Birthday Card and Gift Bag for Elaine

This past weekend I went to a BBQ/Bonfire for my great friend Elaine. I am so excited for Elaine as she is pregnant with her first child! I bought her a maternity shirt that I happened to find at Old Navy while shopping for my kids! I left the shirt on my half wall (going the stairs) and as the day went by looking at it I thought how it would make such a great inspiration for a card or project! The colors are so pretty and the color combinations! Also the print is very much like some stamps out there! I often would read on other blogs about color inspiration and all of a sudden as of last week I see it now too! In fact I am finding it hard to go clothes shopping as all I see are ideas! How funny is that? Maybe one day I will host color inspiration challenges or something as I gain more readers! So I decided to make Elaine a gift bag as it's so much fun to do! I had made one for my friend Lisa last month. Since I didn't have a blog than than I will share it here now:



I stamped the HA Heartwinged Butterfly on Lisa's bag. I wanted to try making a bag with diecuts instead thinking it would be easier! Well it wasn't. It was as much work if not more! I used colors from the shirt and the Blossom Party die by SU. I like how it turned out! I wanted to make a matching card but I knew for sure that I wanted to use the running girl from the CTMH stamp set Be Yourself. (Same set as yesterday's card) as when I saw that stamp I thought of Elaine! It suits her perfectly! So I used both the flowers and embossed the running girl stamp. A different combination but actually it kinda suits her also, she may love to exercise but she is fashionable and pretty!

The shirt, the bag and the card! Isn't the shirt such a great inspiration?



A close up of the bag. Funny story about the bag. A few weeks ago I was at a women's conference and they gave away tons of prizes! I sadly didn't win one but one of my friends did and was ditching her bag (a small solid pink one) When other girlfriends saw me with it they of course asked if I won a prize so I explained to them that I took it to create it with it and they remembered my bag from last month for Lisa. Well they got me this white bag from yet another friend who won a prize, love reusing things!

And of course a close up of the card:

Products used: Random white bag, Bazzill cardstock, SU cardtock and Blossom Party Die, Pearl accents, CTMH Be Yourself

It was fun making Elaine's shirt not just being the best part of the gift! I encourage you to find inspiration from your clothes, if you loved the shirt what makes you love it so? The colors, the print? Try it on paper!