Copic Refills Storage.

 I found I was in need of storage for my Copic marker re inkers.

Unable to find something I liked that was suitable I decided to make my own box.

This box is made from chipboard and covered in paper from Tim Holtz " French Revolution" paper stack.

 I love these little clasps,  hubby bought for me for a project I am working on for his mum.  There were a couple left over so I used on on this little box.

They came all the way from France. I love them so much hubby has ordered some more for me.

We purchased a pack of drawer handles from our local  Homebase store. Of course the screws were far to long,  so  hubby cut them down to fit.

To reinforce the card for the handle Hubby cut a piece of thin steel a little larger than the handle and drilled two holes through the steel for the handle screws to go through.
Unfortunately I had already lined the inside of the box before we decided to  add the steel.
I could cover it with another piece of card and decorative  paper to hide it, but to be honest, I am not to worried about this.

The  leather look corner reinforcing pieces are actually leather effect wallpaper.
 I can tell you this stuff really does look and feel like leather, it's pretty tough too.




I cut some dividers to help keep the bottles in position.

I used a scraps of floral wallpaper  to line the inside of the box.

The box is approximately 6 inches square, each section holds 10 refills. the whole box holds 40.

This weekend .....I ordered more refills and hubby had ordered some for me for Christmas.......so,  "I'm gonna need a bigger box". So my next project is designing a much bigger box that will take longer to fill. lol.

Box Card Tutorial.

Box Card Tutorial .
Here's quick tutorial on making the Box Card.My measurements may vary  slightly from other tutorials.

Start by cutting an A4 sheet of cardstock in half as if to make two 4x6 cards.

Place your card on your scoreboard and score  at  2"  4"    6"  and  8" inches.
You will notice there will be a narrow strip left at the end of the card. this is where your adhesive will go when you come to stick the box together.






Turn the card around on the scoreboard so that the narrow strip is at the bottom of the scoreboard. Then score a line across three the top three panels ONLY. Then mark the narrow strip at the 2" inch point.

The unscored panel is the back of the card where you will place your sentiment panel  and a space for the card to be signed.



Using a knife or scissors cut down the  three score lines to the the score lines cross over.





Cut away the top section ONLY  of the narrow strip. 

Your box should look like this  when the cutting is finished.


DO NOT stick your box together yet.











Cut three side panels in either white card stock or a decorative cardstock that coordinates with you base card.

I have decided to decorate the panels myself using rubber stamps rather than my usual  patterned papers.

I have chosen this colour because  I was asked to making a card for a Sapphire Wedding Anniversary.
So I thought I would experiment first.

Your panels need to be half and inch smaller than the side panels of the box.
You will also need to cut 4 smaller panels to decorate the top flaps of the box.   Again these need to be about  half and inch smaller than the box flaps.

The last panel is  going to be  half an inch smaller than the full length  back panel .





Here I have use a  Night of Navy ink pad from SU and stamped the images from the flower shop  stamp set and the petite petals stamp set.
Using the Aqua painter I picked up a  little ink from the lid of the ink pad and brushed in a little more colour to the flowers. the I sponged the edges of the card stock with the same ink. I repeated this on all the panels.

 Now you can stick stick your panels onto your box  sides and flaps.





You can also join the sides of the box together now with a strong double sided tape or glue.

Allow to dry if using wet adhesive.







Next step,  the  mechanics of this card. 

Cut two strips of card about half an inch wide.


Then cut the strips into  lengths of  3" you'll need three in total and  score a line  half an inch in at both ends  of each strip.
These are the bridges  which you will be sticking all your decorative piece to and they so it is important they are stuck in to position firmly.



Fold the ends so they are going in  opposite directions, so they look rather like a stretched Z.

Open up your box and stand it on a firm surface.

Place a small amount of glue onto the end tabs of one of  the bridges and gently place the bridge inside the top opening of the box and as bring it as far forward as it will go and then squeeze those glue tabs  against the side walls of the box, then lay the box  on it's side and  gently squish it flat, this is to make sure it will fold flat when it's  finished so that it will fit into an envelope.   You really don't want any nasty surprises later on.


Repeat this until all three bridges  stuck in. 


Do remember to  fold it flat after adding each bridge. If you do something wrong at this point you will be able to correct it easier  at this point  rather than after you've added        all  your bit's and bobs.



Now comes the fun bit.
Cut  some thin strips of fairly thick acetate around 1/8" wide  and  in varying lengths. You'll need quite a few.

Then stick each of your decorations on to an acetate stem. 

Starting with the larger items begin sticking them to the Bridges. Then  add the smaller items.


I love to use small glittery hearts  and  shiny gem stones mixed in with the flowers to give a little sparkle and to lift.

Here is the box with all the strips of acetate stuck to the bridges. This card was made for a Sapphire Wedding Anniversary hence the 45.

Simple Christmas card

This month I saw my 3rd anniversary as  a Stampin up demonstrator. I am sorry to say this will probably be my last anniversary.
The current economic climate has taken it's toll on so many people and made it  impossible for me to continue.
 So many people I know have been hit so hard by the downward spiralling economy, including myself. As much as  I love the stampin up products,   I can't keep on buying  products just to reach my quarterly figures. Dear hubby as patient and as understanding  as he is of my addiction, would have a fit if I did.
So unless a miracle happens this will be my last year on the SU demo list.

I will  continue to post cards and other items I make as and when I make them.
I have to say I have been busy making doll's clothes for my Grandaughter and have really enjoyed getting back into sewing.  We also  have another grandchild on the way.
So...
I think it's a good time for me to take a small break from the paper crafting
and start using up all the boxes of fabric lurking  all around the house, hidden away in  chests, ottomans and plastic boxes stashed away in the loft and shed.
Not to  mention the  cloakroom  size cupboard that is stuffed full of fabrics.....
I am now feeling the need to make a teddy bear and try my hand at quilting.


 Ooops, I just told hubby the answer to all those,  What's in there?" questions, that  I just answer with a,  "you don't want to know?"  and bless him,  he leaves it at that.

Dress Card

 I  woke this morning with a stiff neck and a stinking headache, which was probably the result of spending so much time working on this card. It's for a very special young lady who is my eldest son partners . She does have a passion for fashion  so I hope she likes it.
To make this card, I cut out the dress shape  twice in black card. I then cut about an inch and a half  of the fish tail off  of one of dresses and applied versamark ink  and heat and stick powder all over the top part of the dress. I heated the powder until it began to melt (DO NOT OVER HEAT) then I applied  black glitter and pressed it down into the heat and stick .  You can  used a xyron to apply the glue if you prefer. 
I then added some crystals along the top edge of the dress.

Taking the second dress shape, I cut off the  bottom 2" of the  fish tail and discarded the top part of the dress.
Using some soft, limp lace fabric,  (about 1 1/2" wide and 6 - 8" long )  I ran a line of  small gathering stitches very close to the edge of the fabric and pulled the thread up to gather the lace until it was approximately an inch wider than the card fish tail.
I put a strip of double sided tape across the card fish tail  half an inch down from the top edge to hold the gathered lace edge.
Lining up the bottom edge of the lace with the bottom edge of the card fish tail I pressed the gathered lace edge onto the the double sided tape (arranging the lace as I went along. ) leaving about half an inch of card above the lace.  ( This is to join the two parts of the dress together later.)
 I  folded  the  ends of lace to the back of the fish tail and held them in place with double sided tape.
Apply a little glue  across the width of the card fishtail  ( the bit  that's above your gathered lace)  and place the  glittered  part of the dress on top,  butting up the bottom edge of the dress to the top edge of the lace.
I ran   a very thin line of crystal effects  across the the lace where it meets the glitter and sprinkled with more black glitter. I then layed a kebab stick over the lace gathers and pressed it down to flatten the lace join .
My lace looked a little too matt against the all the sparkle of the glitter so I lightly brushed some crystal effects over the lace with a stiff paint brush and applied  more black glitter.
The last thing was to gather a small length of ribbon to form the flower and stick a diamonte in the centre.

Now you maybe asking why didn't I just use edging lace and and just stick over one  of the dress shapes........ My answer ....edging lace usually has a slightly thicker edges,  which adds bulk and makes it more springy therefore  making it more difficult to stick down.

Joining the two pieces of card at the fish tail created a a slight step in the card which means I have a join between the lace and the card  that is flush and there is no bulk . I have  a stronge dislike for cards with fabric on that look bulky and out of control.

The handbag was made using  a tag punch, 2 circle punches  , and an oval punch from SU.

The crown was created by stamping a crown in versamark ink and heat  embossing in black and apply tiny dots of crystal effects over the embossing and applying black glitter.

Decorated Note Pad

Here I have used a discontinued stamp set to decorate this little note.  It wasn't discontinued when I made this.
I just forgot to post  it. Perhaps I need to use this.
I actually got my sewing machine out to decorate  part of this.
The label on the front of the pad says  "Sew you don't forget".
The box  cover says " for your C.R.A.F.T moments which  stands for .. .C an't   Remember A  F******  T hing."
Which is quite apt for me at the moment.

cards that impressed me

 I have had a lot of time this week  since my injury to go looking at other people s blogs. Wow !!! there are some amazing ladies out there making wonderful cards.

Here are two that I found and had to have a go at making.
The first one doesn't show the  enbossing detail very well. So I will say  that the candles  sizes are about  1/2 " wide  X 3" long. I inked the edges with the same colour ink as the card. and placed them in an embossing folder before sticking them on to the white card. I punched 7 Bird wings  in yellow. Using the  bird punch from S.U.   and daubed some apricot appeal ink at the base of the flame.

This second card  Looked fantastic on the ladies blog but when I reproduced it  looked flat and to be honest very disappointing. So I took it all to pieces and inked the edges of all the circles and stuck it all back together. I was much happier with the result.     It  was created using three different size circle punches. 

Tea caddy/Copic marker storage

 I am always looking for good storage  containers. A little while ago I came across this tea caddy  in Lidls.  I thought it would be idea for my Copic markers.                         I know you can buy purpose built copic marker racks but they seem to be rather expensive if you don't have or don't intend to collect the whole range of pens.  

I don't have a huge collection of them but I do have  to many too fit in a standard pencil case and finding the colour you want in a pencil case  is never easy,  the one you want is  always the last one you come across.

There are only five compartments in this caddy so I figured  I could get away with keeping two or three colours in each  section. yellow/ peach and orange in one section, pinks reds and burgundys in another and so on.   On the whole it seems to working for me so far.  Although occassionally I do tend mix them up a bit.