High flying Warren the Wabbit

Today is the 6th Birthday of a little neighbour of ours and up until children are eight or so ( sometimes beyond that) I do like to incorporate their name onto their Birthday cards. With this card I started out with the idea for how to do the name as a banner and then rummaged round to find stuff to suit. This was the result:

I used:

- 6" x 6" square white card blank

- SU 'Real Red' card stock topped with a sheet of 'clouds' paper from a paper stack called 'Let's Fly Away', free with Quick Cards Made Easy magazine in 2012

- the bunny in the basket started out as a Craftwork Cards round topper featuring Warren the Rabbit, ready to colour as you choose. I chose badly, the turquoise I used on part of the balloon was a horrible clash with the cloudy background paper and for a minute or two I thought all was lost. By then I'd already fussy cut round the image anyhow, it took quite a while to get round the ropes holding the basket and would have been such a waste of time and effort! But, I already had a snippet of dotty patterned paper (from the My Mind's Eye 'Quilting Bee' paper pad) ready for the banner and realised it could save the day. All I did was to die cut a circle (using the Tonic circular die set I recently raved about) just slightly larger than the balloon, gently snip around part of Warren's ear, then glue the dotty circle over balloon wreck leaving Warren's ear to overlap the front :)

- used a Memory Box 'Classic Numbers' die to die cut the number 6 and a round die for the red circle to stick it onto then adhered the balloon onto the card with thin sticky pads

- the trailing banner 'tail' was fun to make - first punched banners from the dotty paper using SU's 'Banner' punch. Then stamped the letters onto white card using stamps from a See-D's (NBUS, shame on me) alphabet set and SU 'Real Red' ink pad, punched them out using the super useful SU Itty Bitty round punch and stuck them onto the banners. I'd already  tied a length of yellow and white bakers twine to the balloon so all that was needed was to add thin sticky pads to the back of each banner and place them evenly along the twine

- the sentiment was stamped onto a snippet of white card, using SU's 'Real Red' and an Inca 'Dot Birthday' stamp which is especially good for kids cards. Then to cut the cloud shape using using MFT 'Cloud Trio' - the largest cloud in the set I used a useful trick to correctly position the cloud over the already stamped sentiment. All you do is to die cut yourself a template using the die you want to use and some spare card (paper is too thin for the next step I reckon). Place the cloud shaped aperture which is left in the spare piece of card you just die cut over the sentiment exactly where you want it to sit and stick in place using removable tape at the edge, not at the aperture though, Then, take the die, sit it face down and gently wiggle it into the die cut shape - that's why I reckon you need to use card and not paper for your template as it's easier to feel the die sort of drop into place. Tape the die to the card to stop it from moving, again use removable tape. Run the die and both layers of card through the die cutting machine and hey presto, one perfectly positioned die cut sentiment - if all of the above drivel made any sense to you of course :) 

The Memory Box number dies are new goodies, the lovely Sarn has been kindly keeping me stocked up with Olivia numbers (and letters) but I thought it was time I coughed up and bought my own number dies for a start. I don't like the Britannia Letter dies I already have (waaaay too fussy for my taste) so might even order the Memory Box letters next :) Or put them on my 'Santa, I've been a good girl' letter - tee, hee.

Di
x