Upcycling!

Okay, I know it has been forever since I posted.  Being a full time working mom makes it a little hard to get to the extra stuff sometimes.  I was definitely inspired by something a little unusual recently though... tissue boxes - specifically Puffs brand - which have super-cute patterns on them in stores now.  Check out this simple, but really cute one.  The box is mostly plain, but it has these super cute circular patterns made up of purple teardrop/pear shapes.  

So, I thought that instead of simply tossing this in the recycling when the tissues were gone, I'd do something more creative with it and "upcycle" it.  Fun, right!?

My first step was to determine what part of the pattern I wanted to use.  Sometimes, I'm just a little lazy, and my circle punch was a really easy way to catch part of this pattern, so I used it repeatedly around the tissue box to capture the center, smaller part of the circular pattern.  When done, I had a bunch of these fun circles to play with.


Utimately, I decided to use them on a girly disco card.  The dense circle pattern was reminiscent of a disco ball, and I had a stamp set from My Favorite Things that I was just dying for an excuse to use.  The purple teardrops in the pattern on the tissue box also became the inspiration for the purple to pink color palette on the card.  I chose three of the Puffs punchouts (I nearly always group in threes) and added a little bling to the center.  My Disco Queen was stamped with staz-on and colored with water color pencils. I then used a blender pen to achieve the look I wanted.


All in all, I'm happy with how the card turned out.  You'd never know that the circles came from a tissue box and not some fancy designer paper pack!  Next time you are looking for a little inspiration, take a look around at things you might normally consider trash and see if there is a way you can turn it in to something that can brighten a friend's day.