12 Months of Christmas, or Homespun Christmas Challenge

Hello there! How are you? I can't believe 2014 is almost over, can you? It's actually Christmas evening as I type this. The presents have all been opened, the food has all been eaten, (not really, we have lots of left-overs), our company for the day have all left to go home, our littlest and my handsome hubby are currently playing a game together on their computers, and I am just relaxing.

All-in-all, it was a great day, and I will write more about it on our family blog, but leading up to it was just too hectic for me. As usual, I planned lots of fun things to make for family and friends, but I planned them too late, and spent the last several weeks in a flurry of busy-ness that I just didn't like. There were many other family oriented things I would have like to have done, but just didn't have the time to do it. I didn't even get Christmas cards out this year. I have quite a few made, just didn't get time to sign and address them, or write our annual letter. :-( Here's a picture of some of the projects I did get done this year.

While speaking with a couple other friends, I found that I'm not alone in this. Without planning ahead, the year just goes by too fast and once December hits, there's so many other things going on, that there's just not enough time to do all the fun, crafty things for others. I would like this next year to be different. I want to plan ahead and work on things a little at a time, month by month. I sat here this evening and made a list of things I could do ahead of time to make life easier next December and divided it up into month-by-month challenges. I find that I work better when I am challenged and when I have someone to hold me accountable, so, at the beginning of each month, I am going to post my challenge for that month, and then come back at the end of the month and let you know how I did. You are welcome to play along with me if you'd like. You could post ideas and projects you are working on, and let us know whether you met the challenge or not. Keep in mind that your challenges each month may not look just like mine. For instance, I plan on making 10 Christmas cards each month. That way, by the end of November I will have 110 cards ready to go. I don't need that many, but I can use the extras for gifts. You may need more than that, or a lot less.

Anyway, since this is December, and not officially 2015 yet, I am going to give you a pre-challenge. Get out there and take advantage of the after-Christmas sales. Stock up on some things that you are pretty sure you can use next year, whether it be for a handmade gift, or just a gift in general. I personally am hoping to find a bunch of fuzzy socks on sale since it seems like every little girl in my life right now LOVES fuzzy socks and I can use them for gifts throughout the year. I also make ornaments for my nieces and nephews every year, so I stocked up on some blank ceramic ornaments at 66% off yesterday. I think I may do something like this with them. I would love to show you the ones I made this year, using Stampin' Up's Simply Pressed Clay, but, as with many other things, I didn't have time to get pictures before I mailed them off. (Are you seeing a pattern here?) Well, since I think a post with just one photo is kind of boring, here's a picture of one of my past ornaments.

Don't forget that Stampin Up! is having a Year-End Closeout. There are quite a few holiday stamp sets, papers and embellishments on sale right now, some of them up to 80% off!

I have one other challenge for you, and that is to help me with a name for this challenge. My original idea (actually, it was my daughter-in-love's idea) was the 12 Months of Christmas Challenge, which I love, but I also like the image Homespun Christmas conjures up. What do you think? Any other ideas?

Well, it looks like my family is ready for bed now, so I will close here. Please let me know if you'd like to play along with our challenges this year and help me with my name of it. :-)

Till next time...
God's love and blessings!

I'm sorry.

I am back, and I have to apologize to anyone who has been expecting my Stamp-of-the Week posts. It just didn't happen. I'm afraid that as long as I'm a cake decorator, it probably won't either. As much as I'd like to spend more time posting, I just haven't figured out how to make it work. I have been busy crafting, and teaching craft classes, just haven't had time to sit down here and post about them. Anyway. with all that being said, I am sorry and I will do my best to post regularly, but I just feel it's better if I don't commit to anything specific so I don't disappoint anyone.

For those of you in a fall kind of mood, here's a fun project we made at my Tips, Tools and Techniques class this week. We used the new Gift Box Punch Board to make letter "blocks" for fall. I have to be totally honest here that I was not too thrilled with our Color Me Autumn Designer Series Paper when I first saw it, but I really like how these came out and I think I can see quite a few more projects using it.

We used circle and oval punches to make the cute little pumpkins. Here's the back:

Don't pay any attention to the crooked mat on the "v" block. ;o)

The word "celebrate" came from the Celebrate Baby set, and the "thanks" came from the For All Things set. We simply used a marker to ink up just the word thanks on the Give Thanks For All Things stamp.

I used my Silhouette to cut out the letters. Stampin' Up! has lots of digital files that can be used on e-cutters like the Silhouette. This way I was able to change the sizes of each of the letters to fit the blocks.

I actually have several more projects, both finished and in the works that I want to share with you over the next week, I hope. And, for those of you interested, I have 4 Stamp-A-Stack classes scheduled for next week. Check out my Events page to get the details and RSVP if you'd like to attend. I have some great holiday and birthday cards planned for the class.

Till next time...
God's love and blessings!

September SOTM #6 & #7 Some Changes Ahead

Ooh, what a cryptic title. ;o) I'll give you more info on the changes in a bit. First, let's see another project with this month's Stamp of the Month--Gorgeous Grunge:

What do you think? I think I've mentioned before that I LOVE sparkly...anything sparkly, so I especially love our Glimmer Paper. You get tons of sparkle with no mess. Doesn't get much better than that, my crafty friends, doesn't get much better than that.

While I was perusing Pinterest for some ideas, I came across these cards and instantly fell in love. I loved the color palettes and the design, but I don't have any star stamps or punches. ;o(. No problem, I could simply switch the stars out for butterflies. This will make the perfect card for a couples' 50th wedding anniversary. The inside says "1 great life."

Ok, so now for the "changes ahead" part. I got to thinking and realized that I really like this Stamp of the Month idea, but there are 2 things I need to change. I realized that if I continue with the Stamp of the MONTH, by the end of the year I will only have focused on 12 stamp sets, and Stampin' Up! has way too many great sets for me to just focus on 12. So, I've decided that I will make it a Stamp of the Week (SOTW). That way I can work my way through 52 sets in a year. (Fun!)

With that in mind, I'm going to go ahead and show you project #7 so we can end Gorgeous Grunge week on a Saturday. This one isn't a card, it's a super cute gift box made with our new Curvy Keepsake Thinlits Dies.

I finally managed to use one of the stamps from this set that isn't a splatter. I embossed the stripey looking one with white after I stamped a splatter in Crumb Cake. I sponged all the edges in Crumb Cake and used an Aqua Painter to pull a little more color onto the cap of the acorn. After I finished this one, I thought it needed just a little pop of color, so I added a bit of ribbon.

What do you think? Which one do you like best? Oh, and don't worry about not getting more ideas to use this set, I'm sure it's going to pop up in coming weeks on other projects. It's just too versatile not to.

The second thing I will need to change is my expectations of my time. I was able to post 6 days in a row this week, but that was only because I already had a couple of cards made to show to you. I also had no cakes to work on, as I mentioned yesterday, and things are a little slower around our house this week. Next week I have a bridal shower to celebrate, a 50th anniversary to attend, and a birthday party for my own daughter. Each of these also means a cake-or 5-for me to make. Busy week means little time for crafting, and even less time on the computer, so while I plan on continuing to highlight a stamp set each week, and then giving away my projects at the end of the week, I will probably not be posting on a daily basis. I hope to still have 6 or 7 projects for you, I may just put a couple of them together on a post to save me a bit of time. Not sure how that will work, but I'm going to do my best to post at least 4 times each week. We'll see how that goes.

Anyway, I have also decided how I'm going to give away my projects. On Saturday, I will ask for you to leave a comment telling me which of the projects you liked best that week. I will then number the comments and randomly draw a number to see who will get the goodies. Sound like fun? Guess what? Today is Saturday so be sure to look back over the last couple of posts and come back here and let me know which of the Gorgeous Grunge projects was your favorite. I will give you till 9pm Monday evening, September 8th to comment.

Well, since I know next week is going to be SUPER busy for me, I think I'll spend the next couple of hours playing with next week's stamp set so I can get a head start and have some great stuff to show you.

Till next time...
God's love and blessings!

September SOTM #5

Wow, this is amazing! I've managed to post 5 days in a row. Of course, I haven't had any cakes to work on this week, so that makes a HUGE difference in my free time. In case you are new to my blog, cakes are my other hobby. You can check out some of my work here.

On to September's Stamp of the Month: Gorgeous Grunge. Love this set. So many things you can do with it. So far we've done a feminine card, masculine card, bright and cheery, and a thank you. How about the holidays? Yep, you can use it for holiday projects too. Lookie:

What do you think? Can you tell where I used Gorgeous Grunge? Yes, one of the splatter stamps makes a perfect snowfall.

To make this card, I stamped the tree image from the new White Christmas set on Whisper White and then stamped the snowman on the hill. I stamped a second image on a scrap piece of paper and used it to mask off the snow while I sponged Night of Navy on the sky. I then embossed the snow in white. I stamped a second image of the snowman on some scrap Whisper White and fussy cut him out. A little shading with Cherry Cobbler and Pumpkin Pie and he was ready to go on with a Stampin' Dimensional. I used Smoky Slate to shade the snow a bit and highlighted it and the tree branches with some Dazzling Diamonds. Wish you could see how sparkly this card is in real life. LOVE!

My demonstrator friend has an awesome tutorial on making bows. I used it for this bow and it was super easy. You really should check it out. I used one of our wider ribbons and found that just gluing the bow to the ribbon didn't look right since the ribbon was much wider than the knot in the bow. To remedy this, I stuck a glue dot in the middle of the ribbon and pinched the edges together to gather it under where the bow was going to be stuck.

Yes, I pulled my bow off so I could take this picture for you. 

About the White Christmas stamp set. It is super cute. Not only is there a snowman, but there's little birds, a deer, a polar bear, station wagon with a tree to go on top, a banner and more. Lots of great scene making images there. It is also a photopolymer set which means it is perfectly clear and easy to line up the images. I did learn something rather important while using it though. Do NOT use Staz-On ink with the photopolymer sets. I wasn't aware of this, and since my original idea was to watercolor the background I immediately reached for my Staz-On. Not a good idea.

Apparently Staz-On has a reaction with the stamps and makes them SUPER sticky. Like, it ripped my paper in multiple places, sticky. So, lesson learned, use our new Memento ink with the photopolymer stamps. It is water resistant as well, so you can still watercolor with it. I did try water coloring, along with spritzing some background color for this, but I think I like the sponging the best, at least for a dark night time sky look.

When I first mentioned the Stamp Of The Month idea, I said I would be giving away the projects that I've made, and I've finally figured out how I'm going to do that, so check back tomorrow for those details. :o)

Till next time...
God's love and blessings!

September SOTM #4

Hello there. How are you this fine day? We had quite a storm blow through here yesterday and are ever so grateful that the tree that decided to lose it's top last night dropped it away from the house. Simple blessings. It seems strange to hear the creek flowing again after so many weeks of quiet.

Anyway, I know you're here to see the Stamp of the Month project for today. In case you forgot, the stamp set is Gorgeous Grunge, and here is my card:

I have to admit that this card was almost completely cased from this card I saw on Pinterest. The only change I made was to the buttons and the embossing folder. The card was actually done a couple of months ago while the Olympics were going on and my demonstrator friend challenged us to make a card using gold, so I switched out the buttons for some Champagne Glimmer Paper hearts. I LOVE this paper. There really is no such thing as a "scrap" piece with it because you can take a tiny piece, add it to a card and you have an instant sparkly embellishment. Love!

I also used some of our gold sequins and gold embossing powder for the sentiment.

The color palette for this card is Bermuda Bay, Strawberry Slush, and Baked Brown Sugar (which really looks like a non-sparkly gold color).

Well, what do you think so far? Lots of ideas to use this set with. As I mentioned yesterday, my new holiday stamps came in and I got to play with them a bit. I even managed to use Gorgeous Grunge on a Christmas card. I'll show that one to you tomorrow.

Till then...
God's love and blessings!

September SOTM #3

Woo hoo! I have my September Stamp of the Month (SOTM) #3 ready for you today. I'm on a roll so far...3 in a row. Also excited because the man in brown showed up yesterday with my goodies from the Stampin' Up! holiday catalog, and since we finished our first day of school and I managed to get all my housework done early, I got to play with them last night. :o) Can't wait to show you what I made.

On to the SOTM. So far I've shown you a feminine card and a masculine one using Gorgeous Grunge. This time I went bright and cheerful. Once again, this card is super versatile. You could use this for either gender, young or old, birthday, thank you, or as I did in this one, a simple "I love you" card.

In fact, I made several of these and used different sentiments from the new hostess set Good Greetings. This set has 19 different sayings and you can get it for FREE!!! I don't know about you, but I love free. This set will only be available till October 31, so be sure to check out my Promotions page to get all the details.

Do you see my "boo boo"?

I stamped the images on Whisper White card stock with Real Red, Pumpkin Pie, Daffodil Delight, Old Olive, and Bermuda Bay. I used Basic gray as the mat for the stamped image and for the sentiment. Super quick, super cute. Love it!

Well, if I spend more time on here, I won't have as much time to get some crafting done later, so I'll close this here. 

Till next time...

God's love and blessings!

Technique Tuesday & SOTM

Hello again! Today you get a 2-for-1 special. I'm going to post #2 for September's Stamp of the Month, and give you a Technique Tuesday all in one post. You're welcome. :o) First off, in case you weren't here yesterday, the Stamp of the Month for September is Gorgeous Grunge and here's my second card with it.

What do you think? I'm always trying to find an idea for a masculine birthday card, and I tend to go for the blue/brown combo for them. This card uses 3 stamp sets: Gorgeous Grunge (of course), Hardwood, and Remembering Your Birthday. I even used one of the Gorgeous Grunge splatter stamps to make "sprinkles" on the cupcake. :o) Here it is with the matching envelope. 

As with yesterday's card, I wanted to give this one a little dimension, so I popped the cupcake liner up with a Stampin' Dimensional, and I curved the sentiment banner with my fingers before strategically gluing it down. I just put adhesive where the banner goes under the circle and where it touches the card (under the word "thought"). You don't want to lift the banner up too much, or it may get squished in the mail. 

This sentiment has 2 parts, so the inside looks like this:

In case you can't read it, it says, "I remembered and thought...and then I forgot! Happy Belated Birthday."

Now for your Technique Tuesday. I've always had a hard time with background stamps. Even with using a soft mat under the paper, I often had areas of the stamp that just didn't get pressed onto the paper enough. Now, I usually do them upside down--with the stamp on the bottom, and the paper on top. Like this:

After inking the stamp and carefully laying the paper where I want it, I place a scrap sheet of paper on top and gently rub my hands all over the stamp. It's hard to take a picture while doing this, but I keep one hand still (to keep the paper from moving), and rub the other one all over, then switch and hold the other still so I don't miss any spots.

Lookie there! Nice even coverage all over the paper.

For the envelope, I folded my scrap paper to make a pocket to mask the envelope so that only the flap would get stamped. Then I turned this whole piece over and placed it on the stamp, just like the card front.

The scrap paper "pocket" did double duty as a mask so that I could sponge the edge of the flaps as well.

So, what do you think? We went from a very feminine card to a more masculine one. Like I said, this stamp set is pretty versatile. Tomorrow we're moving on to bright and cheery.

Till then...
God's love and blessings!