Arnold Grummer's Design Team Blog

It's hard to believe another year has gone by and that this will be my last post for 2013.  I know many have been through difficult times this year, my family included, so I'm glad in a way to see this year end, but just because it's ending doesn't mean there's not fun in store for 2014.  I'm looking forward to seeing what the upcoming fun will be. The start of a new year is the time for resolutions.  Make one of your resolutions be to start a new hobby such as making your own handmade paper.  It's a great way to have fun and create some wonderful handmade items including all of the gifts you will need next year.  You know you'll need one sooner than you want to think about it so now is the time to get started! This New Year's banner was created using handmade paper.  The "bow" started out to be three bells, but when I dried the paper using an iron I had laid them on top of each other and suddenly my eyes saw a bow and that's how ...

Are you still decorating for the holidays? I am—and probably will be until the wee hours on Christmas Eve. (But, then, I guess that would be the very early hours of Christmas Day!!) Anyway, you get what I'm saying: I'm going to be decorating until the last possible moment. Many of my decorations include handmade paper, and today I'm sharing one of my favorites. It is a 3D angel. She's so easy to make!! I'm sharing the pattern in PDF , MTC (Make-the-Cut) , and SVG formats. Here you can see the angel cut out from a light blue handmade paper. I colored the paper pulp with a pale blue tinting tissue and added botanical inclusions. I following these basic instructions when making the paper, but for this piece I processed longer so the inclusions would be blended into smaller pieces. Next step was to embellish the cutout. I chose a silver metallic chenille stem for her halo and Dew Drops along the hemline. You could also use glitter glues, rhinestones, or othe...

I love working with paper and am  really excited to say that I will be joining the Arnold Grummer's design team  in January!    Making dresses with handmade paper is so much fun. Cut the paper, get it damp and it is easy to work with, almost like delicate fabric. If you have a dress form to work with it makes it easier to form the wet paper when creating the dress. Before the paper is  wet run a thread about every 1/2 inch through the top of the skirt to help hold the gathers in place. After the paper is wet gently (VERY GENTLY) pull the thread to make the gathers.  Pictured is the damp paper dress tied with ribbon on the form ready to dry overnight. When making a project like this allow plenty of drying time.  NO cheating... the paper must be totally dry before removing it from the dress form. The dried pieces are able to free stand.  To make the dress I free cut the a skirt, three parts for the bodice and the s...

I love making rosettes and this time of year I always seem to make as many as I can.  This rosette is extra special because it's made using handmade paper.  The image is one of my favorites that I've had for a while now.  It came from one of the collage sheets from Altered Pages.  I've been in a vintage creating mood lately so chose to make this rosette have a vintage look to it.  For the rosette, I made 2 sheets of paper using the Papermill Pro Envelope & Stationary Kit .  I used some scraps of white paper that I had been collecting and followed the basic instructions for making paper.  When I added the water according to the directions, I added a 1:1 ratio of water to tea to dye the paper.  I laid the paper flat and allowed it to dry for a day. Here's a little hint, if you don't want to use an iron or heat gun to dry it quickly, you can lay it a little ways away from a heat vent and as the furnace turns on and off it helps to dry...

There's always a flurry of activities between Thanksgiving and Christmas—shopping, parties, gift wrapping, Christmas cards. But this year I'm ahead of the game, if only on one item on that list—my Christmas cards. I've been thinking about the design for quite a while. Since this summer, actually. I live in Ohio where we have brisk autumns that move into cold  winters. I like to do my handmade paper making outside, so I try to make lots of paper during the spring and summer fair-weather months. I made the papers for this snowflake Christmas card way back in May or June using these basic papermaking instructions . Since I knew I'd be using these papers for Christmas, I was sure to include plenty of metallics and sparkles along with botanicals . I had the pastel color palette in mind when I selected my tissue tint s to color the papers. I used a variety of Sizzix snowflake dies to cut the individual snowflakes, then layered the four snowflakes on the card base. Las...