Christmas Tags Continued

 It's that time of the year... Gift Wrapping Season right? :) I actually enjoy making tags and do them off and on all year so, that particular idea of a season for wrapping just makes me smile. Stamping Up has it as a stamp in the set called North Pole Mischief. 

 On this top box, its stamped and then diecut with a rectangle die and is on a Tag cut from the Ellen Hutson Modern Tags set of dies. 

 I wanted to find pretty paper covered boxes to contain them as Thanksgiving weekend gifts but, I used to find those boxes at Joann's Fabrics and when I went to Micheal's I did not see anything like that would work for me. ( they are still putting Christmas on the shelf at our local store so) I did find these plastic containers in the organize your stuff isle and thought OK this will work. 

I am debating if this one can work for a guy gift or not, I am thinking Maybe... The boot and sentiment "Life is short, buy the boots" is from Taylored Expressions Cute to Boot set. ( the dies came with the stamps) they had a sale last week and this was one of the things that came in the mail yesterday. The other boot really looks like Sunflowers to me and I think I will do it more girly. but, I did do this on one some Kraft cardstock and then used the kraft/red distressed color for the background thinking not only guy but, Christmas. There is some Daniel Smith watercolor paints on it and Stickles glitter glues. The edges of everything were inked with DOX Scorched Timber ink.

4 more mostly reds Tags The Gifts on this are printed paper as is that Santa. the little one in the lower right corner is a folding 3X3 gift card/tag. 

I might have flashed these while they were on the table under consideration. I did them close to the same time as the "guy tags". That Joy diecut has Stickles glitter glue on it and so do the stamped packages on the big tag. 

 Each of these the main Snowman here is from Inky Antics. 

 I had stamped off and started watercoloring a bunch of random Snowmen a while back and finally finished some of them into gift tags. This view shows off the Stickles glitter glue on these guys.

 This view may show the colors a little better, All of these snowmen are from Whipper Snapper Designs. 
I  have piles under construction but, some of the finished things will go live next week and the weeks after for challenge Samples and these are just some bonus things that I did for fun for me. and I have to tell you I enjoyed that. doing what I wanted. That's a hard thing to do some day's when you check a calendar for the next thing and so on as far as samples go. I try really hard to only make things that I like and or that interest me anymore but, some days that is the challenge part of being a maker I think. when the challenge is do you see something you can tweak into something you can use. I have also been cutting up some printed papers and putting those things in piles of things to work into tag ideas as well. I get so caught up in the whole you can make just about any theme that interests you anymore with the tools you have that I don't hardly touch the papers of the sitckers or anything that could make it easier as a process and I think. I need to make a dent in using up some of those things. And I tell my self its OK to do things in a time saving Easier way. that's why you have these things right? At any rate, I am getting ready to start wrapping and usually Do end up making more tags at the last minute to suit the gift or the person and I will probably have more to share soon. Thanks for stopping by. 

 

 

Odds and Ends

 A while back one of the Clean and simple challenge was to do spring and I happened to start adding more watercolor paints over the top of the (marker?) color to this previously started and set aside Penny Black snail and then when it was finished I decided it was not really all that Clean looking with that printed paper. So, I never linked it up.

I fished that sentiment out of one of the envelopes in the drawer so, I am not sure who makes it off hand.but it was die cut with a spellbinders labels trio die. The snail panel was probably cut with a Simon Says Stamp wonky stitched rectangle but, I do have similar stitches from one of the UK companies that has a set in A6 size so, one of those your guess is as good as mine now as to which one it was. That textured printed paper I think is Die cuts with a view. 

 

This is a little bitty gift sack that has an Tag for J for Easter this year. The butterfly is a sticker that she gave me, the tiny tag I sprayed with some shimmery paint spray a long time ago, That gold ribbon is probably Offray and the black hemp string is maybe lawn fawn? ( once you take the wrapper off its hard to say anymore) The tiny J tag was done a long time ago I have a little plastic envelope of letters I use frequently die cut in it and this was fished out of there the color of the tag was a nearly perfect match to the purple flowers on the tissue paper. That's about it from me, Hope you are doing well & thanks for stopping by.

Personalized Christmas Tags

 A while back Kia was the featured stamper and I used this card of hers for a jump start for this tag of mine. I did switch out the colors and the sequins became white gel pen dots here.

 The leaves were watercolored and the bird was cut from shimmery cardstock as was the white in the Joyful frame.

 

 the big C is an old making memories mailbox letter the other letters are from a Tim Holtz pack of stickers that looked like a matchbook type thing. 

 The snowman is a Sizzix diecut and the birdhouse is a Quickutz diecut and the holly is from a Spellbinders Joy die.

 This one the felt holly was cut with a Hero Arts holly jolly die and that is a sequin in the center of the berries.

 I ended up shooting a shot of things piled up so that I did not duplicate them and make only snowmen or only stockings. (because, when I am on a roll I tend to do that) The bucket in the background is being filled with Tags for her to use that are blank ( not personalized ones)

 Some of these are old ones, I have a basket in the closet where there is wrapping papers of Tags I have made over the years and I trained my family to hand them back to me when they were cleaning up the paper mess after. So, maybe they will save these.

 These were on gifts of stocking holders that I had mailed to them in November and I knew I would not remember what I made by the time Christmas had rolled around so, it was a cool thing to find this in my phone.

 These were done for work tin plaid baskets that are holding wine and gifts.

 This was a preliminary shot before any of the gifts went into the buckets the snowman & elf things are wine bottle wrappers from Kohls.

 

A closer look at this tag, the Santa hats are an jollees sticker.

These are going onto bags of embroidered gifts for newer guys at work. The candy canes are very thick plastic stickers. I have a bucket of embellishments like that to use up still that are just too bulky to me for sticking on cards but, I do think they work for Tags as not everyone saves them. (and they are not trying to fit through postal machines) That's about it from me, Thanks for Stopping by.

WOYWW # 393 Christmas

Happy Desk Peeking day :) If you would like to play along with us the link up starts here at Miss Julia's blog.

 So, as it happens we are remodeling our house (the livingroom, & eat in kitchen which is really mostly one big room.) and so, as far as decorating for Christmas goes the little trees and fern I found last week that are up in the hobby room on the coffee table are it. ( so far) but, I have started wrapping, which will probably lead to more decorating (up here) soon.
and its funny that I settled on a blue and minty greens color combo for this pack I tend to lean more traditional Christmas colors more than pale winter-y ones. This is a peek of the wrapping session that started monday and continued through tuesday and as I was doing this I really loved the colors more and more so,

 a closer look at some of the tags. the wrapping paper is tissue or kraft paper in a pale green. with dies from Memory box, Sizzix, Taylored Expressions, Spellbinders, ect. stamps from Justrite, Hero Arts, Concord & 9th, Impression Obsession, and it lead me to creating these cards below because, I had gotten out the Concord & 9th O Christmas Tree set and pretty much continued these colors.

These used the stamps from the Concord & 9th set with a SU gently falling ( snow embossing folder) and some Micheal's lace and the mint color cardstock is from SU also. the trees were stamped with both mint melody & mint macron markers so the colors had some flux to them. They are all A-2 in real life, and if you peek closely you can see in the top right corner one of the Two Paper Diva's bottle brush trees peeking out as a vertical variation on the theme. and the funny true story is these are my most favorite cards I made for Christmas so far this year. I spent hours after this last night stamping sentiments in all the cards being hauled to the PO today and will wait in line for them because, I did guess on the postage of the one of a kind lumpy ones going out.

So this was a dozen cards total. I did not line the insides but, I did for the first time ever stamp sentiments in every one of mine going out this year from the Altenew Holiday Wishes set.

WOYWW # 336 Veteran's Day

So, I had taken some desk shots on Tuesday evening, and then I realized that some people who peek at this blog... they are getting what was made and shown in those mug shots on friday... So, today after work I had to do new shots. If you'd like to play along with us this blog hop starts here at our hostess Julia's blog.

 

 Front and center in this shot as I came up the stairs is a container of  "Diamond Files" ( a gift from hubs) who had remembered that he cut apart one of my die sets last month? and he told me these things will file down "anything" ( like those sharp little numbs on the edges of dies that get cut apart) also the remains of some of Tuesday's things ( which will show on friday ) and the Share Kindness pile that I am working on. Oh and the elephant die just arrived in the mail the other day, so it was hauled upstairs too.

 Off to the right are fairly new stamps sets along with the snow that was painted and glittered last weekend.

 A closer look at the wooden snow ( micheals) and todays holiday blitz tutorial all printed out at work and hauled home to try a Kittie Wreath..

 I have this punch. this is as far as I got with that. ( tutorial says I need 50 ish of these for one 2" circle) I got to about 40 when everything it cut looked like that. only cut on the edges with torn and ripped cardstock being eaten in the punch. It doesnt seem to cut in an even kind of a way it cuts the edges and then sometimes it looks perfect in the piece that was being cut from and comes out in a little pile of branches...
( I think its defective. I bought it on ebay years ago when this was a very hard to find punch)
( I ordered a new one tonight that amazon says will be here friday)
I really want this to work. ( mostly its Kitties influence that makes me want that) :)
I can credit her with quite a few of my small die purchases over the last few years too.

 So, I pushed the branches off to the side and decided to cut some dies, these are mostly Lawn Fawn stitched snow diecuts and one of the glittered wood snowflakes on those sizzix tag cards.

 I diecut and used up a lot of scraps today... and made a few things.. the base on this one is a Stardream shimmer cardstock.

And got the first kindness packages gathered and bundled. that is just tissue paper with the heat embossed sentiments the hearts are tiny buttons with some scrappers floss in them. This may take me a while to get them mailed as I have a bigger list of people I would like to send a little something to than time in the day to work on these... :) but, that's ok it will still be a surprise when it does get mailed.

WOYWW #293

A peek into my space tonight. ( its still Wednesday on the west coast) if you'd like to play along and or visit more desks you can find this week's line up for the blog hop here on Julia's blog. 

Well, here it is tonight. I am doing some last minute package wrapping and using some of those poppies. ( did also after this stamp some of the smaller ones) if you squint really hard you will see the two old stamps that followed me home from the swap meet, the weed sentiment is from PSX and the quilted looking shamrock is from Peddlers Pack. 

just tissue paper with mostly vintage laces and or some ribbons. the copper cords are elastic. 

the butterfly in the top right is one of those wooden veneer ones it's covered with old basic grey pp and the edges were filled and then inked with an peachy shade of water based marker. ( forgot to look at which one) I deliberately crumpled the darker shade of tissue before using it as wrap. not sure if I like it or not but, after I had done it to one, I figured they all (that color) needed to blend and crumpled them too. 

Wrapping Continues

the wired ribbon ( whole spool) was used on this and cut into three pieces. the gold slim ribbon was from the SU Christmas book. the snowflakes were die cut with the lawn fawn stitched snowflakes die. the pearl is from Jollees, the layers of snowflakes are up on pop dots above the avery tag. 

I had one piece too tall to fit inside the round box and close the lid, so I placed that piece on top of all the other things in the box ( all wrapped) and decided to tie the lid on, the square box under the bow is holding a Christmas card ( lumpy, boxed) 

the second altered gift sack, I love how these look when finished and filled with the cards, this one and the one after it I used some score tape to keep the flap folded in place instead of stitching the edges. 

a third altered sack for wrapping multiple gift cards. 

slim tags trio die with Hero Arts sentiment. May Arts ribbon, unknown old Christmas papers. 

the green snowflakes ( wooden) kind of threw me for a loop when I seen them, and I thought I would have to paint over them but, thought the green blended pretty well with this ribbon ( also found at Joanns recently) the gingham tissue is also from Joanns. 

So I picked up some of these tin gift card holders at Joanns a year ago on a deep sale after the holidays and decided to alter one today to better suit the person (man) receiving this card. 

Lawn Fawn stitched snow die with a wooden snowflake (joanns) with an old wooden button and May arts burlap string. 

a finished view of the card holder box.

Some Personal Tags

the view early Friday am... nope did not go black friday shopping but, did go through Dutch Brothers on the way to drop off my truck at the ford dealers. ( hubs made an appointment for it to get an updated navigation system installed and they only halfway got it in ) but, these were started on Thanksgiving night and had to drip dry the stickles... these went onto the altered boxes but, there are two of each name so the others will go on packages later. 

a closer look, and yep, you can click on these to enlarge them. 

so as it happens a few years back I had made some "personal" tags for my family to re-use. they have alphabets on them J, S, T for Christmas packages... and I had made 3 with an S on it, and every year I get grief about there not being enough S tags... so, I started out doing that... the bird is chipboard and stained with distress stain ( as was the tag) which was then run through an sizzix embossing folder. the letter S is an actual wooden disc like a vintage bingo chip but, some scrapping thing I've had for years.

had colored this wreath recently and cut it out and thought OK this can work as a tag too I guess. 

I still have a little pile of these painted letters I stamped and cut out years ago, so once I had a couple of S tags I got bored with that and went back to making J & T tags lol. this one the letter was run through an sizzix basic grey folder. the tag was stained with distress ink. the sentiment ( quickly becoming a new favorite) is from Unity Stamps. 

all of these die cuts were from the drawer. the name plate is a story though, you remember those chatterbox premade tags that were on QVC years and years ago? ( doesn't matter) but, I bought them and was fairly disappointed that the printing was not perfect as the die cutting so as I was staining tags the other day I realized the back sides of these things are just plain non coated cs... lol flipped some over and gave them a coat of antique linen stain, so now there is hope these will actually get used. 

The ornament is from the spellbinders hanging holiday tags die set, the flower is an blingy sticker thing. ( have a sheet of them will have to look up the mfg. info. later. 

now the A's kinda HUGE so, decided to see how it looked without a tag behind it. 

think it does not look too bad. this is actually kraft colored paper and that ribbon is red and cream but, shot this one on auto since it was in a dark corner of the room with no lights... one thing is wrapped... guess we should work on putting up the tree next. haha. 

I've had this snowflake for years off of something Alice gave me, been waiting to recycle it for years. I added some antique linen distress acrylic paint to the top with this Tim Holtz button June gave me that I have been hoarding too. so, I think maybe I can get into this making S tags if I use up stuff I have been hanging onto just because, I like how it looks... 

cool stuff eh? 

the wood shape is a camera body ( retro) with an T bead in it. 

for one of J's female friends. 

hee hee found these GI brads in the eyelet outlet site. fun stuff. 

these rhinestones were little boogers to attach had to wad up the micro sized glue dots to make them small enough to tuck behind them. 

another one for me, the birdhose was stained first then later sprayed with walnut ink. there is raffia poking through the nesting hole and the felt poinsettia is from MM. the letter charm is unknown. made the tag shape by hand from a piece that I ran through the cuttlebug chicken wire folder. 

have a couple non personalized tags will post them tomorrow.