Last minute, last project.....

 Last trip to Hobby Lobby I picked up some Christmas embellishments for 70% off the regular price... I picked up a strand of holiday beads and decided to make a couple of the beaded pokey tools:

I had the scribe pins in my stash so I did not have to buy anything else for these decorated pokey tools. Here is a photo of the packaging for the scribe pins at Hobby Lobby:

The price on the packaging says $2.99 but I always buy these when they are on sale for 50% off so it is about 75 cents for each scribe pin. I used the holiday bead strand and made two of the pokey tools. I also used spacer beads from the stash. I had also picked up a strand of their peppermint candy beads that day - those beads are silicone.. As for all the pokey tools I used E6000 for the adhesive. To package this to give away for Christmas I put the rubber tip protector on the pokey tool it comes with and I cut a piece of heavier card stock and put the beaded tool on that.and held it in place using a small strip of card stock that I stapled onto the white card stock piece. This way the tool was safe and would not poke anyone. I also used the silicone peppermint bead for the dangle I made for the pokey tool. For each dangle I added metal charms and holiday red and green beads from the stash:

I have made these tools in the past:

One of the two holiday pokey tools is for me so now when I am working on Christmas projects in July I can use the holiday pokey tool while working along on holiday projects.... Another good project to use tiny beads from the stash for the dangles on the tools. Fun holiday project to put together...

Lip Balm Holder

Bought the I-Crafter Lip Balm holder die set on sale and put it to use this Christmas - here is a photo of some of the holders I made for this Christmas:

I used scrap card stock prints for the holders and across the bottom of the front of the box I put washi tapes or pieces of the printed card stocks to decorate them. I also used clear packaging and I add a clear window to the box:

I bought the chap sticks in mulitple packs so they are economical. Here is a photo of one of the boxes:

This die set comes with the Merry Christmas dies and other word dies, a reindeer, and shapes. I wanted to keep this simple with just a greeting and I used embellishments and punches from my stash to decorate the fronts of these boxes. You can make two of these boxes out of one sheet of 8 1/2 x 11 card stock. Another good use for printed card stock scraps as well. 

Seeing red . . .

 As usual all holiday projects are planned and in progress or ready to go.. and then just when you are done.... another project catches your eye..... Had seen a video on YouTube from Muriel on her channel:

Mscooperscoop.  She showed the finished project and briefly explained what she had done to make her project and she also tells you where she had seen a picture of this project on Instagram. Cute idea and happy she even said where she picked up the ornaments to decorate...

This project features plastic Light Bulb ornaments from Mikes.... but good luck finding them... Long story but the THIRD store I went to - after calling first for stock availability - is a 45 minute drive from here. I had checked the web site for a store near to my house and the website said this store had these in stock - I arrived at that store when they opened the doors in the morning and none of these ornaments could be found... grrrrrrr..... off to a closer store to the house after checking with their website and we get there and again NOTHING.... back to the car and I decided to call this last store rather than looking on their website and the gal said yes they did have them and I asked if she could hold two packages of them for me and that it would take me awhile to get there - happy me she set them aside at the register for me. Drove there and picked them up and headed home.... 

Here is one of the ornaments that is finished that I made following Muriel's directions:

Years ago I had painted the inside of clear glass ornaments so I knew the basics but with these ornaments being plastic I decided to watch a few YT videos from crafters that had painted and decorated the plastic ornaments with paint. For the most part Folk Art craft paint from Plaid was suggested as the best paint... off to Hobby Lobby to buy that paint in the colours I wanted to use for my ornaments.... easy peasy.... or so I thought.... 

Picked up paper cups to use as bases for my ornaments so they could dry after I painted them. Before I painted the ornaments I used a hole punch and punched holes in the cups to allow for air to circulate with the ornaments drying. I used an exacto knife to cut a hole on the bottom of the cup so the ornament could be held in place while drying... Here is a photo of my painted ornaments:

When I picked out the shades of paint I wanted to use I knew for the red paint I wanted a more blue red shade and not the orange red colour. Brought the paint home, cut my cups, and began the project. Removed all the metal tops to the ornaments and one by one I painted the ornaments, rotating them so the paint would cover the inside and once the ornament was covered I set them on the cups to dry. I did this in the laundry room with the laundry sink for clean up and I used the top of the dryer to set up the dry station for the ornaments..... Decided to leave them for 24 hours but I did check them a couple of times to see how things were going..... SO not happy when I saw the red paint was pulling away from the inside of the ornament... 

Figured the problem with the red paint was it was so thick so went in the craft room and pulled out a bottle of red paint I had in my stash - it is also by Plaid - but it is a thinner paint but still the shade of red I wanted to use. . . Got out another plastic ornament and used this different red paint on that.... Swirled it and did it very slowly this time and let it lay down for a half hour and then turned over the ornament for another half hour -- then I checked it and all looked good so I put it on the cup to dry.... checked it later in the day and once again.... the paint was pulling away from the sides of the ornament.... again.... grrrr... 

Off to Hobby Lobby again and decided I would check the paint aisle and see what I could find... I looked at 4 brands in shades of red I liked and I read the labels on each bottle and who the manufacturer was. Did not want to try the Plaid brand again since I tried it twice with no success.... the last bottle I picked up - was on sale for 63 cents and it is by Rustoleum -- BINGO!

Brought this home and before I tried it on the third ornament... I took a photo of the first two ornaments to show the result using the other paints:

I figured Rustoleum would be the best of all the brands I saw and since they are known for their spray paints that I was sure this would work..... Shook the bottle and put it into the third clear ornament hoping for the best.... slowly swirled the paint in the ornament and once it was all covered I waited a half hour and then put it on the cup to dry.... Happy me try 3 worked! Here are photos of the ornaments I made - For the metal tops of the ornaments I used tear and tape and put washi tape on the metal tops to decorate them. Then I used various ribbons/trims from the stash for my ribbons and for my dangles I used chains, beads, and charms all from my stash.  Thanks to Muriel for sharing her cute ornaments!

Once I decorated the ornaments with the tops, ribbons, and dangles I set them in the drying cups on the craft table to keep them from rolling around or falling off the table while I worked on other ornaments:

Fun project and happy I was able to find the light bulb shaped ornaments. Mikes also sells the disc shape and the round ornament shapes but definitely like the light bulbs... So happy Rustoleum makes a craft acrylic paint that works on these ornaments -- esp in the red as the first colours I wanted to make was the red and green.... Fun project for the holidays!

Christmas Cards, Tags 2022

This post shows the cards and a couple of the tags I made for Christmas 2022. Wanted to use only items from my stash so made a variety of cards:

Wreath stencil and hot foil greeting used for this card front. This next card I used strips of 6x6 card stocks I had in a stash for a few years and I used rose gold foil from Mikes for the greeting:

This card I used a left over hot foiled piece and I decided to frame that out using gold foil card stock and a rectangle frame. Added a hot foiled greeting to the front:

A rectangle stencil and a snowflake die was used for this card:

For these cards -- My-Creative-Time.com has a candy cane die but it is just one die in the set so the candy cane die cuts in one direction only - to get the other direction you would have to turn the card stock over and put the die under it to die cut. But she came out with a smaller candy cane die set and I had bought that earlier this season and it has two candy cane dies - each facing in a different direction. Here is one of the cards I made:

Red striped card stock piece on the left is from the stash. Used the M Stewart sprig punch for the greenery and also a leaf punch for the larger leaves. The red foil bow was die cut using a bow die from Cottage Cutz. Made two more of these cards using other items as well:

The above card I used one of the candy canes. For the background I used the Taylored Expressions Holly cover plate die and cut that out of white card stock. I had bought this cover plate die at a used stamping sale in October and the cover plate cost me one dollar.  I also used gold holographic foil for the greeting. 

This next card:

I used the two candy canes and for the red pieces on the candy canes I used red foil card stock. Again used the Taylored Expressions Holly cover plate die for the background. Added small red crystals from the stash as some of the berries on the background. Used gold glittered card stock for the bow die from Cottage Cutz. Happy with the size of the two candy canes and esp like the stitching on the die cut pieces. 

These photos are a couple of the tags I made using a Gingerbread Man die I bought off of Amazon:

Used recycle card board for the tag bases and used a tag die set from the stash to cut those out. Used all holiday printed scraps for the fronts of the tags. The gingerbread man is die cut from the recycled card board. The snowflake and the holly and candy cane embellishments are from Hobby Lobby from the end of the season for last year.  Bells and twine are from my stash.