*Click on the pictures for a larger, more detailed view.*
My neice had her 7th birthday a couple weeks ago and this was the gift we gave her.
I had a blast putting this together. I do have a cofession to make, though. I actually started this project LAST year. ;) Shhhhh......don't tell her. It was supposed to be her birthday present last year and never got finished. I decided that I better get it done this year or she would lose all her teeth by the time I was done with it. It's not the same thing as having an adult tooth pulled in your 20s and putting it aside for the Tooth Fairy, know what I mean? (Besides, the Tooth Fairy isn't really rich enough to leave $75-$100 to make up the price of extraction.)
So.......the whole thing that inspired this project was the little mint tin that's actually hidden inside the book. Last year, on the 2005 Western Caribbean Stampin' Up Cruise, one of the women created the cutest little WOW project using a mint tin and the Pretty Princess stamp set, along with Silver Cord for the wings. I wasn't part of the WOW swap, so I'm not sure who made it, but here's a GIANT THANK YOU to whoever it was!!! I took a picture with my camera and came home and got right to work making some of these adorable little tooth fairies. I made three of them. And............they've been sitting in my craft bin for a year and a half now. The good thing is, that part was already done when I went to finish the rest of this altered book.
This is actually the first Altered book project that I've done that uses ALL Stampin' Up supplies. I was quite proud of myself, to say the least.
What I did was start out with an older book that I got for free from the library. They have a shelf near the door that says, "Free books to a good home." I don't DARE tell them what I'm doing with them, for fear of them giving me librarian-wedgies for committing "book sacrilege." Besides, it's not like I'm taking them home for a neighborhood book burning, or dumping them in a landfill. I'm giving them a new life. "Reincarnated books," if you will. ;)
I sectioned off about 80% of the back of the book and held it together with Binder Clips (also known as "bulldog clips"). Using a foam brush, I glued the edges around the book with Mod Podge. (I WISH I were the inventor of Mod Podge.....I would be set FOR LIFE and then I could sit around all day Mod Podge-ing things,. ;)) I sped up the drying process by waving my Heat Tool back and forth around the edges, making sure not to hold it in one place too long (or the book starts stinking and smoking). I moved the binder clips around to make sure that I glue where the binder clips were. I did about 2-3 coats on the sides. I did the same thing for the front 20% of the book on the left hand side, leaving just a couple pages loose.....you'll understand why in a little bit.
When everything was dry, I took a ruler and marked out the space that I wanted to cut my hole out of. Using a metal ruler, I made my first few cuts with my Hobby Blade. I always start at the corners, dig down and work toward the next corner. Each time I turn the corner, I start by digging down into the corner and then making my cut. This makes it easy to pull the pages out without them getting stuck in the corners. You want to make sure, as you pull out the pieces of pages that you're cutting away, that you don't "tear" them out. You don't want a bunch of scraggly pieces of paper in your corners. Use your hobby blade to work pieces loose. Never tear! If you find that you have a few stray pieces and some rough edges here and there, you can always take a fine grain piece of sandpaper and sand those areas down when you're done.
Make sure, that when you cut a hole or shadow box in a book, your hole is a little bigger than the item you are putting in there, or you may have TOO snug of a fit and you can't fit what you want in there. Especially for something like the Tooth Fairy Box.....I thought I made the hole big enough, considering that the box would have to be opened to put the tooth in, but after I was done, I realized I should have made it just a tad bigger. Not much, but perhaps a 1/2 inch more.
After I was done cutting out the hole, I used Mod Podge around the edges on the inside of the hole. This helps to keep everything together and give it a finished edge. Remember those 2 loose pages from earlier? I use a glue stick to glue those down over the hole that I just cut out. I then take my hobby blade and cut out the hole from those two pages. This helps to smooth things out on top and give it a finished look. I then painted the outside edges of the book, along with the sides and bottom of the hole with pink acrylic paint. Actually, I used white acrylic paint mixed with Regal Rose & Pretty in Pink ink from the reinker bottles. I also painted the outside cover of the book, as well. Front and back.
I covered the left hand side of the inside of the book with the squiggly designed pink paper from Stampin' Up's "Tickle" designer paper (which was retired from last year's catalog). I used a VERY thin coat of Mod Podge for this, though I prefer using an Anwhere Glue Stick. I took this project with me to my PJ Party earlier in the month and forgot my glue stick and only had my Mod Podge with me. If you use Mod Podge for a top coat of paper like this, you want to make sure the layer is VERY thin and that you smooth the paper out as best you can after you put it down. This will get all the air bubbles out and will keep the paper-buckling to a minimum.
I found the Tooth Fairy poem here: ToothFairys.net They have some great poems, but I needed something small and cute and this one was the winner.
I cut strips of Whisper White cardstock and stamped the poem using the Euphoria Alphabet (that was in the Winter Mini Catalog this past winter) with Basic Black ink. I used a Stampin' Sponge, along with Regal Rose ink, to sponge around the edges of the white cardstock strips. I also sponged around the outside edges of both pages.
I stamped the image of the fairy using the Fairy Nice set that was featured in a past mini catalog, colored her in with Stampin' Write Markers. I used my 2-Way Glue Pen to add some glue to her wings and her little skirt and then sprinkled Dazzling Diamonds Glitter on top and shook off the excess.
I punched out the flowers in Summer Sun cardstock with the awesome Spring Bouquet Flower Punch. I coated each of the flowers with the 2-Way Glue Pen and sprinkled those with the Dazzling Diamonds Glitter. You can kinda see the detail here of the glitter on the above photo.
On the right hand side of the book, I used the striped patterned paper from Stampin' Up's retired "Candy" designer paper. I cut the hole out AFTER I glued down the paper to the book.
I used the Regal Rose to sponge around the edges of the hole. I did a bunch more of those cute Summer Sun flowers and glued them down around the page for some extra shine and sparkle.
Now, for the Tooth Fairy tin, I used a Velamints Tin (yes, I ate the mints.....if they were Altoids, I would have made my hubby eat them....blech!). I painted the sides of the tin with the same acrylic paint that I used on the rest of the book.
To create the fairy, I used the Pretty Princess stamp set on Whisper White cardstock with Basic Black ink. I used my Stampin' Write Markers to color her in. Just like I did with the little fairy on the opposite page, I used my 2-Way Glue Pen and added some glitter here and there on her dress, the star wand, her crown, etc. It's hard to see in the photo:
I used Silver Cord as the Fairy's wings. This took a little pratice to get this right. After about the 3rd try, I had it down. I actually made 3 fairies like this the same day because I decided I was on a roll with the wing thing. I used a Stampin' Dimensional to hold down the middle of the wings to her back. Those Dimensionals are STICKY and perfect for this task!
I cut a piece of patterened paper from Stampin' Up's retired "Sassy" designer paper to fit the top of the Velamint tin and adhered that to the tin with Sticky Strip. I then used double layers of the Dimensionals to stick the fairy down to the top of the tin.
I used E6000 Glue to stick the tin to the bottom of the hole. That stuff holds ANYTHING down! (And it's fun to sniff......but only for a little while..... it'll burn your nose hairs after a while...just kidding!) The glue needs to set a little while, depending on how thick you put it on. I put a good thick layer in there, so that it would stick down well, with the opening and closing that I'm sure is to happen in the hands of a 7 year old who's losing her teeth pretty quickly.
If I wanted to go even further with this project, I could have lined the inside of the Velamint tin with pink felt or something similarly pretty, but hey, it IS for a 7 year old! ;) And a relative at that! ha! Seriously, though, if I'd had more time, I would have done it.
To hide the open edges between the inside pages, I placed a long line of Sticky Strip down the middle and stuck a piece of Light Pink Grosgrain Ribbon on top of it. It hide the edges SO well. I let a little piece hang off the bottom and cut the end at an angle to give it a finished look.
For the front of the book (scroll back up for a picture), I used the Simple Type alphabet (retired) with Bravo Burgandy Craft Ink and heat set it with my heat tool. I used some more of those nifty Summer Sun flowers coated with glitter and then did some cute doodling with my Bravo Burgandy Stampin' Write Markers around the flowers and at the bottom of the book. I had to make sure to heat set these as well, so that the color wouldn't lift off if it was touched (yah, learned that the hard way).
I sponged around the outside edges and spine of the book with Bravo Burgandy CLASSIC ink and heat set that, as well.
When I showed the book to my grandparents at the birthday party, my grandfather cracked me up by saying, "You could go into a new business for the mob! They could hide their guns in things like these! You're so creative!" And if you knew my grandfather, you totally would NOT expect something like that. ;)
When my brother saw it, his comment was TOTALLY expected. He said, "Hey, you could hide weed in there!" Um, yah, I'm sure I could probably find a market for that, but would I really WANT to?? ha!
