Make the Season Bright

Chestnuts roasting on an open fire

Jack Frost nipping at your nose

Yuletide carols being sung by a choir

And folks dressed up like Eskimos

Everyone knows turkey and some mistletoe

Help to make the season bright.

Tiny tots with their eyes all aglow,

Will find it hard to sleep tonight.

They know that Santa's on his way;

He's loaded lots of toys and goodies on his sleigh.

And every mother's child is going to spy,

To see if reindeer really know how to fly.

And so I'm offering this simple phrase,

To kids from one to ninety-two,

Although its been said many times, many ways,

A very Merry Christmas to you

-From A Christmas Song

Skipping Stones Designs has another fabulous sketch up this week as well as a Blog Hop to feature many of the wonderful Texture Sets from  Skipping Stones Designs! If you are hopping along today, you should have arrived from the blog of Jingle! If you just happened along my blog today, start at the beginning of the hop at Skipping Stones Design. We've got a lot of inspiration to show you, from the regular team to our guest designers, sketch artist and crafty partners!

I received a little help from The Play Date Cafe when choosing colors for the design and The Paper Variety's Falalala Challenge of being inspired by a Christmas tune. Loved working with the Timeless Textures set, these colors as well as the papers from Canvas Corp in my design. What a way to make the season bright, eh?

Head over to Shannon's blog for some more Skipping Stones Design inspiration! I hope that you will be able to join along with the sketch this week, as always there is a fabulous prize up for grabs!

Supplies:

Cardstock: (Light Blue) Walmart, (White) Office Max

Patterned Paper: (Green and Red Polka Dot) Canvas Corp

Stamps: (Timeless Textures, Sentiment Frames) Skipping Stones Design

Ink: (Blue Chalk) Clearsnap, (Vintage Photo Distress) Ranger, (Brilliant Blue Pigment) SU

Fiber: (Natural Burlap String) May Arts

Tools: (Circle Cutting System) Creative Memories

Jen is Delightful

***For my Lawnscaping All About Red post, please click here***

***For my CAS-ual Fridays post, please click here***

Do you know Jen? She is talented. She is thoughtful and encouraging. She's sweet and kind and everything in between. Jen is absolutely delightful and it's her birthday today!

Erin from Homemade Cards by Erin and I are doing a version of Carbon Copied to wish Jen a very happy day, we are both showcasing PTI's In Bloom Set and Authentique Paper for their current sketch challenge. (Featured on the above card is Authentique's Gathering Collection-their Bloom Patterned Paper and Icons.)
 

Artful Delight's December Card Kit includes some beautiful Authetique Paper. (Still pinching myself to be able to showcase the amazing products within this kit.)  In addition to the card above, I also created a cute little tin to showcase some hair accessories.

The hair accessories were so simple to make! I simply hot glued the metal embellishments in the kit to hair clips. Another quick and easy gift for my husband's niece.

The tin was just as simple to decorate. I measured the sides and top and cut patterned paper to size and then used Modge Podge as a glue and sealer. The top was also embellished with a pack of goodies included in the kit. Both of these projects feature the Basic Grey Picadilly products included in the kit. I'll be entering this into Basic Grey's Anything Goes Challenge!

Remember that Artful Delight has a sketch challenge over on their blog, Artful Delight, too! I used that sketch to create a card. It's a beautiful sketch for a layout but also easily adaptable for a card too!

Woosh, that's a lot of projects already created with Artful Delight's December Card Kit and I'm not even half way through the products yet! Stay tuned next Saturday for some more projects!

Warm Hearts

 ***Please scroll down for my CAS-ual Fridays Challenge post!***

 

Welcome to the second Lawnscaping Blog Hop! You should have arrived by way of Ayu (MimiPipi Craft's blog. Today it's all about red! I'm sharing a sweet, easy, little treat to make for the Christmas season: a hot chocolate wrapper!

And it all features a beautiful, red, foxy friend! I started by coloring the vixen (Lawn Fawn's Winter Fox) with some red and red/orange markers and used the "beyond the border" technique to frame her out.

 I distressed the focal panel with some hand made spritz and then mounted it to a long strip of red vintage colored patterned paper. The sentiment (from Making Frosty Friends) was treated with the same distress technique, and mounted to the panel and wrapped with twine. The heart from My Silly Valentine completes the sentiment. I also mounted I scored the paper and die cut one end to match the shape of the focal frame. A simple staple holds the hot chocolate packets and that was dressed up with some twine too.

See, I told you it was easy to make a special gift! Personalization is so simple too, if you'd like to go that route. This little giftie would make a great stocking stuffer as well. 

The hop runs from Friday, December 9th to Sunday, December 11th. Comment on all of the blogs for a chance to win prizes from Lawn Fawn, Mold Muse and Whisker Graphics!

The next stop is Melania Deasy's blog, and if you get lost, just stop by the Lawnscaping Blog!  Thank you for stopping by today and I hope you found something here that inspired you...

Supplies:
Cardstock: (Natural Ivory) Stampin Up!
Patterned Paper: Graphic 45
Stamps: (Winter Fox, Making Frosty Friends, My Silly Valentine) Lawn Fawn
Ink: (Vintage Photo Distress) Ranger, (Onyx Black) Versafine
Fiber: (Natural Burlap String) May Arts
Other: (Markers) Copic
Tools: (Labels Four Nestabilities) Spellbinders

How Goes It?

Hello!

How Goes It?

We are introducing a new CAS-ual Fridays Challenge tonight-In the Mist!

Create a clean and simple project using mist.

I was asked to put a few ideas together for misting: 

• Use pre-made misting products available at your local or on-line retailer.
• Create spray mist using a mix of re-inkers and water squirted through a spray bottle.
• Create opaque splatters with a mix of acrylic paint and water flicked off a paintbrush.
• Add fine water droplets to your background of distress inked paper.
• Utilize an airbrush system or marker misting tool
• Channel your inner child and spray ink or paint from a brush onto paper by blowing through a straw

Now's the time to try mist out, or further your skills as there is a fabulous sponsor,

Sweet Stamp Shop!

Please check out the challenge blog for challenge details, rules, sponsor information and lots of inspiration from the Girl Fridays!

Supplies:

Cardstock: (Kraft) PTI

Stamps: (Scootin' By) Sweet Stamp Shop

Ink: (Onyx Black) Versafine

Other: (Glimmer Mist) Tattered Angels

Tools: (Corner Rounder) WR Memory Keepers

Classy Pinecones

I've been busy decorating my home, among other things. How about you?

I have another tutorial (my version of a creation by this guy) over on the May Arts Blog today

that features some "classy" pinecones.

Would love for you to take a peek at the full version over on the May Arts Blog.
Remember to check out the giveaway that they have over there this week too!

Krafty Christmas

My Christmas gift hunt was on for the perfect coloring book and crayons. Something new and exciting, out of the normal...something that would fascinate a five year old boy. My search was a success, the little boy loved both the items and promptly decided he wanted to work on his book, and that I needed to help him. Fast forward elven years and this little boy, now my nephew, is about two feet taller than me and deciding on collages. Teenage boys. What can you get them for Chirstmas besides the electronics that cost an arm and leg? What would they be happy to receive? A gift card! Gas, food, clothes...Can't go wrong with a gift card!

 

Skipping Stones Design has a new sketch artist for December, the fabulous Jen del Muro, and our guests are Tosha Leyendekker, Windy Robinson and Kendra Sand.  We have the pleasure of teaming up with the amazing Canvas Corp this month too! An early Christmas gift! Please come and join us with a creation of your own following the sketch for a chance to win! There is a ton of inspiration over on the Skipping Stones Design blog and Canvas Corp blog!

*********

I also have a what I think is a really fun tutorial that will go up over on the May Arts Blog, perfect for the holiday season. I call it "ribbon smashing"! Did I pique your curiosity?  Please check it out over on the May Arts Blog! There is a giveaway on the general blog too, as May Arts is sponsoring the Ribbon Carosoul Challenge this week!

Holly Jolly

Ooh, my little nephew is just at the age where he will enjoy the shiny, bright crinkly wrapping paper more than the presents. I wish I could see him on Christmas Day but I'll have to rely on my sister's explanations this year instead.

I tried my hand at "real" sewing again and made an activity book for him using the Holly Jolly fabric collection by Jen Allyson from Riley Blake. I've got a few more pictures of the inside up over on The Project Girl's blog today, want to take a peek and let me know what you think?

Delightful!

So tell me...have you ever come across a situation where you have to pinch yourself

(to make sure it is real)

when presented with an offer that is out of this world?

I was invited to be a guest designer for the month of December over at Artful Delight

to feature the card kits available at their store.

 

And I had to pinch myself again when December's card kit arrived at my door.

Oh my goodness, all the wonderful goodies in one card kit!

Check it out!

(You can find a listing of all the contents here!)

This kit contains the hottest of stamping items right now from stamps by Paper Smooches to designer paper from Basic Grey. Swoon. I'm in love.

Back to my featured projects!

(I only have little boys at my house so this gracious puppy helped model the headband.)

There are these large, full felt blooms included in the kit and

I just knew I wanted to make a headband for my husband's soon-to-be four year old niece.

It was super simple...a bit of hot glue and it was done!

And then I created a cute, bright and happy birthday card to pair with the headband

by stitching some pattered paper to solid card stock from the kit.

I stamped a sentiment onto a hand-cut banner and then

stitched some ribbon (also from the kit!) to the banner and adhered it to the card.

I can't wait to show you what else I have up my sleeve that

I've made with this December Card Kit available at Artful Delight.

Thank you, Artful Delight, once again, for this amazing opportunity!

Oh-would you like a chance to win next month's kit from Artful Delight?!

Create a project using the layout below and link it here!

Rhapsody

**This is my second post for today, to see a bit of my May Arts/Lawn Fawn project, click here!** 

"Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?
Caught in a landslide, No escape from reality
Open your eyes,  Look up to the skies and see,
I'm just a poor boy, I need no sympathy,
Because I'm easy come, easy go, Little high, little low,
Any way the wind blows doesn't really matter to me, to me..."

Lyrics from Boehemian Rhapsody by Queen

Yay! CAS-ual Fridays is back from a Thanksgiving vacation and we

have another utterly fun tic tac toe challenge for you! 

The sponsor this week is Paper Temptress and man oh man does she

have some great card stock available! I was lucky enough to receive a sampling.

I was having a difficult time choosing which route to go on the board

so I asked my son to pick one and he chose Aqua, Kraft and Scallops.

I punched out circles from both patterned paper and olive kraft, cut them in half

and then adhered them to an aqua cardbase. A bit of

burlap string and a button, along with a fun sentiment, 

finishes off the card. I thought it had a rather bohemian chic look to it

and then from there I couldn't get the Bohemian Rhapsody song out

of my head. (Yes, you can thank me later when it won't leave yours either!)

So, please stop on over to the CAS-ual Fridays Blog

to check out the challenge details and rules,

find out more about the prize and sponsor, Paper Temptress

and see the awesome inspiration from the Girl Fridays!

Supplies:

Cardstock: (Aqua, Olive Brown Bag) Paper Temptress

Patterned Paper: (Recollections Collection) Crate Paper

Stamps: (Sentiment from Word Up) Paper Smooches

Ink: (Rich Cocoa) Momento

Fiber: (Natural Burlap String) May Arts

Other: (Button)

Tools: (Circle Punch) Creative Memories

Caramel Corn

Have you heard? There is a Lawn Fawn and May Arts Blog Week going on with tons of fabulous inspiration. Check out May Arts and leave a comment for your chance to win product from both companies!