A Few Alice Shrines

I've been thinking about Alice, wondering what kind of project to do, when two very Wonderland-like niche shrines from Alpha Stamps arrived in my mailbox!

The first, called Little Niche Shrine - Pocket Watch, reminded me of Alice's encounter with the White Rabbit, so of course that's what I turned it into. The shrine was painted black and gold, and I stamped a bunch of numbers onto Aged Parchment Scrapbook Paper before gluing it to the front. Details were added with a Micron or gold paint pen. It was finished off with a few collage sheet images, paper roses, and a chipboard flourish. 

The second niche shrine is shaped like a top hat (is it a magician's? a ringmaster's? some dapper dancing dude's? Could be anyone's!) With Alice on the brain, I made the Mad Hatter's chapeau with a little surprise inside. I used the Niche Shrine - Top Hat but added a Chipboard Top Hat Blank to the front. The outside is a tad boring, but when the flap is folded down, a scene appears inside. 

Inside the shrine is the sleeping Dormouse, the Cheshire Cat, a stack of teacups, and a pouring teapot. (Psst, the "tea" is hot glue colored with a brown marker.)

The fun parts are the two pop-ups of Alice and the Mad Hatter. Pop-ups like these are incredibly simple to create. Here's how I made the Pop-Up Tea Time shrine.

Paint the shrine front and Chipboard Top Hat Blank. Trace around one of the pieces onto black cardstock, then fold the piece over and trace around again. Cut out. Trace around just the shrine front on a second piece of cardstock. This will later be used as the outside cover.

With a pencil, mark the center where the fold will be.

Mark two lines for each pop-up. I wanted the Hatter to be further away from the shrine, so made longer lines on the right side.

Trace over the fold line with a bone folder, but skip over the pop-up lines. Erase the pencil line.

Cut the pop-up lines, then fold the card in half. You'll have to pull out the pop-ups as you fold. Crease the fold with the bone folder.

Cut a rectangle of cardstock to cover the opening of the pop-ups, fold it in half, and glue to back of piece.

Glue a magnet along the top of each chipboard hat piece, then glue the pieces to the matching sides of the cardstock, sandwiching the magnets between the paper and chipboard. I forgot to take a photo of that, whoops. Thin magnets would work just fine, but all I had were chonky ones, resulting in the paper wrinkling where it covered the magnets.

Remember that second hat you traced around? Good. Cut out the shape like so, leaving the bottom of the paper attached. Glue the niche to the back of the shrine.

Slide the paper over the niche and glue in place.

Flip the entire thing over, then fold the entire thing onto the other side of the cardstock. Trace around the hat again. So much tracing.

Cut around the shape and glue in place. I glued baker's twine around the edges of the hat to cover the layers, but it really isn't necessary. And done!

Happy that I managed to complete a few Alice projects, and now it's time for a cup of tea.

Go HERE to see the supply list for the I'm Late! project and HERE for the Pop-Up Tea Time supply list.

Hearts Aflutter Mini Valentine Hutch

This month's kit from Alpha Stamps is chock full of red and pink and retro valentines, oh my! The tiny cards and envelopes were difficult to put aside, but I first wanted to decorate an Unfinished Wooden Hutch or Buffet with the Polymer Clay Valentine Hearts Slice Mix and 2-Tone Heart Bead Mix from the kit. There's also a bunch of other stuff in there too.

After the hutch was painted, I lined the shelves with strips of My Valentine Polka Dot paper (from the kit). Tons of images from the Tiny Little Valentines collage sheet were cut out to fill the shelves. There are candy boxes, two valentines card boxes, two gift bags, and a (mini) handful of vintage valentine cards on the shelves and on the lacy border. Peeking out from behind a cake on the top shelf is the cutest kitten you've ever seen. Thanks for making some extra tiny cat valentines, Leslie!

Whenever I am making a miniature hutch or shelf of some sort, I tend to crowd stuff in there, jamming as many tiny things as will fit. The project sort of turns into an "I Spy" game, which is kinda fun. Some of the things you'll find are a red jam jar, lemon cake with LOVE frosting, heart cookie cutter, tiny cake slices in glass bottles, cupcakes, pink strawberry cakes, candy jar with red candies, a pink doily, heart button, tiny heart-shaped chocolate cakes, and an embossed gold dresden heart. 

Most of the minis in this project were altered just a tad, like the Red Canisters. (I just glued a heart from the Polymer Clay Valentine Hearts Slice Mix to the front!) Some of the jar lids were painted or colored with a red Sharpie before being filled with microbeads, or more polymer clay slice mix. The lid of the mini white peanut butter jar on the top shelf was also colored with a red Sharpie, and I drew on a little heart. 

The Tiny Lace Borders - White worked out perfectly for the shelves. The bottom lace was cut from a wider section and I added pink rhinestones along the top. The heart-shaped lace border was just trimmed and glued on. So quick!

Here is another thing that was colored with Sharpie: a wee Half Scale Round Cookie Tin! I cut out an image on the Romantic Faux Postage collage sheet and glued it to the front. 

I was very excited to find the doors opened on the hutch. More room to put stuff! 

Hope your Valentine's Day is full of all the miniature things. Except the chocolate. That needs to be full scale. 

All of the supplies used can be found HERE.