Beautifully Belated

Sharing today a MEGA SURPRISE I received in the mail a few months ago. This was a belated birthday surprise from my amazing friend Patti of Creations By Patti blog...I'm totally embarrassed that it has taken me this long to finally posting this...really struggling to keep up with my blog these days! Patti sent these two handmade treasures; a personalized take out coffee cup (the perfect gift for a coffee fanatic like me) and a fabulous matching keepsake tissue box cover.

Remove the sipper cover on the coffee cup (she made that too!) to find a sweet surprise inside... hundreds of yummy Rolos candies, dressed up with adorable little stickers, each individually stamped and colored! How CUTE is that!

This keepsake tissue box cover is beyond AMAZING. The base is made of very sturdy specialty paper board, covered with pretty decorative papers. Patti used four different Asian Marci images from Lala Land. expertly colored and intricately paper pieced with beautiful washi papers for each of the box sides. Love how she used die cuts set in the background of each panel to make each side uniquely special. CRAZY AWESOME, right? To learn more details on how these two fabulous projects were created, please visit Patti's blog post here.

And that's not all! Here's the super KAWAII birthday card that accompanied the wonderful gifts. Patti used Mama Elephant's Lunar Extras stamp set to create this adorable shaker style card. See all the pretty iridescent pink sequins inside? LOVE this!!! 

Needless to say, I am one lucky gal to have a friend as creative and generous as Patti. Belated? Who cares! Receiving these  beautiful birthday treasures was like getting to celebrate all over again! Thank you, Patti; your thoughtfulness and friendship is the best gift I could ever ask for.

Boys Day and Mothers Day Surprises

I'm a few weeks late in sharing these wonderful treat boxes from my sweet friend Lorna that were waiting for me when I returned to work after vacation. Finding these two kawaii surprises in my locker instantly brightened my day and made having to return to work seem not so bad!

This adorable boy kokeshi treat box immediately stole my heart! Lorna paper pieced his kimono with washi paper, and oh my, don't you just love his spiky hair?!!! She attached a small box in between the front and back pieces of the doll to hold the yummy Boys Day treats...sweet!

For this super kawaii Mothers Day box, Lorna wrapped a piece of cardstock around the candy for the kimono and added a strip of washi paper for the obi sash. Mama kokeshi's head was print and cut, then attached to the top of the kimono. Oh! And there's even a little baby kokeshi riding on Mama kokeshi's back...too CUTE!
A big thank you to Lorna for always making and sharing the BEST and most creative treat holders ever!

Pikachu Center Platform Card

For my sweet niece who is all grown up but can still be seen carrying around her Pikachu stuffed toy whenever she comes home...I made this card to send for her birthday.

This card style was designed and shared by the very talented Maureen Wong on her blog, "My C.A.S.E. Studies" and is called a "Center Platform Card". It's sort of like a Center Step Card but  has a platform in the center instead of steps.

Here's a side view of the card where you can see how the cardstock meets in the center of the platform, leaving a slight gap where you can insert your paper pieced or stamped images and embellishments. The center piece on the bottom provides stability so the opened card stands up nicely for display.The finished card folds flat just like a step card and easily slides into an envelope.

For paper pieced Pikachu, I used a freebie svg cutting file created and shared by Krafty Nook. Birthday cake cutting file comes from Miss Kate's Cuttables. Make the Cut (MTC) was used to render coloring book images found on the web into cutting files for Pikachu's Pichu friends, and I welded oval and retangle shapes together in MTC to make the label. A Die-namics border die was used for the grass. Taylored Expressions die for the swirly clouds and a Punch Bunch mini punch for the flowers.

Final step was to add my sentiment to the back of the card.  The real beauty of this card is that it was super EASY to make! You can view Maureen's  two part video tutorial for this card on You Tube. I know I will most definitely be making this type of card again!

"FAN"-tastic Mothers Day

Hope everyone is having a great Mothers Day. Sharing today the card I made for our moms and a treat box for giving to our friends and family who are moms too. Not exactly sure why, but it seems  lately I've had this thing for Japanese fans and have been using the fan theme on quite a few of my cards.

First, this is the card made for our moms. I used Sister Stamps "Yoshimi" dancing with her fans for the front of the card. Colored her with Copics and paper pieced her kimono with washi paper. The  background label is a freebie cutting file from the Labels 5 Set designed and generously shared by Monica of Monica's Creative Room. Textured gold strip behind it was embossed using a folder from the Cuttlebug Asian Bundle and cherry blossoms were punched from Carl Crafts punches.

Then on the inside, I tried a different kind of pop up card; I think you would call this a "Tunnel Card". I used the tutorial by Mary Deatherage of Stamp-N-Lingers blog but made mine with a rectangular window instead of the oval one in Mary's tutorial.

In addition, I added strips of cardstock to the top and bottom inside the "tunnel" to serve as struts, and attached strips of acetate running vertically between the the top and bottom struts to hold the fans.

In these photos you can more clearly see the strips of acetate. Fans were cut using the Cricut Pagoda cartridge from black cardstock and washi papers then glued onto the acetate strips. I added embossed gold cardstock on the inside for the backdrop. For the sentiments, I used the same label as on the front of card, resizing it in Make the Cut. A fun. but a little challenging card to create. Hope to try this type of card again, and hopefully it will get easier and quicker to put together.

For my Mothers Day treat boxes, I kept it simple by making these sliding "matchbox style" boxes. Once I figured out the right size the box needed to be, making the "sleeve" was easy. Sort of like making a belly band, just larger. I stamped and used Sister Stamps" Miyoko" to decorate the front of the box. To keep with the "fan" theme, I cut away the cupcake she holds and replaced it with a separately stamped image of one of "Yoshimi's" fans. The fan shaped label and shadows were created in Make the Cut, and I used Punch Bunch mini punches for the flowers and leaves.

I baked manju (yaki manju) with sweet red bean (azuki) and apple fillings to put inside the boxes.Hope the moms enjoyed them!

And before I go...just wanted to share a sweet surprise I received in the mail from my daughter and son in law on Friday. I was totally amazed how these lovely tulip buds survived the trip from the mainland, in a box and with no water! After trimming their stems and putting them in water, they perked up and today the buds are starting to open...so beautiful!
Thanks for stopping by today! Hope everyone has a wonderful and relaxing Mothers Day!

Boys Day Gift Card Holder

Thursday is "Kodomo No Hi" or Childrens Day in Japan; also still known as "Tango No Sekku" or Boys Day. No boys in our family except my son in law; and though he might be all grown up, I still enjoy sending him fun stuff on Boys Day just to let him know how much we love him!

While in Japan recently, we were delighted to find Peanuts boutique shops filled with the cutest Japanese gifts and trinkets featuring my favorite beagle. I guess little Snoopy continues to capture the hearts of all, worldwide. So when I came across an adorable image of Snoopy riding a koi nobori windsock on Pinterest, I thought it would be perfect to use on a gift card holder. I used Make the Cut (MTC) to trace the image and render it into a cutting file, and had my Silhouette cut the pieces from white and black cardstock. Colored the pieces with Copics before piecing it all together. Embroidery floss was then threaded through the finished piece for the reins.

Put paper pieced Snoopy onto an oval backing and adhered it to a double hinged box with an pop up insert to hold the gift card in place. Nothing fancy, but I'm hoping my son in law liked it.

A video tutorial by Crafty Caroline for a hinged box can be found here, and the cutting file for the pop gift card holder insert is from the Holiday Cheer Collection at SVG Attic.

And just for fun, here's our furbaby Latte, dressed for the occasion donning her origami samurai helmet and koi nobori pinwheel wishing you all a "Happy Boys Day!!!!"