Pop Up Platform Cards (without dies)

In their newest release, Lawn Fawn introduced something they call a platform pop-up, and if the shop I usually buy my Lawn Fawn products from hadn´t just closed, I would most definitely have bought these dies. As it is, I have no idea where to get my Lawn Fawn stamps and dies from any longer. I could of course buy them directly from Lawn Fawn, but as far I as I can see, they don´t charge the Norwegian VAT, which means I would get slapped with an extra sum when the merchandise go through Norwegian custums, in addition to most likely pretty high shipping costs. So, I will have to do a little looking around to see if anyone else offer Lawn Fawn here in Norway. Anyway, to get to the point, since I don´t have the dies, I became really happy when I found a tutorial which shows how to make them, without using dies! I decided to take the time to watch through the tutorial to see if it was doable, and since it was, I bookmarked the tutorial, to make another day. A couple of days ago I decided to give it a try. I´m in the process of making two identical Easter Cards for my sisters, so since Easter is buzzing around in my head, I decided to go with an Easter themed card.

I made the card base, the platform, first, but then when it was time to decorate, I got stuck, as I most often do. Therefore I put it aside and continued with the cards for my sisters instead. The next day I pulled out some Easter stamps, my stamping platform and my alcohol markers to make some little tidbits that I could use for the decorations. It took forever! However, I ended up with more pieces than I would need, so there are possibilities for some more cards. I struggled a little to build the scene, and ended up regretting how I had placed the decorations, once I was done. I should have gone with the lowest decorations in the front. I didn´t change anything, however, as that most likely would have messed up my card. I did take note of not to do it again, though, so I guess you can say that I have learned from my mistake. I do think it is a really cute card, nonetheless🐰!

Back to the main card of the day, though. I decided I would go with papers fitting for a jungle themed scene, dove into my stash of Lawn Fawn cardstock and went with the color "Rainforest", a perfect color for a scene form the jungle. In addition, just to make it even more jungle, I looked through my Made to Surprise paper collection, which I know contains a 6"x6" jungle scenes paper pad. Made to Surprise is a co brand of Craftstash, who are the main sellers and producers of the brand. The designer of the brand, however, is Sam Calcott of Mixed Up Craft, of whom I have spoken of multiple times before. She has two main YouTube channels, one for Mixed Up Craft, and one for Made to Surprise. She is well worth following, as she posts tutorials for beautiful papercrafted items, cards, bags and boxes, on a regular basis. Just to finish my advertisement for Sam Calcott, I also should mention that she has a really popular Facebook page called Mixed up Crafters.

Back to my card😉.

As you probably can see, I left my jungle scene plan, and went with a forest scene instead. I did this when I tried to make my little scene with the jungle critters I have available, and I realized that they were somewhat too large to fit on a card like the one I was making. Luckily for me, Made to Surprise has a woodland collection(double slider woodland collection), as well, which I also am lucky enough to have bought😂. AND, I felt even more fortunate since I knew that I already had some pre-stamped, colored and cut woodland critters. By then I had started thinking that I needed to show more clearly that my critters were in a forest, and I knew that I had seen platform pop up cards with an addition of a "wall-like" extention in the back of the card. The tutorial I had found on how to make a platform card, didn´t have this addition. I therefore decided to have a look at the actual die set on Lawn Fawn, to see what the extention looked like. I thought it looked easy enough to copy, so I decided to try. This is where I should just film how I did it, but I am not that quick and clever on my feet, that will have to be for another day😉, but I can write an explaination: I decided how tall I wanted my "wall" to be, 2 1/2", then I measured the back half of my card, 5 3/4" and cut a piece of cardstock slightly shorter, measuring 2 1/2" x 5 5/8". I marked with a pencil where the score lines on my card were; 1 3/4" and 4", before I scored and burnished. Looking at the "add-on-dies" I knew that I had to trim the upper hand corners, so I measured out the half-way mark of the height of the cardstock, 1 1/4" with pencil marks, and in addition I marked about 1/4" on the outside of either score line at the top, before drawing a line between the pencil marks that I then cut along, making sure I slightly rounded the corners. I then chose one of the woodland scenes form the Made to Surprise paper pad, and cut out a strip measuring 2 1/4" in height. I then measured between each score line, to get the right size for the layers; 2 x 1 1/2" and 1 x 2 1/8". I then laid the smaller pieces over the cardstock, and drew the outline on the back of the woodland paper. Then I cut about 1/8" on the inside of the pencil line, and glued everything in place. I attached the "wall" to the platform, gluing it on the inside of the border part of the card. And voila, I had something that looked like a forest. I have to mention that I have made a template for this add-on, should I decide to make more of these cards😉.

I cut out some grass, and glued the animals and the other decorations I had chosen, on to the grass, after first having tried out the placement. To finish off the card I stamped my sentiment onto a stamped and colored signpost and glued it to the very front of the card.

A really good thing about these cards is that they fold flat, the platform sort of collapses on itself and it fits into, in my case, a 5 1/2" x 6" envelope.

The initial card I made fits into an 4 1/4" (4 1/2") x 6" envelope.

Lastly, I want to give a shout-out to Ann Melvin from Positively Papercraft for posting the tutorial I followed to make the initial card. Below is a link to her tutorial. Just make sure you watch the whole video before making the card, as she makes a couple of mistakes, that she has chosen not to edit out of the video, and to prevent you from making the same mistakes, I advise you to look through the WHOLE making the card part of the tutorial before starting to make it yourself. And hey; I am NOT affiliated with any of whom I have added links to. I just like adding links😂.