Last weekend, I found myself with a rainy day and an imminent friend's birthday. There was clearly only one course of action, and that was to gather together all my old craft bits and turn them into something worthy of a space on her mantelpiece; so here's what I did.
After I'd collected together all the craft scraps from earlier projects, I did a quick stock-take. There was some old, floral wrapping paper, half an A4 sheet of white foam, some sticky-back red glitter paper, black felt, a few scraps of coloured paper and some flame red ribbon. More than enough for a great card!
But being in a hurry, I lacked inspiration. So I opted for the age-old method of 'making something else into a creation of your own' (also known as "plagiarism") and dug out some old animal prints from Paperchase...
I then opened up a nice bottle of vino and set about making the design my own. Who said you couldn't craft while a little tipsy? Certainly not me...
Next, I cut out a rough version of a stylized deer depicted on the card. I didn't bother tracing, or sketching the design, and I think this made the result more 'my own work' ;) I changed the colour scheme on the original cartoon to incorporate the red glitter paper and the black felt, which gave the deer a lovely tactile look:
I then created some 'scenery' to put the deer in a setting it might be suited to, using the coloured paper and a scrap of balsa wood for the tree trunk.
I finished the card by mounting the deer on the white foam, which I cut out to match its shape. I used ordinary paper glue for this.
And - hey presto - we have a card! My friend seemed happy with the result, and it ended up at its intended destination - her mantelpiece.
Now, I have another two birthdays coming up, I think my penknife will be rather busy...
