Parting is such sweet sorrow...

Hello again!  Hope you're all having a lovely August weekend - weather permitting!  Thank you so much for choosing to spend some of it here at Words and Pictures... it's great to have you stop by.

I've been having a glorious time distressing and ageing to create some leaving cards I'd been commissioned to make.  It was a slightly strange experience...  a colleague from the Royal Shakespeare Company (where I worked for nearly eight years until going freelance earlier this year) is now also leaving, and asked if I could make some farewell cards for her to distribute.  So I found myself making Farewell cards on someone else's behalf, for people I know very well, and with whom I'm just about to start working again, as I'm going back in as a freelancer at the beginning of September!!

In any case, you'll now understand the Shakespeare theme when you see the cards.  And my colleague had selected specific 'thank you' quotes for each person, so the cards vary slightly according to the play from which the quote is taken.  Take a look...

When I knew I'd be making several cards, I wanted to work with a technique I really enjoy!  I did enjoy getting a vintage patina and lustre onto the embossed background, but my absolute favourite thing to do at the moment is the ageing and distressing... I love using inks, the Tim Holtz Paper Distresser, rubbing, rolling, ripping, tearing and curling to give the papers an antique feel, and some dimensionality on the page...




Each card has the first page of the First Folio (my absolute desert island book) text for the relevant play for its quote, inked, ripped, rolled and so on to get some sense of the nearly 400 years which have passed since its publication (1623 for the curious amongst you...).







Then the quote itself is printed, grunged with a Tim Holtz texture stamp, inked, Paper Distressed on the edges, and finally rolled around my useful bit of wooden dowelling to get the wave effect, and the curly edges.

(I'm sharing mainly the Twelfth Night one here, but you'll get glimpses of some of the others.)





The background is medium weight Kraft cardstock, embossed with the Tim Holtz Patchwork embossing folder.  I then blended Vintage Photo, Walnut Stain and a bit of Black Soot onto it, and finally gave it a good spritz with the Heirloom Gold Perfect Pearls Mist, for a lovely lustrous finish.

The nib, of course, is there for the writer, and you'll see that I've used the Prima French Script stamp to provide a background on the cream card base.



I printed some tiny Williams to put in the little jewellery findings frames I got from the Bead Shop online, and filled them in with Glossy Accents... then attached them with a TH Idea-ology long attacher.

You can see in this photo that I've also taken the Paper Distresser to the edges of the embossed background layer to get that extra texture.




Just another little shot trying to really capture the movement in the quotes (this one the Henry VIII card).

You can also see below the inked mesh and ribbon added for texture and for some strong horizontal detailing, which I felt it needed to anchor all the higgledy-piggledy layout and distressing.

And finally a shot of the whole lot, awaiting delivery to their commissioner - who was, thankfully, very very happy with them.  I look forward to finding out how they went down with the recipients soon!

Thanks so much for spending some time here at Words and Pictures... it's great to have your company along the way in this crafty journey... and I look forward to meeting again here or elsewhere in Craftyblogland very soon!

I'm entering these in the following:
Favourite Technique (ageing/distressing) at Simon Says Stamp and Show
The Allsorts challenge to add something metal (nib and picture frame) with their Heavy Metal challenge

The remarkable thing about Shakespeare is that he is really very good - in spite of all the people who say he is very good.
Robert Graves

Wonderful women!  Have you ever thought how much we all, and women especially, owe to Shakespeare for his vindication of women in these fearless, high-spirited, resolute and intelligent heroines?
Dame Ellen Terry