Snowflake Card and Bag

I love using kraft, white and red on Christmas projects and as I still had Hero Arts Hand Drawn Snowflakes and Fancy Cut Christmas out on my table, I thought I'd make another Christmas card and a matching gift bag.

To make the card I white embossed the snowflakes on a panel of kraft card and applied white ink around the edges. After die cutting the sentiment out of the panel I die cut the sentiment again from glitter card and inlaid it into the panel. For some extra sparkle I added a sprinkling of gems.

Hero Arts - Hand Drawn Snowflakes and Fancy Cut Christmas

Next it was on to my gift bag. After die cutting the bag, I embossed snowflakes on the back and front panel. Again I used the inlaid technique and added some gems and baker's twine once the bag was assembled.

Hero Arts - Hand Drawn Snowflakes and Fancy Cut Christmas
Lawn Fawn - Goodie Bag Die

I'm submitting the card into Hero Arts Holiday Card Making Challenge and the gift bag into Simon Says Stamp Wrap It Up Challenge.

Making Roses out of the Messy Bits

Recently I bought a beautiful set of Spellbinders dies called Tudor Rose and used a couple of the dies on a card, gift bag and set of cards for a friend's upcoming birthday.

I have lots of what you could charitably call experimental pieces but in reality they are messed up inked or painted backgrounds that didn't work out and could never use in solid pieces!

Anyway over the years I've found that these kind of yucky panels can look okay if used in smaller amounts rather than in big solid pieces. Because of this I never dump my inking disasters as they'll always get used up in some way.

For the flowers I used the die cut inlay technique which I always enjoy. This is the card I made for my friend

Die - Tudor Rose (Spellbinders)
Stamps (Hero Arts) - It's Your Day & Be Happy

and this is the matching gift bag.

Dies - Tudor Rose (Spellbinders) & Goodie Bag (Lawn Fawn)
Embossing Folder - Textile Texture (Cuttlebug)

Since I was enjoying making the flowers and clearing out some of my messy pieces, I continued making flowers and put together a little set of cards to include with my friend's birthday pressie.

Die - Tudor Rose (Spellbinders)
Stamp - Making the World a Better Place (Hero Arts)

Die - Tudor Rose (Spellbinders)
Stamp - It's Your Day (Hero Arts)

Die - Tudor Rose (Spellbinders)
Stamp - Everyday Sayings (Hero Arts)
Embossing Folder - Butterfly Corner (Darice)

Die - Tudor Rose (Spellbinders)
Stamp - Everyday Sayings (Hero Arts)
Embossing Folder - Butterfly Corner (Darice)

It's hard to see in the photos above, but each flower is layered in the centre and I've applied Wink of Stella (love that stuff!) on the flowers for some lovely shimmer.

I'm submitting these cards and gift bag into Simon Says Stamp Friends or Superhero Challenge.

Flower Gift Bag

This morning I wanted to make a gift bag to hold a small pressie and gift card for my sister so gathered together some patterned paper scraps and supplies to make it.



Stamps (Hero Arts) - Butterfly and Flower Stamp & Cut and It's Your Day
Dies - Goodie Bag (Lawn Fawn) & Curvy Leaves (Elizabeth Craft Designs)

After die cutting the two pieces for the goodie bag, I stamped the sentiment on the bag front with Hero Arts Butter Bar Ink and added some stitching. Once the bag was assembled I added the embossed flower and die cut leaves.



A button was added to the flower centre and I applied clear Wink of Stella to the flower and leaves - unfortunately it's a dreary, grey day here today so I wasn't able to capture the lovely shimmer on the flowers and leaves.

I'm submitting this gift bag into Hero Arts Nature Challenge and Simon Says Stamp Add a Little Texture Challenge.

Just a little reminder in relation to the Hero Arts Hostess Hop - you have until 11:59pm PST tonight to comment for a chance to a prize pack of Hero Arts goodies. Day 1 of the Hop starts here. Good luck!!

Dotty Gift Bag

I'm joining in again on the Spots n Dots Challenge over at Simon Says Stamp's Flickr Group.

I wanted to make a little gift bag so had a rummage through my patterned papers and came across a Recollections set called Today Tomorrow Forever which has a lovely mix papers including dotty and wood papers that I wanted to use for this project. Recently I bought Lawn Fawn's Goodie Bag die and used that to die cut the little bag. It's such a quick and easy way of whipping up a bag in no time - love it so much! Then I cut a panel of wood patterned paper, and from it, die cut the goodie bag handle and used the banner from Simon Says Stamp's Bundle of Stitched Shapes to finish the shape.

Stamp - Birthday Farm Animals (Simon Says Stamp) Die - Bundle of Stitched Shapes (Simon Says Stamp)

After adhereing the banner to the bag I stuck a little branch on the banner and tied the bag with raffia. I stamped the chicken from the Birthday Farm Animals set, coloured it with Promarkers and did a bit of paper piecing.

As the paper I used for the bag has glitter on some of the dots I thought I'd add a bit of sparkle to the chicken using clear Wink of Stella. I tried to capture some of the sparkle on the chicken's head in the photo below.

After having very mild weather over Christmas, it looks like we're having our cold snap now. It was -3C this morning when I went out and we're due some snow tonight - brrrr!

Christmas Shaker Gift Bag

Yesterday, after making my first Christmas card for this year, I was feeling a bit Christmassy and decided to make a Christmas gift bag for the current Hero Arts challenge and the All Wrapped Up Challenge at Moxie Fab World. I absolutely love this shaker card that Sally made recently so I decided to make gift bag with a shaker on it.


Stamps (Hero Arts) Holiday Dolls & Three Trees

I recycled a bag like this one for my base. To cover up the name of the shop on the front of the bag I stitched the embossed snowflakes panel to pink card. For the sky inside the shaker I embossed various snowflakes in white and applied broken china distress ink. The doll is coloured with Promarkers and I added diamond stickles to the bobble on her hat. I stamped the sentiment on the acetate cover and added some punched snowflakes and beads to the shaker. To finish I just added a clear button which I had covered with glitter and tulle for the handles.



If anyone has any tips on taking photos of acetate, I’d love to hear them – I was nearly driven demented trying to get a photo without reflections!

A few of my favourite things gift bag

Part of the Hero Arts' challenge this month (Everything Autumn) is to make a gift bag. Sometimes I recycle bags from shops and use them for gift bags and here is the one I used today.


I decided to add a few of my favourite things to the bag - the Large Flower, Scallop Borders and fabric. To start with I cut a piece of upholstery fabric from a sample book for the background. Then I white embossed the flowers on vellum and embossed parts of the petals using sparkling stardust embossing powder.


Stamps (Hero Arts) - Large Flower & Scallop Borders

I layered the flowers and added assorted beads and pearls to the centres. For the scallop edging on the top of the bag I white embossed one of the scallops from the Scallop Borders set and applied worn lipstick distress ink. I used some left over pieces of tulle for the handles.



It's such a cloudy day here today so I'm afraid the photos aren't great and don't capture the sparkle on the flowers.