Elfin' thru the season . . .

This post is some of the items I have been working on for Christmas treats. To start with I did not want to have a theme or colour for this year's treat holders.  In the past I have used certain colours or maybe a theme but this year I wanted to make different treat holders in various colours and shapes using different items in the craft room.

I knew I wanted to make a square pillow box treat holder so that was one of the first things I made. I made these using kraft coloured card stock. I wanted a holiday design on the card stock so decided to use the Holly background stamp I had bought from Impression Obsession. This was a new stamp and not a seconds or used. (I recently went to their warehouse sale in Virginia to shop). Here is a photo of the packaging for this stamp:

I have other of their background stamps and have never had a problem with them. These stamps are packaged in clear packaging and on the back of this stamp is a piece of paper you peel off the stamp to reveal the sticky back for stamping with the MISTI or other stamping tool. I began to peel this paper off the back of the stamp and did not get half way before.... the paper would not come off the rest of the stamp.... I tried peeling it, tried the heat tool to heat up the adhesive on the sticky back to release the paper and this is the back of the stamp as I continued to work:

that is the best I could do to remove the stuck on paper. Have never had this happen before but what a mess it was.... but I really like the holly design so I had to be able to use this. Decided since the backing was not as sticky as it would have been if the paper had peeled off in one piece as they usually do I decided to use this stamp flat. I die cut all of the front and back of the pillow box pieces and inked the flat stamp and then laid the die cut pieces on the stamp and used my hand to press the pieces into the inked stamp to get the design on my pieces. Not what I had planned to do but it worked --- with all the pieces inked I put the boxes together and decorated them with printed card stock scraps. I had picked up the wreaths at Hobby Lobby on sale. They had foam pieces on the back and I removed them and used tear and tape to add them to my box fronts:

Here is a photo to show the light inked holly design on the pillow box:

Next is a bag topper I made -- used a bag topper die from my stash and cut that out of #110 weight white card stock from Mikes. I then cut a piece of red card stock to go behind the front of the bag topper piece. The printed card stock is from Christmas in the Country from Frank Garcia Studios. I used a poinsettia die and cut out red foil card stock for that. Used a bottle cap and clear disk from Hobby Lobby for the Santa face. I cut that out using a circle punch from the holiday printed paper pack from the Christmas in the Country collection. I used the glue gun to put this onto the center of the poinsettia and then put that onto a mini clothespin so I could clip it onto the bag topper:

Between the Santa disk and the poinsettia flower I put some thin gold thread for some sparkle. Used a die for "Believe" and I cut that out of gold foil card stock and put that on the bag topper using a glue pen. For a holder for the Tootsie Pops I used a die from My Creative Time:

but I had seen a video on Youtube for this Tootsie Pop holder so I made this one as well:

used stickers from Hobby Lobby to decorate the front:

I put the circle Santa sticker onto a card stock scalloped circle I used a punch for. The only thing I had added to this holder was the ring around the tag hole at the top to make the hole stronger for tying the twine through.

What Christmas is fun without the Snuggets?????

Those are Hershey nugget candies and their hats are finger tips from the Dollar Tree gloves sold in the bath section.... Added a white pom pom using hot glue. The small Snowman faces are from Morningstar at:   http://morningstarstamps.com/stamps/stamps.html   Pam sells the small and the large Snowman face stamps and I use them all the time for holiday items. I also have lots of her other stamps and you should visit her online store.

We have all done it -- seen a new product but maybe it was too expensive or maybe too limited... I had seen the Stampin Up Cutie Pie die set when it came out but to me making a piece of cake or a piece of pie into a box was too limiting and how many birthday cake boxes could I make??? So did not buy it .. but then.... had it seen it at a crafter's used stamp supply sale and I picked it up at a great price.... had seen a similar idea on Pinterest and had that project in mind when I bought the die set. Here is what I used it for this year for a holiday treat holder:

I die cut the box pieces using #110 weight white card stock from Mikes. I wanted this to be a sturdy box since it is filled with chocolates so I used the heavier card stock. I used the bone folder to crease all the scored lines well and then stamped the holiday greeting on the front piece using red ink. Set that aside. Before I did anything else I picked out the ribbon I wanted to use for this. Since I used a ribbon with snowflakes I decided to die cut a snowflake for the box front. Did not want white on white though so I used a glittered silver card stock and cut it out. Then for the back of it I used a piece of white/GP card stock covered with Stick-It sheet and cut out another snowflake. Peeled off the Stick-It sheet and put the two snowflakes together to make the snowflake sturdy. The center of the snowflake die has a star cut out in it so I took a small piece of scrap red foil card stock and die cut the red star out. I put the star into the center of the snowflake piece and put glue dots behind it to hold it in place.

With stamping and die cutting done I assembled this box using tear and tape. Put the snowflake on the box front using a glue dot behind the center of the snowflake. Used glossy accents to add a few of the small mirrored sequins to the box top. Filled the box with white paper shred and chocolates and closed the box. Tied one piece of ribbon around the box and it was done:

The ribbon is tied around the box and it can easily slide off to get into the box for the treats. Since I had never used this die set before I had made my first box using the white/GP card stock for my sample to see how to assemble this box. VERY easy and FAST and I think this is my favorite treat holder of all -- always like red and white for holiday items....

Lastly -- Candy Cane Seeds -- had bought the organdy bags at Hobby Lobby on sale and filled them with peppermint candies.  Printed  "Candy Cane Seeds" off the computer onto white/GP card stock and used circle punches to punch them out:

That is mostly the treat holders I have made -- not all were photographed but I wanted to share what I have been working on. Plan to post the front of the bags used to hold my treat holders in a day or two. TFL