Spring Faux Shadow Box Decor

 Happy SUPERBOWL Sunday crafty friends!

Melinda here with you today. I am not a big football fan, but my hubby, son and brothers all love to watch.... so they will be tuning in this evening.... How about you? If I am lucky, I will be able to get lost here in my craft room...lol!  Today I am sharing a cute little Easter décor piece I created with dies from the new Cottage Cutz SPRING RELEASE! Here's my project.

I created this little faux shadow box with a cute little décor piece inside. 

I started by taking the adorable little pieces from the Spring Chickee in Basket die and coloring them. I cut them all from plain white cardstock.

I cut out two of the Nested Stitched Doilies from the die Set in white cardstock. I wanted to make some mats for them and a two hour circle cutting saga began!!!!...lol! I have some punches and recently got this circle cutter. I know some things are great tools and some are not. This, for me, is a big fat NOT! It was something I just couldn't use with ease. I didn't have the right size punches either. I didn't want to pull out my electronic cutter for a simple circle....so the lesson here...
get a great set of basic circle dies.... like this set!

Going forward, I will be collecting all of the basics from Cottage Cutz... I don't want to go around the "circle saga mountain" again...lol!

Next, in staying with the circle theme, I wanted to create a rosette. So I cut out a piece of paper 5" x 12" from some patterned paper in my stash. I scored it every half inch.

I then cut it in half, so I had two pieces that measured 2.5 x 12. They were both scored. I then "accordion" folded them. 

For one I started with the first flap up. For the other I started with the first flap down. This way when it came time to join them together, they would just fall right in line.

Here's a photo of the adhesive on one end tab. I just adhered the first flap of the other one, right onto that piece.

Here's what it looks like joined together. You can't tell where one begins and the other ends.

I then adhered both ends together. That creates this piece.

Once you gather the folds together, you lay it flat and you get your rosette. Here you can see that you can change the size of the rosette based on how loose you gather it, or how tight and small you make the center.

Here is a picture of the center closed in together much tighter.

I then used some hot glue and a circle punched piece of cardstock to the back.

I do the same thing in the front. I use hot glue so that all the folds will stay together.

I wanted to add a little extra something, so I had this white tulle netting with a little sparkle.I just cut a length of it off the spool. Approximately 20 inches or so and just gathered it in the center.

I folded it and more or less found the center. I used a little twist tie from my stash to keep it gathered in the center.

I then poofed it out and saw that it was way too big for the rosette so....

I gathered it together and chopped of about 3/4-1"

I then arranged the cute little pieces onto the circle doily mats.

I then added all that onto the tulle and rosette.

Here's another view. you can see I added some foam in between the layers to give it all some extra dimension.

Next, I decided to create what I am calling a "faux shadow box" I needed the inside to be a finished size of 6x6. So I worked out from there. Here is a photo as I was putting it together. There is some definite "tweaking" I had to do, but as soon as I can, I will share the dimensions. I kind of had to "Frankenstein" this one.

Once I got it all together, I added the sentiments Easter and Blessings along the top. Here is a closer look at the blessings.

Here is a closer look at the Easter. They both come from the Spring Sentiments Die

Here's another look at my finished project.

I have it sitting on my entrance table. I will finish decorating it for the coming season and this will definitely be a part of it. 

DON'T FORGET THIS DIE IS PART OF THE FABULOUS NEW SPRING RELEASE! THEY ARE A GENEROUS 30% OFF FOR A LIMITED TIME! CHECK OUT ALL OF THE SUPER CUTE DIES IN THE SHOP, AND PICK THEM UP TODAY!

The Dies I used to create this project:

Spring Chickee in Basket die

Spring Sentiments Die

Nested Stitched Doily Set

In case you didn't hear, The CottageCutz YouTube channel is up and running.  Head over and check out the latest video! There is a giveaway for subscribing too!

Well that about covers it for today! If you want to see more of my work, head over to my blog: CraftyMelinda.com. Until the next time, have a wonderfully crafty day!

Melinda Beltran

Bunny Peeker Treat Box With Bonus Card

 Happy Sunday crafty friends!

I am sharing a little more spring inspiration today featuring dies from the new Cottage Cutz SPRING RELEASE! Today's project is a super cute little box with the adorable new Peeker Bunny w/ Pocket Die for the front!

Ice Skate Die Cut Shadow Box

 Happy Sunday crafty friends! 

Today is my day to share over on the scrapping cottage blog. SOOOOO, I created this fun winter themed mini shadow box using the Holiday Ice Skate Floral die set and the pierced circle die set.

Heat Embossing Color Tip

 A quick tip showing how you can have any colour heat embossed image when using clear embossing powder, versamark and the ink of your choice... I wouldn't recommend using this method ALL the time as obviously you will be laying some versamark onto your ink pad but it got me out of a fix as I had ran out of black embossing powder and I'm a tad impatient ;)

Stamped image from Giggle Greetings by Stampin' Up

Tip for making clay buttons using Stampin Up's Simply Pressed Clay & Button Molds

I hope this is a help to anyone else that is struggling using the button molds

Julie :)

Making Flowers using a Honeycomb Embossing Folder or Hexagonal Papers

Hi everyone, here's a really quick Flower making video for you, so easy to do and I like how they turned out. Hope you all have a great weekend :)
 

Using bleach on a background stamp !! :)

Hi everyone, I just want to share a video I made today showing how I used bleach on a woodgrain background stamp, I've used bleach on my cards before but only on small stamps and after trying a few times to get a good bleached background image I was finally pleased with this attempt after adopting a 'less is more' attitude towards the bleach lol

Sewing linen thread onto your cards to make branches

Hi everyone I hope you're all keeping well

Here's a little tip that I think is quite cute for your bird stamps... enjoy :)




 Let me know if you have any tips you'd like to share here,

Julie :)

Cute Polymer Clay Easter Bunny Tutorial from Ewa

LET'S CLAY! Easter Bunny - tutorial polymer clay

Click HERE to go to Ewa's You Tube Channel

Treasures from the button box

Thank you very much Wil for contacting me to share your clever use of buttons to use as dolls house accessories.... isn't this clever!!  I can't tell you how long I've been staring at this photo in awe.. such a brilliant tip and I'm now looking at my own stash of buttons in a new way

You can see this photo on Wil's Blog HERE 

Make Your Own Embellishments

Hiya There... Debbie here

Today to share is a little Tutorial.

I know we all like to use embellishments on our cards and there are some beautiful ones available to buy, but I get more satisfaction when I make my own.

I feel then the card is totally 'Handmade' with Love.

  

Here Im showing you how I made the frames and corners I keep being asked about and they are ever so easy.
There are LOTS of different Air Dry Clays on the market. This one Im using at the moment is a Martha Stewart one. There are different colours available but I mainly use white but also have Blue, Red,Brown and Yellow as they are the main mixing colours.

Using a little bit of clay, roll into a sausage and spread evenly around the mould, pressing firmly so that the pattern engraves in the clay.

Once all covered make sure none is overlapping the edges.

 

I then pop straight out and make another. I must admit the first time I did this I was scared I would spoil the frame as it wasnt set, but the moulds are so flexible it just popped out.Leave on a flat surface and allow to dry.

Then once you have become more brave try mixing. Here I used a tiny ball of red to make Pink

 

I even attempted a flower and attempted two colours in one mould.

 

 I always spend hours making embellishments and flowers, then they are just at hand for your projects

 

Once finished and set, which can take a few hours I then paint. I usually end up painting white anyway, but they do look nice with a different colour showing through.

 

Hope you liked this tutorial.

I also have more Tutorials on my blog HERE under the Tutorial Tab

Thanks so much for looking

 

Big Hugs

 

 

 

 

Re-purposed Pin Cushion

Hop on over to my blog, Twisted Figures to see a tutorial on how to make this pin cushion out of a  Valentines Day box. -Shonna

 

 

 

Would you like to contribute to this blog?

Thank you to everyone that has contributed to this blog so far and to everyone who visits every day, links here from their blog and of course a huge THANK YOU to the lovely followers of this blog

If you have any Tips, Techniques or Tutorials to share please contact me

You will become an author of the blog and can contribute as and when you like, I only ask that you link back to your own blog or website so that others can find you if they have any questions

All contributors can put the Contributor button above on their blog or website

If you have any questions don't hesitate to contact me at tipsandtutorials@gmail.com

Julie Allain :)

Rose Posy Picture so 'Chic'.

Rose Posy Picture so 'Chic'.

Today's post is going to be about using some of those beautiful flowers that we sell at Craft Fairy in a picture frame. I've made this because so many of my customers say that our flowers are too beautiful to use and they keep them in a draw to look at from time to time. Well we cant have that can we. So this is how to get them out of the draw and use them to good effect.

Do you like this frame? Does it look expensive? Well, it actually cost me 99p and it came from the shop of the same name. You probably have a local one yourself so get on over and have a look at what they have in stock. There was no glass. What did I expect for 99p? Better for the purposes of making this picture.

The paper is from Making Memories and was part of my stash that I'd been keeping for a long time as it was too pretty to waste.

 Cut the paper so that it fits on the backing board. Fix it in the frame.

For the posy, I used a selection of flowers.

Large curly roses in pink.
Vintage blue roses in blue

Shape your roses so that they form  round shape as seen in the image. Then apply foam pads to the back of the posy.

Stick down onto the backing paper.

To make the vase cut a vase shape from some decorative card. I used some non shed glitter card but you could use any toning card that you have.

Tie a knot in a piece of 16mm ribbon. I used french blue,  and trim to make it look like a bow. Apply tape to each side of the ribbon and tape to the back of the vase shape.

Now attach this to the picture with more foam pads and your picture is complete.