Marianne dies

Today will be the first day of our new format cardmaking club where we all take our own projects to work on. I'm looking forward to being part of it rather than being the one that produces everything for the others to do. After 5 plus years of producing 3 cards a week for them with only a couple of weeks off at Christmas and a couple of weeks holiday I am about out of ideas.  And when the cards had to last them for 3 hours it wasn't just a case of any 3 cards!  They had to be complex enough to keep them busy but not too hard for newcomers to have a crack at. It was a challenge!  Now it's time for me to take a back seat and enjoy the time myself!  Soooo I'm taking in the flowers to have a go at and enough for others to try if they want to. My super duper friend is going to show me how to make boxes by just folding... no glue. Watch this space!

I just love the Marianne Design dies. There is so much detail and delicacy about them. They can be a bit fiddly to remove the pieces but rubbing the die with a tumble drier cloth makes a world of difference. I'm also a big fan of the black and white look. This card needs some gems of some sort in the centre of the flowers and I'm leaning towards pearls rather than sparkly jewels.

Why is it.......

Why is it that whenever you have a new toy there are a million and one other things that just HAVE to be done before you can play with it?

I have been desperate to play properly with my Grand Calibur but so many other things needed to be sorted first.  I feel like a kid at Christmas who has been given the toy of their dreams and there are no batteries and the shops are all shut!!

At last it has come out of its box. I still have another problem..... namely the lack of any A3 card in any great quantity.  However..... I did manage to make one large card and a smaller one with  the only Grand dies that I have.  I'm sure you will all see the deliberate mistake on the scalloped circle card but I live and learn. Next time I will turn the die slightly so that I don't have to cut the bottom scallop to stop it from leaning drunkenly to one side.  This is your lesson for today!