Recipe for crazy fun

Best way to enjoy an evening. First, get a four year old little girl who is game for anything. Second, decide to decorate gingerbread cookies. Third, make sure you have matching aprons. (A key ingredient in happy baking.) Fourth, do NOT take your eyes of said four year old...the icing does not last if you do. Lastly, once the sugar high has ended fall asleep!

Here is a layout I did of my niece, Gillian, and I making cookies. We had an absolute blast. I pulled out the Apron Strings Smaller than a Breadbox December kit. Which had a sampling of my little shoebox. This is from their Winter Wonderland collection. This paper is so playful and naturally I am hoarding the rest. You may see it pop up here soon, but for now it is under lock down while I decide on my next holiday layout/ project.

Getting ready for next year...

Okay, so January is here which means I have less than 12 months until next December. Seriously!! So, I am relying on Jingle Belles to get me up and moving towards a new Christmas card goal. This week's prompt calls for presents. We can have presents on the card or we can use wrapping paper. I went with a fun present stamp given to me by my good friend, Dara. I pulled out my Apron Strings kit and played with some Echo Park paper. I really layered on the paper. I could not seem to stop myself. Hope that you enjoy.

More Christmas

Since I was making cards anyway, I started playing. I cut and organized scraps and began making tags. These three came together pretty quickly. It is always nice to use some old paper. Hope that you enjoy.

Christmas in June...and heading into July

I am gearing up for the holidays and trying to get my ducks in a row. There are only six months left until the holidays and I need to be ready. So, I headed over to Jingle Belles and worked on their Christmas card challenge. This week it is on layers. The theme is "all bundled up" and we were encouraged to use three or more layers. I look at this card and think... "I threw everything I had on it." I have a tag, a flower, a brad, ribbon and multiple pattern papers. Still, I am happy with the result.

Most of the papers are from Graphic 45. I cannot leave them alone when it comes to Christmas! Hope that you enjoy!

December will be here before we know it

Thanks to Jingle Belles I am back on track! They have a fabulous challenge this week. In honor of Earth day, they are encouraging participants to reuse or repurpose items that would otherwise be thrown out.

This was more fun than I anticipated! First, I started gathering up items that were "trash bound" and reviewed them. I came up with a scrap of fabric, an old tan envelop and a group of clothing tags. Now, most of you know, fabric is not my medium. It makes me nervous. But, I put on my big girl panties and went for it! I cut it into little hearts. I figured I could not screw it up that royally and I didn't! Next, came the lovely tan envelope from some junk mail. I stamped a "from the heart" image. When I was done, I stamped a few other Christmas images and saved them for later. I then moved onto the clothing tags. I stamped a tree image onto the inside of these tags. There was already a fun chain-link image there, so the tree image in brown really looked fun and textured. Lastly, I pulled some paper from the box o' Christmas scraps. I would love to tell you what paper, but I do not remember as they are now scraps. Pulled some buttons and paper flowers from the stash and Bob's your uncle, we have Christmas cards!

I am back in the game and making some serious headway, thanks to the lovely ladies of Jingle Belles. Seriously, anyone who needs some Christmas card inspiration should head right over. They have what you need! Now come December 1st, all I have to do is turn on the Hallmark Channel and address my homemade cards! Thanks again Jingle Belles!

Oh, the holly tree

Thank you Jingle Belles! Another song prompt to get my Christmas card making back on track. The suggestion is to add ivy and holly. Luckily, I am using graphic 45 and Making Memories. Both had some fun holly accents and were so pretty with a lot of old world charm. The design team's inspiration was fabulous and inspired me to collage.

It was more fun than I could possibly imagine. This may be a new trend for me...playful collage.

Tis the Season

The season for making Christmas cards that is. Thanks again to Jingle Belles and Sparkle's blog for giving me inspiration. They also gave me guidelines which is really good for me as I am totally a rule follower.

So, the goal was to use a sketch. Actually, to use a special sketch that both Jingle Belles and Sketchy Thursdays teamed up to create. Like it gets any better than that. Then, Sparkle Smith gave her Christmas card challenge and it was a color challenge. Sparkle's Christmas challenge encouraged us to use, dark and light blue, silver and white. So, with a sketch and a color pallet, it was pretty much easy living. I even got to use up the rest of my Bo Bunny Christmas paper from last season. Let's hear it for scraps! And great challenges!

Treats in the Mail

Oh how I love to get treats in the mail! Yippee Skippee! I just got my new Apron Strings Smaller than a Breadbox kit in the mail. Those of you who belong to a kit club understand the joy of getting a whole new box of possibilities. The most fun about this kit is... it contains October Afternoon paper.

Confession time: I have a slight obsession (need serious therapy) with October Afternoon. The two lines I would say that I hoard the most are October Afternoon and Sassafrass Lass. Judge not folks, I know there are a few of you out there who are closet hoarders. Perhaps your fix is Basic Grey or Graphic 45. But we can all relate to the desire to find the perfect pictures, perfect story for this our favorite paper.

So, in trying to use up stash, clean out supplies and get over hoarding problem, I have devised a plan. I am using this October Afternoon Modern Homemaker line on two super cool home binders for family Christmas gifts. Shh, don't tell. A home binder is simply a binder with important numbers, chore list, favorite recipes and anything else you might need to create household order. The Flylady has one and several magazines sell options for one. But my sister who is the single mother to a four year old is getting a handmade one from yours truly. Yep, that is how much I love my sister, I am wasting... I mean using October Afternoon paper on her. :)

I promise to show you the results when I am finished. Thanks for letting me using this post as group therapy for paper hoarding!

A no-red Christmas card

The dogs have been walked and fed. The bathroom and kitchen have been cleaned, and there is a brisket happily cooking in the crockpot. It is finally time for some crafting.

Thanks to Jingle Belles, I am working on my Christmas cards. This weeks challenge is a Christmas card without any RED. It was so hard! I adore red. I try to sneak red into everything I do. In fact, I just got some cute red and white polka dotted ruffle ribbon. So, this took some thinking.

Luckily, I got a new stamp set from Stampin' Up. This is the Loads of Love set. I used some paper from the Graphic 45 Christmas Past Collection. This is the Letters to Santa sheet. Lastly, I used a set of lined post-it notes. All in all, I am happy with the result and cannot wait to try another one. Thanks Jingle Belles for getting me outside my comfort zone!

Getting the flock out of here

Years and years ago, I purchased flocking material to give my scrapbooks and cards some fun, velvety texture. And of course, it has stayed in the package until now. I also had some fun kid cutouts I got in an old kit from a friend a few years ago. Today, I am proud to say, they were all used!!

Thanks to Jingle Belles Christmas challenge, I pulled out the goodies! Their theme was "Baby, it's cold outside." They were encouraging felt, mittens, warm, etc. What is warmer and cozier than velvet flocking? Maybe some hot chocolate, but it is so hard to get cocoa on a card!

A few Christmas cards down, already I am feeling organized!!

Hello February

January has flown by and now February is here in full force. One of my goals for 2011 was to stick with my plan to make one to two Christmas cards every week until December. I decided that I would give myself the month of January off, but come February, I would work like a fiend.

To get me through this abbreviated year of cardmaking are several sites. There is Jingle Belles that will have challenges weekly. And Sparkle Creations also has weekly Christmas challenges. Plenty of inspiration to keep me going. But today, I started with an idea and some scraps. Love to be able to pull out some Christmas scraps and finish a card.

Gearing up for Christmas, here we go!

Back in the craft saddle again

The folks at Snapfish have sent me my Christmas photos. Add that to the December Apron Strings kit I have been itching to play with and we have a layout. I went online to the Apron Strings blog and used their suggestions for Friday 5 Challenge. I also went to Sketchy Thursday and used their sketch as a jumping off point. I had a lot of fun with this layout. Used Fancy Pants Designs Tradition the stripe and scallop sheet. It's double sided and I was able to use one sheet both sides. I then also altered a journal card from the same line. I used a strip of velvet ribbon which I cut into two pieces and one button from my stash.

Another Round of Christmas Cards

Thank you Friday Sketchers for your fabulous sketch! It got the creative engine running and gave me a fun way to play with my new Bella Road Paper pack. Between delightful sketches and playful paper I will survive this holiday season. Thanks Friday Sketchers and Bella Road!