winnie & walter :: february leading lady, part 1 :: from the card to a gift

I have the honor of being Winnie & Walter's Leading Lady this month--which actually means I have a standing date every Saturday in February to guest star on their blog!  I'll have 4 fun posts using W&W products and I'm even hosting a giveaway one of those days.  You'll have to tune each week to find out more about that, though ;)  

I started out in the papercrafting industry making cards and while I still make them, I've become obsessed with wrapping gifts and packaging.  So when I was trying to decide what to do for my first Leading Lady project, I thought I'd take a W&W cutaway item and show you how to take it from a card to a gift.

I'll start with the card...The stamp and cutaway set I focused on was Sketchy Thoughts.  The reason I chose it was because the large word bubble cutaways were the perfect size for a tag on a smallish package.  Plus, I knew I'd have no trouble using them on a card.  (I'm loving everything about this stamp set from the Jan/Feb Release!)

By papercraft nature, I'm a layerer and clusterer.  I'll admit that I prefer to make a big fat card with lots of girth and texture!  So my projects might be a bit untraditional in the stamping sense, but I hope you'll get a few ideas from things I show you.  True to form, I used a few cutaways to trim some shapes like tags and tabs from glitter and patterned scrapbook paper.  Then I made sure to cut out my Sketchy Thoughts bubble (the more circular one in this case).  I adhered two tabs from the Essentials: Katharine Cutaways set, then glued down some pale pink tulle in a ruffled manner--for depth--before adhering the glitter tag on top of it.

After that, I embellished the tag with a black sticker, small tag cut from the new Essentials: Lana Cutaways in the same Maggie Holmes dotted yellow paper, a wooden heart, and a purple fringe bow.  For the card sentiment, I chose 'lots of love' from Sending You with Evelin T. Designs with a close crop and a glitter tape matte.  Then I cut out the Sketchy Thoughts bubble from a sheet of Hazelwood patterned paper (1Canoe2).  I love that shade of pale pink and wanted the single bunch of flowers to be partly visible behind the sentiment.  Adding a few foam adhesive dots to prop it up and add dimension, I stuck it onto my card as the finishing touch.

To complement the card, I wrapped up a small personalized ring dish for a friend. Small packages like this one are so fun and easy to wrap.  Truth be told, I hate pulling out huge rolls of gift wrap so whenever possible, I love to use scrapbook paper or my own stamped wrap on simple copy paper instead.

In this case, I wrapped the box with more of the pink floral Hazelwood paper and used the yellow Maggie Holmes paper for my word bubble tag.  I wanted to keep the packaging somewhat consistent with the card (but not exactly the same) so after dressing up the package with some leafy black fabric and lace, I tied on the smaller Essentials: Katharine Cutaways tag (in gold glitter) and a purple embroidery floss tassel (instead of a bow).  I also swapped out the tulle with a strip of lace.

When it came to the word bubble, I used the square-ish one and a sentiment from the Sketchy Thoughts stamp set because I wanted something a bit bigger than I had used on the card.  Instead of glitter tape as a matte, I used lace.  I tied it to the fabric with a length of metallic thread because the thread gives it kind of a wispy, delicate feel.

This little box is ready to send off to my friend.  It's a 'just because' gift and I like the idea of the little sketch bubble used as a tag.  It's almost as if I'm actually saying "Hello!" from far away!  I have 4 of these little dishes to send to friends across the country and because I made the tags myself from the stamps and cutaways, I can easily replicate all the packaging.  The same goes for the matching card.

I have to mention the cute little ring dishes...they're handmade from Az and Airalee and they are just too sweet--and make the best photo props!  Check out their website if you have a chance.  And, of course, head over to Winnie & Walter and pick yourself up a few stamp and die sets (I'm completely in love with Sketchy Thoughts)!  I can't wait to share a few more W&W projects in the coming weeks!