Each Passing Year is Another Journey Travelled

Hi everyone, hope all of you is enjoying the week so far.

I'll be flying back to Indonesia on Thursday evening as it's Eid ul-Fitr (which translates to lots and lots of yummy food for the whole weekend, wooohooo!!!), so I thought I'd publish another post tonight.

Today's card is a card for my brother in law's birthday, which falls sometime this week--I've already mailed out this card a couple of days ago but I'm quite certain that's it's gonna reach him late! Oooopsss, my bad!

Anyway, here's the card using Card Pattern's Sketch 80. Not sure that the pattern is 100% as sketched, as it turned out that the bicycle image was too wide for a rectangular card T_T.



My brother in law loves cycling, so choosing the bicycle image as the topper was not a hard choice :). I created this bike silhouette digistamp from an image from Modish at SXC.



The cardstock and patterned paper I used were SEI's Oasis range; it's definitely one of my favorites although I think they might have discontinued this range :(.



As an embellishment, I printed a verse on kraft paper and adhered it to a punched scalloped circle cardstock (cut by my new Marvy Uchida Scalloped Circle Punch). Font credit goes to Kevin and Amanda's Free Scrapbook Fonts.

I'm submitting this cards to these following challenges too: CCCB Week 21 (One for the Boys, using the color blue), Paper Cutz Challenge #57 (1 ribbon, 2 button, and 3 colors--blue, brown and cream), and also enrolling them for the second time at Bee Crafty's Anything Goes (with digi-image), Daisy Doodles Creative Challenge's Anything Goes, and Digi Doodle Shop's Best Challenge (Write Me a Message).

Okay people... Gotta go now, got some packing to do :). Hope you enjoy the rest of the week and keep an eye out for my next post 'cos I may be posting loads of photos of oh-so-yummy food!

Cheerios!

Much love,
F

Happy Birthday Dad! (And A Discount Coupon for All of You!!)

Hi there!

Well, two birthday cards down last week, three more to go :). Next week will be the last week before we have to move house though, so with all the bits and bobs we have yet to pack, I don't know whether I'd be able to finish and mail all the cards in time :(.

Anyway, in the midst of folding and packing a sea of clothes while listening to Jason Mraz's I'm Yours - Remix (trust me, this song really makes any kind of house chores more enjoyable--albeit slower as I'd dance like fifty per cent of the time!), I managed to squeeze in making one more birthday card for my beloved dad.

I haven't submitted any cards to the CPS blog for the past two weeks, so this week I played along with their sketch #178 Challenge :). I loved their sketch this week; very clean and simple, so I'm also submitting it to the Stamp, Scrap & Doodle Saturday Blog challenge--their theme for this week happens to be clean and simple as well.

I managed to create AND finish a digital paper kit on Saturday, which is very, very fast by my standards :), so I got to use it for today's card. I have yet to find a suitable name for the kit, though, LOL. I also used a digital stamp of a tree for the topper.


The interesting part of this card is the embellishment; I used three wooden-carved letters to form the word "DAD". I bought these wooden letters from a local craft shop a few months back, and I've actually forgotten that I'd bought them. Luckily I found them amongst my pile of paper scraps when I was making this card, LOL.


Now on to the discount coupon!!

Since my dad's birthday's coming up, I want to celebrate it by sharing a little joy with everybody :). If you have a special man in your life that you'd like to give a present to, now is the perfect time!

Hop on to Brookstone Online Store today for a wide selection of unique, thoughtful gifts for dad or that special someone that you love.

~ February Lane ~ readers will get to enjoy $10 off any online purchase of $70 or more!!

Enter this coupon code when you purchase from their online shop: 22SAVE

That's all for now, hope you'll enjoy the discount coupon! Thanks for visiting!

Much love,
F

Birthday on Wheels

Hello there!

If you have been reading my previous posts, you'd probably know that August will be a super busy month for me. Not only will I be moving to a new house (yaaayy!!), but I also have to make five birthday cards to send out throughout the month (pheeww).

So I may as well get a head start, I thought, by making one of the birthday cards this weekend.The first person who's having his birthday in August is my brother in law, who's a huge fan of cars. Yep, you guessed correctly, that's why finding a theme for this birthday card was a piece of cake, LOL. Today's card will be the card that I'd send to him next week, so I'm basically keeping my fingers crossed that he won't be reading this blog post before the card's off in post, LOL :).

As I was blog hopping, I also happened to come across the Paper Cutz Blog's Challenge #51, which is to make a creation that features something with wheels, which is a perfect match with this project's idea. I combined the theme with Sweet Stampin' Challenge Blog's Challenge 36, create something vintage, and came up with the design for this card.


I used Martine's Sketch from Simon Says Challenge Blog, although I think I might have made quite an alteration on the sketch as I thought following it as is might disrupt the topper's balance on my design--sorry, Martine :).


I also used Donna's recipe from the Cards for Men blog, which is Challenge #15. They'd asked readers to combine one image, two papers and three embellishments, which is exactly what I've done (well, although I used more than three embellishments. Couldn't resist the temptation! But I did use three buttons, though).

The Fussy and Fancy Girls over at the Fussy and Fancy Friday Challenge have also posted an exciting challenge a week ago, which is creating a design with scallop, stitches and sparkles. I used faux stitches for this card, adhered scalloped edges to one of the papers, and used four sparkly (well, metallic, to be exact) eyelets to embellish the card. And last but not least, I'm also posting this card to Digi Doodle Shop's Best Anything Goes Challenge.


Again, I used two of my "For His Eyes Only" digital papers for this card. I have not grown out of it for now :), plus I haven't gotten around to designing another kit for men :) :).

Well, that's all for tonight. It's gonna be the start of a busy week tomorrow, so I'd better kick it off with a good night sleep!! Thanks for visiting and have a great week ahead!

Love,
F

A Midsummer Day's Christmas Card

Hi everyone!

It's a rainy weekend here in Singapore, so I had every reason to stay in and catch up with my stack of craft materials that I've neglected for weeks now. My husband and I have finally made an offer on a flat, so fingers crossed that it'll be the end of our house-hunting season soon!! Yayyy!!

Although it is still officially summer in most parts of the world, today I made a cool, crisp and icy looking Christmas card. Not that I'm preparing for Christmas just yet--in actual fact, I still have some countless number of cards to make before August comes, with the myriad of people around me that somehow decided to have their birthdays in August (which includes both my parents, whose birth dates are just four days apart. Pheeewww!).

Anyway, Donna of the Cards for Men blog posted her No. 14 challenge, which is Christmas in July. As I was looking for inspiration, I bumped into Caz's, Deb's and Lynn's blog, Cute Card Thursday, and their challenge for this week is also to get a head start for Christmas cardmaking. Well, two reasons for creating Christmas cards in July is good enough for me :)! Using the CPS #176 sketch from the lovely team at Card Positioning Systems Blog, I created this card.


I used a digital stamp that I created last Christmas, which is a snuggly, furry winter bear holding a bell and a candy cane. I hand drew, scanned and saved the image as a PNG object, then printed it on a heavy 200 gsm white paper before coloring it with Faber Castell watercolor pencils. I really liked this image but since most of the Christmas cards I created last year was either vintage or bold looking, I did not have the chance to use it.


I also used two sheets from my English Roses digital paper pack. So as most of the materials for this card were digital, I also decided to post this card for the the Something Digital challenge that I found in the Stamp Something blog.


Instead of using the usual pre-folded card blank, I made a gate-fold card using American Crafts' AC Cardstock in Lagoon. After adhering the background panels cut from my digital papers (printed on heavy 110 gsm inkjet paper), I used a wide 2" blue satin ribbon for embellishment, before adhering the stamped bear as a topper.

That's all for today, would love to write more but as always, weekends always bring a bunch of ironing for me :). Thanks for visiting!

Much love,
F

My Grandma's Birthday Bouquet ♥

Helllooooo...

Wow, two weeks went by so fast and I did not even realize that I have not posted anything in more than two weeks. More than two weeks, people!! Amazing as this translates to, of course, two weeks without crafting, cardmaking, taking photos or writing. Pheww.

Well, I have a pretty good excuse for being MIA, though. My husband and I are on the hunt for another apartment as we need to move out of our current one by mid next month. I have mixed feelings about this; partially excited over getting a new place to ransack :D, but also slightly saddened as this house is, after all, the first house we've lived in after we got married :(.

Anyway, I'm sure it'll turn out for the best and we'll find a great place soon :).

Two weeks ago was my husband's birthday and just so happen that we were invited to one of our friends' wedding in Indonesia. (And this means that hereafter, on every 3rd of July, I will have to make a birthday card for my husband AND an anniversary card for my friend :P)

As much as I would like to post the must-have-been-lovely photos that I would've taken at the wedding, since I had to leave the office late that day and headed directly to the airport, my darling husband had forgotten to pick up our camera from the house :( :(. This is despite him knowing that disuniting me from any types of camera on a holiday can and will send me on a catastrophic tantrum that costs him no less than a pint of Ben & Jerry's Cookie Dough to subdue.

The day after the wedding was also my grandma's 78th birthday, so while we were there, we made our way to her house to celebrate. It was a great party as most of my mum's entire family was there, which doesn't happen often.

The birthday party reminded me of one of my fondest childhood memories, which was staying over at my grandparents' house on almost every weekend. I remember that every time I walked into my granny's bedroom--where I would sit for hours listening to her stories--I would smell the Yardley English Rose fragrance that she used to wear. And I would really, really love it.

Even now, every single time I visited her house (although she does not wear the same perfume anymore), I think that I can still smell the scent in my head. Frankly speaking, I suspect my unexplained fascination of English roses was cultivated by this memory somehow :).

Needless to say, this birthday card was made with the same inspiration--English roses. Yeah, yeah, I know, I've been creating so many rose-themed cards recently, but what can I say :), I really adore them.



The backing paper I used was one of my digital paper set, English Roses, which I finally finished designing after a month (yayyy!!). I printed the topper using a clip art from the digital set and cut out the circle using my Marvy Uchida Clever Lever circle punch. Then I adhered the circle on a punched-out scallop circle cut from recycled paper with my Woodware Scalloped Circle punch.


To finish off, I cut a piece of white printer paper with scalloped scissors and glued it on the backing paper, and stuck the topper on a 2.5" blue satin ribbon, which has been tied loosely to give a knotted effect.


Chic and simple, don't you think? Perfect for my beloved grandma :).

That's all for today; it's quite late now and my eyes are neither closed nor open, LOL. Tomorrow is a new day, hopefully with some good news on our house hunt. I'm off now and see you soon!!

Much love,
F

Another Father's Day Card :)

I'm back with another Father's Day card!

As today is Father's Day, for this week's cardmaking challenge I made another special card for all dads in the world :).

Today's card is inspired by a sketch designed by the folks at the CPS blog, and I must admit, when I saw the sketch, I thought it was a bit challenging as I don't usually do asymmetrical layouts. Nevertheless, the sketch turned out to be really fun to work with, and although I intentionally left out the arrow element, I am quite satisfied with the design :).

Having the same theme in spirit, I also submitted this design for CardsforMen blog for their Father's Day challenge.

So what do you think of it?


I found a pre-folded cardstock at the bottom of my craft-supplies drawer, which was handy because its baby-blue color matched the feel of the patterned papers that I used. The patterned papers were from my digital paper pack collection, For His Eyes Only, which will be listed on Etsy soon. Follow FebruaryLane on Twitter if you want an update of when it's listed :)

I was also excited about the sketch because it had a circle element, which meant I could use my new Woodware scalloped circle punch :) :). I bought the punch when I went to the UK three weeks ago, but I have yet to find the chance to create anything with it.

I used the scalloped circle punch to make the recycled-paper base for the topper, which I printed on an ivory 80 gsm parchment paper. The image is of an antique beetle car that I had edited using CorelDraw with oil pastel effect. I used jute strings (I know, I know, I use too much jute in my designs) to tie the topper to the patterned paper and adhered them on the baby blue blank card.

Okay, that's all for today, I really have to go to the library and return a book before I get fined :). Wishing all of you a great Father's Day and hope that you can celebrate this special day with a man who is very dear to you!!

ICSketches #70 - Happy Father's Day!

Hi again!!

Well, as if this week has not been busy enough, I managed to squeeze in another cardmaking challenge on my agenda--although it meant neglecting my poor husband who has just sprained his ankle two days ago. Apologies, love.

Anyway, this week's card sketch was provided by Inspirational Card Sketches, and I thought their Design Team has put together an array of wonderful examples using the sketch. Here's a glimpse of the sketch:


As this coming Sunday is Father's Day, I decided to make a Happy Father's Day card using one of my digital paper packs.

Here's my take on the sketch:


I printed the digital paper pack using an inkjet printer on a heavy 200 gsm cardstock. I designed the topper using a cool photo of a classic car taken by Michal over at Sxc. I gave it an 'ink-pen sketch' effect in PhotoShop and recolor it in Corel Photo Paint to bring out a vintage feel.

I printed this topper on a 110 gsm ivory parchment paper, which emphasized the 'rugged' feel of the design. Then, I adhered the print out on a rectangular craft foam for a lifted effect that accentuates the topper.


As always, I think jute never fails to give an amazing touch to any card. So when I ran out of paper after cutting a few miscalculated pieces (although the good thing about digital papers is that you can always print a few more!!), I reached out to my left over jute bundle and found a scrap perfect for the job :).


After putting the pieces together, though, I still felt that the card was still too plain for my liking. Thus, I decided to give the honorable task of embellishing to a pair of brown plastic buttons, which have done the job quite well, I think!

If you are wondering, the digital paper pack that I used was a kit that I created for my Etsy shop, although I have not listed it yet. This kit is called "For His Eyes Only", and as the name describes, this is a very masculine, rugged yet classy kit of 8 digital papers, which you can use to create digital scrapbook, cards or other crafty stuff for a beloved guy ;).

Here's a peek of the pack:


So that's all for tonight's challenge, pheww, I can't believe tomorrow is already Friday!! Wooohooo!!

Much love,
F

CPS 171 - English Bouquet

I have been a HUGE fan of the CPS - Card Sketches blog since I started making cards a few months ago.

However, being the biggest procrastinator that I am :), it is not until now that I decided to play along with their weekly card sketch challenge. So here goes!!

This week's challenge is CPS 171, sponsored by Kraftin' Kimmie Stamps. Here's a peek of the sketch:


And here's my creation today:


I used a cardstock that I actually bought for father's day cards that I planned to make before I went to Europe, but that plan never rolled out in the end ^_^. Hence, I was left with a few masculine-themed cardstock and papers, but it turned out that this grayish-blue color worked well with the topper.


In case you are wondering, the topper that I used is from my English Bouquet Digital Paper Pack Set that I sell on Etsy. It's not listed as yet since I haven't finished designing the entire range, LOL. But you'll be able to view (and maybe buy a set ;D) them in a week's time or so. Follow February Lane on Twitter if you'd like to know when it's listed :).



The three diamond-shaped embellishments were made from hand-cut jute fabric, which is perhaps officially my 'signature' material by now, LOL. The rose was one of my hand-made 'scout' roses (I call them 'scout roses' because I learned how to make them when I was in the scouts :D), made using crimson and moss-green satin ribbons. The sentiment was printed on recycled paper.

That's all for tonight, I will come back again next week with new posts!

Much love,
F

Hello!

Hi there!

This is my first post on this blog and I am sooo excited about it ^_^. I have been intending to publish my own blog forever and a day, and being the lazy gal that I am, well, it dragged on for months on end :P.

I have always loved arts and crafts since I was barely a teenager, and have been selling my own handmade stuff since I was in Junior High. The first 'art' that I sold was a handmade journal, or, to be overly concise, a journal with a handmade cover (I literally just scrapped off the cover and replaced it with a jute cover that I made) and sold it to one of my besties for about $1 because I wanted to buy a new pair of baggy jeans (which were very much in trend back then, I swear).

Anyhow, my crafting pursuits carried on for years, ranging from paper crafting, sewing, painting, sketching to loads of other stuff (I christmas cards, crafts, digital paper, digital scrapbooking, hello cards, Jute Cardseven hand sketched my best friend's portrait for her birthday gift, lame as it is), until I went to university.

I majored in Architecture in uni, thus my 'crafting' endeavors or any part thereof, became--shall I say--an 'obligation'. Never in my life have I seen so much crafting needed to be done in one day, as with my days in Architecture (and I am sure my uni friends can vouch for me on that). Studio hours were endless, handmade modeling of buildings kept us awake for forty eight hours at the least, and watercolor lessons were 'recommended' in order for us to pass one of the studio subjects. Even I, being much in love with crafts in the beginning, became desensitized to its daintiness and started to see arts as an industrialized course, if nothing else.

That was ten years ago. I started working not long after my graduation (ironically not as an architect, pheeww), days come and go and I was far away--million miles beyond doing anything crafts-related.

And there was I, about a few months back, preparing for my wedding. Yet in the midst of an excruciating episode of planning three different weddings in two different countries (with one man, mind you! But don't ask, I'll save this story for another time!), the one thing that I had in mind was to get DIY everything for the wedding(s). I was overwhelmed with the invitation samples, favor samples, patterned papers, etc., etc., etc., and I must say that I was so astonished at how the craft industry has changed so much in a decade.

I mean, some ten years ago, I created patterned paper by sticking a dried leaf on a foam block and stamping it on recycled paper in green acrylic ink. Now, you can go to virtually any shopping malls, find a scrapbooking shoppe, and get all the patterned papers in any design you can imagine--all on the cheap. And it's not only limited to brick and mortar businesses, go Google 'cardmaking' or 'scrapbooking' and you'll find hundreds, if not thousands, of resources to back you up in your crafting pursuits.

Then, a few weeks after we came back from our honeymoon, I realized that I was craving to do something creative again. So I went back to those scrapbooking and craft stores, and went on a maddddd shopping spree for papers, stamps, ribbons, punches, and just about anything that I could get my hands on without my hubby scowling at me (:P Luv ya hunny).

As it was a few weeks before Christmas, the first cards that I made after the long crafts-hibernation-episode were, of course, Christmas cards that we sent to friends and family (so I had an excuse to spend on supplies as I was saving us the price of a few Christmas cards, LOL). I wasn't so sure that I made, well, 'presentable' cards, but surprisingly I received positive responses from the people whom we sent the cards to.

These are the first two cards that I made in Christmas 2009:


I made this card for my beloved hubby. He always likes scruffy, vintage looking stuff and I was browsing around some digital scrapbooking blogs for this kind of theme when I bumped into Summer Driggs' website. I think she's one of the coolest Digital Scrapbook Artist ever, and all her kits are available for free on her blog. I printed some of the papers and elements from her Believe kit, and it worked very well on recycle paper, giving me the exact vintage look that I was looking for. I inked the edges with Tsukineko Coffee Bean ink for the extra 'aged' look. Thanks a bunch for your kit, Summer!



Another one of the initial inspirations for me in the first weeks of my cardmaking crave was Complete Cardmaking Magazine. Its Christmas 2009 edition was indeed a treasure chest for a beginner cardmaker like moi! This magazine always comes with a free CD with loads of designs and themes, and the paper and card topper that I used for the card above was printed from that very CD. I sent this card to my parents in law :).

Lo and behold, four months on and a few more cards under my belt, I pulled myself together and am determined to get my crafting endeavors underway once more. I recently opened up shop on Etsy called February Lane, and I am hoping to list new handmade cards and some craft supplies for fellow crafters very very soon.

I must say at the moment I am very, very lucky to be living in Asia, where craft supply wholesalers are a dime a dozen, and that I have a very, very lovely mum who's always happy to help me source some strange materials from the corners of my hometown in Indonesia :). And have I mentioned that my office is a stone's throw away from the biggest textile center in Singapore, where fabric, beads and ribbons galore? Now, go figure how blessed a crafter I am!!

And what could say a simple hello better than my own, handmade card?? ;) This is one of my mixed-media favorites: hessian (aka. jute aka. burlap) fabric topper that I bought from a fishing shop two shop houses away from my office, embellished with a needle felted applique. I needle-felted the daisies myself, and it was supposed to be a 3D daisy. But at the end I was too distracted by the new episode of 24 that I managed to skip the next 2 layers and made it into a 2D applique (LOL). I hand-shaped the word "Hello" myself using florist wire and ouch, did it hurt my fingers! But it was super worth it.




So this card brings us to the end of today's post... I will try my best to post new stories in the upcoming week, to share with you a few of the cards that I made in the past few months. But as I do have a full time day job, please pardon me if I don't post regularly at times!! ;) See you!!

Much love,
F