Painterly rosettes – with the Geli plate

I was thinking about this idea but needed to work out the best way to get a long enough strip with the 6 x 6 plate.  It finally occurred to me that as the rosette is folded, printing 1/2 the plate on one edge and the other half in a line, would work fine.  You don’t really NEED to have a continuous print with no obvious join or overlap, as the folding is going to disguise it anyway!

You can see the top edge of the paper there above, where I sliced off the 1 1/2 inch strip to score and fold the rosette.  I’ve run out of the pre-cut Tim Holtz die rosettes that Julia very kindly brought me when she lent me the die, but I see no reason you couldn’t cut them, then print on the cut rosettes with the Gelli plate and then fold them.  I did it old school, with a scoreboard. Pretty, hummm?

I would think this would be a good use for prints where you like the colour but the pattern you are less keen on, if you had the bigger plate and didn’t have to intentionally 1/2 print along the edge to get enough length.

I also think that you could use the word strips that I have shared before to print on the Gelli print with your printer.  I already know printing works, as I did that here on the Gellibird:

and I am sure the word rosettes would work fine.  I can see it looking good on a clean-up print, where the colour of the print is painterly but quite light so the words really show.  It looks fine on patterned paper, so I am confident it will work!

No time to give it a go at the moment, but when I do experiment, I’ll be sure to at least add a photo.

A couple of tips: First, make darn sure your print is DRY.  If you are using a scoreboard, score on the BACK of the print – the bone folder might chip off the paint if you score too deeply or your scoring tool has quite a sharp edge.  Scoring the back will make no difference to the folding.  I would also suggest thinner paper.  This is using the Staples Text and Graphics paper (dirt cheap for a ream of 500 – maybe £6) which is I think about 125 GSM.  Thicker and the rosettes will score and fold less easily.

The thing is, while I just LOVE printing with the plate, I quickly amass piles and piles of prints and since I don’t really art journal and I don’t really collage, I kinda have to figure out a way to use them that fits the kind of stuff that I DO do.  This would look very pretty on a card front, with a Gelli print background in lighter colours, would look pretty hung up by twine in the window – a bunch of them would look even better – and is thin enough that it would work on something like my Gelliprint paper bag book or on a layout or for a rosette wreath.

Basically I think you can pretty much use a Gelli print as a substitute for patterned paper, for just a more “arty” look! I have one or two ideas to test out in addition to the printed word rosettes so watch this space!

 

Bonus post! Mini rosettes from the TH die

I almost forgot about this one so I am adding it between the Sunday post and the regular BIG CARD one.

I was thinking about the layout I did a while back with the rosettes.

At the time I made it, I had the idea to trim off part of the die-cut, to make the rosette smaller, without having to resort to scoring and creasing one by hand (one that would not have the cute scalloped edge like the die-cut one.) Of course if I had taken a moment to really LOOK at it I would have realized that cutting off the side meant the whole thing basically fell apart.  It was bugging me, as things sometimes do, and while I had a roll of Washi tape on my desk it gave me an idea!

I die cut the rosette, then trimmed off about 1/2 inch from the non-scalloped side.

I stuck a line of Washi tape along the cut edge then folded it over to the back.

Crease and fold as normal.  The tape is a little thicker, so really you HAVE to use hot glue to stick it all together – it will spring open if you don’t!

Here you can see it in relation to the normal die-cut rosette….

and here on top of a 2″ punched circle, just to give you an idea.  I think with various Washi tape/patterned paper combos you could come up with some really cute ones.

Quick card – wedding, perhaps

I had a lot of debris on my desk from yesterdays exploding box, so I though I would quickly see what I could come up with.  I had gotten one of the Martha Stewart stamp-around-the-page positioners, with a few of the stamps that fit and not really used it much so I thought this might work on one of the rosettes Julia cut for me.  It does, and looks quite sweet, I think.

It fits pretty well right across the rosette.  I then took one of the votive holders and cut out the heart from the centre.  The strip itself was too long as is for the 4 x 6 card front so I did a little surgery on it – after removing the heart to be used to top the rosette, I trimmed the sides (cutting off the tab and slit that make the holder) and snipped some of the middle away.  I sponged on some coordinating ink, just on to plain card, and mounted the votive holder over that.  That let the colour peek thru the lacy laser cut.

The rosette is big enough to mask the fact the lace is in bits.

I did consider backing the card front, as the votive is pearl card and the card blank is plain, but I think it detracted from it. Embossing it would have just made it look more “busy.”  I don’t actually own and pearl card so until I get some, this is it.  And like many of my posts it’s more about the process than the finished item! The point is the stamps work perfectly on the rosettes and offer another option to just cutting them out of patterned paper or card.  The stamping is quite delicate looking.  I’m betting one of those little stamp rollers would also work, but the ones I have are a bit useless  (I think I have a mountain range and maybe chocolates, maybe a sort of Aztec pattern one – none that I can see working well for this sort of application!) In any case, I do think a better quality card blank would help.  I am always going on about how much I like the Cosmic Shimmer mists because the colour is so rich.  Well in this case, the pale cover of Glimmer Mists would probably do the trick.

Doing the HAPPY DANCE – Tim Holtz Rosette die WoRKS!

OMG – I am totally doing the happy dance right now.  I thought I would have to struggle to get the words from my Rosette Word files to fit the Tim Holtz die but they work, pretty much as is!!

I first held a pre-cut die up over the print out, to see what sort of adjustment I would need to make.  Not sure if you can see this, but the words fit near perfectly as they are.

Can you see how they fall between the score lines?

As Julia-the-lovely gave me a whole stack of pre-cut ones as well as the die, I thought the easiest thing to do was to attach the pre cut dies, first placing them with the window light to guide me.

Now the thickness of the cardstock caused two slight problems – first, the top edge had some ink deposited on it not a lot, but a smudge.  I would solve that flipping the file and printing, so the smudge was at the bottom, where the top edge would overlap.  For these I just joined them by sticking the clean bottom edge OVER the smudged top edge.  I would use some good strong adhesive for that, as it isn’t a good a way to do it as joining as intended, bottom fold tucked under the top edge.  Next issue, and if you look at the last couple of the Merry Christmas ones you can see it clearest   (and also by the fact that the words NOT printed on the dies are off by a bit) is that the paper shifts every so slightly, again, I suspect due to the thickness.  PEACE is nearly perfect in placement, Merry Christmas has a few that are close but not perfect.  Now look at them folded:

PEACE is short enough that the companion circle that the die cuts works fine.  Merry Christmas is a little long, so a smaller circle works better.  I’ve tried to capture the wonky areas so you can see that even so they are not half bad!

Two things – first, it may work better (but it may not) if the card stock is printed first and then die cut – but I think the same problem with slippage may occur.  Second, making the words a smaller point size will def. help – mine were pretty much as big as they could be, but I can see the advantage of making them smaller.  I’m just not sure that I will like that.

Are you as excited by this as I am?  Probably not – but I can’t believe that the most recent file works.  Now I am NOT sure the previous ones do, only because I think I tried to adjust further down the list, for the slippage I was getting with hand scoring.  But I will make some files for you – or you can use my instructions to make your own with any words you like – when I can.

Just to add the WIP link!

Rosette Wreath with word rosettes!

I finally got around to doing a YouTube doodah for the Word Rosettes.  I have seen various rosette wreaths on t’internet (Pinterest, probably) and thought the word rosettes might be nice for one of them, so I started one this morning.  After spending a diverting couple of hours with the lovely Julia, wandering around Hobby Craft and meeting having a coffee (where I clearly showed my lack of social skills and proved that I spend far too much time in my own company, as I prattled on about whatever was in my head and the poor woman barely got to speak) and where I collected from her the TH rosette die (so generous!) I had to shop and then cook – pulled pork BBQ and sour cream potato salad for dinner, yum, yum – and have still not managed to blog.  Tsk.  I figure I’d better share the progress as I have something ELSE I am keen to share for WOYWW day (and I seethe, still, as the LINE may be installed but they screwed up the order so the actual BROADBAND won’t be active for at least 5 days.  Ggrrrr! That leaves me struggling for another WOYWW session with the old system.  GGGRRRRR agan!)

So here we go.  I made a base from a ring of matboard and then printed this sheet of words.  It’s spaced so the cut strips can be added, wider spaces for the longer words and shorter ones for the small words.  All are 1 1/2 to 1 inch wide.

I left the sheets attached to the printer paper so I could score all the strips in one go, THEN peel them off the sheet to fold and collapse the rosettes.

I hoped the Merry Christmas on the red patterned paper would be clearer, and I may replace that with another one – so do test out your papers to make sure the words are clear enough for you!

Then I will attach them to the frame. Like so.

And just a close up so you can see a couple of them better:

Now I need to do 3 or 4 more to fill in the gaps, then tidy up and get the new project out.  And at some point I will carry one with my idea to fit the word strips to the TH rosette die, now I have it.  Oh there is nothing more frustrating than an idea delayed!  I missed about four crops in the last 8 weeks, at least two chances to get my mitts on that die, and it’s been making me crazy.  I feel certain it can be made to work – in fact someone commented on the YouTube show that same idea, so it’s not just me who thinks it’s a good one – but so much easier to deal with the die, the cuts themselves, and not just the measurements!

Bear with me while I play.

Christmas Rosettes – a card

I mentioned in my post about the word rosettes that I felt they would be best made using paper-weight rather than cardstock-weight paper. That was just my feeling, so I figured I should test it out and see.  At the same time, I thought I might edit the files to make Christmas words, given that I am getting loads of blog hits on Christmas stuff (in JULY!!) and if the interest is there, far be it from me to ignore it. I’ve done both HAPPY (more Europe and UK) and MERRY versions.

Here is the card I made.  I used some double-sided light cardstock weigh paper (Scenic Route, from a few years back) and it scored and folded well, and hold it’s shape perfectly.

How visible the text is is very dependant on the angle of view.

The same rules apply – no bigger than 1 1/2 inch strips lest the paper tear when you collapse it.  For A4 paper I could add another set of words, to lengthen it, but in order for the file to work for both A4 and US letter (which is shorter and wider than A4) and to give them the best chance of printing without printer border pre-sets affecting them, they are the size they are.  Why not have a go making your own strips?

Oh, and just to go back to the original post – I didn’t bother making any word-strip PDFs to print the around-the-edge version.  For that all you need to is repeat the words in a line, then rotate the text block so it prints lengthwise down the paper then cut the strip.  ANYONE can do that in any standard word processing package.  But if someone can’t do it and wants a set it would take 5 minutes to make one so speak up and I can do one.

Now I need to snap a shot of my messy desk and then tidy up – I have a project to work on that I have been thinking of for WEEKS, but just got the files I need this morning.  It may come to nothing, but it may end up very cool.

Sunday-right-here – Word Rosettes

Enough people commented yesterday that they liked these that I carried on playing and made a PDF of some useful greetings.

I’m going to assume you know how to score and accordion fold rosettes.  If not, there are loads of YouTube videos for that, mine is just one. I would suggest using thinner patterned PAPER and not cardstock – I think that will be too thick, but hey, give it a go and let me know if it works!  Also if someone has the TH rosette die and wants to see if this can be made to work with that, I’d love to know.  I think the scores are 1/4 in that but don’t know for sure.  I am pretty sure the longer words won’t work but will any of them?

I use the Martha Stewart Score Board. To make these I use the BLACK lines (1/4 inch spacing) and the PDF is designed to fit that.  But lots of things may affect your attempts.

I thought about adding this as a PSE file, but frankly I think that wouldn’t work.  For a start, if you don’t have these fonts installed they will all appear in whatever your default font is.  And each font I used is sized to fit and they are not all the same point size.  I must have printed 20 test sheets, and scored them, then made tiny adjustments to try to make sure the text fell as it should. See my “scooch” notations?

At the bottom of this post I’ll give you some guidance as to HOW I did it so you can make your own file if you don’t like my greeting and font choices!

• if your printer adds a margin the PDF of text might be shifted down slightly.

Solution: line up the first groove so it falls just at the top of the first word (a SMIDGE above) then carry on scoring.  It SHOULD match pretty closely.

• it still doesn’t match, you say? 

Solution: Try to use the thinnest stylus you can.  My thoughts on this are that we are dealing with tiny increments.  As the stylus pushes the paper down into the groove, in is imperceptibly shifting it a teeny amount.  20+ score lines and it adds up. If you are scoring a STRIP, and not the whole page at once, you can shift the paper left or right as need be so the score line falls where you need it to.  If you saw my decorative edged Rosettes thing on YouTube (well over 2 years ago) you will see IT DOES NOT MATTER if your lines are all 100% the same.  Once you flatten it out, a smidge this way or that won’t affect the look by much.

There is some flexibility in the width you cut your strips.  But, they must be between 1 inch and 1 1/2 inches.  If you make them wider than that, because the PDF is based on an A4 sheet of paper (but made to accommodate  US letter paper) the text strip is no longer than 11 inches.  If you cut it wider than 1 1/2 inches, the paper may tear as you flatten it.

In general, I keep the aligned edge of the words pretty close to the edge of the paper, leaving the empty area on the other side.  Especially for the longer ones, like ANNIVERSARY, it keeps most of the word visible once you form the rosette.

As I mentioned, you can score the entire sheet and then cut your strips and fold.  The you will have a stash of rosettes for when you need them.  If you want just one, copy the word strip into another file and print, or print once, cut strips from a number of papers, adhere them to the first print and print again so you have each set of words on different papers.

The other issue is the centers.  You will need to use something fairly small for all but the 1 1/2 inch strip, or the decoration will obscure the words.  See what I used for guidance.

At the back I add a circle of cardstock covered in adhesive – that plus the brad thru the middle holds them just fine.  A dollop of hot glue in the middle works too.

Here you can see the 1 1/2 inch, 1 1/4 inch and 1 inch rosettes:

I thought about trying to make a set to fit a strip edged with a scallop punch, but there are so many on the market, so many measurements of scallops, and life is too short!

How I did it, in case you want to make your own:

Easy Peasy. This is the program I use, and you can see how the words are arranged:

• Open a file in whatever you use for this sort of work.
• Trigger the GRID, making it .25 inches (1/4 inch)
• Type your text.  Make sure each word is centred within the grid lines top and bottom
• Leave a blank grid.  So Happy then a blank 1/4 inch, then Birthday. Repeat to fill the length of the paper.
• Select all the text and either CENTRE it or ALIGN RIGHT (or left, I suppose it doesn’t matter)
• Print the strip of words and make your first score line just over the text.  Then, as I say above, you SHOULD be able to score at 1/4 inch all along the strip.

There may be a bit of trial and error to the process (there was for me) but you’ll get there. I hope you have fun with this!

Word rosettes? worth the time?

Super quick today – I have been playing around with adding words to folded rosettes.  The thing is, it’s hard to get it precise, as in such tiny increments, the barest smidge of  difference in the scoring and folding gets magnified with each subsequent fold.  So I wonder is it REALLY worth the effort? What do you think?  Cool idea or a waste of time?

One with the word around the edge, one with the words along the folds:

The B&W one is just on printer paper – no point in wasting good paper if I didn’t like it LOL!  Actually, that one is the one I like best. Might look cute on a card.

Maybe I’ll play some more, maybe I’ll abandon it.  Who knows…..

Interesting multi-layer rosettes

I alluded to this the other day but a series of issues kept me from elaborating.  I had planned to do a little YouTube doodah for it but the version of iMovie I have on my machine is incompatible with the new OS.  I had loaded and marked the photos but when I tried to start iMovie my Mac crashed.  nd again. Then DH tried to start Security Spy (the camera system we have that lets us watch the house from afar) remotely and THAT crashed my Mac as well.  Somehow, in the process, the photos disappeared.  So I had to do the step-by-steps all over again.

It’s really more appropriate for a slideshow, as there are a LOT of photos, but I will try to compress the process as best I can while still including all the appropriate info and once I get the new iMovie version (or am brave enough to boot my machine from the other disk with the OLD OS) I will do a YT thingie.

So here is what they look like.  There are two ways to do this, depending on the weight of your paper/cardstock choices.

1. Using two cardstock weight papers:

Punch the edge of one of your choices.  It can be elaborate or simple.  Cut this at least 1/4 inch past the punched edge.  Cut a second strip at least 1/2 inch.

With WET adhesive, glue the punched strip to a sheet of thin paper (printer paper, so long as it is not too heavy, is fine) then glue the other strip up to the edge, butting it up against the first strip. Here you can see both sides.  The printer paper is short, and that is fine. It will make the overlap less bulky. LET IT DRY.

Score and accordion fold as you normally would for any rosette.

2.  Using one cardstock weight paper and one thin paper.

Punch the edge of the cardstock.  Apply your WET adhesive to the back of the thinner paper and stick it 1/4 inch past the punched edge, OVER the cardstock.

Trim the strip – on my sample the thinner paper is about 3/4 inch wide. Score and accordion fold as normal.

To assemble either version: add adhesive to the last fold.   Overlap and join.

Punch a circle from plain or contrasting paper and apply a bead of hot glue around the edge.  Keep the glue well away from the center!

You can either squish the rosette so the center is quite small, as is the usual way. Add any decorative element to the center – here a small flower and a brad:

OR you can do something a little different!  Punch a circle from a photo – I used the standard 1 inch punch.

Put something about the same size in the middle of your backing circle. Again, keep your bead of glue to the outer edge.

Slip your joined rosette over the tube and press into the hot glue.  Once it is stuck, you can slip the photo into place like this:

The tube (in this case a glue applicator that was just the right size) keeps the opening in the centre of the rosette wide. It adds to the overall width of the finished rosette, but not by much. I COULE have tried adding the photo to the centre first, but I didn’t fancy trying to keep the glue off it, or not marring it when I put the glue tube over it.  Maybe you are better at that than I am!

I have about 30 photos that explain the steps more visually so off to boot from the other disc.  Fingers crossed.

Enjoy, and Happy Friday!

 

WOYWW – rosettes with a difference

Hello WOYWWers! It’s been too long since I have been able to have a lay at my desk, with the festive season, the surprising snowfall, and DDs ice show hell-week (which coincided with the snow week as well) but I have had a chance finally to do SOMETHING crafty , other than paper globes for ornament gifts – they work perfectly to hang around a bottle of wine as a little something extra.

Anyway, I have also been playing with more rosettes – where did I read that they will be BIG (in popularity, not size!) in 2011, with many scrapbook manufacturers selling them as pre-made embellishments?  Can’t recall.  But as you know I’ve been making them by hand with just a scoreboard and paper trimmer for a while now and see no reason to switch.  But if they will become ubiquitous, then I want mine to stand out so ..

I’ve made them before adding a little line of Stickles to the center valley fold between each peak, but I wanted something NOT bling for a change (and despite how hard it is to admit, bling is NOT always appropriate! LOL!) so I have been sewing, a bit.  I just went round the rosette with a bit of spare embroidery floss, from the middle along the valley, around the edge back into the middle and carried on till I had lined each valley.

This floss was Marlett, so a bit shimmery.  I like it almost better with the standard matt floss

And then I got really crazy and ironed on some thin fuseable interfacing to the back and made a fabric one!  Now this I really like.  I think it could make the basis for a cute lapel pin.

I added a YouTube video for the process yesterday and you can see it here

I am starved for inspiration so am very much looking forward to seeing what everyone is doing.  I suspect it will take a while because I would love to find the time to go back 3 weeks to see the ones I missed! I can already see I missed Julia’s new decor over at WOYWW Ground Zero,  The Stamping Ground – I thought i was in the wrong place for a minute!

No desk shot as I am working on another project and it is chaos. I’m not going to be the one you look to and say “At least my desk isn’t THAT bad!” this week