Wednesday 25 February 2009

Ready Steady Go!

I have two ranges of cards. The large custom-made cards, when I create a one of a kind card for a specific person according to their hobbies, loves, favourite football team... the list goes on! These cards can take me some time to create, particularly when I get very involved in the details. You have seen many of them here on my blog and I hope to show you many more to come. I also make cards for all occasions, for people to buy ready made. These ready made cards are simpler to create, once I have finalised the design, and I can produce many cards of the same design if a particular person, or occasionally a store, has requested birthday, new baby or maybe Barmitzvah cards. Above and below, you can see some ready made cards that I have been working on this week. Some Mazal Tov (or Mazeltov, the anglicised version) cards and some new baby cards. I especially love creating these baby cards. Those little round faces bring a smile to my face every time.

Thursday 19 February 2009

Fashion, football... and cooking

A few more birthdays have been celebrated this week, so I am now able to show you more of my recent designs. In the top right hand corner you can see a card for a gentleman who enjoys cooking and reading. All the cards shown were made for a wonderful customer who comes back to me year after year with requests for cards for pretty much the same people. I have been making cards for Bob for several years now, usually on a cooking theme, and each year I have to take it a little further and come up with something different. I am pretty sure that he has not had a chef's hat and wooden spoon before! Bottom right, you can see another of my football strip cards, similar to these ones. This time Manchester City was requested, and as far as football shirts go, fortunately theirs is one of the plainer ones! Finally, on the left, I created a card for a shopaholic 13 year old. We have a brand new shopping centre in our city and apparently she is there all the time. I hope that she likes the items of clothing that I have picked out for her on this card! You will notice that this card is in Hebrew and opens from right to left. I wonder how many of you can read what it says?

Sunday 15 February 2009

Awesome

The young man who received this card celebrated his Barmitzvah this last weekend, so I can now show you one of my latest custom-made designs. I was asked to illustrate the long-haired boy playing his electric guitar and to add some music notes and the word "awesome", presumably because he uses it a lot! Just as I finished creating the character and as I was about to fix it to the card, I received a phone call telling me that his favourite colours were dark red and black and asking whether it was possible to include those colours in the card too. Fortunately I was able to change the background colour at the last moment and I hope that this is now a suitably rock star coloured card! I wish our would-be rock star Mazal Tov (meaning "good fortune" in Hebrew) on his Barmitzvah and I hope that he appreciates this well and truly personalised card!

Thursday 12 February 2009

A little extra publicity

I have been busy creating several custom-made cards recently but cannot show you them yet as I am not sure that they have been sent. I will keep them for a later post and in the meantime have some exciting things to show you.
Above you can see an Etsy Treasury that was created by Tara at Crochet and Crafts. I was thrilled to see that she included my Valentine's Day cards up there on the top right. It's obviously a little late to purchase these cards for February 14th, but this design is also suitable for birthdays, anniversaries, or just to tell someone that you care. They can be used all year round!
If you would like a closer look at this lovely treasury then click here.
I also received a little publicity from Michelle at Sparkling Bliss. She also gave the very same Valentine's Day cards a mention in her post 'Showing Some Love'.
To those of you who celebrate it, I hope you have a wonderful and romantic Valentine's Day.

Monday 9 February 2009

Turning Japanese... again

I received some very positive feedback when I created this card back in December, so decided to make it again, this time as a papercut picture. This picture shows a Geisha wearing a blue patterned kimono, with some blossoms and buds and a collage of a Japanese dragon in the background. Created in cut paper and some collage, this is an original artwork, and is signed by me.
I would love you to drop into my shop and take a look at it.

Tuesday 3 February 2009

Daffodils and daisies

The rain that I was excited about in my previous post didn't last long and we have spring weather here in Israel today, even though it is only February. The weather must have influenced my card making and, above, you can see my daffodils and daisies, now assembled on some 10cm x 10cm folded cards. Each daffodil is cut by hand, making every individual card unique and that little bit different from the next one.
If you are having snow or rain in your part of the world, I hope that these cards help you feel a little more spring-like today.

Sunday 1 February 2009

Rain, rain, don't go away!

We had a lovely day out over the weekend walking in the fresh air at the port of Tel Aviv, but last night it started raining heavily, which we have been waiting for here in Israel. Here at 'Handmade in Israel', however, I am starting to think about spring and some floral cards for my shop. Above you can see some daffodil heads on my cutting mat, awaiting some stems and leaves and other pretty spring flowers to accompany them.

Shareaholic