White Elephant

Today we are having a gift exchange at work. The kind where you bring something wrapped, you draw numbers and when it is your turn you choose a gift or perhaps steal one from someone else. Our spend limit is $10.00. If I wanted to make sure my gift was a hot ticket I would wrap up a bottle of wine or $10.00 in lottery tickets. Instead I made some items to go along with some fancy hand soaps and lotions.

You know you are a crafter when.... your gift begins with the wrapping, lol! I loved this idea from Tosha. Being fresh out of kraft bags, I used a white one I had. It was too WHITE to leave be, so I covered the front with some fabulous new October Afternoon papers. I apologize for the sorry photos! The top of the lid has the same paper that I used on the tag. I stitched. I added punched borders. I added sparkle. I spent way too much time on the wrapping. But it was fun.

The gingerbread man is a Sizzix die. I adhered the paper to a medium weight coaster before cutting it out. I "sugared" the whole tag with some glass glitter.

I included a matching magnetic list pad and a set of Hershey nuggets wrapped in a tin.

Making little gifts is so much fun!! Hopefully they will also be enjoyed by whoever gets them!

Christmas Card Sample

'Tis the season for shopping, cards, baking and more. Not so sure the cards will be part of my preparations this year. There are just not enough hours in the day. But here is another one of the cards we did at the Stamp a Stack a few weeks ago. At least I can say I helped make some cards, lol.

The stamp set is SU's "Come to Bethlehem", inked in Soft Suede and stamped onto vanilla card stock. The sentiment is stamped in Cherry Cobbler and the star has a little clear rhinestone in the center. The Cherry Cobbler layer was embossed with a folder from Sizzix, it has a frame of poinsettias and vines. We added some dots of gold leaf pen to the centers of the flowers. The stamped panel is up on dimensionals but otherwise no bulky embellishments to put the postage over a normal stamp.

I tried to post this before work this morning, trying to cram more things in than time will allow and ended up spilling my drink all over the keyboard. Sheesh!!! Luckily the keyboard seemed to dry out while I was at work. Deep breath, lol.

Stable Box

I can't believe that Thanksgiving is now just a week away. That means Christmas is around the corner. Each year it seems to fly at me at a faster rate! Much of my shopping has been done and this year I am also going to try to do the wrapping a bit ahead. I am usually the one wrapping, decorating, baking and cleaning all in one last mad dash the day before.

Here is a small bag I made that will nicely hold a gift card and some small candies.

The image is called "Away in the Manger", from Stampavie's Tina Wenke collection. I colored it mostly with Letraset Promarkers. The acetate "bag" is half of a A2 card size box with wide ribbon attached for handles. I thought I had some kraft colored filling (note to self: buy Christmas wrapping supplies!). Next best thing...the scrap pile! I cut and crimped several slivers of so saffron card stock. At first I thought it looked like straw which matched the scene in the stamp. Now I think it looks like crinkle cut french fries, lol! I must be hungry.

Simple & fun!

Snow Much Fun

Last week I held a Christmas card stamp a stack with friends. Finding time to create has been difficult at best, so prepping for a class was a challenge. But I miss that time of teaching and hanging out with friends so much that I made it a priority.

Here is one of the cards we made using SU's new set called "Snow Much Fun". I {{heart}} the snowmen in this set!

I don't usually plan images that require coloring for a class like this but snowmen are on the minimal side. They even used my Copics {{gasp}}! We used the new color Pool Party...my favorite of the new colors. The top of the panel was embossed leaving the bottom blank so we could stamp the cute little birdie on the snowball. We made 4 each of 3 designs, embellishments were kept to a minimum. I didn't even use ribbon this time, that was probably a first. I like the design like it is, it won't require any additional postage. But it would also be simple enough to add some ribbon or do-dads if the design is too plain for your liking.

I will be back tomorrow with a Stampavie project, hope to see you then.

Rockin' Christmas

I hope you had a wonderful weekend. Mine did not turn out as expected. On Friday I took the day off because we were supposed to sign mortgage refinance papers. At the last minute we found out the papers were not ready so I decided to spend the day running errands and having lunch with my husband. On my way to meet him, I was rear ended causing me to be the cream in a car sandwich. Totally messed up my day, not to mention my car. Fortunately, my car is drive-able, minus a rear bumper. The car that hit me looked totaled--cracked windshield, deployed airbags, crumpled up engine--had to be towed away. After initially being really mad, I realized that God's hand of protection was on me. If you had seen the other guy you too would marvel at the little damage my little Vibe (not to mention me) sustained. My back is quite sore but I was able to enjoy the rest of the rainy weekend.

My creative time was spent making a tag using a Stampavie image called, Rocking Horse, part of the Tina Wenke line.

The shape of the tag is 2 layers of a Sizzix die set. The bottom layer is embossed and the second layer is a piece of designer paper from Authentique. Everything got the Photo Distress ink once over. I have been trying out some Promarkers from Letraset. They are alcohol based makers but their tips vary from the Copics. The firmer nibs on the Promarkers do take some getting used to. After the image was colored, I added some Prismacolor pencil details for age and depth. I sewed on a strip of heathered red felt. The shape looked like a bell to me so I added the knocker on the bottom.

That is it for me. I appreciate you stopping by.

Winter Birds

Well, thanks to some friends coming over to stamp, the pit I call my stamp studio is now clean. No, I didn't make my friends help clean up, I was so embarrassed that I cleaned it before they came over. I invite people over for dinner sometimes just to give me the added kick in the rear I need to tidy things up. Tell me I am not the only one who does that?!

The weekend was also very productive. I got some Stampavie Projects done, baked a peaches and cream pie, made a second (double) batch of spaghetti sauce with meatballs and cooked up a pot roast for the family. The best part was hubby doing clean up after I used just about every dish, pot and appliance in the kitchen. Love that guy!!

I even snuck in creative time. Here is a sample I posted to the Stampavie blog today. The image is called Winter Birds from the Tina Wenke collection.

Kraft serves as the base for this card, anchoring a darker/richer color scheme. The image pretty much takes up the whole card, just a bit of room for some crinkled ribbon. After I colored the image with Copics, I added fine glitter to all the areas of snow.

I have a busy week ahead of me but hope to be back again soon with another project.

Have a great day!

Christmas Stocking

I am back! Today was my day to post on the Stampavie blog so I might was well share it here too in case some of you don't follow over there. (I have to plug the Stampavie blog for a second though, the DT has posted some incredible projects lately!!)

Stampavie released a stack of new images for the holidays and I chose a cute one by Tina Wenke for this card. It is called Rabbit with Christmas Stocking and the sentiment is also from a new Tina set, called Peace on Earth.

I tried my hand at using Promarkers on this image. They are alcohol based markers similar in concept to Copics but their tips are much different. It took me a bit to get the hang of using them but it was fun to experiment. I got some new die goodies at my LSS, the arch die is from Sizzix and the fence is from....???, I can't remember. I'll have to get back to you on that, but it was a new company to me.

My mother's visit is winding down, she will fly home on Thursday. We are trying to enjoy the couple of days we have left. Tonight she is cooking up potato pancakes with home made applesauce. Mmmmm, I can't wait!!