Birthday card and notepad gift set

Okay, I promised a view of the gift I made for my aunt. Here it is ...

I covered a piece of thin card board (actually, a cut down cereal box) with some Cheerful Treat DSP  and then added a note pad and a pocket to contain some cards.  

Here are the cards I made. I had some fun with the products and techniques for each card.

These first two may seem occasion/gender specific but I truly believe they can be used for any number of occasions. Graduation, marriage/engagement, new job, baby, etc.

I embossed the background paper then inked the edges with Soft Suede. The sentiment was cut out using the new Framelits Label Collection and stamped with the Elementary Elegance stamp set (available soon - it's in the Sale-a-Bration catty!) Believe it or not, the two pieces of striped patterned paper are from the same sheet of paper! See how where you cut out your label shape changes the entire look of the paper? Makes Stampin' Up!'s DSPs so versatile.

For this card I embossed the Melon Mambo card stock and then used my 2 1/2" circle punch to punch out the circle and half circles. The background image was created using various stamps from the Circle Circus stamp set in Melon Mambo, Blushing Bride and Concord Crush. For a little bit of sparkle I added some rhinestones. (I see that one has gone wandering ... oh well, too late to fix it now!)

For this one I used my Scalloped Trim Border punch all around a piece of Lucky Limeade card stock which I then stamped in Lucky Limeade with an image from the Take It To Heart stamp set. A banner in Melon Mambo and a few pearls finished it off.

This one may be my favourite. The butterflies are cut and embossed using the Beautiful Wings Embosslit die. I added the little antenae with a Stampin' Write marker. The curvy sentiment is from the Flight of the Butterfly stamp set.

And last but not least, I embossed the Concord Crush card stock and then rubbed some Whisper White Craft ink over the embossed image. Love that effect! The middle cut out was inked (liberally) with Lucky Limeade and an image from the Posy Punch stamp set was stamped in the middle. The Happy Birthday is popped up with Dimensionals.

To help keep things closed, I added these buttons and used some Bakers Twine to join them together.

Some Lucky Limeade Ruffled edge ribbon along the spine finishes things off.

Hope she likes it! Clicking on any of the links above will take you to my on-line store in case you want to purchase any of the products or check out pricing information. To see the new Occasions Mini, please click here.