St Pat's Cards

 Not a huge fan of St. Patrick's Day -- I do make cards but I do not make treat holders and such. Earlier this year I had ordered the Gnome die set from Jaded Blossoms. For Valentine's Day they sold a die set for the original Gnome die set - Valentine Gnome Add On I believe it was called. I did not order that add on set but.... 

When I saw the St. Patrick's Day Gnome Add On die set I placed my order. Here is a photo of that set:

A recent stop at Hobby Lobby and I picked up a new St. Patrick's Day card stock print for my cards for this year:

The shamrock print was more of an emerald green and I knew I had solid emerald green card stock for my card stock bases in the stash so I was happy to find this print. Using my scraps I decided to cut out the gnome for St. Pat's. With this die set having so many tiny die pieces I decided not to cut the die pieces apart but to keep it as a one piece die set:

Die cut the gnome base, hat, nose, shoes, and beard from the original die set for the gnome. From the St. Pat's set I die cut the hat, pot of gold, hands, and shamrock using scraps. Assembled the gnomes and here he is:

I have the Diagonal Stripes hot foil plate in my stash from Spellbinders and I wanted to use that for background for the gnome. To start with I cut the emerald green card stock for the card base with it scored at the top. Used a piece of white card stock for the card front and trimmed the shamrock printed card stock for the card front. Put the card pieces together using the ATG. With all my gnomes die cut and assembled I decided to foil a background frame piece. 

Using the Hammermill card stock I used the Glimmer hot foil machine and Spellbinders diagonal stripes hot foil plate and their gold foil for my background piece. Once the white card stock was foiled I set that aside. Using the PinkFresh solid hot foil plate I used the same piece of foil I had just used on the white card stock background and foiled that onto a new piece of white card stock - once that was done I peeled off the wasted foil piece and this was all that was left of the wasted foil:

Here are two cards I made using the same piece of gold hot foil:

The card on the left was the first piece that was foiled and the card on the right uses the wasted piece of the gold foil left from the first card. For the foil panels once I did all the foiling and then used the solid plates for the wasted foil pieces I used the Stitched Stax Rectangle die set from MFTStamps to die cut the foil panels behind the gnomes:

The one thing about the solid hot foil plate is because it is solid it not only holds the heat longer but it is also a heavier hot foil plate. My magnetic pick up tool from Spellbinders can not lift and hold the solid hot foil plate off the machine over to the rubber cooling mat that comes with the machine. So off to the kitchen I went and now when I lift the solid hot foil plate off the machine I use a spatula to lift it up and over to the cooling mat:

Definitely an improvement using the Hammermill card stocks for hot foiling. Also I use the "hinge" method to keep my hot foil plates straight and where I need them to be on my card stock. Will say PinkFresh has many really nice hot foil plates but I had a hard time trying to buy their Perfect Sentiments - Holiday hot foil plate with matching die set..... Everyone had it sold out or on a back order. I wanted to buy both the hot foil plate and dies together but finally gave up on locating any sets anywhere..... decided I would try to buy the die set from one place and hot foil plate from another.... 

Was able to buy the die set from a seller on Etsy and then bought the hot foil plate from EllenHutson.com during one of her 20% off sales. That will probably be my next hot foil project so I will have lots of holiday greetings ready for cards and treat holders for Christmas. Very happy I was finally able to buy these two products for holiday hot foiling..... 

Also my PIC (stamping Partner In Crime) had gifted me the foil trimmer from Spellbinders and that is what I trim my foil pieces with and it cuts down on static and keeps the foil flat when trimming it to the size you need:

Also -- this a size comparison photo of the Jaded Blossoms Gnome I used on my St. Patrick's Day cards and the Gnome from SimonSaysStamps release awhile back:

Happy the St. Patrick's Gnome arrived this week and has already been put to use in the craft room. DH wanted to stop at Harbor Freight this week so I picked up a couple of plastic bins for organizing smaller items in the craft room:

I like the smaller boxes inside also snap closed so it will keep smaller beads or bling together in an organized space.... never know what I can find at Harbor Freight for the craft room..... Off to clean up and start on Easter projects this week - will post those once I get them done.... 

Foil Friday - - -

 Spellbinders Glimmer Hot Foil machine joined my craft room long ago but when I used it I was not happy with the wasted foil left over from the projects/cards I had foiled.... and there the machine sat.....

Fast forward to now -- here and there I have watched videos on YouTube for hot foiling with many tips and tricks and all. . . Then came the solid hot foil plate from PinkFresh from Heather. I watched videos using the solid hot foil plate and thought I would give it a try hoping it would do as they said using the waste pieces of the hot foil. 

I ordered the solid plate with other hot foil products from PinkFresh:

When my order arrived I put my hot foil plates in the plastic sleeves that I bought on sale from EllenHutson.com. I use a red Sharpie and marked the top of the packaging - D means there is a matching die with that hot foil plate and I keep that die in the plastic sleeve with the plate. The S means there is a matching stencil and that is also in the plastic sleeve with that hot foil plate. 

Using the Tiny Hearts hot foil plate from PinkFresh I made a sample piece using the Glimmer Hot Foil machine:

For this sample piece I used no extra shim just to see how my Big Shot would work with the hot foiled piece. 

Clearly by the sample I saw that I would need one card stock piece as a shim to add to my sandwich for my Big Shot machine. I added the shim piece and again used the Tiny Hearts hot foil plate with gold foil for the front of my Valentine Cards:

Watching all the YouTube videos on hot foiling I learned the best results with foiling is using the Hammermill card stock. I ordered my card stock from Amazon. When it arrived I cut a good amount of the sheets into four pieces and I keep them in a covered box with my foil supplies and machine on the Raskog cart I have set up for hot foiling. My gold foil is from Spellbinders and the red heart is glittered card stock that I die cut with a large heart die. The "love" is a hot foil plate from SimonSaysStamps and I bought the matching die set for that and I keep them together in the plastic sleeve I keep my foil plates in. 

My second Valentine's cards I made this year I used the hearts stencil from Maker Forte and this was my first purchase from them:

Their stencils are larger than an A2 card so you can stencil a larger area if you want to using their stencils. Here is my card:

The stencil design almost looks dimensional and that the smaller hearts are just floating on the design. Their stencils are nice quality and they are made in the USA. Fast shipping as well. Two fun card designs using new products in the craft room.....

Crafting assignments - -

 Decided this year I am making a plan to work on holiday items throughout the year for BOO Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. This post is my first for Christmas for this year:

This first project is a triangle treat holder from I-Crafter:

This is an easy die to cut out and assemble and this was the first Santa Box:

The die set has pieces for the face, cheeks, eyes, nose, beard, and holly/berries:

I had seen a video on YouTube featuring this Santa Box die and I had not heard of the I-Crafter line before. For my Santas I used holly/berry stickers I had bought after Christmas on sale at Hobby Lobby so I did not die cut those out. To close the box you use a piece of ribbon or twine after you add your treats or small gift. Used card stocks from the stash for the boxes. Cute treat box for the holiday!

Valentine Gift Bags

 These are the gift bags I made for Valentine's Day:

I used kraft gift bags from Hobby Lobby for the bags. For the patterned card stock for the bag fronts I used only prints that I had in my stash. For the tic tac board - I used 1/4" wide strips of glittered silver card stocks. For the "XO"s I used an alphabet die from the stash and die cut the letters out of silver poster board sheets from the Dollar Tree. The glittered red hearts were die cut using a die set from the stash and the card stock was in the stash:

Used a sheet of adhesive pearls from the Dollar Tree that I cut into strips to fit around the front printed card stock on the bag front. Put all the letters and hearts on the bag front using tear and tape. 

To hold the "Happy Valentine's Day" greeting strip (stamp from the stash) I used wooden clothespins from the Dollar Tree. I used a small paint brush and covered the front of the clothespin with ModPodge and then put a piece of washi tape on that and covered that with ModPodge:

Once the ModPodge dried I had DH drill a tiny hole on the top edge of the clothespin to hold my dangle. You need the hole near the edge of the clothespin so that the dangle will hang freely. If you center the hole the dangle will not hang correctly. Using chain and charms/beads from the stash I made a small dangle for each clothespin. I used different washi tape for the clothespins.  The red gingham bow is ribbon from Hobby Lobby and I tied that into a double bow using the Bow It All. Used hot glue to add the bow to the clothespin. Easy bags to put together and another good use of the alphabet die set in the stash and all the printed card stocks in the stash..... Inside the bags are various treat holders filled with chocolate treats for Valentine's Day.