Flowers and Butterflies Gift Bucket

I'm playing along again with one of Cath's 350 Cards and Gift Week Challenges over at Moxie Fab World. This time I thought I'd try the Gift Packaging Challenge .



Stamps (Hero Arts) - Blossom Art & Birthday Messages

Sometimes I like to give gifts in small buckets and picked up this little one a while ago. I embossed the flowers on vellum, cut out and layered. Then I added little flower gem centres and adhered the flowers to the bucket. To try to give a light, airy feel I used some organza ribbon for the bow and tulle as packaging.



I had loads of tiny little butterflies left over from punching borders for cards, so to use up some, I sprinkled them over the present and tulle. Well I better go tidy up my stamping supplies, you'd never guess the huge mess I made putting together this tiny gift bucket! Thanks for visiting:)

Happy fingers, happy feet and a chance to win a trip to Ireland

My fingers are orange and green but, as always, I've had great fun playing with distress inks!

I made this card for the Focal Point Challenge in the Moxie Fab World, Paper Crafts September 2012 Gallery Challenge (natural elements) and the current Hero Arts Challenge (fall feast).



Stamps (Hero Arts) - Earth Flowers, Blossom Art, Designer Woodgrain & Everyday Sayings

On the card base I stamped the woodgrain using antique linen distress. Then I die cut a piece of fabric and stamped the Earth Flowers with tea dye distress ink. The flower and leaves were white embossed and I applied distress inks (spiced marmalade and forest moss). To add some more natural elements I added some raffia and a wooden button.

So you've heard about the happy fingers and now on to the happy feet with some photos from a recent hike in Glendalough. We started the walk from the far side of the lake you can see way down in the valley. You can probably tell from the photo our walking boots have enjoyed quite a few rambles!

On some parts of the trail these railway sleepers have been put down, mainly to protect the mountains but they also provide a good grip on what can sometimes be slippery slopes.

Wish I could capture in photos just how beautiful it is in the mountains,

especially on gorgeous sunny days.

The heather is in full bloom.

But it looks like we were a bit late to try the sweet, juicy fraughans (bilberries) that can be found there.

Coming down through the forest we can across foxgloves. A bee was hovering around them but in each photo I took he had disappeared into the flowers or ended up blurry.

Here we are back down at the lake again and up to the left is where we had been.

I just thought I'd mention a place where I came across a chance to win a trip to Ireland next year from the US. A year long event called The Gathering celebrating Ireland and all things Irish is being held next year. It sounds like it's going to be a brilliant fun filled year. Anyway on The Gathering's Facebook page there is a chance to win the holiday here. Good luck!:)

Flower Pot Treat Containers

I wanted to make some treat holders and ended up making these little flower pot treat containers.


Stamps (Hero Arts) - Blossom Art, Envelope Pattern, Be Happy and Woodland Creatures

To make the flower pots I cut strips of card (thanks again Trinh!) 6 x 2 3/4 and scored them at 1/2, 2 1/2, 3 1/2 and 5 1/2.



I marked dots 1/2 inch in from the sides and added lines (see photo below)



Then I cut out the excess pieces...



...and was left with a flower pot shape.



Then I added the grass to the outside of the pots and stuck down the rims of the pots.



I put little treats - conversation hearts (thanks again Trinh!) wrapped in organza in the containers and adhered the top edges of the pots together. I might add little packets of seeds if I make these again.



The stems were made by wrapping baker's twine (thanks again Linda!) around cocktail sticks and adding leaves from some May Arts ribbon. The flowers were white embossed and distress inks (barn door, spiced marmalade and mustard seed) applied. I just added some stickles for sparkle and little ladybirds to each pot.

I’m submitting these into to the Household Items Challenge in the Moxie Fab World (used cocktail sticks for the stems), the Paper Scraps Challenge in the Moxie Fab World (used lots of scraps to make these) and the current Hero Arts Challenge.

Wedding bits and pieces and gift box tutorial

Since I went back to work recently, I haven't had much time (or for that matter, energy!) to make anything. So I was really delighted to get the chance to play and make this wedding favour box, place card and candle for the current Hero Arts Challenge.


Stamps (Hero Arts) - Blossom Art & Small Variety Alphabet

I white embossed the flowers on white card, applied shabby shutters & tumbled glass distress ink and spritzed lightly with water. Then I added some Hero Arts lace, pearls (thanks again, Sharon) and heart gems to the favour box and place card. A quick tutorial for the box is further down the post.

Then I decided to make a wedding candle.


Stamps (Hero Arts) - Blossom Art & Small Variety Alphabet

The flower is made in the same way as above. For the flower centre I embossed the couple's initials on a circle of kraft, lightly applied white chalk ink to the edge and added a couple of Hero Arts heart pearls.



Now to the gift box tutorial. I hadn't realised my writing is so small but you can click on the photos to get a clearer view! Cut two pieces of card 14cm x 14.5cm. Score at 3.5cm on three of the sides as in the photo below.


Cut out the two 3.5cm squares at the base of the pieces of card. Then adhere the two pieces of card together.


Flip the piece of card over and apply double sided sticky tape as shown in the photo below.


Adhere one side of the box together...


.. and then the other side.


When the box has been completed adhere a die cut piece of card to each side. I used the second biggest die from the Labels 8 set for my box but you can adjust the size of the box to fit any of these dies.


Hopefully it won't be as long till I post again! Hope you all have a wonderful weekend:)

A Big, Big Thank You:)

Below is a card I made for today’s Hero Arts Social Club. Linda, Anita, Sharon, Sally and I were delighted when Tami from Hero Arts asked us to be on the Social Club today and we decided on a theme of thanks. I have so much to be grateful for and have enjoyed every minute of being a Hostess with the talented and fun hostis - Linda, Anita, Sharon and Sally. I’m just sorry that our time as Hostesses has whizzed by so quickly.


Stamps (Hero Arts) - Many Petals, Classic Fabric Design, Blossom Art and Dolls.

Thanks to Hero Arts for their wonderful stamps, amazing generosity, inspiring blog and, of course, for the brilliant Hero Arts Flickr group. I am inspired on a daily basis by everyone in the group and never imagined when I joined how much fun I would have and the good friends I would make there. I can’t thank Tami and Libby from Hero Arts enough for all they have done for us over the last three months, they have been absolutely brilliant! If you aren’t already in the Hero Arts Flickr group, I’d encourage you to join right away!



To start with I applied broken china distress ink to the Fabric Background, spritzed well with water and stamped on watercolour paper. Then using white embossing powder I embossed the leaves and flower. I applied broken china and shabby shutters distress inks to the leaves. On the bottom layer of the flower I applied worn lipstick distress ink and spritzed lightly with water. Worn lipstick distress ink was also applied to the upper layer of the flower and I added a selection of beads to the centre. For the sentiment piece I applied worn lipstick distress to white card, spritzed with water and embossed the sentiment in white.

Hero Hostess Takeover!

It’s Hero Hostess week on the Hero Arts blog this week and we’ve had such a fun time making birthday cards and projects for the blog!

Linda and Sharon were first up on Monday with wonderful cards for a friend and a guy. On Tuesday Sally shared a stunning gift box which she had created and is sure to make a present extra special. Wednesday saw Anita with her very first video tutorial and she created a gorgeous card with wonderful instructions on how to make twisted ribbon flowers. So Friday is finally here and I’m sharing some gift wrapping ideas.


Stamps (Hero Arts) Antique Engravings, Blossom Art, Large Flower & Birthday Messages

I often make my own wrapping paper and embellishments for gifts. I love choosing the stamps and colours to make these and had great fun going through my Hero Arts stamps to wrap these particular gifts. Full instructions on how I wrapped the gifts are here on the Hero Arts website so I’ll just give the short version now. I stamped a butterfly randomly over pieces of some blue craft paper using VersaMark.



To decorate the parcels I white embossed the butterflies and flowers on vellum and added a selection of gems – thanks again Joy for some of these! The bottom layer of the sentiment was also white embossed on vellum with the top layer white embossed on a scrap of the blue paper.



The blue paper I used was from a roll which is 70m long and cost the same as a single sheet of wrapping paper. So I’ll be able to wrap lots of presents from this roll and will be able to customise them to suit the recipient’s tastes. The other day I wrapped a present for a friend using different paper and stamped embellishments. She told me that she has saved the embellishments so that she can make her first cards using them – hopefully she’ll get hooked on card making too!



I'm submitting this project into The Shabby Tea Room "Party Time" Challenge and the Simon Says Stamp Happy Birthday Challenge.

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!