Storage boxes

I like to craft storage items myself, however I haven´t made any for quite some time. I guess I haven´t made any items since I made my inkpad shelf, which I was SO proud of, but wasn´t able to post on a FB page I belong to. Obviously it wasn´t something that the administrator of said page had made, so even though I wrote that it was inspired by, and that I had used what I had learned about working with foamboard from her, she wouldn´t post it. I thought I had shared it in an earlier blogpost, but I must be mistaken, as I can´t find it in my blog😳. Well, I can at least show a picture of it here:

Here it is. The first photo shows it empty, and the second after I had put in some of my ink pads.

Ok, over to what I wanted to share today. Since the craze these days has been to make organizers, I followed suit and made one as well. I made mine, and all the storage items I have made so far in foamboard, as I find foamboard to be both stirdy and fairly easy to work with. I try to decorate all my items with the same papers as my ink pad shelf, namely Scrapboys Loveland series, paper 04, Happy Anniversary, to be more exact. https://scrapboys.com/loveland.html and Bazzill Smooth Grape Delight.

I also made a mini-organizer.

A storage box for my Christmas stamps:

And a very impromptu thrown together temporary storage for my stencils:

Single Stepped Shutter Card

A couple of the women in one of the card groups I belong to on FB, have recently shared some beautiful Double Stepped Shutter Cards. I decided to have a look at the tutorial they followed, and the YouTube creator, Iced Images, started the double card by first showing how to make a single. I decided to practise making a single version first, and then dive into the double after seeing whether or not I liked making it. I did like it, and I am in the midst of making the double version right now, I just have the decorating part left. Anyway, I will show the single version that I have made in this blogpost, then I´ll see if I´ll make a post about the double version once it is finished.

To make this card I used Lawn Fawndamentals cardstock in "rainforest", as I was thinking of making a card with a jungle theme. I had some spesific paper from the Made To Surprise Swing Card release in mind. Both the paperpad, but also the critters, are perfect for building a really fun scene. I had already stamped and colored several of the jungle animals, so all I had to do was to decide on which ones I wanted to include, and where to put them. SO this card turned out to be a really fun and very easy one to make! A real change for me, as I usually struggle when it comes to decorating my cards.

A card like this doesn´t have too many options for where to write your message, but I ended up putting a panel on the back of the card for exactly that. The card folds flat and fits in a 6"x6" envelope. So there you have it, my Single Stepped Shutter Card.😊

Iced Images´YouTube tutorial:

Valentines Gift Boxes

As I promised in my blogpost yesterday, I would share a couple of really cute Valentines Gift Boxes in my next post. Here they are!😊 Inspired by the Paper Pixie, like so many other times! She is the perfect go-to for such an array of small gift box ideas!

The boxes measures 2 5/8" x 2 5/8" x 2 5/8", and are perfect for a small token of appreciation, not just for Valentines, but for any occasion, any time of the year! It all depends on how you decorate them. On the front, where these I am showing here have small acetate heart windows, you can use any shape that fits. The whole point of having a see through hole, is to give the receiver a little preview of what is in the box. However, if you don´t want to reveal anything, you can just leave the box whole.

I can easily imagine having a dinnerparty and using these little boxes as hostess gifts, or even as place cards. The names can then be written on the little tag attached to the ribbon.

These two are going to be small gifts for my two younger sisters for Valentines, along with the box cards I showed yesterday.

The box cards from yesterday😉

Valentines Box Card

Todays post was inspired by my crafty bestie @Caatandco messenger message right before midnight the other night. I had gone to bed and was in a state of not quite asleep but feeling very drowsy, however, awake enough that I had to glance at the message. There was a link to a YouTube video included, which I definitely was not going to start watching at that late time. The next day, however, I did watch the video. It was basically a video promoting this new die set for a box card, which coincidentally my friend also had included in her message the previous night, but since I love challneges, I decided to try to make my own version of a box card.

Link for the die set: https://www.simonsaysstamp.com/product/simon-says-stamp-basic-box-card-hearts-wafer-dies-set-set485ch-and-back-again-set485ch

As I said, I watched the video, and in it Kristina Werner shows how to make a box card using the dies. The box card, when finished and folded flat, fits into an A2 envelope, which makes it tiny! I decided to make each of the box´sides A2, although since I wanted to cut the base of the box from just one sheet of 8" x 11" paper, I adjsted my size from the normal 4 1/4" x 5 1/2" A2 size to 4" x 5 1/2", so a little narrower than a regular A2. This meant that when my box card folds flat, it measures 8" x 5 1/2", quite a bit bigger, but I can easily make an envelope to hold it.

As you can see in the link I included for the dies, you can also purchase dies for the layers creating depth in the box. I obviously don´t have any of those, so I had to try and figure out how to create my own layers. It might be easier if the box you are making is for an ordinary occation, but since it is Valentine´s Day soon, and I am in the midst of creating Valentine´s related items, I needed the layers to have a heart/love theme. Unfortunately I don´t have too much that I can use for this, but I do have one A2 heart background die, that I decided would do. One layer down, two to go.....😘. Since I made a couple of Valentine´s Gift Boxes recently (next blog post😉), I wanted cards to go with these, and although my initial thought was something a bit more simple, however, I decided that if I used matching paper as one of the layers, the box cards would match the boxes perfectly😂.

When it comes to the written message, which is basically why we make and send cards, I did not want to write it directly on the box like Kristina Werner suggested, so I decided to create an insert to hold a note, as my third and final layer. I chose a patterned pice of paper that I cut to the right size for folding in two to create a pocket, and glued it into the box card. The inserts themselves are just made from the same paper that the actual box card is made from. They have holes punched at the top, in which I put heartshaped eyelets, and ribbon. I also kissed the edges of the paper with some Kitch Flamingo distress oxide ink.

The papers I have used to decorate the box card with, are from a Valentine´s paper pad from Martha Stewart Crafts, that I just bought on sale. On the front where I have cut out panels, so that you can see into the box, I have adhered heat embossed acetate.The message says (in Norwegian) "You make me happy Because you are exactly you. Very ordinary, very special, very you."

These box cards were sort of made using the trial and error method, as were the envelopes. At first I made an envelope to fit an A8 sized card, 5 1/2" x 8", but that became a little too snug, so I had to increase the size a little.

Making these, I have come to the conclusion that I am more of a box, than a box card, kind of girl, so most likely, unless I am asked to make more of these, I will let cards be cards, and boxes be boxes in the future.🤣

Layered Stamping

I go through phases when I craft, and lately I have been trying out something new to me, namely using a stamping jig to do layered stamped images. I have seen it before and then thought that it would be a good idea to stamp several images effectively, but it wasn´t until last week when I saw a video tutorial by Jennifer McGuire - jennifermcguireink.com , that I decided to try it out. It must be said that she is the queen of everything crafty, and she really took it to the next level and made about a gazillion cards at one time. Me? I made one😂. But I am really happy with the result. It is also the card that has generated the most response to a card I have made, ever, with more than 450 reactions in one FB group, and about 100 in another. Needless to say, I am thrilled.

This is the card shown with it´s envelope. I had some flowers left over, and instead of making another card, I decorated the envelope, AND the inside of the card:

I don´t really have many layered stamp sets, so when I, a few days later, found another set in my stash, I had another go. This stamp set is by Alinacutle of Alina Crafts, an original designer at AliExpress. Being an original designer on AliExpress is somewhat of a curiosity, as most of the stores there sell rip offs of the designs by major craft labels. This stamp set, of roses, is beautiful, although a little hard to line up right. Actually, I find that to be the case with most layered stamps.

Now, that I have made two cards, I have sort of gotten it out of my system, and moved on to other techniques and styles😉. Although I now know that it is something I am able to do with a decent result!

Here is a link to Jennifer McGuires wonderful video tutorial: