Garden Bench

Cherry Blossoms in the Park

| ullycatdesigns

It’s time for the May 2024 Karen Burniston Design Team Challenge with the theme of From the Vault. I used for inspiration a 2021 Thanksgiving card and made it into a spring card.

My new card uses a similar cardbase to the original, but I skipped the foundation and the fourth fold.

Cardbase: Cut from medium-weight cardstock three rectangles 6 1/4 x6-inches and one 6-inch square.  Cut five 6-inch squares of decorative green paper Using double-sided tape on the back of four of the decorative panels adhere to both sides of two of the 6 1/4 x6-inches rectangles. Cut out windows from the center of these two covered panels using the largest Square Crosshatch die. Attach window panels to opposite sides of the 6-inch square. Adhere last 6 1/4 x6-inches rectangle to bottom of the 6-inch square. Cover the hinge flaps with a decorative paper. (This will be the back of the folded close card. On my card it is pink.) Cover the 6-inch square inside with green decorative paper and the bottom square with a grass like paper. On the back side of grass covered square cover with a stone wall patterned paper.

Trees: Use the tree and leaf dies in the Tree Pop-Up set to cut five of each die. Glue leaves to trees. Die-cut 16 times the flower die in the same set from pink. Using a tiny ball flower shaping tool, push each flower into stiff foam to shape petals. Top of trees will be glued to each side of window frame panels and tree trunk will be sandwiched in between the fence pieces. (You will use two trees per window panel.) Wait to glue onto cardbase until one layer of fence is adhered to cardbase.

Fence: From the Iron Fence Pop-Up set, cut eight of the fence die in black. Trim off the end post on one piece and then trim off just before the fifth pence post a section of fence from a second piece to made a fence that is wide enough to span the 6-inch cardbase panels. Made five of theses fence sections. Glue a section to the bottom edge of one of the window panels. Attach a tree. Glue a fence to other side of window panel matching all the scrollwork up. Adhere remaining tree and fence to 6-inch square panel.

Tulips & Tree Flowers: Add six dots of glue to tree leaves on one panel and place tiny pink flowers in glue using the pointed tip of QuickStik to firmly attached to leaves. Continue with each of the five trees until flowers are all attached.

Cut from green cardstock 25 of the tulip base die in the Garden Charms set. Trim off charm loop from flower bases. From yellow cardstock cut 50 tulip flower tops. Glue a yellow top to front and back of all the flower bases. To create the flaming streaks of color, use a red brush marker starting at the bottom of the yellow tulip and drawing up to the points following the curves of the tulip shape.

Sentiments: Both the shadow die and word die were used for the “Happy Birthday.” The inside sentiment of “Happy Spring” is a words-only die.

Envelope: The card will fit in a catalog envelope of 6×9-inches.

Thank you for reading this blog post. I hope this inspires you and makes you smile. Please like and leave comments 😊

Materials Used:

Dies

Papers

  • Core’dinations – 12×12 Single-Sided Textured Cardstock – Light green Crosshatch
  • Honey Bee Stamps – 6×8.5 Double-Sided Premium #65 Cardstock – Grain and Grunge
  • Hot off the Press – 12×12 Double-Sided Paper Pack – Spice Market
  • Colored and White Cardstock

Ink

  • Pigma – Mircon 01 Fine Tip Pen – Black
  • Ranger – Tim Holtz – Distress Ink- Frayed Burlap
  • Scrapbook.com – Glitter Brush Marker – Red, Blush & Mint
  • Sharpie – Permanent Marker – Fine Tip –Green
  • Sharpie – Permanent Marker – Ultra Fine Tip – Green
  • Stampin’ Up – Stampin’ Blends Markers – Light Daffodil Delight

Adhesives

Tools

  • Die Cutting Machine
  • Scoring Board
  • Bone Folder
  • Craft Mat
  • We R Memories – QuickStik
  • Sponge Dauber
  • Stamping Blocks used as paperweights
  • Scissors
  • Pencil
  • Paper tape
  • Flower Shaping Ball Tool
  • Stiff Foam for flower shaping

All That Jazz

| ullycatdesigns

Needing a birthday card for a fun loving and jazz enthusiast gentleman who always supports concerts in the park, was the inspiration for this card.

It uses a variety of animals and scene dies as well as a pop-up bench by Karen Burniston. This was my first time using the Pear Blossom Press EZ-lights which are also available on the Karen Burniston website.

EZ-Lights:  To start the card, I had to plan out how the lights were to be installed knowing that the switch/battery piece had to be surrounded by foam strips and that I wanted lights on both the front of the card and inside the card. I don’t like to have wires going across the card-fold, so everything needed to be above the fold on this top-fold A7 (5×7-inch) card. (I also watched some assembly videos on using the EZ-Lights.) I made my front decorative panel and added decorative papers to the inside of my card base before poking the holes for the one light on the card front and two lights on the inside top panel.

Front Panel:  The front panel uses the fronds pattern plate cut from a dark green cardstock over a grass printed paper.

Lampposts:  These are cut using the street lantern pop-up die set using a glossy black piece of cardboard packaging which gives nice dimension as well as highlighting the embossed features of the dies. The edges of the lampposts I colored with black markers. For the lamp itself I used both clear vellum and golden parchment to allow the light to show through. (Assembly video)

Bench:  For the bench, I used the garden bench pop-up die set. I found a piece of glossy black paper that looks like metal, and I adhered it to some brown cardstock and then die-cut the bench. This pop-up is a glue-in pop-up, so I watched the assembly video several times to get the installation of the bench correct for this card. The monkeys are attached using foam squares.

Animals:  The jazz duo of a bass playing elephant and a giraffe playing the sax are from the safari animals die set with a beret cut down from an engineer’s cap and sunglasses from the three tiny accessories die sets. The musical instruments come from a die set from Doxie Craft Supply. The monkeys are from the monkey and lion die set. All the animals have stencils within the dies to add details like hoofs, eyes, mouths, ears and tails.

Bushes:  To create bush behind the bench, the large and small frond branches were cut from the landscape scene die set and inked with brown Distress ink. Three small fronds were used to cover up mistakes around the ground under the bench and for a decoration on the lower right corner.

Sentiments:  In order to turn on the lights two “Press me” labels were created -a yellow moon on the front and a green bush on the inside. The moon come from the landscape scene die set while the bush is the lion’s mane from the monkey and lion die set. A stamp was used for the “press me” stamped in brown ink.

“All that jazz” uses the mini alphabet die set. A strip of paper tape was used to provide a straight edge to line up the letters when adhered to the card front.

“Celebrate” and “Happy Birthday” are die sets also from Karen Burniston cut from yellow and tan cardstock.

This card is to be hand delivered, so no envelope.

Thank you for reading this blog post. I hope it provides inspiration and joy. Please like and leave comments 😊

Materials Used:

Dies

Stamps

  • Lawn Fawn –Clear Stamps – Push Here

Papers

  • Colored Cardstock Scraps
  • Black Glossy Cardboard Packaging
  • Keep It Simple – Back to Basics – 12×12 Double-Sided Cardstock – Jade Collection
  • The Paper Studio – Clear Vellum for Printers
  • Hunkydory Forever Florals – Autumn Days Printed Parchment
  • Park Lane – A7 White Card and Envelope

Pens & Inks

  • Sakura – Gelly Roll Pen – Medium – White
  • Pigma Micron 05 – Brown
  • Sharpie Permanent Marker – Ultra Fine Point – Black
  • Sharpie Permanent Marker –Fine Point – Black and Light Green
  • Ranger – Tim Holtz – Distress Inks – Vintage Photo
  • Stampin’ Up – Classic Stampin’ Pad – Early Espresso

Adhesives

  • Neutral PH Adhesive by LINECO
  • Fine-Tip Glue Bottle
  • Scrapebook.com – Double-Sided Permanent Tape ¼-Inch Wide
  • Fun Stampers Journey – Journey Dots
  • Stampin’ Up – Mini Stampin’ Dimensionals (Foam Squares)
  • Queen & Co. – Foam Refill Scraps (Foam Tape)

Miscellaneous

An Autumn Day in the Park

| ullycatdesigns

Sometimes spending a holiday alone in a place far from home means that one must adapt and make new traditions, friends and feasts.

This penta-fold aperture card opens out to form a park scene complete with a water fountain and squirrels sharing acorns. Karen Burniston dies are used for all but the 4 inch square apertures.

Card base: Cut four pieces of heavy weight cardstock 6 inches x 6 ¼ inches and one piece 6 inches by 3 inches. Score and fold all the 6 ¼ inches sides at ¼ inch to form tabs.

Adhere decorative papers to the front and back of two of the tabbed squares. (I used double-sided tape at the outer edges of paper.) Center a 4-inch square die over the patterned paper and secure with removable tape. (Remember if you are using different papers for the inside and outside of your card to test that you have the papers on the correct sides of your tabbed card base panels before you cut the apertures.) 

Glue the aperture side panels to the 6-inch sides of the back panel whose tab is glued to the floor panel. The floor panel’s tab is glued to the 6-inch side of the 6 inch x 3inch piece. Adhere decorative paper onto all panels on the card base.

Trees: Cut four tree trunks using Tree Pop-Up die set.  Cut four leaves dies. Glue trunks to leaves. Use a fence piece to position each tree trunk on the sides of the apertures, gluing the overlapping leaves together in the aperture opening. Repeat all steps for other aperture panel.

Fence: Cut ten fence panels from the Iron Fence Pop-Up die set. (I cut twelve fence piece incase I made a mistake in cutting, which I did.) Trim five fence panels at the sixth post from the left. Trim the remaining fence panels at the sixth post from the right. Trim off sixth post tip and scrolls at the right of post on left panel as shown in photo. Glue right panel over left panel. Take one elongated fence panel and adhere to the back panel. Glue fences over aperture panels front and back matching up fence tips. 

Bench: Stamp with woodgrain stamp onto brown kraft card stock and heat emboss with white embossing powder.

Die cut one whole bench using the Garden Bench Pop-Up die set. Cut the seat section again with the woodgrain going with the seat planks. Save two of the scrolling out-cuts from the bench back to glue onto the front of bench arms. Glue seat onto bench matching up planks. Follow package directions to attach the bench to the back and floor panels.

Fountain: Cut one of each of the two pieces of tree trunk from Tiny Trees Pop-Up die set of blue card stock. Cut tree base from gray card stock.  Cut two sets of rocks from Tent Pop Up die set.

Assemble tree as per package directions. Trim the tips of branches off

Trim two colors of mylar foil into 1/8 inch wide strips. (I used the Spellbinders Quick Trimmer) Glue two color strips to each side of the trimmed tree trunk.

Cut a circle of blue foil and glue to fold made by the floor panel and the 6×3 inch panel. Cover edges with gray rocks. Attach the tiny tree foundation per directions on package.

Squirrels: Cut two squirrels and the tummy fur from two different colors. Cut two acorns from a light brown and two acorn tops from a dark brown. Assemble squirrels and acorns per package directions.  Cut one of the long pop-up platforms from the bench pop-up die set. Attach to bench per directions on package. Glue squirrel to platform.

Sentiments: “autumn colors”, “happy autumn” , “Happy Thanksgiving” and “Thinking of you” are sentiments from two of Karen Burniston Word die sets – Greetings and Autumn Word Set.

Thank you for reading. If you enjoyed this blog post, please like it and follow the blog. 😊

Other Bench Cards

VALENTINE SWING

A SWINGING ANNIVERSARY

SWING GATE FOLD

The Secret Garden

Dies:

Stamps & Heat Embossing

  • VersaMark – Watermark Stamp Pad
  • Stampin’ Pad – Rubber Stamp – Hardwood
  • Recollections – Detail Embossing Powder – Snow

Papers

  • Heavy weight white card stock
  • The Paper Studio – traditions Floral paisley – 112094
  • Authentique – Pioneer Plaid – THA005
  • Brown kraft cardstock
  • Colored cardstock and specialty paper scraps from my stash

Additional Supplies:

The Secret Garden

| ullycatdesigns

Greetings it’s Sue here from the Dies R Us design team with a quad-fold, garden pop-up card.

This card was inspired by some of the Tutti Designs garden dies. The card specifically uses Garden Trellis, Garden Fountain and Garden Bench Set.

I created a quad fold card base by taking two 10 x 7 inch heavy card bases and cut one into a 5 ½ x 7 inch piece and a 4 1/5 x 7 inch piece. The larger piece is scored and folded at ½ inch along long side to form a tab to glue behind the other card base that in scored and folded in the middle. This creates a tri-fold card. Cut rectangular apertures from each side large enough to fit the fountain and trellis dies. Apertures should match up when folded closed.

Now is a good time to use Distress Oxide inks and a blending brush to color the inside of the trifold card a sky blue.

Spritz lightly the 4 ½ x 7 inch piece of card base with water to make it more pliable and use a cobblestone embossing folder to create the textured “floor” of this card. Score and fold ½ inch along short side of piece. Paint or decorated the textured area before gluing tab to center back of tri-fold card.

Cut two fountains from white card stock and ink both sides of each piece using Distress Oxide inks and a blending brush. (Adding the beads is optional.) Using a needle and thread, string seed beads and then adhere with glue to fountain. Glue beaded fountain to front of card aperture, glue second fountain to inside of front aperture matching up with front fountain and hiding the threads of the beading. (My aperture was bigger than the fountain and trellis, so I used thin stirps of clear plastic that I cut form packaging to act as extensions for the bases and tops of the fountain and trellis so that I could glue them to the card base.)

Cut two trellises from white card stock and two from green paper. Cut out the ivy from the green pieces and glue to the white trellis pieces. (An alterative is to color the ivy with green markers on the white trellis.) Adhere one trellis to the second aperture on the card base and then glue the second trellis to the back of aperture matching up lattice work.

Cut a tree and leaves from the Karen Burniston Tree Pop-Up die set. Cut a number of strips of grass from green paper and glue in layers to the inside of card. Position the tree behind the bench on the center panel. (I had to cut a second trunk to make the tree taller.)  Glue down the tree then layers of grass. Decorate with birds cut from Karen Burniston’s Tiny Trees Pop-Up die set.

Cut two of the benches out of heavy brown card stock. Save the four strips that are waste from the die cutting of bench. Cut the top of bench back off one piece as shown. Snip the arm rest from the back of the same piece and trim off extra angled piece. Fold the cut back down to form seat of bench.

Fold down the cut arms. Take the wider of the saved four strips and fold in a rectangle that is 1/ 2 x 3/8 inches and glue ends together. Glue the bench seat to the whole bench piece which becomes the bench’s back. Glue the rectangles between the front curved bench legs and the back curved bench legs. Take one of the thin strips and cut in half. Fold each half into an “L” shape. Glue the “L”s under the fold arm rests and adhere “L” strip to the bench back.

Train the bench to fold up, before gluing on to card base. To glue the bench into the card. Add glue first to rectangle bottom strips and position the onto the card “floor” near the fold. Glue bench back on to center panel of card. Move the bench while glue is still wet for best positioning.

To add some activity to the card, I stamped and colored a Funky Fossil dog stamp I had with Distress Oxide – Rusty Hinge with a water brush. The ball was colored with markers and attached to the dog with a strip of clear plastic cut from some packaging. The dog was then attached to the cobblestone flap by cutting a strip of cardstock and folding into an “L” shape and gluing to back of dog and onto cobblestones.

I covered the fronts of the aperture panels and the back center panel with green patterned paper before adding sentiments.

Sentiments are foiled Spellbinders sentiments I had in my stash and a Riley & Co. sentiment that is stamped on white card stock scrap in green ink, fussy cut and adhered to the back of cobblestone panel.

Hope this fun card has provided some inspiration for your crafting. 😊

SUPPLIES Used from Dies R Us:

Other Supplies:

  • White and brown cardstock
  • Green paper
  • Patterned papers from Park Lane Paperie – Strawberry Patch
  • Clear plastic strips cut from packaging
  • Darice cobblestone embossing folder
  • Crayola Signature Brush & Detail Dual-ended Markers
  • Ranger – Distress Oxide – Mowed Lawn, Stormy Sky, Tumbled Glass, Rusty Hinge
  • Scissors
  • Needle and thread
  • Clear glass seed beads
  • Funky Fossil Designs – Clear stamps – More Furry Friends
  • Foiled sentiment strips from Spellbinders Glimmer System foils and plates
  • Riley & Company -inspirations – Find joy in the ordinary – INS-111
  • Stampin’Up Classic ink pad – Pear Pizzazz

Don’t forget to come join in the fun at the Dies R Us Challenge Blog. There’s a new challenge theme offered on the 1st and 15th of each month and one lucky randomly drawn winner will receive a gift voucher prize to the Dies R Us Store.  

 For your convenience, all the important Dies R Us links are provided below.

click below for:

STORE

CHALLENGE BLOG

FACEBOOK

INSPIRATION BLOG

FRIENDS OF DIES R US PINTEREST PAGE