Tag Archives: Christmas

Joy to the World!

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Christmas brings such JOY to me! I love this stamp set with the bold declaration of “JOY”!

All the images come from the stamp set Peace and Joy. And, they’re great for mixing and matching–and adding the large script with a small block print. It works perfectly here and would be great on a Christmas card too! I used real red and old olive for the images. Expresso is used for the block text. Super simple, super easy, but a striking declaration of the season!

I can’t believe we are at the end of the year! It has come so quickly! I pray that you can know the Joy that has been declared to the world through the birth of our Savior! We celebrate Him this season!

If you happen to be on Maui, stop by our street! Come shop local makers and small businesses to finish up your Christmas lists! As an added treat, the Maui High School Choir will be caroling through the streets! Hope to see you!

Have a wonderful Christmas! And head on over to see what Anne and Cheryl have in store for you today!

With love and aloha!!– Crystal

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Santa is on his way!

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I needed some gifties for Isaac’s classmates. But, as usual, not much time to get them made. So. Target and SU! To the rescue!

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Target had these super cute kisses wrapped like Santa hats. And I knew IR would be perfect for this stamp and these tags!  And the Santa hat is made using the tree punch (folded over) the 1/4″ circle punch and the word window punch (out of red and dazzling details glimmer paper….cause of COURSE, Santa would have glitter.)

I tied them up with the old olive twine (retired but still on the clearance rack…and amazingly priced).  And, I made Isaac sign them all…. : )

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How cute is that??!!

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Well…. Here’s to the Christmas prepping… Be sure to slow down and enjoy!

Believe

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Here is another item that will be at the Maui Stampers Craft Fair. (This Sunday.). The believe banner. Just perfect for he Christmas Season.

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I love the neutral look and the combination of burlap and bling. I love it so much I think I’m gonna redesign my Christmas decor this year. (I needed to do something different anyway…)

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I only have a couple of these, so shop early! It will come with the jute to hang it. I just couldn’t get a nice picture with it hanging.

I think I’m gonna hang mine with a garland in the entry way to the kitchen. Where are you gonna put yours?

Christmas Collectibles

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Hello Again!!  Welcome to the next stop on the next Stamp of the Month Blog Tour…

This month, I have for you a few projects for your Christmas gift needs…  A card, goodie box, and a goodie bag tag!  All perfect for your gift giving needs.  And, take my advice (and this is totally a “do as I say and not as I do” piece of unsolicited Christmas prepping advice).  START NOW.  then you don’t get overwhelmed in December.  (check back in with me in December and see how well I heeded my own advice).

So, here it is:

First up is the Christmas Card.  And I must confess, I got the color scheme from Pinterest.  The polka-dots from the Christmas paper (Season of Style) and the Coastal Cabana (just fyi, I love this color so much I’m thinking of painting my kitchen a shade of it…).

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Very simple layout.  One of my favorite styles of cards (i.e. the 3×6).  Tag is cut from the Chalk Talk framelits set.  And, a piece of washi…  And, of course, after I made this and was so proud of myself, I realized that silver cord is retired.  But, we do have the perfect silver ribbon that would totally work.  I didn’t wanna take it off cause it’d never look quite right for me to re-do… and I didn’t feel like remaking everything… SORRY.  My apologies.

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And, next up is a little gift tag.  This would go wonderfully on a gift, a cello bag of goodies, or you could even layer it up and put it on the front of a card:

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I love how the coordinating punch works so well with this set.  And, you can punch a bazillion ornaments for all your ornament needs…  You could even make cute ornaments for your own tree.  The children would love to make it…

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Just another view…

And, last up, is the little goodie box.  SU has expanded their packaging line, to my utter joy and excitement.  I LOVE PACKAGES.  And, the best gift, given in a junk package is not nearly as brilliant as if it were packaged well…  so, there is NO excuse for ugly packages this year…

ANYWAY… these boxes are super cute.  They have a clear slide that allows a peek at what is inside.  Don’t get too excited.  I had no idea what to put inside at this point (It’s October, and I’ve already alluded to my procrastination problem…) So, all I have inside this one is the brown crinkle paper.  Which makes it look cute, but the gift receiver may not be very excited about the gift…

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The nice thing about this box is that you can put belly bands ALL the way around the plastic sleeve and its FINE.  Cause the plastic sleeve slides off the box.  So your design stays nice and you can still get into the box.   BRILLIANCE I TELL YOU…. PURE BRILLIANCE.

Here is the set together:

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Hope you enjoyed this installment!  Next, you are off to see Deb Leigh.  Click on the button below.  And, below that is the entire list of those in the blog… If you need…

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Nancy Amato           http://stampinallnight.blogspot.com
Melissa Bolinger      http://www.stampinup.net/blog/2089191
Jackie Bottomley     http://www.jackiebottomley.blogspot.com
Susan Carlson         http://stampinmomoffour.blogspot.com
Tamra Davis            http://www.thecardladies.com
Connie Deibler         http://www.conniestamps.com
Sherri Eddleblute      http://www.sweetestdesigns.blogspot.com
Crystal Kondo           http://www.card-ed.com
Deb Lehigh               http://thestampinhut.typepad.com
Anne Matasci            http://www.MauiStamper.wordpress.com
Robin Merriman        http://www.trinitydesignstudio.blogspot.com
Audra Monk              http://thecraftyyogi.blogspot.com
Maria Pane               http://www.stampinandscrappinwithriri.blogspot.com
Andi Potler                http://www.absolutekreations.com
Michele Reynolds     http://www.inspirationink.typepad.com
Pam Staples             http://www.sunnygirlscraps.com
Jeri St. John             https://jerrisgemtastics.blogspot.com
Jeannette Swain       http://www.stampsnwhatnot.com
Janet Wakeland        http://www.remarkablycreated.com

Tag…you’re IT!!

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Okay, So I don’t know how the title has anything to do with the card I made, but I had to use it…  cause it was so corny…

Anyway… Welcome back to the Stamp of the Month tour….  This month we are using the Ronald McDonald House Charities Set called “Tag It”.  This set is special because $3 from the sale of the set is donated to RMHC.  It’s so cute, and it’s for a good cause!!  This set is $16.95 for clear or $22.95 for wood.

The other great thing about this set is all the images coordinate with the Chalk Talk Framelits.  So…. there is a matching cut-out for each one…to make it a tag!!  How great is that??!!??

So, here is the card I made.  I was kinda of drawn to the Christmas image.  It’s August.  I know, but we are already starting to think about our Christmas Stamp Classes and just, well, hum.  I don’t know.  I just decided to do Christmas.  Go put on some Christmas music then come back and finish reading this post…

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So, there you have it…  My Christmas Card in August.  I decided I wanted to maker a card, as opposed to a set of tags, so I decided I needed some other images to play with.  Gorgeous Grunge to the rescue.  We got this stamp set as part of or Convention goodies, and I gotta say, I had trouble WAITING till convention to get it.  It makes such glorious background stuff.  And, WASHI.  I am truly, honestly, and FULLY in LOVE with WASHI TAPE.  It’s so easy to use.  And, that’s the SU washi in the Christmas Colors (p. 25 in the Holiday Catalog…$4.95 for 3 rolls…which is a STEAL).  Anyway, The inks I used in the background were Early Espresso and Crumb Cake.  I wanted to keep it neutral and use the washi to add color.  I love that it is a little see-through.  This makes it real fun to layer.

For the card I used Crumb Cake and then layered with Early Espresso.  I stamped on Very Vanilla.

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Close up of the tag.  You can kinda see my flub up there…. here’s why…

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Can you see in the light that it is embossed?  I wanted it embossed, but wanted it TWO colors.  And, really didn’t want to have to cut out stuff.  SO….  I wanted to clear emboss over ink.  And you typically would do this by stamping your stamp in the versamark ink, then into the color ink.  But, cause I wanted 2 colors, I decided to try and marker it after stamping in the versamark.  Don’t do that.  It doesn’t work.  I had to get creative with how I used the ink pad and ink the image with the edges and corners of the ink pads.  That’s why the flub.  And, this happened:

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See the red seam binding?  It’s cleverly disguising a red spot on the image, where I dropped the stamp into the red stamp pad after having the espresso ink on it already.  (BTW:  the red is Cherry Cobbler).    And, I like the cherry cobbler seam binding on the card.  Don’t you just love happy accidents?  Anyway, back to embossing…. stamp the image in versamark, cleverly apply the ink from the other stamp pads, then sprinkle with clear embossing powder and emboss.  I decided to hand trim the image out because I wanted to be able to layer it onto the espresso tag that I made with the coordinating framelit…  so, yes, I cut it by hand…

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SO.  Now.  TAG.  YOU’RE IT.  It’s your turn to play with this wonderful stamp set, give to charity (when you order the set) and make some fantastic projects with it!!  But, wait…. finish the blog tour of course!!

Your next stop is Deb Leigh.  Click on the button below…

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If that doesn’t  work, you can use the list below to go on to the next blog…

Nancy Amato           http://stampinallnight.blogspot.com
Melissa Bolinger      http://www.stampinup.net/blog/2089191
Jackie Bottomley     http://www.jackiebottomley.blogspot.com
Susan Carlson         http://stampinmomoffour.blogspot.com
Tamra Davis            http://www.thecardladies.com
Connie Deibler         http://www.conniestamps.com
Danielle Denhardt    http://www.purrfectlycreative.com
Sherri Eddleblute      http://www.sweetestdesigns.blogspot.com
Crystal Kondo           http://www.card-ed.com
Deb Lehigh               http://thestampinhut.typepad.com
Anne Matasci            http://www.MauiStamper.wordpress.com
Robin Merriman        http://www.trinitydesignstudio.blogspot.com
Audra Monk              http://thecraftyyogi.blogspot.com
Maria Pane               http://www.stampinandscrappinwithriri.blogspot.com
Andi Potler                http://www.absolutekreations.com
Michele Reynolds     http://www.inspirationink.typepad.com
Vicki Soni                  http://www.paperinkle.com
Pam Staples             http://www.sunnygirlscraps.com
Jeri St. John             https://jerrisgemtastics.blogspot.com
Jeannette Swain       http://www.stampsnwhatnot.com
Janet Wakeland        http://www.remarkablycreated.com

Lots of Tags!

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Botb of my stamp clubs decided to do tag exchanges for our December meeting.   It was tons of fun.  For one group,  Harriette designed a little game where we had to guess who made each tag.  I did a little better this year… Got 4 right. Last year I only got one right (my own….  Hum….) anyway… 

So…  Here are the tags!

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And  here is tbe one I made…  Love that core’dinations card stock.  There are some new colors coming in the new spring occasions catalog,  but if you like these colors you’d better order before January 2…

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And, I wanted to show you some mds tags I made.  In an effort to simplify Christmas,  I decided to make a bunch of tags.  These can be used on gifts,  neighbor gifts,  whatever…  Love it… Cause I made it but it was so fast and easy….

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And…  Here is what it went on… SCONES!! To go with the lemon curd…

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Well…  Hope you have a good next couple of days…   Getting ready for Christmas. I still have some baking to do…. And a gigantic pot of Portuguese Bean Soup to make.  My stomach is already growling…

Take time to enjoy each other.

Christmas Lemons

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So… I know I need to get a post up with all my tags I got from my swaps… Promise. I will. But I wanted to share with you a tag I made for my “Christmas Lemons”. This year I decided to make lemon curd for the neighbors. It has been a bountiful year as far as the lemon tree is concerned and I wanted to share some of the deliciousness it provides. Of course, I needed a super cute tag for the jar… So the perfectly preserved framlits was perfect! And that yum stamp…. Is a SNEEK PEEK. Now… You can’t wait for January… Can you?

Giving a Gift (Card??)

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Perhaps the most popular gifts now-a-days are gift cards. I remember last Christmas the most stolen gift at our gift exchange was an amazon gift card. It went through the hands of all 20 something people in attendance.  And nearly caused a few, hum…, holiday rumbles?? (These are the things memories are made of.)

But, the trouble with the gift card, while perhaps being the perfect gift, is that it is… boring.  WELL.  Not on my watch.  No way.  Give your gift card in style…  with these super cool, super cute gift card holders. 

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Aren’t they cute?  The Santa card lifts to reveal a place to tuck a gift card inside.  The reindeer is a pull-out.  These are great items to have on hand for those last minute gifts that you need wrapped in a jiffy.  Stop by the Maui Stampers Craft Fair on Sunday (9:00-2:00) 190 W. Kamehameha Ave.  You will be able to get a handfull of these for all your gifts (cards).