May Flowers Blog Hop!

Welcome to Team L. I. 's second Blog Hop!  I am so excited to be part of this fabulous group of crafters for the second time!  We had so much fun with our "April Showers" blog hop that we just had to do it again!  If you are coming from Sharon Armstrong's blog, then you are in the right place!  Our group has grown since last month, so we decided to split into two groups.

                                           

Day 1 started with Elizabeth Mindemann.  If you would like to start at the beginning of the hop on Day 1, then go here.  We are now on Day 2 of the hop, which starts with Valerie Ward.  There are 15 blogs in all (8 on Day 1 and 7 on Day 2), so be sure to visit all of them from both days!  Read all the way through, because near the end of this blog, you'll have an opportunity to enter our monthly Raflecopter giveaway!  The prize this month is sponsored by none other than your's truly and I'm really excited to give away some fun things to the winner of our contest!

This month's topic is "May Flowers" and I have some great flower tutorials to share with you over the next few weeks!  For the blog hop, we will concentrate on one of my favorites that I learned while teaching classes at Scrappin' Goodtime in Corsicana, Texas...this super simple mum/carnation made from a phone book.  Yes, that's right -- a phone book!  If you've followed my blog for very long, you'll know that I just love finding new uses for old items, and I am a big fan of recycling in any way.  Recycle, Renew, Reuse!

To make this flower, you'll need a few simple items:  a phone book (I prefer the ones with white pages), a punch (this scalloped circle from Stampin' Up! works great!), a brad, a paper piercer/awl, and some form of colorant.  I used Dylusions Ink Spray for this example, but Tattered Angels works really well, too, and will give it a softer (and more sparkly) color.

 Use the punch to cut a bunch of scalloped circles.  I usually punch through as many pages of the phone book as I can comfortably get inside the punch and still work the punch.  Punch repeatedly all around the edges, and then trim off the jagged edges and punch some more.  The more pieces you punch, the fuller your flower will be.

 It's hard to tell, but this is how many stacks I got from punching a whole page (multiple pages, deep, of course).  It turned out to be exactly enough for the flower you see in the example.

Next, you'll want to put a hole through the center of all the circles.  I just stack them up on a foam mat and muscle my way through it with my paper piercer, but you can also do it just a few at a time without the mat.  The circles do not have to be lined up or anything...in fact, it's probably better if they are just stacked up randomly.

 Once you have a good hole, you can insert the brad.  The shank on the brad I used was just barely long enough to go through the circles I punched from that one stack of pages.  So keep that in mind while you're punching away -- there is such a thing as too many!

 Once the brad is secure, you want to start scrunching up the circles one at a time to form the flower from the inside out.

Just keep scrunching each piece separately.  It will start to get bulky after a while and it is very tedious. You will think it is taking forever and you're never going to get done, but really, it only takes about 5 minutes.  Towards the end, when it starts getting really full, you can start scrunching some of the pieces together at the same time

When you are done with all that scrunching, you can scrunch and fluff some more.  You can even twist some of the layers around on the brad so that the layers ruffle a little more instead of lining up.

as I mentioned, I sprayed my flower with a little Dylusions ink to give it this intensely bright color of pink.  The color I chose was "Bubblegum Pink".  I also added a little Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist in the "Pink Bubblegum" color, but the sheen doesn't really show up in my photos.

As an added little bonus, I stamped and cut out some little ribbon banners from some scrap paper and adhered them to the back of the flower.

 And as a finishing touch (and to make sure the phone book pieces don't tear off the back of the flower, I punched another scallop from cardstock and adhered it to the back of the flower with a little white glue.  This also covered up the uneven edges of my ribbon banners.

That's it!  You have a great looking flower that is perfectly suitable for all kinds of paper craft projects.  I put mine on a blank switch-plate cover that needed some sprucing up (see my facebook page!), but I think you could do a lot with these!

So now, I bet you are wondering how to enter our little contest, and exactly what prize you will get.  Entry is very simple...just "join" or "follow" my blog using the gadget boxes on the left side of my blog then leave me a comment on this post -- I'd love to hear what you like or don't like about this project, or what you might like to use the flowers on.  You also need to "Like" my facebook page (that link's on the left, too!), then be sure to do the same on each of the other blogs in the hop.  We've set up this great Rafflecopter code to help you keep track of all your entries.  As a bonus, if you share this post on your facebook page, tweet about it, and/or pin it to Pinterest, you can get up to 3 additional entries!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

So what's the prize?  Crafty Neighbor is offering a $100 discount voucher good towards the next Crafty Neighbor Scrapbooking cruise, sailing from Galveston, Texas aboard the Royal Caribbean Navigator of the Seas December 1, 2013 on a 7-Day cruise of the Caribbean, including ports in Jamaica, Grand Cayman, and Cozumel. The voucher covers all scrapbooking-related fees, including all classes, workshops, make-n-takes, gifts, prizes and give-aways throughout the cruise - a value of $250-$500. Winner must register for the cruise with a full deposit no later than June 15, 2013 to use the voucher. Winner is responsible for the cruise fare, as well as any airfare, hotel stays or incidental expenses (see our website for more details about the cruise http://www.craftyneighbor.com). Winner will also receive a small grab-bag of cruise and beach-themed products including “Ocean Breeze” paper assortment (8 pieces), coordinating cardstock, and an embellishment assortment.

You have until May 31st to join and comment on all the blog hop pages.  The winner will be announced June 1st on Elizabeth's blog.  The winner has one week to claim her prize or another winner will be chosen.

That's it!  I'm the last blog in the hop!  If you'd like to complete the circuit for Day 2, hop on over to Valerie's Blog, or if you'd like to see where it all started, Elizabeth Mindlemann kicked off Day 1 on May 15.  Don't forget to complete the entry requirements for each blog in the hop!  Thanks for stopping by, and good luck!