Flowerpot a la Susan DeMuth

Hi Everyone!

Ever had one of those days when you are in a funk and not sure why? Well, that's how I felt yesterday until the mail came. My friend, Susan DeMuth, had sent me a package filled with surprises. In seconds my mood swung from "funk" to "fantastic".

Let me start out by introducing you to Susan. Susan is an artist. She is the owner and president of a company called Shapes, ETC. If you are a classroom teacher you NEED to know about Shapes, ETC. and can learn about Susan's note pads and cutouts by visiting her web site. In addition to drawing all of the images for her business, Susan knits, sews, quilts, makes button necklaces, makes Sculpey dough pins, makes her own cards, gardens, cooks, reads every book that she can, and probably does a lot more things than I have listed. She is AMAZING. I want to be "Susan" when I grow up!

Susan designed my logo for me. I described what I wanted over the phone and she understood exactly what I wanted and created my business cards and labels for the backs of my cards.

Susan is the friend who totally turned me onto papercrafting. About 2 years ago when we attended the annual school supply trade show, we roomed together and both brought some papercrafting things with us. That was when I learned how to make what I now call "Flowers a la Susan" which I will explain to you later in this blog. First I want to tell you about the package Susan sent me yesterday.

There were slipper socks in the package...amazing socks that Susan knitted. She's made me slipper socks before and I LOVE them because they actually stay on my feet when I walk around.

There were six Sculpey dough pins in the package. They are the most detailed and amazing pins you have ever seen. I just took the picture of them a few minutes ago and the light is not great right now so the picture doesn’t do them justice. You’ll just have to trust me when I tell you now amazing they are. I especially love the owl.

And there were 3 cards in the package. Cards that I totally loved. Cards that inspired me to make my own card. Cards that inspired me to make a template that I could share with you so that you can make these adorable cards too. I scanned in the template I created and another awesome friend of mine, Cindy Montgomery of The Virtual Vine turned my template into a PDF file for me. If you are a teacher you also need to know about Cindy who is a SPED teacher in MS who has the most amazing web site, The Virtual Vine. Cindy is also a papercrafter so be sure to check out her incredible cards.

Wow, this is a long blog, isn’t it! So much to tell you about today! Well, here’s the card I created after oohing and aahing over Susan’s cards. The flower arrangement pulls out of the flowerpot and that is where you can stamp a message or attach a gift card. Study the flowers. I punched them out with one of my EK Success paper punches. Then I placed them on a thick piece of foam, (you could use your mouse pad), and pressed a stylus down in the middle of each flower which makes the flowers "pop up" and become 3D. That is a technique that Susan taught me which is why I call them "Flowers a la Susan". I used my bone folder to score each of the leaves and then folded them slightly along the scored line. The leaves are created from a Martha Stewart leaf punch.

I traced one of Susan’s flowerpots and created this pattern for you. I think you will understand how to make the flowerpot just by studying the cards that Susan and I made. If you have any questions, please post them on this blog and I will answer them for you.
Now I must do some of my "real work"!

Have a great night.
Carol