A Gnome for the Gnome Card

 I so adore the Gnome card I made that I just had to make a little Christmas Gnome for the tree too.  This guys was super easy.  I have alot of different trees in my yard and have access to some different pinecones.  The one tree provides the perfect ones for the Gnomes beard.  I then just hot glued some tiny cones from another tree and used some felt, bells and a wooden bead..  Not many supplies are needed.  The main pinecone is from a pine tree that is very sappy so it is best to not use cones that you have just gathered this year but let them dry out for a year or two.  They release this terrible sap for what seems like forever!  Mine have been down in the basement for maybe 2 years and still had some sappy pitch on them.  Anyway paint them white and let them totally dry.  Cut a piece of felt into a quarter circle and form it into a cone and glue together.  I wing it.  No pattern was used.  Glue to the top of the pinecone where the stem is.  Next decorate the hat.  I chose to use tiny cones on the brim but you could use pom poms or chennile stems or even cotton balls or sequins.  Up to you.  You could even leave it alone.  I also added a little greenery and a berry.  Up by the brim I glued a wooden bead for the nose.  A pom pom could be used here too.  Then at the top of the hat I poked a hole with a skewer and slipped a hook through then added some twine and a jingle bells.  Super cute.

I made a couple but next year I think these may be placed on some of the packages.

Til Next Time.........................................  

Gnome for Christmas

 Yes I'll be "Gnome For Christmas"

I love Gnomes and so do some of my dear friends.  Some of my other friends also gifted me some Papers from Photo Play The New Norm which got me thinking..... Why not combine the 2 of them with Christmas and make a very unusual Christmas card.  We all need something to smile at right now and I thought this might put a grin on a few friends faces. 

I own a few Gnome stamps and dies and I'll admit I picked the one easiest to color.  I haven't much time this year and of course I'm really hoping these cards won't be needed next year so no time to waste with fussy coloring.  I was racking my brain trying to figure out what to write on the inside.  Then in the middle of the night (of course) I thought of the first 2 lines.  Jumped out of bed and jotted it down in the bathroom with eyeliner before I forgot.  I swear when I was done I went to the kitchen grabbed a pen and paper and had seriously already forgotten what I had just wrote.  Late night writting does not stick in my head.  About an hour or so later I came up with more, 20 minutes later a bit more and 2 hours later even more.  By morning it was a bit confusing but I was at least able to rearrange and it at least made a bit of sense.  Here's the first finished card.  

Drum roll please......................................

I Then decided to make a few Slimline cards as well as a couple more regular ones.  But no time to make as many as I wanted to.  All of them had the dame saying on the insides.

As much as I loved making these I really hope I won't need to repeat them next year.

Til next time

HAPPY CARDING AND

M E R R Y   C H R I S T M A S ! ! ! !

SIMPLE COOKIE EXCHANGE TAGS

 I am not sure how many of you feel the same as I do but here we are nearly a year into a pandemic where many of us have "Sheltered at home" and I feel like I don't have enough time.  I started the holiday season thinking "Hey I got this"!  Order gifts on line early.......Check!     Wrap gifts early........nope.......hmmmmm.  Make tags for said gifts........well kinda?  They are super simple but I do have some made so CHECK!  Make Christmas cards....Ccchheck???  Get them mailed early...well they are as of this weekend so Check!   Make Christmas Cookies.........Check!  Make Cookie tray tags............Ok ok major fail!  I made a tag but OMG Looks nothing like what would be on a festive cookie tray.  I mean C'mom....we are "Sheltered at Home"  What else do I have to do????  But nope I did not take the time to make totally awesome Baking inspired tags for the cookie trays.  Instead they turned out like this.........................

Yep!!!!!  Just took cut aparts out of a 6x6 pad and slapped it onto a piece of card stock.  Rounded the corners and punched a hole.  When I put it on the plates.   I didn't even add twine.   I just shoved it between a couple of the cello bags on the plate.  HOW LAZY IS THAT!!!!!  SHAME ON ME!  I swear I don't think I would have been this lazy if it had been an actual cookie exchange.  Ok it was an actual exchange but it was family and family forgives right?  UGHHHH now that the plates are all gone I feel like such a shlup.  Like I should redeem myself and do a porch drop off of a bottle of wine.  Oh wait.......................I still have to wrap presents!   Ugggghhhhh.......I need more time.

Happy Chaos

Tags for the Wee Ones

 I don't know about all of you but when my little grand children open presents on Christmas Day the last thing they are doing is Oooo'ing and Ahhh'ing the beautiful tags on the gifts.  In fact One is lucky if they even take the time to read the tag.  lol  The youngest is now 4 and she has no interest in the tag.  All she wants to know is "Is this mine?"  Her brother now 9 is a "Counter"  Does not care what the tags look like or whose name is one it just as long as he and his sisters get the exact same number of gifts and he makes sure everyone has one in front of them before they open it so all is fair.  The eldest is 12,  you would think she'd be interest in Ama's (me) tags since during the year she helps me make cards and tags for birthdays but nope no interest at all.  So why spend time and energy creating beautiful elaborate tags that will most likely be torn while an anxious child opens a gift?  No one wants that stress on Christmas so I make super simple, I don't care if they're tossed tags.  For those who know me you know I love making tags probably more so than cards and I can get carried away.  So simple is a challenge for me though I know I can do it.  My only problem is I look at them when done and think geeze sooo boring.  But here's what I do.

I use the most inexpensive card stock I can find.  Freebies from friends is best but when I have to buy it I usually get the Recollection brand from Michaels when on sale.  Then at the end of the season they usually have these 6x6 paper pads on clearance too so I pick up what ever they have left.  I don't care what it is I just grab and go.  Last year it was these three.

Now I'm not a scrapbooker so these pads always have sheets that I usually can't use for cards.  Those are the ones I pull out for the tags.

Ooops when I went through the pads I found that the middle pad Happy Pawlidays was actually doublesided so though 1 side I couldn't use the other I could.  But the other 2 pads had these larger design sheets that are actually meant for scrapbook pages so I cut them up for the tags.

All together I'm working with 9 6x6 sheets.  I cut my first set of tags 2.5 x 4 and scored at 2 to make a folded 2 x 2.5 tag. The layer of the above papers were cut 1.75 x 2.25.  I got 16 of these and then carried on to another style since I get bored quickly lol.

Second set were 2.75 x 4 with layers of 2.5 x 3.75.  Very minium embellies.  I was able to whip out 32 of these.  I made both sets while watching the evening Television thats how quickly they went.  I just sat there with a glue stick and glued away!

This was the year I was suppose to show my daughter-in-law and niece-in-law and sister how to ake tags using nearly zero supplies and 1 6x6 paper pack but due to Covid that didn't happen.  I am hoping next year will be different.

Til next time............................

HAPPY CARDING!

No Tag Time

 This year has been crazy.  Well I'm sure that's no news to you.  In our own family there have been health issues (no covid thank goodness) that had kept me away from my craft room except when absolutely necessary.  Things had finally quieted down and I was rushing to get a handful of cards made (actually had to grab some of the leftovers from previous years).  Then there were Christmas gifts for the grandkids.  Yikes!!!  Not wanting to go into stores I did nearly everything on line.  So hard for me since I'm a touchy feelie kind of person.  I had alot of disappointments in purchaces when they arrived because they were not exactly what I thought they were.  Now tags...Ey Yi Yi.

I Cut up some white cardstock 2.75 x 4.25 and then hit the scrap bin.  Corner rounded the tops with ticket punch or scallop punch, layered a 2.5 x 4 piece of scrap added either a circle or square with a sticker of some sort on it and stamped to and from on the back.  DONE!!!  I just don't have time this year.  I feel bad since normally my tags are a bit fancy but not this time.  These have to do.  I got 32 whipped out in an evening.  

I'm now working on tags for the grand kids gifts ages 4-12 and then the grand nieces and nephews ages 5-11.  Doing the simple route again.  Mainly because I really need to get these gifts wrapped!  Times a tickin'!  lol

My husband of course wanted to know why I don't just use those store bought peel and sticks............come on!!!!!  I'm a card maker!!!!!  Papercrafter!!!!  I got stuff!!!!  I should use it right?????

Til next time

HAPPY CARDING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm Obsessed

 OMG...........................DO YOU WANT TO BUILD A SNOWMAN?????

I DO     I DO     I DO

I saw these adorable snowmen on Pinterest a bit ago and now with Covid and being locked up for the last 9 months I really needed to find something else to focus on.  So............garage digging!!!  I got my husband to make me a new mailbox post and I ordered a new mail box and got it all prettied up.  Of course there were scraps.  Hmmmmmm...what to do, what to do????  Well Pinterest?  Snowmen?  4x4's?  2x4's?  3x4's?  I got it all!!!  Buried in the garage but I got it!  So digging I went.  Then got hubby cutting and cutting and cutting.  I was at first happy with 4 of them made with 2x4's about 7" tall.  I had a bag full of new stretchy gloves from clearance last year that we all thought we could do something with but had no clue what until now. and I did these.

Then I thought hmmmm  why not use 3x4's cut at 5" high and use the mitten's instead of gloves?  So I came up with these and I also thought they were all kind of boring so I added a tad of greenery to all of them too.  Oh and I did try to make 2 from corks and just fingers cut from gloves but nevermind.  Pain in the butt.

Then I thought heck I still have wood so lets keep going.........

So yes all in all (4) 7" ones,  (10) 5" ones (2) cork ones and then..............

Yep had to do it..................................

45" 4x4

Dare I go back in the garage?????  I think these's some pressure treated wood in there somewhere lol!

Til next time

???????????????????????

No Card Post

 So Christmas is just around the corner and I wanted to get together a craft box for the nieces and nephews like I did for the fall.  But why do the same right?  So I changed it up just a wee bit and made it into a Christmas Craft Bag from Aunt Santa Sue.   I ordered some material on line and made little draw string bags that measured about 16" wide by 20" tall when completed and filled them with various craft items.  I did include some other activities too that I usually include in my grandkids Christmas box.  Here's a picture of 2 of the 4 bags after they were filled...

Pretty cute and home made tags too.  Inside they have a calendar with some fun activities to do like bake cookies, make a snowman, take a walk and look at neighborhood Christmas lights, have a movie night, make a neighbor a card (supplies provided) etc.  Here are some of the crafts.

All supplies were put into the bag so they didn't have to search for anything.  Thay LOVED it just as much as I loved putting it together.

Now as for my own Grandkids, I had started the tradition of a Christmas box that the kids recieve on the eve of November 30th evry year.  It has a calendar with daily activities counting down to Christmas starting with writing your letter to Santa.  Certian things in the box are wrapped so its a surprise.  Example one of the days states its a good night for a movie so open gift #4 and it would be a new Christmas movie they haven't seen yet.  Usually an oldie but goodie lol.  There's a new Christmas book wrapped up for the day that states read a book before bed open gift #5.  I'm so excited about this years book.  I got the Jimmy Fallon book 5 More Sleeps til Christmas.  Here's their box nearly finished being filled this year.  

I re-use the same box every year.  My son returns it to me at the end of the holidays. 

Well That's it for now.  I'm definately more into a crafting mood than cardmaking mood right now so I'm not sure what my next post will be so...........................

Til next time

HAPPY WHATEVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!