Sweet Treats ~

Another fun "class" project courtesy of one of my online pals.

It's a card, treat holder, gift card holder, whatever your imagination desires.
I'll be putting my niece's gift card for her birthday inside in the right pocket.

The layout for the card is from the Our Craft Lounge's July Sketch Challenge.
I left out a couple things and moved the oval down, but the overall sketch is there.


Folio directions:

Here

I also added a small piece of Scor-Tape on the outside edge to keep the flap closed.


Stamps used for this project are:

Sweet Treats by Our Craft Lounge
Mix Up of Cuteness by Unity Stamp Company
SU!'s It's Your Birthday

Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black and Versafine Onyx Black
Paper: Neenah Solar White, SU! Basic Black and Green Galore
Patterned paper by BoBunny
Other: Copic Markers: R81, R83, E97, E99, and 0, Oval punches, Pink mini brads, Distressing tool, Dimensionals

We're off the Balboa Park to play for a while at the Science Center.
Have a great day!

V.~

Whispy Blooms Tag Box~

If you've had a look at the new SU! catalog there's a box on page 14 that has everyone guessing on how to make it. I'm sure there's several versions floating around with different measurements and ways to assemble, but I came up with this one. However, I could not do Christmas tags, it's 92 degrees outside and December is not on my mind right now!

It's a tag box full of 16 Whispy flower tags; 4 of each design.
Images for the tags are from Whispy Blooms by Our Craft Lounge
They are stamped on to Neenah Solar White cardstock with Memento Tuxedo Black and colored in with Copic Markers. R81, R83, RV17 for the pinks and YG03 and YG25 for the greens.
They are punched with assorted SU! punches: Scallop circle, Scallop oval, Tag, and Curly Label. To disguise the coloring bleed through on the back, I punched a matching shape for each one and glued them together before hole punching, setting an eyelet, and adding silver cording.

Tag Box Tutorial

Paper Sizes:

• 1 - 8" x 8" square piece of cardstock
• 1 - 3" x 3-15/16" piece of cardstock
• 2 - 1-7/8" x 5-7/8" pieces of cardstock
• 1 - 4-1/16" x 11" piece of transparency

Other Supplies:

• Scor-Pal
• Scor-Mat
• Scor-Tape
• Craft Knife
• Metal Edged Ruler
• Stamps and Ink
• Coloring medium, if necessary, for line art stamps
• Eyelets, punch and setting tool
• Cording and Ribbon

Step 1
Align the 8" x 8" square to the top fence, left side, and score at
1", 2", 6", and 7"
Step 2
Rotate 1/4 turn and repeat.

Step 3
For illustration purposes, I've used plain cardstock with pencil lines indicating the score lines.
Using a craft knife, metal edged ruler, and your Scor-Mat, cut as shown on the orange lines.

Now, cut as shown on the blue lines

After cutting, this is what you will end up with.

Step 4
Notch 4 small tabs.
Now take a sliver off each side of the 4" flap. 8 cuts total, from the edge of the paper to the first score line. This will ensure the box folds together nicely without binding in the corners.

Step 5
Attach a small piece of Scor-Tape to each tab.

Step 6
Turn cardstock over and attach 4 strips of Scor-Tape to outside edge of flaps.

Step 7
Prefold all scores.

Step 8
Adhere tabs to inside to create box form.

Step 9
Adhere flaps to create box, burnish sides with your Scor-Tool to create crisp sides.

Step 10
Align the 3" x 3-15/16" piece of cardstock to the top fence, left side, and score at
1/2", 1-1/2", and 2-1/2"

Step 11
Prefold all scores and attach a piece of Scor-Tape, as shown.

Adhere together.

Step 12
Align one of the 1-7/8" x 5-7/8" pieces of cardstock at top fence, on the 1/6th (midway between the 0 and 1/8") at the left side, and score at 2", 3", and 4"
Repeat with second piece of cardstock.

Prefold both pieces and attach a piece of Scor-Tape.

{Insert missing photo here of both pieces adhered together.}


Step 13
On the longest of the 3 inserts, place 2 pieces of Scor-Tape, as shown.

Step 14
Attach the 2 smaller inserts to the Scor-Tape.
Tip: Attach to one end and then the other, finally to the middle, this ensures all edges line up; burnish with the Scor-Tool.

Step 15
Align the transparency sheet to the top fence, left side, and score at
2-1/2", 3-1/2", 7-1/2", and 8-1/2"

Tip: Even after scoring, transparency sheets can be hard to fold. I line up a metal edged ruler to the scored lines and fold over the ruler, and then burnish with the Scor-Tool to get a hard edge.

Step 16
Attach a piece of Scor-Tape to one edge and wrap scored transparency around the box.

Finished Tag Box
Slide clear cover off, insert stamped tags, replace clear cover and tie a ribbon around the box.

I hope you enjoy making these tag boxes!

V.~

Out of the Box....

and into the bag!

The July Flower Soft Design Team challenge was to use Flower Soft® in an out of the box way. Hmmm, what to do, what to do.....This week the PTB at Flower Soft® sent us a bit of new product, Holiday Card Toppers and Polar White Flower Soft, so I decided to go headfirst into the holidays.

My out of the box project was to create a Beary Merry Christmas gift bag. I trimmed the tree/bear image from the topper sheet, matted it on green, and added fun pop out accents (light and bear parts) for additional dimension. A bit of Polar White Flower Soft® sits as snow on the trees. The pop out accents are so fun, they remind me of paper dress up dolls from when I was a kid. I also added a bit of Glossy Accents to the light fixture and bear noses.

The bag was something I purchased some time ago at Michaels. I added a red cardstock strip to help anchor the image and a button/gingham check ribbon embellishment on the handle. The bear image was attached with dimensional foam to the bag front. That's just about as much holiday creating I could do today - it's hard to wrap my brain around that time of year when it's in the 90's outside. :)

Getting back into summertime colors, my other out of the box project is a shadow box card, using Sweet Pea Flower Soft® on the cupcake frosting. The fun cupcake image and sweet sentiment inside is from Summer Sweets by Our Craft Lounge. The Happy Birthday sentiment is from Drake the Dragon.

Supplies not listed above are:
Ink: SU! Kiwi Kiss, Regal Rose, Basic Gray, ColorBox Fluid Chalk Prussian Blue
Paper: SU! Very Vanilla, Pink Piroutte, Prism Iced Teal
Patterned Paper: Cherry Hill Cookie Jar by October Afternoon
Tools: Scor-Pal, Cuttlebug, Nestabilities Scallop and Circle Dies, SU! Modern Label Punch
Accessories: Buttons, Cardstock thread, Olive grosgrain, Glue dots, Dimensionals

V.~

eta: the scheduling part of Blogger is apparently not working today as you can tell by the post date. So, please pretend that it's the 1st! As I well know, once published, even if retracted, the post stays on some readers.

A "Class" Challenge~

So the story behind this reading journal is this....
I'm in an online group, there's a a few of my very funny, very smart, and very talented stamping friends in this group. Somehow, with summer in full swing it was decided that there would be a weekly "class" of sorts for us all to participate in, making a project for everyone to follow. So last night I find out that I was volunteered to be the "teacher" today. What?! No planning allowed! LOL
I noodled during the night on what to start this morning, a card, or what?

I read a ton and sometimes get confused if I've read a book before. I also want a place to jot down the names of books I'm interested in reading. Maybe a place for a few notes about a favorite book. Lots of things that can go into a small journal like this. There's a number of readers in our group, we're always suggesting, comparing, etc. the books we've read and loved, or read and didn't care for. So I thought a summer reading journal might be a fun project.

This is the front cover, it opens at the top like a tablet.
The letters are stamped on cardstock, cut out, and attached to the white layer. Corner brads anchor the panel. A patterned paper and buttoned flower, 2 simple ribbon knots, and crinkled leaves are the only embellisments on this journal front.

The first divider has a pocket where I can place all the library due date slips that I usually lose!
I don't know about your libraries, but around here it's just a small slip paper, no more stamped library pocket cards. I do much of my reading from library books, the used book store, and books I trade with my dad.

Inside pages are just college ruled lined paper cut to size.

A simply decorated divider. Enjoy, exactly what I do when I read a book. It's one of my favorite things to do! As long as I can remember I've been a voracious reader.

Another decorated divider. Explore, I often travel to far away places and times in my reading!
Don't you?


I divided it into 3 sections, I am not sure how to label them yet. I'm open for suggestions!
The patterned paper rectangular coasters, dividers, and lined paper are all bound together with the Bind it All and "o" wires.

The journal is 3-7/8" x 5-3/8"
The size determined by the coasters. Inner dividers are the same size. The lined paper is cut to 3-1/4" x 5"
Cardstock is SU!'s Baja Breeze, Pumpkin Pie, Riding Hood Red, Green Galore and Whisper White
Patterned paper is by We R Memory Keepers
Stamps images are from Kim Hughes by CHF
Ink is Versafine and SU!
Round Tab and Corner Rounder punches by SU!, Pumpkin striped ribbon by SU!

A relaxing day and a card to share~

We spent the day here, at Lake Cuyamaca, (about a 45 minute drive into our local mountains) fishing, it was just Jay, Brett and me today. Morgan had plans with a friend who is heading off to college soon. It was a beautiful day there, nice and warm, with a bit of breeze and lots of time to just sit and relax. I did manage to catch more fish than both the guys, but I won't tease them too much about that! The funny thing about it is I am not someone who usually fishes, I generally sit and read a book and watch everyone else fish. Today, I picked up a pole just for fun, I must have hit an underwater party because I snagged 6 fish in less than 30 minutes.

Afterwards I came home and made this card for a very dear friend's birthday tomorrow. I can't wait to give her the gift of my favorite paper crafting tool and a couple of its accessories. Can you guess what it is? *hint* I used it to make this card!

This card is a Flap Fold card, the tutorial may be found on the Scor-Pal website. I followed most of the tutorial but I did change the way it's scored and trimmed. Rose Ann's directions call for cutting the half round flap first, then guesstimating/trimming a bit to make sure the paper is the right size for scoring.

Here's what I did instead:

• Starting cardstock size: 3-1/2" x 11"
• Step 1: Align the 11" side at the top fence, left side, at the 1/4" marking and score at 4-1/2" and 9"
• Step 2: Make 2 very light pencil marks 1/2" above the 9" score, one on each side of the width of the cardstock . Using a Coluzzle or circle cutting system, line up the template to these marks so that you can trim an equal half round flap. Clear as mud?
  

The rest of the card follows Rose Ann's tutorial.
eta: My mats are a tad larger as I left only a small border. Mats on my card are:

• outside patterned paper is 3-3/8" x 4-1/8"
• inside is a double mat: 3-3/8" x 4-3/8 red with 3-1/4" x 4-1/4" white for inside sentiment
  

As far as the stamping details:
I stamped the flower from Fifth Avenue Floral in Memento Rich Cocoa on a SU! Whisper White scrap. I wasn't concerned with blending the colors so Whisper White worked just fine with Copic Markers. I simply began with the lightest color and added 2 additional shades on top. No blending at all. The center is colored in 2 shades of green and golden yellow surrounds the flower. After coloring, I trimmed the flower leaving just a smidgeon of the yellow. Once trimmed, the center of the flower was embellished with Glossy Accents and clear microbeads.
Once dry, it was mounted to the scalloped piece with dimensional foam.

The sentiment is from Teeny Tiny Wishes and punched out with the Modern Label punch.
Both of these items are in the upcoming SU! 2009-2010 catalog.

Patterned paper is from a K & Co stack that I got on clearance at Michaels.
Solid cardstock is Pink Pirouette, Riding Hood Red and Whisper White by SU!
I created a custom matching envelope using the opposite side of the same patterned paper as the card. Finished card measures 3-1/2" x 4-1/2"

Have a beautiful rest of the weekend!
V.~

Notecard Box redux and an explanation~

A while ago I posted a tutorial for a project similar to this one. I removed it for reasons I didn't want to go into at that time. The reason was I discovered a couple of my tutorials out on the internet, harvested without my knowledge. I know there are those out there who say you post it, it becomes free domain. Well, I just don't know about that. Tutorials are time consuming projects and I want to offer them, but it left me with a sour taste in my mouth.

Now I understand many of the tutorials I adapt to the Scor-Pal are from die cuts and print it yourself templates that are out and around the internet, and are not anything new. I am not claiming to be original every time (on occasion I am though Ü ), however, I am able to look at many 3D projects and see how to convert them in my head with the Scor-Pal. I don't have to print and copy other ones, I just see them and am able to figure it out. This has only been the case for the last couple of years and using the Scor-Pal. I never used to be able to see in "3D" this way. Actually, I pretty much failed math in school (well not quite, but it was close LOL), numbers were not my thing at all.

I heard several stories from people in regards to the tutorials they've gotten off the internet. Some said they had to pay for them, and even after paying for them, if offered as a class to other people they had to pay additional user fees for each person. Others are a one time fee. Others are on 3rd party sites, paper crafting websites, as well as on blogs, and such. So there are various ways to share. I am choosing to share on my blog and on the Scor-Pal site. A number of mine appear on the Scor-Pal site as I've been working with Diana and Roy for quite a while. Currently I am in the process of creating many tutorials for the metric Scor-Pal that will be released soon.

The reason I am reposting is simple, I've been overwhelmed with emails for the pdf version, even after I "closed" it due to being overwhelmed. So, to make my life easier I am posting it here again, in full color. Ü

On to the tutorial.

Paper Sizes you will need:

• 1 - 8-5/8" x 11-1/8" piece of doublesided pattern paper
• 6 - 4-1/4 x 5-1/2" pieces of coordinating cardstock
• 6 - 4" x 5-1/4" neutral pieces of cardstock
• 6 - 1" x 5-1/2" patterned paper strips
• 6 - small focal pieces

Supplies:

• Scor-Pal
• Scor-Tape
• Scor-Mat
• Craft Knife
• Metal Edge Ruler
• Ribbon
• Adhesive
• Stamps and ink
• Punches, decorative rotary blade, etc. for embellishment

Step 1
Align the 8-5/8" side to the top fence, right side and score at 10" and 11"
These scores will create a double walled box side.

Step 2
Rotate 1/4 turn, aligning 11-1/8" side at the top fence, right side, and score at 10" and 11"
These scores will create a double walled box side.

Step 3
Rotate 1/4 turn and align 8-5/8" side at top fence, right side, and score at 10" and 11"
These scores will create a double walled box side.

Step 4
Rotate a 1/4 turn a final time and align the 11-1/8" side at the top fence, right side and score at
9" and 10" These scores will create the box side and lid area.

Step 5
Using the Scor-Mat, craft knife, and metal edge ruler, cut on lines shown below and remove pieces. (Ignore that darker middle line and just cut to the score line, a pen mishap occurred.)

Step 6
1. Notch 4 small tabs.
2. Slightly remove a smidgen off each short end of the 6-1/8" side flaps.
4 smidgeon trims total, just trim to the first scored line; this will help the double sides to fold easily and not bind up inside the box.

Step 7
Place a small strip of Scor-Tape on each small flap.

Step 8
Turn paper over and place Scor-Tape on the side flaps, bottom flap, and lid flaps.

Step 9
Pre-fold all scores

Step 10
Adhere small tabs to inside to create box shape.

Step 11
Adhere bottom flap followed by both side flaps to inside box. This creates a double walled box, a bit more stable than a single walled box.

Step 12
Adhere lid flaps down to outside box. Embellish lid area as desired.
Box will fit 6 - 8 A2 sized notecards and matching envelopes.
Standard A2 cards and envelopes will also fit.

V.~

Notecard BoxTutorial error~

If you emailed during the time the tutorial was available and received the pdf file, an error was just discovered. That's what happens when one tries something different and embeds the directions into the picture file. :(

Anyway, I emailed everyone (I hope) a correction. But just in case:

The error is in Step 1, the picture and the written words are in disagreement. The picture is right, the scored lines should be on 10" and 11."

When it becomes available on the Scor-Pal site, it will be correct. In the meantime, please make the notation of the change.

I apologize for the error.

V.~