Flowery Congrats

A very big hello to all my readers and crafting friends. The monsoon is still absent from the shores of the Bay of Bengal(and consequentially from Kolkata too, where I live)  but it is storming and thundering every day so I guess its not too bad. The days are hot, humid and sunny...it is impossible sometimes to muster the willpower to get off that posterior. I have been doing a host of things to while away the time...learning French and doing calligraphy are some of the things I do other than crafting.

I have been obsessed with stencils of late. As I own remarkably few of them, I have been forced to entirely hand draw and cut my own. But I always have a wonderful feeling when I remove the stencil and reveal the wonderful pattern underneath. It's like magic to me!

I had to create daisy stencils in two different sizes for this card. I created a wedding card keeping CSCC#4 in mind. I also tried to use the colours from Cosmic Colours#2.

I think the sentiment looks like calligraphy...the practising is paying off!

Thanks for reading, and happy crafting!

My First Layout

Yes, I have finally succumbed to the scrapbooking bug...I'll share my first layout with you guys today.

I started with an old photo of my Ma. I really love this photo of hers because she is smiling so fully, without anything held back, without any artifice.  Anyway, it was just lying about, not even in a proper album so I decided to create my first LO with it.

Mother's Day

So here is the card I came up with for this mother's day. Its become more than just giving a card because currently, she's really pissed at me! We quarrelled yesterday on a MOST trivial topic and I've noticed that the loudest quarrels always stem from the stupidest things. Don't you agree? I hope she is blown away by the supposed loveliness of the card and forgives me on the spot.

RIC#59

I just fell hook, line and sinker for Runway Inspired Challenge's inspiration this week. The fabulous colour combo and the lace detailing at the bodice is what drew my eye. Here's my card...

I traced the damask pattern from an old wedding invite. I decided to give my handwritten sentiment centre stage, so there is no image/embellishment. Tracing the pattern was a pain in the posterior but I think the effort was worth it.
Also linking this to Seize the Birthday, Moxie Fab World and Itsy Bitsy Monchromatic challenge.

Thanks for reading, and happy crafting!

Something Electrical

After all my whining here about the weather and absence of rains and all...I'm thrilled to say that it finally rained! In fact its raining as I write this! Maybe I did not go dance in the rain but I am enjoying the cooler weather a lot!

After the weather report, I guess I'll share the card for today I made for CASology's brilliant cue word this week : ELECTRIC(Seriously guys. HOW do you think the cues up?). After almost exclusively studying static and current electricity and also things like electromagnetism in Physics the previous year, my brain was buzzing with many ideas. But uncharacteristically I decided on a bit of a romantic card, here it is :

Have you ever been in love? I haven't. But from countless romances I've read (guilty confession :p)I am assured that is is a very electric thing. In fact whenever the hero and the heroine come in contact with each other they feel bolts of electricity shivering down their spine, or tingling the hairs at the back of their necks...or creating sensation in some *other* places...ahem. But I digress. What I meant to say that I wanted to convey some kind of attraction with these sparking hearts!

The hearts I cut by hand, wrote the sentiment and drew the sparks with glitter pen. I actually tried a feeble pun on the phrase "The start of something beautiful".

Thanks to Hazel for letting me know about CAS on Sunday! I hope this card qualifies for their current challenge as I've used a glitter pen!

As per Susan's suggestion also linking this to Moxie Fab World...

Thanks for reading, and happy crafting!

With Love...

With my brother currently staying with us(he stays in Bangalore) I am finding that I spend all my time hanging out with him! There is no time for crafting... but yesterday I made up my mind to make a card, and so here it is today.
For this card I tried to make paper roses. Now I have made origami roses before, and fairly complicated ones, but the most realistic ones can be made only with cutting or punching. So I searched for tutorials... but drew a blank : either they were too difficult, too ugly(!) or made use of punches. Finally came across a Pin(origin forgotten :p) and adapted it to make my first paper rose...

Almost From Scratch

The daughter of a friend of my mother's had had an accident recently. So my mother thought it would be nice if I could make a card for her to give when she visited the hospital. Now, I had never met the Didi in my life. So I had to opt for pretty much a generic card. But the problem came when it came to supplies. Again, NOTHING except for quilling paper. Not even white cardstock for the base. So what to do? The local stationary shop does not stock cardstock(India. More importantly, this is Kolkata :-\). So I glued together two sheets of thick art paper as neatly as I could. A girl's gotta make do with what she's got, unfortunately. Then my gaze fell on a box that was lying around. It was the container of a cosmetic gift set. It had quite a lovely picture of a heart. So I quickly dismantled the box and cut out the picture.
Imagine my surprise when I found the inside of the box was a nice lavender colour! I cut out the maximum part that could be reclaimed, and voila, I had lavender cardstock!
So, without further blabbering, here's the finished card...