ME!!!! Can you believe it? I was so excited and, I'll admit, a LOT nervous when Laura emailed me to see if I'd be willing to participate in her Tuesday Stash Challenge. I've had the privilege of actually meeting Laura and I'll tell you, she is just as sweet and down to earth in person as she is on her blog! But even though she's "just like the rest of us," she's LAURA for pity's sake! We went back and forth a couple of times trying to figure out what we both had that we could get rid of from our stash and eventually settled on those ribbon charms/sliders - I think mine were from Making Memories.
I found a pewter one with "gratitude" on it and thought it would be perfect for a thank you card. But the longer I thought about it, the more I wanted to do *more* than just a card. So, I went through my stash again and found some blank notecards I had never opened. The cards were 4-3/4" square and the envelopes were 5" square and the wheels started to turn ~~ a little box of thank you cards would make a great gift. So, I got out my scrap paper to figure out what the dimensions of my little box should be, where it should be scored etc. The box base is 5-1/4" square and the sides are 1" high. The box top is a bit bigger at 5-1/2" square and 3/4" tall. In hindsight, the top is a little bit too loose and it could have been taller but live and learn, right? I used Riding Hood Red CS for the base and Pink Pirouette for the top.
With Valentine's Day coming, I wanted to keep with the pinks and reds for my color scheme and I knew the Bella Rose paper would be perfect. I knew the main colors would be RHR and PP but Valentine's Day just wouldn't be complete without a bit of CHOCOLATE thrown in, right? I went to work on the background layers and how they would all come together. In the end, I used my Top Note die to cut out the Chocolate Chip polka dot layer and my Labels One Nestabilities for the Pink Pirouette CS and DP layers. To finish the background layers off, I paper pierced the points on the PP CS layer and used my Martha Stewart Lace Doily punch to finish off the RHR base layer.
I chose Inspired by Nature for my image ~ I just love that coneflower! When I stamped the coneflower with RHR ink and looked at it, I decided that it wasn't exciting enough for this project... too one-dimensional. I stamped the image again, this time with Versamark ink and used heat & stick powder to apply the red glitter (Martha Stewart). I cut it out with my oval Nestabilities and matted it on a Chocolate Chip scalloped oval. It really popped but the CC layer needed *something* so I got out the old white gel pen and added dots to each of the scallops. Again, it just didn't do it for me - BORING and one-dimensional. My regular readers know how ADDICTED I am to adhesive pearls so I immediately got out my white ones and placed them over the gel pen dots. A few more pearls added to the corners and VOILA! I added some RHR taffeta ribbon to the outside of the box top before turning my attention to the actual thank you cards.
I went to Splitcoast to see the Sketch Challenge for this week and found this:
I thought I could use this sketch even though the dimensions of my cards were going to be square. When I decided to use the gratitude ribbon slider I knew I wanted to use the gratitude definition from the "Define Your Life" set. Through some trial and error I came up with these:
They are all basically the same but I've managed to make each one just a *bit* different from the others. I used my Labels One Nestabilities again and used the grasses from the Inspired by Nature set (stamped in Pink Pirouette) as the background for my definition (stamped in Chocolate Chip). A little bit of paper piercing, some Cuttlebugging (Swiss Dots again!), some ribbon and embellishments and these thank you cards were done.
Can you pick out the differences? It's not really that difficult especially when they are side by side like this! I had so much fun working on this "secret" project (even though I fretted for DAYS about what I was going to do!) and a HUGE thank you to Laura for including me in her new weekly challenge - I truly appreciate it. If I have forgotten to include some important information, please leave a comment and I will answer as soon as I can.
Thanks for stopping by - have a great Tuesday everyone!
