Category Archives: Cupcake Builder

Olaf birthday card (from Frozen)

01 Tuesday Jul 2014

Posted by in 1 1/4 inch circle, 1 3/8 circle, 1 inch circle, Bird Builder, Birthday, Cards, Cupcake Builder, Jewellery tag, Kids cards, Kids party, Modern Label, Owl, Punches, Tutorial, Word Window

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Hello

Sorry I haven’t posted to my blog in a while.  I’ve been pretty busy with not much time for crafting.   I finally got a chance to make some stuff recently though, so I will show you a few things over the next little while.

It is my little boy’s 5th birthday today (where did that time go?!?) and, like seemingly most children, he is currently quite obsessed with the movie Frozen.   So I decided to tackle Olaf the snowman for his birthday card.   Here is the end result:

Olaf the Snowman card (Frozen)

 

The card background is on Coastal Cabana card stock with some (retired) Winter Frost designer series paper.  I used my dazzling details glitter to add some sparkly snowflakes in the background.  I wrote the greeting (“I like warm hugs” with my Coastal Cabana Stampin’ Write marker and punched it out with the word window punch.  I used the modern label punch to do the background, also in Coastal Cabana.  I put a couple of dots of dazzling details glitter on either side of the greeting for some extra sparkle.

Here’s how I made Olaf (all pieces punched from Whisper White unless otherwise specified):

The base of the snowman – 1 3/4 inch circle punch, with approximately 1/2 cm cut off the bottom

The middle of the snowman – 1 3/8 inch circle punch, with approximately 1/4 cm cut off the bottom

Head – the large oval punch

Feet – the two large circles from the owl builder punch

Buttons – the middle sized circles from the owl builder punch (Basic Black)

Arms – 2 x branches from the bird builder punch (Chocolate Chip).  I thought about trimming the leaves down to make the arms look slightly more twig like, but I decided that was far too much effort!)

Mouth – oval punch (cut off about 1/3 from the top)

Teeth – the base of the jewellery tag punch (retired).  If you don’t have this punch you could easily cut a small rectangle freehand.

Nose – I punched a 1 inch circle punch and then cut it down to an oval freehand

Nose – the candle from the cupcake builder punch (I also thought about using the candle from the same punch, I think either would work) (Tangerine Tango)

Eyes – I glued on some goggly eyes with some mini glue dots.

I drew on the eyebrows with a black texta and have since been informed by Mr 5 that I should have drawn on his hair as well.   Feedback was noted, hair has now been drawn on (although I don’t have a picture of that!).

Apart from the minor criticism about my attention to hair detail, Olaf was received with much excitement today!

Thanks for reading, and I’ll try not to be so long between posts next time

Caro x

 

 

A tip for punching small pieces of card stock

18 Wednesday Sep 2013

Posted by in 1 inch square, Cupcake Builder, Tutorial, Using up scraps

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Yesterday I showed you how I made some hot air balloon baskets with the Stampin’ Up! cupcake builder punch and the 1 inch square punch.

Making these baskets is a brilliant way to use up scraps of card stock.   Do you remember I made some Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer decorations a few weeks back?  Ever since then I have had 6 soft suede circles on my desk that I was trying to figure out what to do with, as well as a pile of off cuts.

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All very uninspiring … until I realised they could be hot air balloon baskets!

Today I wanted to show you a tip for punching small pieces out of scrap paper.  It can be very fiddly trying to get the small piece in the right place and keep it there long enough to punch.

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Solution?  Use a post it note to help you!

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This is a really handy tip for whenever you want to punch something out of a smaller piece of paper.

I hope this helps!

Caro

More balloon cards

17 Tuesday Sep 2013

Posted by in 1 3/4 circle, 1 inch square, 3D / pop up, Birthday, Cards, Cupcake Builder, General occasion, Kids cards, Punches, Using up scraps

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Hello

Yesterday I showed you some hot air balloon cards I made using the Stampin’ Up! A Little Treat stamp, which is now retired.   I said I would show you how you could make one of these cards even if you didn’t have this stamp set.   I thought of 2 ways you could do this: using the Stampin’ Up! cupcake builder punch and a square punch with a pair of scissors.

Method 1 – the cupcake builder punch

The first way is to use the cupcake base from the cupcake builder punch as a basket.

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You can see that the base is not quite ‘square’.  That doesn’t bother me when I’m sticking the hot air balloon on the card at an angle, but you can always cut just a small amount off to make it straight:

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Here are some hot air balloon cards made with the cupcake builder punch baskets:

IMAG0057You can also use the cupcake tops as clouds!

IMAG0066You can also give your basket a little ‘bling’:

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Method 2 – Using a square punch

Another way to make a basket is to cut a square and cut down the sides to make a basket.

IMAG0067Here’s a balloon made out of a square punch basket:

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(I can’t help myself and had to use up a tiny scrap of lace I’d had lying in my scrap pile!)

I hope you enjoy making some of these.

Caro

Pirate birthday party card

05 Monday Aug 2013

Posted by in Big Shot, Cards, Cupcake Builder, Decorative Label, Dies, Kids cards, Kids party, Modern Label, Owl, Punches, Top Note, Using up scraps, Word Window

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Hi

It seems that lately the only crafting I get to do is with a 4 year old sitting on my lap being the artistic director!  (I’m not complaining, I love it!)  It does mean though that most of my craft time is spent thinking up fun ideas for cards for kid’s birthday parties! This past weekend’s challenge was a card for a pirate themed birthday party.

So off to my office/craft room we went and did a little Google searching for inspiration.   Mr 4 was most impressed by the idea of an owl pirate – and he thought we should make a pirate like this one on Lynn Starzi’s blog.

I’m not too sure about this card (remember Mr 4 was the artistic director!) but here it is:

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Most importantly, both my munchkin and the lucky recipient thought it was great – so I guess that’s what matters!

The waves were made from some scraps of Pacific Point.  I’d saved some off cuts from cutting out some Top Note shapes, and the edges of where I’d cut out the Top Note actually worked quite well as waves!

The rest was the card was a mix of free hand cutting and Stampin’ Up! punches.

The pirate was made from the owl punch.   The pirate’s shirt had to be “red and stripey” apparently, so I found an old bit of Poppy Parade DSP (now retired).   Please note the peg leg!   Made from the candle from the cupcake builder punch.  The eyes were cut from the owl punch with “goggly eyes” stuck on top with mini glue dots.

The pirate’s hat was the side of the decorative label punch, flipped horizontally.

The boat was a large oval punch cut off across the top (Soft Suede card stock).  I cut the mast, the sail and ‘the plank’ freehand.   And a white Signo pen was perfect for drawing on the crossbones (no skulls for me).

Mr Artistic Controller was most insistent that the card had to say “Ahoy, me heartie!”, not “Happy Birthday”.    Given that my stamp collection doesn’t quite stretch to pirate messages, I wrote in on in pen.  (I’m still not convinced I spelled ‘heartie’ correctly but what can you do?!?)

The frame for the message is a modern label punch and the white is a word window punch.

There you go – our owl pirate card!

Caro x

 

 

 

Dinosaur punch art cards

13 Saturday Jul 2013

Posted by in 1 3/4 circle, 3/4 inch circle, Birthday, Cupcake Builder, Kids cards

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Hello

Sorry for the long delay between posts.  Work has been very busy.  Add into that a 4 year old’s birthday party and some overseas work travel and there hasn’t been a lot of spare time lately!

I finally got to do some card making today though – with my 4 year old, which is always nice and can be challenging!  He is off to his friend’s dinosaur themed birthday party tomorrow, so we decided to try and make a dinosaur themed card.

We started by a little Google searching for inspiration, and he decided he’d like to try and make a dinosaur a bit like this one (made by Sandra Jayne Wingate).

First we tried a prototype:

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He was quite pleased with that one (as was I!) – but then he decided we could do better!

So here is Dinosaur Mark II – with added spots, buttons for nostrils and bigger whites behind the googly eyes.

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Here they are side by side:

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These were pretty easy to make.

The orange card blanks were standard C6 size.  The pale blue was cut 10cm x 14.3cm.

The dinosaur body was a strip of paper approx 1 inch x 4 inches (they are slightly different on each one as I was using up scraps).  The rest of the shapes were punched from Stampin’ Up! punches:

Head –  1 3/4″ circle

Mouth – Extra large oval

Eyes (on Dinosaur Mark II) – 3/4″ circle

Nostrils (on Dinosaur Mark I) – circles cut from the Cupcake Builder punch

Clouds – cupcake top from the Cupcake Builder punch

Spines & teeth – edges cut from a star punch (retired).  You could also use petals from any flower punch, the tip of the bird’s wing or tail from the Bird Builder punch or just cut some triangles from a strip of paper (or divide a square punch into 4).  You could even use the ends of the Modern Label or Word Window punches … the possibilities are endless really.

I hope the birthday boy enjoys his dinosaur card!

Thanks for reading.  I’ll try not to have such a long break before the next post

Caro

Card layout for using up scraps

30 Thursday May 2013

Posted by in Cards, Cupcake Builder, Fancy Flower, General occasion, Punches, Using up scraps

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So far I’ve focused on little projects and ideas for using up left over pieces of pretty paper.   If you’re anything like me though, you probably have a pile of paper that you have been saving for a rainy day, because it’s too beautiful to throw out, or because you haven’t quite figured out what to do with it.

Today’s post is a suggestion for a simple card layout that can use up some of that gorgeous paper by turning it into cards.   These cards are really easy – if each one takes you 10 minutes I’d be surprised!  Probably more like 5 once you get the hang of it!

This Soft Suede card is 14 cm x 14cm.   The Pool Party background is 13 cm x 13cm and the DSP (from the free Everyday Enchantment set from Stampin’ Up!’s 2012 Sale-a-bration) was 12.5 x 12.5cm.    I added a doily, a Pool Party and Whisper White circle and used the Cupcake punch and matching stamp set to make the centre embellishment.

20121210_154540The great thing about this card layout though is that it can work with pretty much anything in the middle.    Here’s another one with a Fancy Flower in the middle.

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Pretty much any flower, heart or circle punch would work, as would a butterfly.  You could also turn it into an age birthday card by adding some die cut numbers in the middle.   The possibilities are endless really!

Thanks for reading.  I hope you’ve gotten some ideas to try out in your own card making 🙂