HAPPY FALL, Y'ALL!

Hey!

Happy Fall, Y'All!

Today, the official first day of Autumn, I wanted to share something fallish with you. So, I present to you these two punkins made from Stampin' Up! Designer Series Paper.

I am a paper hoarder. Did you know that about me? Stampin' Up!'s DSP is so exquisite that I have a tendency to hang on and hang on and hang on. I'm sure many of you know firsthand what I'm talking about. I am especially bad about seasonal paper. Sure, I'll use SOME of it, but the rest? Hang on -- just in case.

Well, I'm glad I hung on to fall/Halloween DSPs I've owned over the years. Because this project took a lot of sheets of different designs. And I had to be extra careful that the oranges blended well, and that the neutral in the papers was Very Vanilla as opposed to white. 

These are the two pumpkins I made. One takes six sheets of DSP, while the other -- smaller -- one requires 12 sheets. 

This next photo shows the two of them sort of from the top.

I made the first pumpkin a couple days ago. For this one, I used a 4" circle die to cut out six different fallish Designer Series Papers. I then folded each of the circles in half precisely. In making these, or any other similar project, it is so so important to be precises in folding,  matching, etc. It is too easy to be a little haphazard when doing these projects, and then the final result is a little wonky, and/or doesn't sit up straight. So, be careful!

When I was using stripes, I was absolutely sure that the stripes went exactly up and down. Once I had all six of the 4" circles folded in half, I realized that I should have folded the good sides -- the sides I wanted facing outwards -- together. So, I refolded my six circles, creasing each one well with a bone folder.

Then, I carefully looked at all the prints and decided the order I would add the circles together, in hopes that the papers would be differing enough if they were to be right next to each other. If you know what I mean. Once I had my circles stacked the way I wanted them to appear, I started with the first circle folded in half, adding Tombow Multipurpose Glue (Green Glue!) to one side, being careful to not get glue too close to the folded edge. Being precise once again, I took the next circle in line, and matched up that half. Each time I added another folded circle, I clunked the folded flat edge against the table to be double sure that it was all straight and even. I continued on in this manner through my entire pile of circles. 

At this point, I made a critical mistake. Yes, I was sort of making this up as I went along. OK, here's the mistake: I finished the pumpkin circle by gluing together the first and last circles so I had a complete pumpkin shape. Great. This presented me with two problems.

When I set the pumpkin up, it was wobbly. Of course, the bottom was ROUNDED. What did I expect?!? I folded the pumpkin flat, and went to my trusty old Stampin' Up! guillotine papercutter, and trimmed a bit off of one end. Happily, it was only six layers of paper, and the cutter handled the job. Whew.

Now, another problem I then discovered:

I needed to add the stem, leaves and curlicue. How was I going to do that??? Luckily, I'd had the foresight to not glue too close to the folds on each of the circles. So, there was just enough of a gap at the top of the pumpkin to do some weird insertions. 

For the stem, I took a piece of cool kraft packing material that came in my Young Living box, cut it to the appropriate size, and rolled it tightly, gluing the end to the stem. I added glue to the bottom of the stem and wiggled it into place.

Next I did the same with the diecut leaves and the squiggly. I did carefully undo that last gluing to slip them into place, keeping my fingers crossed that nothing would tear or buckle in the process. I lucked out, and it worked just fine.

The first pumpkin with mistakes and only six pieces of paper:

That pumpkin seen from above.

It doesn't have a whole lot of character, in my opinion.

This afternoon, I'd had my heart set on creating a smaller but fuller pumpkin. For this one, I needed to go into my stash again to find more fallish prints that would work well with the six I'd used on the first pumpkin. As luck would have it, I was able to manage it.

I then die cut TWELVE different papers into 3 1/4" circles. Once that was finished -- you know, they say that experience is the best teacher -- I took my folded half circles to my papercutter, and one by one, tucked the straight folded edge against the top of the cutter, moved the pumpkin to the 3" mark, and snipped off that much. By being so careful, I was able to get through all 12 circles and have them all match.

Experience again: I learned to fold my circles in half by putting the "good" sides together. The only exception was when it was a stripe or a distinct design. Then I needed to put the "bad" sides together for the first fold so I could match things up. At that point, I turned it "inside out" and used a bone folder to crease my folds. 

I proceeded as with the first pumpkin then. After sorting to get a good combo of designs, I started to glue it together. But . . . I DID NOT GLUE THE PUMPKIN TOGETHER. Yay me!

For the stem, I did the same thing, but could comfortably glue it in place with the pumpkin lying in an open state. I used a different leaf die to cut the two leaves for this pumpkin, and glued them in place. It was a little tricky to get it glued back together with the extra bulk, but I got it to work.

The smaller,, but fatter, pumpkin from above:

And the two of them side by side together once again:

Now, here's the question: Do you prefer the pumpkin with fewer circles or the fatter one with twice the number of circles?

I love learning from my mistakes. When working with more expensive paper like Designer Series Paper, it is heartbreaking if you make an error and are not able to work with it to rectify the situation. Then it gets garbaged. Grrrr. But, I lucked out, even though I'd had a few errors on the first one, and was able to salvage the situation.

Fall

Smiles.