Crazicards Crafty Blog

In my previous tutorial we went through the steps required to make your exploding box and we inked and stamped all of the panels before putting the box together.

If you missed that first part you can see it again here.

Now for the fun part and that is making your butterflies and making them float inside your box.

What you will need

• Plain White card for stamping, you can use coloured if you prefer.
• Butterfly stamps of your choice - Gina K "Take Flight"
• Ink pads in your chosen colour - I used Black archival
• Acetate sheet
• Waxed Cotton thread
• Glitter or Sakura gel pens
• A fine liner pen in the same colour as your ink pad. 
• Promarkers
• Wet glue, mini pegs or paper clips

Step 1

Stamp you butterfly out 4 or 5 times depending on how many you wish to use for your project.

For this I used a dye based ink as I am going to use Promarkers to colour in my butterflies.

Once the ink is thoroughly dry cut out you butterflies as close to the image as possible.

Step 2

Now we need to stamp the backs of the butterflies so that when they are floating about they look real and don't have a white underside.

To do this place your stamp flat onto your work surface and ink it up with you dye based ink.

Now take one of your butterflies and place it gently down onto your rubber stamp.

Now you need to gently press down so that the ink from your stamp is transferred to the back of your butterfly. You can use a brayer for this step if you prefer. Don't worry if you have white edges we will correct that in a minute.

Step 3

You might end up with a small white line around the edges of your stamped image, if you haven't then skip straight to step 4.

This is easily fixed with a black fine liner pen or felt tip. Carefully go round the edges of your butterfly and colour in the white edges with your fine liner.

Taking care not to load too much ink onto the card as it may seep through to the other side and muddy you image.

Step 4

Once you are happy with the underside of your butterfly you can then go on to colour it in with your Promarkers.

Start with the top first and then once you are happy colour in the underside making sure that you follow the same colour pattern as you chose for the top.

This is to prevent the colours muddying up. Once you have coloured in all 5 you will need to make the antenna for each butterfly.

For this I used black waxed cotton and you can also add other embellishments if you like. I added a little black glitter so that it catches the light when the butterflies are bobbing around when the box is opened.

Tip: Don't add too much embellishment as this will make the butterflies too heavy and rather than float they will flop over.

Step 5

Next you will need to cut 5 thin strips of acetate, mine were just under 1cm wide and started off at 8cms long.

You need to make it longer than you will need as setting the height of the butterflies will require adjustments as you go along.

This is the trickiest part of the whole project and will take a little time to achieve the look that you want so please be patient.

Take your acetate strips and attach them to the underside of your butterflies with Glossy Accents , Collall Glue Gel or something similar. Take care not to crease the acetate as you need it to bounce once the bottom is attached to the box.

Hold the acetate in place with a mini peg or a paper clip until it is completely dry. Glossy accents dries a lot quicker that silicone gel so depending on how patient you are you can use either one....

Once the acetate has been attached to your butterflies you can then proceed to position then inside your box.

I chose to vary the height of my butterflies, to do this you simply place the acetate onto your box panels and slide it up and down until you get a level that you are happy with and where your butterfly will float quite nicely without flopping over, snip off any excess acetate.

To attach the base I used a combination of extra strong tape and a dab of glossy accents. Again take care not to crease the acetate as this will cause your butterfly to flop rather than float.

Tip:  Make sure to check the position of your butterflies each time with the box sides lifted up as you want the butterflies to spring out when the box opens. If they are all clumped together you run the risk of them getting tangled together.

And there you have it - An Exploding Box with a Twist. 

Here is another example of an exploding box with a twist. For this one I made some lovely little flowers and butterflies with Cosmic Shimmer Film and Angelina Fibres.

I hope you have had fun making your own boxes. The key is to experiment and have fun making them. Please feel free to send me the pictures of your completed boxes with a brief summary of the products you have used and I will show them off in an update blog. Send your images to support 'at' crazicards co uk.

Don't forget to visit my website for some great crafty bargains.

Thank you for reading and until next time Happy Crafting xx