Top 10 Projects of 2014

I love seeing everyone's round-up of their favorite projects of the year.  Here are mine for 2014 in the order that they appeared on my blog:

Snowman Tag:

First Winter Snow:

I'm Yours:

Valentine Frame:

People We Love, Places We Go, Things We Do:

Another Day, Another Round of Candy Land: 

Fueling Up:

December Daily: Joy

My Elf:

Merry and Bright:

You can see last year's favorites on this blog post. If you did a post on your favorites, I love to see yours. Please link it in the comments. 

I'll be back tomorrow with my first layout of 2015. Thanks so much for stopping by. 

Mini Envelope Valentine Frame

Hello everyone and Happy Valentine’s Day!  

I love re-purposing old frames. Today I am up on the Fancy Pants Designs blog with a Valentine project using a standard 5 x 7 inch wood frame. 

I got the idea to do a frame of little love letters after finding this McGill envelope punch at a thrift sale for $3. It makes the cutest little envelopes. 

I punched several envelopes from double sided paper from the Be Loved collection from Fancy Pants Designs.  It's such a sweet collection. I love the mix of yellow, aqua and grey with traditional pink and red.

The base of the project is the pretty yellow side of the Adoration paper from Be Loved, trimmed 5 x 7 inches to fit a standard frame. I added the mini envelopes I had punched then decorated them with buttons, stickers and ephemera.

After the piece was complete, I added a bright blue bird and a sentiment to the outer frame.  

Here’s another look at the final project.

Thanks so much for stopping by!  I hope your day is extra sweet!

Top 13 Projects of 2013: Year In Review

Hello everyone. I can't believe a new year is dawning!  As 2014 approaches, I wanted to look back at my creative projects from 2013 and post a few of my favorites.  I love seeing these types of posts on your blogs and wanted to follow suit. 

Below are 13 of my favorites in the order that they appeared on my blog this year. The blue titles hyperlink back to the original posts and tutorials. 

At The Sea - Pebbles Inc. 

I'm All Ears - October Afternoon

Welcome Little One - Echo Park Paper

Lollipop Tents - Echo Park Paper

Delight - Little Yellow Bicycle

Sailboat Tag - Pebbles Inc.

Silly Amazing Handsome You - My Mind's Eye

The Race - My Mind's Eye

I Fell In Love - Fancy Pants Designs

Tuesdays With Cory Mini Album - Fancy Pants Designs

One Fine Day - Fancy Pants Designs

Toilet Roll Reindeer - Fancy Pants Designs

Shaker Card - Crate Paper

Do you have a favorite among these?

As it turned out, 2013 was the Year of the Pub for me. I had 38 projects in print publications this year including work in Paper Crafts Magazine, Creating Keepsakes, Better Homes and Gardens (specialty issue Make It Yourself), Scrapbook and Cards Today, Scrapbooking & Beyond, CARDS, Scrapbook Trends, Create and Simply Handmade.  Sadly, most of these magazines have either ceased publication or will publish only (or primarily) in digital form in 2014. 

I hope 2013 was a wonderful year for you. If you've written a list of favorite projects from the past year, I'd love to see your post. Please link it in the comments. 

Happy New Year!

Paper Cone Ornament Tutorial: Fancy Pants Designs

Happy Christmas Eve, everyone.  Before I head home for the holidays, I wanted to share a tutorial with you for paper cone ornaments. These are easy to make and can also be used as bows on your packages.  

Supplies:  Double sided paper, circle punch, large brad or flair, sentiment, twine or ribbon hanger.  My supplies are all from Fancy Pants Designs, the Merry Little Christmas collection. 

Start by punching out about 14 circles. 

Roll each circle into a cone, using a strong adhesive. Wet adhesives like Zip Dry probably work best. I used a clip to hold each cone together as the glue dried, which only took a few minutes. 

For the base, I punched a larger circle and stapled a twine hanger at the top. The staple won't show as the cones will completely cover the large red circle. After placing these four, I realized all my cones would not fit, so I trimmed the ends and that worked. See below. 

Add in all the cones or as many as will fit.  If, like me, you rolled some cones fat and some cones skinny, you may need to make some adjustments. I ended up using just 11 of the 14 cones and trimmed the ends off each to fit. 

I punched a hole in the center to help me gauge where the center was as I placed each cone.  A hole in the center will also be helpful if using a large brad as a decorative element. 

Here's a side view. You can see the dimension of the cones. I love how they look. 

To complete the ornament, I topped the cones with a flair button and a sentiment ticket. I used the ornament here as a package bow. It can be removed and used by the recipient as an ornament. 

Thanks so much for stopping by. Wishing you a very merry Christmas!

Creative Gift Cards: Inside a Snow Globe

I love to give and receive gift cards but I also really appreciate a good presentation. For my friend who is a big coffee fan, I gave her a Starbucks gift card inside a homemade snow globe.

Starbucks has these super cute snowmen gift cards this year that work perfectly for snow globes. 

I only needed a few ingredients to make my own snow globe and I already had everything on hand in my house. Bonus!  I used an old pickle jar. I dumped out the last few pickles and cleaned the jar. 

If you want your snow globe to last awhile, be sure to use distilled water or cooled boiled water. This helps prevent mildew and cloudy water. I added a tablespoon of light corn syrup to make the glitter and sequins fall more slowly. 

To create the scene, I added little bottle trees from Fancy Pants Designs in front of the Starbucks card. I used Gorilla Glue to adhere them. Be sure that you use an adhesive that will not break down in water. 

I wrapped the Starbucks snow globe with a gift card that said: In case of emergency, break glass. Of course, she wouldn't really need to break the glass to get the ornament. Just turn the jar right side up and unscrew the lid!

Thanks so much for stopping by.  Have a great weekend. I'll be back on Monday with tutorial for paper ornaments.  

Toilet Roll Reindeer: Christmas Crafts for Kids

I have a children's holiday craft today: reindeer made from toilet paper rolls. These are super quick and were easy to make with items we had around the house.  

We started with three empty toilet paper rolls, cut each roll in half, then choose patterned paper to cover them in. I used paper from Fancy Pants Designs, the new Timber Grove collection.  

We cut the paper into strips, 2 inches wide by 6 inches long, then glued the strips around the rolls. 

After the glue was dry, we punched two holes for antlers near the top of the toilet rolls.  I ran one long pipe cleaner through both holes. The middle of the pipe cleaner is the perfect spot for an ornament hanger. 

To curl the antlers, we wrapped the pipe cleaners around a pen. 

Decorate as desired. 

Then they're ready for the tree!

Holiday Wine Tags: Fancy Pants Designs

It's over the river and through the woods to Grandmother's house we go - for Thanksgiving, that is.  We are making a few side dishes to take along and, of course, I also wanted to bring a little hostess gift.

The one of the left is for Mom.  She is certainly fabulous!  The one on the right, I am saving for a Christmas party.  While I was making one wine tag, I figured I might as well make another. 

These tags are easy to make. I cut each tag 3 inches wide by 10 inches long. I scored the tag 2.5 inches from the top to make the fold. I used a circle punch for the wine bottle hole. All paper and embellishments are from Fancy Pants Designs, the cute new Fall and Winter lines. 

For the holiday bottle of cheer, I used a patterned paper frame and filled the inside with subway art style paper from the Timbergrove collection. I'm thinking a bottle of red would be perfect for curling up in front of the fireplace on a cold night. 

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog today.  To all my US friends: wishing you a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday.

DIY Chalkboard Train Table

For Christmas last year, I wanted to get my son a train table but quickly discovered that nice ones were quite expensive. 

After looking around, we thought it would be easy enough to make our own. And it was.  We decided to make a versatile table with a chalkboard top for drawing and writing when it wasn't used for trains. 

The total cost for this table was less than $15, which gave us plenty of money leftover for wood tracks, trains and accessories.

We happened to have this table base, which we had purchased at a yard sale for $5.  It has a wood insert (not shown) to make a table. The trouble was that there wasn't enough room inside the confines of the table for a figure 8 train track.

With some basic woodworking skills, we were able to make a table to fit on top of the base. We made it a rectangle, measuring approximately 40 x 48 inches. 

After we put together the tabletop, we gave it a couple of coats of chalkboard paint and we were ready for the train set. 

We purchased the Figure 8 Train Track at Target. It is the Circo brand and is interchangeable with other brands of wood track. The trains and accessories are a mixture of Thomas, Brio and Circo. 

The table and trains are hands down my son's favorite toy.

If you have any questions about how to make the table, feel free to post questions in the comments. Thanks for stopping by!