Garden of Grace: Thanks A Bunch for Donna Salazar Designs and Really Reasonable Ribbon

There's something so special about a handcrafted thank you card. I've created one to have on hand featuring Donna Salazar Designs products along with Ribbon and Wild Orchid Crafts Flowers from Really Reasonable Ribbon for this girlie grunge card.

Be sure to check out my tutorials included in this post. I show how I create my Bitty Blossoms Roses. They are so easy to make and can be used on any kind of paper crafting project from layouts to cards and altered pieces. I cut my paper scraps with the Bitty Blossoms dies and use spare time riding in the car or watching television to make them up to have on hand for my projects. I've also included a tutorial for the Grungy Wrinkled Ribbon I used for my bow using seam binding.

"Thanks A Bunch"

Tips and Techniques

Here's a close-up of the flower cluster featuring my Bitty Blossoms Roses. The tutorial on how I make them can be found later in this post. I dabbed my flowers and the edges of the card with Clearsnap Glue Gloss, then sprinkled with Clear Fairy Dusty Glitter. I love the sparkle Donna's glitter adds to this card!!

Really Reasonable Ribbon carries a wide selection of gorgeous Wild Orchid Crafts Mulberry Flowers. Here I've used Chrysanthemums, Sweetheart Blossoms, and Open Roses along with some hand crafted flowers using Spellbinders Bitty Blossoms and Carnation Creation dies by Donna Salazar.

You can also see some of the mixed media background behind the flowers. I stamped the top corner with Donna Salazar Designs Dear Sir Stamp by Art Gone Wild with Jasmine Mix'd Media Inx, then heat embossed with Jasmine MMI Embossing Powder. I spritzed with Clearsnap Smooch Spritz in Tea Party. Then in the bottom corner I used Donna's Brass Corner Stamp again with Jasmine MMI and then embossed with Clearsnap Top Boss Clear Embossing powder. Here I rubbed Petals MMI CHOX over the embossed image.

I die cut Donna's GCD Studio Natural Beauty paper from the 6" x 6" paper pad using her Spellbinders Pockets and Swirls die set. I adore the design printed on the denim paper and placed the smallest pocket die so that the design would go across the top of the pocket. I embossed the pieces while they were still in the dies. Once I removed the die cuts, I highlighted by rubbing MMI over the embossed areas.

The smallest pocket die pierces holes around the design which I used to hand stitch using blue embroidery floss.

Can I just say how much I adore the seam binding from Really Reasonable Ribbon? It is so versatile. Bonnie carries a huge selection of colors. I have collected my share of them, but my go to color is white, and I had to buy an entire spool!! In my tutorial below, I show how to color, wrinkle, and grunge it up - so perfect for those shabby chic projects!!

I finished my sentiment inside the card using Donna's GCD Studios Family Jeans Chipboard Alphas highlighted with Denim Mix'd Media Ink, which I also rubbed around the inside card edge.

Bitty Blossoms Tutorial

Supply List

Spellbinders ~ Donna Salazar Designs - Bitty Blossoms Dies

SpellBinders ~ Artisan X-plorer

Large Tip Stylus and Foam Pad

Glue

Quilling Tool (Optional)

Round Nose Pliars (Optional, but very helpful)

Step 1. Die cut one Medium Bitty Blossoms Flower with your die cut machine. I used my Spellbinders Artisan X-plorer.

Step 2. The next thing you want to do is to cup your petals so the flower will look more natural. Use a stylus with a large tip and use a circular motion to cup each petal. Start on the small end on the right side and cup the first two petals.

Step 3. Turn the flower over on your mat so that the back side is showing. Continue to cup each petal with the stylus. This photo shows how your flower should look when all the petals are cupped:

Step 4. Starting on the end with the larger petals with the right side facing up, use a round nose plier to roll the first 10 petals back as shown. You could also curl the petals around a skewer or something similar. However, if you own Bitty Blossoms and plan to make them regularly for your projects, the round nose pliers will make things go much faster!!

Step 5. For the 10 petals you rolled, go back and this time roll back each side as shown:

Step 6. Using a quilling tool on the small end, start rolling your flower. The design on the right side will be on the inside as you roll, so in the photo below I will be turning the quilling tool in a counter clockwise direction. I have found that it helps to use my fingers to help mold and wrap the paper around the quilling tool to keep it from tearing.

Hint: If you don't own a quilling tool, don't worry, you can just roll the flower with your fingers (which is Donna's preferred method of rolling.) For me personally, I've found I can roll the flowers up more quickly using the quilling tool.

Step 7. Continue rolling with the quilling tool until you reach the petals you rolled back in steps 4 and 5. Remove the quilling tool and hold the rolled flower in place.

Step 8. Continue to roll with your fingers to the end. Bend the glue flap into place. Release the flower and it will uncurl/loosen up just a little:

A view of the back. You can see how the back looks in this shot:

Step 9. Pull the flap open and apply glue to it. Fold it back into place and while the glue is still wet, arrange your flower making sure the outside petals are offset.

Here you can see a finished Bitty Blossoms Rose.

You can use Bitty Blossoms Roses individually in clusters or as flower centers for larger flowers. I have used them both ways on my card:

Now for my second tutorial of the day:

Grungy Wrinkled Ribbon Tutorial

Supplies

Supply List

Really Reasonable Ribbon Seam Binding in white

Mix'd Media Inx, Jasmine

Mix'd Media Inx CHOX - Petals

Water in a misting bottle

Heat Tool (Darice)

Nonstick Craft Sheet (Ranger)

Tweezers (EK Success)

Step 1. Measure out the length of ribbon needed for your particular project. Remember there will be some shrinking during this process, so you will want to add some length to account for this. I used 23 inches of ribbon for the triple loop bow on my card. Notice how nice and smooth this ribbon is coming right off the spool. It won't be that way for long!!

Step 2. Rub ink color(s) of choice onto a nonstick craft sheet. This pink was a little darker and brighter than I wanted for my ribbon, so I also put down some Jasmine (white) ink to mix with the pink. You can use any color of water based ink for this technique.

***Hint*** If you would like to keep your rayon ribbon the original color, you can spritz the ribbon with water and skip the coloring part of the tutorial.

Step 3. Spritz the ink(s) with a light misting of water.

Step 4. Rub the ribbon through the inks - blending and mixing the two together as you go. I didn't mix them together first, because I wanted the ribbon to be blotchy with darker and lighter pink areas and even some small areas that were left white.

Step 5. Scrunch the ribbon up and hold with a pair of tweezers. Don't over think this step and don't try to make it pretty - just randomly scrunch. Also don't worry if some of the edges get a little frayed looking. That's part of the grungy, shabby look I was going for. You could also do this with ribbon that is already colored to add wrinkles. Skip the coloring/ink steps and just spritz the ribbon with water and follow the remaining steps here.

Step 6. Dry with a heat tool. To get the center of the bunched up ribbon dry, you may need to take the ribbon out of the tweezers and bunch it up again to expose more of the damp section. Repeat until it is all dry. It just takes a couple minutes for this type of ribbon. Also if you overheat the ribbon, it will singe and turn a little yellow. Again, that was fine with me. If you don't want any yellowing, you could allow the ribbon to air dry over night scrunched up in the tweezers or keep the heat tool further away from the ribbon and keep it moving.

Here is a photo of the ribbon once it is dry. You can see the color variations and the wrinkles that result from this process.

I tied a triple loop bow on my fingers using Ginny's tutorial found here. You could also whip out one of these bows in a jiffy using the Zutter Bow-it-All, now carried in the RRR Store.

Supplies:
Paper
GCD Studios ~ Donna Salazar Designs - Natural Beauty 6" x 6" pad, Wall Vines A, Rosy B
GCD Studios ~ Donna Salazar Designs - Family Jeans Heirloom B, Family Clouds B, Family Dots B
ChipboardGCD Studios ~ Donna Salazar Designs - Family Jeans Chipboard
AlphasColors/Inks/Mists

Clearsnap ~ Donna Salazar Designs - Mix's Media Inx: Jasmine, Denim
Clearsnap ~ Donna Salazar Designs - Mix's Media Inx CHOX: Sparrow, Petals
Clearsnap ~ Donna Salazar Designs - Mix's Media Inx Embossing Powder: Jasmine
Clearsnap ~ Top Boss Embossing Powder - Clear
Clearsnap ~ Donna Salazar Designs - Smooch Spritz: Tea Party

Dies

Spellbinders ~ Donna Salazar Designs - Bitty Blossoms, Carnation Creations, Pockets and Swirls

Stamps

Art Gone Wild ~ Donna Salazar Designs - Dear Sir, Brass Corner
Bling
Want2Scrap ~ Donna Salazar Designs - Build Your Own Bling 1

Embellishments

DMC Embroidery Floss ~ #823
Really Reasonable Ribbon ~ Wild Orchid Crafts Mulberry Flowers

Wild Orchid Crafts Mulberry Flowers ~ Chrysanthemums - Mixed Pink/White

Wild Orchid Crafts Mulberry Flowers ~ Sweetheart Blossoms - 2-Tone Baby Pink

Wild Orchid Crafts Mulberry Flowers ~ 15mm Open Roses - White

Ribbons/Fibers

Really Reasonable Ribbon ~ White Seam Binding

Mixed Media