forest bordered goodie bags.

I have a lot to show you this morning, so without any of the usual chatter, lemme show you how to make these:



I made treat bags to show off lawn fawn's new snow day collection.  It's the regular goodie bag, but I combined it with the forest border to give it an extra special look.



You could just cut a forest border, and tuck it inside, but seamless is so much nicer...

So let's get to the tutorial!

In case you can't read the type on the pictures, I'll repeat it: cut 2 goodie bag pieces.

On each piece, try to find the straightest portion of the forest border die, and cut just below the handle. We want that thing off!



OFF.

The trickiest part: don't assemble the bag yet! Hold the front of the bag, with the forest border and pinch it to the side. Make a pencil mark where you will want the edges to line up. Do this for each side!

Once each side has a pencil marking, you can line it all up and send it through your machine.



All ready to be assembled!



Trim off whatever is extra when you fold in the sides and there you have a very pretty looking holiday box!

You can stop here and it looks fantastic. I added some strips of patterned paper to the inside for an extra pop:



I hope you like it!

Check out the lawn fawn blog for more snow day collection inspiration - click!

♥.

stay cozy.

It's getting colder here. Sweater weather, air-conditioning turned off, near freezing temperatures in the morning. Tall boots, too.

I even had a salted mocha latte at starbucks the other day.

Just keep all of that in as we continue to show wintery/christmasy things to promote lawn fawn's latest release. (a friend sent me an annoyed email telling me to knock it off since it was still officially summer... ha)

Today, I'm showing off stitched snowflakes.

I used Finley's abcs and the Snow Day heart layered over a stitched snowflake.

I gave the snowflake some chunkiness by layering 4 of them together. No need for foam tape now!



The wavy middle panel was created by die-cutting the same rectangle shape as my base layer, and then using the stitched hillside borders on either side. I love the finished look I got by keeping a stitched border all around.

I hope you like it! There's more to see on the lawn fawn blog today - click!

♥.

donut you know...

It's time for another day of lawn fawn inspiration! If you like all things punny, you'll love what I whipped up for today's showcase of love you a latte (if you don't, you'll roll your eyes and call me a dweeb like my husband did, haha):

I kept the design sweet and simple so the images and lettering could take center stage.  The little accents on either side of the word donut are from another new set, deck the halls.



The new stitched rectangles are so perfect for quick cards that look polished.

In other news, I bought a donut pan. I need to try it out soon.

I hope you like what I created today!

♥.

joy to the woods {lawn fawn september inspiration week}

Welcome to the first day of Lawn Fawn's September inspiration week! Today is our showcase of Joy to the Woods, and its coordinating set of dies.

I think this card has a bit of a folksy feel, don't you?  The artwork is a bit less cutesy than we're used to seeing from lawn fawn, too. I really love this set, and all the things you can do with it!



I let the chipmunk have a ride on the fox's back as they checked out the ornaments that the bird was holding up.

After coloring the images, including the entire background, I masked only some of the images before spraying a blizzard, (mister huey's opaque white spray) then went around accenting the images with a white gel pen. I felt like this worked well with the folksy feel of the card.

Behind the images, I tried my best to line up 2 scraps of striped red paper (from last year's lawn fawn christmas collection) so that it looked like the stripes were going in opposite directions.



I hope you like it!

Check out the lawn fawn blog for more Joy to the Woods inspiration - click!

Cozy Christmas...

I'm back again here and on the Mama Elephant blog today, for a closer look at the new Cozy Christmas dies and what you can do using them.

I think this Santa is so cute, and it's extra nice not having to cut out those arms!  I stamped, colored and die-cut Santa and his extra arms, and wanted to have him perch over the sentiment banner (from the new Tags a Lot die set.)

but he was too short.

womp, womp.

Here's what I did: i cut him in half. Complicated, right? ha.

Having sliced Santa above his belt, I was able to take my scissors and cut around his beard a bit, so that when I put the card together, his beard could overhand onto the sentiment banner.

Once I had everything stamped out (including the sentiment from Believe in Magic,) I adhered the focal rectangle to a starry clear card base. I think this is my first-ever acetate card base. Pretty nifty.

A length of candy-cane twine and some pretty sequins finished it off. That was that!  I hope you like what I made for you today, Visit the Mama Elephant store to see what else is new this month - click!

In other news.

I will be back tomorrow, and the day after that, and the day after that, and for the next 6 days in a row - because today marks the beginning of Lawn Fawn's September inspiration week!

Check out their big giveaway post here.

And, did you see the exclusive set lawn fawn designed for Simon Says Stamp's big Stamptember event? You can see it here.

THEN. I just want to show you this sneak of what I worked on all day yesterday:

My niece is turning 4 at the end of October and wants a mermaid party. You recognize some of the stamps: lawn fawn's critters in the sea and the frame from sweater weather. But what's that on the left? Oh yeah. I drew myself a mermaid. And she fits right into the lawn fawn scene with an ease that blew my socks off. I can't wait to keep making more decorations for this party. 

The more I play around in Illustrator, the more excited I get to create new images. I cannot wait for you to see what I have in store in October! Stay tuned!

♥.

You can't be sad... {mama elephant designer series}

Hi there! I'm here and on the Mama Elephant blog today, to show off the brand new "tags a lot" die. I went bananas when I first saw this tag set. If you're thinking who needs another tag set - the answer is you do. this one. The oversized tag is making my life.

Who needs holiday cards when the tag is card-sized? Fantastic.

I combined the following sets for my tag:  toy shop, cozy christmas, and carnival toppers.



You can't be sad when you're holding a holiday treat is my new fave. I did some selective inking to achieve this sentiment. Forget cupcakes! Gimme a plate of gingerbread cookies, please.



I stamped the toy shop directly onto the tag, masking it and the tag's edges to be able to sponge on the rich, red ink.  I like the pop of white around the outside of the tag!

I also created a bit of a bokeh effect by splattering water onto the tag. The red distress ink reacted with the water and gave this great effect.  In front of it all, Mrs. Claus is standing out front passing out free samples.

I hope you like it!  I'll be back tomorrow with a Cozy Christmas card.

♥.

Mama Elephant first look: believe in magic dies

Hi! I'm here with a pair of projects to show off the new Mama Elephant dies for Believe in Magic. I have loved this set since it was released last year, and now I love it even more! The dies will be available for purchase as of September 15th.

My first card features a snowglobe-santa-baby. hee. I love that he's wearing Christmas pjs, and a Santa hat (borrowed from Santa himself, from the Cozy Christmas set.) I stamped the little boy, masked him, and swirled a light blue ink all around. Keeping the mask on, I used white embossing paste and a snowfall stencil to create the snowglobe blizzard.

Once the inside of the snowglobe was all set, I grabbed some candy-cane striped patterned paper and used the globe's die to create an opening through which to peek my santa-baby.  On the back of the patterned paper, I taped down some clear packaging (ok, really just a piece of a ziploc sandwich bag. i'm so fancy.) and propped it all up onto a white card base.

The base of the snowglobe was adhered to the front of the card, as was the cozy greeting.

My second project uses the Believe in Magic stamp set and die set in a more straightforward way:

I love everything about this tag.  The night sky, the dark reindeer (that requires no cutting, thank you new dies) and the twinkle of stars overhead.

I colored the sky with dark blue and black copic markers, and then used the colorless blender to remove dots of color. I also used a white gel pen to add brighter dots of stars.



I stamped the reindeer in black and colored the die-cut outline to match the sky.  I then used a wink of stella glitter pen to make him stand out a bit more.  Before placing the reindeer onto the globe, I brushed on a thin layer of glossy accents.  It shines in real life!

I hope you like both of my projects today, and thank for stopping by!

♥.