yupo paper | The Contented Crafter

Do you remember a couple of posts back I mentioned a give-away? And where I showed you the beginning processes in the creation of my new line of Note Cards. Yupo paper, alcohol inks and hours of doodling went into completing four A4 sheets. Each sheet was then cut into four pieces and, when the note cards were all made up there is a grand total of 16 different designs.

I already showed you the first four completed cards. When Susanne made a comment on that previous post about them reminding her of ‘Swinging London’ in the 60’s their name was born. Here they are again, sporting their new look. Meet ‘Note-Cards ‘Carnaby Street’

Here is the second sheet of Inky Yupo paper

And here the doodling work is completed

Here are the four cards that utilise that design ‘Note Cards Summer Garden’

Here is the third ink dropped sheet

Doodles completed

And here are the four cards ‘Cosmic Time’. I think this is my favourite one

Here is the fourth sheet, remember I had started the doodling work

This one took the longest to complete, there is more than 15 doodle hours here:

And here are the four note cards ‘Evening Garden’

You can use any card upright or top hinged, it is purely personal preference.

Every A5 note card comes with a writing paper insert, allowing you to write fully on three leaves. After much experimentation and contemplation I decided to stay with white card and ordinary printing paper for the inserts. It was simply easier and more affordable.

Every note card is hand made by me. I cut the card, slice the original design into four and trim it to fit the card. I ink the edges of each little printed design. I alone score, crease and fold the card into shape, wrestle with my double sided tape gun (which is being extremely temperamental at the moment) and adhere the card and printed paper together. I then cut the paper insert to size, trim and finally adhere that inside the card. Slight variations and imperfections are inevitable.

Now to the give away. Which isn’t really a free thing at all, I’m asking for your advice and in return your name goes in the draw for a set of note cards, design of your choice. So, to enter you must humour me and help me solve a terrible conundrum. Please do read on if you want to play…….

Will you pretend with me that you want to purchase a set of four note cards. You are ready and champing at the bit to get into letter writing again, these doodly cards are the perfect size for a chatty and cheerful note to get the ball rolling. You feel that the cost of $NZ17 is affordable, you know, that’s just $4 per card and 25c per envelope, cheaper than most mass produced cards.

And then you check out shipping costs. (We’ve been here before recently, yes? Well, here we go again!)

You discover that four note cards with envelopes costs $17 + $15 shipping for International customers and $5 shipping for domestic customers. Suddenly the cards from the corner store are looking way more appealing!

The thing that pushes the cost up is the size of the envelopes, they take the packet from letter rate to small packet rate, which is the same rate I send small light catchers around the world for. And there’s a big difference in size and weight between 4 note cards and a triple strand light catcher!

So what if you just bought your own envelopes from the local store?

Four note cards with no envelopes costs $16 + $3 shipping – anywhere in the world.

Which scenario would you prefer?

Hit your option choice in the poll box

*$NZ16 = $US11.50 / $Ca15.11 / $Au15.05 / UKP9.20

Double your amount for total cost inc shipping of option 1

But talk to me too – I love you to talk to me 🙂

Do you have a favourite design or colour way?

All regular chatterers will go in the draw, your choice of note card pack:

*Carnaby Street

*Summer Garden

*Cosmic Time

*Evening Garden

*Mixed Notes {one of each collection)

And finally, Siddy says “Helllloooooo!” to his fans

March 16 3

Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did!

Wow, lookit me go! It’s still January and here’s another post! I hope it won’t be too much of a shock for you.

I’ve been pottering, and the silver lining to the no-show summer is (Ta-da!!) the tiny house has now been entirely decluttered. I mean ENTIRELY! There is nothing in this house now that is not useful or beautiful and probably both. The laundry was the last space holding onto ‘someday’ things. The last drawer has been sorted and tidied and there is nothing left to do now but keep it all ticking over nicely. Can you see my halo, isn’t it bright and sparkly ……..

I rocked up to my local stationers a couple of days ago and had them scan all twenty of the pieces in the art journal I worked on for the last three months of 2016. Plus print out copies of all the yupo paper/alcohol ink pages I had made. I’d decided to copy the ink spreads and then doodle so that I have lots of options to play.

Did those last two sentences sound like a foreign language to you? Read on my friend, read on.

Yupo paper isn’t paper, it’s a synthetic, a plastic pretending to be paper. It is therefore classed as a non-porous surface and things can be done to this stuff that can’t be done on paper, no matter how many gsm’s it is.

It’s also, at this end of the world, horribly expensive and something I intend to try only once in this life. Hence the photocopying before doodling remark. I treated myself to fifteen sheets and waved a fond farewell to $25.00.

One of the really fun things we can play with is alcohol inks, dripping drops of different colours onto the page and watching what happens. The ink spreads out and ‘blooms’, changing colour somewhat at the edges, more with some colours than others. Mixing different colours together results in different spreadings, different blooms, and sometimes even no blooms. It’s like taking part in some mysterious class in alchemy and is totally fascinating to observe.

When the dripping and watching and wondering is done and the inks are dry (which doesn’t take long at all provided you don’t over drop in the first place) you doodle. Doodling is also fun! It can be done in front of the TV if you are so inclined, or can just be a quiet, meditative activity that steals hours from your life 🙂

Here’s some examples of the ink drops

Here’s one I have started to doodle on

And here is the only spread that is finished so far.

And here is that last spread cut into four pieces and note cards made using different coloured card and with writing paper inserts. The following two photos taken at the desk, under lamp light, in the middle of a dreary, wet day:

Notecards 1

Notecards 2

I’m not complaining though, we had three lovely sunny, warm days on the trot. It was quite exciting!

I have to say I really like these notecards, and in the interests of encouraging the renewed interest in letter writing, I’m going to package some up and put them in my shop. And do a giveaway. Stay tuned for that.

‘Believe’ is finished.

This is a texture rich piece and there’s also a ton of gold metallic paint in there so it looks entirely different in different lights. This is a slightly skewed scan, which is entirely unexciting as far as mood lighting goes. You must therefore use your imagination to see all the gold glimmery bits. Sorry about that.

I’m quite pleased with this one.

I hope you like it too.

So what do you think, are you tempted to play with yupo paper and alcohol inks? Have you done so already? How did it go for you? And what do you think of those notecards?

Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did!