Envelope Punchboard File Folder Card & Gift Card Holder!

 

This is my version of the file folder card that so many are trying out with the new envelope punch board.  It is one of the options for my next stamp club...I've made 3 or 4 options so I'm having a hard time choosing.  Because many people ask me for ideas for gift cards, I wanted to share this idea with you.  As you can see, I embellished with the festive flurries bundle (a bit of an addiction these days).  The file folder card shape is cinched together and the pocket it creates includes both a tag using Chalk Talk (don't you think this works well when stamped in cherry cobbler for Christmas?!) and a gift card envelope which I also made with the envelope punchboard.  These cards would also be ideal this Christmas for those who send a family photo or a family letter in their Christmas card...the possibilities are endless.

If you want to get a basic sense of how to make a file folder card with the envelop punchboard, here's a link to Catherine Pooler who has a video on it (though there are lots of versions out there).

Festive Flurry Banner - a different kind of banner

So I didn't have great lighting for this photo and I don't have any of my Christmas stuff out yet to really give it effect, but I'm thrilled with how this idea turned out.  As you can see, I'm still playing with the festive flurry bundle.  And if you've been following my blog long you know that I love to make banners for holidays & occasions but this time I thought I'd made a wall banner that hangs down instead of across...and each element of the banner has a snowflake as it's base.  So  stamped and layered snowlfakes to my hearts content and then I strung them on some cherry cobbler seem binding.  I cut the JOY letters out of red glitter paper using the big shot, and the embellishments on the snowflakes in between the letters were actually in color accents that I embossed in gold (they were originally crisp cantaloupe, but you'd never know that now...see you can repurpose or remake anything to your suiting;)

Festive Flurry Bundle - Ornament Idea #2

Here's another ornament idea I've tried with the festive flurry bundle.  This one is made from 3 different sizes of the snowflakes each stamped in a different color (cherry cobbler, gumball green & gold)...then I layered them together (folding each in half first) and assembled similar to how I did yesterday's ornament.  I bet that gold will catch the light of the Christmas tree well:)

Festive Flurry Bundle - Ornament Idea #1

I can't seem to get enough of stamping snowflakes with the new festive flurry stamp set, and cutting them out is a cinch with the coordinating framelits.  This ornament was made from five of the large snowflakes stamped in cherry cobbler and cut out...then I folded each one in half and punched a half circle out...then I glued them together and before I closed up the last snowflake the first one, I strung some of the new silver ribbon down and made a little dangle to hang in the punched circles out of some glitter paper punched five times with the small heart punch.  Now that I have the basic idea, I want to try with some other snowflake sizes, I think the next size down might be easier for folding purposes than this one was, and I wonder what else I could dangle in the 1 1/4" circle the ornament creates?!:)

Envelope Punchboard - Gift Card Holder, Thank You Card

 

I made this card using the envelope punchboard to get the file folder shapes in the pocked and the gift card insert.  Again, I was playing around with ideas which is why the colour pallet ended up being rather neutral.  I used the shop around roller stamp for the pocket and the greeting comes from one of the paper pumpkin kits from a past month.  I decorated the pocket with a dress from which I cut from black card stock using the dress up framelits, and I embellished it with a pressed clay flower that I made using the medium mold.  The dsp came from the in colour stack.

Mosaic Madness Christmas

While I was playing outside of the box on the weekend, I pulled out my Mosaic Madness stamp set and punch and paired it with the Sweet Essentials greetings and came up with this ornament Christmas card idea.  I love it when you get a lot of mileage out of a stampset and I love to find ways to use good basic supplies and stamps for any occasion and that is exactly what happened here.  I've been experimenting with making ornaments out of snowflakes (using the festive flurries bundle...see more thoughts/ideas on that in the days to come on this blog:)....and as I was experimenting I started looking at the idea of folding and combining symmetrical images to create ornaments...and from there these ornaments made with Mosaic Madness were born.  And an ornament needs a ribbon and a string don't you think?!  I think it turned out pretty cute, though if I had it to do again I would stamp the green background piece before forming the ornaments onto it, but since I was experimenting at the time, I didn't know where I was going, and I thought I'd just share with you the raw idea.  If you try it yourself, please let me know...I'd love to see what you come up with too!:)

Vintage Christmas - a new colour palette

The colours for this Christmas card see at first very non-traditional, but I was inspired by some vintage Christmas ornaments...see this link!  In fact, it isn't non-traditional at all to use pinks and turquoise along with golds  in vintage Christmas vingette's at all.  I'm not thrilled with the final version of this card...I think it needs to be shiny-er.  It's prettier in person that the picture captures, but I feel like I could have pushed it just a bit further, but that is all part of the process...we create...and we re-create...and things evolve and take a life of their own.

I'm probably more of a red & green girl at Christmas, but it's far enough away to experiment and create outside of the box a bit;)

Stamp sets used on this card were:  Calm Christmas & World Map

Up-cycle your old Holiday & Occasions Catalogs!

I made this little Halloween gift bag from pages from last year's holiday catalog.  I saw the idea to upcycle them from another demonstrator and then today I came upon this video from yet another demonstrator that makes it very easy, so I thought I'd share the link here.  My tag was made with the Tags 4 You stamp set & coordinating punch.

Pop & Place

Here's a preview:

Stampin Up's new Pop & Place Holiday Gift Tags come in a booklet of 70+ tags in five designs--created from our existing punch and die shapes. These tags (which coordinate with the Season of Style products in the 2013 holiday catalog) are perfect for anyone wanting to make cute quick tags, even for new customers who may not know what punch or die shapes they are interested in just yet:) 

There are a few different options to choose from depending on your needs:

Item	Description
134975	Pop & Place Holiday Gift Tags Book   $11.95
134623	Christmas Tagables Photopolymer Stamp Set  $16.95
135921	Pop & Place Holiday Gift Tags Bundle includes   $22.95 Pop & Place Holiday Gift Tags Book  Christmas Tagables Photopolymer Stamp Set
135290	Pop & Place Holiday Gift Tags Starter Bundle includes  $27.95 Pop & Place Holiday Gift Tags Book  Christmas Tagables Photopolymer Stamp Set Soft Suede Classic Stampin' Spot Clear Block C

World Card Making Day!

Today is World Card Making Day, and so you know I had to make a card, or two...  Actually, I have a number of other responsibilities today, so I didn't have the time to create all the things in my head, but I did sit down to make this card today to send to some wonderful friend who are going through a difficult time. 

 

So this is today's card (got some inspiration from Monica Vale:)  On this card I used the following stamp sets:  Layered Labels, Blessings from Heaven & Feeling Sentimental (I also used one of the single stamps from the first Paper Pumpkin kit).  The dsp comes from the Modern Medley pack (and the coordinating envelope was made from paper in the in color dsp stack).  In colors were Baked Brown Sugar & Basic Black.

I'd love to see what cards you made on world cardmaking day so be sure to post a link in the comments below or share with me on Facebook:)