Monochrome Exploding Box

My hubby asked me to make a special card for a work colleague to go with a gift. We bought her a lovely pair of ear-rings and I put them inside the lovely spotty gift box. I thought it would be nice to make the card as an exploding box and then when it was open up the gift would be inside. I used the colourscheme from the gift box as the basis for the card colours. The inside flaps of the box are decorated with rub ons from Sizzix, a digistamp cake from Bee Crafty and paper punches. I used a metallic Silver pen to colour certain parts like the cake and butterflies. I also added a small amount of nude pink as the cake looked awful left white.

The outside spotty paper is from the Clare Curd Signature pad by Papermania. Around the edges of the lid I used a yummy lace which you can thread a ribbon through and the spotty card dangling is the gift tag from the ear-rings.

The inside flaps of the box are decorated with rub ons from Sizzix, a digistamp cake from Bee Crafty and paper punches. I used a metallic Silver pen to colour certain parts like the cake and butterflies. I also added a small amount of nude pink as the cake looked awful left white.

The lid is decorated with one of my favourite dies from Sizzix and I used a black gem brad from American Crafts to join the layers together. I used my flower corner punch to add more decoration to the top and added pearls to the flower centres.

The recipient had never seen anything like this and loved her card and present.

I would like to enter this project into the following challenges (in alphabetical order):-

• Alphabet Challenge - Brads & Bling (on lid)
• Bunny Zoe #12 - Lace
• Craft Your Days Away #20 - White plus one colour (black)
• Crafty Ann #40 - Birthday Card
• Crafty Creations #118 - Anything Goes
• Creative Belli Challenge #117 - something beginning with S (spots, old bellies are pearls & gem brad)
• Creative Inspirations #59 - Glitz & Bling (black gem brad on top & pearls)
• Delightful Challenges - Flowers (on top of box and punched out)
• Digistamps 4 Joy #18 - It's a celebration
• KB Cute Monday #13 - Anything Goes with a Digi
• Mami Doodles #26 - Spots and Stripes
• Moving Along With The Times #98 - 2 B's (Black, Box & Bling)
• Ooh La La Creations #79 - Tres Chic
• Paperplay #19 - Anything Goes
• Paper Pretties #153 - Texture (lots of 3D elements)
• Paper Shelter #17 - Black White & 1 other colour (small amount of pale pink to colour cake)
• Penny's Paper Crafty #53 - Anything Goes
• Rainbow Lady #151 - Texture (lots of 3d elements, especially on lid)
• Scrappy Frogs - Anything Goes
• Sew Many Cards #53 - Anything Goes
• Shelly's Images TTT - Bling (on lid)
• Simon Says Stamp & Show - Anything Goes
• Squigglefly #97 - Create a Shaped card
• Stamp Insanity #58 - Monochrome
• Stamp Something - Anything Goes
• Stamping Vacation - No Embossing
• Stampavie & More - Ribbons
• Sweet Stamping Challenge - Spots Stripes & Sparkle

A Wedding Commission

My goodness, I have been a bad blogger lately. Since starting my new job on the 20th July I haven't made any cards but I have been working on this commission. I have been planning and making it most nights after I have been at work and had my tea. I have loved making it but have to admit I am glad it is finished so I get on with making other beautiful things.

I made a card like this last year for a work colleagues wedding and one of my friend's Karen asked to do something similar for people who are getting married in Sorrento in Italy. What a glorious setting for a wedding :)

The brief was to use colours of lilac and silver. I couldn't find my scribbled down instructions from making it last year so had to start from scratch. One of crafty buddies Jenny has asked for instructions so I have written them down stage by stage and will be typing it up for her. if anyone else is interested in instructions please pop your email details on this thread and I'll forward them to you when they are typed up. The finished box dimensions are 5.5" square x 8.25" tall and it is constructed from sheet of A4 card so easy to piece together.

Anyhoo I have made a slideshow of all the flaps in the card with all the gorgeous details below.

The main card is lilac cardstock from the Papermill. The silver paper has been punched with my Martha Stewart doily punch. The ribbons are from my stash from various sources. The silver filigree hearts are charms. The tiny lilac flowers and the roses are from Ebay, the diamante centre flowers at the top of the cake and on the lid are from the bridal section of M. Latifs in Birmingham. All the peeloff stickers are from Papermania/Docrafts. I have used rubber stamps for the top of the box, the wedding cake and the bride and groom image all from Docrafts. Sakura glitter pens have provided the coloured details and I decoupaged the image on the box lid by stamping 3 times and mounting the layers with 3D foam.

I have missed out on the blog challenges over the last few weeks so have a lot of 365 Cards challenges to catch up on, but I have loved making this card. I used to get a fair amount of commissions whilst working at Amtrak as many people would ask me to make their special cards. Although I love being creative in general, my absolute favourite thing is to make cards for a special reason and a wedding definitely counts as being a special reason.

Luckily for me, the current Caardvarks challenge is to make a new bridal or baby shower card or item. I'm hoping I might be very lucky and win a prize with this little beauty. Also Sarn's current forum challenge is to make a shaped card so I'm adding this over there too. On of the recent challenges for 365 Cards Day 144 was to use 2 different methods of adding dimension to your card. I have a decoupaged lid and the whole of the inside is 3d so has a tremendous amount of dimension.

I have also linked this to the wedding themed challenge #42 at Rosie Dee's

Wedding Explosion Box

One of my work colleagues Helen got married yesterday and I made an exploding box for everyone to sign.

I knew what I wanted to make but wasn't sure what the diemensions would be and also whether it would work so I did a trial 'cake' first. The proportions of the cake were wrong so I am glad that I did it.

Each teir of the cake is a cylindrical box which were stuck together with strong glue. The wedding colours were burgundy, cream and gold so I used floral embellishments in those colours and some lovely loopy ribbon that I had. All embellishments are from my stash.

The bride and groom were working on a tight budget for the wedding and loved my cake design so much that they decided to display their actual wedding cake that way too. I was extremely flattered.

All the images for the box are in the slideshow below.

Another Baby Box

This is the last baby box for a while and a little bit different. My colleague Sue wanted one for her Sister who lives in France (I'm spreading into Europe now LOL)

Not knowing the sex of the baby she said she liked mint, chocolate and cream together, so thinking mint choccy chip ice cream I set to work.

On the lids of these boxes I have been using little kits from inside a TSV that I got from QVC, but no longer had any neutral coloured ones left. I had purchased the large 'B' Sizzix die previously and had a go at doing it myself. I used tags from my stash and a brass charm and think it has come out really well. I used chocolate brown velvet ribbon for the edge and it has a touch of luxury to it.

Sue wanted to encorporate the other children in the project, welcoming the new baby into the family hence the photos of brother and sister.

Embellishments used were from the following - Prima flower, Sizzix Die, Let's Make Cards, Papermania brads & peel offs, rubber stamps, printables off the tinterweb, & Sizzlits teddy die.

The slideshow below has all the images from this project.

Exploding box for New Baby

My exploding boxes have become very popular at work as a special keepsake. Jemma wanted one for her sister who was having a baby boy.

His parents had chosen his name already so I made it and was just waiting for him to arrive to make the final pages complete. Jemma had posted pictures on Facebook of the new arrival and I put one of the pictures in the box as a surprise. She had not expected that so I was really pleased.

It was nice to know the sex of the baby so I could gather together all my blue bits :)

Embellishments used were from Papermania (ribbons & peeloffs), QVC, Prima flowers, Poundland (felt stickers, 3D embellishments), printable off the tinterweb, Let's Make Cards die cuts, Cuttlebug embossing folders, rubber stamps.

All images are shown in greater detail on the slideshow below.

New Baby exploding Box for Helen

One of my work colleagues Helen asked me to make and exploding box for imminent the birth of her baby nephew.

She wanted me to make it the same colouring as the previous one, but to make it personal we encorporated the details of the baby's big brother.

It would appear that baby projects are quite popular at the moment as you will soon see.

I used many embellishments to decorate the flaps of the box and Helen was absoloutely delighted with it.

I have made the slideshow below to showcase all the pictures.

Exploding Baby Box

My good friend and work colleague Dervla was leaving to have a baby and I was asked to make a card for everyone to sign.

I'd already decided that I wanted to make something very special for her and came up with the idea of putting a baby bootie inside an exploding box. This would then give plenty of flaps for my colleagues to write their sentiments in.

I made the bootie first using a template obtained from the By Donavan site. The finished bootie then dictated the size the box needed to be. I embellished the edge of the bootie with border outline stickers and a Papermania brad. The sentiment was added as it looked a little plain and the baby when born will have a surname of G.

The box was made to a finished size of 5 1/2" square and required the use of many pieces of card to get the required shape. I used a piece of mountboard for the base to make it substantial and all the pieces wer then mounted on that.

The layers were individually decorated. The base has peel off borders around each edge. The top cream layer has been corner punched with a corner adorner punch. This performed really well even though the card was very thick. I used this cut out shape to stencil through with a gold gel pen to the green layer to add a little interest.

The embellishments used inside were a mixture of items from a QVC TSV kit (baby tag with HOTP nappy pin, pram,angel tag, cutie tag,) Lisa Bearnsen QVC kit (clear quotes, B embellishment on lid) Prima flowers Pink Petticoat downloaded image.

Dervla said she wasn't going to cry - but she did ! I said I hadn't done my job very well if she didn't. She absolutely loves it, so does James to proud Father to be. I just wanted to make something special for 2 lovely people and I am very much looking forward to meeting Baby G.

As a result of making this box I have now been commissioned to make another one so i guess I'll have to cost this one up !

I have made a slideshow with all the images of the card below.

Christening Card Exploding Box

This card is the first exploding one that I have made and I really enjoyed making it.

I used different coloured cardstock and layered it so that it gave it more visual image. As this card was from 3 separate households it was good to be able to have a flap each for the sentiment.

I made my own template for it as I couldn't find the magazine article I had read so there was a fair bit of tweaking needed.

Materials used were Rub ons from DCVW, Poundland and Papermania, Peels offs Woodware & Papermania, Flowers were from Prima, a hen night 'lei' and Ebay buys. Ribbon and gems are from Papermania.

Inside the box I used a gift card from the Linda Bernsen QVC TSV and we all put money inside it. This was a perfect way of giving a gift and a card all rolled into one.