Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas....

Hi there, it's Anita popping in today with a super-quick little post with a layout for you to hang your favourite Christmas photo on! I hope you and your families all had a wonderful time celebrating and that you now have some lovely memories to scrap.

Sometimes it's nice to break away from the standard square layout and use a die cut page for the base instead to add a little interest. I used a mix of 2 of Kaisercrafts collections, those being Silent Night ( available in the shop here) and also an older one called Saint Nicholas ( which I had in my stash)

 I did a little bit of fussy cutting with the holly leaves, bells and the robin and then also cut out the 3 baubles...which I then sponged the edges with a gold acrylic paint and added some red twine to hang them from.

I also cut out a few of the tags and signs, which I then again sponged the edges of with the gold paint, this highlights them nicely and really shines when it catches the light.

After matting the photograph and repeating the sponging process, I then took all the panels and the photo and hung them on a line of red and white Bakers Twine, using teeny wooden pegs, that I had strung across the page. I popped another panel and a hand cut Santa on the bottom left of the page and I finished it all off with a pearlescant die cut snowflake.

So that's it for me this year and I am looking forward to scrapping my way through 2017..... I hope you got some lovely new stash to play with for Christmas.....and if not, don't forget there are lots of lovely things for sale in the SHOP and also there is a vast range of items at super prices in the SALE section too.

Happy Scrappy New Year to You All
Warmest wishes
Anita xx

Blue Fern Studios - Christmas Hamper

Hi, Lynn here today - with a Christmas gift made using the delightful Blue Fern Studios Vintage Christmas & Vintage Christmas 2 collections. I wanted to create a special hamper to take along as contribution to our hosts on Christmas day. I found a crate style box at IKEA which I thought would be just the right size and set about painting and decorating it. Then I dressed up the contents of the hamper too.

The storage box from IKEA is called knagglig, it cost £5 and measures 23cm x 31cm x 15cm. I screwed it together following the simple instructions and painted inside and out with Ranger Distress Paints. 

I selected three sheets of double-sided paper, 2 from the Vintage Christmas collection - Wonderland and Greetings Cards and 1 from Vintage Christmas 2 - Holiday Treats. These papers all work well together. All the papers I cut were inked with Ranger Distress Ink. The papers are very thick making them ideal for this project, as they hold their shape well.

For the front of the box I cut the border pattern from 'Holiday Treats', cut the sides down and stuck it around the edges of the front of the box. I added embellishments including bells, ribbon, lace, flowers, holly leaves and dew drops - all from the shop.

The laser cut chipboard words on the front of the box 'Twas the Night Before Christmas'  (also Blue Fern Studios) was embossed with Stampendous Frantage Embossing Enamel in Shabby White. This has a great texture and is mainly white but has a bit of a golden sparkle too. 

Then I gathered all the goodies to go inside and set about decorating them to match.

The wine bottles were decorated with hangers made with patterned paper cut to 3" x 9" and folded over at 3" and 6" down from the top. I cut a hole with a circular die to go over the neck of the bottle. Pictures were cut from the paper called 'Greetings Cards'. I cut some with oval shaped dies and the other was cut cut to the shape with scissors and trimmed with a corner rounder punch (as were the corners of the hangers themselves). Lace, paper roses, poinsettia and gems were added to decorate. 

This mini trug was filled with chocolate coins, a Santa and peppermint sticks. I cut another image from the 'Greetings Cards' paper ad wrote a message on the reverse side. This was all wrapped in a cellophane bag and tied with twine decorated with another paper rose.

Next I added a topper to this bag of nuts by folding over one of the larger images from the 'Greeting Cards' paper.

This long box of Maltesers was decorated on all four sides and the top with 'Wonderland' paper, and a small tag was cut from 'Greetings Cards' paper.

This jar of salted caramel spread was decorated using two images from the 'Greetings Cards' paper.

The Camembert was treated to more papers and a gold doily, ribbon and button.

The dates were decorated with paper cut from 'Holiday Treats' and 'Greetings Cards' topped off with a length of gold ribbon. 

These will all be put together with some roses, greenery, cinnamon sticks and pine cones for Christmas day.

Thanks for looking

Merry Christmas
Lynn x

Christmas gift ideas and highlighting Scrapiniec

Hello

Julie here, I'm back for a final time this year with a couple of last minute gift wrapping ideas and highlighting the wonderful new range of chipboard by a company called Scrapiniec.  This wonderful range will, no doubt, fly off the shelves in January when it hits the shop.

I am always stuck for how to make gift cards, vouchers or money look "pretty" as a present.  I decided to come up with a few ideas using the gorgeous, vibrant new papers from the American Crafts "All Wrapped Up" line.

Firstly, I used a plain envelope from my stash (Papermaze stock some here) and simply stuck some double sided tape on it and laid several pieces of scrapbook paper on the front and back of the envelope to cover it.  You can go to town doing this adding as much or as little paper as you require.  This is a great way to use up scraps and also a great way to jazz up a plain envelope without having to make the envelope yourself.  For the label I use a label die and added several of the beautiful Scrapiniec holly leaves around the edge for decoration.  I used Mercury Glass Stickles to add a little bit of glitter to the holly leaves.

If you happen to have the brilliant We R Memory Keepers Envelope Punch Board you can also use your favourite scrapbook papers or scraps to make your own envelopes in four easy turns.  I created this envelope in the matter of minutes following the easy guide provided on the board.  A gift card or money can fit inside this envelope beautifully.  As a label for the front I used a 3x4 Project Life card. I love finding more uses for my scrapbook stash.

To go inside the envelope I used a large label die and cut out two pieces, one of cardstock and one of scrapbook paper and tied them together with ribbon.  I then added some more Stickle covered Scrapiniec holly leaves to the front label.  I cut out two little stamp pieces from a piece of the All Wrapped Paper and stuck half the stamp down to create a sort of tab to hold a gift card inside.  Alternatively this method could be used to hold money or a gift voucher.  The Scrapiniec chipboard is so slim that it doesn't add too much thickness to the card and fits inside the envelope beautifully.

I love finding excuses to use my We R Memory Keepers Fuse Tool and made a super easy gift token.  I put a piece of All Wrapped Up Paper inside a 4x6 page protector, added some glitter to the front and a Project Life card to the back to write what the gift token was for and then sealed the pocket up with my Fuse tool.  A very quick, easy idea that looks fabulous on your tree!

Finally, I made a scrapbook layout using almost solely Scrapiniec chipboard to highlight how wonderfully versatile it is.  I used a Memorybox Snowflake stencil and a stencil brush to lay a background on some red Bazzill cardstock.  I found the colour was a bit bright so went over the background with Picket Fence Distress Ink that gave it all a lovely faded look.  I then spritzed the background with white spray stain and a gold spray stain.  Now comes the gorgeous Scrapiniec chipboard!  This chipboard is a lovely pale cream so doesn't need colouring if you don't want to colour it.  I left some chipboard "nude" and decided to test out some techniques on it.  I put some distress ink on it using a blending tool and as it was already cream it went on as a true colour and blended beautifully.  I also used stickles which looked beautiful against the cream.  I then tried embossing powder, the chipboard is so detailed and fine that I feel that the powder clogged some of the finer patterns but it still looks beautiful.  This chipboard is just beautiful, the detail is fine and delicate and it is so thin that it won't weigh your layouts down.  I can't wait to use more!

I hope you enjoyed these last minute ideas and I hope they have helped.  Thank you for reading my blog posts this year.  Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all!

Winter Wonderland Explosion Box

Hi There, it's Anita here today and in amongst decorating our tree, shopping for and wrapping pressies and all the other things we all have to do in the lead up to Christmas I have been playing with some gorgeous papers from Simple Stories.

I have been lucky enough to play with some of their Winter Wonderland collection and instead of a layout I thought I would make something I could use as a gift for someone.
 You could use one of these explosion boxes in place of a Christmas card for someone special or you could add photos inside and make it into a mini album maybe..... I personally will be using this to tuck a gift card into and surprise someone.

 There are lots of tutorials for these boxes all over the internet, here is a link to one of them and you can just adjust them to whatever design/decor/style you wish.

I used 2 sheets of Bazill cardstock for the base and inner layer and various sheets of Winter Wonderland including this , this and this for using various elements and patterns to decorate the flaps, this one for the lid and the sticker sheet also for bits and pieces. I had a nice length of cream organza ribbon which was perfect to create a lid 'pull'.

I used some pom pom trim,  which I removed the band from and piled the pom poms up in a pile as snowballs and then added some Icicle Stickles to make the snow sparkle and shimmer.

You can make several layers in these boxes if you prefer or even just leave it to one layer, they are very versatile .....and great to use for all sorts of occasions and themes.

All the products used can be found in the shop ....along with a vast variety of other lovely products. Why not pop over, have a browse and maybe treat yourself to some lovely new stash to start the New Year with a bang and encourage you to have some creative time for yourself....

Merry Christmas Everyone.....and I would like to wish you a Scrappy New Year too xxx
Warmest wishes
Anita xxx

christmas decoration and gift idea

i must apologize for my post being late and typical for the time of year when everything just takes hold of you and you feel you have no time.

Anyway back to the gift/decoration idea. So around October time i bought some large plastic baubles from hobby craft and thought that these would be great to put in small Christmas gifts and i could also use my old paper scraps to decorated them

So used my dies to cut out leaves, roses from the tattered pine cone die by sizzix, basic flower shape and holly shape. I inked the edges and went about arranging them how i liked and adhered with hot glue. Found a wooden reindeer i purchased from a local Christmas market along with the word "merry" die cut from some gold sparkly paper i had stashed away. Added some glitter glue to the sides of the rolled up roses and a red button

Here are some close ups

If  you do not have these specific dies, use punches, draw a template or cut a circle and use your scissors to spiral this circle and roll up into a flower. It will use up all your unwanted scraps of Christmas paper and make a unique gift.

Have a very merry Retro Christmas with Authentique

Happy Friday to you all, today I am here to share a Christmas mini book that I have created.
I finally got myself in the festive mode and not a moment too late as Christmas is almost upon us.

This book is sort of my version of December Daily, I like the concept but it doesn't really work for me, so I decided just to document December as and when things happen.

I used the Retro Christmas collection by Authentique, this collection has a fun mix of patterns and images from Christmas past.

I fussy cut the Santa head from the Newspaper Clips sheet and added him to my layered papers. The cute little sprinkles shapes are by Doodlebug and there are plenty in the pack for me to use on the inside pages as well. The 2016 are Thickers in a nice shiny metallic gold colour, I also used some Make It Merry stickers by Bella Boulevard added in here and there.

I will be back later in the month to share some of the inside pages of this 6 x 6 chipboard album.

Hope your Christmas preparations are going smoothly.

For this project and all your papercrafting needs please pop over to the shop

Sizzix - Tim Holtz Alternations Thinlits Die Set - Snow Globe and Glitter

Hello - Lynn here with you today and my first Christmas project for this season. I couldn't resist this Snowglobe die set when I visited the Papermaze shop recently.

Together with some delightful A4 glittery card, Bazzill cardstock, embossing plates and other dies I made a selection of Christmas cards. I also used miri card and some patterned paper scraps. I have listed all the supplies at the end of the post.

I made all the card blanks using Bazzill Cardstock.

A couple more cards I made using the same cardstock and some Crafter's Companion dies.

Supplies used:

Card blanks and some of the shapes were cut from Bazzill cardstock.

Crafter's Companion Embossing Folders 5" x 7" - Flourishing Flakes

Crafter's Companion Dies - Seasonal Sentiment, Stylish Tree, Merry & Bright, Snowflakes of Joy

Elizabeth Craft Designs Die - Merry Christmas

Tim Holtz Alterations Thinlits die set - Snowglobe

CArt-Us Glittery Cardboard and Miri card from the shop - there are many lovely colours to choose from and the beauty is the glitter stays on the card not on the floor and everywhere else! (not on the website - so please contact the shop for details).

Gems - various different flat-backed gems.

Hope this has inspired you with your Christmas card making.

Back later in the month with a Christmas Eve idea.

Thanks for looking.

Lynn x

Christmas Cards

Hi Carol with you today…who, like me, is well behind making their Christmas Cards? whilst at the shop on Saturday, before the Christmas Crop, I saw this great pad by Pinkfresh - Oh Joy….

This pad has some fantastic papers which will make your cards for you, with a little imagination and bling added, …so once home I set about making some quick and easy cards..

Card 1 - all of my cards are pre-cut 6"x6" cards

Cutting my paper to size I inked the edges using distress ink and a blending tool (same technique for all cards).  Using a "Happy Christmas" stamp and black archival ink, I stamped onto white cardstock, inked with blue distress ink, matted onto gold cardstock and mounted this using silicone glue onto some washi tape, some bling was added to the corners.  Stickles were added to my trees and further bling for the tops of the trees finished off my card.

Card 2

"tis the season…." the paper does it all for you - cut to size and edges inked.  Use stickles to add a bit of bling to the circles…add a poinsettia which has had a little stickles added….

Card 3

Mistletoe is a must at Christmas, paper cut to size and edges inked with brown this time… distress ink was added thro the mini poinsettia stencil,  washi tape was then added along the bottom 1/4 of the card and then the same Happy Christmas was stamped and matted onto red cardstock.  The poinsettia was cut from red card, stickles and bling added….some stickles was also added to the mistletoe berries.

Card 4

leaving the card base blank with some black lines to edge, I added a 2" piece of the cardstock, painted some Tando Creative trees (which then had stickles added) and adhered these to the base.

All of these four took about 2 hrs, not bad for a christmas card session hey?

To finish off, I made this using Graphic 45 papers

the card base had black lines added, I then hand cut a star from the graphic 45 Christmas Carol  6 x 6 patterns and solids pad…the star was then doodled and elements from the 8x8 Christmas Carol pad were then added along with three red flowers.

Well, thats my last post for 2016! May I wish you all a very Happy Christmas and all the best for a very happy and successful 2017 xx