Ins(paper)ation

Today I'm starting a new tradition: Ins(paper)ation. Two words together: inspiration and paper are two magical things that make me dream, imagine and create. Every ins(paper)ation I will share with you what has inspired me to create. This time my inspiration came from a beautiful creation by Donna Downey. She covered her canvas apron with Prima flowers, just because she was curious how it looked. Each section of the apron is filled with different colored flowers, which gave me the inspiration to create a monochromatic white layout.

This layout is with my son's photos from the Jewish holiday Shavuot, celebrating the acceptance of the Torah (first five books of the Bible) on Mount Sinai more than 3000 years ago. One of the holiday's customs is to wear white to symbolize the purity of the Torah.

I used a nature motif and tried to play with different shades of white. The holiday of Shavuot is also an agricultural holiday celebrating the season of harvest in Israel, especially wheat. That is why my son wears flowers on his head and the layout is filled with flowers.                                                                                                                                 

Since I was inspired, I want to try and inspire others as well and join a challenge or two:
* Kaboodle Doddles challenge #31: Monochromatic design
* ABC challenge: V is for Vintage
* A spoon full of sugar challenge 105: Celebrations 
* Lets capture these sketches: sketch # 39
* Stuck on U sketches challenge
* Gonna start me up: Black and White
* Method Playground: Antique 

Flower Tutorial

In the last post you had a chance to see the flower I designed from the new Sizzix Dies. But! You don't have to have those Dies, you can make them yourself!

Here's how:

1. Cut strips of paper. Use any pattern or solid paper. you can stamp, paint and ink it. You can cut as many strips as you want and in any size you want.
I used: 8 strips - 5 inches on 3/4 of an inch (13 x 2 cm)
           12 strips – 4.5 inches on 3/4 of an inch (11.5 x 2 cm)
            6 strips – 4 inches on 3/4 of an inch (10 x 2 cm)
2. Cut the edges of the strips to form an arrow. Punch a hole on each side.
3. Cut 5 circles 3/4 of an inch (1.5 cm) in diameter. Punch two holes side by side to make the circles look like buttons. You can also use actual buttons.
4. Cut a piece of wire, about 6 inches long.

5. Thread the wire through the two holes of the button piece.
6. Twist the wire to form one strand.

7. Start with the medium size strips. Thread the wire through the hole, loop the strip and thread the wire through the other hole. Continue to thread all 6 strips.
8. Separate the wire and add another button. The button makes it easier to handle the layers while you are assembling the flower.

9. Add the next layer of loops, large size.
10. Repeat the process with the rest of the strips, separating each layer with a button.

11. Add rolled strips of paper as stamens.
12. Cut more strips for leafs.
13. Take a wooden skewer and push it through the middle of the flower. Thread the loops on the skewer to create leafs.

You can add glitter, Mika or beads to embellish the flower and even create a bouquet!

A farewell flower

How time flies! It's time for our final challenge in the Sizzix blog hop. We had so much fun with those beautiful, versatile dies. The last die was particularly fun. The BOW is a series of strips bind together to create… anything. When I started playing with it, I immediately saw a flower in the making.
 























I decided to cut new strips from patterned and solid papers and build a multi layered flower. After the flower was assembled I added some stamens from rolled narrow strips of paper. For the final touch I sprinkled some colored Mika on top of the petals. Then I attached a wooden skewer as a stem and added some green leaves made from the same Die.

This was such a fun blog hop. It gave me a chance to work with the new great Sizzix Dies, as well as being a part of an amazing group of designers. I'm sorry it is over so quickly. Can't wait for the next one!

If you enjoyed seeing these ScoreBoard projects on the hop, please leave a comment here or on Eileen Hull's blog so we know you stopped by.

Check out all the other great designs with the links below:
Ann Butler
Bonnie Bruns
Candice Windham
Craftside - a behind the scenes peek at a crafty world
Debra Quartermain
Eileen Hull
JGoode designs
Julie McGuffee
LollyChops
Madeline Arendt
Michelle Cummings
Modern Surrealist
Roxi Phillips
Sparkle studio
Veronica Goff

Have fun creating!
Einat

Building a dinosaur

Here is another layout for my sweet young boy. He got a kit for building a dinosaur, and being a big fan of dinosaurs he started working right away. I tried to take some pictures, a task that was not easy at all. He was so excited and he was moving from side to side making it hard to capture the excitement without blur.

For this layout I used a lot of dimension especially in the embellishments and the letters. I used chipboard for the tree branch and leaves, as well as the dinosaur. I dyed all the chipboard with chalk ink to get a sort of Crayon look, as if it was painted by a kid.

I always try to stretch my supplies as far as I can, so I used the inner part of the foam letters "O", "B" and "A" to create the dots on the dinosaur's back. I also created more dimension by using two foam letters in different sizes on top of each other.



Finally, I created the grass by ruffling two colors of green ribbons.

Einat

Food for the soul, fun for the hands

Yesterday I participated in a workshop day with Nathalie Kalbach, a very talented mixed media artist and

scrapbooker from Germany

Every few months my friend Alice, who owns a store in Israel, organizes a workshop day or weekend for all of us scrapbook fans. This time we had the pleasure of working with Nathalie, and make great projects. Usually I am busy with deadlines, projects that need to be delivered and other peoples' scrapbooks. Days like this give me an opportunity to do something for myself, or as I call it: food for the soul and fun for the hands

 

The first project was a mini album. We made it from corrugated cardboard and canvas pages. We had fun with materials like Tattered Angels' Glimmer mist, Glimmer Glam, Chalkboard, masks and stamps and we used Prima papers

Nathalie's example was horizontal. I decided I want my album to be vertical (always have to be different…). The theme of my album was: "YOU ARE", all the pages in it have a line describing my two boys. Each line opens with the words: you are

Our next project was a canvas. I was very happy that this canvas was about us. A lot of my designs are about my kids, but this one was about me: "Einat's Wonder Land". We made a whimsical, a bit crazy, colorful canvas featuring us in our wonder land. We used Webster patterned papers and Prima flowers, embellishments and canvas letters. It has a lot of atmosphere, dimension, colors and bling. a true wonder land

They are my favorite

It's time for another Sizzix blog hop! This challenge was yumy! We had to design a cake featuring our favorite...anything...
My favorite things in the world are my two boys. Their favorite thing is chocolate. So I decided to combine two favorites into one. A high, beautiful, brown chocolate kids cake!

The bottom part of the cake was the Sizzix Die, which was painted with brown acrylic paint. I wrote on it with a white colored pencil "They R" and added "MY FAVORITE" with white chipboard letters. I made the upper part from cardboard and added my kids' photos. I decorated the cake with some fake whipped cream made from cotton wool, with dots of stickles as fake chocolate on top.

If you enjoyed seeing these ScoreBoard projects on the hop, please leave a comment here or on Eileen Hull's blog so we know you stopped by.

Check out all the other great designs with the links below:

Ann Butler
Bonnie Bruns
Candice Windham
Carla Schauer
Cindi Bisson
Craftside - a behind the scenes peek at a crafty world
Debra Quartermain
Eileen Hull
JGoode designs
Julie McGuffee
Karen Burniston
Laura Bray
Lisa Rojas
Madeline Arendt
Modern Surrealist
Niki Meiners
Roann Mathias
Sandy Laipply
Veronica Goff

And the winner is...

Congratulation kmassman! You won the "Love" mini album. Give it to someone you love and the circle of love will be complete.

Please send me your address and I will send it to you.

Thank all of you for taking part in this great blog hop.