Christmas Favor Boxes Featuring Magnolia Doohickeys

Hello crafty friends! It's no secret that I am addicted to Pinterest. Well, I think a lot of us are, right? I never fail to find inspiration for my projects and today's project is no exception. I was looking for a cute way to gift some holiday goodies to my daughter's teachers. Sure enough , I found the cutest little box idea. It wasn't Christmas themed, but with the right papers and embellishments I knew I could make it perfect for the holidays.

Christmas Favor Boxes

Ta-da! How cute are these? And I finally got to play with my new Doohickey Dies.

This one is my favorite! I'm just so in love with the cute Santa die. I wanted the die cuts to take center stage so you can see I kept it light on additional embellishments. A few strategically place rhinestones and lots of Snow-Tex is all it took to give these a wintery look.

Here's a side view of the cute rocking horse too! So adorable!

Here's that Santa again!  I made the mini tags out of cardstock scraps and added a jingle bell tied with some bakers twine.

Take a look at the little trees. I added a few red rhinestones and dabbed them with Snow-Tex.

The stocking die is adorable too! Such cute little details on the die cut pieces.

I die cut 2 of the larger poinsettia pieces to give my flowers more dimension and then, of course, dabbed them with more Snow-Tex! 

I think they turned out adorable! All I have to do now is add some crinkled tissue inside and add my goodies. I hope Kaylah's teachers' love them.

Thank you so much Tracy MacDonald for the inspiration and the wonderful tutorial. You can check out her awesome tutorial here:  http://iwannabuildamemory.blogspot.com/2012/02/treasure-box-tutorial.html

Thanks for stopping by.

I'll see you all real soon! Take care.

12 Tags of 2014, December

Welcome back! Today I want to share with you my take on Tim Holtz's December tag. It has been so much fun participating in the monthly tags and I'm so proud of myself for playing along  each month. Well...I did miss August and September, due to my move, but I won't tell anyone if you don't, hehe. The tag for December was amazing , like all of Tim's tags! Again, I was without a lot of the products he used, but it's always fun to work with what you've got. So enough babbling, let me show you what I came up with...

December Tag

It's very different from Tim's but I think it turned out rather cute. I created the background with a combination of Chipped Sapphire and Weathered Wood Distress Stains for a dark winter day look. Then I embossed a piece of Frosted Film (didn't have the new Frosted Sheets) with a snowflake embossing folder from my stash and adhered it to my tag. I love the shimmery effect of the frosted film and the subtle embossing. To create the look of snow, I splattered white paint on the surface and dabbed Snow-Tex all over the tag.

I hope you can see the shimmer and the embossing from this angle. Believe me, it's there and looks gorgeous in person.

I don't own the Prancing Deer die so I used one of the deer from Reindeer Flight. I cut out 3 deer out of chipboard and glued them together for dimension.  The deer was colored  with light brown acrylic paint mixed with Antique Linen,then I sanded and inked the edges with Walnut Stain. I did add Distress Glitter in Rock candy and dabbed Snow-Tex on the deer to make it look like falling snow.

As for the greenery, I used the branches from the Tattered Pinecone die. I cut them out of watercolor paper and used Peeled Paint Distress Stain to color them. Then I just lightly sprayed them with a shimmery silver spray from my stash and dabbed some Snow-Tex ( can you tell I love this stuff)?

 

The branches are from the Branch Tree Die. I cut three out of chipboard and layered them for dimension. Then, I inked them with Walnut Stain and heat embossed them with Walnut Stain Embossing powder. This is my favorite technique to create realistic looking branches. You can see more of that snowy stuff on my branches and one last, little green leaf just clinging on for dear life. The scene really does look like a Winter Wonderland and makes me long for a white Christmas. I topped of my tag with a crinkled ribbon bow dyed with the stains used to color the tag.

Well, that is it for me today! I had so much fun creating this month's tag and there's still plenty of time to play along, if you haven't already.

Can't wait to see what Tim comes up with for the New year.

Thanks for stopping by!

Graphic 45 Twelve Days of Christmas Advent Calendar

I'm back with my second post of the day! As you can tell, I'm a little behind on my posts so I want to catch up before the holidays are over!
This project is for my baby girl, who loves counting down the days until Christmas.

 Twelve Days of Christmas Advent Calendar

I picked up a paper mache advent calendar at HL and started off by painting the edges and compartments with Warm White acrylic paint. I then covered the advent calendar with papers from Graphic 45's Twelve Days of Christmas collection ( one of my faves). Each compartment is numbered and decorated with fussy cut images from the 8 x 8 paper pad. The numbers were stamped in Versamark and then heat embossed with gold powder.This really makes the numbers pop.

I sponged gold acrylic paint and Snow-Tex on all the edges to give them a snowy look.

 I fell in love with the signature page of this collection but it was too big to fit on the back. So I decided to "re-create" it , my way .  All the images were fussy cut from  the paper then layered over and  under the song lyrics.  I used foam tape on some of the images to give them more dimension.

I created a cute Christmas morning scene on top of the calendar. The little tree is from the dollar store. I dabbed it with white gesso, added gold bead trim, red bows and topped it off with a glittered star. All the tiny gift boxes and bags were made by hand using scraps from the paper collection. I found the little wagon and teddy bear in the miniature section of my local art store. They are the perfect addition to my Christmas scene.

Needless to say, my daughter loved it and looks forward to opening the little compartments each morning. There is always a sweet surprise awaiting her. 

Thank you so much for stopping by!

Christmas Stocking and Mitten Gift Card Holders

Hi everyone! So Christmas is 2 weeks away and I haven't even started my shopping! Please tell me I'm not the only one ( I know there are others like me out there, hehe). No but seriously, I really need to get a move on. Sometimes, I just don't know what to get someone so I usually stock up on gift cards. Yeah, yeah,  I know that's a little impersonal but I'd rather buy a gift card than purchase something that will end up in a bin somewhere, or in the trash. I personally don't mind receiving a gift card, this ensures I get something I really want. And who wouldn't like that!
Anywho, I wanted to create some cute gift card holders for all my gift cards. I came across these super cute stocking holders on Pinterest and was instantly inspired. So let me show you what I made...

Stocking Gift Card Holders

 

 Aren't they cute? The ones I saw on Pinterest were created with a die, but I thought I could make my own by just using  a template. I found a stocking template online and printed it to size. I then cut it out and traced it onto heavy weight cardstock. This ensures I have a template I can use over and over again. 

The paper collection is "Christmas Home" by Teresa Collins. I also used bits of lace and braided trim to decorate my stockings. Those cute poinsettias are from HL and the leaves were fussy cut from the paper collection. I added a bit of tinsel to the tops to make them more festive.

I loved the stockings so much that I decided to make mitten gift card holders too. I made these a little more vintage looking and a lot more dimensional.

 

 

 

 

 

Omg, I adore the way these turned out! I found the sweet images online and printed them on ivory cardstock. Then I distressed them with Vintage Photo for the perfect aged look. I used Authentique's "Festive" collection for these.  The clear snowflakes  and the festive red ribbon are from the dollar store. The greenery is from a Christmas pick and the Pinecone bunch was purchased at HL.  Who wouldn't want  to receive a gift card in one of these. They can also double as cards if you just add a message on the back. Super cute!

 

I hope you like my projects! And hopefully I've inspired you to make your own sweet gift card holder.

Until next time, take care!!!