TupeloDesignsLLC Guest Designer

Hello there!  I'm so excited to announce that I've been asked to Guest Design in September and October for TupeloDesignsLLC!  If you haven't heard of them before they're an awesome online store that carries lots of popular brands and hundreds of crafting supplies.  They offer speedy, FREE SHIPPING (items ship the same or next day) with no minimum purchase in the US, and discounted shipping for International orders.  Yep, you read that correctly, NO minimum purchase required for free shipping!  I can't tell you how many times I've needed just one item in a hurry and I ended up paying as much for the shipping as I paid for the one item!  I love that I don't have to worry about that now!  They also have a customer Loyalty Rewards Program where you earn points just for signing up and points every time you shop, and those points can be redeemed for free products.  Seriously folks, I'm so happy to have discovered this store!  I'm all about saving money and fabulous customer service, and TupeloDesignsLLC has both!

Now on to my project for today.  I've been eyeing these gorgeous LACY FLOWERS dies by Waffle Flower Crafts for some time now and I'm beyond thrilled to finally be able to create with them!  I love the intricate, delicate design of these dies.

I started my card with a base of TIM HOLTZ DISTRESS WOODGRAIN PAPER.  I love the fine, woodgrain detail in this beautiful paper, and it comes in pre-cut 4.25 X 5.5 sheets which makes it super easy to use!  To make the flowers for my card I first cut several of the LACY FLOWERS dies from cardstock, using a metal adapter plate to ensure clean cuts.  The flowers are gorgeous as is, but in this case I wanted them to have another color as a base.  There are coordinating, solid dies that are sold for these but I don't own them, so to make the solid backgrounds I used a product called Press 'n Seal (it's sort of like a sticky back plastic wrap).  You should be able to find this in any grocery store, and it comes in handy for a lot of crafting uses.  I applied a piece of the Press 'n Seal (cut roughly to the size of the die I wanted to cut) to the back of my cardstock, sticky side of the Press 'n Seal facing the cardstock.  I placed the die on the cardstock (opposite side of where the Press 'n Seal is applied), and ran it through my die cutting machine, this time NOT using the metal adapter plate.  You want all those little bits and pieces that you would normally pop out to stay intact.  Here are a couple of photos that I hope help to show you what I'm talking about.

The picture on the right shows the back of the die cut flower, with the Press n' Seal holding things together.  The picture on the left shows the front of the flower with all those little bits and pieces nicely sticking to the Press 'n Seal.  A little tip that helps to keep everything intact, after you've run the flower through your die cut machine, leave the die in place and pop the die AND the paper out together, then proceed to very gently poke through the little holes in the die to separate the die and paper.  By popping out the die and the paper together you won't be left with any little straggly bits of Press 'n Seal around the edges of the flower.

After I cut the solid backers for my lacy flowers, I used spray adhesive applied to the backs of the lacy flowers.  With these intricate dies I personally find that spray adhesive is the way to go. I have a cardboard box that I keep handy in my craft room and I place my paper in there and spray the adhesive.  I use a tweezers to pick up the sprayed piece and place it on my project.  The leaves that I used on my card were cut using LEAFY GREENERY DIE-NAMICS from My Favorite Things.  This is a wonderful die set because there are so many different shapes and sizes of leaves in it.  I artfully arranged all of the leaves and flowers on my card, popping some of them up with foam adhesive tape.  The sentiment is from SPRING HELLO BY LIA from Hero Arts.  I just love the font on this word!  I stamped it on some thin white cardstock (thin because I find thin cardstock easier to fussy cut than thick cardstock), and fussy cut.  My card is finished with a few black sequins to embellish it.

I love the way this card turned out and I can't wait to play with the LACY FLOWERS dies again!

I'll be back next Sunday with another card for TupeloDesignsLLC, hope to see you then!

Some of the products I used today were provided by TupeloDesignsLLC, however all opinions expressed are my own.