Invites With Ellen Hutson Zipper Panel Die

You all know that I love clever things. I've been on the look out for some interesting dies for my Sizzix die cutting machine, and I found one that I think is just so much fun. It's the Zipper Panel Die from Ellen Hutson.

The die basically creates a card that's sealed on all 4 sides. To get into it, the recipient has to peel up a middle zipper panel to reveal the inside of the card, along with any goodies you may have stashed inside. You can see a cool demo in this video. (You also get a 3 bonus word dies!)

I think the die itself is designed to hide a gift card or cash inside, but I thought it would be fun to have a little surprise birthday invite inside instead. How fun for little kids to get to tear open a card!

Here's a quick rundown of how I created these invites.

First, I found the cheapest way to print the inside of the invitations was to get them as 4x6 photos locally. The inside 'window' of the die is 4.5 inches by 3.25 inches; so make sure to center the image in a rectangle of that size.

 Create two die cuts of the zipper panel, and cut just the center panel from one as shown in the video above. Then glue the partial panel to the back of the whole panel.

Now we can decorate our card front! Because I would eventually have to create 10-15 of these I wanted to keep it as simple as possible.  I used the 'celebrate' die that is included in the set and brightly colored pattern paper.

Since photo invite we printed is 6 inches tall, and our finished card will be 5.5 inches tall, we need to trim the photo. I used a extra diecut zipper panel window to center my photo invite to know where to cut. The great thing is that once you measure it once, you can use the same measurement for all your invites.  Then attach the photo to a 5.5x 4.25 peice of cardstock.

I used super strong Scrappy Tape to stick the front panel down. I love this stuff-- it's plenty strong enough to withstand pulling up on the zipper panel.

 And here it is all finished!

I have to admit, I opened this one within minutes of making it, and I was still excited to tear open the top. Almost there...

And the big reveal! I had to mark out our address :) .

 I think this is such a cute and clever card idea!It would be easy to make a few card fronts and backs in advance. Using the scrappy tape, you can have the adhesive already applied to the card front.  I can't wait to make a ton of these for all those last minute gift card giving occasions throughout the year!

WPlus9 Cupcake Wrapper Die Review

After having a couple birthday parties under my belt, I've decided that cupcakes (trendy or not) are the way to go kids birthday parties.

They are easy to transport, and avoid the mess and hassle of cutting up a cake during the party. And they are cute! Well, most of the time. At my son's Bob The Builder party last year the chocolate cupcakes made the yellow cupcake wrappers look muddy brown. This year for my daughters party I decided to try making cupcake wrappers as a way to avoid this problem.

Finding wrappers that I liked was a problem. I wanted some that weren't tall enough to touch the icing, and covered the discolored wrappers completely.

 I searched high and low for some cupcake wrapper die that met my requirements. I finally settled on these dies from W+9.

What I love about these:

• They are slightly shorter than store bought wrappers, so I can fit 4 to a sheet of inexpensive 8.5x11 cardstock. Other dies I looked at only fit 4 to a 12x 12 sheet. 
• They have tabs and slots for closures so they are easy to secure closed on the day off the party
• They have a pretty edge, but aren't overly feminine or masculine. (See how boyish the ones in the picture are!) 
• They cover the entire cupcake paper. So many wrappers that I looked at were lacy or see through-- which didn't help with my chocolate bleed through pattern. 
• And... they come with an optional accessory pack to decorate the wrappers with! 

Here's a quick rundown of how to put them together:

Since a standard sheet of paper won't fit through your diecutting machine, you'll have to cut your paper in half hamburger style. Be sure to place your die as vertically as possible since it's a tight fit to get two wrappers in each half.

 These would be so gorgeous done on pretty scrapbook paper. Since I was making so many (and I was on a budget) I ended up using plain paper, and then stamping it with a floral design. I looked through my stash for any floral stamps, and arranged them using a wrapper as a guide. I then used one of my large quilting rulers to pick up all the stamps at once.

 This way I was able to stamp each liner just once, and finish two dozen in just minutes. Score!

 The notches do an awesome job of holding the wrappers together, so you can store them flat until the time of your party.

 The accessory pack for the the wrappers is adorable too. The is a die for a bow and tails. It doesn't look like much once it's cut out...

 But it's so adorable once it's folded. I love that I was able to make the bow with just one glue dot-- super simple if you have to do a bunch.

 You can also play around with the tails to create different styles. There is also die for the paper ribbon that goes around the wrapper as shown on the blue cupcake wrappers from above.

 They just made my little cupcake display. Not a single one fell apart-- and they were so easy for little hands to hold!

 Looking at this picture from above you can kind of see how much darker the chocolate wrappers are in comparison to the vanilla, but the cupcake wrappers made everything look nice and consistent. They were super quick and easy to make, (and fun too). Next, I want to try stamping a personal sentiment on the wrappers when I make small batches as a gift! How cute would it be to deliver a cupcake that says "Happy Birthday" or "Thank You" on the wrapper? That's my kind of gift :)

I want to send a a huge thank you to W plus 9 for sending me the dies to use for this review. I was not compensated in anyway, and all opinions are my own.

DIY Reusable Gift Sacks

More Christmas projects??? -- why yes! There are just 7 days left and I'm going to maximize my crafting time :).

If you've been following my posts lately, you've seen that my crafting room has gotten an new addition-- a die cutting machine! I lovity-love my Fabi. The Fabi is a fabric die cutting version of the Sizzix Big Shot or Big Kick; but packaged with quilters in mind. See the cute cathedral window print? That means it's for us!

What's a die cutting machine?  Well the machine is basically a great big squeezer. It squishes the fabric and the dies together with enough force that the blades in the die cut through the fabric. Each shape you cut requires a different die. Sizzix a has a huge selection of dies that cut common quilting shapes for peiceing (hexies anyone?)  and even dies that cut little stuffies.

The best part about the Sizzix dies is that they can cut 8 peices of fabric at a time, so you can cut a quilt in minutes with zero measuring. For this project though,  we are going to Sizzix's Alphabet dies to cut our no sew applique for our Gift Sack.

Materials:

• Fabric for bag (I used 1/3 of a yard, but your bag can be any size)
• Scraps of felt or fabric for letters
• Heat and Bond
• Sizzix Fabi 
• Sizzix Alphabet Dies 

Let's Get Started:

First, we need to make our bag! We've done many drawstring bags at MIH, so we are going to go over this one quickly. You can size your bag to fit your intended gift so go as big or small as you like!

I started with a 12" x WOF (44") strip of fabric folded in half. Fold the top down a half of an inch and then over by 2 inches on both sides to create a pocket for your draw string. Press and sew this fold.

To create a gusset for your bag, fold a pleat as shown at the bottom of the bag. Then simply sew up both sides of the bag, backstiching and stopping an inch and half from the top of the bag.

Turn right side out and you have an easy gusseted gift bag. In this version, the opening for the drawstring aren't finished. If it bugs you, you can always serge or zig zag the raw edges before sewing the bag together.

Now for the fun part! Take your scrap of felt and iron Heat and Bond to the wrong side.

Now lets use our die cutting machine! Here is the way that I found was easiest. Place one of your cutting mats on the bed of the machine.

Find the die with the letter that needs to be cut out.

Place the scrap of fabric Heat and Bond side up on your die and cover with the other cutting mat.

Place the die and mat on the machine face up, and run it though.

Voila! a perfect die cut, every single time! The hardest part of this, for me at least, was remembering to put the Heat and bond side up. If you can remember that, you'll be done in about 5 minutes.

Here's the entire name spelled out. I was able to cut out the two a's at the same time. I added a little hand cut heart because.... well because.

Remove the paper backing from each letter, and then simply iron on. The Heat and Bond Ultra will stick even through the wash-- no sewing required.

Now all that's left to do is to add a bow, and you have a gift bag you can reuse each year.

I hope your holiday prep is just going swimmingly and that you have a few minutes to do a few extras.

---

*Sizzix provided a Fabi and dies for me to review, but I have not been compensated for this post. Purchasing from the affiliate links above helps support MIH! 

Felt Baskets (In Any Size!) Tutorial

Hi everyone! I'm back with a quick tutorial for Felt Baskets! I made these as a cheap option for baskets to go in our mudroom shelf--which you'll be hearing more about tomorrow.

These are super simple and super cheap. I spent a whopping 5 dollars on 2 yards of felt and had enough to make 3 baskets, a hanging organizer and still have felt left over. All you need to do is sew a seam-- it doesn't even need to be straight!

First, a note about shopping for felt. Some felt can be thin and icky feeling. I like to purchase premium felt off the bolt, and I make sure to find a color that has some variegation to make it look more natural.

Next we need to do our math. Instead of a formula I thought it might be easier to explain how to come up with your rectangle size in a diagram. Use the height, width and length of your desired basket to cut your big rectangle. Then cut squares out of each corner. (The sides of the squares will be the same as your basket height.) If you feel your felt is thin, cut two boxes, lay them on top of each other and treat them as one piece for the rest of the tutorial.

For me, the hardest part of this project was cutting the felt. I really, really suggest getting a sharp rotary cutter for this project. Mine was too dull and just ended chewing up the felt.

Instead I had to trace lines and cut with (gasp!) scissors. The humanity!

When you are finished, you should have something that looks like this but better. This was my first attempt with my rotary cutter.

Now, pinch each of the sides wrong sides together, and sew about a quarter inch in from the edge.

I trimmed the seam allowance a bit to hide any wonky sewing and cutting.

And you are done!

Add caption

You can embellish them any way you wish. For one of my baskets, I folded down the top and hand embroidered a running stitch in felt.

I love the way the exposed edges look. On this basket I used a double thickness of felt for a super sturdy basket. This one will keep our wallets and stuff so it will be used constantly.

I also made baskets out of just a single layer of felt. I was suprised that they seemed just as sturdy. Instead of doing a cuff, I just sewed a small decorative seam on the bottom edge of the long sides.

I love handsewing through felt, so I'm planning on embroidering these with something... maybe my kids names? Right now they just hold our reusable plastic bags.

In case you were curious, the rest of the fabric became this cute hanging organizer.

Thanks, and I'll see you back here tomorrow for a mudroom sneak peek! And I hope you all are getting ready for Pillow Palooza! 

How To Make Indian Flatbread... plus a Cuisnart Handheld Mixer Review

Rotis, chapatis, puris, thepla, debhra... flatbreads are a huge part of Indian cuisine... and consequently a huge part of my life.

We were lucky enough to grow up with a mom that made roti nearly every day. I don't make it as often, but they are still my kids favorite food.

A few weeks ago my mom, grandma and I got together to make up a batch large enough for us all to take some home. I wanted to write down the recipe for you all, but my grandma is like a cooking ninja. I couldn't record everything fast enough. But I did find a good recipe that seems authentic, and is very similar from Show Me The Curry. (We make it with and without the methi, this time we made it without.)

Instead... I'll just share a bit of our afternoon cooking with 4 generations.

This is Grandma practicing mise en place... without the fancy containers.

 And of course, the compulsory argument about how much sugar is needed. (This is my mom and grandma)

 There are a lot of things I dislike about my stand mixer, and one is that I have to use a special bowl. With  the Cuisinart Handheld Mixer, I was able to us a bowl that was comfortable for hand kneading as well as machine kneading. Plus... I didn't need to drag these two gals to the counter -- they were able to work on the kitchen table.

 Oil... lots of oil...

The Cusinart mixer came with dough hooks and claimed that it could knead dough. I'll admit it was skeptical, especially since this dough is a very dense whole wheat dough. Would the mixer pass the test?

 I have to admit, I was pretty impressed. This little machine saved me quite a bit of time in hand kneading.

 It's even grandma approved.

 You'll still need to get your hands dirty to shape and divide the dough, but the machine does save time and effort; especially when making a huge batch of dough.

 Now, simply divide the dough into golf ball sized pieces, and roll out. I'm lucky enough to have inherited a few traditional rolling pins-- it makes rolling thin circle shapes much easier. You can buy these at your local south asian market for a few bucks-- it's so worth it!

 After rolling them out, you can cook them on a pan much like pancakes or tortillas.

And of course, don't forget the helpers! We have a set of wooden cutting boards (like these) so the kids can help too.

 Because you aren't just making food... you are making memories.

 I'm so grateful that my kids can see their grandparents and my grandparents on a regular basis.

I couldn't end the post without showing a picture of Amaani eating thepla when she was a baby.

She still loves them just as much! See you back here on Friday for Rakhi pictures!

*Cuisinart provided a mixer for review, but all opinions are my own.