Awash with Color: A Magical Card with Karen Burniston Dies & Doodlebug Designs

I think this Castle Pop-up might be my favorite die set ever. My husband and I both love sci-fi/fantasy so I flipped when I saw this release! I already had the perfect papers to go with it: Doodlebug Design Fairy Tales. I wanted to make a castle to match the one in the papers, as if the fairy brought it to life. I modified the castle to have three roofed towers instead of two. I also added flag poles on top of these towers using the stir stick from the Coffee Cup Pop-up.

Karen Burniston Castle Pop-up with Doodlebug Design Paper Fairy Tales

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Making the Card

1. Cut light pink cardstock 4 1/4 x 11 inches; fold in half to form a 4 1/4 x 5 1/2 inch top folding card base. Cut dark pink cardstock 4 x 5 1/4 inches. Cut unicorn/castle patterned paper (Fairy Tale 12x12 pad) 3 7/8 x 5 1/8 (note: be aware of pattern if you want the unicorn and castle on card as shown); adhere to dark pink. Adhere to front of card.

2. Cut rainbow/castle image shown on front of card from label page in Fairy Tales 6x6 pad. Cut dark pink cardstock 1/8 inch bigger (this will make a 1/16 inch border around it). Adhere rainbow/castle image to dark pink cardstock. Adhere to front of card where shown. Cut "Believe in the Magic!" label from same page in Fairy Tales 6x6 pad - trim as shown (the border makes it too big if you want to see the patterned paper behind it). Cut purple polkadot paper 1/8 inch bigger. Adhere "Believe in the Magic!" to purple polkadot paper using dimensional tape. Adhere to card where shown.

3. For the Castle Pop-up, cut 2 pieces of light green cardstock 3 3/4 inches by a tiny bit under 5 1/4 inches. These will go on the inside of the card leaving just enough room for the fold. Watch the following video for assembling the castle. The cardstock colors are listed below the video. I recommend watching it once, then going through the cardstock colors, and finally watching again while doing assembly.

Cardstock Colors

From the cardstock listed below, use the Castle Pop-up dies to cut the castle pieces and the Princess and Mermaid dies to cut the fairy pieces. Hint: put all little pieces in a small dish or other safe place while assembling castle. Use the stir stick (stirring end, looks like a small spoon) from the Coffee Cup Pop-up for the flag poles; cut at about 1 1/4 inches; these will be glued behind the tower roofs (may want to add a fold down the middle of the pole parts where they will attach, but leave tops round areas without folds).

Dark pink: main castle, 2 towers (do not adhere together until customized), extra drawbridge (from pop up piece)
Dark pink: flag poles (6); glue pairs back to back to form 3 poles as described above
Light pink: flags (3) to be glued to flag poles, drawbridge decorator piece, window decorator pieces (2 sets - won't use one of those with a longer side), front castle decorator piece, long wall sections (4), short wall section, tower decorator pieces (2); emboss all pieces with stones
Black and light pink: use the pop up castle piece with drawbridge to cut 6 bigger dots and 4 smaller to use as cheeks and eyes on the clouds and fairy
Purple polkadot (Fairy Tale 6x6 pad): 3 roof decorator pieces
White: a small and a large cloud (see step 4 for eyes, mouth, and cheeks - do not adhere clouds until after faces have been drawn and glued on)
Fairy - head/arms: peachy/cream; hair: brown, wings (dress): white glitter, dress: turquoise glitter, dress bottom and belt: dark pink glitter, wand and crown: silver glitter

Add a little Picked Raspberry Distress Oxide ink to some of the embossed stones using the stencil part of the dies - I used a cotton swab to apply it, you could also use a makeup applicator. Wipe dies with damp paper towel to remove excess ink.

To customize tower, cut the tower part of the castle die from dark pink cardstock and trim as shown in photo below. Adhere to front of back tower piece (tab bends back, just flatten the tab as you work on it). Adhere front of tower (tab bends forward) - be sure not to put adhesive on tabs. Adhere purple polkadot roof. Adhere window decorator piece. Adhere stone tower front.

Assemble castle, leaving off clouds. Use dark pink/pink/white twine (or pink/white twine) for drawbridge.

4. Lightly pencil eyes, mouth, and cheek placements on clouds to match those in paper pad. Use mouth stencil on fairy head/arms die to draw eyes and mouth on large cloud and mouth on small cloud with Black Copic Multiliner .2. Adhere cheeks on both clouds and eyes on small cloud. Adhere to castle as shown.

5. Optional: add Spectrum Noir Sparkle Clear to fairy hair and head/arms. From fairy head/arms piece, cut off arm that will hold wand (i.e. her left arm on right side). Assemble the fairy as shown, using white dress as wings (leave off wand for now). Adhere to front of card as shown using dimensional/mounting tape behind all but the arm holding the wand - use glue behind hand. Adhere wand in her hand.

6. Cut a piece of purple glitter cardstock just larger than Happily Ever After die. Cut a piece of dark pink glitter cardstock the size of the heart. Run though Xyron 9" Creative Station with Permanent Adhesive (you can use the 5" cartridge!). Die cut with Happily Ever After die (to die cut heart, just place it over heart part of die, then die cut).

7. Cut dotted label (Katherine Label Pop-up) from dark pink cardstock. Adhere to card where shown. Adhere "Happily ever after" and dark pink heart.

8. Cut Doodlebug Design Unicorn (also available as an SVG from Lori Whitlock) using Silhouette Cameo 3 - cardstock colors: light gray, dark gray, white, bright yellow, light pink, dark pink, bright green, orange, turquoise/blue, purple. I cut mine about 1.8 inches high but if you aren't used to cutting so small, you may want to make it larger. Assemble and adhere to card where shown using dimensional/mounting tape.

Bonus Card

I made a simpler version of the same card. Cut light pink cardstock 5 1/2 x 8 1/2 inches; fold in half to form a 4 1/4 x 5 1/2 inch top folding card base. For the front, use the small pattern castle/unicorn background from Fairy Tales 6x6 pad with dark pink in same dimensions but in a horizontal orientation as in step 1 above. Cut unicorn about 3 inches high (step 8). Cut large decorator label from Katherine Label Pop-up from light pink cardstock; cut dotted decorator label from light turquoise/blue cardstock and adhere to light pink. Adhere to card front where shown using dimensional/mounting tape. Adhere "happy birthday" sticker (12x12 Fairy Tales) where shown using dimensional/mounting tape. Adhere unicorn where shown using dimensional/mounting tape.

For the Castle Pop-up, cut the 2 pieces of light green cardstock 5 inches by a tiny bit under 4 inches. I didn't add faces to the clouds, add the extension to the tower or add the poles for the flags, and only attached 2 flags to the tower roofs as shown in the video. Assemble and adhere castle (step 2).

Using Word Set 5 - Royalty, die cut banner with "It's good to be" inside on dark pink Glitter Silk cardstock (use temporary adhesive to hold dies in place while die cutting). Cut light pink strip of cardstock just larger than banner. Adhere banner to strip then add to card using dimensional/mounting tape near inside top center. Die cut light pink banner; die cut "Queen" from purple Glitter Silk cardstock. Adhere banner and word where shown.