Guest Designer - Deborah Nolan

Die Cut Divas lets get to know.............Deborah Nolan   

Tell us a little about yourself -
Hmmm…. I've been married to Spouse for 23 years, and after many miscarriages, we had Gigi, who just turned 11 years old. We three are ridiculously close as we have no near family. I'm a film aficionado, and I rarely watch TV until a series is long over and playing on Netflix. I love to read, sing (especially harmonizing to hymns in the bluegrass gospel style Spouse plays on his mandolin), and I would really like to spend more time in the garden this year.

How long have you been a card maker/scrapper & when did you start?
I started scrapbooking in 2002 after Gigi was born. I was invited to join a LSS Design Team shortly thereafter, and I had to make a card, a tag and a page for each assignment – which is how I started getting into card making. I eventually became much more interested in making cards than scrapbooking. (I suspect this is because the canvas is much smaller.) J ·

Do you follow sketches or dive right in?
I start with a sketch – although I don’t seem to be very good at following it once I get going. This can be very annoying, and no matter how I well I'm doing, it’s almost inevitable for me to decide a lower layer needs to be changed, so I do a lot of repositioning. · How many projects do you make a week? It depends on our family’s schedule. If the rest of the world isn't intruding into my free time, I make 3-5 cards per week. (Note that I didn't say I make 3-5 good cards per week.) · 

What is your favourite tool (what can't you create without) & why?
Asking me to limit it to one tool is just plain mean! It’s a toss-up, probably, between two tools that help me with my glue issues – and I just realized I don’t know the name of either of them! (How sad it that? I had to go hunt them down online.) The first one is the only thing I have from Creative Memories… the Multi-Purpose Tool. (Real descriptive name, eh?) It’s about 7” long and has a flat, narrow body made from a mildly flexible plastic that can be used like a spatula to slide between two adhered items to gently pry the top one loose. (Remember how I said I reposition things a lot? This is what keeps them from getting mangled or bent.) The other item is a Xyron Adhesive Remover. This is a rubbery 2”x2” square that will remove most dried adhesives. Since I tend to somehow get bits of glue everywhere, this is a LIFESAVER. I’ve also found that it’s pretty good at removing light applications of Ranger Distress ink. (BONUS!)

What at the moment is your most favourite thing to do on your project?
I’ve really started to get into paper-piecing lately – either by fussy cutting or with dies. (I prefer the later as I’m lazy and love the perfection of a die-cut edge.)

How would you describe your style? Non-existent. (Elusive at best, AWOL at worst.) Seriously, I envy some of my friends because I can spot their work a mile away. Kelly Booth, Donna Mikasa, Lucy Abrams – all are great cardmakers with distinctive (and KILLER) styles – whereas I’m all over the place. I can say that I’m drawn to the clean and simple school, that I tend to choose colors that are exactly opposite one another on the color wheel for maximum pop, and that I am very keen on using a large mat as my first layer.

What about your style would you change (or not) & why?
I would really like to have one, for starters. I think I get a little anal with my color matching, and I’ve always been stumped by patterned paper. I recently took Jennifer and Kristina’s online class, Pattern Play, and this was SO helpful. I don’t think I learned anything new, per se, but it gave me the ability to harness all those different bits of knowledge and mentally organize them so they’re working together in a more efficient way. It’s like I defragmented my brain.

Have you been published or on a Design team - when & where?
 I have been published multiple times in Take Ten, The Stampers Sampler, Somerset Studio, Cards, Paper Trends, and Paper Crafts specialty publications. I’m currently a Design Team member for Memory Box and The Craft’s Meow, and I’m a staffer at Scrapbook News and Review.

 Memory Box
The Craft’s Meow
Scrapbook News and Review



Describe (pictures are even better) your crafting area
My creative space is ½ of a room in our unfinished attic and has no heat, no AC, and almost no natural light because the chimney shaft blocks the only window – which is pretty dang small. (Oh, the humanity!) I threw convention out the window a few summers ago and sponged the unfinished walls on my side with paint because I just couldn’t take the ugliness any longer. I still don’t have trim or baseboards, but I can live with that for now. Since the dormers start 4’ from the floor, my vertical real estate is limited. I’ve arranged my most-used tools and supplies in three strategic spots: hanging from a pegboard above my work surface, nesting in my tool carousel to my left, and stored in multiple drawer units to my right. I like to keep staples within arm’s reach. Also to my left are my stamp pads and a Cropper Hopper hanging file box that holds my paper scraps by color. I can easily pivot on my stool if I want to stitch a card on the sewing machine, and, If I want to heat emboss or die cut, the necessary tools are located about three feet away. (I have since replaced the Big Shot in the picture with a Vagabond, btw. You can also get an idea of what the walls used to look like in this picture.) These pictures are at least two years old, but everything is pretty much the same – although I have some rain gutters (for ribbon storage) that I want Spouse to install on the slanted dormer wall.

Do you have a blog? If not where can we see more of your fabulous creations?
The Society of Stampaholics (or SOS because these initials privately refer to Save Our Sanity).  SOS

 Do you host any challenges? Please tell us about it/them.
  I host a monthly, international card exchange called the Card Chain Challenge. You have until the 17th or so each month to sign up, with a reveal of all participant’s cards on the 1st of the following month. Each participant makes and sends a card to the person above her on the sign-up list (the first person on the list sends her card to the last person on the list so it comes full circle). The challenge is very rewarding since everybody “wins” and at least one person actually does win a prize (usually a stamp) from a random drawing of the participants. You should definitely come and sign up for this month’s challenge!

Thank you Deborah for being our Guest Designer for April & don't forget about her fabulous CCC that Deborah holds every month.  I can tell you it is a lot of fun - maybe not so much for the postie (he doesn't like being stalked lol).