Merry Christmas

A Merry Christmas to you all.

May you spend a wonderful and joyful time with family. ♥

(The card is from Naomi, she made it for Lauren's daughter but we couldn't send it on time *shame*, I used my computer to erase the Alexa at the bottom of the card so that it is now for all of you here! ;-)...)

Candles

I finally finished my candles for Noah's teachers & therapist. Just a little something to accompany gift cards.

I know everyone here knows how to make those, but allow me to explain for my friends and family who don't have a clue!... ;-)

First you stamp (or draw) on a piece of tissue paper, then you wrap the paper around a candle and heat it up with your heating gun (a craft tool much like an hairdryer but that blows less and heat more...). The heat melts the candle which then "absorbs" the paper, leaving only a beautiful design behind.... (in theory, LOL! Sometimes the candle melts a little uneven leaving a few bumps along the way...).
The 1st pic is, obviously, of my stamped design, then it's the finished product! :-)

I hope they like it, I have no clue about what colors they like or anything....Thanks to the monogram regifting would be hard, LOL, but they can say they used it and it's burnt out and get rid of it if they find it hideous!

I like "disposable" gifts for people I don't quite know. I think the correct etiquette about that is to give something that can either be eaten or broken so that people have the option of having the gift disappear, LOL, I think this is wisdom!!! :-D

Stamps : "Boho Blossom" by My Favorite Things, "Ambassador monogram" by PaperTrey Ink, "Sewing kit" by Gel-à-tins

Ink : Brilliance Coffee bean, stamp markers

First stationery

I made this set for Naomi's teacher to accompany some Lindt Truffles.

I don't have a clue what colors she likes but since she wears a lot of black (has black hair and black eyes) I went with that and added red just to make it more cheery. I really like my flower center (flower by MFT and monogram by PTI) but am not quite happy with my border. I find it a little too empowering and think I should just have left it bare, but it's done, I made 10 of those (and had to redo one or two because of smeared ink...) and can't stomach starting all over again!.... I also worry it does look a little too handmade and imperfect for a gift... :-S ?

Since I only have 2 circle punches and needed a rather small center to not hide the flower too much I couldn't use the beautiful borders from PTI (that you can see on the enveloppe flap), so I used the "sewing kit" from Gel-à-Tin and used a button stamp just wiping clean the middle before stamping. The border is made with the sewing line in that set. And of course the monogram on the flower is on pop-dots ;-)

It is such a simple project in itself but the different steps took me forever! At the end my eyes and my wrist were killing me! Maybe I should start wearing my glasses for that type of work!

For the box, I reused a box my PaperTrey Ink stamps came in, and trimmed it to the right size and decorated it to match my stamping.

Stamps: "Boho Blossom" by My favorite Thing, "Ambassador Monogram" by PaperTrey Ink, "Sewing Kit" by Gel-à-Tins.

Inks: Brilliance Graphite Black and Pearlescent Poppy

Ducky love

There's a story behind this cute card I made today for... my husband. Yes, I know, you thought it was for the birthday of a 5 years old but it's not....

When I showed him my new stamps the other day, we looked at the "Essential sentiments" from MFT, and I was commenting on how I might not see myself using some of them too often, like the "Hey Sexy!" one for example. I told him he was likely the only person who would ever get a card from me with that on... So that explains the sentiment...

Now, don't you love my cute little ducky? When I showed my hubby the cool set of little penguins (From C.C. Designs at All that scraps) I bought for my daughter (with the promise she would let me use them, LOL) he took a look and told me "It's cool you can even use it for ducks!" I admit I hadn't thought of that (yet!)... so that explains why there is a duck on a card for a 42 years old! LOL

I tried coloring the little guy but wasn't too happy with the result so I finally stamped him on yellow cardstock.

The heart is from "Boho Blossom" by MFT. I clear embossed the heart and the ducky and really love the glossy finish it gave them. It was a little complicated because I had already cut things out when I thought about the gloss so I had to hold Mr Ducky with tweezers by the little cowlick on his head! :-)

I wanted to sponge the borders of my green square but I forgot to do so before gluing the paper so it staid bare.... :-S The heart and the duck are on dimensionals.

As always you can see the details by clicking on the pic. (the little guy is even cuter in big size!! ;-) )

Stamps: "Essential sentiments" and "Boho Blossom" from My favorite Things, "Little penguins" by C.C. Designs.

Ink: Brilliance Graphite Black, Brilliance Pearlescent Poppy, Versamark.

Oh my dog!!....

I received my very 1st order from My Favorite Things! *grins*

Those of you familiar with that stamps set will likely be horrified to see that the labrador disappeared... As my husband put it, I did a "dogectomy" (please, don't throw stones at me)... I am not a dog person (I'm a cat person ;-)) and didn't feel like having the dog there.... I just wanted the seashore because living in Florida it's a must! ;-) I think I'll have some good use of this sentiment over the winter!!...

The little sticks coming out of her hat are supposed to be hair and I used the wave stamp for that... My coloring is pretty dreadful (I used watercolor pencils and regular pencils) and from the pic you can't really see but I used some Stickles here and there... The frame is on pop dots but I kept the image flat for my 1st try.

I really like my "suntiment"! ;-)

And I used my new Nestabilities (Thanks to my in-laws who gave me money for the holidays... ;-))...

Happy Hanukkah

Hannukah is soon to be over and my Hannukah cards haven't made it to the mail box.... *shame* and I just realized I didn't even wish anyone here a Happy Hanukkah! (That's what happens when you have several blogs, you get confused on what you wrote where!...)

I don't know if any of my fellow scrap-bloggers here (or lurker-readers?) are jewish but I wish you all a very Happy Hanukkah.

May the lights of this season shine upon your life all year long.

I love this Holiday and the symbolism of light.♥

Anyway, I made those 2 cards this morning. I was thinking about a friend of mine. I never met her in real life but "know" her through e-mails, phone calls or messenger for almost 3 years now (waow, time really flies!!) She has an autistic son too and when my son was about to be diagnosed I turned to an online french community and started looking for answers, that's where I "met" her. She lives in NY state and has no family around and I thought that a little holiday cheer couldn't hurt. :-)

Those are 2 "spur of the moment" cards. For the 1st one I had this idea of the frame with the saying on the paper peeking through so I went with that and the second one actually was born from a piece of yellow cardstock I fell upon, where I had tried my scallop punch (the Martha Stewart one that looks like lace) and from the spool of ribbon I had just finished with the 1st card (the cardstock semi-circle down there is the spool side).

I'm sure by now you have guessed I don't own any Hannukah stamps... ;-)

Now I better write those cards and get them to the mailbox!

Baby girl 2

After my fiasco with Lauren's sketch challenge (the card ended up in the trash...) I had to make another one because we need to send those baby gifts out.

By then I was even more tired and really not in the mood anymore! Plus a big bad migraine has taken possesion of my head. :-(

So I whipped up this one in 5 minutes top! Honestly it's not out of this world, but it's not my worse card either and sometimes I wonder why I spend so much time on something for a result that isn't better looking anyway!???....

(P.S: The weird looking little thing at the bottom is a little safety pin...)

Baby girl

I wanted to try Lauren's sketch challenge from this morning, but for whatever reason my card got derailed in another direction...then I tried again and the result is...blah...

And actually when I was moving it around to try to get some kind of correct lighting I made the glitter pen and ink smear all over so it ended up in the trash! :-(

I needed 2 cards to accompany gifts for baby-girls (just what I needed in the midst of my holiday breakdown!!) so I think not having the liberty of chosing the theme or the stamp blocked my inspiration!!

My camera is acting up big time, shutting off by itself whenever it feels like it...which of course didn't help with my mood.

I am tired and sick (sore throat), I haven't been sleeping well for a couple of nights because I couldn't swallow or woke up choking, so I'll just blame my current state for my blah-ness!... :-)I guess you can't always be happy with your work, or can you?

Lost in scrapbooking

No, I am not dead and haven't been abducted by aliens...

I am just busy. I don't know where the time goes but this is a disaster!!!

I have been working on little (accordion) scrapbooks-in-a-box for gifts this year and it's taking me forever, argghhh...

It seems I always have more on my plate than I can chew...

I don't think I'll make those next year!!! :-)