A Challenging Gift Card Holder

Early in June, Susan Daly from Stampindaly.com issued a challenge on her blog. She would send out a little packet of materials and the recipients had to create something with those materials. Of course, I forgot to take a "before" picture, but she sent me some orange, yellow and red cardstock, some double-sided dp (red on red stars/polka dots), some striped dp, a chipboard star, an image, a few tags in red and white and some black grosgrain ribbon.

Here is the card she sent with the goodies. Isn't it cute that she created a ladybug from punched shapes? And I always love flowers on flourishes! These materials have been in my head since I got them, and I wanted to do something special. Since the colors are really outside my comfort zone, I waited and waited until the idea came to me. Then I had to wait some more until I had time to execute the idea! Well, today was the day and I made time tonight to complete it. I still have pieces of materials left, and will make another card tomorrow after a good night's sleep.

I chose to make a flap card gift card holder. To begin, I covered the star in the dotted paper. In the center of the star is a small punched star and a rhinestone. The star hides the magnet closure for the card. The outside is layered with the red, then the striped dp. I even took the time to match up the pattern of the pieces so it looks more polished!!

Inside, I colored the hippo with Prismacolor pencils and blended with OMS. I dragged the gray around the image to create a shadow. The main image is mounted on red, then the dotted dp and adhered to the center part of the card. The bottom, as you can see, has a strip of the black ribbon across it that holds the gift card in place. One problem - the gift card slid out the bottom of the card when opened all the way. As a remedy, I added a tag that has a sentiment from my own collection and some punched stars from the dotted dp. This is attached to the ribbon with a red brad (also from my stash) and the lower right corner is adhered with a glue dot, which holds the gift card in place. Clever, no? I'm sure I'm not the first to use this trick!

This is the first time I have used the BG magnet snaps. I LOVE THEM!!!

I hope Susan likes what I have produced. I'm hoping to get more stamping time this weekend. My desk is relatively cleaned off, so I won't have to waste time doing that before getting started. The only chores for the morning are a run to the farmer's market to supplement our tomatoes and zucchini, and a trip to get a haircut for DS. Then the boys will take a ride in the new car and the day is mine (insert evil laugh here)!

Hope you all have a good weekend. Thanks for looking :)