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!!!!"

Anniversary Wishes for a Beary Special Couple

Wow, I can hardly believe 4 years have already gone by since our daughter and son in law were married. This is the card I sent them for their anniversary.

Wanted to try something a little different, so I decided to do a Surprise Sliding Pop Up type card and added a cut out window. Cute teddy bear couple inside the window is from the "Love You To The Moon and Back" cutting file by Cuddly Cute Designs. Cut the pieces for the bears from white cardstock, then colored them with Copics before piecing them together.

Pulling on the ribbon at the top of the card makes the front of the card slide back and up to reveal the sentiment underneath. Sort of looks like a Flying Easel type card, but more fun because of the sliding movement.

The window frame was created in Make the Cut by joining a rounded square shape together with a freebie label cutfile created and generously shared by Images By Heather M. found here. I then adhered the teddy bears to a scalloped edged heart shape and suspended it in the frame using fishing line tied to the top and bottom of the frame. Banner on the bottom is a cutting file from Cricut Wedding Solutions cartridge.

I also added a sentiment "Love bears all things" to the backside of the heart.

For the floral embellishments and flourishes on this card, I used a combination of various dies and punches. Leaves and embossed white petals from Nellie Snellen punches; tiny branch punch from Martha Stewart; mini flower punch from Punch Bunch; and leafy flourishes from Tiny Fanciful Flourish die by Cheery Lynn. Larger pink mulberry blossom is from All Natural Accents; and pretty corner flourishes are a free cut file from SVG Cuts.
In keeping with my fun tradition of including "memories from the wedding" on their anniversary cards, I chose patterned papers with the same color scheme used at the wedding and added tiny die cut love birds (Memory Box, Resting Birds die) to match the love birds theme at their wedding 4 years ago.
Had fun putting this card together for my daughter and son in law. Always enjoy making Surprise Pop Up Slider cards...the tutorial for the basic card by Beate Johns can be seen over at Splitcoast Stampers. I thought adding the window made this card even more fun; and if you twist the bears around a few times before putting it in the envelope, the bears will spin in the frame when the recipient slides the card open...very cool!

Asian Fan Accordion Card

It's been a while since I've made an accordion style card using acetate so I decided to put one together for my sweet friend Lorna who celebrated her birthday earlier this year. For this card, I used the Sizzix Accordion Card die designed by Karen Burniston.

For each of the panels with the fans, I ran the die through three times; once with acetate and twice with cardstock for the outer frames. A word about the acetate: the first time I attempted this type of card I recall using a medium weight sheet of scrapbook type acetate sheet which I felt didn't fold easily resulting in a very bulky card. So this time I chose to use a thinner, transparency acetate, which folded much easier but ended up tearing and breaking off at the pivot points just as I thought I had finished the card. I redid the torn panels, but I'm afraid this card won't withstand much opening and closing. Next time I'll definitely stick to the thicker acetate.

Fans were cut using the fan image from the Cricut Pagoda cartridge using black cardstock and brightly patterned washi papers.

The first panel of the card was cut from cardstock instead of acetate because I needed a place to add my sentiment and I wanted to keep the inside of the card hidden until it was opened.

On the front I added a Kimono Marci digital image from Lala Land. Colored her with copics and paper pieced her kimono with washi paper.

And finally, the finished card, folded closed and ready to go into a washi decorated petal fold envelope. I was happy with how this card turned out (except for the issue with the tearing of the acetate), and am thinking I'd like to try another similar version soon, maybe using the smaller Elizabeth Craft dies also designed by Karen Burniston.