Frosted Frosty Pin

This time of year there are lots of arts and crafts shows to browse. I recently attended a great show and found lots of great items to inspire me. There was jewelry made of sea glass, wine accessories made of cork, wonderfully knit items and so much more. The talents of some folks just amazes me! And inspires me!

I have a box full of glass slides and copper foil that I have used to create pins with over the years. I was inspired to drag out that box and create something new. This time I used a Stampavie image called "Snowy Cuddles" by Penny Johnson.

The top piece of glass is a frosted piece measuring 2" square, made by Inkssentials (a Ranger product). The image was embossed onto the frosted side using clear embossing powder. This technique originated with Ellen Hutson many moons ago. The frosted glass adds a very fun dimension to the finished piece. Of course, you can always use clear glass as well.

The image was stamped and colored with Copics before sandwiching it between the 2 pieces of glass. I added a piece of pattern paper to the back to hide the bleeding markers. The pin back was glued on with SU's Crystal Effects.

They also make nice magnets!

Now that it is all done and assembled I wish I had given them rosey cheeks! Oh well, guess I will have to make another ;).

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!

Crafty Hair Accessories

We have 2 sons and I love them dearly. My husband, the gem that he is, has taught them to ooh and ahh over my creations and to even seem to appear interested. But they are teenage boys after all. My crafting does little for them and there is little I can make for them personally. Now my baking talents are a whole other ball of ribbon, lol.

I do however have 2 young nieces and for Christmas this year I am having a ball putting together little bags of do-dads for them. I do a LOT of couponing so have scored free lip glosses, eye shadows, nail polish, hair brushes, etc. I made some cute hair accessories for each of them using some of the items in my craft room.

One of the girls loves pink and the other purple. The pink flowers are from Stampin' Up and the purple ones are from Prima. I simply glued them onto some hair pins I picked up from Hobby Lobby. The tags were simply stamped in coordinating colors onto shipping tags.

So simple but fun! I hope they like them.

Thanks for visiting!

40...Something

In my office we hold a monthly food day to celebrate those with a birthday that month. One of our staff is turning 40 so as a little gag, we brought little bags of 40 "something". We had bags of 40 almonds, 40 pieces of yarn, 40 leaves and various other items. It wasn't intended to be anything fancy or costly, just imaginative.

This staffer happens to be on Weight Watchers and she has given me charge over her bag of dark chocolate Dove candy. I dole out 1 piece a day. Yep, call me the Dove Nazi, lol. The best part is I can help myself when ever I want. For a biggie birthday like 40 it seemed only appropriate to gift her 40 Dove chocolates!

They didn't fit nicely in a Ziploc so I packed them in a medium sized kraft lunch sack. The crafter in me couldn't leave it at that. I gussied up a clothes pin and added a tag. I took the negative created by the flower die and used it as a stencil on the tag. The sentiment was a no brainer, lol.

Easy Peasy lemon squeezie!

Curiously, she has not brought back the bag to be rationed ;) I guess I'll let it go this time.

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!

Boo!

Happy Halloween!

Just dropping in with a little gift bag I made.

This one is easy peasy! Start with a piece of 8 1/2 x 11. Score the long sides 2" from each side, then score the shorter side at 4 1/2 and 6 1/2. Cut in to create the flaps for the box and adhere. Add a handle of your choosing and done! My handle is attached with brads so the handle moves out of the way to access the goods!

The image is called "Batty" from Stampavie's Penny Johnson line. He was colored with Copics. I cut the flags for the banner by hand and added foam letters, assembled it with brads and a bit of orange twine. The top spider web border was punched and added after the box was assembled.

Have a great day, I hope you get nothing but treats!

Share the Warmth

Happy Tuesday! I enjoyed making the coffee cup gift card holders so much a couple of weeks ago that I made another! This time I used designer paper on the front along with an image by Stampavie.

Totally festive right?? The paper is from a line called Simple Stories, I loved the warm feel of the colors and the pattern was sized right for the cup. There is a corrugated (crimped) cozy around the cup but the rather large image mostly covers it up. The Penny Johnson image is called "All Warm Inside". The sentiment is also from Stampavie, it is in the "Holiday Wishes" set.

Here is a picture of the insert holding a Dunkin' Donuts card.

The cup will fit inside an A2 envelope. I will say that several people I have shown this to have not been able to figure out how to "work" the card, lol. Maybe the back needs a big note to "pull here". You could place the fold at the top with a fixed lid so it opens like a top fold card. That would probably be easier for some folks to figure out but I don't think it would be as fun. But it would be a shame for someone to not realize there was a gift card inside. Can you imagine??? The thought of it makes the frugal person in me shudder!!

Have a great day.

All Prettied Up

Hello! Have you adjusted to your fall routine yet? We are working on it at our house. Eldest son's last minute decision to play JV football is throwing us for a loop but as with most things, we just roll with it. The sleep in until the very last minute and then rush like a mad man so they don't miss the bus and have to pay the Dad taxi $5 for a ride to school routine is what makes me crazy.

I wanted a little something for the boss lady who is celebrating a birthday. I finally tackled my pig sty of a stamp room last night and had just a wee bit of time to put a gift together.

Remember this card from last month?

Well, I recently purchased these fun, vintage style bottles of lotion and hand soap by JR Watkins. Smelly lotions are a nice gift right? These particular ones are lemon scented.... so wonderful! They just needed a little dressing up to make a match to the card.

The covers will easily slide off so the products can be used. Easy Peasy.

Gotta run!

Thanks for visiting!