Holiday Time!! Yippieee!!!

Hello Everyone,

I know I have again started taking long pauses from posting on blog but that doesn't mean that I am not creating..I am still crafting and certainly wish to share too but last few weeks have been really really hectic and I have been neck deep in workshops, exhibitions and preparing for my upcoming holidays for which I had already planned ages ago....

On the work front, things are going great with me creating lots of things such as cards, quilling my logo, more shadow boxes and workshops...(Don't worry, will be sharing each one of the creations here for sure!!) :) :)

On the life front, I am all geared up for the holiday season which has certainly begun for me starting Today! so yeah folks, I am on a holiday from today to Nov. 20th with exception of one week - last week of october..In that week I will try to post as much as possible about all the things I have finished so far..

To my workshop students - I will always be in touch through emails..In case you have any problems/ issues/ queries, please feel free to email me anytime. I will definitely reply within 24 hours (only if i am in a place with no internet that my reply will be delayed..in that case I will reply as soon as I get in internet zone).
Just in case you need my emails here they are - justlovecraftsblog@gmail.com, priyankagupta87@gmail.com.

To all my crafty/ bloggy friends - I will be back sooner than I have gone and will be sharing the crafty love once again..

Time to Yippieee now...Yay!! Yay!! Holiday!!!

:D :D :D

Love all,
Just Love Crafts xx

Self framed shadow box for Quilling - 3

Dear All,

I have promised you that I will be posting regarding my shadow boxes which I have framed myself and which hold my precious quilling designs. However, I am keeping busy with a number of things these days and blogging has become a luxury. But finally before this month ends, I would like to display another one of my shadow boxes.

This box is displaying my mini cherry blossom creation and one of the best that turned out to be. Have a look-

I have used a shimmery navy blue thick construction paper to make the shadow box and a contrast light pink paper for the frame border. With the lovely flowers inside, I could not figure out how to decorate the frame and it took me endless ideas to finally come up with the butterflies.. my weird color combination was not making it look better in any way :P
So finally I added some butterflies I had in my stash for 1.5 years now.

A close up of the design inside.
and one final look of the shadow box-

Please do leave your precious comments to let me know how did you find this work.

Thanks a lot.
Love all,
Just Love Crafts xx

Quilled Miniature Wedding Cakes

Hello All,

These days I am lined with the humongous task of making my 'Inventory List' of all the craft things I possess, just to have an idea of what all I already have before making a purchase and it is soooo tiring!! Believe me!! Noting down every teeny weeny thing I possess is freaking me out a bit..So I decided to unwind and this is what I came up with...part experimenting..part utilizing stuff in stash...

So I had a couple of 5 mm Quilling strips pre cut packs lying with me.. Since I mainly use 3 mm shredded quilling strips for all my general quilling, I have been toying with soo many ideas to use these strips and finally came up with these-

Quilled Miniature Wedding Cakes-

I made 4 in total using almost 200 strips. The bases were easily done.. Decorating them differently was a challenge though...

That's a blueberry flavored icing cake with glazed and plain cherries. A fondant red heart on the top makes it perfect :)

This is one is my favorite and the first of the lot. I simply loved the buttery hues of this cake and the shaded pink roses seemed just perfect for it. With the added pearls, I simply adore this little one :)

With different shades of red and maroon icing, this cake is the brightest of all and I have covered half side with white roses and half with pearl and rhinestone embellishment to give it a vintagy yet fancy look at the same time.

This cake was a little out of the box. May not look like a traditional wedding cake (sans the tiers) but I nevertheless enjoyed making this one as well.

I have included a steel ruler to give an estimate of the sizes of the cakes. The box in which I have kept these cakes is little over than 3" tall and the cakes are somewhere between 3 cm and 4 cm.

I had a fab time making those. Please do let me know if you like them and if you have any suggestions/ comments to help me improve my work, then I would certainly love to hear them. 

Thanks for dropping by.

Just Love Crafts xx

Tricolor Quilled card *UPDATED*

Hello Everyone,

This morning I posted another self framed shadow frame in the series and here is my second post in the row. 
This card is totally inspired by Itsy Bitsy's tricolor challenge. I have been thinking about making it since the moment I saw the challenge..which was about 10 days back but look at the odds of me participating in this challenge. I am entering my card just when its 2 hours to the deadline...:P :P

No No, I am not feeling proud about it..Just the last moment habit has seem to stuck and it will just not go.. Sigh!!
Have a look-

Do let me know how this card is. Though I am totally thrilled about the interesting and of course much patriotic challenge, but more than the challenge it was the theme that really pushed me to make this card. I somehow wanted to quill something in Indian Flag Tricolor combo but never really got a chance to do so. Even though Independence Day is long gone, I didn't want to lose a chance to make something that connects me to my beautiful country.
I am so glad and kind of satisfied that Itsy Bitsy came up with this challenge.

So, I have used Only and Only the 'tricolor' colors to make this card and I am glad the way its turned out.

Linking up to Itsy Bitsy Challenge here.

Details of materials used - 
This card is completely made of paper apart from the little ribbon which is a piece of a satin ribbon I had recycled. (From an old Indian Rakhi)
All the paper I have used for this creation is from the collection I bought from India when I moved to Singapore (Yes!! I did carry my paper collection here :P)

*UPDATE* - Yayyy!! We won!!! This card has been selected as one of the winners of this challenge!! So happyyyyy!!!! :D :D

Thanks for dropping by.
Just Love Crafts xx

Self Framed Shadow Box for Quilling - 2

Hello,

I hope you all remember my previous post about the framed shadow box for your precious quilled creations. For those who haven't seen it so far, you can find it here.

This is the second one in series I have prepared and is smaller than the other versions. 
Here it is - 

I have used an A4 size sheet to make the shadow box. The reason it appears smaller than the others is that the width of this frame is more than the other boxes I have made and is perfect to hold a pretty 3-D petal quilled flower.

The 'frame' is made up using a polka dot patterned paper from Primary Basics scrapbook paper collection.

I have added a little punched daisy flower made from a daisy craft punch with a rhinestone for that teeny weeney hint of bling (I seem to love a blingy effect on my creations! :P).

Here is a close up of my quilled flower. You can see a hint of bling here too :P. The flower has protected it well enough by the faux glass frame made from an acrylic sheet (OHP) and the patterned paper.
Simple and Effective??

Hope you like it. I will be uploading more shadow box frame designs with quilling inside. Keep checking the blog.

Linking it to the following challenges - 
1. Do More with Less 
2. Lulupu - The craft Lounge
Thanks all,
Just Love Crafts xx

A Very Special project - Framed Card for a Wedding!!

Dear All,

I am really excited to show you this very very special project of mine. How is this special? Well, there are a number of reasons for that. 
Firstly, it was my very first commissioned order in Singapore. 
Secondly, This is the first time I made something like this. 
Thirdly, I had a total of 24 hours, that is one day to make this (including designing, framing, delivering.... everything). 
And finally I was actually successful in it as my client was very very happy which is what that made the whole process worthwhile. :)

Here it is, my first project of its kind-

Framed Final Version

It is an A4 size framed card to be gifted on a wedding. I was not sure if I will be able to manage everything in one day but I am glad it worked out as it has really given me that extra dose of confidence that I know I can accept a challenge like this again as well.

Unframed Version

It was very difficult to picture the framed version in the normal circumstances and even the unframed version couldn't be captured properly due to the shimmer of the background paper. But I was totally in love with this project and took loads of pictures. Of course can't put all, so here are a few more :) :) :)-

Wedding Rings

 My client wanted Doves, heart, rings, wine red and purple color and the messages to be written in both English and German so it gave me a fair idea of what all 'has' to be there. Now the task was to set up everything neatly and in a way that none of the component gets overshadowed by another.

Heart to be the main focal point and should be between the doves

 They wanted the word 'Jaaaaa!' in the heart. :)

The border

I did the borders at the very last moment. I was damn unsatisfied that being a wedding gift it got to be special and nice and nothing was clicking. Finally, during my brief sleep spell something clicked and I made the border as soon as I got up. (Subconscious mind does help!! :P)

Niki- The Groom

Our very handsome groom :)

Nora- The Bride

Pretty pretty bride with a beautiful necklace.

One last shot

This was taken a minute before it went to its new owner. I was kinda sad as I knew I might not see it again. It flew to Germany the very same night. The 24 hours I spent making were certainly stressful, not because I could not make it, but because I wanted to make them perfect. 

However, I do realise that perfection is not easily achieved and it does have its share of flaws but the happiness I saw on the faces who took this away was more than perfect and that just made this perfect.

P.S -Though I am the maker of this entire project, I wish to express my thanks to all my amazing contemporary crafter friends who have always shared their awesome creations inspiring each other in more than one ways. Thank you all very much :)

Lots of love :)

Just Love Crafts xx

Make you own Ink Blending Tool Tutorial!!

Hello Everyone,

We all love distress inks and the beautiful results we get due to its blending properties. It is totally worth to buy the vibrant shades of distress ink or any water based inks as their usage is multiple. However, in order to get those beautifully blended shades, we need to buy those expensive ink-blending tools as well. More the number of inks, more the number of replacement pads you need. And well! technically its just extra expenditure...(Not that they are bad, just plainly expensive!!) 

I had seen the ink blending tool and I am sure all those who have seen it must have noticed that it is not a very complicated or complex tool. In fact it is made of a very simple phenomenon. And so I decided to do a bit of research as to what options can we have to make this tool without spending a good deal of money on it.

So I went to ask my best friend, i.e Google (world's best friend :P) and spent a couple of hours researching about the options. There are many many ways and methods of making your own ink blending tools spread over youtube, websites, blogs etc however, after much experimenting with different mediums I have discovered the most comfortable, easy and extremely cheap method of making your own ink blending tools. 

Here is how I started-

Material required - 
Cosmetic sponge (Any shape or size) - Available at any shop selling cosmetic/ toiletries
Foam tape
Scissors
In order to stick the cosmetic sponge and to make the 'handle' of the tool, you can experiment with things lying around the house, such as old nail polish bottles with a wide base, An old fashioned stamp, Kid's playing wooden blocks etc.
Distress Ink or any water based ink

Method-
To start with, I have used wooden blocks as 'handle' of my ink blending tool as I found them here very cheap. They were found in the DIY section and are used to make toys. For $2 I got about 20 blocks but you can use anything.

Since my cosmetic foam sponge is bigger in size I cut it into half.

Take the foam tape and cover one side of the block fully.

Stick the piece of the cosmetic foam on the tape side and trim of the excess using a pair of scissors.

Make as many as you like. One sponge gave me 2 parts so I made 2.

Thats it!!
Your ink blending tool is ready..Now its time to play around a bit. I made 2 scrap portions of white card into tags using this very tool and distress ink and thats how they came out to be-

(Sorry about the bad quality pictures. My hubby had taken the digicam with him and I did not want to wait another time to make this tutorial so just took pictures using my phone..:P)

Well, I am totally new at distressing/ ink blending and my results are far from perfect. But it served my purpose and I am very happy about it.

Hope it helps you too. :)

Please do let me know what you think about this tutorial. Your comments are always appreciated. :) :)

Much Love,
Just Love Crafts xx

Framed Shadow box - Do it Yourself Quilled frames!! Part 1

Hello Everyone,

We all love to do quilling or to make a dimensional project but only after it has finished that we realise that we gotta protect it from getting dusty or faded and worst..crushed. 
Traditional picture frames can protect our beloved memories in form of pictures but cannot unfortunately accommodate the dimension caused by quilling. And the custom made frames are just so expensive that it isn't feasible on the pocket.

After a lot of thinking and getting inspiration from our contemporary crafters and quillers I have come up with the idea of making your own shadow boxes and then 'framing' it in your own crafty way. 

We all are well acquainted with the frame/shadow box template Inna has shared with us all in her blog. For those who haven't seen, they can see it here. It is this very template that I have modified to suit my purpose of having a shadow box. I used A4 size sheets I had for quite some time which were too thick to be shredded into quilling strips and made these shadow boxes I knew I wanted to do quilling in.

I made square boxes with the help of scorpal and each side is about half inch wide. I have also attached a square piece of handmade paper at the base to prepare a nice background for my quilling. I have made about 7 of them and I will be displaying each one in a separate post as each of them is very special with their own special story. :)

Making Frames- This is the part where you need to use your creativity. In order to make the frame, we need to use something such as thin acrylic sheet or an OHP sheet which will serve as the 'glass' of the frame protecting our creation underneath it and of course a boundary holding our faux 'glass'. Something like this-

It might not be clearly visible here but if you open the image and zoom you can certainly see the thin acrylic sheet I have used along with the paper frames.
Now I know that these paper frames are looking bland like this, so yeah, put your crafting skills to use and apart from decorating the interior of the frame you now get to decorate the exterior of the frame as well. 
I made a shadow box with quilling inside and decorated the exterior as well sans quilling. have a look-

 Step 1 - A simple shadow box with quilling which I would like to frame and protect.

 Step 2 - I made a simple frame, with acrylic sheet and decorated the frame with simple embellishments and twine only because I was not liking the plain bland look. At the same time I have tried that the decoration shouldn't be overpowering your design on the inside as that is what you really wish to show off.

Step 3 - I used a simple tape runner adhesive at the back of the frame to stick it to the front of my shadow box and Voila! we have a framed shadow box with quilling.

Wont't it make a beautiful gift to anyone? It is light as a feather and hence proves perfect to be put on walls or fridge with some magnets attached behind. Just use your creativity.

I have already thanked Inna for her tutorial for shadow box. I would also like to thank Pritesh as the idea clicked when I saw her dustproof boxes. You can find her dustproof box tutorial here.

Well, this is just one box, but I have made 5-6 more. Please keep checking as I will be uploading more soon along with more ideas to make the border of the frame and also decorate it.

Once again, don't forget to let me know your precious comments about this creation.

Love all 
Just Love Crafts xx

Quilling Shape Beginner's Chart

Hello everyone,

Ever since I began taking workshops in Singapore,I had a hard time explaining and making basic shapes and I did not want to waste time making them also every time. So I came up with an extremely simple yet effective chart for basic quilling shapes. I know its not comprehensive but it was all I could fit on an A-4 size sheet. Here it is - 

I enjoyed making its border a lott...It took my one friday evening and little bit of Saturday morning to finish the border and it took about 140 coils.

I framed this chart in an A4 size frame almost immediately so that I can show it to my students every time without it getting damaged..we all know how fragile quilling can be.. :)

Please do let me know how it is. Your comments are always appreciated :))

Thank you all.
Just Love Crafts xx

Candy Land card!

Hello All,

I made this card just like that. I somewhat wanted to make something which looks like candies and when I assembled the whole card it gave me a feel of a candyland. Lol!!
So here it is-

This card gives such a sunny, cheerful look that I made it apparent in the sentiment. The sentiment is hand written. The 'candies' are quilled circles of various shades.

The other supplies used for this card are patterned papers from assorted collections and a valentine theme twine from doodlebug.
Some more pics-

Do lemme know if you like my candy card or not..:D

Thank you all!
Just Love Crafts xx

Another two tone card!!

Hello everyone,


Presenting another two tone card after the first one in shades of pink n purple..I have tried a bolder combination this time...here it goes...

I am enjoying making two-tone cards a lot, however thinking of a generic color theme which will go with my kind of designing takes a bit of experimentation for me..but guess its just me..

I feel this card will go well for both genders...kinda 'HOT' combination...:D
Do tell me your views about this card.... :) :)
Just Love Crafts xx

My first Beehive card for a first anniversary...:)

Heya all,


I was never confident of trying Beehive technique as such before for one project..I used to try making swirls with some leftover strips to get a knack of it..but this is my first project using this technique as such...Of course all thanks to Susan and Pritesh for inventing and promoting this technique...:) :)


Well, I wanted to make a card by incorporating quilling technique at the same time make it for the 'first' anniversary event...so I decided on making a big number '1' as the main motif on the card and simply added some patterned paper, ribbon and sentiment to it.

The beehive swirls I have pasted here are the ones I made during my practice and hence the assortment of colors and neatness in swirls.. :P
I tried to incorporate my friend's favorite color as the main backdrop and hence the purple color background, but plain purple was looking very odd, so to spice up the whole thing, I added a piece of gingham red pattern paper..

 I am not sure how it has come out...yet to hear from my friend as she hasn't received it so far...

But please do let me know your comments/ views about the card...it helps me to improve :)


Loads of love..
Just Love Crafts xx

A flowery card

Hello,


This card was made for my hubby's colleague and friend of mine :). I asked her, her favorite colors and she told me - hot pink and cyan.
Both the colors are bright and cheery and I had to figure out a way to make both the colors stand out..this is what I came up with..

I know the stem is a little offset :( :(
Its a result of my impatience with my creations..but I loved the look of daisies.

The flowers look nice but I am really not liking the stem.. :(

please do let me know your views about the card.. It will help me do better :)
Love all
Just Love Crafts xx