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Sunday 30 September 2018

Cardmaking: Poppies from Circles

We are still busy exploring how far we can take the simple shape of circles in making cards. In today's blog, we will cut blood red poppies from the red cardboard and stick them down on the green to make a beautiful field of remembrance for a loved one.


Trim the leftover green cardboard to have four straight edges.


Fold the sheet over to form a card.


Trim a wide piece of red cardboard off the main sheet.


Draw rough freehand circles of various sizes on the red cardboard, using a black marker.


Draw flower centres into each of the circles.


Cut out the circles so that the outlines still form part of the flowers.


The cut flowers.


Fold each flower in half, with the drawn side facing out.


Fold in half again.


And fold in half yet a third time.


Open the flowers up.


Put a glue dot on the backs of each of the flowers.


Stick the flowers at random on the green card.


Use a black marker to draw stems, leaves and grasses on the card.


The completed card.


Marietjie Uys (Miekie) is a published author. You can buy my books here:
You can purchase Designs By Miekie 1 here.
Jy kan Kom Ons Teken en Verf Tuinstories hier koop.
Jy kan Kom Ons Kleur Tuinstories In hier koop.
Jy kan Tuinstories hier koop.
You can follow Miekie's daily Bible Study blog, Bybel Legkaart, here in English & Afrikaans.
You may prefer to follow the traveling blog, A Pretty Tourist.
For more crafty ideas and great product reviews, visit A Pretty Talent on Facebook.
If you are in a literary mood, follow Miekie's musings, stories and poetry on A Pretty Author - Miekie.
Remember to keep nurturing your TALENT for making life PRETTY.
You can subscribe to any of these blogs and receive regular updates by email. Simply register your email address at the top of the applicable blog.

Friday 28 September 2018

Cardmaking: Cats from Circles

I continue the series on making cards using circular shapes in today's blog. I use semi-circles to make a trio of cats from paper cutouts. I then add some detail with a pen and, in no time at all, I have an inexpensive and cute card, to present to one of my many cat-crazy friends on their next birthday.


I have cut some squares from my sheet of orange cardboard. I now trim the edge straight by cutting the cut side away. Retain this off-cut as we will use it in a future project.


Fold the sheet in half to form a card.


My compass is still in storage with some of my other art materials. As a result, I am forced to use a kitchen dish to draw a circle on a sheet of blue cardboard.


This is what the circle looks like when I remove the dish.


I only need half a circle and don't wish to waste cardboard. Therefore, I erase one half of the circle so as to not cut more than I need from the cardboard. Use the blue semicircle to cut two similar semicircles from red and green.


Cut out the semicircle.


I use the lid of a glue stick to draw two overlapping circles.


I form these two overlapping circles into an ellipse by connecting the circles with straight lines.


Cut out the ellipse and then use it to cut two similar ellipses from red and green.


Cut two small triangles for the cat's ears from the blue. Do the same in red and green.


Draw a tail on the blue and cut it out. Do the same in green and red.


Use glue or double-sided tape to stick the shapes in place on the card. Notice how the cat at the bottom run over the side of the card.


Trim this away.


Use a white marker to draw the eyes of the cats.


Draw the pupils, noses, mouths and whiskers of the cats with a black marker.


The completed card.


Marietjie Uys (Miekie) is a published author. You can buy my books here:
You can purchase Designs By Miekie 1 here.
Jy kan Kom Ons Teken en Verf Tuinstories hier koop.
Jy kan Kom Ons Kleur Tuinstories In hier koop.
Jy kan Tuinstories hier koop.
You can follow Miekie's daily Bible Study blog, Bybel Legkaart, here in English & Afrikaans.
You may prefer to follow the traveling blog, A Pretty Tourist.
For more crafty ideas and great product reviews, visit A Pretty Talent on Facebook.
If you are in a literary mood, follow Miekie's musings, stories and poetry on A Pretty Author - Miekie.
Remember to keep nurturing your TALENT for making life PRETTY.
You can subscribe to any of these blogs and receive regular updates by email. Simply register your email address at the top of the applicable blog.

Wednesday 26 September 2018

Cardmaking: Flowers from Circles

A circle is such a simple shape, and yet it is one of the most versatile to use in arts and crafts. I decided to do a short series on making cards, using simple circular shapes. I was inspired by some of these ideas from Pinterest and other sources, while some are entirely my own. The grouping of it together here in one place, makes for a fascinating collection. In today's blog, I will show you how to use simply circular cut-outs from cardboard to make cute flowers, using only pens to complete the picture.


I decided on a range of A4 cardboard sheets of different colours. I would use these for a number of projects. The colours I settled on were: red, yellow, blue, orange, green and black.


Start by folding the black sheet in half to form a card.


Cut squares from the green, blue and red. Draw large freehand circles on each of these. Strive for imperfection when drawing these circles, as this simple card derives its charm from the imperfections.


Cut out the circles.


Draw smaller circles on squares cut from the green, yellow and orange, and cut these out.


Here you can see what sizes to aim for more or less.


Cut even smaller circles from squares cut from red, yellow, orange, blue and green.


This is what we are aiming for.


Use double-sided tape to stick the circles to the card.


Cut the yellow cardboard slightly smaller so that it would fit inside the black card with ease. Retain the pieces of cardboard that were cut off, for a later project.


Fold the yellow cardboard in half.


Stick double-sided tape along one of the folded edges.


Insert this yellow card inside the black one. This creates a space to write your messages that is easier to write on with a normal pen, unlike the black cardboard.


I then used a white paint marker that I had also bought at the Herbert Evans sale to draw petals around one of the flowers. The paint came out in such uncontrollable blobs, that I was forced to go over the blobs with a black marker to fix it. I could not continue to use this pen for the rest of the project and was forced to switch to another white pen with a thicker tip. Anyway, draw double petals all around the circle and then put dots inside the inner petals.


Draw the detail for one of the other flowers. Here you can see that I have switched to my trusted Posca marker, which never fails to deliver brilliant results! Note also the detail drawn inside the flowers.


Add the detail for a third flower and draw a half a leaf peeping into the page.


Add the detail for the first of the smaller flowers and draw in the foreground.


Draw the detail for the last of the smaller flowers.


I then switched to a black marker to add some shadows to the flowers.


The completed card.


Marietjie Uys (Miekie) is a published author. You can buy my books here:
You can purchase Designs By Miekie 1 here.
Jy kan Kom Ons Teken en Verf Tuinstories hier koop.
Jy kan Kom Ons Kleur Tuinstories In hier koop.
Jy kan Tuinstories hier koop.
You can follow Miekie's daily Bible Study blog, Bybel Legkaart, here in English & Afrikaans.
You may prefer to follow the traveling blog, A Pretty Tourist.
For more crafty ideas and great product reviews, visit A Pretty Talent on Facebook.
If you are in a literary mood, follow Miekie's musings, stories and poetry on A Pretty Author - Miekie.
Remember to keep nurturing your TALENT for making life PRETTY.
You can subscribe to any of these blogs and receive regular updates by email. Simply register your email address at the top of the applicable blog.