Fancy Die Cut Envelopes

After Christmas I decided to treat myself to a couple of new dies  and I have been itching to get in the craftroom to try them out. But my favourite room became the dumping ground for everything I needed to get out of the way over Christmas. So the craft room has been out of bounds for a while. 

 Today was the day I decided to fight my way through the door and and have a go at creating these envelopes.
These would be great for wedding invitations. But I  wouldn't fancy making too many of them.

I have to say the 6x4 envelopes were a cinch to make with my envelope punch board from SU.
The die I used to decorate the flap is a Spellbinder  Gold die.  I think it's called the Envelope Corner Die.
It's Beautiful design and I have been umming and arring  over it for some months now.
I am glad I finally got round to buying it. I think it makes these envelopes look really specially. I would be loathed to throw it out if this arrived through my letter box...... Mind you, Hubby would say I am loathed to throw anything thing out.

As for the black lined envelope,  I'd like to say that was a cinch too  but it wasn't. Everything was  great until I got to the last flap,....... how the hell does one die cut the last flap without squashing the embossing on the two side flaps.
As you can see I did manage it somehow  but there has to be and easier way.
I found the die needs to be near the edge of my Bigshot pro to cut through the flaps cleanly.
but angling the flaps to avoid squashing the  previously cut flaps means the die had to go through the centre of my Bigshot. 
If anyone out there knows of a tutorial for making these without squishing the side flaps Please tell.
Hope you like these.

Christmas Cracker as a Gift Wrapper.

Inside  this cracker is the needle case I made that matches the pin cushions in the post below. I had already sealed the cracker before I realized I hadn't taken a photo of it.

It's not often I make or buy a gift that is small enough to fit in any of the boxes or bags I make, so I was delighted that this gift fitted in the cracker perfectly.

This square cracker was made using the Envelope punch board from Stampin' Up.

They are very easy to make, I have previously done a tutorial on making the crackers which you can find here on my blog. So I am not going to go into details on this post.

A quick look at the new Envelope Punch Board

At long last somebody has come up with a foolproof envelope board.  Yay!!

This is a must have item.

I have  a basic envelope board,  I bought many years ago, but I lost the instructions so I have never been happy using it. 
 I always managed to score the wrong lines. Sometimes even with the instructions.
So I was delighted  when I saw that SU were bringing out this Gadget..... I LOVE IT!




 I was expecting it  to retail  around  the £25  mark.
 So when I saw it was only £17.95 I  just had to buy it.
It makes,  making envelopes a cinch.

You get a paper version of the instructions in the box with the board, but what I love is that the instructions are also ON  the board, so if you do lose the paper instructions  you can still use your board successfully.

It tells you what size to cut your paper  for each size envelope and which measurement you need to score for the size of envelope you want.
                                                                              You only need to measure where to put the first score line and punch out the corner, then you just turn your paper  round and line up your first score line with the little finger on the punch and score your next line and punch again.
                                              

 You do the same on all four sides and fold and stick  ... and that's it.   SO EASY.



If you want a rounded  tips on the flaps you   put the tips of your envelope into the other side of the punch and just punch .

Nothing could be simpler.

This board even comes with a scoring tool that is neatly hidden away in it's own little slot under the board. You can see this on the right of this photo.

Envelopes are  not the only thing you can make with this board.

 It's only been available  a few weeks and already there are some very clever ladies out there making other things with it.

I haven't chance to have a proper play yet.
 I have been very busy making wedding invitations, but  now they are complete,   so maybe I'll get the chance to play,  once I have cleaned up the mess and made some space.

Envelope Punch Board Cracker.

 Another project for the envelope punch board   which is the latest gadget from Stampin ' Up! is to make crackers. 
I saw this on on an Australian Demonstrators website.  Tanya has a tutorial you can download free of charge for this project. Unfortunately for me  the tutorial  wouldn't download, so I ended up  figuring it out for myself. You may have better luck .


I will leave details of her website at the end of this post so you can view it for yourself.  I don't know how or if her tutorial differs from mine. But for now here's how I made it.
 I used a piece of card stock 8 1/4"  X  6 1/2".  I  having been using whisper white card and the DSP to make these  crackers as I am  not sure if the punch could cope with two thickness of the plain coloured card which is thicker. I am a coward and really don't want to try it just in case I ruin my punch board.

I scored  the card length ways at 1  1/2"  intervals    which leaves you with a  1/2" strip  which is the Flap for the adhesive  Fold  all the score lines.

I folded the card to the first score line and placed the folded edge in the punch lined up to the 2" mark on the rule and punched .
I then opened it up an folded to the second score line and punched  again. I repeated this process until I had punched on every score line and on the edges of the cracker.

Then turned the card round and repeated the whole punching process again until both side matched. 

Taking the cracker back to the score board I scored a line each side of the the punched holes.
Then folded the inside line in towards the centre of the cracker and the outside score line back. ( see the photo) This will help the cracker to keep it's square shape when you tie the ribbons round.

If you intend to stamp your cracker now would be a really good time to do it, While the card stock is relatively flat.

 Here I have used to the Holly wheel wheel stamp to decorate this cracker, then added  red glitter glue over the berries.

One the glitter glue is dry, I will stick the edges together and tie ribbon around the punched lines which will draw the card in to give the cracker it's shape.

These two crackers are now ready for  the finishing touches.
As promised  here is the info to find Tanya's blog

Tanya Bell's Blog Australia

stampingt.com/au/blog 

Tanya has made loads of other amazing things and a visit to her blog is well worth the time.  
Go see for yourself.