the Last Christmas Card

This is it! The last of the Christmas cards of 2009! and I'm so tired from all this holiday hooplah, that I'm afraid you're getting few details. Except that if you still need some holiday stamps, you've got time to get them if you go digi! They can be in your "hands" almost instantly and you can finish up all those last minute projects! Run on over to Lindsay's Stamp Stuff for a great selection of beautiful and fun digital stamps for the holidays. Check out the great specials, too! I used an image from the Christmas Potpourri set (yes, it's my favorite). I just printed it out on some GinaK White Pure Luxury cardstock, colored it with my luscious copic markers, and paired it up with this beautiful, glittery paper from My Mind's Eye!
I hope everyone has a very merry Christmas or holiday season! Check out the design team for more inspiration and be sure to stop on over at Lindsay's blog to see what goodies she's got for you today for free!

Gifts Galore

Someone wake me when it's Valentine's Day! I declare, this Christmas season is exhausting. I can't seem to get anything accomplished because I'm always rushing off to attend something. Last night it was my husband's company's Christmas party. Tonight it's our bunko Christmas party. Sunday I'm off to a copic class. When am I supposed to bake, decorate, and shop?
Well, thank goodness Lindsay has come up with some ways to make my gift wrapping faster and cheaper! The LSS shop has these cool new Christmas Card, Tags, and Toppers Printable Kit. Look at what I started with. It cost .50 at the dollar store.

It's a bag, right! Nothing special...until I add a topper from Lindsay's Stamp Stuff which I just sized to fit the bag and printed it out. That's it!

This will look much cuter under the tree than that plain ole bag I started out with. I also used one of the ornaments in my favorite set Christmas Potpourri Digital Stamp set. I printed the image out on my GinaK paper, colored it with a couple of copics and spica glitter pen, cut out the ornament and added it to the tag that came with the bag. I did use SCAL2 and my cricut to cut out a mat for the ornament in red and drew in the wire hanger with a copic pen. But this project took just minutes to put together and I could very easily make dozens more in a short amount of time.
Okay, if this doesn't convince you to run right now and pick up these two sets, how about this:

ANDDDDDD...Lindsay's got a great new set in the shop which is just perfect for making calendars! Be sure to check out the special and all the great items in the shop to ease your holiday stress! Need some ideas? See what the LSS ladies have been up to this week and start by stopping by Lindsay's blog. Look under the tree. She may have a present just for you! Happy Holidays everyone!

Some Christmas Potpourri

Whew! What a crazy week this has been! I need about 15 hours of sleep to get caught up. But at least the work part of the week is over and there's lots of time for family, food, and shopping. My son is home from school for the holiday so I'm looking forward to having him around for a few days, too. 
Still, the BIG holiday (Christmas) is looming close and I've got LOTS to do to get ready. I've been trying to get some cards and projects going but it sure seems slow. I did manage to salvage an empty tea box which I altered with papers and some great digital stamps.  Now I just need to find a great little gift to put in there!

The papers are some Basic Grey Lemonade and the stamps are from Lindsay's Stamp Stuff. They are part of the Christmas Potpourri set. This is a great set for creating Christmas cards, tags, or altered projects like this one.
By the way, if you find your self needing to do some shopping on Thursday while the guys are in a football frenzy, check out the great online deals. Lindsay's stamps are on sale at 20% off all day Thursday over at My Grafico. And if you need to get in some crafting time after the Thanksgiving dishes are done, there is a contest at the Lindsay's Stamp Stuff group. Be sure to check this out for a chance to win a free stamp set!
Happy Thanksgiving!
Project Recipe
Paper: Basic Grey Lemonade, DCWV Holiday Glitter pack, Ginak White Pure Luxury CS
Stamps: Lindsay's Stamp Stuff Christmas Potpourri
Accessories: cuttlebug, Spellbinder's Scalloped Circle die, copic markers, Spica Atyou Glitter pens, Clearsnap Smooch, beading wire, bead, Fiskars Effervescence border punch, checkered ribbon (Michaels)

Digi Rub-ons for Christmas

Gotta add some digi stamps to your Christmas list. These things are waaaay cool! I use them all the time, but I finally figured out a way to get them on non-paper items! And since these days I'm all about Christmas, I thought I'd show you how I put a digital image on a Christmas ornament. Yep, you heard (read) right! I put a digital image on a round, glass Christmas ornament. Okay, it didn't fit in the printer, but I found this cool product that lets you make your own rub-ons. I used a product called Grafix Rub-onz Transfer Film. It's expensive (well, I think $9 for four sheets is expensive), but I did use a 40% off coupon at Hobby Lobby.
There are tutorials out there for making homemade rub-ons using transparency film, but I could not get them to work for me. I tried everything I could think of: different brands of film, different printers, longer drying times, etc. All I ended up with using the regular transparency film was a wet mess. The Grafix Rub-onz has an adhesive component to it that allows the image to actually transfer to a smooth surface.
So, basically, I printed out my digital stamp onto the transfer film following the instructions provided, colored the image, and then rubbed it onto my ornament. Look at the stunning results.

I chose an image from Lindsay's Stamp Stuff Christmas Cupcake Wrappers Digital Stamp Set. Love that set and I have yet to make a cupcake--so much versatility. I sized the image in a word document and did a couple of test runs with plain paper to make sure the size was what I wanted before printing on the transfer film. Once I got it the right size, I printed it out on my rub-on paper, colored it with copic markers, and rubbed the image onto my ornament. I added a few dots of Frosted Lace Stickles to the berries for highlights. Isn't that so cool! But wait till you see this next one!

Ahhhh! Love the intense green on this one! Same exact process as above, but instead of using copic markers, I used Clearsnap Smooch and some red stickles. Have you seen Smooch? It looks like a bottle of fingernail polish but has a much more precise brush. In fact, I didn't color in this image until after I transferred it to the ornament, so I actually "painted" the image in on the ornament itself instead of the transfer paper. I loved this so much, I promptly returned to Scrapbook Gadgets (Angela's got a great selection and shipping was super fast!) for more Smooch in more colors! My poor Christmas tree won't know what hit it after I'm through decorating the decorations!
Now, if you're thinking you'd like to jazz up your ornaments, jars, metal containers, etc with some cool, custom-made rub-ons, let me encourage you to do a little Christmas shopping at Lindsay's Stamp Stuff where you can pick up this great Christmas Cupcake Wrapper set or her brand new Christmas Potpourri (to "die for" cute) set. You might also try googling "homemade rub-ons" and see if you can find a cheaper method of creating rub-ons. If you find something that works, leave me a comment. I'd love a more affordable option, but I must say, I still have lots of transfer paper left. It goes a long way. And digi stamps are so affordable, you can afford to splurge a little on the transfer film.
Be sure to check out what the ladies of the Lindsay's Stamp Stuff design team have prepared for you, and Lindsay's sure to have a Christmas treat or two, so don't forget to stop by her blog. Have fun and have a homemade Christmas!
Project Recipe
Paper: Graffix Rub-onz Transfer Film
Stamps: Lindsay's Stamp Stuff Christmas Cupcake Wrapper
Accessories: Old Christmas ornament, copic markers, Clearsnap Smooch Green Apple and Moonlight, Ranger Stickles Frosted Lace and Glitz Ruby Slippers

Christmas is in the Air

I warned you I would be gearing up for Christmas and here's my first project. It's a little gift box just the right size for some jewelry or a gift card and some candies, perhaps. We do secret Santa's at work and this would be great for a little treat for my secret Santa, but as soon as I put this in the workroom, everyone will know who it's from, lol. If I want to remain a secret, I have to go with store bought, but that's no fun!
You can find the tutorial for creating the box here. You need the top note die if you want this particular cover, but once you create the box, you can probably come up with all kinds of ways to cover it. I love this new paper I found by My Mind's Eye. You will be seeing a lot in the future from this paper pack called Organic Glitter Papers. You see the sweet little Santa in the circle? He's an adorable digital stamp from Lindsay's Stamp Stuff called Christmas Cupcake Wrappers and these stamps aren't just for cupcakes! I printed Santa out on some PTI Vintage Cream Cardstock, colored his hat and cheeks with  copics, and then used Liquid Applique and some glittery embossing powder on his hair, beard, and hat. Once the Liquid Applique dried, I heated it up and "puffed it" with a heat gun. He's a cutie patootie!
I cut out the swirl using my cuttlebug and a sizzix die, put a Kaisercraft flower on top of the swirls, and "popped" Santa on top of the flower. These little digital stamps make this type of project fast and easy! This will be so simple to mass produce.
Be sure to check out Lindsay's Shop today. She has a new set perfect for creating recipe cards. Also, don't forget to stop by her blog. It's Thursday and that usually means freebies! She's also got the complete list of design team members and you will want to stop by their blogs for more holiday and crafting inspiration!
I'm in Houston right now, so it may be a few days before I can get back in the craft room, but I've got a cool holiday ornament to show you next week so stay tuned!

Holidays Digi Style

It's a digital holiday parade. Be prepared to do lots of scrolling because I covered some holidays today using digital stamps from Lindsay's Stamp Stuff. Before I get this parade going though, let me let you know about some great stuff going on at LSS. First, be sure to check out Lindsay's Blog. She's got a design team call going on for her My Grafico store front. Also, she's looking for guest designers. Be sure to check out the store this week. There's lots of new stuff in there and if you're ready to tackle some Christmas cards, she's got some really cute new images to help you out with that. Also, check out Shannon's blog for a great tutorial on changing the color of digital line images in PhotoShop Elements. And while you're checking things out, don't forget to see what all the rest of the LSS Design Team is up to!
It's getting really close to Halloween, so I squeezed in a couple more projects for that holiday. The two projects below look kinda like cards in the picture, but they are actually little treat bags of M&Ms.

Lindsay's really been rockin the circle stamps these days. I found the circle stamps over at My Grafico for free and I filled the centers with my LSS Halloween stamps. Color these little cuties in with markers, punch them with a 1 3/8 circle punch, mat using the SU scalloped circle punch and attach to project. Cute, simple, and quick! Gotta love that!
Through with Halloween? How about a Thanksgiving project sure to please any Thanksgiving hostess?

The little pumpkin is a template by Kelleigh Ratzlaff that you can find at The DigiChick. The beautiful leaves are a digital stamp called Leaf Montage from LSS. I colored them with copics (oh, so fun!), cut them out with nestabilities, and sponged the edges. The lid lifts off the "pumpkin" so it can house a little treat like these candy corns.
Want to get a jump start on Christmas cards? How about a clean, simple card design that can be quickly mass-produced?

The circle stamps are from a new set over at Lindsay's Stamp Stuff called Christmas Cupcake Wrappers. Be sure to check out Lindsay's blog and some of the design team blogs. I think some of the team used the wrappers. I printed out the circle stamps, colored them in with my copics, and again used SU punches. With these stamps and a few scraps of paper, you can have a great set of cards in no time at all. Might even have enough time to make some cupcakes!
Busy, busy, busy! As you read this, I'll be taking my GRE. Wish me luck. I don't have to get a really high score, but I gotta prove I'm college material again!

World Card Making Day --The Journey Continues

There were so many challenges yesterday for WCMD. No way to do them all. I probably could have combined some challenges but that would have stressed me out and this craft shouldn't be about stress! Anyway, I did get several projects completed yesterday but I didn't have the time or mojo for one last project that I wanted to try, so I did it today. This was one of the SCS WCMD challenges (there were many). This one was sponsored by Verve and it included choosing the flag of a country and using that flag's colors to create a card.

I chose the country of Georgia (not the state) whose flag includes the colors of burgundy, black and white. I love how striking this combination is. I have been wanting to use the ornament and my copic markers ever since I got in my recent Verve order, but there just hasn't been time. Now, I can't wait to try this with other colors, too. It is just a gorgeous image (actually, one of several gorgeous images in this set). I blended R37, R39, and R59 for this ornament and then added some stickles for added sparkle.
World Card Making Day was lots of fun, but I think I'm ready to tackle a few other kinds of projects now. I've still got a few more things I've created this weekend to show you, but I'll save that for another day. Hope your WCMD was just Zippy!
Project Recipe
Paper: PTI Scarlet Jewel CS,  PTI In BloomPP, SU Black CS, GinaK White Pure Luxury CS
Stamps: Verve Ornamental Christmas
Accessories: copic markers, Ranger stickles in Black Diamond, Ruby Slipper, and Frosted Lace, cuttelbug, Spellbinders Label One die, Spellbinders Classic Circle die, PTI True Black Swiss Dots Satin Ribbon

Christmas Shopping in July

If you've been to Hobby Lobby this month, then you've witnessed the transformation from the summer garden scene to the winter wonderland! Incredible how they do that. One day I was looking at some patio furniture. The next day all that was replaced with Christmas trees. We're still experiencing triple digit temperatures, so I'm just not ready for the transition.
BUT this week's Digital Tuesday Challenge is Christmas in July and while I'm not ready for Christmas trees and snowmen just yet, I know it's time to start "the list". So with that in mind, I printed out a digital image of shopping bags from Lindsay's Stamp Stuff which I colored with my copics. Be sure to do a little shopping for yourselves and visit Lindsay's store this month. She's running a special all month: spend $5 in the store and get a free stamp of your choice and since it's digital, there's no waiting for days to recieve your images! Also, be sure to visit Lindsay's blog to check out what the rest of her design team is up to this week. Someone's got a darling little freebie to give away this week!
I used the Tuesday Morning Sketch challenge to create the layout for this card. It was so hard to take this card seriously, so I just had a little fun with the whole thing. I counted up the number of days until Christmas so I could print out my "tongue-in-cheek" sentiment which I punched out with Stampin' Up's new modern label punch and matted with their new movers and shapers die. I embossed part of the card with the new cuttlebug herringbone embossing folder. I cut out an ornament with a Sizzix die. Now, who can I send into a panic with this card announcing that time is running short to get that Christmas shopping finished??? Merry Christmas, yall!
Project Recipe
Paper: SU Wild Wasabi CS (retired), SU Real Red CS, Real Red DSP, DCWV Metallic Cardstack, DCWV Nana's Kitchen CS
Stamps: Lindsay's Stamp Stuff Shopping Bags
Ribbon: SU Real Red grosgrain ribbon
Accessories: SU Modern Label punch, SU Sizzix Movers and Shaper Die, Sizzix ornament die, Ranger Stickles, Cuttlebug Embossing folder (herringbone), Cuttlebug, copic markers (G0000, G21, G82, R0000, R46, N2)