VALENTINES CARD

I wanted to something different this year for my husbands valentines card then i came across this old photo and thought i could use this on my card as we have been together 14 years this year.

I started off by cutting my black card stock 15/15 cms using acetate cut a square measuring 13 1/2 by 131/2 cut out the square and glue the acetate in the centre then cover with black strips to fit inside cut 3 squares of glitter card stock the same size fold in the middle and cut a heart shape out of each fix onto the side of the card.


Using white paint paint in a sweeping motion add a little red streaks once dry fix patterned papers and photo stitch over the heart shape when stitching double up on your stitching this will enable you to have the repeated pattern on the inside to make it look neater inside the card add chosen embellishments to Finnish off your card cover the inside with patterned paper.

Valentines Layout - Little Yellow Bicycle

When Wendy asked me to choose a range to play with to create a Valentine layout for the blog, I just had to ask for the Little Yellow Bicycle Love Letters range.
She also threw in some other embellishments for me to add in too.

Before I started the layout I decided I wanted to make it interactive, and the most obvious way to do this seemed to be to include some sort of card.
As this would need a fair size space to accomodate it on the layout, I started off making the envelope so I knew how much other space I had left.
I loved the Solid Die Cut edge paper and drew around an old opened envelope on the reverse of the paper.

Once I had cut it out, I scored along the fold lines.

As this paper wasn't double sided, I chose to line the inside of the flap with some of the reverse of the Love Ledger paper.
Again I used the envelope to cut the correct size, and I also covered most of the inside below the flap as once the card would be removed from the envelope it is nice to see pattern underneath there too.

I inked all around the top edges using my maroon Cats Eye Chalk inkpad.

After sticking the inside paper in place, I folded and stuck the envelope.

The basis of the rest of the layout would be the Grid Scalloped Circle die cut paper.

I stuck this to a pale grey base cardstock (from which I cut a large round hole in the centre as I hate wasting all that card!) and stuck the die cut circle in place.
Using my white pen I doodled a circle around one of the rings in the pattern just to add a little extra something.

Next I cut a few small blocks of paper.... from the Stripe with Type paper...

... and the Kiss Lace paper.

Then I adhered these to the layout like so-

I now returned to the leftover Solid Die Cut edge paper, and cut a border from it....

I inked the edge of this; then matted the photo onto some white cardstock, and inked the edges of that too.
Before sticking both these down, I laid the envelope onto the page to ensure I got the spacing right- then added the border and photo to the layout.

Next came the title, for this I used American Crafts Glitter Thickers Lax in white.
I stuck these onto a scrap of one of the papers I already used, then trimmed it to size leaving a small border.

This i stuck near to the bottom right edge of the page.

Now it was ime to start embellishing the page.
To make some decoartive corner accents, I used these pretty corner stickers from the Clear Border Stickers sheet.
I stuck them onto white card, then trimmed around the edges.
I added small 3-D foam pads to the back so once stuck down they gave extra height to the page.

I used these Scenic Route Hearts chipboard pieces, covering them in pieces of the patterned papers.
To do this I drew around the chipboard pieces upside down on the reverse of the paper; cut out; then glue to the chipboard- I like to use the 2 way blue Zig glue pens.

To make the card, I folded some white cardstock in half.
I cut a piece of patterned paper, which I matted using some of the leftover grey cardstock I cut from the middle of my base earlier.
In the extra embellishments Wendy sent me there was a blank tag; I used this as a template to cut a tag; and the heart was the middle piece I cut when making the covered chipboard hearts.

I assembled all the elements, along with a piece of ribbon tied through the tag, to make a simple but pretty note card.

Now I stuck down the chipboard hearts, and added the little flowers and a touch of bling.

I also added some flowers to the title, and added a tiny gem at intervals down the side of the die cut border strip.

And here is the layout as it is without the card and envelope...

And the layout complete with the the card and envelope...

As you can see, the envelope can be tucked into one of the decorative corners to hold it in place, and a piece of ribbon stuck to the page means it can be tied on securely.

The card could be used as a Valentines card, to be given to your loved one, then added to the page afterwards to keep; or it could be used as a place to add some hidden journalling, maybe about how much your valentine means to you.

A Mini Book of Love...

This year, I wanted to make my partner something special for Valentine's day - I normally make a card, but this time I wanted to try a mini book. Fortunately, this Christmas I received an instruction book for making all kinds of different mini-books, and I decided to adapt some of the ideas for my own creation. When the Kelly Panacci papers arrived in the post from Papermaze, I knew they were perfect for this project.

First I covered some chipboard to make back and front covers for my mini book. I mitred the corners and covered the insides with contrasting papers. I decided to add some stamped detail using some Autumn Leaves Swirl stamps using Walnut Stain Distress Ink.

I made the hinges with two pieces of cardstock - they were folded into accordions before being adhered to the front and back covers. I stuck the inside of the accordion folds together using double sided tape on the outside of the book, so they didn't act as springs!

I chose eight of my favourite photos of myself and my partner and printed them at a small size. I then stuck them to small pieces of the patterned cardstock, inking the edges and adding more stamped details to the back side of each piece of cardstock. These would act as the pages of my mini-book. I stuck the pages alternately on either hinge, as shown.

I wanted the decorations to be fairly simple, so I punched heart shapes out of the cardstock and inked the edges using a heart punch, just adding a touch of bling before sticking them to various pages.

I cut Scallop Circles using a punch from brown cardstock, and made a spot for the date on the inside front cover and a space for my journalling on the back cover.

I also punched a scalloped circle for the front cover, which I adhered so that it slightly hung over one of the front covers. I made the title by cutting a word out from this piece of cardstock:

and added a subtitle with Making Memories Tiny Alpha stickers.

I will add some journalling to the back pages of the mini-book before giving it to my partner on Valentines day!

Basic Grey Bittersweet

First I made some glitter hearts, I took a chipboard heart and placed it inside a plastic bag, using stickles I drew over the heart... I applied the stickles quite thickly, I then slid the chipboard heart over and using another colour of stickles did the same thing, I repeated this a few times using different colours as I wasnt sure what colour heart I wanted at this stage.

I left the stickles to dry over night ...... when the glitter glue had dried I peeled the shapes off the plastic.

I cut some squares from the basic grey bitter sweet papers using a suare punch, I inked the edges of the punched squares using chestnut roan cats eye ink pad

I cut a mat for my photo from BasicGrey Bittersweet - Almond Toffee paper, and i scalloped the edge, then drew round the edge with a white pen.

I cut my white card stock to 8.5x11 and arranged the punched squares under my photo mat, then stuck all this to the white card.

I took my grey glitter heart and glued this to a flower and then glued a small pink flower to the top of the glitter heart.

I took a grungeboard bookplate and inked it with pale pink ink.

When the ink had dried I used cotton candy stikles to glitter the bookplate and left this to dry.

Once dry I attached a love charm using some pink fibre

I attached the flower embellishment and the bookplate over the end of the lace and border sticker.
I matted my photo on cream glitter card. And stuck this on to the photo mat. I added my title using making memories tiny alphas and added my journalling

Here is my finished LO