(Another) One for the Boys

Despite making cards for men being universally considered as the hardest task, I've just had a second success in one week. On Monday, I got inspired by this month's Get Funky! Boys Boys Boys challenge and made a card for my cousin's birthday next week, along with several spares for upcoming male birthdays. Today, having wimpily abandoned my plan to watch live cricket on the grounds of less than perfect sunny warm weather and the probability (which has been realised) of a Surrey defeat, I settled down to listen to the Lord's Test, watch Le Tour de France time trial and see if I could come up with something for the Docrafts Creativity challenge that Katy had set this week.

Katy alternates sketch layout challenges with inspiration challenges. This week's was one of the latter, which provide opportunities to be as creative as one likes, as long as there's something to link the finished product with the original photograph. Katy, either cheekily or cleverly, gave us a very Christmassy photograph, which has divided the entrants so far. Several took encouragement to start on their festive card making; others moaned that it was far too early and did anything but. I wasn't in the mood to make a Christmas card but didn't stand firmly in the latter camp either, having very happily knocked off 40-something of this year's Christmas cards in early-January.

I did like the five circles in a row component of the photograph and, particularly, the single element stood forward of the background. It came to me that each of the circles could bear a letter of someone's name (as long as it was five letters long) and that the forward element could be attached to the card on a strip of acetate, and so dangle in front, rather than being fixed flat. Running through my friends and relatives with appropriate names, I quickly came to my eldest nephew, whose birthday is in November. So, sort of planning ahead, but not quite as far as Christmas (155 sleeps to go, by the way). I hadn't necessarily intended to use the red and silver colours from the photograph but as my nephew's a Liverpool fan (no idea why; he lives in Somerset and his father supports Man City), it seemed a good plan.

Having decided to include letters, I then had to produce them. I thought about using some wrongly coloured chipboard ones as templates and cutting them out but was fearful that I wouldn't be able to do it neatly enough. I then remembered that I had bought a set of Papermania alphabet stamps a while back on the grounds that they were a craft box essential. So essential, of course, that I had never used them and almost forgotten about them! When I tracked them down, I also found an unused round "Happy Birthday" stamp, which gave me the start of an idea for the dangly component.

Progress from there was swift. I stamped the letters on textured red card with VersaColour silver (92) pigment ink and heat embossed them with Crafter's Companion metallic silver embossing powder. That combination of products gave a lovely effect, even though only single embossing was practicable. I backed the red circles with scalloped circles of textured matt silver card, which seemed to complement the embossing better than shiny mirror-board. I did indulge in the latter to back the sparkly red background and for the triple stripes, which seemed to add an appropriate sporty touch and were far easier to cut than I'd imagined. A pearly red gem in each of the cutaway corners and the basic card was done.

This just left me to make the dangler (for which I'm sure there's a more formal name that I don't know). Using a bit more mirror-board was an easy decision but I wanted to add some depth and weight to help it hang well. It occurred to me that fun foam might work well but I wasn't sure how to cut a circle from it. I knew that punches weren't up to its thickness but I wondered whether a Nestabilities die cut in the Cuttlebug might work. The answer, once I tried it, was with ease: result! I needed something to go in the dangler's middle: firstly to finish it off and secondly as I had got a smudge of silver ink there from the stamp. A silver sequin topped with a clear star gem did the trick. I toyed with adding a little ribbon bow but decided it wasn't quite the right colour red, which saved me the trouble of deciding whether a bow on a male card was appropriate.

Having visited the Crafter's Companion website to make sure I'd remembered correctly about the apostrophe and where to stick it (something of an obsession of mine), I discovered that their monthly challenge was One for the Boys. I thought I'd put this card in for that as well, as an example of their marvellous embossing powder, which I love. My only gripe with it is that the container lid isn't removable so getting the excess powder back into the pot - we crafters hate to waste anything - is a fiddly and time-consuming task. Perhaps the next release could have a screw top lid?

OK boys, you've had a more than disproportionate amount of my crafting energy and attention recently. I will gladly admit to having enjoyed it greatly, and having discovered layouts, styles and combinations that I can readily use for many purposes, but the next projects will be firmly focussed on the girls. They'll have to be: September is bursting girlie birthdays.  BTW, did you work out my nephew's name yet?

Lions Roar No More

Well, we all know - don't we? - that Twenty20 cricket isn't real cricket … except, of course, when we recall that England are the current T20 world champions. This frame of mind comes from Surrey's exit from the 2011 domestic competition at the group stage. Huge disappointment, as with just two of the sixteen matches to go, the dizzy heights of a home quarter-final was on the cards. This had an added excitement for me, as it was feasible that this would have been against Lancashire and occur during the tiny five day window when a really good mate, Manchester born and bred but now exiled to France, would be visiting. Through my daydreaming, I should have realised that that was just too much expectation to place upon the shoulders of Rory's young Surrey lions.

I'd missed the first half of the campaign while lazing for most of June on a Greek beach. Several of the fixtures had been declared no result due to inclement English weather. Things were looking pretty open. My first match, three days after returning, was on a roasting hot afternoon at Beckenham. I appreciated the chance to top up my suntan, but a Kent victory was unwelcome. This was followed five days later, in the company of my utterly bestest cricket girl pal, by a comprehensive defeat at the hands of the Somerset cider-boys. Having grown up in Somerset, and with cricket mates living in Taunton, this was also not what I wanted to see. Apart from such terrific company, the highlight of evening was wearing my Ashes winning t-shirt. Not subtle or polite, I agree, but effective.

At this stage, it seemed clear that the T20 trophy was not going to return to the Surrey cabinet this year. Then came our glory week: three fixtures, at three different grounds, in five days, all of them victories and I saw all of them live. First, Monday evening at Whitgift School in Croydon: got really tight, felt Sussex had the upper hand but they kept dropping catches and Surrey squeaked home. Next, off to The Home of Cricket, in the company of a Middlesex member so with a view from the Pavilion. Marvellous experience and a great victory for Surrey.

Two out of three. Now, as we well know, Mr Loaf believes "two out of three ain't bad". I have never agreed with the man - fabulous performer though he is (well, apart from the time that I saw him collapse on stage at Wembley): two out of three ain't good enough in my book. And Surrey agreed. Back at The Oval the next night, watching for the first time from the top of the OCS Stand, Surrey pulled off a comprehensive trouncing of top of the table Hampshire. Yes!  Three in a row.  This was it, surely we were going to get our home quarter-final.

The ECB scheduling, for reasons known only to itself, threw a four day Championship match in next. We spectators took deep breaths, got pleasantly lulled by the soporific effects of the grown up game after so much hectic T20, and Surrey pulled off a tense and close victory, on a very cool fourth morning, against Kent. This backfired quickly the following evening, as Kent took their revenge and beat us easily. OK, the home QF was off but if we overcame Sussex the next day, we would still be through. Embryonic thoughts about a trip to Hove to watch were abandoned quickly as the news came through that it was sold out. Probably a blessing as Sussex reversed their Whitgift defeat and the Surrey Lions roared no more.

Plenty of talk on Twitter from deluded optimists pleased by a perceived improvement from Surrey's performance last year. What rubbish. In a knock-out tournament, what matters is getting through - not how well or poorly the team plays. We'd failed and from my point of view, the glass was utterly and completely empty. Still chastened by the crashing down of my T20 dreams, I'm yet to climb to wild heights of optimism about our CB40 one day chances. Yes, we won our first five matches. The sixth last weekend was a casualty of the weather. We're top of our group. All positive, so why am I not looking forward to the first weekend of September and the semi-finals? In fact, I have so little hope of such a prospect that I'll be back in Greece then. Perhaps having, so nobly, sacrificed the chance to see victory will ensure success? Yes, that's the plan. Come on The Rey!

Boys Boys Boys

This month's Get Funky! challenge from Funky Hand is "Boys Boys Boys". Cards for men are almost universally held to be the hardest to make but with two male relatives having birthdays in the next few weeks, this was a timely challenge for me. As usual, the wonderful Anice provided a fabulous freebie paper and, although there is no obligation to use it, the colour and pattern combination made it irresistible.

Learning from my experience with this week's Docrafts Creativity challenge, I decided to go for simplicity in design but also to have another go at using the previous unfamiliar combination of squares and circles. The colours of the freebie paper came from the Jovial Man collection on the Papercraft Factory Colour Me Happy CD and I chose another pattern from that as my second paper. After that, it was simply a matter of cutting out squares and circles, inking their edges (obligatory!) and matting them onto complementary card. Anice had included stars on the freebie sheet and although I didn't use those, I liked the idea (and sentiment) of including a star so punched one out of card, inked it, topped it with a button and stuck it on. I was very glad to find that I had just the right colour of ink and style of stamp for a casual "Happy Birthday" greeting, using another of the collection's papers. The wooden mini-peg was not part of my original design but, having found it in my button box, it seemed to provide a slightly quirky yet appealing embellishment. Albeit one that's not necessarily going to travel well through the mail …

Pleased with how the finished card looked, I made a few more along similar lines using other patterns in the collection. Although blue and green is a combination that's not "supposed to be seen", it's one that I've always really liked, being based, it seems to me, on prolific colours in nature, and certainly works well for men. Thanks to the Get Funky! design team for the inspiration; that's my male card needs sorted for now and a few more to come, which is a great relief. Lots of female birthdays coming up at the end of the summer: any chance that next month's challenge could provide a useful starting point for them?

Squaring the Circle

Good weather, cricket and a holiday have distracted me from card-making for too long.  With Surrey out of the Twenty20 and the UK summer reverting to the usual cool, damp and dull weather, staying in and crafting became not just a feasible option but also a very attractive one.  Too much time pressure when making cards rarely, if ever, enhances my creativity but a deadline of some sort does help focus my mind.  I didn't have any particular cards in hand for the family and friends with birthdays coming up in the next month.  And, after a hectic week in mid-April, I also haven't done all that well (understatement) in taking part in online crafting challenges.  A wet Sunday afternoon (about which a complaint has been lodged with St Swithin on the grounds that his saint's day at the end of last week had been gloriously sunny, hot and, most importantly, entirely dry - at least in London) offered a good opportunity to address both.

The Docrafts Creativity website has a new paper-crafting challenge each Tuesday, with a Monday evening submission deadline.  I'm impressed by those who are able to get cards in on Wednesday or Thursday but suspect that I'm amongst the majority who submit late on Sunday or during Monday.  This week's challenge was a simple sketch outline involving a square set on a circle.  This is not a natural combination in my card-making as my preference is to keep curves and angles separate.  I had a pink and green colour way in mind - perhaps to balance the greyness outside my window.  A suitably shaped and sized topper in each colour came readily to hand, along with some co-ordinating papers.

Although I am pretty hopeful that the finished card will go down well with the intended recipient, I'm not entirely satisfied with the final card.  I like the combination of paper colours and patterns and think the ribbons work well, although it's a shame that so little of them remains visible.  I had originally intended to avoid using the card-maker's staple of mirror-card.  However, the papers alone looked a bit flat and adding just a little bit of silver card as a matting layer behind the topper and as flower and gem embellishments seemed to lift the design in a pleasing way.  I think the card is a bit cluttered and would probably have benefitted from being a little bigger overall.  The papers seem to dominate and distract from the topper itself; probably something less complex would have worked better.  However, this combination of a circle and square has a potential that I wouldn't have thought of myself.  With a simpler, and completely square, topper - perhaps an initial or a single shape - it would work well and I aim to try a variation along those lines.

I suspect that there is no creative project with which the creator has ever been entirely satisfied.  Looking back over my back catalogue of cards, I can see plenty of positive evolution in my style, designs and skills.  Those who have been at this much longer than I have frequently comment that they are always discovering and learning something new.  That's a big part of the joy of it and I trust it long remains so. Although I suspect (or is that hope?) that cricket and good weather will get in the way of me taking part in the weekly challenge for the next couple of weeks.