CTC#175 My Bigshot makes it all so Easy

Welcome back to another week of CASEing the Catty.  April is rushing by but I have found/ made some time to be creative this week for this blog and a class.

The bigshot is an essential tool in my craft room - and I love it. Stampin' Up! has so many great thinlits and embossing folders to use with it that it's sometimes hard to choose where to invest your money. So I try and purchase items which are able to be used in a number of different ways, and which will be good for gift giving, market stalls and personal use. 

The Lots to Love box Framelits set is one of those sets which ticks those boxes for me. I have created a few different items this week to showcase it's versatility. And I have to thank all those generous crafters who share their ideas and projects online.  I am a long time fan of Dawn Olchefski and her great videos (because I am unlikely to create any videos any time soon). You can get the links and some of the techniques for these projects from her videos here.

For Class this week we created 2 cards for Mother's Day, and then this little box and a few notecards to go inside.

I love to show a few options for ways to personalise the projects for my class ladies so they had a choice of belly band/ ribbon/ decoration of the box.

These boxes are the perfect size for a coffee bag and a Cadbury breakaway biscuit- so handy that they are individually wrapped in foil.

Each box is created from one piece of A4 cardstock. 

• with the cardstock oriented to Portrait cut 2 panels horizontally at 11.5 cm, the remaining strip is the perfect width to decorate the box front. Simply cut to  12 cm length and run this piece through an embossing folder. 
• Adhere to the front of the box
• construct the box using a strong glue
• Wrap the finished box with a Belly band of coordinating DSP being careful to fold and crease the strip (5cm x 25cm) at the right intervals to go around the box. Tape it to itself so it stays closed 
• tie some matching satin ribbon around the band
• add a tag 

My next project is a gift card holder. And while I used Dawn's basic layout I tweaked the design to be more me!

 The front closure is some layered circled held in place with a brad ( very old but very perfect for this!). I used the Ripple Embossing folder to add texture to the entire front panel, and I kept the flap on the front piece but glued it to the inside to secure the Whisper White message panel.

My final project used 4 panels of the box die piece, decorated with DSP as per Dawns' instructions. This is quite a good masculine project depending on the Paper you use. I think the stripes are quite striking. However, I couldn't resist adding one of the Floral elements from the Embellishment kit which just made it super fast.

All the ladies at class loved using the Box Framelits, they are one of the fastest boxes you'll ever make. I'm sad they are retiring.  

We'd love to see what you create using the same inspiration this week. Share your projects with us on our Facebook page.

The clever Megan is next on the hop this week.

Fi is before me this week

Thanks for looking today. Don't forget this set is retiring so be sure and order yours before they are unavailable. You can just click on the Rainbow Shop Now button on the right panel of this page to make it easy for you.

I hope you have a creative week and remember, 

"don't just post online,

 post something pretty!"

cheers, Liz