Friday 26 November 2010

Get your birthday pants on!


Today is a friend from work’s Big Birthday so I hope she is wearing her birthday pants!

Birthday pants? Well, apparently in her family, it’s a tradition to have new pants for your birthday and she was telling us all about this when it was her son’s birthday a few weeks ago. It’s a tradition which she sees as perfectly normal (as we all do with our quirky family habits) but that everyone else in the office thought was downright weird, so we decided to surprise her at work yesterday with a special gift of some Really Big Pants, lovingly made by the office seamstress in vile brown and yellow checked fabric.

I also surprised her with a cheeky pink and red number featuring pom poms (her reaction is unprintable) and made her this card.

You open it up to reveal a line of colourful pants, all punched from the Greenhouse Gala Designer Series Paper using various circle punches. The striped pair was a little pale, so I brayered some Daffodil Delight ink over the top. The washing line was hand-drawn with a marker – scary, eh?

Here’s how to get the hole on the front of the card in the correct place.

  1. Decorate the inside of the card first. Yes, it feels weird to do it in that order but it works.
  2. Punch a circle from some scrap paper and apply a small amount of any adhesive to it.
  3. With adhesive side up, place it over the part of the image you want to show through to the front.
  4. Close the card. The circle will stick to the inside of the front of the card.
  5. Now you can use this circle as a guide to punch a hole in the front of the card. 
NB: Punches do not like going through more than one layer of card at once. They don’t mind one sheet of Designer Paper and a sheet of card, but not two sheets of card. So punch each layer separately.

Here’s how to get the scallop edging around the aperture:

  1. Punch 1 3/8” circle from a piece of Baja Breeze cardstock, leaving more space than usual around the edge.
  2. With the Scallop Circle Punch upside down, carefully position it over the hole so that it is nicely even, then punch again. Now you have a scallop circle with a hole in the middle which you can glue to the front of your card.
Stamps: Just Perfect Alphabet
Cardstock: Daffodil Delight, Pear Pizzazz, Baja Breeze, Whisper White
Paper: Greenhouse Gala
Ink: Baja Breeze, Daffodil Delight
Accessories: 1 3/8” circle punch, Scallop Circle Punch, Scallop Edge Punch, ¾” circle punch, 1 ¾” circle punch, Stampin’ Write Journalling Pen

All products by Stampin’ Up!®           
  
PS: A note for American readers who are not familiar with the British use of the word “pants”. Pants are what you call underwear, which you will no doubt have worked out by now from the picture. The word “pants” is also used as a general derogatory term. 

8 comments:

  1. Love the card and the gift! So funny and so clever, making panties out of punches :)

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  2. ROFL!! I love this!! I used to live near High Wycombe, Buckingshamshire and am very familiar with pants, rofl! But your card is amazing! I love the intrique it holds and the colorful pants :) Fabulous! You should email us with your friends "unprintable" reaction, lolol! Splendid card :)

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  3. I hop over from SCS and it´s the first time on your blog. Your Card is really FUN !!!

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  4. LOL! What a great card. Off to punch some pants!

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  5. So cute!! Birthday pants??!! :)

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  6. I love this card Helen.
    Tracey

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  7. I love this card! Very clever.

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  8. I laughed so hard at you post! I bet she was pretty excited to get those new pants on her big day! :) Love this card and how you created that cute little clothesline! Very fun! :)

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Thank you so much for taking the time to comment.

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