Pop-up Flower Tutorial with Tonya

Tonya here with my first Guest Designer post for Samantha Walker Designs.  

I am excited to share my ideas and projects with you.   

While looking at other crafter's blogs, I came across a flower pop up card, and thought to myself - 'I would love to be able to make that!'  As I scrolled through the post, I saw the picture of a lily version.  Lilies remind me of my parents.  Lilies are my mother's favorite flower; and my daddy used to send Easter Lilies to me and my sisters every Spring, before his passing in '98.  I knew I wanted to try my hand at a lily version, of my own. 

The instructions in the post show how to cut an 8 petal flower with a die cut machine (she provides a free file), then hand cut to make a 7 petal flower.  Her file provides a rounded petal flower...and I wanted a lily like flower.  I figured I could create a file with my Silhouette software to fit what I wanted.  

With that in mind, I headed to the Silhouette Store to look through Samantha's files.  I did not find a flower file that perfectly suited my needs.  So I thought I could adapt/create one. 

 Samantha's Lattice Flower Circle file (#23491)  worked nicely as a starting point. 

I created an internal offset for the flower outline.  To do this, I highlighted the image and clicked on the offset icon (upper right).  I put the offset distance as 0.150.  This created a more pointed flower petal (closer to a lily petal) and moved the offset away from the image so that it was easier for me to drag it away from the base cut file. 

   

 Next, I moved the offset away from the base file, and deleted the original image. 

  

For the flower, I needed 7 petals, and this one had 8.  I used the knife tool to cut away one petal.  I lined up my curser so that the crossbars were centered between the top and side petals to find the midpoint of the flower, and 'cut' from the center out.

 Next, I created score lines between the petals for folding.  I used the same method as the knife tool above, drawing dashed lines from the center out between each petal.    

To keep the pieces together, I highlighted all the parts and grouped them. 

Since these were to be lilies, I needed some stamens.  I used a stamen (top) from Samantha's Hawaiian Hisbiscus Flowers (#4170).  

All I needed to do was duplicate the flowers to the number needed for the card (7 total), and size the stamens accordingly. 

*Note* - there are 14 stamens in my file, instead of 7.  This is just in case a couple do not cut cleanly or I make a mistake/rip one while embellishing the stamens.  

The stamens are not yellow in the original file.  I tend to 'color' my pieces so when I cut them out, I have a visual reference. 

Here are my flowers - one assembled (center) and 6 unfinished.  The flowers were dry embossed for detail.  I cut the stamens out of the same white cardstock as the flowers.  They were colored with a Wild Honey Distress Marker mixed with water and highlighted with yellow Stickles. 

Supplies: Samantha Walker Silhouette files #23491 & #4170, Silhouette Cameo, Recollections Cardstock, Distress Marker, Stickles, Paper Studio Embossing Folder, Sizzix Texture Boutique

  

Signs of Spring - Flower Tutorial with Nicole

Here in Utah there are signs of spring everywhere!  The daffodils in my neighbors yard are in full bloom, the grass is turning green, and best of all the days are starting to warm up.  I've been bringing the spring into my crafting as well.

I wanted to make a card with some daffodils and chose Samantha's flower 5 to create a daffodil looking flower.  I opened it up and placed several of the base and the centers on my mat in Silhouette Studio.  I then brought in just the grass from the Easter Bunny file.  

I placed all my cardstock on the mat and hit cut.  I slowed down my machine just a touch from the textured cardstock setting since the cuts on the flower centers are tiny.  The Cameo is amazing and cut them out perfectly!

I then added a little texture to my petals and flower center by curling them up.  The centers are so tiny that I used the end of a colored pencil to help.  

I then took orange chalk ink to ink the edges. 

 I assembled all my flowers with small dots of glue.  

Here is my finished card.  I just love the added dimension these small flowers create.   

 Supplies Cut files:  Flower 5 and Easter Bunny (links below); Pattern Paper: Carta Bella; Stamps: JustRite; Vellum: Darice; ink: Martha Stewart (chalk ink) and Tsuikeniko; cardstock:  Bazzill; embroidery floss: DMC

Hope you are starting to see the signs of Spring wherever you are, Happy Crafting!

Flower Pen Tutorial by Christine

Hi Samantha Walker Fans!  Christine joining you today to share a flower project! I had so much fun playing with Samantha's new flowers this week and found a fun way to incorporate them into a project.  Today I am going to show you how I turned these flowers into pens.  I have them displayed here in a flower pot.

Your first step is to cut out the flowers that you want to use.  I used two shades of each colors to add a little contrast.  I set them up on my screen like this and then used 6" X 12" papers on my cutting mat.  I used the following flowers:

#55487

#55845

#55842

#55840

#55830

You will then want to fold and bend your flowers to your taste....I just use my fingers for this but a pencil would work great too.  I also embellished mine with some gemstones.

I then created my "stem" by using a six inch square.  First off, I have to give credit to the team coordinator, Jamie, here because she helped me figure out how to do this step.  I set it like a diamond on my grid and trimmed off one end so that it lined up with where I wanted the paper to end on my pen (a grid mat was super helpful with this).  

I used strong craft glue that dries fast and rolled up the pen, securing it with a clothespin while I worked on the others.

I then wrapped it with washi tape because I thought that would help it hold up better and looked pretty!

I cut slits in the end of it so that it folds down in thirds, making it easy to attach to the flower.

Once again using my strong craft glue I attached it to the flower

And then you are done..you've got a lovely little pen to display.

Our school secretary is an awesome friend and because I always talk her head off about paper crafting (which she doesn't do any of), I decided to make this into a gift for her.  I used a small flower pot and added some beans.

I then added the whole variety of them!  I hope this will give her a little bit of spring joy for the week!

Have a great week crafters!