A challenge for you...... and tutorial!

All cards are 4"x 4".

Today I have a challenge for you! Can you make THREE darling, sweet little cards from one sheet of 12x12 paper? .........and use every single bit of scrap that is left to decorate your cards, and use nothing more?

If you would like to learn how, follow along with me on this tutorial.... I have quite a few photos..... so sit down with your cup or tea, or coffee, and enjoy.  This was NOT my own design. I followed along with Einat Kessler on her YouTube video here.... this was quite an inspiration for me. I LOVE fun little projects like this.  Here goes.....   I'll try to keep it quick and simple (although if you know me, that's hard to do!)

NOTE: I suggest using a piece of paper that has some light areas on one of the sides, that you can use for your sentiments.





Come on! Go get a pretty piece of 12x12 paper, your scissors, glue and trimmer, and follow along with me!







1.  Start with one of your favorite pieces of double-sided 12"x12" scrapbook paper. Cut off one side at 4 inches, so that you  have a 4" x 12" strip.

Cut the remaining piece into THREE 4" x 8" strips. These are  your 3 cards. The 4x12 strip is what you use for your flowers and embellishments. Set that aside.

2.  Score one of the strips in half, to make your first 4x4 card (above). Round the corners (optional). 

3.  As we work along, it's up to you if you want to ink all the edges of the cards and embellishments with a distress ink or a dye ink. For mine, I used Ranger Vintage Photo distress ink and swiped all the edges using a little sponge.  Depending on the colors in your paper, use whatever color you'd like. I wanted mine to look a little vintage.

4.  Now, from your first card, cut a hole somewhere on the front. I cut a scalloped hole on the lower right side of the card (see below) using my 2" scallop punch. Distress the circle if you want.

5.  From the scalloped circle, cut a spiral (see above) so you can make a spiral rose. If you don't know how to make the spiral rose, search on YouTube and you'll find tons of instructions! Basically, you cut your circle in a spiral, starting at an outside edge, all the way around to the center, leaving a little small circle which you can see in the above photo. 

Start curling the spiral, starting at the outer end, using a small tool at first, like a thin paintbrush end, or your emboss tool, and once you've started, you can just roll up the rest using your fingers. When it's all curled, let loose a little bit so it spreads out, and then glue the little circle that's left to the bottom, to hold the spiral in place.  Set the little rose aside. We'll finish this card later.

6.  Now we'll start on the second card.  Take your next 4x8 piece, and score it on the long side at 
2-1/2" and 5" (see below). We are going to make a cute little easel card! See below top right photo, how it sits up on the 2-1/2" flap?

7.  You'll need something for the top flap to sit against, or it will keep tipping over. So I cut about a 1" strip from my "leftover" 12x8 piece, and used my scalloped scissors to cut one of the edges. Then I curled the edge a little big and inked it, and glued it to the bottom flap of the card.

See below top right how the top flap now sits against the scalloped edge?

8.  Now punch another 2" scalloped circle from  your scrap piece (I made mine with my punch) and ink the edges, then glue it to the top of the easel card, letting it stick up some... I think I let mine stick up too much. I would put it down lower so it isn't so high on the card.

9.  You'll notice that the card wants to keep tipping over backwards! So to stop that from happening, put a bunch of little embellishments towards the bottom. I punched 3 little flowers out of my scrap piece, using a little flower punch I have, wadded them up, then stacked them and glue them together, to make a little flower.  

I glued that on the bottom left, along with some little buttons.

It still wanted to tip over!..... so I found a little chipboard "love" sign, and added another button on top of the chipboard button, and that did the trick. I also cut the little heart by hand (oh I need a little tiny heart punch!) and stuck it on top of the "love" sign, just for a little extra glitz.

10.  Now for the 3rd card. Oh this is so fun! I really enjoyed making these. This will be a "gatefold" card. Score your 4x8 piece at 2" on the long side, and then 6". Now the "gates" will fold towards the middle.

11.  Ink the edges if you want to, and then I cut a little decorative piece out of my leftover strip, to put on the right side. I used a Martha Stewart edge punch for this. It's about 1".

12.  Now we want to make a paper flower out of our scrap piece, to put in the middle of the gate fold, to hold the flaps down.  If you have about a 2" flower punch, punch 3 flowers out of your leftover scrap piece. I don't have that big of a punch, so I made a freehand pattern (lower left) and then traced around it for my 3 flowers and handcut them out. Really, it's not that hard!

Now scrunch up your 3 flowers (alot), and then open up carefully, and either stack and glue, or use a brad like I did. Kind of fuss with it to turn up the petals. Now glue the flower to the RIGHT side of the card flap only. It should hang out over the right flap, to keep the left flap from popping up.

See below how you only put glue on the RIGHT side of your flower, and then glue it to the right flap of the card, so it sticks out over the left flap.

You can see above right, my fold was a little wonky, so I just trimmed it off! We can usually fix things fairly easily!  


Oops...I know, I'm taking too long!..... have you finished your cup of tea? you'd better go get another, and a few cookies......... enjoy the journey!

Now set this card aside and we'll work on the other embellishments from our leftover scrap piece (which is getting smaller and smaller).

13.  See above left what is left of the 12x8 scrap piece? Not much. From that, I punched two more circles, using my 1-1/4" circle punch. You could probably use a 1-1/2" punch but not much bigger. Then I cut 4 long strips (having striped paper really works neat), and two short pink strips from the tiny piece that was left, so I could stamp my sentiments on them. 

See the lower right photo (above) - I found sayings that would fit on my strips, from some of my small stamp sets, and flagged the ends to use to decorate. I also cut two tiny leaves (by hand) to put on one of the cards.  I made two more spiral flowers from the 1-1/4" inch circles for my first card.

After cutting every bit that I could, I looked at my 3 cards and decided which ones needed a little something extra. We're almost done! Have patience.........................

14.  On my first card, I added the "thinking of you" sentiment and the two little tiny circle flowers. I also stamped a heart in the center of the punched out circle (on the inside of the card).  I added the two little leaves (blue side out) and 3 gems.

15.  On the easel card, all I did was stamp a sentiment on a flagged piece I had cut from one of the strips, and stamped a couple of little buttons on each side.

I had some darling little Hot Off the Press stamps that I got from Paper Wishes (that are only $1.29 each!). They have the perfect little sentiments for tiny cards.  I LOVE them!

16.  For the 3rd card (gatefold card), I needed a short strip on the bottom to hold the right flap down, so I decided to use a piece of the little pink strip that I had cut, flagged both sides, and glued on the "Cute as a Button" sentiment, and added two little gems. This held the right flap down, and kept the left flap from popping up.

I had the thin green strip left (nothing wasted right?), and the striped strip and short pink strip, so I flagged the ends and glued them to the top left, as that area needed something. I found the cute little cupid button in my stash, so added it too.

None of this was planned, and I didn't have a theme in mind. The colors and stamps I had did the "talking" for me!

And there you go. Did you have fun?????  Three sweet little 4x4 cards are done and ready to go for your own use, or to package up as a gift.

I hope you enjoyed making these. 

Please comment if you did, and send me an email to show them off! The ones I get pictures of, I'll post on my blog (with your permission of course!).(pinkpapercottage@yahoo.com).

Flowers on paper only!

Hi all, 
I'm so JEALOUS seeing some blog posts popping up where there are pictures of actual real flowers blooming! I'm so sick of snow... and I'm sure there are many of YOU out there feeling the same way!

I NEED SOME FLOWERS AND SPRING!

I mean... snow IS gorgeous and pretty and all that... but come on now... we've had enough! ...............as I'm sure so many of you have had enough of it in the Northeast!

I NEED SOME FLOWERS HERE! All I have is browns, white and greens. Well, I must admit, we HAVE had some blue skies lately, but it's so darned COLD out.

All I have right now are some pretty flowered scrapbook papers. That's all I get! I just bought a few gorgeous 12x12 paper pads at Tuesday Morning, an awesome store here around the Pacific Northwest, that has alot of "seconds" or special deals on things.  So here goes.... all that I get right now....... flowers on paper.

I LOVE this hydrangia!

These are from Heidi Swapp, the Sugar Chic paper pad that I got for $3.99! Love all the pinks and blacks.

And oh my....... some yellow roses.......

These yellow roses papers are from Colorbok, the Antique Paperie pad I think I got for $2.99. There are some gorgeous papers inside!

 And could I dare dream for a pink rose?

Pinks and greens from Colorbok again! and roses and antique look "wallpapers"... from the Victorian Parlour collection, also $2.99 I think. Sigh...................

If you want to see some gorgeous flowers and indoor bouquets... go check out Aiken House & Gardens. She lives on Prince Edward Island, Canada (east coast) so she is truly getting her share of the snow, but she somehow manages to make her "indoors" feel like Spring!  I love hopping on over to her "house" and peeking inside to see her wonderful flowers and transferware.

Photos from Aiken House & Gardens.

Can you see the snow outside her windows?

Oh (swoon......)... this was just taken a few days ago!

Carolyn, at Aiken House & Gardens, is also a wonderful photographer, and collects stunning transferware and china.

Whenever I need an uplift, I visit Carolyn at her house and gardens!

For now, my flowers on paper will have to do.......... and by the way, I AM working on a tutorial on a neat little mini photo book, that can have unlimited pages put in it!.... and with an EASY way to bind it! Stay tuned..... it should be posted in the next few days.

I hope you're having some Spring weather wherever you are!