol.Paint, dimensional magic, glossy accents, image from the internet.

And,that's the end of my post.Hope you like these.

Cheers
Pallavi
 

ATC Swap

Hi

I am very happy today!I had mentioned in one of my previous posts that I had been a part of an ATC swap over on myscraproom and showed the ATC that I had made.Yesterday I received the ATCs from all my partners and its so exciting to finally have those with me.

This swap was a Vintage Christmas ATC swap and my group had 5 people including me.Here are the ATCs that I received.

They are all so unique and pretty!I am so glad that I decided to participate.I am not sure if the people who sent these ever read my blog,but if they do,then thank you!


Cheers
Pallavi

Create with abandon : My current motto.:-)

Hello!

I am back with another project and I am so glad I finally did something!I have been busy with work and have been postponing all my crafty work for almost a month now and was itching to do something.

I don't know what to call this.Maybe a plaque?A lot of people have been working on identifying a defining word for this year.A word that will be the underlying inspirational theme for 2013.I have been thinking real hard and I came up with one finally.Mine is Endeavour.I am one of those people who always hesitates before getting into anything.Extra cautious and non committal,that's me!This year though,I do not want to play it safe.I want to play,take risks and try everything,hence the word.I wanted to to make something to remind me of that.Unfortunately I was also creating this for a challenge and I had the restriction of a 6 by 6 project,so I decided to use the word CREATE.Cliche much,eh?I will probably make a bigger something for my actual word, but for right now this also mirrors how I want to be this year.

Anyway,without any more rambling,here is my plaque or affirmation sign or whatever you want to call it.

It was pretty simple to make.The base is thick white cardstock.The pattern paper is punched.The letters are coloured with blush pink acrylic paint and then I used pink glitter glue on them.The rest is diecuts,laces,flowers etc.I tried to create some texture with a stencil and gesso.Not sure if I like that too much,to be honest.There's some stamping too but its hardly visible.

Hope you like this project!

Submitting this for Crafters Corner Challenge No. 4 which is anything but a layout or card.My project is neither of those,so I hope it qualifies for entry.

Supplies :
Paper : DCWV botanicals stack from Crafters Corner
Die Cuts : Tigerlily Collection from Lulupu (Either from the Lakehouse or the Tigerlily collection)
Flowers : I am roses,I think.:-)
Chipboard Alphas : Itsy Bitsy

Cheers
Pallavi

Handmade Desk Calendar

Hi

One of the swaps that I participated in was the 2013 desk calendar swap on Swap Central India .I was so happy when I discovered this blog since I had been whining and grumbling about the need to do swaps and not having a forum locally.I have been following the blog for a couple of months and finally gathered my courage to participate in one.

I decided to use the papermania chipboard album for the calendar pages and made a standing frame to hold the pages using a fairly thick chipboard.

All the paper that has been used on this calendar is DCWV fresh florals stack.I kept the pages very bright and happy.I decided not to make monthly theme based pages since I did not have enough coordinating embellishments.I decided to go for bright colours, flowers and butterflies since mostly everybody likes those.I have provided a pocket on almost all the pages.The recipient can stick in some notes in there if they want to.I used tons of perfect pearls and glitter and I love it!It's a little bit chunky,but it stands okay,so that should not be an issue.

Supplies Used
Paper " DCWV Fresh Florals Stack
Flowers : Crafter's Corner,A1 Crafts,Itsy Bitsy and handmade
Stickers : Itsy Bitsy
Wood Flowers and leaves : Crazycrafter
Chipboard Flourish : Itsy Bitsy
Calendar Printable : Findingnana

Cheers
Pallavi

Christmas ATC

Hi

Two posts in a row.Yay!!

I mentioned some swaps in my previous post.One of them was a Vintage Christmas themed ATC at MSR.We had to make 4 ATCs for our group and here is my entry.

The front of the ATC looks like an envelope and this is how it looks when you open it

Isn't that image adorable!I love love love it.I just cut the image in three parts.I figured,if one wanted to,they could use this on their mantle or something during Christmas.

I did not do too many techniques here on this ATC.Did not have enough time.I do hope that people who get this like it.

The image is from Graphics Fairy .
Cheers
Pallavi

Project # 2 : Decoupaged Coasters

Hey there,

Here I am again.Project # 2 is also Mod-Podge so I am not really following the true spirit of '52 projects', but as long as I am making something, I am happy and satisfied.

This time I decided to do a mini makeover of sorts on some plain boring coasters I had.It was plain wood and cork and I think they sorely needed a makeover.Here's how those looked :

Project #1 - Mod Podged Tray

This does not really qualify as my first project since I made it before I decided to do my "20 projects", but what the heck.I make the rules around here and my rule says, anything counts.;-)

Okay, so I had this ugly looking tray which I am not sure why I ever bought.I mean it's not very ugly but I hate the plywood/laminate thingy on it and wanted to change it.Let's take a look at the 'project victim' first, shall we?

Yes, I didn't clean it up before taking a pic.Why bother! is also my current philosophy in matters which require unnecessary effort.

The first step was to spray paint the heck out of it.I had only white paint handy, so that's what I used.This is after one coat.I think it's already looking better.

While that was drying, I googled "Moroccan tiles" on google images.Saved a copyright free image and used a photo editing software to replicate the image on a single sheet of matte photo paper.I was originally planning to create a tiled, mosaic-ey sort of design but I suck at photo editing and husband was not in a mood to oblige.It was way past midnight folks, so I forgave him and went with whatever I could handle myself.

After that it was just cutting the image and Mod-Podging the paper on to the tray and sealing it with varnish (which I have still not done).I did have trouble arranging the '"tiles" so if you pay attention you will see that some areas do not align with each other and are a bit different, but the image is so busy I reckon it does not really make a difference.

So here it is,the project output.How do you like it?I don't love love it but I think it is better than what it was earlier.(Expert comment from kid brother : Wrong choice of paper.aargh)

So finally here's a before after shot :

Thoughts, comments? Good or bad, both welcome.

Cheers

Sumi

Repurposing Bottles

Old glass bottles and jars are a craze in the craftworld nowadays.These are being tinted, painted, decorated, turned into lanterns and what not and every single one of them looks good.So I thought maybe we can take a look at some ideas to recycle glass and be more eco friendly.What more could one want!The pleasure of crafting something AND contributing towards making our world greener.High five for that!

My mom has some talented bunch of friends who are really into crafting and stuff and one of them is totally obsessed with glass bottles.See what she did with some empty bottles.Aren't these pretty?

Mirror Revamp

Hi

I am back again.Shocking,isn't it? Two days in a row!Well,there is a reason behind it.Yes,everything has an explanation and the expalanation is that I had taken off from work so I had spare time to work on some things.Going back to work tomorrow :-( so back to my normal,infrequent posting.

Anyway,today we are going to revamp a mirror.I am living in a rented flat right now and there are some awful plastic framed mirrors in each of the bathrooms.I am going to  move into my own apartment really really soon,so I did not want to bother with buying new ones.But why live with ugliness when you can beautify for cheap.Long story ahead,prepare yourself.

I'm a little teapot,short and stout.Here is my handle and here is my spout.

I have a project.New! New! New! :-)

I cannot claim it to be my idea.I saw it in a home decor magazine and have been itching to try it out but I had run out of spray paint.Weekend was utilized in repleneshing my stock and hence the project.

Remember this ?

Okay ,so I did mention that I was a little iffy about this teapot and wanted to experiment a little bit.I wanted a white porcelain-ey look for it.So I spray painted the heck out of it.I used a fast drying glossy white enamel spray paint.

Then,I did this

Another Mod Podge Makeover

I am back after a pretty long time but I am back with a small project to make up for it.Nothing special, but since I have done pretty much nothing crafts-wise this would have to be it.

My colleague at office has been using a cheap wooden paper /magazine rack thingy to store her office papers and I have been dying to make it pretty.Ever since I have discovered Mod-Podge,all I do is look at different surfaces and want to "cover 'em up".Does that happen with you?Anyway I asked her and she happily gave it to me to "beautify" it and that's what I did.

Quilled Artwork

Hi there,

I picked up some small canvases on my regular trip to my favourite stationery shop and was trying to figure out what to do with those.I was too scared to attempt to try my hand at drawing or painting ,so I figured that I will go with paper quilling.To tell you the truth,I am a novice at this quilling thingy too but I so love the different things people make and wanted to try my hand at something similar and came up with this.

I started out with the grand idea of making a wrought iron sort of window box but it ended up looking like a planter.Never mind,it's not too bad I think.Since I am pretty new at this, I know a very few basic types of flowers . I just made some rolled and fringed flowers and some quilled and rolled roses and called it a day.For the background,I painted the canvas a pearly yellow using acrylic paint and lifted off some paint using a paper napkin.You can see that there are places where I lifted off too much but I don't intend to fix it.Making these flowers and scrolls was pretty easy but assembling them was a pain.I still think it's worth it though.The beauty of quilling is that whatever you make, it ends up looking pretty.At least that's what I think.I am going to make one more flower themed artwork using paper quilling anf gift it to my mom.She is sorely in need of something on her walls.

Here's a closeup

I also attempted to try staging a photograph.See..

What do you think? I dunno if this looks good or bad.All I know is that I suck at photography.:-(

By the way ,the kettle that you see was bought on an impulse and I just can't make up my mind whether I like it or not.I intended to use it as a flowrerpot but now I want to try my hand at painting it some other colour and using it as a decoration.Can't make up my mind though!

To learn more about quilling,see these videos on youtube:

Quilling Spiral Roses

Inroduction to Quilling

Submitted for

Also participating in the

See you later

Cheers

Sumi