Just paper, Baby!

Needing to make quick baby cards today- and this piece of paper has been sitting on the desk for weeks! Lol, I was going so fast~ I should have trimmed off that tiny bit of the upper row!

The background layer is Papertrey's Pacific Vineyard ; the card stock is Fine Linen.

Ribbon is Fine Linen Swiss Dot Satin, and the little charm is from a pack from Michael's. If you don't have the paper I used, you could just take a more subtle piece of patterned paper and stamp BABY on it for the same effect.

Die Case Tutorial

Any follower of Nichole Heady knows she showed us devotees how to store Papertrey dies in CD sleeves inside of CD boxes. Well! What a great way to organize my gaggle of dies that were spread all over!!

So off I went to get the boxes and sleeves, and last night and this morning I started. I had bought colored sleeves, so it made sense to me to put series of dies all in the same color. Uh oh- I put the Dies To Match in yellow sleeves, one die per sleeve, and soon ran out of yellow. I was going to go buy more, and thinking about the gas to get there, when it occurred to me: Hey! They are just paper and an acrylic window. Well darn! I've got all of that (and more!) right here!!

I started out by cutting the paper 6 inches wide, but now I think you should cut it just under 6 inches, because they are pretty tight in the boxes. I used 12 x 12 paper, and got two sleeves per sheet.


So cut the 12 x 12 just under 6 inches wide by 10.75 inches long. Put the paper on the right side of your score board, and score at one inch and at the 6 inch mark. Darn, it is so hard to show score lines in a photo!



Turn the paper, and put it on the left side of the board- score at .5 inch. Turn the paper and score the other side at one half inch. You want each side flap to end up one half inch, and the middle section to be just under 5 inches wide. I think, lol, I actually didn't measure my middle, but the math says so.

Using a circle Nestability, cut a circle in the 'square' section with the one inch flap. This is the front.

Cut 4 .25 x 4..25 inch acrylic 'windows. Apply 1/8 inch Scor-Tape close to the edges.

Use an Xacto to put a semi-circle flap holder in the center of the opposite side, just about .5 inches from the edge. The flap holder is on the opposite side of the one inch flap.

Apply the window, making sure it is on the side with the bumps of the scores, since the flaps will fold in to the bumps. Hope that makes sense!!

Here's the hardest part: with scissors, cut down the score line (to the inside of the score line) on the side not with the window. Cut just past the score line that makes the sleeve fold in half. Then cut in from each side to cut off that 'flap' that you don't need. Use the scissors to round the corners of all three flaps- each side flap and the top flap.

Apply Scor-Tape to the side flaps, watching that you don't apply it where it might stick to the inside of the sleeve instead of the outside.

Fold along all score lines, and stick the side flaps to the back. Now I realize I didn't take a photo of the back side.

This sounds confusing, but really, it's pretty easy! Except now I need to order another package of acrylic card stock. lol lol lol~~

Here they all are in their boxes- Mat Stacks and Fillable Frames are in the holder with their stamp sets.

Enjoy! Ask questions! Let me know if you make some!! Show me patterned papers!!

Pink and Blue Peas

Sometimes the easiest is best. lol, I guess that is what CASis all about, eh?

Dollar stamp from Michaels, stamped in Memento Black, clopicsw over the words and colored in the peas, bit of ribbon to top it off.

Sigh- don't they look so springlike??

Flower Fusion #1

Last weeks Papertrey Radio question was 'Do you copy an inspirational card exactly? My answer is: 'Yes, exactly, then I make another one a little differently, then the third one usually is quite different. Sometimes I show the second one, sometimes I only show the third. I need the exact CASE, though, to help me figure out how to best use the stamps; but also to remind me what it was that was so moving about the set. I didn't see this card of Maille's until after I submitted my first February order. Flower Fusion #1 went right into the cart after I saw it. I was good, though, I waited a week before I hit submit. Silly me, I thought I could not get the matching die. Silly, silly, me. Third February order, lol lol lol. This is my second card done after I first CASE'd Maille's card.

I made my flowers from felt, using the matching die but also one of the Cuttlebug tiny scalloped circle dies for the middle. That's one of the retired small wooden buttons from PTI. My A-2 opens from the side, and I used a background layer from one of DCWV stacks- Citrus, as I recall. New Leaf matches the glittery layer perfectly! I used one of the Memento inks, Pear Tart

These CASE cards are always quick, and I can see my stamping is a little off, and it might be better if I had done something with the edges of the sentiment layer. See? That will be the next card!

What was that supply??

So... we are now at the cabin for a week or so. i came now so I could see if the daffodils I planted last fall are going to come up. They were a school benefit, so you never know about the quality. My daffs at home (100 miles away) are up about 8 inches, even popping through the snow in places, with buds on the tops. Um yeah, pulled in here to 12 inches of fresh snow on the ground, and not a spot of ground in site. Not to mention the waist high pile of plowed snow blocking the driveway. Ahh, spring!! And now I discover I did not load the list of supplies for this card... Sorry!!

I made the paper with spray mists on watercolor paper. I know I see the butterfly from Butterfly Dreams on there, lol. Rub-on flowers, and butterfly stickers. Let me know if you need to know the details, and I'll pm you when I get home- my apologies again for being a bad blogger, lol lol lol!!

CASED from Paper Crafts

I made this for the Papertrey Make It Monday's Challenge to sponge and blend away! Now, I've made lots of 'scene' cards and can blend with the best, but this one took a life of it's own!

I started with the card from the front of the March/April 2010 Paper Crafts magazine, made by Heidi Van Laar. What a great card that is! I've been eyeing it all year, since my Mother is an artist and has a series of paintings with sticks attached to them, and she has an April birthday.

I wanted the blending to bring a setting sun to the scene, but as I started to sponge on the Enchanted Evening ink I could see that if I blended too much more it would be too dark- so I just ended early, lol.

Products are

Paper: Stampers Select, unknown polka dotted green

Ink: Enchanted Evening and Summer Sunrise, Spring rain, yellow from Studio g

Stamps: sentiment from Mixed Messages, Background Background Basics: Stars

Other things: Nestability label die, Cuttlebug tiny tag (I hand cut the layer under it), Butterfly sticker unknown, Twine from SU, leaf punch unknown, little twig from Mother Nature on a snowy day!

It's Your Bird-day!

Can't get a correct exposure here, lol, it's just snow and flash... neither very good for the white image layer, darn. Isn't this the cutest image? Not my general style, but it just made me smile, so I couldn't not buy it, as my MIL used to say. It's Hero Arts. I stole the layout form this card on Splitcoast. The patterned paper is Summer Dream, a DCWV mat stack. The doily is cut from Sweet Blush using PTI's big doily die. Can you see the Fresh Snow sewing along the sides? That's a small die from Waltzingmouse. Ocean Tides Satin ribbon and a Prima flower finish off the outside. Ha! Makes me laugh when I flip it open!! It's a Stampendous stamp; not terribly versatile, but so funny!

Ooobleck

Lol, it does occur to me that I think I post this very same picture and thought every spring- even sometimes as late as April. So goes living in Maine. At least this morning we still have power, so I still have coffee, and the world seems to be controlling themselves this morning, too.