Gift Card Holders

I had this idea to make a bunch of gift card holders a few weekends ago so I'd have them on hand for birthdays, housewarming and Christmas. I picked out my patterned paper, sat down with all my supplies, and got creating. I was so excited to finish and get on with the next one, until I realized how unhappy I was with the finished product. Needless to say, my bubble was burst, I was discouraged, and in true "baby" fashion, stopped and wallowed for the rest of the night. LOL.

Well, this weekend my husband and I went to Hobby Lobby. I had no idea there were any in New York, let alone 45 minutes from my house! We are a somewhat rural/suburban town, but it's quite country. Lots of crafters here in Upstate New York and the only craft store we have is Joann's. And it's quite lack-luster. It has about one-quarter of the scrapbooking goodies I've seen in other Joann's and they almost always are "out of stock" on Cricut cartridges. They only have a few 4x6 DCWV paper stacks and their stamp collection is limited, to say the least. The next closest craft store is AC Moore and that's 20 minutes away and that's just as boring. So, I was thrilled going into Hobby Lobby. Luckily, there's restaurants abound in the same town, so it'll be easy to make the drive then go to lunch. I'm SO excited. Too bad they don't accept competitor coupons. :( Oh well.


Anyway, a couple of weeks ago, I saw I saw Emma from My Creative Time make a gift card holder and I loved the idea of using mini brown paper bag sachettes. I found them in Hobby Lobby and had to get them. The mini bags measure 4" x 2.5" and are PERFECT for gift cards! Here's a picture of the back of one.


While at Hobby Lobby, I picked up some Tim Holtz Fragments on clearance, half off. I'm so glad I did because they were the perfect touch to finish off this project, don't you agree?

Here's a close up of the fragment. I stamped the image on stone cardstock from Papertrey Ink, inked up the edges with Stampin Up! Crumb Cake ink, spread some Glossy Accents over the top, and stuck the fragment on top. After about 10 minutes, it was dry enough to move. I adhered it to my base with Tombow liquid adhesive.


For my Christmas gift card holder, I used Emma's All Around Christmas set. For the "fur", I used Snow Writer, which is an awesome product. While it was wet, I used a little glitter to give it some sparkle and I love how it looks in person. It's so fluffy and it dries hard. Very easy to use even though it's from a bottle, not a pen. Here's the Snow Writer I used.
And here's how it looks on this adorable image from Emma:


And here's the whole thing. I used a Christmas stack I bought at Hobby Lobby from The Paper Studio. Boy, did I have fun at that store!
Thanks for looking and have a great day!

PKS Challenge #57: Sketch with a Twist

I love Peachy Keen Sketch challenges when they include a twist. I'm not a fan of sketch challenges, but when there's another element, I'm thrilled. You can see the sketch here and the twist was to use coral, robin's egg blue and honeydew. I just received my stamps from Emma's latest release and I could not wait to use them so I decided to make this a Christmas card. I made several Christmas cards last year with non traditional colors and I loved how they turned out. I thought these colors seemed like a nice alternative holiday color combo and I think the card turned out nice. I used the new In Color Calypso Coral from Stampin Up! for the base. The blue and green are from last year's Joann's holiday stack called Peppermint Forest. I just loved that stack!! I also used Emma's dies from her newest release. Can I just tell you how easy it was to use these dies? They cut perfectly and they are so cute! All the stamps are from her All Around Christmas set, including the sentiment.


Thanks for looking and have a great day!

The Simple Joys of Life

I made this "anything" card with my new Freshly Picked cartridge. I love mushrooms and this cut was so easy to layer I couldn't wait to use it. That adorable butterfly is from the Create a Critter cartridge and the postage stamp-like base is from Gypsy Wanderings. The base is Berry Sorbet from Papertrey Ink. I had that ribbon in my stash from my local scrapbooking store. I've had it for about a year and love it so much that I couldn't bring myself to "waste" it. I only bought a yard. LOL. How absurd! Anyway, I love that background paper which is a subtle blue that looks like the sky and it's layered on a piece of Crumb Cake cardstock from Stampin Up. Crumb Cake is almost identical to Kraft cardstock, which I'm almost out of :/. Those tiny buttons are from a generic bag I purchased from Joann's. The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink's Green Thumb set. I added some black stitching around to make the card pop because it seemed a little dull. I'm very pleased with how it turned out. Thanks for looking!

My Pink Stamper Design Team Submission

Robyn over at My Pink Stamper is having a Design Team call this month. The challenge is to create a project using your favorite Cricut cartridge and incorporate the colors brown, green, turquoise, orange and another color of your choice. I chose white as my 5th color. For my card, I used my current favorite Cricut Lite cartridge Jolly Holidays. I used the adorable penguin on that cartridge. I love her little umbrella. For her face, I used a Peachy Keen face stamp from the Happy Lashes set.
Recipe:
Card base in white cut at 4.25 x 5.5, edges punched with corner rounder punch.
Green layer cut at 3.75 x 5
Cuttlebug embossing folder: Seeing Spots
Penguin cut with brown cardstock from Jolly Holidays cartridge at 3.75
DCWV Just the Girls stack for the umbrella
Stamp from My Pink Stamper: Punny-licious
Orange ribbon

Thanks for looking!

Tacky Tuesday Challenge #8

The Tacky Tuesday Challenge this week over at the September Ninth blog is to use any "cool treat" cut and the sentiment "sweet" on your project. For my card, I used the Cricut Imagine Yummy cartridge for the ice cream cone. I used Glossy accents on the sprinkles and the cone. The frames were cut from the stock images on the Imagine. I distressed the smallest frame with the Cuttlebug Distressed stripes folder. The "Happy Birthday" and "sweet" stamp is from Papertrey Ink and the others are from a variety of My Pink Stamper stamps. It's my brother-in-law's birthday, so I tried to make a masculine card. Thanks for looking and have a great day!

PKS Let's Face it Friday Challenge

Peachy Keen's LFIF Challenge this week is "Plentiful Patterns". The challenge is use your favorite patterned product and pair it with PK faces for a project of your choice. I love polka dots and had this in a Basic Grey 8x8 stack and never noticed it before. Well, I'm sure I did when I first bought the pad, but forgot all about it. I love the yellow/green dots on the dark red background. Since I only have 2 8x8 sheets, I color photocopied the page. The background red is a little more orange than the original, but it still is pretty. The worm is from Create a Critter and his face is from Wide Eyed Kids assortment. I just got this set in last week and am thrilled. I coveted this set since it was first released! My worm is attached with an Action Wobble, another recent acquisition. It makes the card so fun and interactive. I used Glossy Accents on his eyes. The ribbon technique I used is one I've used before, but I was reinspired by Emma from My Creative Time's tutorial video here. I stitched mine on with my sewing machine. I love how this cute card turned out. The sentiment is from an old Papertrey Ink set whose name escapes me right now. But it's so appropriate for a worm, isn't it?

Thanks for looking and have a great day!

Throwback Thursday Challenge

Emma's challenge this week over at My Creative Time was to use Wild Card or Just Because cartridges and incorporate heat or dry embossing somewhere on the project. I chose to use Wild Card. I am so mad because a few months back I made a card with an oval window just like this, but from "scratch" and it took me forever! I didn't realize this cut was on this cartridge. Ugh! Anyway, the embossing technique I used is pretty cool. I used my reinkers in two different colors and rolled them on the embossing folder with a brayer. Then I ran a white piece of cardstock through my Cuttlebug in the embossing folder and came up with this beautiful pattern. I saw this technique while browsing You Tube one day. I am in love with this technique...and this embossing folder. The flower cut on the bottom corner is also from the Wild Card cartridge. That cut took FOREVER! The sentiment is from My Creative Time's Turn That Frown Upside Down set.
Enjoy!
Here's a closeup of that intricate cut that I had to cut twice because I forgot to use multicut the first time and it's thicker glitter cardstock. Oh well, such is life. :D

Thanks for looking!

Overall, I have been inspired

Ok, ok. Enough with the puns. But, I was inspired again by Kimberly's blog, My Craft Spot. I just love her projects. She was inspired by Creations with Christina, so I'll credit them both. These overalls were just too adorable I had to buy Freshly Picked and make some of my own. Aren't they the cutest little cards?! You can view Kimberly's here and Creating With Christina's here. I used Glossy Accents to give the pocket/sentiment some shine and used my new Twine from The Twinery. Very fast shipping and adorable twine. Thanks for the inspiration, ladies.



Here's all 3 together. Aren't they adorable?!
Thanks for looking!

A flocking deer friend

So, I purchased some flocking powder a few months ago and flocked a little details on some cards, but have been wanting to spotlight flocking. While blog hopping for inspiration, I landed on The Sentimental Scrapper, Kimberly, from My Craft Spot. She made an awesome card using the cute little deer from Create A Critter. I fell in love and had to make one of my own. So, here is my card inspired by Kimberly's card which you can see here. Thanks for the inspiration, Kimberly! She even has a video showing you how to flock. I flock the same way, with the Xyron, and it works beautifully. So, without further adieu, here is my card. The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink's Forest Friends Sentiments. I made another card, mirror image and changed up some of the colors, and cut some stamps from the Forest Friend's Sentiments set to create the "You're a deer" sentiment.
Thanks for looking!