Aloha, all!
While members of the (very large) Book Club to which I belong don't usually exchange gifts, I decided this year that I'd spend some of my paper crafting time making holiday bookmarks for everyone in the group. A bookmark is definitely not expensive, especially when I've got everything I need to make them already in my craft room supply stash.
This is a 3-layer bookmark, which gives it enough thickness to use for quite a while without it getting too messed up with all the handling it should get. The back layer is plain Very Vanilla Cardstock and the middle layer is a piece of one of the sheets from the Home for Christmas Designer Series Paper set from the Stampin' Up! 2015 Holiday Catalog. Cutting and adhering them together was just as simple as can be.
The stamped layer took a bit more work, but still it was pretty easy to construct. For the images, I chose two of the stamps from the November 2015 Paper Pumpkin kit. I wanted that layer to be fully stamped, so out came my MISTI tool. It's not a Stampin' Up! tool, but it's readily available online and makes stamping like this SOOOO easy! For the red in this design I used the Cherry Cobbler Stampin' Spot that came with the Paper Pumpkin kit, and both my Garden Green and Cherry Cobbler Stampin' Write Markers. The holly leaves are line art, and I filled them in by using a Stampin' Up! Blender Pen inked up from my Stampin' Up! Garden Green Classic Ink Pad.
Finally, to give the bookmark some texture, I punched the corners using the Curvy Corner Trio Punch.
As I said, this is a very large book club, and we usually have 16 to 20 people attending each meeting. So if I am to make, say, 25 of these bookmarks, I'll likely have to use different Deisgner Series Paper – or even card stock – as my middle layer. But that's not really a problem as I manage to have a good stash of holiday papers that will be nice accents for the stamped layer.
The final touch for the bookmarks are the vinyl covers that I'll use to package the little gifts. That way I can put them all in a basket and those who want one of the bookmarks won't end up with one that's been picked over and messed up by lots of hands, no matter how late they are in picking one out. I tied bows to hold the top of the cover together, using pieces of the Garden Green 1/8" Striped Ribbon and the Gold Cording Trim, both from the Holiday Catalog.
I think this is a nice little gift for my Book Club – and it won't take too much time to get them all made by the December meeting a week from tomorrow. Yikes! 7 days to make these! Better get a few more started!
