Christmas Ideas

Here I am once again after realising that I need to use Mozilla to be able to bring my photos through to my blog.
Gosh its been a warm day today. First of all it was raining and then I heard it was 90' humidity.  I wondered why my feet were kind of sticking to the floor.

Here is a Christmas Cracker which I cased from Andrea Walford. This was also my Secret Santa gift when the Stamparoo's met for a Christmas gathering at San Churro's in Hillarys Boat Harbour.  I have used a toilet roll for the inside but if I were to put something in it I would have used a kitchen roll of some type. I have decided to use this one as one of the decorations on my tree so have left it empty.  You need some red tissue paper, some DSP and ribbon. I have looked online to see if the tutorial is still available but I cannot find it. To view it you will need to be a member of her Paper Crafters library. I cannot seem to find any tutorials anywhere for this cracker so I will give you a quick run through of how the tissue paper part is done.
For the ruffles on the end you will need to pull out one sheet of tissue paper. Fold it in half so that you can find the centre. Unfold it and then fold one side of the long side toward the middle to the midline. Do the same to the other side. Then fold in again to the midline on both sides. Do this one more time until your tissue paper is about 3" wide.  You will then need glue down one side to keep them together while cutting little strips about 2/3 way, careful not to cut to far. This forms the ruffle. You will need to do this twice as you will need one for each end. Its quite a tedious job but if you have one of those scissors with the three or four blades on it you will be finished in no time.

These cards were also cased from Sue Madex Creations.  The original  card featured the Snow Flurry on the front with the Silver Glimmer Paper. I decided that you could only get 9 flurries from 1 sheet so I used the Ornament Keepsake Dies instead.  I have Stamped the Snowflake Soiree (holiday catalogue) image onto the Whisper White and embossed with White Embossing Powder.  I then used the Emboss Resist technique and went over with a dauber with Bashful Blue, Marina Mist and Not Quite Navy ink.  The card is folded in half and then the front part is folded in half backwards toward the spine of the card. Be sure when writing your message it is not visible when the front of the card is closed.  The Whisper White card that you can see has been embossed with Northern Flurry Folder. The Ornament Keepsake baubles are one with Silver Embossing Powder and the other with White Embossing Powder. I decided I liked the White better. I have kept the card very simple with no sentiments as I feel it does not need anything else. Check out Sue Madex website to check out her lovely card. She also gives the dimensions for the Z Fold.

For Christmas I decided to make some biscuits to give to my fellow colleagues at work.  All in all I made around 130 biscuits. My daughter had found the recipe and I thought it was a great idea as they were Christmas Wreaths glazed with lemon icing and dotted with red and green decorations. I have since made another two batches with the last one being tonight. My mum found the cookie maker at a market and paid only $2.00 for it years ago. She has never used it but gave it to my daughter and I borrowed it for my biscuits.


 I first made one of these boxes at Pat Carr's Cancer Council fund raising day.  Pat had actually used Be Of Good Cheer DSP.  I have used Candlelight Christmas Specialty DSP. You will need to purchase a pack of Kraft Gift Boxes from the main Catalogue, only $4.95 for a pack of 4.  I have used Very Vanilla Cardstock to cover the sides and top and embossed them with Vintage Wallpaper Embossing Folder. I used Teeny Tiny Sentiments for the Merry Christmas and Itty Bitty Banner Die to cut them out. I could only fit 8 biscuits into the boxes but that was enough for a tasty little treat.

Well I am off to bed now as its been a long hot day for me.  I am worn out trying to catch up on my chores and errands.
Thanks for popping by :)

November specials

We are almost half way into November and Stampin Up have some great specials this month.
It's only November, but Stampin' Claus is giving you an early Christmas present: a FREE Festive Paper-Piercing Pack when you buy the Ornament Keepsakes Stamp Set and Candlelight Christmas Specialty Designer Series Paper Bundle.
You will love the Ornament Keepsakes Stamp Set. There are so many different ways you can use it.  Have a look on page 3 of the holiday catalogue to see the stamp set and page 4 for the Candlelight Christmas DSP.

 

From 1 November through 16 December, host a minimum $650 Stampin' Up! party and get a FREE collection of ink pads*-a $79.95 value-in addition to our other fantastic benefits! What a great way to start your ink supplies. I'd be in that and you would get the very new stamp sets which are such a breeze to use. Contact me as soon as possible for this INK-credible offer as time is running out.

I have just arrived back from a stamp camp in Avalon that was run by the lovely Lynda Winfield. We had such a lovely time and it was my first time at the Avalon Homestead. This homestead is a must to see. Peter and Delveen are the lovely hosts and they really looked after us. I will post some photos hopefully later on today.
So its bye for now until then. I just thought I had better get these great specials up before they run out.
Thanks for popping by :)



OCTOBER WORKSHOP

Well summer is getting closer and with the weather over the weekend it truly felt like it was here. We had a nice break yesterday with thunder, lightening and some rain.  It didnt really cool down for long as it didn't rain enough. Watching the weather tonight looks like we are in for rain for the remainder of the week. We really need it.  Speaking of summer, that means its almost the end of the year which means only one more home workshop left before Christmas. Our October workshop has been and gone and I am busy preparing for the next one. I have a Stamp Camp before then though so I have a shoebox to think about.  Not sure what I will be doing.
Anyway here are the cards we made last week.
The first one is one I cased from a day at Ngaire's where we had a get together with some of the other SU! Demonstrators and we did a shoebox each.  Natalie (sorry I don't know her last name) had used a Nativity scene but I chose to use The Open Sea as I wanted a masculine card. The images were punched using the 1" punch then placed on a long piece of Not Quite Navy cardstock. I wanted to keep it clean and simple.

Cardstock - Not Quite Navy
Ink - Not Quite Navy
Stamp Sets - The Open Sea, Wordplay
Accessories - 1" Square Punch

The next card was also cased but I have made some alterations. This card was inspired by Jennifer Timko (Stampin on the fly blog). Jennifer had three vases in a row where she used the Large Oval Punch.  I wanted to alter it a bit and also make it a bit easier for the girls at the workshop.  I used the Extra-Large Oval Punch and only made one vase. I did use the original colours that Jennifer used but then changed it to something a bit brighter. Here it is:-

Cardstock - Tangerine Tango, Tempting Turquoise
Stamp Set - Just Believe, Teeny Tiny Sentiments
Markers - Old Olive, Tempting Turquoise
Stamp Pad - Tangerine Tango (vase)
Accessories - Dotted Scallop Ribbon Border Punch
Small Oval Punch (discontinued)Daubers, Square Lattice Folder,
Crystal Effects (flower)

I have seen this design on a few blogs but recently saw one that Susan Joyce had shown us at a Stamparoo get together at Ngaire Andersons. This is a very simple project and once you have made one then they are quite quick to make. I made one for a friend recently for her birthday so I will put both up. The one we did at my workshop was a Christmas theme. The girls loved it and some of them were going home to make one again so they didnt forget how to do it. The tutorial for this pop up card can be found here

The front I left simple.
Stamp Set - Heart of Christmas
Cardstock - Real Red, Whisper White
Markers - Gumball Green, Real Red
Accessories - Rhinestone, Two Tags Dies, Petals A Plenty Folder

The inside using Candlelight Christmas Specialty DSP
 

Stamp Set - Birthday Whimsy (retired)
Cardstock - Basic Gray, Whisper White
Stamp Pad - Lucky Limeade
DSP - Twitterpated
Accessories - Window Punch

The inside using One In A Million Stamp Set

Well I will be off now as after the weekend I have had I really need my beauty sleep. I now have Fridays off so I am going to endeavour to try to blog on a Friday. I need to create a name dont I!  Until then its goodbye from me and again thanks for popping by :)