Looking down

While looking up can give you some wonderful, lofty views, looking down is a study of texture and subtle patterns.

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Like the quirky abstract shapes of roots making their way up between rocks, moss and a carpet of fallen pine needles...

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...or the swirly pattern of pine needles left behind after the last mini flood...
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...or the tiny grains of sand lodged in the crevasses of an old weather-worn piece of wood from the paths along the beach.

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Details. I love the little details. They are everywhere.

We just have to look with the right eyes.

Looking up

Made by Eva, her camera and the wind.

Autumn is my favourite season to photograph, and I know I'm not alone in that. Baneheia is still fairly green, but the yellows are making their way in. Soon the oranges and reds will take over... Looking forward to more walks!

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No Photoshopping other than the watermark.

Quadruple challenge K&Co card

I'm easing into the card making habit again, having been distracted by illness and a new long-term project (see previous post). So, just a nice and easy card today, made with the gorgeous K&Co Classic K McKenna paper pad my good friend Krissie bought me! Thank you sooo much sweetie! There's nothing like fresh new pattern paper... I'll be having a go at the Wild Asparagus pad next. ;)
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I've managed to qualify for a few challenges: Secret Crafter and Creative Card Crew are both asking for celebration cards. Crafty Creations asks for cards with one or more pale colour, and I think there are pale colours in the pattern papers, and then there are the pale pink rose buds. Lastly, I suddenly realised that this card deserves to be entered to the Pile it On 3D challenge, as the felt flower and the roses make this card so thick that it almost doesn't fit in the envelope! *lol*

Sneak peek

Here's a little sneak peek into one of the reasons why this little blog has had a bit of a down-period lately. I've gone mad (blame it on the fever) and started a project I hope to share throughout December. *ahem* Let me clarify: I hope to share it throughout this December. Knowing myself and considering the scope of this project, there is a real chance it will rather be next December... Wish me luck.

Blog candy

Just a quick post to share some blog candy that's popping up here and there! I haven't got any cards or knitting projects (or anything else really) to share yet, you'll have to settle for these. I might get something done as soon as my fever breaks. ;)

The amazing Bev has a gorgeous christmas themed candy going on right now! And she's closing it today as there are two more coming this weekend. How generous! :)

Anne's blog is quite new, like mine, and she's giving away lots of charms to celebrate her 6 month blogoversary. You know how much I love charms!! :P

Violet has a sweet little candy with some lovely ricrac ribbon and more!

There's another christmas themed candy over at Lisa's blog!

Agustina is giving away a candy with lots and lots of flowers, and some Argentinian treats I'd love to get my hands on... :P

Kristine has a huge candy on her blog, full of amazing goodies that has me drooling on my keyboard! ;)

And if that's not enough, Bec is also giving away a tremendous amount of stuff. Me like. ;)

Showing off

I love reading One Pretty Thing - every time I find something that inspires me and adds a project or two to my already-much-too-long project list. *lol* But imagine my surprise when I checked out their Gifts for Guys part one for some christmas gift ideas... Right there, the very first link on the list, is my own denim wrench casing! Wow! :D I made it for my dad one christmas from a couple of worn-out jeans and posted it on Cut Out + Keep last year. (Mental note: figure out why my web browser, for some strange reason, doesn't let me near CO+K these days.)

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I'm quite proud to be featured on a web site I read regularly myself and draw much inspiration from. :) I will easily admit that this discovery made my day! :D

Gift card folders

Hi, remember me? I'm finally back! And this time even with something paper related. ;)

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These are gift card holders I make for the owner of the beauty salon where I sell cards. She gives them to people who buy large gift cards, as a special service to good customers. In line with her request, I've kept them very plain and simple to keep the price down. Besides the cardstock and tape, the only matierial spent is a bit of embossing powder. All other embellishment is done with my cheapest pattern papers, border punches, stamps and embossing folders. Simple layouts, nothing exciting, I just go with whatever size the leftover pieces have. No wonder I whipped up ten of these in a couple of hours last night. :)

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Maybe now, with these folders done, I'll find the inspiration to make a few regular cards? I certainly feel a weight lifted from my shoulders now that I finally got around to making these.

Wednesday evening bokeh

Autumn is here for sure:

the green houses are once again lit at night.

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The warm orange glow is a welcome sight in my living room window
and brings a flare of warm light when the rest of the world is cold and grey.

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The leaves are turning yellow and red by the day now
and my winter duvet is coming out this weekend.

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Autumn is here for sure.

Olaug 70 years

I've used my DCWV Old World and Latte stacks again - they seem to complement each other nicely. I've inked all the edges, and the green mats were curled before inking to create a more distressed look.

The yarn I used for the flower and "ball of yarn with knitting needles" was originally white, so I doused it all with several layers of Glimmermist. First a light spray of Meadow Green, then lots and lots of Old Lace, topped off with a little bit of my own mix of water and Perfect Pearls Copper powder pigments. Doesn't look too bad!
I'm entering this card to a couple of challenges: Everybody Art for the "shabby" look, and Papertake Weekly for "faking" a ball of yarn and knitting needles.
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Olaug is an avid knitter and I tried to encorporate something of that into the card. Easier said than done - I couldn't find a single stamp, charm or other embellishment to fit! Is that possible? I'm sure there are lots of paper crafters out there who also picks up needles and yarn now and then - like me. Surely that's a gap someone can fill? ;) My first solution was to crochet a flower using this recipe (but counted wrong and got six petals instead of five). And today I stumbled upon the most perfect addition, purely by coincidence! The Craft Magazine blog has a tutorial for making an embellishment in the form of a ball of yarn with knitting needles. How's that for timing! *lol* I didn't have any round toothpicks, so I attacked the ones I had with a craft knife. Love the look of this, and will definitely use this trick to decorate the labels next time I sell or give a knitted gift.

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ETA: the pictures of this post went completely haywire... *Editing like crazy to make them behave*

Candy alerts!

Just a quick note - check out my side bar for some blog candy! I've added a few links recently but haven't had the time to write a proper post for them, sorry. Will be back later today with a card if I can find the time to finish it before I go to work. All work and no play... you know how it is sometimes. *sigh*

Jeanie - all done! (picture&text heavy)

Here she is, all done!

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The pictures show the dramatic change from the pre-blocking photos in my previous post. The pattern is emphasized and brought out with great clarity. Love it! I'm pleased the blocking worked so well, especially since I had no idea how effective it would be. It's a striking difference!

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And in case you are wondering - yes, those are reversible cables! They look exactly the same on both sides! Oh joy divine. :) Those of you who have knitted cables know how ugly they usually look on the wrong side. This concept of a cable that looked identical on both sides seemed a little like magic to me. (In fact, it's really just a little bit of 1x1 rib, so what looks like a C4B is actually a C8BR.) A shawl is the perfect project for a reversible cable, as it (unlike, for instance, a sweather) doesn't really have an inside that can be hidden from sight.

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I was a little bit terrified to start this project, but it turned out so much easier than I had feared! There were a whole bunch of things I've never done before, and some techniques I hadn't even heard of. Knitting from a chart was a little bit scary, not to mention doing three charts at the same time... Temporary cast on, cables on extra needles, reversible cables, drop stitches, cable cast-off, grafting, blocking, the list goes on. I can't imagine what I would have done without all the lovely people out there in the online knitting community, who have spent their time doing all sorts of great tutorials and posting them for us lesser beings to learn from. Thank you all!

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The charts looked complicated and I figured I'd be slaving over them during the entire knitting process. Much to my surprise I tossed the charts before I had even done two repeats! The logic and rythm of the pattern was as clear as day. And from there on it was a breeze. Even after 170cm of knitting I wasn't tired of it at all - I could probably have kept on knitting for another meter before getting bored. Had I known how much she would stretch I would have stopped knitting much earlier though. All good things must come to an end, and the cables running along the sides were (with a great deal of concentration) continued along the cast-off edge and the temporary cast-on edge and grafted together. And I have to say that dropping those 10 metres of stitches at the end was exciting, if a little terrifying. ;)

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To match this very long post, a little picture to give you an idea of how insanely long this shawl turned out to be:

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Could look nice with a long formal dress perhaps?

The humble beginning - The tricky cable cast-off - Nearly done - Jeanie shawl pattern

Nearly done! (picture heavy)

You've seen her before, in her humble beginning and in the tricky cast-off-cable stage: it's Jeanie! Having finally grafted the four cables to each other and weaved in all the ends, it's time for the finishing touch...

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So this was my starting point. A long, thin strip of knitware... You can see the shawl widening in the ends, because the cable running around the edge shouldn't stretch as much as the rest when blocked, so in its unblocked state it looks too big. At this point she measures about 50 cm by 180 cm - I forgot to write down the measurements, of course, but I think that's just about right.

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She's not looking too bad, I'm really quite proud of myself! But the pattern doesn't show well when she's draped around my shoulders. And there was that stretching effect on the short sides I mentioned earlier. So it was time for yet another thing I've never done before: blocking!
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Soaking...

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Getting started...
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After 50 minutes, 122 pins and one sore back, there she is! I know, I know, the edges are hardly straight... I went back and adjusted some of the pins after taking the picture. Bear with me, it was my first time doing anything like this. In this stage she measures 70cm by 270cm! Oh wow, she stretched much more lenghtwise than what I had expected. She'd better shrink down a bit that way when dry... I was hoping to make her wider, but couldn't stretch her more without bending the pins or worrying about damaging the yarn.
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In her stretched state the pattern is extremely visible! Pictures of her all done and gorgeous (hopefully) are due in a day or two, for now she has to rest and dry completely. We'll be back. ;)

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(ETA: here she is, all done!)

Tone and Knut

My mojo has gone walkabout... But I had to get this done, so there it is. It didn't turn out too bad in the end, but I'm happy I threw away my pathetic first attempt last night. ;)

DCWV Old World and Latte Stacks, Bazzill and Core'dinations Vintage and Whitewash cardstock. Stickles details on stamp and flowers, QK Phoebe Skinnimini alphabet, charms from Kort og Godt. EK Success border punch (one of my far too many purchases last weekend).

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I gave up trying to follow a sketch, but still managed to work in a few other challenges. Crafty Creations asks for embossing, and I've done both dry and heat embossing here.

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Stamp Something asks us to use our favourite embellishments. That's a tough challenge for me, because I have so much trouble choosing favourites! The mulberry flowers from Papirloftet and the roses are some of my latest favourites among the paper embellishments. I just love charms and try to work in at least one or two on every card, so that's a favourite too... ;) I guess this isn't really an embellishment, but the sentiment on the inside of the card is from my absolute favourite sentiment stamp series from Penny Black. Love these.

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Last but not least there's the ABC challenge, where D is for Diecuts. Recently I noticed that I frequently got some nice looking frames left over when using my nesties and have started keeping them for other cards or using them on the inside, like here. I'm really stingy about my Core'dinations cardstock, so every tiny piece that can be used will be used. *lol*

New direction

I've managed to do one of the much dreaded man-cards... And it turned out quite unlike what I had planned - as usual. ;) The card is big - 15cm x 21cm!
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This is for a colleague who's leaving for a new job. We're sad to see him go! As his life is taking a different direction, I had an initial idea using road signs, but it morphed into arrows and a compass rose. The stamp has a nice sentiment but I added the "Good luck on the way forward" in QK Moxie letters because I felt it needed a bit more. All the letters were a great way to fill the space too... *lol*
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Saturday was the day for shopping! And there are a few new things used on this card: The compass rose stamp, the ribbon punch, one of the ribbons - and last but not least the "Good times" rub-on. Having been disappointed with some of the rub-ons I've bought recently, these were a wonderful surprise. Really good quality! They came from a Rub-On Swatch Book from Art Warehouse. I'll definitely buy more of these if I get the chance! :)
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I've managed to get a few challenges into this card. Allsorts are asking for something for the boys. That fits nicely with Everybody Art and Creative Inspirations, who are both asking for blue and brown cards.

Weronica 31 years

This is a relatively free interpretation of the latest sketch at Sketch and Stash. I'm almost not sure I can enter it, but hey, I have no shame and will do it anyway. ;) I grabbed the BG and Kaiser Craft papers I had lying on my desk already and substituted a light green Bazzill cardstock for the pink I used on the last card. One of my new border punches (small and cheap) got a taste of paper for the first time! Oh I'm in love with border punches already. Must - have - more. The flower came from a packet of flowers I've had lying in a drawer for a while and not used... Just removed the cheezy plastic center and used a large shiny brad in stead. I've doodled a bit along the right edge, but it's hardly visible (neither in the photo nor IRL...!).

Used some scraps to decorate a glass jar I had lying around and filled it with as many home made Turtle Bars as I could, to make a quick and simple gift to go with the card.