Origami

I was flicking through my Martha Stewart Craft Encyclopedia earlier looking for a quick project/technique to try whilst sitting in front of the TV. There are so many amazing projects in the book that I want to try but quite a lot of them will need extra stash so I decided to give Origami a go.

There were a number of different Origami projects in the book varying from beginner level to frankly hardcore paper folding genius level. I decided to give some beginner projects a go and went with the fortune teller and chinese lantern makes.

I started with the fortune teller, I remember we used to make these at school and have great fun playing with them on the playground. Martha's book suggests using them at dinner parties as table decorations one for each guest which I think is a great idea.

I then made a chinese lantern which can be hung over fairy lights to give a great effect. Both of these were fairly easy to make I think they would look slightly better if I had used a bone folder to get more accurate folding. As you can see I used some left over xmas papers I had and I think when folded they look less xmasy and can be used for any occasion so great for using up and left over festive stash.

Decoupage for Beginners

Today I have made two cards using a combination of coloured digi stamps and some decoupage techniques.

I had two identical images and coloured them both in, I then decided on the elements of the image that I wanted to have raised. For the single robin I decided this would be the hat and the holly branch. I then cut one image out as a whole and cut around the edges, I think a better effect could be achieved if the image was a uniform shape for example an oval but to achieve this I would need some sort of die cut machine which as of yet I don't own. On the identical image I cut out the hat and holly branch I used the scissors to cut out the basic shape and then the craft knife to do the more intricate bits, it was a bit of a faff but I got there in the end. I then affixed them to the matching image using foam pads, I used two foam pads on top of each other to make sure I got a really good 3D effect. I then stuck the whole thing onto a A5 card.

The second image I did was from a digi stamp of some love birds, I decided to try and make it more christmasy by changing the love birds into robins and adding some snow effects. It's not as Christmasy as I would like but I think the 3D decoupage effect on this card is really good.

3D Robin (camera doesn't show 3D hat or holly very well) 

As you can see I only made one or two elements 3D in these cards and stuck with quite simple images, I really enjoyed the technique and the effect it gave so may give it a go with some more complex designs in future.

Lovebirds changed to Robins (camera doesn't show the 3D effect well)