Silhouette cards and tags... (I love aceton transfer!)

I just had to make some cards by aceton transfer now that I have some prints from a new laser printer (No, not mine *sniff*). I thought that the combination of the cardboard and the pictures you get with an aceton transfer would go great together.

And yes, in my point of view the old cardboard with the little bit rough structure of the surface and the worn out / rubbish (a little bit vintage, shaby...? don't know the actual nomenclature ^^) look of the black ink turned out to be a real good combination :)

I made a little collection of cards...

My crow stencil...

...you see my little mistake? The script is mirror inverted!

...of course the zebra isn't missing...

...one of my earlier loves from Karens graphics fairy!

To the left you can see the print after the transfer...

I tried several different methods (or better said a little bit different procedures...). I won't write them down just concetrate on the most important thing for the transfer:

Lay your print onto the desired surface (also wood or fabric is working quite well!).

Put a little bit aceton on a paper tissue and NOT on your print!

Now you have to be fast:

Press the paper tiessue with the aceton on your print.

And I mean "press"! It is only during the first contact with the aceton (or other kind of solvent you are using but aceton works best for me) that the colour starts bleeding. As soon as the aceton dries again the colour won't ever be transferable again (regardless how much aceton you would spill over the print). Also without the pressure the colour won't bleed into your target but stays in the print.

Look at the picture below: On the left side I used some pressure but put the aceton direct over the print. On the right side I used the procedure described above.

In short I would say: Pressure and aceton should be used at exact the same time!

And of course I used some of the tags I cut out yesterday ^^

You see how my skill improved?

The horse is an image from graphics fairy. I also made the cat and the swallow stencil from picutres from graphics fairy (Oh, I just love her collection!) The crow and the tree stencil are my own graphics :)

I have a lot more stencils and things I made by using them, just have a look if you like or jump over here for how to make your own one :)

Starting the new year...

2011.

This year it is surprisingly easy to adapt to the new number. Maybe because I am really happy that the last year is over and there is a new, fresh one in front of me. Yes, I know, in the end it is only a human made calendar. But it is good to have defined end and start points. :) Okay, let's go over to the more crafting related things.

One of my christmas presents was a purple filofax (size: personal). A real beauty! I am now starting to put everything I need in it... dates, numbers, informations... etc. But there was still the need for something more personal in the filofax. Once using it there will be a lot stuff developing by itself... but... there had to be something from the start!

 So I created a new first side.

I just used old calender sites (the last half year of 2010 was still included) as my stencil. Just cut out a piece of cardboard (really just packaging stuff but cool one! Better than every kind I can buy), mark the little holes and punch them out. Yes, it is time consuming but doing just one side I didn't mind :)

I printed the zebra from graphics fairy (Ha, you would never have guessed ^^) with a laser printer out and transfered it with some aceton onto the cardboard. Just apply some aceton on the back of the paper, rub gently and peel the paper off. There it should be! The aceton will dry really fast :)

But have a try before because this only functions with some prints and not with all. It seems that the age of the printer is important. Don't ask me why.... but with old printers it doesn't function and with new ones it does. This is an example for an old print... you see, won't transfer very good *sniff*

After that I added the words and tentacles with artistic water colours.

This isn't black but a dark grey! Sometimes it is better to use a dark kind of grey than black.

I am thinking about carving a Z3 (mirror inverted) stamp... It's like a new little logo and I am somehow into it. Like a little word play. Strange because I only got the Z3 mirror inverted due to the aceton transfer ^^

I will add the brownie recipe for decembersong. I got an award for my blog from centi which says to give it to more cool and small blogs but since this is mostly german I'll have a little difficulty here (but I loved to get the one from centi! :) ).

So insteadt of giving the award to more blogs I will just say here: Have a look at the blog of decembersong and her friends which is called "some nifty things" (and have a look at the so cool axolotl plushy! I hopefully will also get one in exchange for something from my stuff!). This is really something for lisbonlioness because decembersong is also an in the best way odd german ^^ We are out there! A lot of us... whether still living in germany or somewhere in the rest of the world. For some explanations of all these... just go over to lisbonlioness and her Three beds semi!

And also have a look at centis blog too and especially at her cute mushroom "collection" (fotos as well as crafted ones). Starting from centi you could have a look around some german crafting blogs and although they are mostly written in german I think the pictures are most of the time self-explaining.

Then let's end with my brownie recipe.

 (Which is not mine but the family one I only adapted a little bit... ^^)

The normal one is quite easy...

• 150 g (to be honest I always take 200 g) dark chocolate, but the real good dark chocolate with 70 % cacao or more! No chocolate for coating or milk chocolate or cheap chocolate... it makes so much of a difference in the taste!
• 250 g butter
• 1 3/4 cup demara sugar (the real one which is not processed and NOT just coloured ^^ this is also so important for the taste)
• 1 cup floor (in germany type 405, I think this would be like the all-purpose-floor?)
• 5 eggs (size M)
• a little bit vanilla or vanilla sugar 

•  let the butter soften at room temperature, mix it with the sugar and then with the eggs...
•  add the vanilla and the floor...
•  melt the chocolate and add it to the dough

At this time the dough is really fluid ^^ I normally use a spring form where I cover the bottom with baking paper. I use a little bit butter for the sides of the form to grease it and then cover it with really small breadcrumbs. You won't taste them but it will be so easy to remove the cake after baking! With the breadcrumbs it won't ever stick to the form. Love this method and use it for all kind of cakes ^^

•  preheat the oven to 180 °C
•  back it for 30 min (it will still be a little bit fluid inside, it will set while cooling down) for the original taste
•  back it for about 40 min to get a more dry normal chocolate cake consistency (but why make a brownie then? ^^)

For some time now I always add some highly concentrated coffee to the dough. Dark chocolate and coffee... normally I am not a person who can't get enough from dough but with this combination I could eat the whole dish!

But there is a lot of stuff which taste great and can be put inside the brownie... I love the taste with amaretto. Just all kind of nuts are great, whether powdered, chopped, roasted... marshmellows are also cool... dried fruits... Puh, no end to that!

And don't be worried about the amounts. No egg is the same, demara sugars from different companies also tend to be different and so on... The recipe always works whether the dough is a little bit more fluid or not :)

But never add baking soda! Never!

If you won't eat the brownie that day I hoghly recommend to cover the brownie with chocolate. Either with chocolate coating or with chocolate with some coconut oil added...

And then: Add tentacles formed out of marzipan! For this you just have to mix marzipan with a lot of powdered sugar until it is really "hard".

My latest one with tentacles (from this blog entry).

 You can find more of my tentacle cakes here.

 Brownies in a jar / Zebra brownies:

 For my zebra brownies I made a dark chocolate / coffee version and a white chocolate / vanilla version.

Then the real work started... I had to adapt the temperature and the baking time. Puh, the first ones where really fluid (although they still taste great ^^), for some I used way too much dough and during baking the whole brownie said hello over the edge of the jar!

In the end the best conditions (for my oven!) were the following ones:

•  Fill 1/2 to max. 2/3 of the jar with dough
•  use 175 °C
•  bake the whole stuff for about 40 min

Close the jars instantly! Be careful doing this because 175 °C can really burn your fingers...
If some brownie went over the edge just cut it away and then close it ^^

Okay... I don't like enter recipes in my blog. To make a brownie is such an easy recipe! But only to get this written down it took... some time.

Edit: The editing functions of blogger are today somewhat strange... and not doing what I want them to do. Grrrml... First time ever this happens so badly with blogger.

Zebra cards...

After christmas you'll propably send some thank you cards. This cards I made with the cool zebra from Karen @ graphics fairy.

Seems that if I fell in love with a graphic I really have to use it for several projects before moving on ^^ But hey, this zebra is really special!

I printed it out and just put two-side adhesive tape on the back. Two-side or double-side adhesive tape is one of the best things ever for such projects!

And I just cut the zebra out.

I found these great papers at our chinese super market.

They are something called "Weihpapier" which I would translate as blessing paper. Aren't they beautiful?

I made one with the silver and one with the golden paper.

As background I used grey cardboard, black cardboard and an old bookpage.

Just look at the texture!

Mh.. have to think what else to make out of this paper! Any ideas? Want some too? :)

All the christmas sweets...!

Most of the time I don't like to show the things (even the sweets) before the arrived at the persons they are thought for. So here we go with my christmas sweets. But some of them are adaptable for other occasions.

Like my zebra brownie! Just a normale brownie with dark chocolate and a "brownie" with white chocolate baked in an open jar. After baking I instantly closed the lid (Yes, it is hot, be careful!) so it will be durable for a long time. Not that brownies are really durable... that is against their nature of being tasty ^^ The brownie will get a new consisty compared to a traditional one because most of the moisture stays in the jar. It is a little bit more creamy... don't know how to describe it better. But a little bit like a new kind of brownie.

The little zebra pictures I found at Karens graphics fairy. I printed them out the day she showed them on her blog. I didn't know what I wanted to do with them then but just starting to make the brownies all came together quite well. I put the zebras either on old book pages or black cardboard. Sometimes I went other with my sewing maschine with some red thread...

And the most important thing to add: Hot coffee! You can either eat the brownie like it is or warm it up in a water bath or the microwave (without lid!). And to a hot brownie... mh.. you could just add some vanilla ice cream, don't you think so? ^^

 The next sweet was an idea I had while talking with a friend. Snowball apples!

Just use organic apples which were grown without the use of pesticides. I mean you want to eat the apple skin! Wash the apples and put a wooden stick in them. Just cover them with melted white chocolate and cover it with desiccated coconut. All the little flakes...!

I love the look! A snowball!

In a nice wrapping... :)

And of course I had to make some melting snowmen! There were so many in the last linking parties that were so adorable and cute that I couldn't resist.

I just made cookies out of shortcrust (does it really say shortcrust in english for this kind of dough?). The icing is powedered sugar with lemon juice (I love that taste!). The heads were marshmellows which were for 15 to 18 seconds in the microwave at 600 W. The faces and co were painted with a sugar paste.

And now please forgive me... I just added too many fotos of the cookies here! ^^