Monday, April 20, 2009

Acrylic Tag Book

Yesterday I worked on a little acrylic tag book for my Mom for Mother's Day. Since I knew I would be using numbers, I also took this opportunity to make another submission for the CuttleBug Challenges Numbers Challenge by Elle's Studios. You can click on the link to head over there and see more details about that.

These little tag books are great - they are the perfect size for wallet size or smaller pictures. Plus, they are quick to make, and they look beautiful! Here is the front cover:


For this first page, I used the Graphically Speaking cartridge for the 24/7, the heart, and "U" box. Incidentally, the Graphically Speaking cartridge is fantastic! It has some really unique images on it!

"Oma", which is what my kids call my Mom, comes from Opposites Attract. I embossed the background using Cuttlebug folder, and I slightly inked the raised areas and the edges of the paper. For the edges of the acrylic, I used a similar technique on all of the pages - I ink the edges with whatever kind of ink I have in the preferred color; then once that base ink was dry, I added clear embossing ink; then dipped the edges in Ultra Thick Embossing Enamel (UTEE). This creates a really cool effect on the edges. This effect also softens the edges literally! These little acrylic books have sharp edges, and by embossing with the UTEE is takes those sharp edges away while adding a nice color or just shiny effect. This is a closer picture of the embossed edges.


Here are the subsequent pages:


All of these little cuts came from Graphically Speaking - I used Design Studio on the pointed oval "doilie" under the pictures on the left (it started out as a circle doilie).


When I make these little acrylic books, I like to make sure that anything that shows through on both sides of the acrylic is pleasant on both sides. For instance, I typically don't have words that show through on the other side of any acrylic page because it will be backwards on the other side, and I don't care for that. But on the "D&K" page on the right, I put a scalloped border, and I put stickles in the little holes, and all of that will show on the back of the page too.

I also use double sided paper so that it looks nice on both sides of each acrylic sheet. On the family picture on the left, you can see the patterned paper and the scalloped edge showing through from the previous page. I cut the scalloped oval using Nestabilities.


I used the Soccer Solutions cartridge for the soccer cuts. On the right side, the little hearts came from All Mixed Up


I added some ribbon to the binder clip to finish off the project. I really like how this turned out! And I think Oma will love it!

7 comments:

Mrs J said...

Wow Deanne, what a wonderful album that I imagine your Mom will be thrilled to receive! You've put so much work and detail into it, great work and gorgeous photo's! Thanks for playing along again with us at http://cuttlebugchallenge.blogspot.com/!
Hugs Mrs Jx

Amber said...

Deanne I LOVE your tag album, perfect for our #'s challenge this week. And I loved your photos too! The details in the album are amazing, you did a fab job!
Thanks so much for joining us at CBC!
Amber

Nathalia Castellon said...

Beautiful project Deanne! Love all the attention to detail! :)

Nathalia
Cuttlebug Challenge Blog

Unknown said...

This is darling! What a great project!

Meda said...

This really looks lovely!
Thank you for joining this challenge at the Cuttlebug Challenge Blog Meda

Cassie said...

what a wonderful gift!! thanks for joining us at cuttlebug challenge! good luck with the giveaway!

Nancy Sanders said...

Deanne,Wow! amazing and a lot of work but I know your Mother will love this. I have never worked with acrylic.