Tag: gift cards

Christmas · Fun Folds · Holidays

Christmas Slider

susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Welcome to a new week, everybody! It was a relatively busy weekend for us with lots of bowling for the kiddo, but we spent it together and that sure made it fun! We capped off the weekend by bringing our feral momma kitty and her five precious week-old babies inside in preparation from exterior housework we’re having done this week that would have upended her cozy hiding spot. So we scooped up her little birthing hut (thank goodness she used it this time!) and brought her and the crew inside where they’ll all stay until babies are big enough to go to the local rescue group for adoption and mom is recovered enough to (finally) get fixed. I’ll have to share some precious baby photos once I can get momma to let me take some good ones.

This week we’re on to a new design theme — all that glitters is gold. With so many beautiful gold foiled and glittery products in the Stampin’ Up! lineup, it should be a week of shiny goodness! We get started with some goodies from the new suite called Traditions of Christmas and pair them up with a few oldies, like gold foil sheets, Regal Distressed Patterns paper, and a few die sets.

You might recognize this gift card layout and think that it looks familiar. And you would be exactly right! We’re flipping our new slider fun fold on its side to create today’s beautiful gift card design. I’m currently working on the tutorial and hope to have that up on the site later this week!

We get started with a base of Cherry Cobbler cardstock and score it to create the off-center barn fold look with the right panel serving as the pocket for our slider section. A sheet of the beautiful Traditions of Christmas paper serves as the backdrop for our card front. The overlapping focal panel backdrop is a combination of gold foil cut with the Perennial Postage dies and a sheet of the Regal Distressed Patterns paper cut with the Textured Notes dies. We use a combination of the Christmas Greenery dies and paper snips to cut the floral elements from another sheet of the Traditions of Christmas paper. The larger spray of florals is the focal image for the front panel, while the smaller fussy-cut elements serve as the cover for the slider pocket of the gift card panel. The front floral spray is adhered over a twist of the Real Red shiny ribbon using several layers of dimensionals. We finish everything off with a scattering of the Traditional Sparkling sequins across the front panel and add just a few on the gift card panel.

When adhering the florals on the sliding panel, ensure that they are flat for a fully unobstructed open/close of the inside slider gift card panel.

I hope you’ll drop in tomorrow to see what we have glittering next!

Product List
Cherry Cobbler 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock [ 119685 ]
[119685]
$14.00
Gold Foil Sheets [ 132622 ]
[132622]
$5.00
Regal Distressed Patterns 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 Cm) Specialty Designer Series Paper [ 164037 ]
[164037]
$10.00
Traditions Of Christmas 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 Cm) Specialty Designer Series Paper [ 165853 ]
[165853]
$16.50
Perennial Postage Dies [ 162607 ]
[162607]
$33.00
Textured Notes Dies [ 165555 ]
[165555]
$31.00
Christmas Greenery Dies [ 165872 ]
[165872]
$36.00
Words For The Season Dies (English) [ 165797 ]
[165797]
$32.00
Real Red 1/2" (1.3 Cm) Shiny Ribbon [ 165876 ]
[165876]
$10.00
Traditional Sparkling Sequins [ 165875 ]
[165875]
$8.00
Fine-Tip Glue Pen [ 138309 ]
[138309]
$7.25
Stampin' Dimensionals [ 104430 ]
[104430]
$4.25
Tear & Tape Adhesive [ 154031 ]
[154031]
$7.00
Add All to Cart
Fun Folds · Gifting

Hats Off for the Grad

susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Happy Monday, everyone! Our summer is flying by in a flash as we begin the last two weeks of summer break here in N. Texas. It’s hard to believe that school is just around the corner. And I don’t know about you, but that brings about a lot of anxious preparation as we begin gathering new school supplies and shopping for new clothes with a preteen (not for the faint of heart!).

It also means that we’re beginning a new week of fun crafty designs. And this week we’re going to be working through a stash of fun folds that I’ve been dying to try. And first up comes a design of necessity as my oldest nephew is headed off to college in a few short weeks. I might be just a teensy bit behind in honoring his graduation, but there’s always the last-minute items to buy right? *wink* Today, I’m trying my hand at a super cute cap & tassel fun fold that I saw over at Beth’s Paper Cuts.

For a giftie like this one, I try to coordinate the color palette with the graduate’s school colors. In this case, I need to work with a palette of royal blue, white, and black. Finding just the right shade of blue proved a little tricky since I was out of Blueberry Bushel. BUT I happened to still have a supply of Pacific Point in my retired stash, so here we go.

I decided to have the royal blue serve as the predominant color in the design and then I used white and silver as accent colors. I used white baker’s twine to tie the tassel and happened to have some silver thread on hand that I used to bind the tassel together. I liked having this silver detail tie together with the sentiment. I used the recently-retired die set called Wanted to Say to cut the sentiment. Silver trim and drusy embellishments give us nice pops of festive shimmer around the sentiment.

As I was putting my card together, I got a little ahead of myself and ended up adhering the panel that was intended to be the gift pocket, which meant I had to improvise a solution. I cut an extra square of silver specialty paper to serve as the money pocket and placed it in the center of the folding section. It works, but it wasn’t exactly how envisioned this coming out. I’ll fix it on the next go-around. *grin*

I chose to use the top-inside panel to include a hand-written note, so it is not strongly affixed in this short demo. But I still wanted to show how this adorable fun fold opens and where that message panel will eventually be situated. I haven’t had time to make the how-to video for this design yet, but I did take the time to create a PDF tutorial which is free to download here.

Products used in today’s fun fold:
Pacific Point (retired), Basic White cardstock
Brushed metallic silver specialty paper
Wanted to Say dies (retired)
Silver trim
White baker’s twine
Drusy embellishments
Brad
Dimensionals

Christmas · Gifting

Beary Cute Envelope

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Howdy, crafty friends! I got a little side-tracked yesterday with a cookie project and ran out of time to play in my crafty stash. I was trying out a new cookie recipe to take to a cookie exchange. And once again, I forgot how much I hate messing with the candy coating. I can never get it to melt right and then end up making a big mess. I guess the good thing about this particular recipe is that the cookies are supposed to resemble snowballs, and snowballs are lumpy. Soooooo my lumpy candy coating is perfect! Hahaha!

I’m still furiously working away on gift tags and gift holders. And today, I’m bringing you a super easy gift card holder that I ran across on Pinterest that uses a standard card base. I decided to pull together some of my retired favorites for this one because the paper is perfect for my intended recipient!

We get started with a base of Night of Navy cardstock. It’s scored at 1 1/4 inches, 4 inches, 6 inches, and 8 inches and then folded to create the center gift card pocket. I used a 2-inch circle punch to make the pull-out section in the center of the gift card pocket. The pocket itself is held together with tear-and-tape. The Beary Christmas patterned paper pack was a part of last year’s holiday catalog, and I just loved it so much that I stocked up when it went on sale. I was able to use a collection of scraps from another project to cover the panels on the outside and inside of the gift envelope. I thought the sweater-patterned strips were perfect accents for the flap and adjoining panels. I found a cute star-patterned cardstock from the Irresistibly Yours paper pack (long ago retired) in my scrap stash that is the perfect panel for the gift message. Our smaller circle focal elements on the outside and inside of our gift envelope are diecut to highlight cute little critters. I used the Changing Leaves and Spotlight on Nature dies for these circles. I thought the decorative edges were perfect designs elements that add a lot of interest to the pop-out panels. The fox panel on the front is adhered to the flap with dimensionals, which gives a nice gap under which I slid the knotted diagonal striped ribbon to keep the envelope closed.

I just love how this turned out, and it came together quickly. The hardest part was choosing what adorable critters from the Beary Christmas paper that I wanted to highlight on each portion of the gift envelope.

Products used in this design:
Night of Navy Cardstock
Beary Christmas (retired), Irresistibly Yours (retired) DSP
2″ circle punch
Changing Leaves, Spotlight on Nature dies

Christmas · Gifting

Tree Pocket Gift Holder

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We’re gearing up for Christmas here at Song Sparrow. Every day that Amazon shows up, my husband says something about the number of boxes that end up on the porch. *snicker* Hey, I can’t help it if the warehouses decide to box orders in a multitude of boxes.

But speaking of getting ready for Christmas, I’m still working on gifts and gift tags. And today’s design is a super cute gift-giving envelope that I plan to hang on the Christmas tree for a little holiday hide-n-seek. I ran across this super cute envelope in one of my Pinterest searches, and it’s super easy to put together.

We get started with a 6×6 sheet of Take a Bow patterned paper and score from corner to corner on both sides. Then you fold to create the envelope. For this one, the flap on the envelope is supposed to stay open, which makes it a snap to put together. I used two smaller strips of the Take a Bow paper to cover my score line in the center and also to serve as a nice break in the pattern underneath the focal panel. Our focal panel starts with a base of the (retired) Garden Walk patterned paper that is cut using the Peaceful Season decorative square die. Then I just layered the stocking and sentiment from the Joyful ephemera packs right on top using the dimensionals. The gift panel is a sheet of the (retired) More Dazzle specialty paper with a to/from panel cut from white cardstock using the (retired) Stitched Nested Labels dies. I cut some greenery fronds from Granny Apple Green cardstock using the Golden Greenery dies and adhered them to the back of the gift panel with dimensionals. A cute red bow tied from Cherry Cobbler & Gold metallic ribbon finish off the gift panel nicely. The whole kit & caboodle will hang from the tree with some green thread.

The hardest part of this whole design was picking what ephemera I wanted to use! Otherwise, it comes together in a snap. And don’t you think it will just be the cutest way to give cash or a gift card?

Product List
Take A Bow 6" X 6" (15.2 X 15.2 Cm) Designer Series Paper
[164309]
$12.50
Garden Walk 6" X 6" (15.2 X 15.2 Cm) Designer Series Paper
[162227]
$12.50
More Dazzle 6" X 6" (15.2 X 15.2 Cm) Specialty Paper
[161749]
$7.50
Basic White 8 1/2" X 11" Cardstock
[159276]
$13.00
Granny Apple Green 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock
[146990]
$11.50
Joyful Images Mix & Match Specialty Ephemera Pack
[164110]
$9.50
Joyful Sayings Mix & Match Ephemera Pack (English)
[164109]
$9.50
Golden Greenery Dies
[164116]
$39.00
Peaceful Season Dies (English)
[164020]
$34.00
Stitched Nested Labels Dies
[149638]
$35.00
Cherry Cobbler & Gold 1/2'' (1.3 Cm) Metallic Ribbon
[156312]
$8.00
Mini Glue Dots
[103683]
$7.25
Stampin' Dimensionals
[104430]
$4.25
Add All to Cart
Christmas · Holiday Mini Catalog · Holidays

Festive Christmas Gift

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Do you ever include a gift with a Christmas card? Do you ever find yourself looking for cute and/or creative ways to include the gift? Today, we’re looking at a fun way to include a gift card with this year’s Christmas card to friends or relatives. This card is literally a gift that keeps giving!

For our special gift card, we’re pairing some of the beautiful new patterned paper packs with the dies from the Season of Elegance Suite included in the new Stampin’ Up! Holiday Mini catalog. So let’s take a closer look at how this all comes together.

We get started with a base of Real Red cardstock. Our focal gift panel also starts with a base of Real Red that is cut down to leave enough room at the top for our decorative gift card insert. Using the smaller square from the Peaceful Season dies, we cut squares from two sheets of the Season of Elegance paper and one sheet of the Season of Green & Gold paper pack. I alternated the red and cream-colored rows and tried to ensure the center squares lined up so that the Cherry Cobbler & Gold ribbon element ran cleanly from top to bottom. Our sentiment from the Trucking Along stamp set is stamped tone-on-tone on Real Red cardstock and then diecut using the Peaceful Season die, which is matted with the larger rectangle banner from the same die set. The sentiment panel is adhered at the bottom of our package focal panel using dimensionals. I added Drusy embellishments to the panel for added sparkle and to ensure the eye moves to the sentiment. We adhere our full focal panel to the card front using foam strips on three sides to create a pocket behind the panel.

Our gift card holder is a piece of Very Vanilla cardstock that is diecut with the largest tag in the Greetings of the Season die set. We create the bow for the top by cutting Garden Green Festive glimmer paper with the Peaceful Evergreens dies. The bow is assembled with glue dots and then adhered to the top of our tag with dimensionals. You can lightly hold a gift card in place by placing a few glue dots on the back and then placing it on the tag. Tuck it into the pocket and you have an instant gift in more ways than one!

I really love how this turned out and can’t wait to use this design this year. It’s always fun to be able to present a gift card in a fun and creative way and with a lengthier note.

Tune in tomorrow for a new Sketchy Fridays card design and see what our snowman is getting up to!

Products used in today’s card:
Real Red, Very Vanilla cardstock
Season of Elegance, Season of Green & Gold, Festive glimmer DSP
Trucking Along stamps
Peaceful Season, Peaceful Evergreens, Greetings of the Season dies
Cherry Cobbler & gold metallic ribbon
Drusy embellishments
Foam strips
Dimensionals
Adhesives

Product List
Real Red 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock
[102482]
$11.50
Very Vanilla 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock
[101650]
$13.00
Season Of Elegance 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 Cm) Specialty Designer Series Paper
[164144]
$16.50
Season Of Green & Gold 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 Cm) Specialty Designer Series Paper
[164324]
$16.50
Festive 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 Cm) Glimmer Paper
[164106]
$12.00
Trucking Along Photopolymer Stamp Set (English)
[162299]
$24.00
Real Red Classic Stampin' Pad
[147084]
$9.00
Peaceful Season Dies (English)
[164020]
$34.00
Peaceful Evergreens Dies
[164024]
$40.00
Greetings Of The Season Dies
[164112]
$32.00
Cherry Cobbler & Gold 1/2'' (1.3 Cm) Metallic Ribbon
[156312]
$8.00
Drusy Adhesive Backed Embellishments
[164223]
$9.00
Mini Glue Dots
[103683]
$7.25
Mini Stampin' Dimensionals
[144108]
$4.25
Foam Adhesive Strips
[141825]
$8.25
Add All to Cart
Friends for Life · Fun Folds · Gifting

Happy Birthday, Friend

susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Today we’re continuing to explore all the many ways we can use the Friends for Life bundle by Stampin’ Up! to create fabulous projects. I don’t know about you, but I like to have birthday cards of all kinds on hand for those moments when I need to grab a birthday card on the run. And today’s design is a two-for-one — a gift and a beautiful card!

This gift card design is a modified version of the Slide Up Gift Card Holder by fellow demo Jackie Bolhuis over at Klompen Stampers. I simplified the design to have a slide out gift card holder rather than the slide up version Jackie makes, but both are equally as wonderful for providing a lovely way to give a gift card. What I really loved about this design is it offers so much visual interest. From a beautiful card front that serves double duty as the gift card pocket to the ample space on the inside to dress things up, you have plenty of opportunity to express your creativity.

We get started with a base of Pretty in Pink cardstock. The cardstock is halved on the long edge for this design, but rather than scoring in the center, you’ll instead score at 3 3/4-inches and 9 1/4-inches. That gives you a center portion of standard size and then a flip-up flap and smaller bottom flap for the card front. The smaller flap should be adhered to the card base on either side to create the small pocket, which will be visible when the card front is closed. I chose a sheet of the Flowering Zinnias designer paper as the background panel and cut it so that a small border shows on each of the front panels. The fun background image is the large heart from the Friends for Life die set. I cut a Pretty in Pink heart and used the center portion as the background for the Pretty in Pink glimmer hearts. For the glimmer hearts, nestle the leaf heart die inside the large heart die when diecutting. I then used both the outside and inside hearts on top of the Pretty in Pink solid heart. The sentiment panel is diecut from Pretty in Pink using the smudge banner and then the sentiment is stamped tone-on-tone toward one end. The word friend from Friends for Life is stamped in Pretty in Pink on white cardstock and then diecut with the coordinating die. The sentiment is adhered to the card front with dimensionals .Two small hearts are diecut from white glimmer paper and used as eye-catching accents for the sentiment. The card front is finished of with a few In Color shimmer gems.

The inside of the card is finished to coordinate with the card front. The top flip panel has a piece of the Flowering Zinnias designer paper. Two shimmery banners diecut from glimmer paper and cut using the Filled with Fun dies bring festive fun to this top panel. The inside sentiment from Filled with Fun is stamped on white cardstock diecut using the Autumn Leaves dies. TIP: In order to get the banner long enough for the sentiment, you’ll want to use the extension method.

The gift card holder itself is a pocket within a pocket. It’s made two-sided so that the portion visible through the card front disappears into the background. A tug on the Pretty in Pink bordered ribbon reveals the gift holder and the gift card in the pocket on the reverse side. Each side has a piece of the Flowering Zinnias paper to coordinate with the rest of the card, along with a repeat of the happy birthday sentiment. I chose to keep the inside of my card very simple, but you can see where you could really dress it up.

I hope you’ll join me tomorrow for a more masculine inspired design.

Products used in today’s gift card:
Pretty in Pink, Basic White cardstock
Flowering Zinnias, In Color glimmer, White glimmer DSP
Friends for Life, Filled with Fun stamps
Friends for Life, Autumn Leaves, Filled with Fun dies
Pretty in Pink bordered ribbon
In Color shimmer gems, In Color resin dots
Dimensionals
Adhesives

Terrific Tuesdays

Happy Day

susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

This week we’ve been looking at a variety of ways to use the Painted Lavender stamps and dies to make wonderful projects. Today, we’re revisiting the foldout gift card holder fun fold with this bundle. Interested in trying it for yourself? Head on over to my Tutorials page to grab the PDF tutorial or click here.

This design is built on a quarter-panel of Pretty Peacock cardstock. One sheet of the Perennial Lavender designer paper provides the background mat and gift card pocket. A sheet of Lost Lagoon cardstock provides the foldout section. The front focal panel consists of a field of lavender stamped from the Painted Lavender stamp set onto Crumb Cake cardstock that has been diecut using the Thoughtful Expressions dies. The focal panel is matted in Pool Party that has also been diecut using the Thoughtful Expressions set. A banner of Pretty Peacock soft shimmer paper helps draw the eye to the focal panel and provide an extra pop of saturated color.

Don’t forget to dress up the inside of the foldout. This is super easy to accomplish with a gift card pocket from the same sheet of DSP and a decorative notch in the pocket provided by the Heartfelt Hexagon punch. The message panel, though plain, is punched up by using the Perennial Postage diecuts to give it some pizzazz.

You can find even more design inspiration in this week’s episode of Terrific Tuesdays.

Products used in today’s featured design:
Pretty Peacock, Lost Lagoon, Pool Party, Crumb Cake, Pretty Peacock soft shimmer paper
Perennial Lavender DSP
Thoughtful Expressions, Nested Essentials, Perennial Postage dies
So Sincere stamps
Heartfelt Hexagon punch
Lost Lagoon bordered ribbon
Sequins trio
Adhesive

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Packaging · Terrific Tuesdays

Easy Gift Card Holder

susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Did you catch the premier episode of Terrific Tuesdays this week? Together we made 3 super fun gift card holders using the Trucking Along bundle. This gift card holder comes together quickly and easily, which is perfect for your holiday gift-giving.

Missed this week’s episode of Terrific Tuesdays? You can catch it here:

Products used for today’s design:
Cherry Cobbler, Basic White cardstock
Trucking Along bundle
Merry Melody embossing folder
Heartfelt Hexagon punch
Dimensionals
Adhesives

All ads on this site are posted by WordPress and are based on your personal browsing history. I do not control ad content.

Fun Folds · Packaging

Oh, Happy Day

susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Did you catch yesterday’s Terrific Tuesdays video? This week’s episode is all about gift card holders and was inspired by today’s card design! I love finding fun ways to give gift cards. I recently ran across this super fun gift card holder shared by fellow demonstrator Heidi Collins. I knew this would be the perfect design for an upcoming family member’s birthday as this young man is all things outdoors.

The gift card holder is built on a standard single-panel base of Night of Navy cardstock. The patterned papers are all from the Let’s Go Fishing designer series paper pack. The fold-out gift card holder portion in the center is built on a piece of Basic Gray cardstock, which is scored into thirds. For the front-facing panel, I decided to add a little interest to the navy mat by embossing it using the 3D Rope embossing folder. The sentiment panel is stamped on Smoky Slate cardstock with a border stamp from the Heartfelt Hexagon set and a sentiment from the So Sincere stamp set and then punched with the coordinating hexagon punch. The gift card pocket is made with a piece of Let’s Go Fishing DSP with the notch created by the hexagon punch. The cute vellum sentiment panel on the gift card pocket has a heat embossed sentiment from the Gone Fishing stamp set and is diecut using the Nested Essentials dies. There are a few bobbers and some line underneath the vellum panel to carry the theme through and for a bit of visual interest. The message panel is a simple piece of white paper with a strip of Night of Navy diecut and embossed using the Gone Fishing dies.

This gift card holder was super easy to put together! And with several more upcoming birthdays and the Christmas holidays just around the corner, as well, I love having a cute way to give gift cards that can easily be tailored to each individual recipient and occasion.

Wanna know more? Check out this week’s Terrific Tuesdays video to learn how this design was adapted for holiday gift-giving!

Products used for today’s design:
Night of Navy, Basic Gray, Smoky Slate, Cherry Cobbler, Basic White, vellum cardstock
Let’s Go Fishing DSP
Gone Fishing stamps & dies
Heartfelt Hexagon stamps & punch
Faceted gems trio
Linen thread
Silver embossing powder
Dimensionals
Adhesives

All ads on this site are posted by WordPress and are based on your personal browsing history. I do not control ad content.

Gifting · Packaging

Did Someone Say Gift Cards?

susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

These days, it can be hard to know what to buy friends or family for that special occasion. And so gift cards or cash have become very popular options. But who says that you can’t wrap a gift card?

When we give gift cards in our family, we like to dress things up. And sometimes the recipient even has to go on a little scavenger hunt to get to the prize. I’ve found various ways to make these types of gifts feel special. And today, I’m highlighting just one way — the booklet envelope.

Long ago I purchased some pre-cut/pre-scored templates that serve as the booklet base for each envelope. And in hindsight, now that all of these templates are gone, I wish I had jotted down all of the measurements for the base to be able to make more on my own! Each booklet is then decorated using designer paper, ribbon, and embellishments. One 6-inch by 12-inch strip of designer paper covers the outside and both inside flaps of the envelope. I used scraps of DSP to cover any exposed portions of the base on the inside of the envelope up against the gift pocket. I found that a ribbon closure seemed to work best with this design and adhered the ribbon all the way around the outside of the booklet using tear tape. TIP: my favorite brand of tear tape is Sookwang because it’s super sticky, easy to tear, and comes in a variety of widths.

Do you like to dress up a gift card? How do you do it? Let me know in the comments!