Money card for the Graduate

Soon, the school year will be at the end and I am going to need a bunch of envelopes to give a little money or check to those graduating.
This is a real easy  way to do it with a little style.

Take Blackberry Bliss 7 1/2x 9 1/2 and score along the long side at 3" and 6 1/2" to make the trifold.
Use the envelope punch along the 7 1/2 inch side and put the left edge at 3 3/4 (half way point) to punch out the little divot to make it easier to take the contents out ( better than using a circle punch half way like we used to eh? - LOOOVE IT!)

Tape along the front side to create the pocket, money or check goes inside.  I stamped the sentiments inside using versamark and Wild Wasabi embossing powder- did not realize until too late that it was retired- but use whatever color that coordinates.

Make a band with a strip of Painted Blooms DSP with coordinating CS beneath - here Wild Wasabi again. Stamp sentiment with Blackberry Bliss and color in with daffodil marker and punch out with the note tag punch.

Stamp Petal Potpourri with Rose Red and punch out with Flower Medallion punch, stamp the center with Daffodil and punch out with a small circle punch and mount both with dimensionals to make it pop.  You can make a bunch of these ready to go in different colors for any occasion to fit your needs....

A Butterfly Basics case

 I saw a card by Miss Vicky on Splitcoast with this flower out of the box and I just loved it- changed the colors, ribbon, sentiment but still basically the same template. 

I really like the Sahara Sand as a neutral - embossed with theSpring Flowers EF and a layer of the Best Year Ever DSP from Sale-a-bration- such pretty color combination!

I tied the Coastal Cabana ribbon from the Best Year Ever accessory pack.

All the colors are lifted from the DSP.

I stamped the Butterfly Basics flower on a slightly larger piece of whisper white and colored it with blenderabilities and removed some color with the color lifter to highlight and then stamped the honeycomb with Sahara Sand.  Cut the cardstock to size and cut around the parts outside the box. Layer with Crushed Curry cardstock. Stamp the butterfly and ink the sentiment from BYOP - thanks so much with soft suede and Calypso Coral markerss on a piece of whisper white.  Cut the banner and sponge the edge with Coastal Cabana and mount with dimensionals.   Add a little pearl on the butterfly and all done.

Card for a special friend

 One of my friends was recently diagnosed with metastatic cancer and told she would have about six months to live.  I was so shocked because she is one of the most loving, most full of LIFE person you could ever meet and it seems really UNJUST to have her be the one with such a short life left.

I thought of this card and fidgeted with it over and over.  I wanted to let her know I was thinking of her and wanted to spend some time making it so it kept growing to what you see on the left.
Those of you who have followed me know how much I do not like to use scissors but here it is.  This is the most scissor work I have ever done on a card but it is little compared to what she is going through.

 I stamped the background on Sahara Sand- my new neutral and stamped it with the dictionary background with baked brown sugar.  Although the blenderabilities is no longer available, I loved that we could stamp the image with the Baked brown sugar pad and the inks did not run.  I stamped the leaves with Old Olive and thne cut out the oval and left the overhang out of the oval so I could free hand cut it.

 I used blenderabilities to color the flowers and the leaves but the colors were pretty dark so I only used the light color and then used the Color Lifter to take away some of the color to create the reverse shadow.  I wanted to have some texture on the white cardstock on top but I had already stamped the flowers so what to do?  I took the woodgrain EF and laid it down on the table and used the Simply Scored stylus to follow the grooves along the card avoiding the areas that I had stamped and colored ( a light box would have helped a lot eh?) then I added a little baby pearls to the center of the stamen.

 Stamped and diecut the butterfly and stamped the sentiment from A Dozen Thoughts on a strip of whisper white and layered it over a strip of old olive, put a little pearl on each of the corners.

Maybe it's true that God wants back his most precious people but I guess selfish me wants to keep her here a little longer.

Praying for a miracle.
Lynda

My Strawberry Berry Basket

 I have been going nuts with my Berry Basket die.  I have made baskets for almost every occasion we've had since it's debut but I wanted to make a strawberry basket card to go with some fresh farmer's market strawberries I was giving away.
I started with the a 1/2 sheet of Always artichoke.  Cut  the sheet with the entire die and then cut the bottom in half as shown.  You will also need 1/2 of the borderstrip as well.  Cut along the score line already there. I ran it with the woodgrain EF to add texture. I do not like to have things "floating" on cards so I grounded the basket with a 1 inch strip of old olive embossed with polka dots.  I then attached the basket bottom only so I could put berries behind the basket and get a sense of how it was going to look by flipping the basket part open to glue things down.

 To make the berries, you need what is shown here.  I tried different dies and punches to see things would look but I liked this best-  You need 2 different size flowers in Real Read and 1  branch in Old Olive shown from Flower Frenzy.

You also need several Old Olive punched with Bojo Blossom punch and the little flowers from Itty Bitty Punches.  I used the sentiment and frames from From the Garden set for the tag in Artichoke and Real Red.  Pick what works best for you.

 This is how the strawberries are made.  For the smaller flower, the Boho Blossom fits perfectly in the center so you only need one and then punch them out as shown.  The larger flower needs to have the piece moved a bit so I used the left over pieces to make the cap. Stick it on as shown.

 Then use the large oval punch to make the berries separate.  It makes it easier to hold to punch if you leave the flower whole.

 Then you keep going around the petals to make the berries! 

 The last piece can be tucked under the basket so no one will know you didn't have a cap on it- as you can see on the far left and right berries. You mark it up with the white gel pen for seeds.

This is how they look with the berries underneath the basket and some placed on hop with flowers added.    Now, I wanted to add a little filaments in the center of the flower but there was nothing appropriate but then VOILA!
The Perpetual Birthday Calendar stamp set had so many little things you could use for the cent of the flower that I snipped one off (when I want to use it as intended, I can just attach it where it was supposed to go- and you can see exactly where you want to to put it-  the beauty of photopolymer stamps!).  So here at the end is another one I did first before the one above- I was packing the strawberries and one just fell off and I loved how it was sitting by the basket so of course I had to copy nature!  Enjoy! 
Lynda

Happy Easter Berry Basket

 Did I tell you that I was in love with the Berry Basket?  Yes, yes, gazillion times yes! This was the Easter Basket we made for my party last month and it was given to Max a sweet little boy when his mom invited Kyle over for a play date.

Coastal Cabana was diecut with the Berry Basket die then filled with paper grass and yummies including a giant egg with skittles inside it.

The tag was stamped with the small honeycomb and Happy Easter from Teeny Tiny Wishes on Daffodil Delight punched out with Note Tag Punch and stapled together  with the butterfly diecut from Whisper white onto the basket with the Crisp Cantelope Thick baker's twine with the stapler.

 I then covered the larger clothespin with Retro Fresh Designer Washi Tape and clipped it over the staple to look like it was holding it and an easy peasy basket to hold all your little goodies.   I really like this size -  i think it holds plenty of candies and goodies for the day.

Enjoy!

Lynda

Boy Scout Pinwheels from PaperPumpkin June 2014 kit

My husband told me he needed some name tags for the Boy scout dinner he was having.  The prievious year was a centerpiece  that all the kids participated making each of the medallions.  So, how to design a name "tag" that kids could participate in making....hmmmm.

Then the lightbulb moment!.  The pinwheel set from PaperPumpkin from this past year June kit was perfect for it.  I proposed it to my husband and he was all for it.  The pinwheels are summer sun and blue paper that I glued back to back to make it double sided.  I used the straw and the brad and clips from the kit- the mechanisms- and used toilet paper rolls for the base- I always save them for after school clubhouse program that are always in need of them for their craft projects anyway.

I printed out some boyscout logo from the internet and used MDS to print it out and punched it out with a circle punch to fit the center of the brad and it looked great!  The kids used gluedot to stick it on.

 I cut out some thick foam that had come from one of the packages I got from something and hot knife cut it into a circle to fit the bottom and sticky taped it in place before the kids got there.  The toilet paper rool wascovered in same blue paper and the names were diecut using the Little Letters thinlits so they could diecut out their own names.  We then diecut the fleur de Lis (from Michael Strong that I bought years ago just for this purpose) in Gold foil sheets and used multiliquid tombo glue to stick it on. 
then the roll was weighed in with 20 pennies each and then they inserted the straw into a circle chipboard- I used the ends from the some of the Dpaper packs- the real hardy ones - I think this one came from the glimmer sheets or the window sheet- and diecut little circles to fit inside the toilet rolls snugly with the circl in the center to hold steady the straw as shown.

I think it looks like a firecracker going off- perfect for a celebration dinner with each of their names on the side to mark their place.  It was a great fun for the kids to make them.and definitely do-able craft project for the 10 year olds.