'Santa suit' Christmas money holders

About a week ago, I set to and made three money/cheque holders. The size is perfect for euros as I carefully measured up -  but Len had me 'switch horses mid-gallop' so they will now be going to different recipients. Back to the drawing board for the girls and their Mum in Germany - he wanted 'pretty'! Anyhow - this is what I initially made and they will head off to Ipswich:

The money holder, closed

The money holder, opened up with pouch for money on the right hand side

The snippets I started out with. The silver looks gold, but it truly isn't, it's an adjustable 'warmer light' setting on my 'over the desk' lamp. And - I didn't use the very big red snippets in the end - opting for full A4 sheets of card - slap my wrists!

I used - for each holder - which just looks like a normal card until you open it:

- a sheet of Tonic UK A4 sized 'Red Velvet' pearlescent card - scored at 4.25 " and 8.5" from the long edge downwards - with 3.25" remaining

- then folded the holder along the scorelines into three, creasing well with a Teflon bone folder. The narrower width of 3.25" was to make the 'holder' part

- sliced the whole triple folded holder across the width, using a guillotine and cutting it down to 6.25" high

- to create the 'flap' for the money pouch I cut across the 3.25" narrow portion at 2" from the bottom, then down from the top crease line to meet the point where the first cut met the crease (easier to see what I mean by looking at the 2nd photo above), I used a guillotine (for one card) and long sharp scissors for the other two. Neither are easy to be honest but my slight preference is for using the scissors

- rounded the corner of the newly created 'flap' using a large X-cut corner punch

- before going any further I trimmed a snippet of white paper and glued it on the inside of the money holder, ready to write a message to the recipient - bit of forward thinking, for once, there!

- then used very narrow red line tape (one eighth of an inch wide) to securely adhere the bottom edge of the flap to the main body of the money holder - forming a little pouch

- topped the 'pouch' section with a sentiment, die cut using Tonic Studios 'Mini Moments - Merry Christmas' and a snippet of silver mirri card - if I lose it tomorrow - that sweet little die owes me absolutely nothing

- decorating the front of the card was truly the fun part, I used white, black and silver snippets for all of it - as well as a die set made by Joy! called 'Vintage Jeans - Buckle and Belt'

- it's really self-explanatory, but for my own records, the white 'fur' was 1" wide, cut from a snippet of plain white card, the plain black belt portion die for the 'no punch holes' side was far too short so I just cut a .75" wide longer strip of black, again from a snippet

- assembling the belt and buckle was slightly fiddly but still pretty easy - and I stuck the bottom edge of the assembled belt in place at about 1.25" from the bottom of the holder - using red line tape - then carefully pulled off the top layer of tape from behind the belt piece using very lethal and pointed tweezers

- the die set even included a little 'retaining excess belt length', or whatever you call it, die in the set so I cut one and stuck it in place

- the buttons come in four different designs but only used two of the designs as I liked the double button holes and also alternated them - again using red line tape to adhere them - finished!

I have to say that the attention to detail in the design of the Joy! die cutting sets is quite hard to beat.

But, let's talk about about the set of dies I used for this folder/card. There's more detail to the dies - which am sure means running the buttons as well as the belt through the die cutting machine, to emboss them but I wasn't too fussed about going to those lengths. In fact, I only bought the set of dies as they were in a 'super reduced sale' a while ago. You can easily achieve very similar results using a plain black strip of card for the belt, small square, oval round quite tightly nested dies for the buckle (look at your punches - they might do the trick!) - then possibly real buttons or small punched circles for the buttons. Pokey tool for the button holes or a white marker - and away you go!

This is my snippets card to kick off challenge #442 over in the Snippets Playground. Go HERE  to join in the fun!

I'd like to enter this money holder into the following challenges:

Rudolph Days November 2022 Challenge

Darnell's NBUS Challenge #44 as I used the Joy! NBUS set of dies

Dudley Pupdate: We've had work being done here for over a week now and sweet Dudley, during the day time, has been at his absolute wit's end with all the different sounds, deliveries, comings and goings etc. Being on duty has meant no time for his daytime naps, so he's out for the count at bed time! Mind you, so are we.