May 2013 Sympathy Cards

In April 2013 we lost a well-loved family member in my mom`s family.  My great Aunt Mary, who was 104 years old, and just 5 months short of her 105^th birthday.  She lived an amazing life, and was loved by all who knew her.  She was generous and gave of herself right up until the day she passed away.  She knitted hats for the homeless, close to 2500, and finished her last one the night before she died.  She was an absolute delight, and joy to be around, and every so inspiring!  These 3 cards were sympathy cards that I made when she passed away.  A couple of the designs, I have used before for other cards, so you can see how versatile these designs can be, especially when in a pinch to get something nice and meaningful done in a short time.

#1 classic peach roses, with cream linen card and embossed frame.

#2 light blue forget-me-not with embossed blue pearl cardstock.  This is a cherry blossom pattern, but in blue it looks like forget-me-nots.

 #3 a pink pearl rose on a die cut diamond, on embossed linen card. 

2013 Thank You & and Glitter Birthday Cards

In February 2013, my mom at age 79 had to have a kidney removed due to cancer, which was a stressful time for all of us.  She eventually came through it okay, but it was quite a few weeks of recovery, and trying to get her to take it easy.  Thankfully, her remaining kidney, is still okay, with no signs of cancer.  These 2 cards were for her doctor, and the nursing staff.  The one with the glittered dragonflies was for her nursing unit, and the one with the quilled dragonfly was for her urologist, who she had for 32 years, until he retired in 2015.

This 3^rd card is a glitter birthday card that I made for my sister.  I like working with glitter, but it can be so messy. If the air is dry, which is often the case in our place, the glitter flies everywhere!

2013 Accreditation Piece

2013, was an exciting year for my quilling, as I received my Accreditation with the NAQG!  It took me so long to get both parts of my project done.  There were 2 separate stages.  The first one was a shape chart, with specific shapes, and sizes, in a specific color which was shades of blue.  I got it as perfect as I could with my limited vision.  The second stage was the quilled design, having to include specific shapes and techniques.  Then I also had to give a detailed write up, on where I used those shapes and techniques.  There were some times when I got a little stressed out, & even worried that wouldn`t pass, but it was all worth it.  This is my Butterfly & Dragonfly Garden.  I now have it framed in an oak shadow box, but still haven`t taken a picture of it in the frame. 

Christmas 2012

All that I’ve got left from 2012, is a couple of Christmas cards.   I only managed to get a couple made with all that was going on.   Also, I had to focus on starting my Accreditation projects for the North American Quilling Guild (NAQG). www.naqg.org 

Both cards are again my easel cards.  –A simple snowman…, and a fairly simple snowflake card….

    

This pretty much finally catches me up for 2012!  

2013, is coming next…..

September and October 2012 Cards....and Maybe Older...

Well....another year gone without posting and updating!  The last post I made was the day before my dad passed away, on August 5, 2015.  It was sort of expected, but not, at the same time.  He had been suffering from Diabetes complications, and heart failure for quite sometime.  One just never knows when it is our time to go, so cherish every moment with loved ones.  It has been quite a year since his passing, and not everything is completed yet...

Okay, now back to catching up....In September and October 2012, I did not do too much quilling.  There was so much going on next door from the fire, which had some effects on us, from excessive noise, as they rebuilt, to disgusting smells…They had to gut the whole unit, and do asbestos abatement as well.  We had several electrical and heating problems resulting from the work next door.  It was not pleasant at all. And it was just the beginning of a 7 month nightmare!

This first card is a simple light pink husked flower. The leaves are alternate side looping (ASL) technique, which is basically freehand husking, as you don’t use any pins.   Actually I think I made it back in 2011, but can’t remember when…The date on the picture is not when I made it...

For this birthday card, I did a flower using what a lot of people online call the beehive technique, but I’ve always just called it continuous quilling.  I did 2 shades of pink, and the center is both shades rolled together.  Again, the leaves are done with the ASL technique, and shaped wheatears. 

This is a wedding card I made for Bill’s daughter.  I just knew she was having fall colors, but did not know them.  So I did cream pearl roses, and bronze tiny punched flowers, on cream linen card, and dark brown linen card.  Surprisingly it sort of matched her fall theme.

I also made another sunflower thank you card similar to my Stampede entry, only in darker yellow shades.  This was for our apartment office manager who checked on our home while we were gone.

August 2012 Cards and Projects!

After winning those 3 awards for my 2012 entries, it helped restore some confidence that I lost from losing my vision in my left eye.  As I’ve been going through my pictures, I see I made quite a few cards shortly after that.  It didn’t seem like that many, but I guess it was. All of these ones were made in August 2012.

This is a simple card I did for a birthday which has pearl peach roses, and light pearl green leaves…. 

And this one has a similar layout to one I did before, only it has the embossed corners, which really add to the design.  It was for a special order.

For these birthday cards, I used and onion holder to make all of the petals of the flower in 2 shades of purple.  It gives quite a different look.

The 2nd birthday card is the same technique with the onion holder.  The petals are a light soft yellow & light very light aqua. The fringed center is the same colors rolled together using 1/8” strips as well.  The leaves, wheat-ears, and hummingbird wings are also made with the onion holder.

Now this one, I did for a friend’s 50^th anniversary.  I used English gold edged strips for all of it.  Unfortunately, the shiny gold edges don't show up very well in my picture.

The last project I made in August 2012 was a paper embroidered Winnie the Pooh with him sitting in a bunch of quilled flowers, while a quilled butterfly flies towards his nose.  I made it for my 2^nd great niece’s 1^st birthday.  I was so pleased with how it turned out; I almost didn’t want to part with it!  

Okay that’s mainly what I did that summer, as less than a week after that (August 24th, 2012), there was a fire in the apartment next to us!  We didn’t have any fire damage, but we did have a lot of smoke damage.  Thankfully, all of my paper and supplies, had no lasting damage, and Bill put an air cleaner from his work in there right away. 

I could go on about the whole experience about the fire, but I won’t too much, except that, even though we didn’t have much damage, it was still frightening, and a little traumatizing waiting out in our car while the firefighters put out the fire, wondering if it was spreading to our unit, and if we would still have our home...our belongings.... Then, finding out it was caused by careless smoking on a couch!  Thank goodness our building is all concrete!  You will hear more about what we went through in posts to come…

It's Been So Long I Don't Know Where To Start!

Hi Everyone,

It’s been so long since I’ve posted to my blog, I almost don’t know where to start!  I guess back in 2011 is as good as any time to start to explain, all that’s gone on.  The last time I posted was Aug 31, 2011.  My mom happened to get terribly ill that night, which lead to 1 6 to 8 week recovery.  So, all my creativity was put on hold for the most part.  Then in November 2011, we got accepted into a housing co-op, we had 2 months to prepare before our move in on Jan. 27, 2012.  So again, I didn’t do much quilling, as we were busy with Christmas and packing for our move…

Two weeks before we were to move,. I slipped on ice and fell on my back.  Thankfully my hood cushioned my head!   Then one week before we were to move, I saw my glaucoma eye specialist, who found something wrong with my left eye, which I was already partially blind in.  Monday Jan. 23, 2012 I had to see another specialist.  I found out, I had a non-cancerous tumour (a mass of blood vessels growing in my left eye resulting from an early childhood injury), and a detached retina.  I had to have emergency surgery as soon as possible.    I wanted to wait until after we moved, but my doctor said my eye could end up hemorrhaging. So on January 26, 2012, I went in for vitrectomy surgery.  This was the day before we were moving!  I suddenly had 4 weeks off work, which sounds good when you’re moving, but I couldn’t do anything!!!  I could bend down, I couldn’t lift anything.  My mom had to come and stay with us, because I could even cook.  One would never think an eye surgery would be so serious and disabling, but it can be!  2 weeks into my recovery I developed a blood clot in my eye and had to have another vitrectomy surgery.  This gave me another 2 weeks off work.  Our place was in such disarray, and my mom and I really couldn’t do much.  With Bill working full time, unpacking and organizing was a very slow process. 

This ended up being one of the worst personnel experiences of my life!  I had severe headaches for weeks, I lost almost all of my vision in my left eye,  going from about 15% to about 5%.   I always thought I couldn’t see much so it wouldn’t be a big deal if I went completely blind, but I found out that 15% vision was a lot!  Then to top it all off, the second surgery they put an oil bubble into my eye, which I ended up having to have a 3^rd vitrectomy surgery, in June 2012, giving me another 6 weeks off, and finishing off my eyesight in my left eye.  I can see a little bit of light, but it is mostly dark and gray, and it has shrunken significantly.  All this was to save what sight I had, so I would lose my eye.  I was then told that eventually I will lose my eye and have to have prosthetic glass eye.  I am not looking forward to that at all!  If I had known I was still going to lose it, I would have just refused the surgeries in the first place… 

I could go on about everything I went through, but I
won’t bore anyone any longer!  Let’s get back to my paper quilling and card making!

So needless to say, I did not do much quilling for most of 2012.  I did however make a few cards, and do a couple of entries for The Calgary Stampede.  It was there 100^th anniversary, so I just had to enter!  The first couple are mother’s day cards, and then a father’s day card.  As you can see I still love making my easel cards.  They lend them selves so well to quillinq. 

Cards before in easel position

My 3rd surgery was much better that the first two.  And by that, I mean less pain, and complications to the anesthetic.  The next projects were done just before and after my 3rd eye surgery. They were my Stampede entries, to which I won 1^st in class and 2^nd in Section for my quilled sunflower thank you easel card and embellished envelope. And I also won 1^st place for my quilled framed piece, which is an all-black silhouette of a cowboy on a bucking horse in a black shadow box frame.   I did this especially for their 100th anniversary.  

Plenty more to come........