Orchid

Originally Designed: June 2011

Remastered: April 2020

Original artwork by Beccy Muir, all rights reserved. Images are for personal use and must not

be copied, swapped, shared, resold or mass produced without the express written permission of the artist.

"This Life" Album

I really love white on white when it comes to papercrafting. It always looks so pure and clean to me, plus I think you can use it for many different occasions since you aren't suggesting a theme with colour. It also means lots of texture to add interest and help separate the different elements.

I made this 8" x 8" album using Whisper White cardstock from Stamping Up, lots of ribbon, Prima flowers, handmade flowers, pearls and some gorgeous lace I had picked up in a haberdashery.

Fuschia Flowers

Originally Designed: June 2011

Remastered: January 2020

Original artwork by Beccy Muir, all rights reserved. Images are for personal use and must not be copied, swapped, shared, resold or mass produced without the express written permission of the artist.

Tutorial - Accordion Cards

Accordion cards are based on a concertina of cardstock and are fairly simple to make. The one I'm showing you today is the most basic with just three folds, but you can make them as complicated as you like with as much folding as you wish.

1. I started with a 6" x 12" piece of cardstock. This will produce a folded card that measures 6" x 3".

2. Fold the cardstock in half and crease the seam with a bone folder or creasing tool.

3. Fold the top flap backwards on itself, lining up the edge with the spine of the previous fold.

4. Flip the card and repeat for the other side. Crease all the folds.

5. You should now have a concertina of cardstock that forms the basis of your accordian card.

6. Decorate each section as desired.

May Christmas Cards

These are my efforts for the May challenge at Christmas Cards All Year Round. I love the idea of getting all my cards made early and ready (hopefully) to send well before the Christmas rush hits!

The gorgeous Christmas baubles on my first card are Nestabilities that I cut and embossed from cold cardstock. The stamped sentiment in the large bauble and the holly leaves and berries are stamps by Heartfelt Creations.

Great Ideas

Thanks for the great ideas everyone. There were a few suggestions that I thought were probably more techniques for embellishing or decorating cards rather than a card foundation, so I've left those off this list but hope to get to them another time. Also, I've noticed that some cards have more than one name, so I'll list them under both as I come across them (eg: wobble cards are also known as rocker cards, flip flop cards are also swing card, etc.).

These are the ideas I'm going to add, along with the people who first suggested them:

CardArTart - never ending card

mforquer - double side step card

Jacee - centre step card

CraftyGirl - funky fold card, tilt card, exploding card, pyramid fold card, s-fold card, diamond fold card, triangle tri-fold card, double slider card, slider window card, trellis card, magic window card, flip flop card, pop-up twirl card, free standing pop-up card, double diamond card, double tri-shutter card

Jessica - hidden message card

Theresa F - secret message card, venetian blind card

Dragon Design

My very talented 12 year old daughter wanted to share her dragon design with you all. She has a gift for drawing and particularly loves to draw pictures of dragons and other fantasy creatures. We both hope that you are able to use her design in your papercraft projects and would love to see photos of what you create.

Copyright M. Muir 2011

Technique Class - Lynn's Flowers

Last year I had the pleasure of going along to a stamping workshop at the house of a lovely lady named Lynn... Hi Lynn! While we were there she kindly showed us a technique that she had been taught that involved breaking down the fibres in Bazzil cardstock so that it split into layers. Although she learned it from someone else, who probably learned it from someone else and so on, I'm going to call them Lynn's flowers since she is the lady who taught me the basic idea.

Now, you may remember the basket tutorial I posted back in April which featured several handmade flowers placed at the base of the basket handle for decoration. These are the flowers I am going to show you today using Lynn's technique.

Requirements:
3 different sized flowers cut from Bazzil cardstock (Other brands of cardstock may also work
Large stylus (The rounded end of a pen would also work fine)
Piece of foam, such as an old mouse pad
Piercing Tool
Matching brad

1. Cut out three nesting (increasing in size) flowers from Bazzil cardstock. They can be any shape and have any kind of petals.

2. Place one of the flowers on the foam mat and rub each petal vigorously with a large stylus. You will notice the petals become softer and more flexible and eventually the cardboard will start to fray and split.

3. Gently pull each petal apart, leaving the flower intact in the centre. Repeat for all three flowers.

4. Lay the flowers one on top of the other with the smallest flower at the top and the largest flower at the bottom. Poke a hole through the centre of all three flowers using your piercing tool.

5. Push the brad through the hole and open the split pin at the back to hold all three flowers together.

6. I generally spend a little more time at this point distressing the edges of the petals a little more. Try rolling the edges between your fingers, adding little tears here and there or drag out your inks and stains to add some colour. Have fun!