Shaker Tags for Treat Boxes

Once every year hubby and I get together for dinner with two of my oldest and dearest friends and their hubbies from high school. Seems everyone is always so busy with work and family nowadays but we've made a promise to each other to meet at least once a year to catch up on each others' lives. I usually like to bring along a homemade treat to share, this time I filled these take out boxes with cereal mix and added a fun shaker tag.

I came across lots of very cute shaker tags on Pinterest last year when I was learning to make shaker cards and thought, "Oh, I want to try that too!" So here we are, my first attempt at shaker tags. I created the tags with heart window using Make the Cut design program and filled the shakers with pretty pink iridescent heart confetti.

Then to represent the three of us, I used stamped images from Dandelion Designs. These kawaii kimono girls come from the "Tea Time" and "Friends" cling stamp sets. These shaker tags are fun to make and I'm tossing around the idea of maybe doing something similar in a holiday theme for my Christmas treat boxes this year... well maybe, if I get started early enough!

And here's what went inside the boxes..."Furikake Crispex with Macadamia Nuts"...a sweet treat for my very special friends!

Chinese Lion Dance Celebration

Here's the latest shadow box style card I made, this one for my dear crafting buddy Patti, of Creations By Patti blog who celebrated her birthday last month.

Isn't this paper pieced Chinese Lion the cutest? He's part of the Chinese New Year Chibi collection from SVG Cutting Files. Although Chinese Lions are probably best known for making their appearance during Chinese New Years, they often show up at other special occasions too, like wedding and birthday celebrations to bring good luck. And this adorable little paper pieced Chinese girl comes from Marjorie Ann Designs Kids Around the World collection.

Celebratory Chinese red lanterns hung from the top of the first layer of the card are also from Marjorie Ann Designs. The Chinese gate you see way back on the last layer of of card is a cutting file created in Make the Cut Design program from a clipart image found on the internet. If you look closely, you'll see I added the Chinese characters for "Happy Birthday" onto the gate.

The final touch: Asian architectural corners and border designed in Make the Cut by welding square shapes together.

This time around I used extra heavy cardstock for my shadowbox card. It really made a world of difference when it came time to try to evenly space the layers apart to assemble the card. Lesson learned...use extra heavy cardstock for shadowbox cards.

My sentiment was added to the back of the box. It's nice that this card flattens easily to fit in an envelope for mailing. If you'd like to give the shadowbox a try too, I used the instructional video by Lori Whitlock on You Tube found here as a guide.

Hello Kitty Birthday Instacube

Can't say I didn't warn you...everyone's getting an Instacube pop up card for their birthday this year! LOL, just kidding...maybe not "everyone", maybe just "many". Of course I couldn't resist making a Hello Kitty one, and this one was for my dear sister in law.

I used paper pieced images of Hello Kitty on three sides of the cube and our birthday sentiment on the fourth. All the Hello Kitty images were found on the web and rendered into cutting files using Make the Cut design program. Mini punches from Carl and Punch Bunch were used for the hearts and flowers on the top of the cube.

The beauty of this rubber band activated card is how it folds flat to fit inside its sleeve and pops open to its cube shape when removed from the sleeve. I used another paper pieced Hello Kitty for the sleeve, and an Elizabeth Crafts die for the "Happy Birthday". You can find the cutting file for this super fun Instacube card over at the Lori Whitlock Shop.

Miya's ONE!

Earlier this year we received an invitation to a First Birthday celebration for little Miya. I thought the kokeshi doll on her invite was so cute, I knew right away I wanted to try and recreate a paper pieced version for Miya's birthday card.

Happily, Make the Cut design program had no trouble rendering the kokeshi doll image on the invitation into  a cutting file. I used washi paper for her kimono and added stickles to her obi for some glittery fun. Varied size sakura were cut from Carl and Punch Bunch punches. "Miya's ONE!" was cut using New Times Roman font, and the fancy label panel was traced from an image found on Pinterest, then run through an embossing folder from Cuttlebug's Asian Bundle.

I chose to do a Surprise Sliding Pop Up style card to showcase the little kokeshi for Miya's card.

Pulling up on the tulle bow on the top of the card makes the center front panel pop up and reveals a message on the front of the card as well on the back.

Tutorial for this card by Beate Johns can be found at Splitcoast Stampers in the Tutorial section here. Always enjoy making this type of card because it's not too difficult to put together, yet always sure to bring a smile to it's recipient!

Softball Grad

This is the last of the 3 graduation cards I made for the ball playing graduates in our family this year. Did another "before and after" trifold card using the same girl portrait paper piecing similar to the first one I posted earlier.

As with the first card I made, I searched the web to get an idea of what this graduate's high school softball uniform looked like and tried my best to recreate it. And since she graduated in formal Hawaiian attire instead of the traditional cap and gown, I dressed my paper pieced girl accordingly. I added a ruffled neckline similar to the muumuu she wore and used Cuttlebug Jamara embossing folder to add some texture to her dress.

Her haku head garland was made with mulberry flowers from All Natural Accents and sprigs of green using the Martha Stewart branch punch. I used Stampin' Up's Little Leaves Sizzix die for her maile lei, layering the leaf branches around her neck to form a lei.

Kept my trifold card closed for mailing with a bellyband with her high school coat of arms seal. Hoping the graduates all enjoyed their personalized cards!

Baseball Grad

Here's the second graduation card I made this year for a ball playing graduate. Just so happens he's also the brother of the softball player who I made the card for in my previous post. Decided to do another Instacube style card from the Lori Whitlock Shop for him.

Had fun decorating the sides of the cube. Graduation cap is a free cutting file  generously shared by Kay from Clever Someday blog. Cutting file for "Class of 2017" was created in Make the Cut Design program using Varsity font and I added a tassel made from embroidery floss. Baseball, glove and college team logo were also rendered into cutting files using Make the Cut.

I used the print and cut function to do the school seal and added a strip of metallic ribbon to embellish the sleeve which holds the flattened cube. This rubberband activated card pops into a cube when removed from the sleeve. These Instacube cards are so fun and I think they are just perfect for making cards for guys. LOL, they may not appreciate all the work you put into decorating it, but at least you'll know they'll love the poppin' action!

All Star Graduate

We had three graduates this summer in our family, and since all three were ball players while at school, I thought it might be fun to use that as a theme for their graduation cards. For the first one, I used my girl portrait paper piecing to do kind of a "before and after" trifold card.

For the "before" portrait, I searched the internet for photos of the graduate's high school softball team and tried to recreate a paper pieced uniform similar to what their uniform looked like.  And for the "after" portrait, I dressed her in the attire similar to what she graduated in, a gold cap and gown with a brown stole and tassel. And of course, I had to give her the traditional Hawaiian style maile lei, which was created by layering die cut leaves from Stampin' Up's Little Leaves die. Diploma is a piece of vellum rolled and tied with gold ribbon and tassel was made using embroidery floss.

Our sentiment was added to the center panel. "All Star Graduate" word art was created by combining Sebastiana and Brisk fonts in Make the Cut, both are freebies you can download from DaFont. I especially liked how the fun swashes included with Sebastiana font really gives that look of a baseball team logo.

As a final personal touch, I added a belly band with the graduate's class year and school mascot to keep the card closed. I think it's fun to make personalized graduation cards so the recipient knows you made their card just especially for them.