Heart Shaped Rosette with no die - -

 Had seen the video by Vianneycreates on YouTube with instructions to make a heart shaped rosette without having to buy a die for this. I watched the video and followed her instructions. First I pulled out a piece of printed 12 x 12 card stock. Cut a 3 inch x 12 inch strip off of that. Put the 3 inch strip on the scoreboard and scored this piece every 1/4 inches as she explains. Once it was all scored I took it to the trimmer and cut this strip in half lengthwise so you have two 1 1/2 inch x 12 inch long strips. (She explains that she cuts it in 3 inch x 12 inch strips and then scores it and when you cut it in half you now have two strips already scored for your two rosettes). 

Once it is scored and cut down to the 1 1/2 inch x 12 inch strip you fold it in half and then draw the pattern for the heart rosette - which looks like a landscape design:

I drew the landscape shape with a pencil and cut this out using scissors:

Fold the strip on the scored lines. When that is done I used tear and tape to put the ends of the rosette together and that then has to be trimmed off as you do not want that point there:

She uses circles of card stock and covers them in hot glue and presses down her heart shaped rosette and tries to shape her rosette all at once. I make my rosettes the way Tim Holtz shows -- crease the score lines, tape the rosette ends together and stand up the rosette on your craft mat. Put a dollup of hot glue on the craft mat in the center of the standing rosette and use two hands to press the rosette into the hot glue on the craft mat and hold in place until set. I find this much easier than trying to make sure the circle you use for your base is in the center of the rosette on the backside. (Photo not taken but I use my brown Ranger craft mat to make all my rosettes on as the hot glue will not stick to the mat or damage my table top craft mat). 

With the heart rosette made I die cut out a white doily piece to use as a base for the decorated rosette. Used hot glue to put the heart rosette onto the doily. Then cut out a glittered tulle circle to put on top of the rosette, gathered up metallic silver thread and used a red foil die cut heart for the front of the rosette. Added a "love" word across the front and the rosette embellishment is done:

Here is a photo to show the size of this rosette embellishment next to the round rosettes I had made for my Valentine's Day bag toppers:

I also put this heart shaped rosette embellishment on the front of my Valentine gift bag to show it is a nice size for that:

That was nice of VianneyCreates to share her pattern for the heart rosettes so yo do not have to buy a die to make them. Cute idea for Valentine embellishments!

Pre Holiday Sales

EllenHutson.com held a sale before the holidays and I bought three items. The sale was for her brand only, Essentials by Ellen. I bought her Holiday Cheer hot foil plate, matching strip die, Sentiment Strips. I also bought her clear stamp set, Holiday Vibes. Here is a photo of the products:

Her clear stamp set, Holiday Vibes, is a one piece stamp so when you stamp it you do not have to struggle to place the sentiments straight on your card stock for stamping:

Hard to really see but this is the backside of the stamp to show all sentiments are on the one stamp:

The strip die also works with this stamp set so economical set to buy - the hot foil plate, strip die, and the clear stamp sentiment strip stamp. I have not used the stamp yet but I did get to hot foil the sentiment hot plate:

Cut the strips out using the strip die:

The day I did hot foiling I only used red, silver, and holographic hot foil. After cutting these strips out I had quite the supply of greetings:

I hot foiled both the positive and negative foil pieces so I have a variety of strips for Christmas projects ahead. Put them in a clear box and labeled that so when I work on Christmas projects I will have the pre made sentiment strips ready for use:

I still want to hot foil the sentiment plate with gold foil, blue, and other colours but for now I have a start to holiday projects. Happy to be able to shop these products on sale!

PIC's Thank You Card

My PIC (stamping Partner In Crime) gave me lots of great presents for Christmas and I needed to make her a thank you card.... but... not so easy... she is a purple person -- it is her fav colour -- but I have very little purple card stock in my craft room.... so what to do for her card???

Used a Concord & 9th quilt die and made a card front.... but did not like it and I thought it looked "flat" so it sat on the craft table for a couple of days... until..... here is the pieced card front before gluing:

Liked the quilt design but it was not ready to give to her.... laid sequins on the centers of the quilted squares and altho it helped, still not right... then I remembered the Tessler Crafts grid die I had used on Halloween bag fronts: 

Decided I would pull out the die and cut it out of solid purple card stock and lay that on top of the card front piece and see if I liked that any better..... so it worked for giving the card dimension and here is the card I made her:

For the greeting "Thank you" I used a die from my stash and I cut that out using three pieces of white card stock. Used liquid glue to stack those together and set them aside to dry. Then I die cut the words out of holographic silver card stock. If you have used mirrored (foil) card stock in the past then you know it is hard to get the adhesive on the back of the card stock without getting any glues/adhesive on the foiled side.... you can't use the adhesive eraser to remove it from the foiled card stock and a Qtip dipped in rubbing alcohol does not always remove the adhesive..... but....

Amazon sells this package of adhesive sheets and I used them to put adhesive on my foiled words:

This is a package of 11x17 sheets of adhesive that will last a very long time. On the front of the package shows how to use them:

You peel back the protective sheet and place your card stock piece on the adhesive - right side up. I put a piece of new printer paper over my foiled piece and rubbed it onto the adhesive sheet and then I put my foiled "Thank you" on the white die cut pieces. Here is a photo of that on the card front with the stacked white card stock behind it:

I also used these adhesive sheets to put adhesive on my red foiled "Love" for my Valentine bag toppers:

Happy to have this new way to add adhesive to foiled card stock pieces without having to use the liquid glue and getting it all over the place on the foiled pieces. 

Fringe Benefits - - -

Used the crepe paper fringe on past projects:

Decided I wanted to make fringe for some of the Valentine treat holders I was making. For each fringe piece I used 6 pieces of crepe paper cut to approx 12 inches long. For my Valentine fringe I used three colours - red, white, and a light pink. First I cut all the crepe paper and put it in stacks for each of my fringe pieces. I made two different patterns -- one stack has two light pink pieces, then two white pieces, and two red pieces. The other stack had one red piece, one white piece, one light pink piece, then repeated. I used a thin line of hot glue on each piece of crepe paper to stack the pieces together:

Once all the stacks were glued I used fringe scissors to cut each side up to the hot glue line:

With the fringe cut on each side then I scrunched the crepe paper:

The above photo shows the stack of crepe paper glued together, then cut with the fringe scissors, and the bottom piece is after it is scrunched using my hands. This photo will show how stacking the crepe paper differently gives the fringe a different pattern:

The scrunched fringe piece second from the top in the above photo shows the pattern you get by stacking your two pieces of each colour together - I have two light pink pieces on the bottom. two white pieces, and then the two red pieces on top of the stack. When it is scrunched you can see the red in the center, then white, then light pink on the bottom.  The second scrunched piece shows the pattern the three colour crepe papers make when you alternate them - light pink, white, red, light pink, white, and then red. When you scrunch that stack you can see the red throughout your piece and it is not a definite stripe look. 

Using the Gift Bag die set from Spellbinders I made some treat bags for Valentine's Day and I decorated them using this fringed trim at the top:

The above photos show the fringe with the crepe paper stacked together - 2 pieces of each colour on top of each other. This next photo shows the fringe with the coloured crepe paper alternated:

Two different looks using the same crepe paper. Easy trim to make and easy to put together using the hot glue. 

Valentine Bags

Finished the front of the Valentine Bags I am making for all the Valentine treat holders I am making. I used the Hearts stencil set from Scrapbook.com for the bag fronts. The lacy heart is from the new release from Trinity Stamps. Used hot foil for the banners under the tag. The heart in the center of the tag is from the hearts border from Trinity Stamps also. Here is the bag:

This bag has the red foil heart in the center of it and here is a photo of the two center hearts I made:

Here is a photo of the tag with the hot foiled banner pieces:

For the pink hearts across the top and bottom of the bags I used ribbon from the DollarTree and it is shiny and has a holographic look to it:

Definite theme this year is pink and reds.... Love the layered hearts stencil as well as the Trinity Stamps heart die set I used on the fronts of the bags. Used white gift bags from the stash for the bag. White card stock from the stash used for the stenciled front. Heart ribbon/bow is also from the stash. Fun bag to put together and shows off the hot pink and red inks on the stenciled hearts. 

Valentine Bag Toppers

Recently bought the Heart Bag Topper die set from Scrapdivadesigns.com for my Valentine treat bags. The nice thing about this die set is it is a set of three bag toppers - small, medium, and large. This way all sizes are in the same die set and you do not have to buy different die sets for different sized dies. Erica owns Scrapdiva and she ships quickly so you do not have to wait long to try out your new die set. Here is a photo of some of the Valentine Bag Toppers I made:

For my bag toppers first I die cut out the bag toppers from solid card stocks. I wanted mine to have a printed front to them so here are photos to show how I did this:

Now cut out the printed card stock for the bag topper front:

Folded the solid bag topper and covered the solid card stock with liquid glue:

Put the printed card stock piece on top of this: (Do not fold - leave flat)

Put a stamp clear block on top and set it aside to dry. Once it was dried I turned it over and used scissors to trim off the top pieces that were not needed:

For my bag toppers I used the large die in the set. I used heart printed card stock from HobbyLobby and die cut my rosettes using a Sizzix rosette die. Used a doily die from my stash and cut out the white doilies to put my rosettes on. Used a card stock circle and cut out glittered tulle for the tulle circles on top of the rosettes:

The above photo shows the different #110 weight card stock circles I have on hand for my tulle circles. I take a long piece of the tulle and fold it up and lay the circle on the top of it and cut the circle out using scissors. For some of my rosettes I used small tulle circles and also larger tulle circles. I also added metallic thread under the punched glittered card stock hearts on the rosettes:

Here is a better photo of some of the bag toppers:

Added glittered stickers to the fronts of the bag toppers and heart shaped bling to the center of the punched hearts on the tops of the rosettes. Easy bag toppers to put together. The "Love" die set is from my stash and I cut that out of red mirrored card stock and the background piece is #110 weight white card stock scraps from the stash. 

Last minute, last project.....

 Last trip to Hobby Lobby I picked up some Christmas embellishments for 70% off the regular price... I picked up a strand of holiday beads and decided to make a couple of the beaded pokey tools:

I had the scribe pins in my stash so I did not have to buy anything else for these decorated pokey tools. Here is a photo of the packaging for the scribe pins at Hobby Lobby:

The price on the packaging says $2.99 but I always buy these when they are on sale for 50% off so it is about 75 cents for each scribe pin. I used the holiday bead strand and made two of the pokey tools. I also used spacer beads from the stash. I had also picked up a strand of their peppermint candy beads that day - those beads are silicone.. As for all the pokey tools I used E6000 for the adhesive. To package this to give away for Christmas I put the rubber tip protector on the pokey tool it comes with and I cut a piece of heavier card stock and put the beaded tool on that.and held it in place using a small strip of card stock that I stapled onto the white card stock piece. This way the tool was safe and would not poke anyone. I also used the silicone peppermint bead for the dangle I made for the pokey tool. For each dangle I added metal charms and holiday red and green beads from the stash:

I have made these tools in the past:

One of the two holiday pokey tools is for me so now when I am working on Christmas projects in July I can use the holiday pokey tool while working along on holiday projects.... Another good project to use tiny beads from the stash for the dangles on the tools. Fun holiday project to put together...

Lip Balm Holder

Bought the I-Crafter Lip Balm holder die set on sale and put it to use this Christmas - here is a photo of some of the holders I made for this Christmas:

I used scrap card stock prints for the holders and across the bottom of the front of the box I put washi tapes or pieces of the printed card stocks to decorate them. I also used clear packaging and I add a clear window to the box:

I bought the chap sticks in mulitple packs so they are economical. Here is a photo of one of the boxes:

This die set comes with the Merry Christmas dies and other word dies, a reindeer, and shapes. I wanted to keep this simple with just a greeting and I used embellishments and punches from my stash to decorate the fronts of these boxes. You can make two of these boxes out of one sheet of 8 1/2 x 11 card stock. Another good use for printed card stock scraps as well.