Wendy Vecchi For The Lovely Rachel ....

It's the lovely Rachel's birthday soon (No. 1 son's girlfriend).  He has bought her a Spa Day for herself and four of her friends.  Now Matt always makes an effort and a few Sundays ago he had come for a visit and saw the plaque I had made a short while ago (see earlier post).  He thought it would be rather a wheeze for me to make him five invitations along similar lines.  So being the good mother that I am, I set to work .....

The base of the invitations is as before - chipboard shape (by tracing around a Tim Holtz Grungeboard book page), and covered with Basic Grey Porcelain papers.  This time the Studio 490 'Rules to Live By' are stamped on more BG Porcelain paper which was mounted on a Nesties Label chipboard shape (run the chip through the Wizard twice).  Then I went to town with the flowers, leaves, swirls and butterflies ......

Everything was stamped on Grungepaper and coloured with Distress Inks (the old ones - I have a few of the new ones but I'm still stroking them - lol) buttons of various sizes were added and finally a touch of a Glitter Pen here and there (love the way the Grungepaper curls if you heat it with a heat gun) ....

Here's another view ....

Here's the back of the plaque - with the actual invitation on another Nesties Label shape cut from chipboard with more Studio 490 stamps ....

Then it occurred to me - how to wrap them up.  So out come the Bind it All and I made a box (well a container really, 'cos it hasn't got a lid) ....

The box is cut from the last of my chipboard (adding to the NEC shopping list as I type - lol) and punched  away with the Bind It All.  Each side is covered with K & Co papers that I have had for ever and then it's all bound together with lengths of natural coloured raffia. The raffia was a bit of a pain 'cos it kept splitting  - but I do like a challenge - lol.

End result - a very sturdy 'container' - which will be handy for keys, loose change,  sweeties and other bits and bobs.  Thinking now that these would make nice pressies .....

More raffia was cut up to form a 'nest' inside for the invitations to stand in.  I was going to put some more Studio 490 flowers around the outside but decided to make 'tiles' of some of the definitions on the paper instead ....

And - voila - here's the completed pressie ....

I hope Rachel likes it - and you do too ....

It's Now Sunday .... And No Paper In Sight ....

After yesterday morning's adventure, the rest of the day passed without serious mishap .... the runner beans got planted out, the salad growbag planted with seeds, a bit of snipping here and there in the garden, a surprise invitation to a BBQ over at my daughter's in the evening. The only thing that did happen was that while I was out at said BBQ, a cat had had a bit of a scratch in my growbag. I was not impressed .... so there I was in the rapidly failing light rigging up temporary netting - so we will have to see on that one.

I thought I would share what I have been playing with for the last couple of evenings. Back in March, my son forgot my birthday and Mother's Day and by way of apology gave me his credit card (again lol), a fixed sum and said 'Get some stamps'. So (again) quicker than you can say rubber, I was on the phone to the Stamp Attic and got myself these absoloutely beautiful and gorgeous Studio 490 stamps, designed by Wendy Vecchi. Matt bought me my first three sets (some apology eh - everyone wants him - lol) and after getting them I simply had to add to the collection ......Here are some of the flowers I have made so far and, no, there isn't a piece of paper there. All the flowers are made from Grungepaper. All of these in the photo, plus a few more leaves, have been made out of 1.5 sheets of the Grungepaper, so when you consider that there are three sheets in a pack - it goes a long way. The only inks I have used are Distress Inks, so this is a high scoring project on the mess front - lol. I'm not getting everything I own out - just the three elements.
Be back later to share what I have done with them .....