Thursday, February 6, 2014

Making Valentine Crumb cards

  Every year, I make Valentine cards. Usually, I silk screen them. However, I am immersed in quilting lately and in love with crumbs. So, here is how I made a bunch. The insides need to be stamped yet. The stamps are from my former life as an art teacher. Every year, I taught the kids to make valentine cards. We made cards for the local VA hospital using collage and stamps. That was a great thing for the kids to do.
  I started with red and white and pink scraps sewing crumbs together. I love to do this.
I like to throw smidges of other colors in
     I keep building the crumbs until I get a large hunk. I ironed Heat and Bond on the back. I don't like it for quilting, so this was good to use for this.
     Then, I cut some heavy interfacing and fused the crumb piece to it. I traced a heart shape on in pencil, as close to each other as possible. I even made some small hearts out of the leftovers.  I made my heart template making sure the heart was not equally symmetrical (boring). I cut out the hearts. I like the heft of the hearts cut out.


    I buy the cards already cut and scored with the envelopes, using a coupon at Joanns, AC Moore, or Michaels. I put Crafter's Pick, The Ultimate Glue on the back and glued them to the cards. I have this quirk I can't make two things the same. So, I tried some pastels and crayons behind the hearts for a few.


     I wan't really crazy about that. I glued some buttons on some of them as an accent.

     Then, I sewed some fancy yarn around the edges using the Singer 401 zig zag and invisible YLI thread. It was a lot of work. I don't know how much it added.

      The rest, I just glued them on as I thought they had a lot of design going on. It is hard for you to see that they have dimension to them.


     Bottom line is, I just think they need to be on a quilt. I am not making 20+ mini quilts. I did not want to make postcards because I wanted the hearts 3D. I thought the hearts might look good on mini painted canvas but who besides me would hang them up? I am thinking maybe I should make some mini quilts in these fabrics and have them next year for a few people. I just should be happy that I made plenty of cards with crumbs to give away. The line between card and quilt is hard to break.

Just had a brain flash! I could have bought valentine scrapbook paper, like red lines or simple small shapes and glued it on the card first, then the heart. Sigh....

3 comments:

Jan said...

Wow, they're fabulous. Our whole card business started with me making valentines. Love them!

PS I'd hang them up!

Linda Swanekamp said...

Well, I will try to make some on canvas as i have some hearts left over. Thanks for the compliment. Coming from you, the card queen, it is an honor.

Exuberantcolor/Wanda S Hanson said...

I got my valentine today. thank you!! and yes the yarn couched around the edge adds a lot to it!