Squash Card Fun Fold

I was watching Sara Douglass' home crafting video last week and a card her daughter made reminded me of one I learned how to make 12 years ago when I was a Girl Guide Leader at the J'08 Christchurch Jamboree.

This style of fun fold is called a squash card because you squash it down to close it! Squash cards are perfect for scrapbooks, journals, photo albums or a special life event like retirement or a big birthday! I used my original card as an autograph book so I could collect contact details to keep in touch with all the wonderful people I met at the jamboree.

It is easy to create the base of this card . . . the hardest part is deciding how to decorate it!  So I got out some cardstock, designer series paper, stamps and ink and then a few hours later I had created a couple squash cards.

Here are photos showing the front and back of my two cards.

The smaller one was made with three 6" x 6" (15.2 cm square) pieces of Very Vanilla cardstock using the So Sentimental Bundle and Tropical Oasis designer series papers with coordinating colours.

I show you how to make the larger one in my video using two 8-1/4" x 8-1/4" (21 cm square) pieces of Whisper White cardstock. I decorated it with stamps from one of the 'host only' sets called New Wonders along with papers from the Pressed Petals Specialty Designer Series Paper, Come Sail Away Designer Series Paper and an envelope liner from the Magnolia Lane Memories & More Large Specialty Cards & Envelopes.

You can make your squash card any length you want by adding more squares. The finished size of the top will be half the size of the original square that you start with, i.e. a 4" x 4" starting square will give you a 2" x 2" finished card.

When you decorate the inside of the card you simply use squares which are slightly smaller than the finished card size and you can cut them in half at the diagonal for the triangular areas. For the small card I used 2-3/4" (7 cm) squares and the larger card was decorated with 4" (10 cm) squares.

I had lots of fun decorating these cards and I used a lot of colours. For a full list of the supplies have a look at the description under my YouTube video.

I hope you enjoyed this fun fold card and I'd love to see you make your own Squash Card!

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Daisy Punch Meets Rooted In Nature Wood Stamp

During a recent class I was teaching, I explained how I punch out images on a sheet of scrap paper so I can easily see which punches I have and how the shapes will fit over a sentiment before stamping it. I hold the 'negative' punched image over the stamp to see if it will fit the shape. This also helps me figure out if the punch will fit a piece of cardstock I want to use, thus saving me time and paper.

While I was demonstrating how to do this I was using a scrap of paper on which I had punched out daisies the night before and I suddenly had an 'aha!' moment. The large daisy fits perfectly over the large wooden ring image from the Rooted in Nature stamp set. So I grabbed one of the ink pads we were using in class and soon I had a textured daisy.

When I was trying to remove the cardstock from the punch, I wondered if I could make more petals by punching out the remaining stamped cardstock. I then had a complete daisy and lots of petals in the same textured colour. I did it again using Cajun Craze ink and began putting my new flower design together. I stuck the two complete daisies on each other and then glued each petal to the centre overlapping the other colour.

Then I went looking for cardstock and DSP to use to make a card with my new flower. That's usually how I create (unless I am CASEing someone else's awesome designs) -- I play around with stamps and dies or punches and then try to use them in a project. I don't always match up colours precisely as I don't think about what coloured cardstock I have before I make the embellishments, plus I'm not thinking of the final design when I'm playing with my stamps and dies. I guess I'm doing things backwards, but it's more fun and challenging that way!

I knew I had a lot of Mint Macaron cardstock so I started with that colour and discovered that the Mosaic Mood Specialty Designer Series Paper used it as well as Cajun Craze, which was one of my flower colours. I then chose Very Vanilla cardstock for the base and central layer because that was in the DSP as well. From there I used my leaf punch and the Painted Harvest stamp set to make two-toned leaves to match the other DSP colours. The Stamparatus allowed me to line up the two-step stamp easily to make the leaves very quickly. I used a 1/2" circle punch to make a Daffodil Delight coloured circle piece which I shaped to fit the centre of my flower. I used Stampin' Write pens in the colours of the flower for the sentiment and pretty soon I was finished with my card.

So now I can't wait to go through all my stamps to see which will fit my daisy punches to create more unique flowers or maybe I can find new textures for my cat and dog punches!












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