Butterfly bucket

I found these little buckets at Target in the Dollar Spot last Easter-time, and I was super pleased and excited to see that they EXACTLY match the new Stampin' Up color, Melon Mambo.

On this project, this little letters use the Stampin' Up Billboard die and the U comes from the Serif Essentials alphabet dies. Both were run through my Big Shot. To get the patterned U, I cut out a piece of Old Olive patterned paper and a piece of the white chipboard from the back of a pack of patterned paper, both sized to 3" x 3". I glued them together using a glue stick before running it through the Big Shot and cutting it out so that when they came out they were already mounted together.

I used the Circle Scissors Plus to cut out the "lid's" circle so that it just fits within the handles. Then, I took a strip of Melon Mambo 1" wide and 11" long. I scored it at 1/4" (that's the lip you see in the picture above, under the lid). Along the 3/4" left, I snipped in at about every 1/2" so that it could make the curves (see below inside the lid). I glued them down, working my way around and snipping off the last extra inch that wasn't needed.

This card stands on its own!

It looks unassuming in its envelope, but once it's opened, it's like its own little stand up party. :)


I was looking for a special pattern for a big birthday card. Because of her age, I won't say who I gave it too, but I really hope she liked it! The only thing that I didn't like about the final product was that it wasn't intuitive about needing to pull up on the ribbon to open the card. It was fine since I was there when she received the card, but if I made one to mail, I think I would have made a little "pull here" kind of tag.

The letters on this card are actually a Sizzix Naturally Serif Alphabet die that I ran through my Big Shot. I covered the letters in Dazzling Diamonds glitter for some shine.

I won't go through the steps of making this card when they've already posted a great tutorial on Splitcoast's site. My only suggestion in following her instructions is that my first version had too big a slot, and it wouldn't stand up. I definitely recommend trying one of these cards for yourself today!

Faux silk wrapped gift box

This is an easy and quick way to wrap a plain, 2-piece white gift box. I used the new 2-step stamping set, Greenhouse Garden on some plain white tissue paper. This wasn't even new tissue paper and it doesn't need to be. Just stamp all over a piece that is big enough to cover your box top (or card front). I used two pieces so that I could layer them over each other. This gives you more of the look of handmade paper.

Once it's covered ... crumple it up into a ball, opening it and smoothing it a couple of times.

Cover the top of the box using a glue stick and then press the paper on top of it, smoothing out most of the wrinkles, but not trying to make it completely flat. Do the same on the sides, finally wrapping it over the edges and into the inside of the box. You can either leave the box's bottom plain white, or cover it using the same technique.

Wrap a coordinating ribbon around it, and you're set!

These robots like to party!

I finally got some time to stamp again with my Lots of Bots stamps! I made two different layouts with some leftover designer series paper. I have a little DSP from the new catalog, but it's animal and floral print ... Plus, I wanted to use a more boyish color palette and this spoke to me.

Nothing fancy on these two. I colored in the robots with classic Stampin' Up ink using a blender pen on the robot on the left and a marker on the robot on the right (photo above). You can see more detail of each in the following photos. Below, you can see some of the faux stitching that I did using a Zig painty marker in silver, as well as the blue that I Color Spritzered (sure that's a common verb) on the main image and then softened by sponging over using the ink pad and a sponge - move your sponge in circles after dabbing on the ink pad for a softer look.

Here, the robot below was colored in, then I put Crystal Effects over top and once it was dry, I dotted in some accents with the silver Zig Painty pen again. Also, the blue "mat" you see under the striped paper ... that's not a real mat. That was added in with marker after everything was already layered. (You can click on the photo for a larger view.) After I'd finished the card, or so I thought, I didn't like that the white edges of the paper just sort of drifted into the Bashful Blue card base. This turned out to be a pretty good solution. I drew in the thin lines for a border with a Brocade Blue marker, then colored in next to the top layers with my Bashful Blue marker. What do you think of how that turned out??

The sentiment on both cards was punched out using Stampin' Up's smallest oval and the red underneath was punched with the next size up. Both robots have marker "shadows" under them to ground them.

Baby zoo CASE

Stuck for inspiration, I turned to the internet. I found it on Ann Schach's site. She has many other super cute cards, too.

I just haven't had the time or energy to stamp lately and I needed to get set up for my last round of stamp club tomorrow night. I think we'll have a great time. We're going to make one card and then we'll take our tour through the new catalog together! It's always more fun to look at a new Stampin' Up catalog with friends. :)

I did change a couple of things. I added in the lion and owl and changed the sentiment up. The yellow piece below uses the new Modern Label punch. It's great for long sentiments, but I loved the use of it as an embellishment.

Thanks for stopping by and happy stamping!