Festive Faux Library Card Book

This cute book was one of our 2007 MHAG projects and is also a sampler of all the papers, cardstocks and ribbons in The Angel Company's Amelia collection. Perfect for the holidays and all year long, you’ll fall in love with Amelia!
I love to make mini books! They are great mementos and decorations too. Here are the details so you can make one for your mantel too!

Supplies
5 3”x8” Amelia Paper (V-838)
10 3”x1 Amelia Cardstock (B-317)
3 2”x3.5” Amelia Cardstock
1 Lg. Tag, 2 Med. Tags & 2 Sm. Tags from Amelia
5 4” pieces of Amelia Ribbon (B-217)
Be (T-2265)
Palette Burnt Umber (TT-218)
Corner rounder
Hole punch

Instructions

1. Score 3”x8” pieces at 4 7/8”. Fold in half with pattern out. Adhere a 1”x3” piece to the “top” edge of each folded piece where the white will be showing.
2. Round the top corners of each piece (where the 1x3 cs was adhered).
3. Score 4 of the 5 remaining 1x3 pieces in the middle (at ½”) and fold in half. (Use the fifth as an embellishment later.)
4. Lay out the “pages” of the book so that they will alternate facing up and down. Lay out the scored 1x3 pieces so that they will alternate between valley folds and mountain folds. If you want to make sure a certain pattern appears at the front of the book, figure that out now.
5. Begin assembly by applying adhesive to the inside edges of one page and sandwiching one hinge in one side. Move on to the next page, applying glue to the inside edges and adding hinges alternately with the mountain or valley fold facing up to make an accordion.
6. Use the three 2x3.5 cards to make tags to slip in pockets. Round corners, add tabs and ribbons and embellish as desired.
7. Stamp tags and pages with desired sayings.

Semi-Homemade Giftwrapping

If you like to make handmade cards like me, maybe you can relate to something that happened to me a couple of years back:

I was inundated by birthdays and had extinguished my supply of little girl cards. As I wrapped a gift for my friends' daughter, I thought, "She's so young, she won't notice if just this once I use a store-bought card." Well, she didn't, but as her mom helped her unwrap her gift, she exclaimed, "Julie? A store-bought card?!" Just then, her husband, who had been capturing the birthday fun on his camcorder turned the lens toward me and zoomed in, "What? No handmade card?!" Well, as you can imagine I was not only embarrassed but stunned by the realization that my moment of shame would be forever immortalized among their home movies.

Well, I think I have found a happy medium. My friend Yuki Zepeda likened this idea to Sandra Lee's cooking show.* I make semi-homemade cards and wrappings with things I have bought at the store. They still have a special touch, but they are super quick to make. In the slideshow you can see how I added stamping to plain (but oh-so-versatile) wrapping paper for a gift that is quick and classy. Real satin ribbon gives it a little extra style. My other favorites were the notecards I found at Target for $.74 for a package of 10 with the U monogram. I use all of my stamps that have the word 'You' and just cut that off to use with the cards. I also did some cute holiday cards where I just covered the U with a small image. Add a little Stickles or a little ribbon and voila! You'll be ready for all those birthdays that seem to all fall on the same weekend.
PS- Do you know why the second week of November has so many birthdays? It's nine months after Valentine's Day!

(*You know the one. The voluptuous blonde lady that turns husbands who like watching football and hunting shows into sudden cooking show fans.)

Peek-a-Boo Coluzzle Card Idea

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to rush winter, but our new Ornamental Snowflakes seemed perfect for this peek-a-boo card. It looks complicated, but it's actually easy and fun to make. I started by making a semi-circle notch with a punch (quicker) and sanding my Matchmaker cardstock. Using this semi circle as a guide, I marked the place on my card and made this peek-a-boo window with my Coluzzle. The trick is to make a half circle on one side and then the next smaller circle opposite it. With a little nudge, the circle will hinge in the middle, making this cute window.
I used a punch for the white circle too (since I was making 20 for a swap) but all of the circle sizes could easily be made with your Coluzzle.
Give this idea a try and post what you come up with! Email me if you have any questions . . .


Edited: I was contacted by Jean in the UK (Hi Jean!), who was wondering if there were some other tools she could use. Here is my reply:
You could achieve the same look with the Creative Memories cutting system too, but it sounds like you usually improvise with things around the house to save money.


I'm a big believer in using what you have on hand! Other items you could try to get some different circle shapes would be lids to jars and jugs or bottles. You can trace the circles and cut them out with a craft knife. You might even keep your collection and number them in size so you have your own circle cutting system!

A good tip for the peek-a-boo card is to use a ruler or straight edge to make sure your circles begin and end at the correct place. That's very important for getting the circle to "swivel". Hopefully you can figure the rest out with the photo, but if not, send me another message. I'm happy to help!