Eid Mubarak pop up mosque card

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This year we will be celebrating our Eid in mid July. I'm starting early this year with my Eid cards because I don't want to rush making them last minute like before. I'm allocating more time for my Eid cards this time around. But still no custom orders as planned. I still prefer making ready stock ones so that I have more time to complete other projects.

If you have been following my work in the past years you would know that I love using the weaving technique for my Eid cards. It all started with my favourite subject matter which is the Ketupat. I used to make Eid cards that was embellished with Ketupat. The Ketupat was made using ribbons that I weaved by hand. And the common colours I picked are usually shades of green. That's why for this card I did the weaving technique for the front design. So the whole page of the card is embellished by the weaved ribbons. So instead of weaving ketupat, I decided to weave the whole front page of the card. Just trying something new for a change :).

For this card I specifically picked the colour green and white as the main colours because it's the Prophet Muhammad's favourite colours.  I still have a lot of left overs of green ribbons from last year's ketupat card design. So I used them up for this new design. It's simple....just weave different shades of ribbons and embellished them with some rhinestones.

Since I'm more focused on making pop ups cards this year, I  decided to try making my own pop up mosque for my Eid cards. This is the first time that I've tried making it and to my surprise I managed to do it. Seriously I never thought I could. It was a struggle in the beginning to draw up the shape and details and choosing the right type of mechanics for the pop up. But I'm glad I gave it a try. If I didn't, I would have never known that I could.

I might do different shades of the same design or I might just stick to this colour combination. It depends. If there is a demand, I might just do it. The important thing is to have fun making it :D.Do check out the video of the card below and see how the mosque pops up in the card. :)

Green themed card in a box birthday card

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This is my first new card in a box design for this year. Although I don't do anymore customized handmade cards, however, this design has about only 1% request and 99% freedom. My customer gave me the freedom to design this card for her hubby. Just knowing what his favourite colour is, was enough for me to know. The rest was up to me to decide.

I have done stripes designs a lot over the years when designing cards for guys. It's the most simple idea and the outcome is usually good. Especially when you combine a few colours together. In this case it's a combination of white background with, green and brown paper strips. He loves natural green and earth colours. And so that was how I envisioned the card to be on the outside. I cut the brown and green coloured paper and pasted them on the card one by one. It took me some time to arranged them together but I didn't mind because I love doing it.

However, on the inside, I made it a little cheerful because it's a birthday card, therefore it has to look fun and happy somehow....to create that festive look. I love how all those stars, wordings and all pop up when the card is opened. It gives you the feel to celebrate. And it's a good idea as well to pop up the wordings that way especially if you don't really have much to write for wishes. So all the wishes are already there for you.

I really loved playing with the clear stamps that I got from Popular bookstore. They are just the thing I needed for this project. The wordings fits perfectly like it was meant to be. They are so small and suitable to be stamped on the dialogue cut outs. I don't mind doing this again because it was really fun! :)

Pink and blue flowers hand-bound book

Here's another one of the hand-bound books that I've made in November. When I made it I didn't have any plans on who I was giving it to or selling for that matter. I was just making it because I was so into making hand-bound books with beads. I just kept on making them non-stop. Plus because I needed to practice making them before I forget how to make them completely! Hahaha!

I really enjoyed making these books. The ones I've been making were made using quite a thin type of paper which is only 80gsm for the pages. I did try though making books using 120gsm paper and I love them! In fact, I think I love them more than the 80gsm type. Simply because I think they turned out looking better than the 80gsm ones. Plus it would be good for writing as well as sketching. But not for painting though. If it was for painting, then perhaps I need to use the watercolour type of paper for that purpose. 

Hand-bound books great as gifts. Functional too! I love giving people something that they can use. Maybe perhaps it's because I love getting gifts that I can use too. I mean, what's the point of having something pretty in the house and it just sits there without any purpose. I'm a practical person, and I love things that I can benefit from. I guess I was brought up that way. I should thank my Mom for that! :D

At last the book went to a very close friend whom I knew since I was primary school.....well....actually, she's a close friend of the family....she was the one who helped my Mom when my father passed away many many years ago....so she is quite dear to my heart. When her birthday came, I just had to give this book to her. She has never seen a book like this before. It really thrilled her to bits! She adored it very much. And that really made me very happy.

It doesn't take a lot to make people happy. Make the move and spread the love! :)

Card in a box #3

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You must be thinking.....hmmmmm.....this design looks familiar, right? Well, of course it does because it's the same design I made for my first card in a box card last month. The only difference is the colour of the box which I had to change because my customer wanted a card that is in a red and black combination.

Actually I didn't have a red and black pattern paper with a similar design of stars on it. So I had to create my own with the red and black paper. The stars were handcut and pasted on the card one by one. Slow process but at least I get to do a similar pattern as the original design.

I also ran out of the 3D pop up stickers. Huhhuhu!!! So sad about that. The shop never restock them. Searched every where in Alor Setar but couldn't find it. So if anyone were to order this card again, I would have to figure out a replacement for those 3D pop up stickers.

I really enjoyed making card in a box.....they are so much fun! Do check out the video I made of this card. You can see how it opens up. Thank you! ;)

I love you B...

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I got an order to make a card in a box design from a customer who wanted me to make it for her BF. I declined the order in the beginning because I have stopped taking customized handmade cards for a while due to lack of time in my schedule to make cards like that these days. I just want to concentrate on ready stock cards for a while. It's is also because ready stock cards are less stressful to make hehehe!

Anyways, since she agreed to give me the freedom to do it anyway I like it, I then decided to give it a try since she only wanted a simple design for her BF as both of them love simple designs....kinda sounds like me coz I love simple designs too hehehe!

I got some details from her......the wordings....his favourite colour and his less favourite....the dos and the don'ts.....and off I went to complete the card. I thought it would take a long time to make, but, the idea came quite quickly for this one, I just had to carry on with it until it's done. Somehow the red box reminded me of the pop corn box we get at the cinema and that gave me the idea to do the stripes. I have done stripes for quite a while! It used to be my favourite thing to do whenever I make cards. It was like my trademark. So it was fun to do it again for this design! Love it!

As I was thinking of ideas of how to write the wordings on the card. The idea came to me.....I realised I had those colourful glitters set and glue pen from Kreaxions which I bought so long ago. I immediate went to get them from my craft box and started experimenting on it. It took me some time to figure out how to use it....it can be a bit tricky!!! If not careful, the whole thing is ruined! Gotta have a steady hand to write with the glue pen....and gotta write it fast too before the glue dries up otherwise I won't be able to sprinkle the glitters on it....and it might not stick well if it is already dried up. After a few tries, I finally got it!! And I'm loving it! I should experiment more on this new technique next time.

I'm so glad that my customer loved the card so much, she just can't wait to show it to her BF soon. I hope he loves it too!! Have a look at the card in a box at the video below. See how it opens up and pops up all those hearts ;). 

My first Card in a box!

I was taking some time off from work the other day, because I've been working like crazy since January with not much time to rest and I started browsing for new type of cards to make and I suddenly thought of making a card in a box. Been dying to make one ever since I saw them on Pinterest some time ago.

Sometimes I just need some other diversions to keep the mood for cardmaking going and keep on going. Because I'm the type who gets bored easily. Since I've been making a lot of swing cards already, so it was high time I change things a bit to give me some excitement.

From the time I saw the designs of the card in a box in Pinterest, I always thought that it was difficult to make. I figured it was the most complicated card I've ever seen. And it never occurred to me that we can actually fold it flat and insert it in an envelope. But when I saw the video tutorial on YouTube, I was blown away by the trick! What a fancy trick it was! That was what got me into this so instantly. I just had to make one the minute I saw the video. :)

I bought some fancy birthday 3D Pop up stickers recently and thought of using them for my first card in a box experiment. The pattern paper were given to me by a good friend of mine, Sandi Staley. Gosh I have loads of scrap pattern papers from her to use up for my card experiments! hehehe! ^.^

 Compared to other types of cards, this particular one involves decorating on almost all parts of the card. So it's quite a lot of paper to paste here and there...a lot of decoration to do to make it attractive. And since it will have a 3D look once opened, you gotta think of how it will look 360 degrees...all angles. The challenge makes me more driven to complete the card.

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Do check out the video I took of the card so you can see how it transforms from a flat card to a box with pop ups in the center! That would perhaps get you excited to create your own first card in a box soon! ;)

Selamat Pengantin Baru

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I was requested to make this wedding card and I couldn't be happier about it because it's a little different from what I've done before. Every time I create a new card, I try to either implement something that I've tried before and make it better or I use a new technique or material.

For this card, it's a combination of all that and I'm pretty happy with the outcome. It's been a while since I last made those quilled love birds too. Every time I make them, they'll turn out a little different because it's handmade. So it's bound to have a character of it's own. First time ever to have them on a swing card too! Weeehooo!!

This is my first time trying out one of the packs of quilling paper that I got from WholePort. It's smooth on the sides and it's a bit wide, which is about 5mm in width and the length is about 54cm. It's called the Rose Red Quilling paper.  This is my first time using a 5mm quilling paper too. Usually I just use the shredded A4 paper for my quilling projects. And the width is usually about 3.5mm.

It's the first time for me to quill using my new beads slotted quilling tool too on my new card. It may not be the best quilling tool to use since it's handmade, but it does function as a quilling tool and I was able to make those quilling decorations on the card using it. So I'm quite satisfied with it so far:).

I managed to use a few of the brass charms that I got from WholePort too. The latest one I got is that love pendant. It's really pretty....love how it looks on the card. You can check out the pendants at the links here:

1. Believe in love charm
2. Live your dream charm
3. Love pendant

I gotta say that making swing cards nowadays is a must for me. I just love them so much. I do miss making pop up cards though. It's something I seriously have to think about doing in the next few months. I do hope that I'll have time to do all that I wish and miss so dearly.

Do check out my video here.....I took a video of the card so that you can view how the card swings in motion. ;)

Hand-bound book for swap

Here's a close up detail of the hand-bound book I made for the craft gathering swap I attended in February. It's a small book....A6 in size and I did a French stitch binding for it. My favourite type of binding method at the moment ;).

I didn't have enough time to decorate much for the cover. So I just used a simple way of embellishing it which was to use a pattern paper that has a crowded design and glued a piece of ribbon,  a piece of die-cut scallop felt and some embellishments that I got from Wholeport.

You can get the embellishments from Wholeport at the weblinks below:

1. Flower resin

http://www.wholeport.com/item/3zt_25mm-cake-flower-resin-beads-cabochons-5pcs.html

2. Decorative Wooden Ring

http://www.wholeport.com/item/cjl_5pcs-60mm-decorative-pattern-hollow-out-wooden-ring.html

I love making small notebooks like this. It's so cute and I love making them as gifts or for swaps. Because the receiver can use it instead of just admiring it. It's functional so to speak :).

My first French Stitch hand-bound book

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As you can see, I'm a little....just a little addicted to making hand-bound books lately ehehehehe :D. This time around I tried making the French Stitch hand-bound book. It may look a little complicated to make....but in reality, it's actually a lot easier than the Coptic Stitch! Seriously! And the best part of it all, I didn't even need to use a wax thread for it. The thread just slide easily in and out the signatures. Yay!

In the beginning I did have some problem doing the French Stitch because I couldn't find a tutorial on it on Youtube. The stitch is similar like a Long Stitch except that the difference is I only had to hook each thread from each signature together so that it looks like it's connected from the first signature to the last one. Very complicated to explain it here. I just did it based on observation from photos I found in Google Images and tried it out. I tried doing it 3 times and the third time's the charm! ;)

This book is actually made for my Mom....she requested me to make one for her friend's birthday. I didn't want to do the Japanese Stitch or the Coptic Stitch, since I preferred to use the French Stitch now. And that's how it came about. 

As usual, I tried to use whatever materials I had in my studio to create this hand-bound book. Since I'm still a beginner, I rather not spend too much buying new materials, instead I just improvised and make the best of it. Luckily for me, I have some stock from WholePort that are suitable for making hand-bound books. For example, the thread for sewing the signatures, the pattern paper for the book cover and the lace for embellishing the cover.

I used smaller sized ribbons since I didn't have larger ones that would match the cover of the book or the thread. It was kinda tricky to do it like this but I liked the challenge....it's nice to experiment once in a while with whatever I can find in my studio. I love the red thread that I used for sewing the signatures. I got this one from WholePort too......you can get it at the link HERE.

I gotta say I love this lace! I don't have a lot of it since I only got just a little sample of it from WholePort. I would have to get more of it in future. I love it coz I can add 1/8 inch ribbon to it. You can get it too at the link HERE.

It's been a while since I last made these paper roses. It was fun to do them again for this little project! ;). I think this is the 3rd time I'm using this pink polka dot pattern paper. It's simple and sweet. You can get it at the link HERE.  

I can't wait to make more hand-bound books using the French Stitch binding technique. Because with this technique, I can get a book that can open up just like the Coptic Stitch hand-bound book and yet so much easier to sew. Plus it doesn't involve any punching of holes either on the cover of the book! Ain't it great!?? It is to me!!! hahah! :D