Pen Pot!

I am sooo excited about how this turned out! I think it is so cute. I needed a hostess gift for my mom since she is putting our family up in Florida next week, and this is what I came up with (click on the images to get a larger view--there is a few details that are not visible in the thumbnail):

It is a pot to put pens in and the clips are to leave messages.
I started with a tin bucket from the floral department at Wal-Mart, I covered it with paper from KI memories. I used scallop scissors on the top edge of the base paper and a crimper on the accent strip. (the crimping allowed me to use a straight piece of paper but still hugged the angled sides of the bucket. There is tiny white rickrack along the bottom. The letters are the "Go Slim" font from Ellison Design for the Big Shot. I die cut "pens & etc." from SU!'s Old Olive paper.

Then I went crazy with the ribbon :D. There are all sorts of ribbon and other fibers on the handle. For some extra whimsy, there are punched flowers (SU!'s Spring Flower Punch) attached with wire springs on the handle.

The flower is made from Ellison Design's oval tag thin cut die, and the circle punches from SU!. The clothespins and flower are hot glued to wooden shish kabob skewers. There is about 1.5 cups of white beans in the bottom to anchor the skewers and pens and pencils.

VOILA! A hostess gift.

I just hope my mom has half as much fun receiving it as I did making it.
What do you think?