Tuesday 5 March 2019

Bespoke envelopes for my Groovi cards!

Hello friends,

Just popping in because a little birdie alerted me to a comment on this post by Barbara Gray from Clarity.

Paul Church has worked out a great way of making envelopes out of the Clarity Designer Paper.  A lady had commented on Barbs blog post about Paul perhaps coming up with the maths, on how to make bespoke envelopes, for her cards.

Well, I have the answer for every single card you make.  I bought one of those Envelope Punch Boards a long long while ago for my class ladies, to make envelopes for their cards.  My husband, bless cotton socks, then made it so easy for us all, he wrote a computer program to work with it.  Yes, the board comes with some sizes but for one, it's just too hard to read and two, sometimes I want inches and sometimes I want centimetres and most of the time I want a very difficult size!

Here's a few pics on how it works:

You'll find my Crafty Envelope Punch Board Calculator here.

Measure your card and choose which Clarity Designer Paper you'd like to use (the one I chose for this card was from Shenandoah)  



Type into the software the card size - no need to add a bit (just type in the exact card size).  You can choose whether you want centimetres or inches!  The picture below shows that I've chosen Centimetres, you can see I've added my dimensions.  The paper size and first score line comes up automatically (as if by magic)!



I cut my paper to exactly 19.4 x 19.4 cm and lined it up at 9.7 cm on the board.....



This next picture shows that I've scored the line (I also punched the top notch)....




This next picture shows that there is no need to measure again, all you do is turn the paper, the pointer on the notch punch bit, points at the line you've just embossed.  Punch and score again.....


This next picture shows all the score lines done and notches cut out......



When you've folded the score lines to make the envelope, you can make a neat little rounded corner by placing the part you want to be the closing flap, into the corner rounder tool on the board!


All that is left to do is to stick the sides down for a perfect envelope!


The finished envelope.....


So it's as easy at that!  These Envelope Punch boards can be picked up very reasonably from most crafty outlets!  My calculator is free to use, no spam, no adverts, just there for anyone to use!

Happy crafting and envelope making!

Carole xx











Friday 30 November 2018

Parchment Groovi Lace Frame & Cameo Lessons

Thank for checking out my post today.

I'm pretty excited about this frame I made for a pattern I saw on the internet, for a Parchment craft lace border.

I'm not one to take lots of time on borders like these but I thought this one might be quick and felt if I were to try and make one of my frames for lacy borders like this, this simple design might just be a good place to start!


I made another card out of the middle which was cut out.....


Here they both are side by side.....


I still teach the occasional one to one Silhouette Cameo lesson.  If you'd like to learn how to make frames like this or how to get the best use for your style of crafting, out of your Silhouette Cameo machine, my details are on the right of your screen, email me if you're interested  ;-)!

Hope you've enjoyed looking at my cards today.

Happy crafting.

Carole x


Thursday 2 August 2018

Groovi Zig-Zag Border 2 & Tina's Rosie Doodle plates

Hello Friends,

I'm back today with another Zig-Zag card for you to see.

I've been making frames for my class ladies for some time now and usually as soon as one class has finished, I'm on to designing the next frames, using different Groovi Plates for the next class.  Not this time though, I'm really enjoying working with my Zig-Zag frames.  It took me ages to get the measurements correct, so I might as well utilise the Silhouette file I created, as much as I can!

That's the beauty of making cards with my Silhouette, with the features available within the software to use, I can just keep on designing, all I have to remember for these designs though, is that I can't resize those zig-zags!

One of the main ideas behind my frames was to cut down on the amount of snipping that has to be done to make a card.  To me, so long as I'm using great card stock, I think they finish a Parchment card off neater than snipping round the edge sometimes.  With that said though, this time I thought it's time for a bit of snipping, after all it is one of the main components of Parchment Craft.  

For my card today, I pricked around the edge of one of the frames that I'd made (see my last post) and then went back to my trusty Silhouette to make a Zig-Zag card mat!  So easy when you know how ;)!

The parchment is attached to this card by just that tiny bit of thread on the button, in the centre of the butterfly.




The Groovi plates I used were;

I hope you like how I've used my Groovi Plates today.

Happy crafting.

Carole x


Saturday 28 July 2018

Groovi Zig-Zag border plate

Hello friends,

Over the last year or so I've been designing bespoke frames using my Silhouette software to make parchment craft easier for myself and ladies attending my classes.

The launch of the Groovi® parchment craft system by Clarity, was fabulous, it enabled thousands of people to start parching (some again, like myself) and me to go back to teaching the craft.  What I found though was that ladies who attended my card class wanted quick cards, just like myself actually and many of them were not wanting to spend their time snipping out intricate edges.

I'm still someone who aims to make a card neat - in fact that is my main aim.  I also like to use what I consider to be the nicest products, card stock to me is especially important.

I really do enjoy parchment craft using the Groovi® system, especially now I've teamed it up with my knowledge of the software for my Silhouette Cameo machine.  The more frames I've made the more adventurous they have become, I suppose you could say.

It was this latest batch of frames that I designed, that got me thinking I really ought to blog about them.  I wanted to share with you how you can utilise your electronic die cutting machine to cut out frames.  Not only will you find they are great for parchment craft but I'm sure they will work well with rubber stamping and other paper crafting techniques too.





I designed these frames around using this border plate from Clarity.

Email me if you have any questions.

Thanks for stopping by to see my creations.

Happy crafting.

Carole x














Tuesday 5 December 2017

Groovi Parchment Craft Christmas cards - with Silhouette!

Hello friends,

I've been mixing my stash of designer papers, stamps, inks, Groovi plates, dies and of course my Silhouette Cameo to make a few Christmas cards.  These were made by the ladies who came to my Groovi classes during November.

I wanted to share how to use large ball tools and shader tools to white emboss on Parchment for a larger area and I also wanted to show my students how to change up their Groovi nested plates a little, using these techniques we made this card....



Can you see how we used a few dots to break up the lines on the Groovi nested circle, I was really pleased to come up with that one, I hadn't seen it before.  We used Pergamano pencils to colour in the bits that are coloured, blended the colouring with a tiny amount of alcohol and then very gently embossed the body and face of the snowman.  I'd still rather not use brads on parchment, so like usual, I made a frame to fit perfectly, on my Silhouette Cameo.


After photographing the card I thought it needed a little something extra so I produced a matching rim, again using my Silhouette machine.

The next technique I wanted to share was how to make beautiful coloured parchment papers similar to the Clarity ones.  I love the Clarity ones, I think all the ladies I teach here own them, but I really wanted to try and make my own, choosing the colours that I like....


I die cut the parchment using a dotted frame die, on the back we dabbed (with a sponge) Brushos mixed with alcohol, it was great fun.  We stuck the star die cut on the the front and hid Perga glue behind the bits on there to attach the parchment to the background mat and card.  Again not a brad in sight, just carefully dotted glue ;)!

Our final card was actually more about the envelope than the card, to be honest.  I found a great envelope made by someone on Pinterest and thought it would be a fabulous parchment project.  I made one in parchment but it wasn't great (I wasn't careful enough with the scoring so the parchment tore a little bit in places), I showed my students and we decided to go with making a paper one in class, they then had the option of making a parchment one at home.



The card is very simple!  There are actually two different ways of folding the envelope for two different effects, you'll work that out if you make one!

I hope I've inspired you to change up those nested Groovi plates and try a little something new with your parchment craft.

Happy crafting.

Carole x