Stationery Cigar Box

My dear friend Carole needed some cards and

I really wanted to make something special for her.

I have had some cigar boxes sitting around ever since

Jen Lowe, the queen of enablers, showed me her

local cigar store where she purchased them

for her fabulous purses. They sell the boxes for $2.

Who would resist such a bargain?

I did take this box to show my stamp group,

The Wild Women of the West Stampers,

along with my stash of "someday I'll do something with these"

cigar boxes. My stash is now sadly depleted and I

have orders for more cigar boxes that will fit stationery.

I can hardly wait to see what the amazingly

talented Wild Women,

Donna, Nancy and Eva, will do with their cigar boxes.

Oh, I am such an enabler and I learned it all from Jen Lowe.

The lace look paper is another discontinued Karen Foster design. (sigh)

It is cut to fit the raised area on the top of the box.

The edges of the paper are distressed with Ranger

Distressed Inks. Stamps by Stampin' Up (please no one

die of shock here) and die cut alphabet is Cuttlebug's Harmony.

I did use my trusty Stamp-a-ma-jig to perfectly position

the two stamps.

The flowers are painted with Twinkling H2O's.

Lightly sand the area that the paper is to be glued to

for better adhesion.

PPA is my glue of choice for this type of crafting

as the paper is so smooth when the project is dry.

Note here: Do your inked distressing before you glue your

paper to the box. In order to get enough glue brushed on

to enable the paper to adhere well you will have some

squishing out around the edges.

Even a little glue on the paper acts as a resist and

you distressing ink will not work on those area, no

matter how well you think you have wiped it off.

Spotty distressing is just tacky, LOL.

I will tell you with hard won knowledge,

that the sides of your cigar box may not be square.

It took me a while, but I finally figured it out.

The interior of the cigar box is nicely finished off

with adhesive backed black felt.

This insures that my carefully crafted cards

are adequately protected.

I also placed black felt strips on the bottom of the box.

One of my favorite things about this stationery box

is that the beautiful wood shows.

Most of the boxes that I brought home had

very nice finishes and leaving

them to sit open for several weeks totally

eliminated the cigar smell.