Paper-Vinyl Wallets

One of the projects I decided to tackle are these bad boys found on Martha Stewart Living. It looked simple enough--if you're a sewer. But Brittany and I decided to tackle it because we couldn't stop ourselves from picking out all kinds of paper for our project to-be.

Even though I have had limited experience Brittany has never touched a sewing machine. So we may have gone in over our heads...BUT we were determined to make it work. So we brought out the big guns: My Mother.

And off Brittany and I went! 

First we had to cut the template then cut out the paper according to the template. All of which can be found here. 

It took some getting use to let alone some late frustrating nights but we eventually got the hang of it. Brittany got ambitious and made men's bi-fold wallets--hopefully a tutorial in the near future!

On a side note, the clear plastic vinyl (at least for the pocket portion) is a no-go. The cards stick really bad. And it's embarrassing when you're in the line at the grocery store trying to get your debit card out and everyone in line is looking at you like this:

 

So I would advice using the matte vinyl, the cards come out heck of a lot easier!

Check out my facebook for some of the wallets I've made. Also, I'm working on some paper-vinyl wallets to put in the etsy store if you're interested :D

Thanks for reading :)

Etsy Grand Opening - Soon!

So I've been working hard on making Monabeille Designs a reality. More specifically, the etsy store. I'm embarrassed to admit, but it's taken me exactly a year to finally say I can have a grand opening. But better late than never right?

Here's a snap shot of what's to come:

Currently I have bracelets and earrings to choose from. But you will also find wallets like these: 

I've been working on these to make sure everything functions as it should. That pockets aren't too big/too small, that the cards don't stick. There's been a lot of trial and error and testing the general wear of the wallets. But it's been rather fun! More about that later. Until then, I wanted to share my excitement--maybe I'll be too excited and just say what the heck, it's as good as ready! 

Breaking Through

Hello World!

Finally, my first blog post! It's always daunting to write the first one. I never know where to begin and I don't want to bog you down with redundancy from my about me page. So, instead, I've created a list to get Monabeille Designs off the ground.

My list goes a little like this...

First, in order to bring my enthusiasm of crafts to the blogging sphere, I needed to invest in a decent camera. I'm not one to spend money willy-nilly especially if I can make it. Cameras, on the other hand, are beyond my grasp of creativity. Maybe a couple stickers and paint splatters will help jazz it up, but everything else I'll have to trust the experts.

Finding the perfect camera proved to be a daunting task and I wanted one that wouldn't put a huge hole in my pocket book. I thought about those big fancy cameras that require two hands to hold. However, with all those bells and whistles comes a nice hefty price tag, too. I discovered regular digital cameras, at least for what I had in mind, would do the job.

While digging things up, these were the best, up to date, resources I had found:

• Digital Camera Tips for Photographing Jewelry
• This has a good list of camera settings to keep in mind when you're on the hunt
• A nice perk: she has pictures of jewelry she took with various cameras 
• She also mentions that you can use a scanner to take pictures of jewelry so I thought I would try that. It didn't work out so well for me as you can see
  
  

  

  Scanner as a camera. Unsuccessful.

• Best Pocket Camera for Macro Jewelry 
• This was another useful article I came across that also mentions macro settings and white balance 
• She explains why NOT to get a DSLR 
• After shopping around all over the place, I almost got her recommended camera but I was really attached to the updated version of what she had. The problem? It's out of my price range and changed very little from it's predecessor but it took great close-ups at the push of a button!
• Choosing the Right Camera
• This article has a break down of three different cameras and side by side comparison of the same picture
• They also explain the importance of lighting and give you additional resources a newbie
• Grand Decision 
• I decided to go with the Canon SX280 after looking at several reviews (a lot of which from CNET) and a keeping in mind the macro and white balance settings. So far, with some tweaking with the settings, I've been pretty happy with the pictures. 

Making sure I have the right camera to do the job is half the battle. The next thing I had to figure out is how to maximize the quality of the photo. I discovered that lighting can be your best friend or greatest enemy. While digging up articles I found out how to take good photos of your goodies with natural lighting. In some cases, photographers have a wonderful earthy/vintage flare with a wood backdrop. Since I have yet to attempt that, I decided to stick with the classic white which led me to consider a light box. A professional or semi-professional light box can get to be expensive. And we're crafters! We can figure out a solution :)

With the help of good ol' Pinterest, I came across this wonderful tutorial on creating a light box. It looks quite useful, cheap, and quick. Let's hope this works! With the help of my lovely Brittany, we were able to make this epic light box out of an empty cat litter box.

I used a smaller box than the original tutorial called for because I figured I didn't need that much room for jewelry. Although I'll probably make a bigger one later.

Supplies:

1. Medium - Large box 
2. Regular tracing paper 
3. An x-acto knife
4. Tape -- I forgot to take a picture of that, sorry :(
5. An 11 x 7" paper to be a nice little backdrop for my doggie model

Instructions:

1. Cut all four sides of the box about an half and inch smaller than your tracing paper - don't cut the bottom of the box
2. Tap the tracing paper to all cut out sides of the box - we out tape on the bottom to block out the light (you can see the blue tape in image 4)
3. Place light box in preferred setting -- BAM -- you're a instant professional photographer :) 

Annnnd here's what the little doggie looks like. It turned out a lot better (and cheaper) than I had expected!

Several blogs and professionals say that natural lighting allows you to get the highest quality of your projects. I couldn't agree more. With the doggie picture, I used not only natural lighting, which came through the window and hit the left side of him and then a regular lamp above him to capture this image. I would recommend taking your light box in different locations and try different lighting to see what you feel best represents your products.

I know Brittany and I had a blast trying out our light box, I'm sure you will too :)