Friday 17 February 2012

Fifty Six Years Ago

My younger brother and I were playing outside behind the fence on the farm.  We were playing on the wood heap, and yep, we were playing with the axe. He is younger than me by about 14 months. He always had to do things the way daddy did, and so the axe was lifted above his head - he was about 3; he dropped the axe of course, and as my right hand was in the way, I lost my index finger and halved (split) the middle one. I had an excellent surgeon who saved my hand and all but the index finger, and as I am right handed I have gone on to write, knit, stitch, operate a computer (indeed, teach keyboarding skills) and so forth for the next 56 years with little impact on my life. 

Now I have a problem with old Uncle Arthur (ritus) - who visits regularly and who has decided to warp my right thumb joint and draw the thumb around towards the palm. Doctors and physio's are talking operations, and my GP asked me today how I would manage the recovery period when my right hand would be out of operation for about six weeks - its beginning to look at bit close! I see the specialist in March - meanwhile I have a lovely (not) looking foam splint thingy I have to wear all day long - very fashionable! 

It hinders my crafting a bit - I am not as nimble and cannot use the scissors as much, but I am determined to use it and not lose it! So, I made a card yesterday for the Stamp, Embellish, Create - Tuesday Tutorial which was Faux Silk, presented by Sue Walsh at  A Consuming Passion.  Thanks for the great tutorial Sue - I did my best!  After I grabbed the lovely fawn tissue my Annabelle Stamps order was wrapped in, and stamped my image - I had a problem with getting a clean stamp there as well (you can see in the picture below), I tried it on brown and then off white card, and then tore a corner and then forgot to wrinkle it before fixing it, and then got one about right so made it do!


Everything except the image is Stampin'Up - card, paper and ink, ribbons and brads - but the image is Annabelle Stamps - Mother's Day Squared. 


The butterflies are die cut and embossed using Cheery Lyn dies. 

A few days ago I had a go at a layered card a lá Amazing Paper Grace! Her work is so amazing! I used mainly a die set that arrive last week called Spellbinders Shapabilities - Ornate Artisan Tags and Accents. The card and DP is from SU and that lovely bling is the new Kaiser Sparklets (yummy bling!). The sentiment stamp is from Verve and the ink used and backing card is Rich Razzelberry, and the green is my favourite Lucky Limeade. The ribbon is two different SU ribbons - same colour LL. 

Now, I need help here - should I have inked edges? made one layer a different colour? Made the base card bigger? What is needed here please because it doesn't quite do it for me. 






3 comments:

A Consuming Passion said...

Oh sounds as though you're in for a trying time Susan......never mind keep a note book handy and save all the inspiring things you see around the place! Do you have a page on PINTEREST if not you might want to think about it......so much there to keep you happy!
Love what you did with the faux silk tutorial and you were so brave going with the set you chose......I looked at it and thought there might be a couple of problems :) I like your second card and those die shapes are gorgeous! If I changed anything I think I would have embossed one of those beautiful white layers........and maybe popped up one more layer.

Monica said...

So sorry that this wretched Uncle Arthur troubles you...

Your cards are fabby but I do think the second one would shine more with sponging or inking.

Take care of those precious hands,

Monica xxx

Anonymous said...

Ouch, with the fingers! Hope the op goes well for you and good job for still having a go at making cards with your hampered dexterity. I like your cleverly layered die cuts. What to do to make it pop? I would have stencil sponged the details of the diecut under the sentiment, highlighting the embossing with the same ink you stamped with. It would break up the white just a liitle bit, but not too much coz I like the white on white here. I would have also tried a green mat for the paper layer. I like the green flourishes in the focal piece and a green mat looks like it would have anchored the 'floating' green parts. (Make sense?)Very cleverly deigned centerpiece.