Tiny adventurer's log and surprise Anna-Karin's baby shower

Hello everyone. Today we have a surprise blog hop for you and for our very special Inspiration Team member Anna-Karin Evaldson ^.^

Last year there were a lot of changes in Anna-Karin's life, including a move from one continent to another and just a few months later, a new baby! Leo arrived weeks ahead of schedule (and just 20 minutes after reaching the hospital!) but thankfully he and Anna-Karin are both doing well. 

We want to show Anna-Karin how special she is to us, so we are giving her a virtual baby shower today to celebrate Leo's birth! Even though we can't be with her, we send our love and a special crafty surprise.
We invite you to visit each team member/shower guest's blog to see what they created for this new little guy. 

If you have a message for Anna-Karin, please visit Eileen's blog to leave your well wishes in the comments- then she can read them all at once. Thanks for being part of our celebration! 

And now drum roll please...^.^ my special crafty surprise 

 I call it Tiny Adventurer's Log and it is an exploding box which works as a journal and mini album. The project was made with Vintage Kitchen Recipe box die, it holds few tags and have some room in it's pockets for more memorabilia. I hope Anna-Karin will enjoy it and fill it with precious little memories and adventures of Leo ^.^

Thank you for stopping by and don't forget to visit my teammates for more wonderful surprise project and Eileen's blog to leave your well wishes

Anne Redfern
Dianna Hetherington
Donna Budzynski
Lisa Hoel
Nicole Wright
Pam Bray
Shelly Hickox
Tracy Evans

mini album for the Memories Trend (part 1)

Hello everyone. 

I was in the mood for some recycling these days so I searched through my paper stash and guess what I found...mini paper bags and few craft envelopes..."Mini album!" I though...if only I knew... it took me quite some days (a loooot) to finish, tons of photos of the project and for the tutorial, my crafting space became a total mess, but after all it was totally worth it. 

The album measures 20x13cm , I used total of 7 paper bags and 2 craft envelopes, I call it mini album (not sure if it qualifies though), but the project itself (the amount of a work done, photos and tutorial) is rather huge, that's why I'll break my post in to 2 parts. Today I will show you how I did the binding

and some photos of the project and tomorrow I'll share with you more details on some of the particular pages binding and the cover. 

unfortunately I didn't have enough time to choose some photographs for the album, so I left a white space instead

that were few of the pages and now lets move on with how to ^.^

for starters we need to score and fold the paper bags, try not to score too hard, usually this paper tears quite easily (as for dimensions of a flap start from 2cm at least )

 

after that you need to adhere the bag sides

 to make pages sturdier I have inserted a thick card stock inside of each bag and adhered it to the back

  you might have noticed that the first page was a bit smaller and also had an extra top pocket for a photo mat, to achieve that I made a cut on one of the smaller bag sides instead of  gluing it.

when adding a thicker card stock I glued it partially.

before binding the pages together I added the main layer of the patterned paper. 
when binding you only add adhesive to the outer sides of the flap you created .

 the final result

p.s. thank you for stopping by, stop by tomorrow for part 2 ^.^

 

all the supplies used you can find at Memories Trend : 

   

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Going Green with Eileen Hull and the Art With Heart Inspiration Team

Hello everyone  ^.^  This month we are going green at Art with Heart and inviting you to join us with your "green" project for a chance to win charming Mini Shopping Bag die from Eileen Hull collection From the Heart . As a member of on Inspiration Team today I would like to

share with you my "green" project.

My goal was to recycle as much as possible and to achieve a natural look. That is why my main materials were corrugated cardboard (cut from a packaging box), natural hemp cord,few cinnamon sticks and some patterned paper leftovers.
 

I started by cutting the cardboard with Eileen Hull's recipe card box die.

Then I cut a heart-shaped opening (the paper was adhered from the inside with help of 3D self adhesive foam for more dimension) and started adding layers of paint and stamping

The leaves were cut from patterned paper and then some clear distress crackle and vintage photo distress paint were applied  (when the crackle was dry of course ^.^ )

Thank you for stopping by ^.^ and don't forget to share with us your art with heart ♡

 

supplies: