and another birthday

This time for my cousin.  As my regular readers will know, my cousin likes all things oriental.  So this Tilda stamp fitted the bill perfectly.

I stamped the image onto white card, then coloured it with Copics.  The image was then trimmed and mounted onto to matt gold paper.  This was then put onto the prepared card blank.

First Birthday of 2012

It is my MIL’s birthday today – Happy Birthday Mum!

As usual I have made her cards:

   

Back to Oriental

Once again it is time to make my cousin’s birthday card.  Over the years, I have made her many things with an Oriental theme so each year it becomes a little more difficult to come up with something different.

This card was based on the symbol “double happiness” which I designed and cut using my craft robo.

I cut a circle from a red pearlised card blank.  The cut symbol was first put on tissue paper (and trimmed), then mounted onto the card, over the aperture.  Finished with a gold circle frame, here is the finished card.

 

To better show why I used tissue, I put a battery tea light inside and took a photo.

21

This weekend, my cousin’s son celebrated his 21st birthday – where have the years gone??

The design for the card was based around the Chinese symbol for “good luck”.

Back to oriental

I rescued the backing paper from a birthday present that DS had.  In fact, it was a gift bag and I fell in love with it and had a feeling that I could use it to make a card.
I needed to make a card for my cousin (we share a love of all things oriental) and decided to base my design around the “gift bag” backing paper.

I punched lots of little flowers in pink & purple.  I then folded them into quarters and glued them to the backing paper.  Using my small embossing tool, I opened the flowers to give it a 3D effect.  I them glued the backing paper to some matt gold paper to make the whole thing stand out.  As you can see, this was then mounted on a black, linen textured card blank.

While the cats sleep . . . . .

I actually managed to get some work done whilst the cats were sleeping – miracles do happen!

To ease my self back into “creativity” mode I trawled the internet for inspiration.  I saw this and decided to give it a go. 

I made two (as you can see), one for a birthday and one for a thinking of you/get well soon

A Christmas present

My cousin and I have a shared interest in all things Oriental. Over the years I have cross stitched the "Grace" oriental lady, as a special birthday present and the kimonos, individually rather than as a wall hanging. The cross stitch that I have done for my cousin is all beautifully framed (by her) and grouped together on one wall - known in the family as "Lesley's wall". I wanted to do something special for my cousin for Christmas and I came up with the idea of doing the symbols for her (see previous post - Another oriental project - this truly is the last!). However, I didn't want to make them into a tissue box cover (or anything else for that matter) but I didn't just want to wrap them in there raw state - this is what I came up with . . . .


Here we have the finished cross stitch panels.



I then took 3 pieces of A4 card, scored them in the middle. I printed the meanings of the symbols onto the card. I cut apertures (to suit the cross stitch panels) in 2 of the pieces of card and covered the cut edges of the apertures with red folded paper.





On the last piece of card I added my name, using the stamp that DH had made for me on a business trip to China! This was heat embossed with red embossing powder. For the front I made a silver embossed Chinese symbol. I added an eyelet to the front and back.


Then came the tricky part of putting it all together.
















The finished item!

















Anonymous said...

Happy Birthday!!!!!!I wish you a very pleasent day with your family!Kiss,Esther

13 January 2009 11:34

Another oriental project - this truly is the last!

Having spent the morning re-organizing my photographs, I discovered another oriental project that I had done. Each picture features a symbol: longevity, prosperity, benevolence and love. Having fallen in love with the designs in the book ("A cross stitcher's oriental odyssey, by Joan Elliot") I knew that I had to make them. The problem was that DH might not want more pictures on the wall. I decided that he couldn't object to a tissue box cover. So having finished each picture, I made a top, stitched it all together and then covered the edges with black bias binding.

Hi lesly,this would be really great for Boudewijn. he is fond of everything with japan of china.Very nice!!

Esther

13 December 2008 09:17

More birthday cards

Two more cards for birthdays this month.

The one on the left is a swing type card - the greeting is computer generated and topped of with a multi-layered flower. The small flowers, on the left hand side are hand drawn and the card is completed with a Cuttlebugged embossed strip. I loved the colours of this design.

The card on the right is based on a swing card but this time I have glued the front back on itself as I wanted the inside to be more visible. With oriental style paper on the left, complimented by the solid purple on the right, I thought this made for quite an impact. I kept the centre design fairly simple with the yin-yang symbol and a handmade tassle. Let's hope the recipients like them as much as I enjoyed making them.

Yet another oriental project - the last, I promise (for now anyway!)

This is a wall hanging that I made, with orchids, poppies and irises. Each section was worked individually, then carefully stitched to the backing fabric to complete the wall hanging.

I hope you have enjoyed the oriental theme over the last three days.

All the designs are from my much treasured book - "A cross stitcher's oriental odyssey, by Joan Elliot". It is an amazing book and one day I hope to have completed all the beautiful designs in it

So long for now.

Another oriental project

As promised here is another of my oriental cross stitch projects. This one took a lot less time to complete but was just as enjoyable.

Each kimono represents one of the four seasons.

Oriental ladies

As you know I am a keen cross-stitcher. I combined my love of all things oriental with my love of cross-stitch and this was the result:

From left to right: Beauty, Grace and Wisdom

Each took me between 6-8 months and it was a project that I thoroughly enjoyed, so much so that I actually made "Grace" a second time for my cousin's birthday.

More oriental designs to follow tomorrow.