Designer Fabric "Yo-yo"/Ruched Circle Tutorial

S T E P S

Use a 1-3/4" Circle Punch to make a cardstock template if you want to create the same size Yo-yo in this tutorial. Place the circle on the back side (unprinted side) of some Candy Cane Christmas designer fabric and trace around it. Cut out the fabric circle.

Tip: You can also use your Big Shot and Circles #2 Bigz Die to easily die-cut circles from fabric.


Thread a needle and tie a knot on the edge of the fabric circle. Run the needle in and out of the edges. This is called a "running stitch" or "straight stitch."


Continue stitching all the way around the fabric circle. Pull on the thread to gather the fabric edges.


Tie a knot on the back to secure.


Use one tip of your paper snips to gently poke a hole through the center of the Yo-yo/Ruched Circle. Be careful not to cut the thread holding the fabric together. Insert a glimmer brad or other type of brad.


You can use Yo-yos/Ruched Circles to decorate a card, cloth napkins, blouses, sweaters, towels, hairclips or anything else you can think of! I am planning to use these to accent some Holiday Mini Catalog card swaps.

Greenhouse Gala Side-bound Booklet

The following post is a tutorial for a side-bound booklet that I designed. It was for a Late Night Stampers shoebox swap held one evening during Convention 2010. There were many great ideas from the participants and I wish I had a little more time to walk around and absorb it all. As the saying goes: Time flies when you're having fun.

S T E P S

First, cover the two pieces of chipboard with chocolate chip cardstock using glue stick.


Second, you will make the spine of the book. Take the longest piece of Greenhouse Gala DSP, remove the sticky page lining, vertically center and place one chipboard piece on the right (see pen marking to the right on DSP)... place the other chipboard piece on the left (see pen marking to left).

Wrap the extended edges around.

Next, place the shorter piece of DSP to cover the rest of the spine. (You should now see, from left to right: cover, dsp, cover.)

Fold this in half so the corners of the front and back cover meet.


Third, line up the cover template to the folded side. Punch 2 holes using a Crop-a-dile. Set aside.



Fourth, you will create reinforced pages. Start with one peach parfait strip. Use glue stick on one entire side.

Line up an old olive page to the first score line.

Fold the peach parfait piece in half (according to the middle score line).

Repeat these steps for all the pages. Hint: It helps to line up the peach parfait and old olive pages on top of each other.


Fifth, once the reinforced interior pages are complete, you will line them up with the interior page template and punch holes.



Sixth, place the interior pages within the covers you set aside earlier. Pull ribbon through the holes--a few pages at a time. Tie a knot and snip off any extra ribbon.



Seventh, Adhere the whisper white top note die cut in the center of your front cover. Adhere the butterflies on top of the top note layer.


This is what the finished booklet looks like on the inside:


This can be used as a mini scrapbook, poem book, travel journal, or perhaps some other keepsake. Hope you enjoyed this tutorial!

Prepping for Convention 2010

Here are some parts of swaps that I stamped and cut over the past several weeks. I'm still working on the Melon Mambo Eiffel Towers (top right corner of the photo).


These are more pieces that have been stamped and cut/punched. The decorative white labels in the center had to be die-cut one at a time with the Stampin' Up! Lots of Tags Sizzlits die.


This is probably 10% of the cardstock (cut, scored and folded in some cases) that will be used on my swaps for Convention.


I picked up some small swatches of fabric last night and decided to try making flowers with the Stampin' Up! Blossom Party Originals Die. It was really fun and easy. The fabric was not too thick, so I was able to cut up to 6 at a time. I think I will make flower pins and die cut more layers with coordinating colors of SU cardstock.


Clean up was easy too. I just took a couple pieces of tape (about 3" long) and picked up all the bits of fabric that were clinging to the die.

Friends Never Fade Boxed Set

Here is a Scallop Envelope and Mini Note Card Box set that I designed for a Stamp Camp Flyer Swap (Convention 2010). Click here to download the tutorial in Word format.

A Little Bit of Magic Card

I love fairies and whimsical images such as these. I knew I liked this stamp set as soon as I saw it in the Summer Mini Catalog. They were fun to color and I also tried out some Smooch Spritz (as you can see in the background). The wings on both fairies have dazzling diamonds glitter. I colored the images with Watercolor Wonder crayons, used Old Olive grosgrain and added a Playground Designer Button (More Mustard).