Christmas Gifts

Here are a couple of things I have done recently for my MIL. She recently did a complete kitchen overhaul and she picked out these colors to accent her kitchen. First is a coaster pen/pencil box that I did for her. I really liked how it turned out. Not sure where the paper is from, as she picked it up for me. I sanded the edges and sponged them with Basic Brown. I used my CAD to punch the holes and thread the brown yarn. The Prima flowers are held together with a bronze brad.

This is the journal that she wanted to coordinate with the coaster box. I also fancied up a couple of jumbo paper clips to match the theme. I used the flower die cuts with my Cuttlebug and used E6000 to hold it all together.

Sorry for the short post....it's feeding time for Camryn! Thanks for looking!

Christmas Ornaments

Here is another Christmas gift I have been working on. My MIL ordered some of these to give to some friends of hers. I saw this idea on Trudee's blog and just loved the idea. These are really quite inexpensive to make. I got the ornament bulbs at Hobby Lobby when they were 40% off. So for $3.99 (less 40%) for 12 bulbs makes them about $0.20 a piece. I used DP from American Crafts which I also got at Hobby Lobby when it was 50% off. I added some Soft Snow Twinkle Flakes inside of the bulbs and then tied them off with red ribbon, which was $1.99 (minus 40% from my coupon) from JoAnn's. As I said, this was definitely an inexpensive gift.

(Sorry about the wild and crazy ribbon on these. I wanted to hurry and take a picture before I had to pack them off to my MIL this afternoon). TFL!

New Banner

Like my new banner? Beth Silaika over at Freckled Fun Designs does wonders with her designs. If you haven't seen her work yet, stop by Freckled Fun Designs and check out her amazing work! I haven't really played around with the colors of my blog yet to get everything to coordinate.....I'm just happy to have my banner!

Beth also created some watermarks for me so I can be legal in the blogging & copyright world when posting things. Now I just have to figure out how to use them!

Camryn has been teething big time the last few days....low-grade fever, runny nose which turns into congestion, irritability, drooling, etc. so not much has been done in the craft room. I get to "play" tomorrow night so I hope to have some goodies to share this weekend with you.

People Say We Monkey Around

I finally got a chance to play with my new Changito Monkey Pair. I've had this stamp for a while, but just haven't had the time to use it. I also got the Changito Monkey clear stamp set. Lots of cool stamps in that set.

I used my new Basic Grey - Scarlet's Letter paper. Hobby Lobby recently had 50% off their paper, including their packaged paper, so I stocked up on some Basic Grey papers that I had my eye on for some time. I got Scarlet's Letter, Blush & Pheobe. Now if I could only find some more time to use it all. I used my oval Coluzzle to cut the oval shapes. Nothing fancy....just wanted to at least clock in some time in the craft room today....it seems to help the soul, YKWIM??

Supplies: Paper-SU! Old Olive, Basic Black, Whisper White, Basic Grey Scarlet Letter; Ink-Basic Brown, StazOn; Accessories-Black eyelets, Black brads, ribbon from Michael's, Coluzzle, SU! Ticket Corner Punch; Font-TIA Printalicious from Autumn Leaves

Thank You

Here is a card that I made for Kirsten to thank her for the Naptime Nuggets that I won. The base of the card is 5 1/4 x 5 1/4. I used the new DCWV glittered All Dressed Up stack. I just love that paper in that stack. I used my Coluzzle to cut out the two circles on the left side of the card and used decorative scissors to make the circle scalloped. The frame is from the Setting the Stage stamp set from MFT that I won from Kirsten, stamped with Jet Black StazOn on Very Vanilla from SU! The sentiment is from the set Much Appreciated from SU! And I used some black velvet ribbon from Michael's to finish off the card. I didn't really feel like I had to do much to the card since the paper was so ornate. I struggled for a while because I felt like I wasn't doing enough to the card, but the more I tried to do, it looked too busy. Since the paper was my inspiration, I left it at that. I hope she likes it!

Nuggets from Kirsten

A couple of weeks back, Kirsten (Confessions of a Naptime Stamper) had a contest going on over on her blog for some Naptime Nuggets. (I'm sure you have all seen Kirsten's work, but if you haven't, make sure you stop by her blog and check it out! She does AMAZING and INSPIRING work!) You could get a couple of entries in by answering a few questions and by posting a MFT (My Favorite Things) card that you had made. (here's mine) I had never left any comments for blog candy contests before, but since I had a MFT card that I had recently made, I figured "Why not?" And.....lone and behold......I won!!! I couldn't believe it! My first time playing and I won! This is what I won.....Setting the Stage stamp set from MFT, some Bazzill Cha-Ching brads, and some great May Arts ribbon. I hope to have some time soon to start playing with my goodies! Thanks Kirsten!

Long time no see...I mean post!

Sorry I've been MIA the past few days. We've been pretty busy.....plus I took a day and went to IKEA...again! I just love that place! I can never get enough. It's a good thing my credit card has a limit on it or I'd be in deep trouble! I had to return something by the 27th of October from my last trip there and you can never just return something....you have to peruse the store to see all the new stuff they got since the last visit and the next thing you know.....your cart is full! As my cousin and I were taking our full cart out to the van, I realized that I didn't have my keys. Yep, you guessed it, I left them in the ignition! I guess I was just so excited to have a day off from the girls and go shopping at IKEA that I just hopped right on out of the van....with the doors locked! I called a local tow truck company and they were going to charge me $50 to unlock the van. I don't think so! (I wasn't about to return any of my goodies just to get my keys out of the van!) My step-dad had a brilliant idea of calling the local Dodge dealership and have them make up another key. They did and delivered it to me in the IKEA parking lot. They didn't even charge me, so I had to at least tip the driver for bringing the key to me. I don't think I'll be living that one down for a while!

Okay, on to what I've been doing in my craft room. A couple of weeks ago, Peggy was looking through the galleries on SCS and came across the tiles that I had posted. She PM'd me and asked a few questions about the tiles. She mentioned she wanted to learn how to make the tiles because she wanted to do a charity benefit to help her young niece who has cancer. She also wanted to know if I had other craft ideas that were easy and inexpensive to make that they could sell at the benefit. So I emailed Peggy a bunch of pictures with directions, costs, etc. to help her begin her stash of goodies for the benefit. I told her that I would be happy to make some things and send them her way. Here are some things that I made for her.

Everything in this gift set coordinates together. All the paper is from DCWV. First I recovered a composition book. I purchased the book at Target for $0.12, like the one I re-did for myself. I used brown ric-rac ribbon on it to cover where the paper met. The alphabet stamps are from Hero-Arts and are stamped in Basic Brown from SU!. I added some Prima flowers and the pink brad in the middle is from the Target $1 spot.

Next I re-did a 4x6 acrylic picture frame. Again the paper is from DCWV, alphabet stamps are from the Target $1 spot, oval punches from SU!, post-it notes and medium calendar. The coaster box is covered in paper from DCWV and laced up with twine from IKEA. The pink Pentel pen just has a piece of the matching paper rolled on the inside.

I also recovered a photo album book and made two ornaments with the rolled up paper (like the ones on Trudee's blog), but I forgot to take pictures of them before I packaged up the box. Hopefully Peggy likes my goodies that I sent. It was for a good cause, I was happy to help. Thanks for looking, I'll have more tomorrow!