Happy Birthday Box Card

My nephew's birthday is coming up and I made him a box card.    I'm pretty sure he doesn't read my blog so I'm safe in posting this before his birthday.  I was inspired by Jessica Wilson at CraftinandStampin to make this card and used the measurements provided by French Martin to make my own base since I am using an Expression 2 and can't use the SVG that Jessica had.  I had already decided to use balloons in mine after seeing Jessica's video so I was really surprised that Frenchie's video was made with balloons!  She saved me a lot of time in figuring out how to make the balloons look like they were floating.

It was lots of fun to make and I hope he likes it!  Being a young boy I think the gift card will probably make a bigger splash with him but I'm sure my sister will think the card is awesome.  I had lots of fun making it.

You can check out Jessica and French's videos linked above for detailed instructions on putting the box together but here are my basic measurements and materials used.

Box card stock - basic white card stock cut at 9" x 5 1/2" - score on long side at 2 1/8", 4 1/4", 6 3/8", and 8 1/2".  Then you turn the card to the short side and score at 2 3/4".  You will want to refer to one of the videos above for the cutting instructions - it's not hard but I think it's easier to understand by seeing it.

All my solid card stock is Core'dinations and the patterned paper all comes from an American Crafts Hip Hip Hooray pad I picked up at Tuesday Morning.  The stamps were all from the Fiskars Happy Birthday set.  All the die cuts (except for the circle punches) were from my Create-a-Critter Cricut cartridge.  I cut the party hat and pinwheel at 2.5" and the balloons at 1".  I used some scrap plastic that came off one of my stamp sets to adhere the balloons to the box.  The circle punches are some basic Fiskars punches.  The celebrate banner was hand cut.

I used a lot of different inks to get the look I was going for.  The base of the box is actually white card stock that I inked all over with some Stampabilities Yellow Pigment Ink.  I really wanted a light yellow for the box but I just didn't have the right color in my stash.  For the other stamping I used Momento Dew Drop in Bamboo Leaves, Danube Blue, Grape Jelly, and Tangelo.  The red ink is Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Barn Door.  I added some Diamond Stickles to the center of the pinwheel, the top of the party hat, and in the center of the birthday medallion.  It was still wet when I was taking pictures so I couldn't show you that it folds up all nice and flat so it will fit perfectly in an A2 sized envelope.

I used glue dots to hold my balloons together, pop dots on all the die cut elements, Aleene's Quick Dry for the box construction, and ATG to adhere all the pattern papers.  I'm a little concerned that I might have added so much dimension that it will cost a little extra postage.  I'm mailing it tomorrow so I'll make sure and check it out with the mail clerk.

Howdy!

I love my Cricut Create a Critter cartridges but they can look a little plain for all the work that goes into them so I was searching the internet for an idea to jazz up the horse from the original Create a Critter cartridge and I came across Candace at Scrappin 3 Little Princesses.  She did the coolest thing with the horse and what's really funny and quite coinkydinky is that when I cut out the horses I also cut out some horseshoes to use on other cards but she used one of them on her horse card and I think it's so cute so I scrap lifted the idea.  I hope she doesn't mind!

These cards are my standard A2 and are going to OWH for the call they put out for Western related cards.  I used Core'dinations solid card stock for the horse and a piece of patterned paper from DCWV Boyhood Stack for the bandana with some embellishing done with a Gelly Roll pen.

That coinkydinky horseshoe is cut out from some random paper I got in a grab bag of paper from my LSS years ago.  It has a linen type of texture to it and it's this strange light blue tinted color.  I rubbed some Tim Holtz Vintage Photo Distress Ink on it and a little bit on the horse as well to give them both a little dimension.  I also took a cue from Candace and added some highlights to the horse with my Gelly Roll pen.  I really like the way the extra little time it takes to do that makes the Cricut cut so much better!  My husband even got in on the act and created the paint horse on the picture.  I think it's my favorite one and will be the one I keep for my collection.

I didn't have any paper in my stock that really worked for me so I tried to create a tooled leather look with some Core'dinations brown card stock that I embossed using a Darice Damaske Background embossing folder.  Then I worked on adding some Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Barn Door rubbed over the image.  I first tried using a make-up sponge to put it on the paper but it wasn't working so I just started rubbing the actual ink pad on the paper lightly and it worked great!  I really like the look it gives.  Unfortunately I couldn't get a picture that really showed how nice it turned out.

It felt like it was missing something so I added three small square brads that I had in my stash (the special one my husband helped with got hearts) - not sure where they came from but they are really flat so they should pass the dimension rules for OWH.  The sentiment is stamped with the same Vintage Photo ink using my new My Favorite Things Howdy stamp set that I got from OWH's recent fundraising effort.  I was thrilled that I got it in time to make these cards for the Western card drive.  These cards are due by March 20th so my box will be going out this weekend.

Sentiment paper size - 1 3/4" X 7/8"
Horse Cut - 2.5"
Horseshoe Cut - 2.5" (set to real dial size on that one)
Background paper - 4" X 5 1/4"

Here's a link to Candace's card:  http://scrappin2littleprincesses.blogspot.com/2011/08/horsie-hello.html - you should really check out all her creations.  She is very talented!!

Toad-ally Missing You Card

OWH has put out a call for missing you cards with a specific emphasis on kid friendly ones.  I had just cut out these cute little frogs with the Cricut Create a Critter cartridge and had planned to use them with a You Are Toad-ally Awesome sentiment but changed it over to the the missing you theme.  I embossed the frogs with some polka dots in my Texture Boutique Machine using a cheapo Darice polka-dot embossing folder and then mounted them on action wobbles.  I made twelve A2 sized cards total but used three different backgrounds - one girly, one for a boy, and the third can be used for either.  Here is the girly one:

The pattern paper is from The Girlhood Stack from DCWV and the solid papers are all from Core'dinations.  The frog is cut at 2.5" and the pattern paper is cut at 5 1/4" x 4".  I printed the sentiment out using Word with a free font called American Typewriter.  The sentiment is cut at 2" x 1" and mounted on a Cricut cut from that same cartridge cut at 2.5" x 1.5".  I'm just starting to figure out all these little extras on these cartridges and I think it's making my cards look nicer.  I also just picked up some White Jelly pens and have started using them to add dimension to my cuts.  I just popped a little white dot in each eye of the frog and I think it adds a lot.

I'm going to see how many missing you cards I can get done this weekend and then get a small package shipped off to OWH.

Compassion Christmas Cards

This is the card I created for the Compassion Christmas mailing. I popped up the reindeer on Diana's and Renaydine's cards on action wobbles but the remainder I sent in were on foam squares. The card is a standard A2 size.  I made a total of 45 cards in this design. 

Supplies used:

Cricut Create a Critter Cartridge

The Paper Studio solid card stock

DCWV Christmas Pack 

Unknown clear stamp sentiment

Diamond Stickles on the hooves and antlers

Darice gemstone for the nose

Aleene's quick dry tacky glue to construct the reindeer

ATG adhesive for the layers on the card

Foam squares from Hobby Lobby (action wobbles on 2 cards) to secure the reindeer

Creation inspiration:  www.expressionbypinke.blogspot.com