Paper Flowers.....and Happy Birthday Karen!

Can I get a Hip Hop???? It's another fun filled day of Unity and {ippity} goodness! Love Thursdays!!! So, let's get down to business. I've got a fun tutorial for you today, (oh, it's Lisa Henke, here-waving HI!!!). I know there are all kinds of flower tutorials out there, but most focus on flat flowers, ones to use on your cards. Today I thought I'd share how to make a life-like, 3-D flower to maybe use in a paper flower bouquet.

Before I get started, I wanted to tell Karen one more time.....Happy Birthday girl! Enjoy your day and all the cupcake love we sent your way!

I'm sure there are many ways to go about this, but I'm all about quick and easy and still making it look GREAT! You can make these any size, but I like them to be on the bigger side, to give it a more real appearance.

Here's what you need:


any flower die (s)-there are many on the market and most have 2, 3, or 4 flowers on the 1 die. I used the Tim Holtz Tattered Flower die.
cardstock and/or designer paper of choice
stamps-{ippity} of course!
wooden pick-I used a shish kabob skewer and painted it green
scissors
strong adhesive-I used scor-tape
hole punch
foam dimensionals
green paint or ink

Before starting, remember.... cut and stamp first....assemble last.

1. start by cutting a number of paper flowers out of cardstock or designer paper with your die. I like to mix and match. Plus it allows me to customize my flower designs by stamping on some of them.


2. stamp Dots for Sure on two of the cardstock flowers. Punch holes in the center (make sure you find a hole punch similar in size to your skewer circumference.
   
3. to give your flowers a life-like appearance, curve or roll the edges of each of the petals. I like to do one flower up, and another flower down (you'll see why, when I stack them together).



4. take a strip of green cs about 1 inch in width (length isn't as important, because you can trim shorter as needed) and cut slits all the way across like faux grass.


5. paint skewer green for the stem.



6. attach foam dimensionals on the backside your flower layers (you can make your flower with any number of layers, I did mine with 3 layers-1 small and 2 of the same size flowers).



7. create a stemen for your flower by rolling your green slitted cs around the skewer. When you have a nice width when rolled up, snip and make sure it will fit through the hole of your flowers.




8. Begin layering your flowers, starting with your smaller petals and then moving up to your bigger petals. If you are layering two flowers of the same size, use one with petals curving up, layered with petals curving down.




9. After you have your flower assembled, add your skewer-use adhesive if needed.

Here you go! The finished product!

I added a few felt, hand cut leaves that I attached with scor-tape and a bit of twine.

Hope you feel inspired to make a whole garden of paper flowers. The looks great in any vase! Have fun and enjoy the day! Join us in the Unity Forum for more Hip Hop fun! Off you go to the Unity blog.

Metal Embossing Tutorial plus a Special Farewell and Welcome

If you've already been through the whole Hip Hop then you are probably already aware that the {ippity} dt made some farewell cards for a pretty special lady :)

If you didn't start from the beginning {CLICK HERE} to start at the Unity blog.

Michelle Ogdahl has been with {ippity} since the beginning and has been a HUGE part of helping ALL the {ippity} chicks get their business started. Her last day was Monday :( and we were very sad to see her go. Some of the {ippity} chicks made her farewell cards for {Monday's H{ippity} Hop}.
We all wish Michelle nothing but the best as she takes on the next big journey of her life!!

LOVE YA MICHELLE!

{Amy and Michelle eating ice cream....looks like a FUN job right?!?}

NOW

for the great big

HUGE WELCOME

for

AMY TILLEMANS

We are SO EXCITED to have her join the {ippity} and Unity team. She will no doubt be a friend to all of us and you give her a great big hello {HERE} on her introduction on the Unity forums.

She also posted a little bio about herself on the Unity blog {HERE}

Next up....

some of you may have seen this layout on my blog during last week's hop.I promised you a tutorial on how I made this key...
...so here it is :)
Supplies you will need:
Silver Metallic Cardstock

Silver Embossing Powder

Heat Gun

Versamark Ink

Music of My Heart key stamp or stamp of choice

Step 1: Ink up a section of the cardstock with the Versamark pad large enough for your stamp.

Step 2: Cover the whole area with embossing powder....tap of the excess and emboss with the heat gun.

Step 3: Repeat this step 3 times so that you have a thick layer of embossing. You can either dump more embossing powder on when the previous layer is still hot or let it dry and apply more Versamark ink and then the powder. I prefer to add more ink so I'm not so rushed.

Step 4: Heat the third layer of embossing really well because you need it to be really hot to be able to press the stamp into it. You will want to press straight down carefully because the stamp can slip...don't ask me how I know this ;)

Step 5: Now all you have to do it cut out the key and embellish any project :)

Extra Tip: After I cut my key out I had left over area's of embossing. You can heat them again REALLY WELL and use any other stamp you want to make extra embellishments!! Here I used the flowers from Bitty Pixie Paisley.

I can't wait to see some "metal" embellishments on your projects :)
HAVE FUN!!!

If you didn't start today's hop from the beginning, click on the button below to start at the Unity blog.

NEED SOME {ippity}????

Click on the button below to find a chick to purchase from :)

Hello everyone! Happy Thursday!

It's Heather over here, and I've got a fun, clean and simple tutorial to share with you all today! I had an idea to make easter eggs out of nestabilities dies, so thought I would share this with you in time for Easter!

Sorry I've been MIA for a while, I had actually forgot to post a few weeks back, and hope you can forgive me! Hehehe...Batting my eyelashes over here!

Anyways, for today's tutorial, I used Sweet Thoughts of Spring. I just love this cute cute adorable stamp set!

Step 1: Cut your eggs using dies... Step 2: You'll end up with 3 layers but will only use 2. (I used double sided paper)Step 3: Stamp your image on your neutral cardstock.Step 4: After you've colored your image, adhere to cardstock layer.

Step 5: Use pop up dots or dimensionals to add your windowed egg layer.

Step 6: Embelsh to your liking.
Step 7: Ta-DAH!I hope you all will enjoy this fun and simple tutorial! Sorry for the weird pictures, I'm not very good at taking pictures for a step by step project yet! Hehehe...

Here are 2 quotes for you. Lance is always making me laugh and keeping on my toes, so I thought I would share a super cute quote with you all!

Thanks all and hope you have a FABULOUS day!

Hugs,

Heather R.

That's How Thursday-Altered Picture Frame Tutorial

Hello everyone and Happy Thursday!

I'm super excited to be with you today and share
one of my FAVORITE alterable pieces!

I alter picture frames A LOT!

They make fun an inexpensive gifts!

{Graduations, Weddings, Birthday, Valentine's, Christmas, etc.}

The frame was $3.99

The accessories, when broken down came to $1.90

So here were the supplies I started with, MINUS the letters.

{I decided not to add the letters at the very end.}

Step 1: Gather SuppliesStep 2: Paint your frame with acrylic paints
{Set frame aside to dry, about 10 min}Step 3: Stamp your images on the acrylic paint with inks
{For this project, I used Moon Beams & Heart Strings}

Step 4: Alter according to style and taste and occasion.Step 5: Final step is to insert picture of your choice.

Pretty easy and simple alterable project as well as inexpensive.

You can use any kind of archival glue, they will hold, but I like

to use my Hot Glue Gun for that added strength.Hugs all and happy creating!

Heather R.

Shaped Card Tutorial

Hello there!! This is Kelly today and I am still reeling from the amazing week I just spent at CHA with all the wonderful Unity/{ippity} peeps!!  We had so much fun and really got a lot of great exposure for {ippity}.   I am so excited at the prospects of this just getting bigger and bigger!!

I am here today with a tutorial for you on how to make the shaped card that I posted for this week's Hippity Hop Challenge! I made a card in the shape of a house by using an {ippity} stamp and I want to share with you how easy it was!

 The house shape for this card comes from the house in the Devoted set.  Follow the directions below and you can turn any of the image {ippity} stamps into cards too!

How to make a Shaped Card from a Stamped Image

Step 1

Start by stamping the image you would like to turn into a card shape onto white copy paper using black ink.  It doesn't have to be this house stamp, but something that can be turned into a card.

Step 2

Next scan your stamped image on your printer and save it as a picture file.  If you don't have a scanner, you can take it to your local office supply store.

Step 3

Now open up a program that you like to use to edit your photos or make presentations.  I prefer to use Power Point.  Start a new page and then insert the photo you just stamped into it.

Step 4

Using your program draw a temporary rectangle or square using the tools in your program.  Resize this object to the approximate size you want your finished card to be.  This will be used only for a reference for you to know how large to resize your stamped image.

Step 5

Now you simply adjust the size of the scanned stamped image to fit onto this temporary box you created.  If you use the corners to drag your image, you will maintain the proper proportions of the stamped shape.

Step 6

Once you have your image resized to the desired shape, simply print the image out onto copy paper.

See how much larger the new copied image is compared to the original stamp size?

Step 7

Now roughly cut out the shape you just printed and place it over the piece of cardstock that will become the shaped card base. Be sure that the image fits properly before cutting.

Step 8

Fold you card base in half and with the image hanging over the folded edge, begin to cut out around the enlarged shape.  You might like to use a bit of repositionable tape so that your image doesn't shift as you cut.  Cut all around the edges except those on the folded size that are overlapping.

Step 9

Now you should have a folding card that is the same shape as your stamped image! Isn't that neat. It is a perfect match, just larger.

Simply decorate the card as you see fit and you are all done making a shaped card that matches one of your stamps!  Easy peezy right??  I hope you will give this a try and be sure to upload it to the SCS {ippity} Gallery so we can all see what you did!!

Stop by my blog later today where I hope to have some CHA photos uploaded for you! I am so happy to be home and thrilled to be back in my normal routine! I missed seeing you guys on the forums!!

Have a wonderful day!!

simple masking tutorial

Hello it's Eryn posting today with

{That's how you do it} Thursday!

{we are officially on SCHEDULE...wooohooo! We will have a calendar really soon so you know exactly what to expect each & everyday!}

Today I am going to show you a really simple way to create a custom background on your next scrapbook layout.

Below is my completed layout.

Notice the background of my layout is in the shape of a heart...

this was SO EASY to do and added (what I think!) the perfect background to go along with my pictures, stamps, & embellishments.

The supplies you need to create this background are items

you already have in your craft room:

12 X 12 piece of scratch paper

Scissors

Pencil

Tape
Rubber stamp of your choice

Ink

{click on image to enlarge}

1. Fold your 12 x 12 piece of scratch paper in half and hand draw half a heart

2. Cut the half heart out {while leaving your paper folded in half}

3. Open up the paper and tape the heart shape OVER your scrapbook page. Make sure you tape the heart template over your paper and to a hard surface being careful so that it does not actually attach to your scrapbook page.

4. Ink up your stamp and start stamping.

5. Re-apply ink after each time you stamp the image. Repeat until you have the entire background covered.

6. Carefully remove your template overlay. ...and TA-DA!

a PERFECT heart background!

Finish off your scrapbooking page with all of your favorite stamps & embellishments.

The stamp I used for the background is the LoveLOVElove, etc. stamp from the {ippity} kit Because of You

the other stamp images - You stole my Heart ...and I love you more today than yesterday are from the kit Straight from the Heart

....of course you can try this technique out with ANY SHAPE that fits the theme behind your scrapbooking page!

Thanks for stopping by!!