Christmas Pursuits Challenge - PEACE and MERRY

Hi there! I'm back with another installment of my Christmas Challenge. Are you tired of my letters yet? I'm getting there, LOL! But, I know I'll be happy come Christmas time if I have them all done. Since I wasn't able to post any last week, I have two sets this week.

But first, I want to show you the luscious pile of seam binding I dyed up last week. I wanted some light colors since Spring is on the way. Yum!!

OK, on to the letters.

First up is PEACE before:

And after:

MERRY before:

MERRY after:

Just a little somethin' on each letter, but I think overall there's a big difference in the look. OK, another set for next week: WELCOME.

Thanks so much for stopping by! Tomorrow I'll have another card using one of the latest Flourishes releases so I hope you'll stop by again!

Christmas Pursuits Challenge - NOEL Letters

Hey, everyone! Last week I challenged myself to embellish up my NOEL letters. These sit up on my mantle and the general theme for that room is rustic or lodge, so that's the theme I used for my letters. Here they are as I've been using them for a couple of years:

Pretty, but uninspiring, right? Sooooo, I dressed them up with some rustic-like embellishments. For the "N", I used some tea dyed twill, some punched out cedar-looking leaves and a twine tied button. On the "O", I glued some little branches from a tiny artificial Christmas tree, stamped a couple of pine cones from Waltzingmouse's Festive Foliage set, and added another twine tied button. The "E" called for more red so I added a crinkled seam binding bow, some holly leaves from the same set, and some fake red berries. The "L" was a challenge. I ended up tying on a red and cream gingham ribbon, some punched out holly leaves, and a little twine tied button. That didn't seem like enough, so I added some punched out evergreens and some deer--totally keeping with the lodge theme. And here's the finished product:

I don't think this theme lends itself to a ton of embellishments so I kept it to a minimum on each letter. So, what do you think? Better? I think so :)

Thanks so much for stopping by! For next week, I'm challenging myself to dress up another set of letters: MERRY. See a trend? JOY, NOEL, MERRY? Each one has more letters than the last, LOL! Are you getting tired of them yet, LOL? BUT I won't be posting about it that day--I'll have a Flourishes sneak for you instead, so I'm challenging myself right now to get another set, PEACE done before I post again the following week with both sets. How's that? Still something done each week--If I make it ;-) I'll be back tomorrow with a Flourishes card, so I hope to see you back then!

~Supplies~

Stamps: Festive Foliage (Waltzingmouse Stamps)

Paper: Kraft (SU!); Pinefeather (PTI); miscellaneous scrapbook paper

Ink: Soft Suede (SU!); Memento Cottage Ivy

Accessories/tools: twill, ribbon, fake tree limbs, fake berries, buttons, seam binding, twine; punches (Martha Stewart); resin letters (Michaels)

Christmas Pursuits Challenge - Embellished JOY Letters

Last week I challenged myself to embellish the JOY letters that I covered with scrapbook paper several years ago and never got finished. A couple of sets I did embellish, like these, and I love them:

I never got around to several sets, like JOY. They were "OK" like that, as you can see here:

But rather bland. So, I gussied them up a bit and I love them. I decided these needed some bling, among other things, and this is how they ended up:

Oh, yeah, MUCH better :)

For next week I'm challenging myself to do my NOEL letters.

Thanks for stopping by! See you next week for the Christmas Pursuits Challenge!

~Supplies~

Stamps: Holly Jolly (PTI)

Ink: Memento Pear Tart and Rose Bud

Paper: Perfect Paper Panel (MFT)

Accessories/tools: snowflake punch (Martha Stewart); buttons (PTI); bling, gold cord, ribbon (craft store)

Christmas Pursuits Challenge - Christmas Trees, The Final Chapter

Are you thoroughly sick of my trees yet? Well, I'm not, LOL, I love them! I ended up making a 5 1/2" one and one 7" tall for a total of 5 trees. I stocked up on Prisma glitter and got them finished, so I can stick a fork in the paper tree project, it's DONE! They can now be packed away until Christmas, 2011. Here they are in all their glittery glory.

It's SUCH a good feeling to get these done early (can I consider it early if they were for a project from *last* year? Hmmm. Whatever ;-)) and marked off my list--I feel so virtuous ;-)

Now for next week's challenge. I have several sets of resin letters spelling words that I've covered with scrapbook paper. For the most part I've just left them un-embellished but have been planning to go back and dress them up a bit, some of them for two years! How sad is that? My challenge to myself for next week is to get JOY embellished up all fancy-like :)

Thanks for stopping by - see you next week!

Christmas Pursuits Challenge - Christmas Trees Redux

Well, here I am back with this week's Christmas Pursuits Challenge. My challenge to myself for this week was to glitter up the little trees from last week and make one larger tree using my Cricut. 

Here are the little trees in all their glittered glory. I love 'em! the glitter makes all the difference in the world! I used liquid glue and more Prisma glitter on the edges of each section. Whatcha think?

And, I fired up the old Cricut and made one 5' tree. I used a file from the Very Merry Tags cartridge and just nipped off the loop from the top. My friend Kirsty had the cartridge and gave the tree a trial run for me before I went to the expense of buying it. Thanks, Kirsty!  It went together just as easily as the PTI die one did, and here it is next to one of the smaller ones for comparison.

You'll notice the larger one has no glitter. The smaller ones used up a good bit of my precious store of Prisma glitter and this one would have finished it off. So, I've got to get more and then I'll glitter this one up. I tried Stickles on it but I didn't like it--tried applying it and spreading it with my finger. See?

Looks nasty, so I'll wait until I get more glitter. But I really love how the tree turned out! 

OK, I met my challenge to myself. YAY!!! My challenge to myself for next week is to make at least one larger tree using the Cricut. I'm thinking 6" will be tall enough. Much larger than that and I'll have to use a whole 8 1/2" x 11" sheet for each section. I'll see how it works out--may go larger if I can without too much paper waste.

That's it for me today.Thanks so much for stopping by! I hope you'll all join me in getting a head start on next Christmas with the Christmas Pursuits Challenge!

~Supplies~

Stamps: None

Paper: Mellow Moss, Crumb Cake (SU!); Perfect Paper Panels (MFT)

Ink: None

Accessories/tools: Cuttlebug (Provocraft); Stacking Stars Die-namics dies (MFT); glitter (PTI); Xyron X sticker maker; Cricut and Very Merry Tags cartridge

Brand new challenge!!!

Hey, peeps, I decided to start a VERY informal, very laid back challenge. I *always* say I'm going to work on Christmas projects throughout the year so I don't run out of time when Christmas actually gets here. But it never seems to work that way, KWIM? So, I'm doing this to challenge ME, hoping it will make me more accountable to myself, but I'd LOVE to have anyone join me! Every Thursday the challenge will be to do something Christmas-y. Simple, huh? Add a card to your stash, get started on your gift tags, work on a home decor project--any paper crafting that has to do with Christmas works! If you decide to join in, be sure to leave a link in the comments section so I can see what you did--I'm always looking for inspiration and would love to see your projects!

So, welcome to the Christmas Pursuits Challenge! I'm so excited about getting a head start on Christmas! For this first week, I'm starting a project that will  take me several weeks to finish, but that's OK--most of my projects will take several weeks to do. As long as progress is being made, it's all good :)

So, let's get started! I fell in love with these little trees that Nichole Heady made back in September and they've been on my list ever since. I really wanted to get them done this past year but it just didn't happen, so now I'm going to do it. Click here for Nichole's post (it's a long post so scroll on down until you see the little 3-D tree).

Adorable, right? Right. So I got to working on mine and decided to try more sections to see how that would work. I'm thinking it worked pretty well, what do you think?

 
I doubled the number of sections--much more dimension, I think.  I die cut the star toppers with MFT's Stacking Stars Die-namics dies, ran them through my Xyron X sticker maker and glittered them up with Prisma glitter (I really love this stuff!). I couldn't decide about adding "ornaments" but I think I've decided to just glitter up the edges because they will be close to, if not right beside, this gorgeous tree candle I scored at Yankee Candle on Monday.

I think they'll be perfect together :) I also wanted to make some other sizes of the trees for a grouping, so I got a Cricut cartridge that has a similar tree on it. My challenge to myself for next week is to have these little cuties glittered up and at least one larger tree done. I need to learn more about my Cricut and this will make me turn that puppy on and start cutting!

Thanks so much for stopping by! I hope you'll all join me in getting a head start on next Christmas with the Christmas Pursuits Challenge!

~Supplies~

Stamps: None

Paper: Mellow Moss, Crumb Cake (SU!); Perfect Paper Panels (MFT)

Ink: None

Accessories/tools: Cuttlebug (Provocraft); Stacking Stars Die-namics dies (MFT); Christmas Tree Die, glitter (PTI); Xyron X sticker maker