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 Times have been tough in this economy, (as we all know so well) so this year I decided that I would spend my time creating a lot more homemade gifts. (I was always a big proponent of this anyway - much preferring a handmade gift to something store bought) This cute little set was inspired by my friends at Papertrey Ink. What a talented group of gals they have on their design team - they have quickly become my favorite! Nicole Heady, co-owner of Papertrey, has an absolutley AMAZING blog - which I highly highly recommend that you read religiously on a daily basis - Hurry! GO. NOW. She is just so inspirational, and has all sorts of wonderful goodness on her site. A while back, I stumbled upon her blog and saw these fabulous ideas for a line of stamps called "Simply Stationary". It was love at first sight!
For this particular stationary set, I wanted to use a desgin and color scheme that was both elegant and functional. The set includes 8 blank monogrammed cards with matching envelopes that are stored in a cute little card holder. The card holder opens up to reveal the cards on one side, and the bundled envelopes on the other. I also included a cute little coordinating sentiment portfolio, which holds return address labels, monogrammed seals, and stamps. I had so much fun creating this set, and the card holder and portfolio really brought it all together so nicely - you know what they say - it's all about the presentation!!! :)
 Of course, the lovely presentation part of this project could not have been accomplished without the help of the awesome templates I downloaded from Papertrey. The template I used as the card and envelope holder was the "All Boxed Up" template from the very talented Lauren Meader, who created just a ton of templates for Papertrey Ink. All of her templates are just so awesome - easy to use and well worth the $5. These templates can be printed on 8.5 x11" paper and are in pdf form, so they are easy and can be used over and over again for so many different projects. The sentiment portfolio was part of another fab project using Papertrey's Mega Mixed Messages stamps. You can download the sentiment portfolio template for free here.
The damask paper used for the cards was from one of my all time favorite digital collections from Andrea Victoria at Designer Digitals. It is from her Pina collection. OMG - I have so much digital paper but I HEART Andrea Victoria's designs. Elegant and classic - LOVE. love, love her!!! I also had so much fun using my Spellbinder's Wizard with my scallop and circle Nestabilities! I bought my Wizard last year and have been really wanting to use it on a project so I could practice. I embossed my paper on the cover of the card set using the Cuttlebug Divine Swirls Embossing plate. I just love the fact that the Wizard is so universal - you can use dies and embossing folders from just about anyone. I even was able to emboss some of the clear acetate packaging from my Papertrey stamps to create some really cool ghost embellishments. So very happy with my Wizard!!! All in all, such a cute project - it turned out to be such a great gift idea that I made six different sets for my family and friends as Christmas presents! To view more images of this project, please go to my Design Gallery! |
