Being Inspired by Beate, Beth, & Sharon (3x3 note-card purse)

I was inspired by Beate's photo in her Be Inspired Challenge #16 & Beth's 3x3 (Whole Enchilada challenge) to make this little 3x3 note-card purse set. Don't these ladies come up with the best inspiration?

I loved the look of the pattern in that black(?) & white tapestry on the right, so I pulled those 'colours' & I liked the rectangles created by the shelves (larger on the bottom & smaller on top) so I mimicked that in the card layout. The books on the shelves inspired the text ribbon (from 7 Gypsies.) I liked the little busy flowers in the tapestry & used the wee flowers from Simply Said to imitate those... then there's that pop of the large bright flowers with their dark centers...me likey! (What a great little scene. Doesn't it make you wanna fiddle with your bookshelves?)

I've been loving Sharon's black & white +1 colour challenge, but I never would have been brave enough to add such bright colour without Beate's inspiration piece. Thanks Beate for keeping it Fresh & Fun! ;0)

The note cards:

• Print text onto cardstock (this is just an Oscar Wilde text that I scanned)
  

• Emboss flowers onto it (I stamped the Wonderful You flowers in black craft & added clear e.p.)
  

• Paint & embellish flowers [these are painted with reinkers (ruby red, really rust & cameo coral) & have steel microbeads]

• The flower for the purse is covered in crystal effects so that it'd be strong enough to act as the purse closure

• Stamp the small flowers & emboss in white e.p. (after using anti-static bag)

• Edge the cardstock with silver pen...
  

• Heat & colour them in with glitter pen (Sakura clear)

• The 3x3 cards themselves are made of Naturals Ivory cardstock, to lighten it up (& so they can be written in...)
  

• The strip of text is made from 7gysies gaffer tape (Le Monde) To cut thin strips, you can just stick it to cardstock & cut with your paper trimmer (It's adhesive, but easy to work with.)

To work with black cardstock & templates, you can just use a white pencil crayon or signo pen

The purse:

• The strip of text for the strap is made the same way as above (just two are adhered so both sides have text); it's adhered from the back with adhesive and brads for strength. I tinted some of the white text on it with markers to tie it in.
  

• The little chain is just off of a key-chain I had; the round tag is from the dollar store. I stamped it with Close to my hearts acrylic tiny typewriter alphabet
  

• A couple of flowers on the purse are done using tinted signo gel pen. Colouring them in using white lets you add marker & get a tinted look.

• The main flower for the purse was covered in Crystal Effects, but I edged it in silver & added colour as an afterthought to tie it into the bright flowers on the note cards.

Scanning is still on hold...Still waiting to go get ink so HAL will work. Sorry :0) Will have templates for ya by tomorrow.

ETA: Templates available in PDFs here

Hope your crafting is blissful!


P.S. Card ingredients at a glance on SCS here
P.S. Like purses? There are 103 templates linked here.