Christmas Wish Books

     Here is a little project for MHK Designs using their gorgeous Christmas Past paper set. This set is an absolute steal at just £2.02 for 14 papers, available on Etsy.

      To make the tiny books I started with an envelope punch from Woodware and MHK Designs pretty papers. I printed eight of the papers on an A4 sheet of thick paper and punched eight envelopes.
      To make the spine of the book I cut a strip of card 4 1/2 inches long by 1 1/4 inches wide. The strip is then scored at 1 1/4 and the next eight 1/4 inches, this should leave another panel at the end measuring 1 1/4 inches.

     For the cover I printed two copies of the pine tree paper, one for the front and one for the back. Two greyboard pieces, cut slightly bigger than the envelopes, are covered with the paper.
     The covers are joined by sticking on the spine to both the front and the back, then each envelope was stuck to the spine making sure to put them on the right hand 'mountain' of the spine.
     Turning the book over a small length of red ribbon is added to the 'valley' of the spine before sticking all the valleys shut.
     To add some sparkle there is a glue border all the way around the front cover that is sprinkled with iridescent glitter and a tiny glitter dot in the middle of each snowflake.
     Each envelope has a tiny gold edged white card tucked inside for you to write your wishes on. These would make great little decorations for the children to hang their Christmas wishes on the tree.
     There are lots of digi stamp sets and patterned papers in the MHK Designs Etsy shop, there's a Facebook page to showcase your creations and there will be a new challenge blog in the new year.

I would like to enter these little books in the following challenges:

A Snowflakes Promise - Anything Christmas

The Sisterhood Of Crafters - It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas

CraftyHazelnut's Christmas Challenge Extra - Anything Chrsitmas

CraftyHazelnut's Patterned Paper Challenge - Use Patterned Papers

To Bookly Go..........

     Today sees the launch of a new challenge at Craft My Life All Crafts Challenge. You can enter anything you make as long as it's NOT A CARD!
     My creation this time was meant to be a hedgehog but the book I chose to fold had too many pages, as I folded it it got fatter and fatter, until it became a complete cylinder. So then the question was what could I do with a cylinder?...make a pencil?.....cut it in half to get two hedgehogs?....make a rocket!!!!
     I am fascinated by space so choosing to 'bookly go' where no book has gone before was a logical conclusion.
     The tip of my rocket is a plastic golf tee stuck on with Cosmic Shimmer PVA glue (well it had to be cosmic didn't it).

      The base of the rocket is glued to a circular card panel which has three egg box cones glued to it. There are no new items used to make this apart from a couple of photos, all card has come from scraps and all bits are from stash.
     Some of the tags are cut from old card backs, the stamps for the alien and wording are from an old Creative Expressions set called Outer Space. The little alien glows in the dark because I used Wow Glow In The Dark embossing powder. I stamped and gold embossed 'Beam Me Up' on the picture of the Enterprise, 'Blast Off' on the Shuttle photo and 'Greetings Earthling' on the red tag.

      I did put rafia through the holes on the tags but it didn't look right so I have left them stringless. The back of each tag is plain white card so you can write notes on them.
     This rocket could be kept on a desk or near a phone to hold all those important little personal log entries but this one won't make it to a craft sale, it will only be voyaging as far as my son's room, after all resistance is futile!




      Please pop over to All Crafts Challenge and take a look at what the DT have been up to, come and join us as we'd love to see what you've made. This challenge runs for two months so you have lots of time to create.

I would like to enter this rocket in the following challenges:

Allsorts Challenge Blog - For The Guys

Crafting At The Weekend - Anything Goes
Polkadoodles - Men On Our Minds
Delightful Challenges - It's A Guy Thing

Milk Coffee Challenge - Anything BUT A Card

Spike The TagHog

      Say Hello to Spike the taghog. He's a very useful chap to have by your telephone as he'll hold on to any notes you tuck into his back.
     Spike began life as a very tired and worn out old paperback novel, he has been well read but sadly was no longer loved in his original form. Now he has a new lease of life and will soon have a new home too.
     The book was approximately 300 pages long which was plenty. You'll be amazed at how fat he gets as you fold all his pages in half, that's why I find a paperback is better for this project.
     If you search 'altered books'  you will get an amazing array of art, Spike is a real beginners item but he was fun to make. He has old buttons for his eyes and nose and a selection of medium size tags for his prickles.

     He could hold messages by your phone or on your desk, he could also be a very novel birthday book with twelve tags stamped with each month of the year for you to list all those important dates you need to make cards for.
     Spike will be joining his friends in my local charity shop later this week, he's a way of using something nobody wishes to buy and turning it into a desk top novelty to raise money for the hospice.

I would like to enter Spike in the following challenge:

Try It On Tuesday - Handmade, to include writing

Country View Challenges - Paper Chase, must be paper