More Stick pins!!! A little more elegant and little less Flamboyant!

Here are a few more stick pins Ive been making.  I will be including some of these in the 6 blog candies I am giving away, so if you havent got your name down and you were one of my 301 original followers, get your name down on the Candy post before the 20th January 2012.  

Sadly the camera doesnt bring out the detail on some of the beautiful beads, but they still look pretty.  These ones are a little more dainty and elegant I feel than the more flamboyant ones in the previous stickpin post.  I think these would be more suited to cards and altered items like pretty boxes and jewellery boxes.

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas.  Ours is still going on.  We are off to my In-laws today for some tasty nosh and a bit of craic and then to my parents tomorrow for even more food and craic!  I'll end up as stuffed as the Turkey on Christmas day!!  I love going to family events, should it be with my lot or Scrubby's lot, I always have great craic.  So the pavlova is in the oven doing its thing....hopefully it will carry on doing its thing and not collapse on me!  Though I havent had one yet thats collapsed......but there is a first time for everything.

Anyway, here are the stickpins.  

That is it for now my friends.  I hope you are all hitting the sales and getting loads of great crafty bargains.  If you find any great deals.....dont forget to let me know, lol.  

Ohhhh before you go.....look......perfect Pavlova straight from the oven.  There is no cream on it yet, obviously.  But its massive!  You probably cant tell from the photo but its at least 2 1/2 - 3 inches thick!!  Yummy.  It'll be gorgeous smothered in fluffy fresh whipped cream....hmmmmmm.......scrummy!

Straight from the oven....no cream added yet.  It went straight back into the oven after its photo shoot though, as the residual heat helps to prevent cracks and collapse.  Taking a Pavlova straight out from the warm oven into the cooler air makes loads of cracks appear and can cause it to drop a little.  So once it has finished cooking, I turn the oven off and leave it in there until it needs to be served.  Im talking about a couple of hours.....not days!! lol

That is one thick Pavlova!!  It'll look massive once the cream is on it!

Thats my lot for today.  Hope you all have a wonderful day, whatever you get up too.  And if you are out and about visiting, be safe on the roads.  I dont know about where you all are, but Northern Ireland is kicking up a storm out there.  The wind is very......windy!!

Toodles Noodles,

Loops xx

Tutorial - Peace Rose (Raindrops on roses........)

IF LIKE ME, YOU PREFER TO WATCH VIDEO TUTORIALS, I HAVE DONE ONE FOR THIS FLOWER.  PLEASE SEE THE LINK BELOW THIS PHOTO OR CLICK HERE

TUTORIAL - THE PEACE ROSE

IF YOU PREFER THE VIDEO TUTORIAL, PLEASE CLICK HERE

Good morning folks......IT CHRISTMAS EVE!!!!!!!!  AHHHHHHHHH!!!  SANTA IS COMING!  Dont you just love Christmas?  And once the big day comes and youve torn open your presents, set up the kids new toys and added batteries into everything, eaten until you have to undo the top button of your trousers and you proclaim "I will never eat like that again" even though you cant help but nibble at the left over turkey every time you walk passed it.....you'll think to yourself "Ack well, all the stress, expense and hassle was worth it", lol.  I love Christmas, I cant wait to sit around the table with all 18 of us (this year is a light year!!).

Anyway, enough of my waffling ("As if" I hear you cry!), I promised I would do the tutorial of this rose.  I did say it would be done after Christmas, but what they hey.  I may as well stick it up now.  Ive decided to call it the Peace Rose as the very lovely and talented Ruth, and of course not forgetting to mention she is a fellow Northern Irelander....Wooowhoooo! (a passion for cards) told me it looked like the Peace Rose her Daddy used to grow so I thought that was a very fitting name.  So I have named it the Peace Rose......providing Ruth doesnt mind of course?!

Right....on to the tutorial.  Honestly, its pretty much the same as my wee roses tutorial, Im just using a different flower.

I die cut 5 flowers from the Spellbinders Rose Creations Dies.  This is the middle sized flower.  You also need a large embossing tool (or rounded pen end), hot glue (much better than wet glue in my opinion), cardstock (I used 300gsm cream linen cardstock....Ive just used the end of it, I need to find more!), Distress inks to colour the petals, glossy accents if you want to add "raindrops" to your petals.

Using Victorian Velvet Distress inks I went around the edges and slightly into the petals on both sides of each flower.

Use a large embossing tool or if you unfortunately dont have a large embossing tool, like me, use the rounded end of a pen and emboss the flower petals in a circular motion.  This breaks the fibres in the papers and makes them easier to manipulate into shape.

Take one flower and work it into a rose bud shape.

Once you are happy with how your bud will look, open up the bud again and use hot glue on each of the petals, paying particular attention to the edges of the petals.  I put the glue near the middle so none of the glue will show anywhere near the top of the bud.

(Please excuse my gluey mat!)  As hot glue dries quickly, you need to be quick and work your flower back into the rose bud shape.  It wont be hard to do as you had previously worked it into shape.

Take your rose bud, put a dollop of hot glue on the underside of the bud and a circle of glue half way up the bud.

Place the bud into the centre of the next flower and mould the next flower around the rose bud.  Try and off set the petals as you place each layer on top of each other.

With your next layer, again place glue on the underside of the layer youve just made but this time put a ring of glue just below half way up the flower.  

Again place the flower into the next layer and mould it around the forming flower.  You will see that because you havent put the glue half way up this time that these petals flair out a bit more.  This is completely correct.

For the next 2 layers do exactly the same, but again place a dollop of glue to the underside and for the last 2 layers simply place a circle of glue around the sides of the bottom of the flower and again mould each layer to the one above it.  Again making sure you off set the petals.

Once all 5 layers are glued on top of one another, your flower will look like this.  You then need to go around the flower, curling down the outer flower petals to give your rose its beautiful form.  I just use my tweezers and curl the edges around them.

And that it folks....simple as.  I added some glossy accents on the petals to look like raindrops.

On this flower I used the leaves from the die and I embossed my own leaf veins onto them to make them look more realistic.  I just used my thin tip embossing tool to do this.

Side view of the roses

The top rose is using the next sized die up from the smaller flower

Comparison in size between the small and bigger rose

At its very widest the small rose is 1.5inches

At its widest, the larger rose is almost 2 inches

Here they are all together, big and small

Profile of larger flower

And there we have it, my tutorial for my Peace Roses. See it actually is really simple.  As always, any questions please comment below or contact me through my email above.

I just want to take this opportunity to wish everyone a Wonderful and Happy Christmas for tomorrow and the rest of the Christmas Season.  Its my 6 months Blogaversary tomorrow!  Yeah!  And on that note, if you havent seen my Blog Candy and you are one of the 301 followers I had, please scroll down to enter.  Hope everyone has a safe and happy time this Christmas and that 2012 will bring much fun, laughter and fantastically crafty adventures.

Big hugs to you all.  Toodles Noodles,

Loops xx

New flower - Beautiful Rose made from Cardstock - Definitely my favourite to date!

TO ENTER MY BLOG CANDY PLEASE PRESS THE LINK AT THE TOP RIGHT OF MY BLOG OR SCROLL DOWN FURTHER TO PREVIOUS POST

I really wish the photo showed how it truly looks....its so much prettier in real life 

Oh my giddy aunt you lot, I was so excited to show you all this flower that I only made one before taking loads of "Strike a pose" photos and running on here to show you it!  But boy did I make that little rose work for its water!  Poor thing is exhausted from its photo shoot!!  "Wired to the moon as per usual"....I hear you sigh!

Lookie, lookie........isnt she purdy (which evidently is my maiden name by the way....not Lookie you numpties....Purdy!).  I made this using the Spellbinders Rose Creation die, cutting just one of the middle sized flower cuts.  This was made using 5 of the same sized flower and then one more to make the leaves.  The die actually does have leaves you can cut.....but I didnt have any to hand so I just used the extra flower I had sitting and used my new distress ink (Thanks Debbi xx) to colour the cardstock.

All the adornments I just literally threw together to make the photo a bit more pretty.  I dont actually own the Tim Holtz Tattered Clock or the Flourishes dies but my very dear friend Maddy who is Izzwizz Creations here in Blogland very kindly cut me some. Thank you so much my friend.  I know!!  There are actually Tim Holtz dies that I do not possess!  Go figure.  I bought the wee crystal sprays on ebay and the other wee flowers I was mucking about with earlier and came up with these.  I think they look like wee cherry blossoms, dont you think?  I will perfect these as they arent perfect but I think I rather like these too.

Sadly the photos do not do this beautiful little rose any justice whatsoever......yet Im making you look at them anyway, lol!    So here are the photos.......

300gsm cream linen cardstock.  Ohhhh it would look gorgeous with some stickles painted on or some glossy accent rain drops.....ohhhhh....I wanna put rain drops on it!!

ADDED PHOTO!

Through the magic of post editing.....the flower with rain droplets.....glossy accents 

Used Crushed Velvet Distress Ink along the edges of the cream cardstock

The Rose itself has 5 layers and then one layer for the leaves

The Crystal Spray I bought from Ebay ....contact me if you want the link

Side profile.....the flower has great dimension

These are the wee cherry blossoms I made.....my first attempt.  They need perfected a bit.  The two outside ones are cream paper using a 5 petal flower punch. The centre flower is cream cardstock using the Tim Holtz Tattered flowers die.  I prefer the outside ones myself.

This is most definitely without a doubt my most favourite paper/cardstock flower to date.  I say that now, but goodness knows what I will come up with next.  Regardless, its my favourite for now.  AND....no doubt these roses will be found in the 6 Blog Candies I am giving away....so this is a little sneak peek of one little goodie 6 lucky people will be receiving. Thats it from me for another wee while.  Sorry its photos of only one flower.  But as I said, I was so excited about it I had to get it on here asap!  Im an excitable kinda child really......you'd never guess, would you?? lol.

Ohhhhh....not too many more sleeps now until Santa comes!!  Yippeeeee!!

Toodles Noodles,

Loops xx

EDIT - If you want a tutorial, let me know below.  But it wont be done until after Christmas.  Its pretty similar to my other wee paper rose tutorial but slightly different so if you want a tutorial, just say, its no problem. Oh aye....I used hot glue to adhere the rose together.  Toodles.  Lee  xx

More Stick pins!!! I think Im addicted to these and flowers!

Stick pins Galore!!  These ones are highly decorative ones......the next batch will be a little less elaborate

Hello there my wee Loopy Loo's and how are we this crisp Saturday morning?  All prepared for Christmas?  Whats that I hear you say as a shoe whacks me in the noggin?  "Im gonna throttle someone if they ask me that bloody question one more time"!!!  I feel your pain......and not because you threw a shoe at me noggin either! Every year I say I will have everything bought, wrapped and delivered by the first week in December.  Aye right!  Lets face it, it may have come to your attention that I waffle a bit and yes....my promise to myself to be organised this year is nothing more than a load of dribble!  There was a silence for more than 5 seconds in my head so I had to fill it somehow!

Anywho, here are some more stickpins. Edit.....I meant  to say, my wee sister Tara made some of these too....Im trying to convert her into a crafty devil like me, lol!  (When I say wee sister....she's 20). They are quite big in that they arent just single bead stick pins and at the risk of saying they are plastered with beads, I will simply say they are elaborate.  So my next bunch will be a little less elaborate (*cough* plastered *ahem*) but hopefully as pretty.

Awwww look you can almost see their wee faces!!

I like to think of these guys as wee garden fairy/angel stickpins

These are the acrylic diamonte topped stick pins.  Ive used various glass, porcelain and lampwork beads in these.

A lot of these are made with glass and metal beads.  Some are quite expensive to buy.  Well, theyre expensive for beads anyway!

The blue beads stickpins, glass and acrylic with glass spacers and bead caps

"What Mr Ghoul....you want to marry me?" (Give the guy a break....he could hardly go down on bended knee.....)

"Oh go on then.....I do". Great....Im marrying stick pins together now!  Heehee....I think my head needs seeing to!

These are some of the taller stick pins with the triple bead tops, I think theyre 3 inches in total length.  Again these are all glass beads with metal spacers and bead caps.

And that is it from me for today folks.  "What"? I hear you say as you scroll down just to make sure Im not tricking you!  Nope, no tricks, this is a wee short post today....well short for me anyway!  I hope you like the stick pins.  Any questions, you know the drill....comment below or contact me on the email up there ^ 

Hope you all have a great weekend.  Wrap up warm and be safe on the icy roads.

Toodles Noodles,

Loops xx


Ps.......dont forget my blog candy......there are 6 prizes up for grabs.