Christmas Cards!

Ho ho ho! 25 Days until Christmas! I've been pretty on top of Christmas this year - no last minute shopping or card making for me! It has been a little hard since it has been so unseasonably warm here. It doesn't even feel like fall so how could it possibly feel like Christmas? It didn't feel like Thanksgiving either, but I've been trying to work past that so the season doesn't just fly by me unnoticed.

Three more Christmas cards are now complete! I've really been feeling the 3"x6" for these:

Christmas Trees
Supplies:
Doodlebug Clear Expressions Let it Snow
Crafts Etc! Cardstock
DCWV & Lasting Impressions patterned paper
Nestabilities
Spool O' Ribbon
Lime Green Stickles
White Opal Liquid Pearls
JoAnn Sew Essential Buttons

Christmas Stocking
Supplies:
Stampin' Up! It's a Stretch
Lasting Impressions & Doodlebug patterned paper
Crystal Stickles
White Opal Liquid Pearls
Mark Richards Metal stickers
Offray Ribbon











This last one is a shorty so I haven't decided if I'm going to send it to someone or just keep it for myself since I think it turned out super cute. I got the idea for the lights from Nancy, one of the Hero Arts designers, she mentions it toward the end of this post here. None of my brads have ever come with turns so I went looking for some to play with. I ended up with silver which I colored with Bic Mark It permanent marker (sorry Sharpie!) and then Stickles'd for the lighted effect. I think it looks awesome! But perhaps I'm biased.

Very Merry Shorty
Supplies:
Stampin' Up! Short & Sweet
Lasting Impressions patterned paper
Offray Ribbon
Crystal Stickles
JoAnn Scrap Essentials photo holders (silver, colored with permanent marker)
Black braiding cord








Since I have plenty of time still, I may play with some more holiday designs if the inspiration hits. If not I'll just make some multiples of these and the one from the second half of my previous post and call it Christmas!

December - Two Days Early

I'm really stunned at how fast time is flying - I swear the years are just getting faster as we go. That being said, now that December is 2 days away I have mom's birthday in less than a week! If you remember awhile ago I wanted to Sprinkle (like the cupcakes) a card (reminder) and came up with something okay but not what I was originally attempting. Well I re-tackled the concept and think it came out really well! I used the colors of mom's favorite flavor - Vanilla. Though I must say that I spaced and forgot that the vanilla aren't served with the dots either... they have vanilla sprinkles... but with the design of the card she'll still get the point!

Birthday Sprinkles
Supplies:
HA Clear Design Cupcakes
DCWV patterned paper
Crafts Etc! cardstock
Offray ribbon
White Opal Liquid Pearls











December also brings us to Christmas. Thanks to Scrapbooks Etc. I finally found some appropriate Christmas stamps and papers! No pink! I've only made one card so far but I'm playing with some other designs today.

Let it Snow
Supplies:
Doodlebug Clear Expressions Let it Snow
DCWV patterned paper
Crafts Etc! cardstock
Offray ribbon
Nestabilities
K&Co. adhesive pearls
Crystal Stickles

Ms. Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous

Well, this year's 3-Day is over and I just had my first weekend in over 6-months that was completely free! No walking, no feeling guilty about skipping walking, no thinking about fundraising. It has really been weird. I was extremely productive this weekend though: got my Christmas shopping 98% done, wrapped some of those presents, cleaned my room.

Even though I suddenly have all this time, I have done absolutely no crafting. I did do some craft shopping since I'm trying to figure out what I want to do for my Christmas cards. Can someone please explain to me when pink, gray, and black all became Christmas colors?!?! I wanted some new Christmas paper since my one mat stack from years past is now pretty picked through. I could not find one set of paper that I remotely liked. I couldn't even find single sheets I liked! Needless to say I was mad. I'm going to try and hit up the non-JoAnn's and non-Michael's stores later this week. I'm trying to be hopeful.

As I said, I cleaned my room. Most specifically I got really into cleaning up my craft corner - notice I didn't say craft "room." Living with my parents has put crafting in the corner {insert Dirty Dancing quote here}. One of the Hero Arts designers, Jennifer McGuire, posted a video of her room which is so amazing! I would maim for a room like hers! Add some puppies and cupcakes and it's a pretty close approximation to my image of heaven. I had wanted to post some pictures of my area anyway and now I feel extra possessed to showcase my tiny corner that I continually outgrow. I do feel like I've finally hit capacity, but I have felt that way before and found ways to manage.

From the Doorway:
- That would be my 3-Day camp gear in the immediate foreground. I unpacked and did laundry, just don't know where to store the gear yet!

- Did I mention it's mainly a bedroom?













The Naked Desk - In 3 angles:
















Looking down to my left:
-The rolling case has all my non-12x12 stacks, my 3 sectioned containers of eyelets/brads/etc., and various colored pens.











Now lets look behind me - in 2 angles:

















Over-packed tchotchke and book and craft storing going on here.

To My Right:
- I just measured, that's about 7.5 inches between my bed and the desk!

- That black thing bottom left would be my tiny chair, you can just about see my knee hitting the part of the desk to the left of my computer can't you?









So that's my space! All of it! When it's messy you can't see much carpet and the bed turns into additional craft area. The bookshelf always looks like a disaster even when organized so I don't try as hard with that anymore. Hope you enjoyed the tour!

Final Fundraising

This weekend is the big 3-Day walk. I decided to do a final fundraiser at work with cookies (in bags - I have tons of leftover bags) and Christmas tags. I had everything ready for yesterday, not thinking that most of the office would probably be out since we had today off. I did manage to rake in $13 though anyway! I'll resume sales tomorrow and see what happens.

Cookies for a Cure
Supplies:
Nestabilities Dies
CB Support Ribbon Die
Me & My Big Ideas Paper
HA Clear Gemstones colored with permanent marker
Making Memories Eyelets
Spool O' Ribbon in light pink










Argyle Sweater Bear
Supplies for all:
Crafts Etc! Textured Cardstock
Remember When Christmas Plaid paper
Paper Pizazz Kelly Green/Yellow Plaid paper
Making Memories Eyelets
Spool O' Ribbon in green and red
Nestabilities Dies
HA Playful Animals
HA Laughter & Merriment (inside)








Giraffe

















ReinOwl

















Monkey

















Insides
All the tags are the same on the inside, but for an example here's the inside of the ReinOwl.













It was a little hard for me to think Christmas with it still being fairly early November. I normally like to hit Thanksgiving first! Though it was actually pretty fun, I really like these animals! I also realized that I don't actually have many Christmas stamps - Interesting!

Mini Mischief

Not much of a craft-stravaganza going on for me this weekend. I have some things I would like to work on but I just don't feel like dealing with my cramped craft area. So lazy has prevailed! Though I did toss this mini card together real quick for this week's HA Mini Cards Challenge. I had the mini card sitting around since the paper challenge, and actually the cat and sentiment from the same time too. Was trying for awhile to figure out how I wanted it to come together and this is the result:

Mischief Maker
Supplies:
Making Memories patterned paper
DCWV card stock
HA I Love My Cat






I'm also entering Little Birthday into the challenge.

A First Anniversary

Lysa and her hubby are celebrating their first anniversary! I really cannot believe it has already been a year since the wedding. Their wedding colors were brown and blue, and while I told myself I didn't have to stick to the theme I found some really great brown and blue papers in my stash.

First Anniversary
Supplies:
Penny Black First Kiss
HA Happy Anniversary
DCWV & me and my BIG ideas Papers
Offray Ribbon
Prismacolor pencils
K & Co. Pearls