"Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow. . . "

I was "SO rudely" awakened at 5:15 this morning! Our school district has an automated phone tree that lets us know when school is cancelled, etc. and school definitely needed to be cancelled today--but did they have to wake me up when I knew last night that we weren't going to be going ANYWHERE today?? It's currently snowing so hard that it looks like it's just foggy outside! SO, SO glad that everyone in my house is home with no plans of going anywhere today. If you're in this same winter storm area with me, I hope you get to do the same. Perfect time to get to some projects that have thus far fallen victim to the hustle 'n' bustle of the season!

So, I imagine that a lot of you have been wondering where I've been lately! Trust me, I haven't been sitting around eating bon bons (unless you count caramel scraps!) "Santa" has been working fast and feverishly on all the homemade gifts that have become tradition at Christmastime here: lots and lots of caramels in (of course) hand-stamped packaging.
















Every year 40+ packages of homemade caramels get sent to Mike's sales force and office staff, the kids' teachers, relatives, friends and neighbors. It gets to be quite the caramel factory here late in December!

The packages below are those that go to the kids' teachers. The tag on the caramel bag opens to hold a gift card. The "box" on the right is a carrier from a 4-pack of Starbucks Frappacino covered with Designer Paper that I had left from last year, embellished with Big Shot "Swirly" die cuts. Erik had ideas for several little things he wanted to give his orchestra teacher. She loves Starbucks, so we thought the holder would be a clever way to hold her gifts.

The gift card holder/tag is just a strip of cardstock 2-1/2" X 11", scored at 4-1/4" and 8-1/2". I rounded all the corners and secured the sides of the "pocket" with narrow strips of Sticky Strip.

Fortunately we were thinking ahead and delivered the gifts for the teachers yesterday, since Christmas break has started one day early.

I'm off to tackle something on the list! Stay safe and warm!

Christmas Punch Art

My Stamp Clubs got together a few days ago for their December meeting. Traditionally, the swap theme for this before-Christmas meeting has always been "Anything But A Card--for Christmas." It's as if Santa comes early because everyone comes up with such clever ways to incorporate Stampin' Up! products into wonderful little gift ideas to share with all those in the club who swap. (I'll show those to you tomorrow. How's that for being a tease?)

In keeping with the "theme," the projects for the meeting were also gift-related. Everyone made the gift tags you see below, all incorporating punched pieces! Now, before you go thinking that I came up with these creative little darlings, let me tell you that I got the idea from the SU! Demonstrator Website. The tags were designed by a wonderful SU! demo, Mercedes Weber, who submitted them for a contest. Obviously she won because these are so cute and clever I practically had no choice but to share them with everyone. I just love them, and I think the stamp club members enjoyed them too!

Doing the tags this early in December was good--because tie-ons for gifts are always something I want to do, but of course, they always get left for last, when my energy level is majorly sagging.

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I took the idea a little bit further and converted the snowman tag into bag toppers that I put on the caramels that I donated to the Kettle Moraine High School Band's "Breakfast with Santa" bake sale this weekend.

And as if on cue, an email that I received from one of my online swap group members, Laura Lipe, contained a picture of a punch art gift bag she made. She saw a the punched singing reindeer idea on someone's blog and made it a trio to cover the bag. The "antlers" were made using the "swirls scribbles" Sizzlits die and the Big Shot. Cute beyond belief!

Come back tomorrow to see the Stamp Club's swap projects. You're going to love them!

Oh, wow!

Has it really been almost a week since I've been here??? As the ol' saying goes, time flies when you're having fun! And now that I look back, (with the help of my trusty calendar!), it has been a busy but productive week! Hubby's traveling and meals have been coming from the crock pot, allowing some projects to be moved from the "to-do" list over to "DONE!!!!"

Melissa and I made progress with our bathroom re-do, taking plenty of time along the way to admire our handiwork, :-) the minivan finally has some new tires, I layered on warm clothes and plugged away at yard cleanup, and I got to "work" in my craft room, puttering away on some swaps, prep for last weekend's stamp camp, and a little surprise for my stamp club members. Can't show you the surprise just yet, because there are a couple gals who don't have theirs yet, but I'll try to remember to show you later this week.

What I can show you is the other project the Stamp Clubs did at their November meeting. Each month we focus on a different technique and everyone in Stamp Club takes home a "technique card" that can be used later to recall just how to do what was learned. This month the technique was "Markers on Vellum." We used the "A Christmas Cardinal" stamp set from the Holiday Mini Catalog, embossed the cardinal on a piece of vellum (that was cut with the "Top Note" Big Shot die), and colored the image on the reverse side using markers, thus the highly-technical technique name!!! Kiwi Kiss and Riding Hood Red, two of this year's "In" colors gave this Christmas card an up-to-date look.



A reminder that if you'd like to start YOUR collection of technique cards, new stamp clubs will start up in February with the launch of the Spring/Summer catalog. I'd love to have you join one of my clubs, so let me know if this interests you and I can fill you in on the details.

One other thing that I puttered with this week isn't really stamping-related, but I'll share anyway. I was intrigued by a local news story last week that featured a website showcasing handmade crafts and I had to check it out. Etsy.com allows crafters of all kinds to offer their products for sale. I've often had people tell me that I should sell the caramels I make, but I'd never taken the time to try it--until today. I put together a listing, calling it "CaramelsToDieFor". We'll see what happens. The kids were just excited because I had to make a batch in order to take the pictures--they told me they would have no trouble taking care of the "used" caramels for me!

Have a great week!