Sunday, September 4, 2016

CARD# HPJ-2016-22: Chie

Hi! It is raining so hard outside and I'm afraid the power will be out soon. I'm here to finally share to you what I came up with for Chie's birthday. You might find it weird, but she actually asked for a card inside a coffin box. Apparently, she loves skulls and coffins and her favorite anime is Yamato Nadeshiko (The Wallflower). It's just sad that I did not get to make it the way she wanted it--with all the blood spilling on the lid of the coffin and a skull on the card. We tried looking for skulls and skeletons, but they are not yet being sold. Perhaps we will find them in stores in a few weeks since the Halloween is coming.

I made this a few weeks ago, but I just could not give it to her. It felt that it was still lacking something (aside from the skeleton). We had to give it to her. It's way past her birthday. Even if it did not feel complete, I handed it to her yesterday morning. She loved it. Even her teammates loved it. I'm glad she loves it! I wanted to make her happy. I think it succeeded because she was in such a good mood afterwards that she forgot about not being able to go with us for breakfast. She was feeling bad since their team building activity coincided with our small get together at John's house (a soup party with videoke!) She missed our gathering. Heh.

Anyway, here is what I came up with.








The only skull embellishment I have is a tiny metal charm from one of my divi trips a year or so ago. It's so small that it would be out of place if I placed it on the lid of the box. Then I thought of my brocade stencil. Why not stencil a part of it as a background for the skull. It would not make the charm that small anymore and it would also add dimension. And so that was what I did. I stenciled with molding paste and inked the surface after drying. It was still missing something though. I rummaged through my metal charm stash and found the little wings. I adhered them onto the bottom part of the stenciled image and there goes the lid.
I added some more metal charms on the bottom of the box.


At first, the box didn't close like this. I actually made the lid slightly bigger than the bottom to fit the box, but the inside of the lid keeps sticking. It was hard to remove. 

I thought of just making the lid same size as the bottom, but I'll be putting another set of illustration board on the inside of the box whose top part showing should fit the depth of the lid. I set out to work on it and it totally worked. Now it is easier to close and open the box. It still sticks at times because of the paint, but it is no longer that difficult to pry it open. 

After making the base using illustration board and Turbo Tacky Glue (I must say I love the glue! It's now one of my favorite adhesives for my projects. It maybe a little pricey, but it's such a great product. It's strong and it dries fast!), I covered the seams with tissuestock and Mod Podge. I painted the edges with black acrylic paint after it dried. 
I then cut the red board paper into the desired sizes and shapes, inked the edges and adhered them on the inside of the box. I did the same with the designer paper on the outside of the box.
I could not make the original card with the skull so I cut several cardstocks for the messages. Chie wanted red and black. I used black board paper with white pigment ink pen for the message and then white board paper with red gel pen for the message. I originally thought of embossing an image onto the cardstocks, but it failed miserably. I don't know what happened with my embossing ink pad, but it is no longer working as it should be. The ink dries so quickly before I can even put the embossing powder. Hmf. The first and last one that I made looked smudged, but I didn't want to waste the paper so I still included it in the box. I used the normal archival ink pad on the rest.

I put some chocolates in the box to go with the cards. I just love it because the wrapper of the chocolates is red. It fits the inside of the box perfectly! 

This is the very first time that I made something like this-making a box totally from scratch and building it into something dimensional. Our boss saw it when I brought it to work and asked me to make her a Mickey Mouse one. Gah. That's a challenge. It's not that I cannot make it possible, but it would definitely be more of a challenge since the box would be rounded. It is easier to assemble something with straight edges. She is already looking forward to it. What a pressure! I'll somehow make it happen. I'll make her a Mickey Mouse jar for the mean time until I am finished with the box. Heh.

That was that. I hope you liked this project. I'll keep you posted on that Mickey Mouse box. I hope you check my other projects. Thanks for stopping by today! Have a great weekend!


MATERIALS AND TOOLS USED: Illustration Board, Recollection 12"x12" paper pad Blackjack, Rives Board Paper Tradition Black and Red, Bevania Splendorgel Board Paper White, metal charms, chains, jump rings, The Crafter's Workshop Stencil Mini Brocade, Golden Molding Paste, ColorBox Cat's Eye Queue Pigment Ink Black, Kaisercraft Clear Stamps Botanical Odyssey, Ranger Archival Ink Jet Black, Reeves Acrylic Paint Mars Black, Aleene's Turbo Tacky Glue


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