Custom Gift Bags

December 16, 2025 susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Welcome back, friends. I’ve been under the weather the last several days, which is really cutting into my crafting time. Because quite frankly, I don’t feel like crafting. *gasp* I know — I can’t even believe I said it either.

Luckily I had made some fairly decent progress on office gifties and I’ve been able to share those projects with you. I’ll be giving my coworkers gift bags filled with handmade goodies. And today you’re getting a look at the gift bag shell. Why just a shell? Because I’ll be putting all the finishing touches on once all of the giftie goodies are tucked inside.

I learned how to make an assortment of gift bag sizes from my upline Patty Bennett. This particular bag uses 2 sheets of 12×12 patterned paper. I happened to pull from some of my favorite retired paper packs to make my gift bags. These come together quickly and easily and I love being able to coordinate all of the items in the bag! I’ll show you the finished product once I get all of them finished. Hopefully I’ll be well enough to finish them before our office party on Thursday!

Tune in tomorrow as I show you a super cute gift set in a handmade box!

Festive Treats

December 15, 2025December 19, 2025 susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Happy Monday, everyone! We’re on the downhill slide to Christmas which means we’re all in the last-minute scramble to gather all the things and make all the treats.

Speaking of which, this week we’re going to be exploring all of the ways we can use our crafty stash to create unique gifts and goodies for our friends and neighbors and family. We’re getting started with a fun little treat box that I learned from The Paper Pixie. If you don’t follow her, you totally should. She makes the best 3D crafty items and provides spot-on, easy-to-follow instructions.

For the particular batch of boxes shown, I pulled out some of my retired stash of holiday papers. I’ve found that treat boxes are often a great way to use up leftover paper. For the box itself, you’ll need one sheet of 8.5×11-inch cardstock. I typically coordinate the box color with the selected patterned paper I’m going to use to decorate it. Here I’ve used Pool Party and Shaded Spruce for these two boxes. I cut three pieces of patterned paper to cover the front flaps and back of the box. I chose not to cover the inside flaps, but you definitely could if you so chose. I used one of the small Velcro dots to fasten the box closed. The front is decorated with some retired ephemera. I’ve filled the current batch of boxes with Ghiradelli squares, but these boxes easily fit other treats too.

I’m making a bunch of these this year — for coworkers, for my choir members, for the mailman, and anyone else who I think just needs a little holiday pick-me-up. They make great stocking stuffers too! I hope you’ll pop in tomorrow to see the next giftie item on the list.

EDITED TO ADD: You can download the PDF tutorial here.

Christmas · No Stamp Design

Joy of Christmas

December 13, 2025 susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Happy Saturday, everyone! Who all is frantically trying to get all of those last-minute Christmas list items done this weekend? *raising hand* It’s been a busy one today as we’ve squeezed in all sorts of things, including (finally) getting our outdoor decor set up. And now I’m frantically working in the craft room working on gifties for friends, coworkers, and loved ones and still whittling away at the Christmas card stash in hopes that I might at least get them in the mail by Christmas Eve……

So this week we’re working through the crafty stash to put together some (mostly) simple holiday cards. Today’s design is by far the most detailed design so far, but I would still say it only took about 15 min to put together once I got everything situated. We’re pairing up the new Beautiful Pattern embossing folder with the Delicate Pines dies to create this lovely card full of joy!

I was inspired by a card I saw over at Stampin’ Fancy Friday, and I just ran with it from there. We get started with a base of Real Red cardstock. Our focal panel is a quarter sheet of red that is machine embossed with the Beautiful Pattern embossing folder. I went over the embossed panel lightly with some metallic ink to really make the embossing pop. You could easily use paper with a white core, but I like the sheen & sparkle from the metallic ink rub myself. Our sentiment panel takes center stage here with lots of detailed elements and pops of holiday color. The joy sentiment is from the Greetings for You ephemera pack and is mounted on a panel of Traditions of Christmas plaid paper diecut with one of the smaller Traditional Labels dies. We mount the sentiment panel with dimensionals on top of a bow of Real Red shiny ribbon, along with winter evergreens cut from Shaded Spruce and Mossy Meadow cardstock and pinecones cut from Crumb Cake and Pecan Pie cardstock using the Delicate Pines dies. We finish it all off with a scattering of gold glitter dots.

With the template done, this card will come together much more quickly each time since you can cut lots of greenery pieces, pinecones, and sentiment panels all at once. I really love how this turned out and can already think of some variations that I plan to do for my personal stash.

I hope you’ll join me next week. I’ll still be in full-on Christmas mode as I work to finish the card stash and continue making gifts and gift tags.

Product List

Real Red 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock

[102482]

$14.00

Shaded Spruce 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock

[146981]

$14.00

Mossy Meadow 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock

[133676]

$14.00

Crumb Cake 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock

[120953]

$14.00

Pecan Pie 8 1/2" X 11" Cardstock

[161717]

$14.00

Traditions Of Christmas 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 Cm) Specialty Designer Series Paper

[165853]

$16.50

Beautiful Pattern 3 D Embossing Folder

[167097]

$10.50

Delicate Pines Dies

[166073]

$39.00

Traditional Labels Dies

[165864]

$29.00

Greetings For You Mix & Match Ephemera Pack (English)

[166208]

$8.50

Real Red 1/2" (1.3 Cm) Shiny Ribbon

[165876]

$10.00

Traditional Sparkling Sequins

[165875]

$8.00

Stampin' Dimensionals

[104430]

$4.25

Add All to Cart

Christmas · No Stamp Design

Merry Through the Branches

December 12, 2025 susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

TGIF, everybody! I’m not sure if I feel like this week whizzed by or if I feel like it dragged. I guess it kinda depended on the day. All is I know is that I’ve been in race mode to get back home every day to hide all of the boxes that Amazon delivered. *snicker* Anybody else?

Well, I’m still whittling away at my holiday card stash in hopes that I’ll have enough cards made to send out to at least half of the annual mailing list. We shall see how many I can turn out this weekend. One thing that really helps when you get in a crunch is finding easy designs, and that’s exactly what we’ve been up to this week. And today we’re pairing up the Joyful Days Memories & More cards with the Regal Distressed Patterns paper and using a sketch from the Holiday Mini catalog to create this simple card. Let’s check it out.

The inspiration for today’s clean & simple card layout comes from the first sketch in the Holiday Mini catalog. We get started on our card with a base of Mossy Meadow cardstock to tie in the evergreen needles in our focal image. I pulled the small evergreen Merry Christmas card from the Joyful Days Memories & More card pack to serve as the focal image and sentiment. We dress it up just a touch with a secondary sentiment from the Greetings for You ephemera pack that is layered on top of some Mossy Meadow & Gold ribbon. We finish off our pops of coordinating green elements with some sparkly glitter dots in opposing corners.

This card comes together in less than 5 minutes flat! Another perfect addition to the arsenal of make-it-quick designs. I hope you’ll drop in tomorrow to see what else I can pull together from the holiday product stash. I’m thinking we’ll dig into the dies tomorrow, but we’ll see where the crafty muses take me once I lay out the options.

Product List

Mossy Meadow 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock

[133676]

$14.00

Regal Distressed Patterns 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 Cm) Specialty Designer Series Paper

[164037]

$10.00

Joyful Days Memories & More Card Pack

[165822]

$11.50

Greetings For You Mix & Match Ephemera Pack (English)

[166208]

$8.50

Mossy Meadow & Gold 1/4" (6.4 Mm)

[166158]

$9.50

Traditional Sparkling Sequins

[165875]

$8.00

Stampin' Dimensionals

[104430]

$4.25

Add All to Cart

Christmas · No Stamp Design

Tree of Cheer

December 11, 2025 susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Welcome back, friends! I’m sure glad you’re here. Christmas is right around the corner and I’m trying to catch up up on my holiday card-making. One of the funny things about papercrafters is that we often spend a lot of time making holiday goodies but rarely is it for ourselves. Such is the case particularly when you make the holiday craft fair circuit. But I’m making some progress this week and you get to tag along.

This week, we’re making some clean & simple cards that are easy to reproduce. Today we’re pulling out the Joyful Days Memories & More card pack and pairing it with the Christmas Tags & More paper to create another festive holiday design.

We get started with a base of Crumb Cake cardstock. The lovely holiday plaid paper from the Christmas Tags & More pack serves as our background panel. The small tree card from the Joyful Days Memories & More pack is our focal panel, which is matted in Real Red to help it stand out against the plaid backdrop. I pulled out one of my favorite retired die sets — Autumn Leaves — to cut the sentiment from another of the Joyful Days cards. I find that these days are ones I turn to a lot when I’m need the perfect rectangle panel. And today we use the extension method to get it to the perfect size to cut out the sentiment from the center of the small card. The focal panel and sentiment are mounted together and adhered to the card front with dimensionals. Using a combination of Shaded Spruce & Sea Foam ribbon and gold trim, I create a festive bow to hang at the top of the tree. We finish things off with some bits of festive sparkle with a scattering of gold and red glitter sequins.

I hope you’ll drop back in tomorrow to see what else we can create with our holiday crafty stash!

Product List

Crumb Cake 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock

[120953]

$14.00

Real Red 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock

[102482]

$14.00

Christmas Tags & More 6" X 6" (15.2 X 15.2 Cm) Mix & Match Specialty Designer Series Paper

[165907]

$12.50

Joyful Days Memories & More Card Pack

[165822]

$11.50

Autumn Leaves Dies

[162185]

$38.00

Shaded Spruce & Soft Sea Foam 1/2" (1.3 Cm) Ribbon

[165234]

$8.50

Gold & Silver 1/8" (3.2 Mm) Trim Combo Pack

[161633]

$9.00

Traditional Sparkling Sequins

[165875]

$8.00

Stampin' Dimensionals

[104430]

$4.25

Add All to Cart

Christmas · No Stamp Design

Plaid Tidings

December 10, 2025 susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Welcome to hump day. Midweek. Middle of the road. It always seems like the weeks go more quickly as we get into December. Is it just me?

This week we’re whipping up some super quick Christmas cards. And today I’m still hanging out with the Christmas Tags & More pack and getting a closer look at the and more part, in particular, as the tags take center stage.

Today’s card gets started with a base of Shaded Spruce cardstock. The Christmas plaid paper from the Christmas Tags & More pack serves as our festive backdrop for the main attraction. The focal image is the Christmas tree tag from the pack that has been cut with one of the smaller dies from the Sentimental Framing set. A larger die from the same set gives us our dazzling spruce glimmer mat, which really helps our tree pop against the plaid. Our sentiment — from the Greetings for You ephemera pack — sits atop a twist of gold ribbon and a banner of Crumb Cake stripes. The bow of Real Red shiny ribbon and festive sequins scattered across the front finish things off with the perfect amount of holiday twinkle.

I hope you’ll tune in tomorrow as we pair up some more fun holiday goodies from the crafty stash to make another quick and easy card for the holiday card list!

Product List

Shaded Spruce 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock

[146981]

$14.00

Christmas Tags & More 6" X 6" (15.2 X 15.2 Cm) Mix & Match Specialty Designer Series Paper

[165907]

$12.50

Festive 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 Cm) Glimmer Paper

[164106]

$12.00

Sentimental Framing Dies

[165476]

$38.00

Greetings For You Mix & Match Ephemera Pack (English)

[166208]

$8.50

Gold & Silver 1/8" (3.2 Mm) Trim Combo Pack

[161633]

$9.00

Real Red 1/2" (1.3 Cm) Shiny Ribbon

[165876]

$10.00

Traditional Sparkling Sequins

[165875]

$8.00

Stampin' Dimensionals

[104430]

$4.25

Add All to Cart

Christmas · No Stamp Design

Baubles and Bows

December 9, 2025 susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Welcome back, everyone. I don’t know about you, but today was a Monday disguised as a Tuesday — whew! But luckily I worked ahead in anticipation of a tight schedule today.

This week, we’re making clean and simple Christmas cards for my holiday mailing list. Today’s card combines a little old and some new to create this festive design as we pair up the retired Take a Bow paper with the Christmas Tags & More paper pack.

We get started with a base of Crumb Cake and use a sheet of the retired Take a Bow paper to serve as our focal panel base. I chose the sheet of ornaments from the Christmas Tags & More paper pack as the focal panel. I added a bow of gold trim to dress up the center ornament. And from there we’re just adding a sentiment and some embellishments. The sentiment from the Greeting for You ephemera pack sits on top of a small panel of holly and ivy paper with a sprig of holly and ivy on the side to coordinate. This are all popped up with dimensionals to draw our eye to the sentiment section. A few Old Olive glitter sequins in the corner add the perfect pop of color and sparkle.

This is another no-stamp design you can turn out in five minutes or less. And when you’re pressed for time to get those holiday cards in the mail, that’s the perfect answer to a more personalized holiday greeting!

The kiddo has a basketball game tomorrow, but I’m hoping I’ll be able to steal a few minutes to make and share another fun clean and simple holiday card with you!

Product List

Crumb Cake 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock

[120953]

$14.00

Christmas Tags & More 6" X 6" (15.2 X 15.2 Cm) Mix & Match Specialty Designer Series Paper

[165907]

$12.50

Take A Bow 6" X 6" (15.2 X 15.2 Cm) Designer Series Paper

[164309]

$12.50

Greetings For You Mix & Match Ephemera Pack (English)

[166208]

$8.50

Gold & Silver 1/8" (3.2 Mm) Trim Combo Pack

[161633]

$9.00

Traditional Sparkling Sequins

[165875]

$8.00

Stampin' Dimensionals

[104430]

$4.25

Add All to Cart

Christmas · No Stamp Design

No Stamp Merry Merry

December 8, 2025 susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Well, how do you do? Isn’t that the appropriate thing to say when you’re meeting a stranger….. I kinda feel like a stranger at this point. I just need a little break because I was feeling overwhelmed trying to keep all of the balls in the air. Do you ever feel that way? It’s perfectly normal. And knowing what you need to recenter is key. I knew I needed to put a few balls back in the basket for a little bit.

Now that life is a little more manageable, I’m diving back in. And I am SO excited because it’s time to gear up and make my Christmas cards. Although I’ve taken a break from social media for the last month, I haven’t been away from the craft room. And I learned some nifty new tricks as I was prepping for a big Christmas craft faire and look forward to sharing the new giftie fun folds I have in the repertoire! But this week we’re keeping things simple.

Today we’re getting started with a no-stamp holiday card design because y’all, I’m behind on my own Christmas cards! EEK! So I need some designs that I can turn out quickly. And today’s card combines some of my current faves in the holiday-ish crafty stash — with SU!’s Traditions of Christmas and Season of Elegance paired up with ephemera and pops of gold foil for support. You’re going to love how easy this is!

We get started with a nice neutral background of white cardstock. A sheet of the beautiful Real Red Season of Elegance gold foiled paper serves as our background. The focal section is a combination of what I like to call and artsy panel element and a sentiment. The artsy panel has a background of the white and gold foiled graph pattern from the Regal Distressed Patterns paper pack, a mat of gold foil, and the pièce de résistance — the poinsettia & mixed greenery patterned sheet from the Traditions of Christmas paper pack. This whole panel is elevated with dimensionals to really give it that piece-of-art feeling. I chose a simple sentiment — the round merry & bright panel — from the Greetings for You ephemera pack as the compliment and placed it in the bottom-left corner of the artsy panel, putting it just a tick above our patterned panel. We finish things off with a box of Real Red shiny ribbon & some of the Pool Party Traditional Sparkling sequins.

Isn’t this just a stunner? Super easy and oh-so elegant! I hope you’ll pop in this week to see what other quick & easy holiday cards I come up with!

Product List

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Thankful

Gratefulness Knocking

November 11, 2025 susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Howdy, everyone, and Happy Veterans’ Day to all who serve or have served in the US Armed Forces. We are ever so thankful for your faithful and dedicated service to this great nation. It is so easy for us to sit in the comfort of our daily lives, forgetting those who make it all possible and who serve without asking anything in return. So from the bottom of my heart, thank you!

And that brings us to this week’s design theme — gratitude. We’re using our crafty goodies to create designs that allow us to express our thanks and gratitude. Today’s clean and simple design combines the Country Woods paper and some of the foliage dies, like Label Me Grateful and Gathering Moments, to create our door of gratitude.

Our design gets start with a simple and neutral background of white cardstock. A panel of the white woodgrain pattern from the Country Woods paper pack serves as the wall in which our door is affixed. We create our door from a nice woodgrain from the Country Woods pack using one of the larger dies from the Everyday Arches set. The door is affixed to our background panel with dimensionals to give a sense of realism. We create our fall foliage spray using a combination of foliage dies and images, including Label Me Grateful and Gathering Moments, and cut them from fall colors of Cajun Craze and copper specialty paper. We tie our spray together with some Timid Tiger ribbon. The small sentiment under the spray is a portion of a sentiment in the Sentimental Framing set stamped in Early Espresso on Crumb Cake and then diecut with the smallest Traditional Labels die. A few Cajun Craze & gold dots finish things off with a spot of colorful twinkle.

As we make our designs together this week, do you have folks in mind to receive your gratitude cards? I have a few folks who immediately jump to mind and plan to put some happy mail in the box. I hope you’ll drop in tomorrow to see what products might get put together next for the special recipient I have in mind.

Product List

Basic White 8 1/2" X 11" Cardstock

[166780]

$14.00

Crumb Cake 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock

[120953]

$14.00

Cajun Craze 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock

[119684]

$14.00

Country Woods 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 Cm) Designer Series Paper

[163393]

$12.50

Oxidized Copper 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 Cm) Specialty Designer Series Paper

[162190]

$8.00

Sentimental Framing Photopolymer Stamp Set (English)

[165475]

$24.00

Gathering Moments Cling Stamp Set (English)

[165970]

$26.00

Traditional Labels Dies

[165864]

$29.00

Everyday Arches Dies

[164629]

$29.00

Label Me Grateful Dies

[166111]

$24.00

Gathering Moments Dies

[165979]

$37.00

Crumb Cake Classic Stampin' Pad

[147116]

$9.00

Early Espresso Classic Stampin' Pad

[147114]

$9.00

Cajun Craze & Gold Dots

[165984]

$9.00

Timid Tiger 3/8" (1 Cm) Faux Linen Ribbon

[165275]

$8.00

Stampin' Dimensionals

[104430]

$4.25

Add All to Cart

Thankful

Thanks Abounds

November 10, 2025 susanfoxbowenLeave a comment

Happy Monday, everyone! I hope you enjoyed your weekend. Although we were on the go most of the weekend doing the usual errands and chores, we got to enjoy some beautiful weather and time together. And sometimes that makes the most mundane of tasks a lot more enjoyable.

We’re on to a new design series this week, and it seems apropos to do some thankful reflection as Thanksgiving is quickly upon us. I don’t know about you, but outside of personal reflection on thankfulness this time of year, I also try to express words of thanks to others — be it friends, family, coworkers, or someone else who just deserves a word of thanks. So we’re getting started today with a lovely book binding fold that combines the Gathering Together paper with the Label Me Grateful dies and With You in Mind sentiment.

This lovely card comes together in a jiffy thanks to a layout that does all the work. We get started with a base of Early Espresso cardstock. Two different patterns from the Gathering Together paper pack serve as our card front and the inspiration for our sentiment panel. The sentiment panel base is a circle of vellum cut using the Spotlight on Nature dies. A variety of foliage is cut with the Label Me Grateful dies using an assortment of cardstock and specialty paper — Cajun Craze, Earthen Toned Metallic, and Country Woods. The sentiment from With You in Mind is heat embossed in copper on Very Vanilla cardstock and then hand cut with paper snips. The foliage and sentiments are layered on dimensionals over a twist of Mossy Meadow & gold trim. And we finish things off with a few green sparkling sequins.

What a perfect little card to tell someone they’re appreciated! I hope you’ll drop in tomorrow to see where our gratitude takes us for tomorrow’s crafty adventures!

Product List