Handmade Christmas Gifts

So this year we made a lot of handmade gifts to save money. Here are two of my favorites, an altered Gingerbread calendar for my Mom and 26, yes 26 moustache mugs for all of Aspen's friends, teachers and Scott and my co-workers.

Materials Used: Crate Paper/Peppermint paper collection; Jillibean Soup/Dark Woodgrain Chipboard Alphas, Kraft Tags & pink/red felt blossom; Queen & Co/Felt Gingerbread Stickers; Zva/Pink flowers; Recollections/Gingerbread STickers; pink & red gemstones

This idea was discovered by my daughter Aspen via one of her favorite blogs to follow: Kandee Johnson, the full tutorial is found here: http://www.kandeej.com/2011/12/guilt-free-sweet-treats.html A trip to the dollar store for mugs and a special marker from Michaels and we were all set.

Of course we had to add something inside the mugs so there were 2 dipped and sprinkled oreos in each mug as well. YUM. The mugs were a huge hit!

Hope your Christmas was fabulous!

Happy Holiday Photos!

We did our annual Christmas Photo Shoot and just wanted to share some of our favorite family pictures:

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all of you and your families!

Moxie Fab Potpourri Challenge

I had been working on a card that seemed to fit perfectly into the Potpourri Challenge over on the Moxie Fab World Blog. Regardless here was the inspiration photo:

You could interpret it however you like, here is my interpretation:

I was inspired by the cute little chairs and the doily and incorporated those into my design, attempting a shabby chic effect.

Materials Used: Scenic Route & SEI papers; Close to my Heart Stamps/Chairs to You; EK Success/border punches; white satin ribbon; Tim Holtz/Distresser; Cats Eye/Fawn Brown Ink; Archival Ink/Coffee; American Crafts/White Card Base; Want 2 Scrap/green pearls

I found this stamp set half price by Close to My Heart at a Scrapbook Event in October, how cute is this chair? The whole set is adorable and called "Chairs to You." So there you have it a quick card post, very busy time of year here. Better get back to work on Christmas preparations! Hope all you elves out there are enjoying this season! It would be much nicer here in Ohio if we could please have some SNOW instead of RAIN! Yuck, it is not supposed to rain in December. Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow......

Great news when I began this post on Thursday it was raining, today it is SNOWING! YAY! 

The kids and I did our annual Happy First Snow Dance!

The Color Room - Palette #87

There is a spectacular palette posted on the Color Room website this week. The whole month is dedicated to the Christmas Spirit and this week really inspired me, here is the inspiration:

I

Oh my isn't it gorgeous? The colors, the photo, the sketch- soooo lovely.

So here is my interpretation and some close-ups:

Materials Used: Bazzill Cardstock: metallic silver & white base; Basic Grey/Picadilly-Blue Plate Special; Jillibean Soup/Wonderful White corrugated Alpha & Corrugated sheet; Cosmo Cricket/Salt Air-Half Shell; Cuttlebug die/Winter Play; Stickles/white; Martha Stewart/clear bling; EK Success/border & corner punches, white feathers, opalescent ribbon, cream pearls

Hope you are all enjoying your Holiday seasons too! Thanks for stopping by.