Find ideas, instructions and materials used to make a variety of paper-craft projects using Stampin' Up! products. As an independent Stampin' Up! demonstrator in New Zealand I love to share my passion for creating things with paper including cards, boxes, gifts and decorations. I find that making things is a fun and relaxing past-time which relieves stress and gives me a purpose to be active every day. If you have any questions or want to learn more about Stampin' Up! feel free to contact me.
My latest Mailbag Make has been created using the Best Dressed designer series paper with some mini cards and envelopes. The supplies in this kit allow you to make two little 3-1/4" square booklets which you can use as a mini photo album, journal, or special gift.
The front of two booklets and one side of the Best Dressed DSP.
You get six mini cards with envelopes, pre-cut cardstock, and 12 square pieces of Best Dressed double-sided paper so you'll have a huge choice of colours and designs to decorate your books.
The back of two little booklets and the reverse side of the Best Dressed DSP.
You will also get a link to my private instructional video in which I show you how to make the booklets and explain how you can decorate them by fussy cutting some of the designer series paper. If you'd like to stamp your books, as I have done in my sample, you may like to purchase the Dressed To Impressstamp set.
There are enough supplies with this kit so you can make two little booklets with pages made from the mini cards and envelopes.
The first six pages of the booklets made from cards and envelopes and decorated with stamps and fussy cut images.
You can stamp on the pages with your own stamps and ink or attach your favourite photos to them.
The last six pages of the mini booklets decorated with fussy cut images from the designer series paper.
The envelopes pages make small pockets which are perfect for hiding little surprise messages!
The inside of my original booklet with stamped and die cut images as well as some fussy cut paper.
If you don't have any stamps you can write on the pages or just decorate them with images from the designer series paper.
If you want, you could make some mini cards instead of two booklets as you'll have plenty of supplies at hand with this Best Dressed Mailbag Make kit. Just add adhesives and some scissors!
Have a look at my Sneak Peek Video to see what's included in the Mailbag Make and to learn how to order yours!
Stampin' Up! punches are well made and heavy compared to other companies but that is only one of the many features of these fabulous products. There is so much to say about these punches that I have made three short videos to explain everything and I have included them throughout this blog post.
My Stampin' Up! Punches Stacked
All the punches have a locking mechanism which allows them to be locked in the closed position for easy transportation and storage. You simply slide the dark grey lock towards the punch hole to unlock, which allows it to open up for use. To lock the punch, just hold it closed and slide the grey plastic towards the front of the punch. This keeps it flat so you can store the punch stacked on a shelf or in a drawer.
The shapes and sizes of some punches -- the two on the far left are unlocked and the rest are locked and stacked.
The image on the top of each punch shows the actual size of the item that will be created when you use the punch. The front, angled edge of the punch has a small picture of the image as well, so you can easily find the punch when they are stacked.
When I first get a new punch I use it on some cardstock so I can test how it works. I am then left with a template which is very useful when designing my projects.
Punch templates are handy when designing a project as you can use them to choose the correct size for your sentiments.
I can place the template over my cardstock to see how the image will fit my project. I can also use the templates to determine which size label punch will fit the sentiments I want to use.
Some cards and papercraft projects with the punches I used to make them.
The templates are also very useful when using a punch that has more than one image. Place the stamps on top of the cutout sections of the template (the negative space) to arrange them so they will perfectly fit in the punch after you have stamped the cardstock.
I show you how to do this with the Hot Air Balloon punch in this video.
Stampin' Up! punches are strong and durable but sometimes they do get dull with a lot of use. You can sharpen them easily by punching some aluminium as shown in my next video.
You can use the image you have leftover after sharpening to make some interesting projects. Here I have made some flowers with the daisy and leaf punches. I just attached the metal images to some green wire and gently shaped the flowers with a bone folder and my fingers.
Some little metal flowers and leaves made from aluminium cans, wire and buttons.
I hope you've learnt some things about using punches from this post and my videos. Punches are great tools for enhancing your cards and to complement your projects!
I CASEd this idea from Monika Weiss, a Stampin' Up! demonstrator from Austria, and created a video showing how to make this little bridal book.
It doesn't use a lot of materials -- just one piece of 12" x 12" DSP, two A4 pieces of cardstock, a couple 11 x 11 cm squares of cardboard and 50 cm of ribbon to tie it shut -- so you can put one together fairly quickly.
You can click here for Monika Weiss' instruction sheet which is written in German, however the measurements are easy to read and I explain them in my video.
There are plenty of pages to decorate in this little album, 12 in total! This gives you lots of room for photos, signatures or other memorabilia.
You can decorate the inside pages with stamped images, sentiments or die cuts, but make sure you leave enough space for photos or messages from well wishers.
The bridal book is made with one sheet of Flowering Foils Specialty Designer Series Paper and Whisper White cardstock.
For the cover I stamped the bride from Wonderful Moments in Memento Tuxedo Black Ink, coloured it with Stampin' Blends and then cut it out with the second largest rectangle from the Stitched So Sweetly dies.
I stamped the words 'For the Bride' in Versamark ink and heat embossed it with silver embossing powder before I fussy cut it out and popped it up using a dimensional.
I used lots of stamped images from Wonderful Moments, Stitched All Around, Good Morning Magnolia, Love What You Do, and Beauty Abounds to decorate the inside pages with Basic Gray ink.
For the first mini album I made, I used a piece of Animal Expedition DSP (retired) and the Animal Outing stamp set.
I made peek-through areas with some of the Animal Friends dies on a few of the pages and decorated the rest with stamped images coloured with Stampin' Blends.
This album would also be perfect for photos, a gift, an autograph book, a special birthday card or a mini scrapbook. There is no limit to what you could use it for!
