Gift card holder tutorial

Hello my dear crafty friends and welcome to myGift card holder tutorial. This one was made as MOTHER'S DAY gift and can be given to all mothers around, mine too as it's not too young, not too bulky, not too complicated, but still very fancy from inside mostly.
As much as I was tempted to make an art journal page, I moved from my comfort zone and decided to make something useful. So say Hello to my Gift card holder made from  chipboard, cardstock, collage sheets and a lot of Mixed Media products.
Here how it looks when closed and I made it flat in purpose. You can add whatever flowers and extras on the cover if you wish, but I like it flat so it can be sent in an envelope.

Step by step instructions:
1. Cut white 12*12'' chipboard or thick cardstock into two even parts of 12*6''.
Score and fold the first one as shown on 3''-6''-3'' - this is the inner part of the holder.
Score and fold the second half to 2 1/2''- 1/2''- 4 1/2''- 1/2''- 4 1/2''.

2. Cut Kaisercraft patterned cardstock to fit  cover  in one piece and  cut other pieces to fit the " pages" with like 1/8'' less from each side.
3. Use Tim Holtz Gothic stencil and DecoArt Crackle paste  over the cover cardstock. Let it dry and be sure you see crackles before you continue with this piece.

 4.Make the " postcard" with Joggles Quirky Houses collage sheet. Cut  5 houses and arrange them over the patterned cardstock (light wood side). Glue them with Gel Medium and let it dry.

5. Color the Quirky houses with a mix of Ranger Distress markers. Cover  each colored house with Glossy Accents and let it dry. Do not cover the free spaces over the cardstock as we want them to absorb mists and paints later.

6. Use Travel stencil with DecoArt Modelling paste over three cardstock pieces that were cut for the horizontal inside pages. Let the paste dry.

7. Use a mix of distress Ranger inks (names in the supply list) to  color the stencilled cardstock pieces.

8.Cut three flower images from Joggles Basilius Besler Botanical plate collage sheet and glue them over the central piece as shown. Use Gel medium to glue the pieces as this is the best medium to keep everything on place forever.

9. From this step  I am going to show the finished  pieces without extra photos as this is just " add mediums/stickers" techniques.

This is a full opened project and I am going to begin with the upper piece.

And this is how it looks with closed " folds".

 The whole inside was inked with a mix of two distress inks : Wild Honey and Peacock Feathers.

 This upper  piece was covered with  dark " wood" cardstock. The pink bird from Watercolor  birds Joggles collage sheet was cut and glued over it. I covered it with a thin layer of Glossy Accents and added white pen line and dots around. The Tim Holtz stickers were added on the lower left part.

10. Add a bird from the same Watercolor birds collage sheet over the flowers, cover it with glaze and add white line and dots around as shown. Add pink  Glimmer mist ( Tattered Angels Wedding Pink) over the finished pages and let it dry.

11. Now for the closed folds- this is a place to add the real gift card inside the project.
Glue two patterned paper pieces and add 4 black  photo corners to keep the card inside.Ink cardstock edges with distress ink before you glue them.
Cut two feathers from Joggles Watercolor pink feathers collage sheet. First cover them with DecoArt Crackle glaze and let them dry.
Then add Gold fluid acrylic  to enter the crackles and glue them as shown. Outline the feathers with white pen and add  white dots.

12. The " postcard" lower piece was painted with Chalkboard paint; then the paint was wiped and just a bit of stain left over the  piece. Add Verdigris Tattered Angels mist over and wiped it from glazed houses.Add a sticker on the bottom as shown and make all outlines with white pen.

13. Use Gold fluid acrylic to cover the crackle paste crackles over the cover piece . Then add Verdigris mist and even a bit of pink mist and let the cover dry. Glue it over the basic chipboard. Add the metal trinket to make a closure.

I enter this piece to Creative Artiste Anything goes challenge- with chipboards, flowers and stencils.
 SSSS- Show us your metal
 Emerand Creek- Mother's day