Thanksgiving Dinner Prep

We are hosting Thanksgiving dinner for a few family members this year.  I love decorating and cooking for Thanksgiving.  The colors we decorate all year round in our house are very similar to fall colors.  I actually find the food we serve for Thanksgiving to be the easiest to cook of all the holidays.  Year after year I go back to Martha Stewart's cheese cloth and wine technique for the turkey.  The side dishes get a little tricky towards the end with the timing, but it all seems to work out just fine!  It's a small group this year, just 7 of us.  I find it doesn't seem to matter if it's 5, 7 or 12 - it's the same about of work....maybe just one or two additional side dishes.


Here is a picture of the dinner place cards I have made.  I use this basic design often and just change up the colors based on the holiday.  This year I decided to make menu cards as well.  I'll place them in the dining room where we eat, on the server and also in the kitchen on our large island for the guests to get a glimpse of what will be served.

The company I work for is closed Thursday and Friday.  I have decided to add to my time off and took Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday prior to Thanksgiving!  I'm spending the three days cleaning our house and prepping for Thursday.  Just finished ironing the table cloth!!!!  I scheduled a few annual doctor appointments in there (eye doctor, cats vet appointment) as well.  I figure it's a good time since I'm off work anyway.  I also can not clean for a solid three days, I'll simply lose steam.  For good measure I scheduled a massage appointment for tomorrow morning.  A little treat for myself prior to the feast!

If you live in the US, I wish you a very Happy Thanksgiving.

Christmas Gift Tags & Tin

Today I bring to you, yet again, another altered Tazo Tea tin...surprise!!!  Obsessed?  Maybe... well ok, yes!

This time I'm using them to hold a collection of Christmas gift tags I have created.  I used my Cricut  Very Merry Tags cartridge for the base tag and the reindeer shapes as well as Papertrey Inks 2008 Holiday Tags Collection for the stamping.  On the back of each tag I have stamped 'to' and 'from'.

I covered the tin as usual using holiday patterned paper.  On the top of the tin I used stamps from PTI; Fresh Alphabet to spell out 'tags' and an image from their 2009 anniversary set which coordinates with the Mat Stack 1 die.

I've given this little gift to family members for the upcoming holiday so they will be sure to have enough tags while they are wrapping their gifts.  This tin is actually my own stash.  I like that I can just pull out my tin filled with tags and they are read to go!

Desk Calendar & Digging Out

Nichole Heady from Papertrey Ink introduced the Calendar Basics stamp set (along with a mini calendar project) back in 2010.  

This is my take on it.  These make great little gifts at Christmas.  Not including the price of the stamps and calendar die used, these little cuties end up costing less than $4 each.

For my calendars this year, I used 

Year of Flowers Collection  

Calendar Basics

Last year I made one for our friends whom we travel with.  Instead of stamping the pages, I printed out pictures of our trips over the years.  I used the same page dies, mini calendar pages, and Calendar Basics stamps for the titles.  They loved it.  (I forgot to take pictures of the calendar prior to giving it)

Yesterday the North East had some premature weather for October.  My area had about 3 inches of snow.  Our power was out for most of the day.  I was happy to get into my craft room today and get working.  Piper enjoyed it also.  I get great morning sun in my room, so it is the perfect place to start a Sunday.  

Disney

My DH and I are Disney World fans freaks! Unlike most people I know, I did not visit Disney World as a child on a family vacation. Our time was spent at the Jersey shore :)  Actually, I am not even sure I knew Disney World existed when I was a child.

My DH and I made our first visit in 1999 and since have gone back 22 times. We are now proud Disney Vacation Club (DVC) members. Being members makes it possible to bring family and friends with us from time to time.  I love bringing people with us and showing them around and telling them things they never knew about Disney World.

We are good friends with another couple that we travel many places with frequently.  They just happen to be Disney fans freaks also. It's been over a year since the four of us went back to Disney World together (although we've been other places since). THIS is our year! I'm soooo excited. Because we go so often, we I try to change it up a bit for each trip. I like to do something special each time.

I was looking around on Etsy.com and found this shop One Great Thing. Cassi does great tie dye designs. I ordered us four shirts in the fall colors for our trip during the Food and Wine Festival. Check out Cassi's site. She's easy to work with and does custom orders.  

We were not sure how were were going to present the shirts to our friends.  Since they now live in another state we decided to mail them to them prior to our trip.  Hope they go for the four of us wearing them all at the same time!  My DH is a very good sport with this type of thing. I did ask him prior to ordering them.

Been Boo'd

I just love Halloween! I enjoy decorating for Halloween, attending and hosting parties, the fall colors and of course handing out treats to all of the pirates and princesses that come to our home on the 31st!!

For the past few years I've been making "Been Boo'd" kits and placing them on several of our neighbor’s doors a few weeks before Halloween. Five years ago, I never heard of a "Boo". If you haven't either, here's the gist:   put together a treat package with Halloween goodies for a neighbor (or two) and secretively place it on their door step (with a Boo sign and instructions). They in turn do the same for a neighbor that has not already been Boo'd. When a house is Boo'd they will place the Boo sign in their window showing they've been Boo'd. The fun starts around the middle of October and by Halloween nearly everyone in our neighborhood has little signs in their windows. There are all kinds of different ideas out on the internet. At Easter-time I shared my Easter "basket" tins. I pretty much do the exact same thing for my "Been Boo'd" kits (as well my Christmas tag gifts – post to come). I have confessed before that I have a never-ending supply of empty Tazo tea tins.

To cover the tins and make the signs I used the following (I make two of everything and boo two neighbors at a time):
1 sheet of patterned paper (We R Memory Keeps Designer Scrapbook Pad - Halloween)

3 sheets of solid paper to coordinate with patterned paper (PTI - Simply Chartreuse)
3 sheets of sold paper to coordinate (PTI - True Black)
30 inches of ribbon (PTI - True Black)
Ghost for sign 6 inches (Cricut Paper Doll Dress Up Cartridge - Page 30)
Boo for sign 3 3/4 inches (Cricut Wild Card Cartridge - Page 68)
Ghost for inside lid 2 inches (Cricut Paper Doll Dress Up - Page 30)
Halloween Stamps (PTI - Been Boo'd)

The tin on the left shows the inside of the lid and the bottom of the tin. I like to cover the entire tin.

Since our development is only a few years old, most people have the same type of front door windows. I took measurements of our window and cut my sign to fit in perfectly.
Here are the poem and instructions I adhered to the back of the sign:

This treat is for you, we hope you enjoy

The idea is simple, one we hope you employ You pass "BOO" along to two other neighbors
Along with any kind of Halloween favors
If we all do our part, and spread the good cheer By Halloween night it will be very clear
We're a friendly bunch, we like to share fun
So please do your part to keep "BOO" on the run!

Instructions
1. Enjoy your treat
2. Place this BOO sign visible in the window by your front door
3. Make 2 copies of this BOO (including these instructions) and make 2 treats
4. Secretly deliver to 2 neighbors/friends without a BOO
5. Keep an eye on nearby front doors to see how far and fast it spreads by Halloween

Here is a view of what is inside of each tin. I have two families in mind that I'd like to Boo (before someone else does), so I put things in the tins thinking of those kids while I shopped.

BOO!

Wedding Gift

My hair colorist is getting married at the end of the month. I have an appointment with her tomorrow, so I will give her this little gift when I see her.

I created a stationary set for her. I've posted the same stationary design before. For center the monogram, I used their first name initials and their last name initial. Last month she posted some pictures of her shower on Facebook, so I was able to find out the colors of her wedding without asking any obvious questions. Sneaky! I also got her a gift card which I tucked inside of a holder and stamped Mr & Mrs on the front. I covered the back of the holder with the same paper used in the cards.

I wasn't sure how to package my gifts, so I decided to alter a plain white gable box with patterned paper, ribbon, jewels and the same monogram as the stationary.

I'm a Changed Woman

OK, the title is a little dramatic, but my opinion about ink has surely changed!!!  Two weeks ago I was going through my normal Monday morning routine and visited Kristina's blog.  She has discussed ColorBox Fluid Chalk Ink in the past, but this time she gave a great source where to purchase them. 

I am a huge Papertrey Ink (PTI) fan.  Love their stamps, paper and how everything goes so nicely together, but for the past few months they have been having issues with their ink.  They've stopped selling the colors that match their paper and my ink supply has been, well...running dry.  So I decided to dip my finger into chalk ink.  Since I love my inks to coordinate with my paper, I started to do a search of what colors would go well with my paper from PTI.  I came across the Splitcoaststampers forum, where "Stampintoo" gave a detailed description of which ink coordinates with which PTI paper.   They even have a picture showing the paper and ink together.  (thank you very much Stampintoo).

I quickly placed my order for nine different colors based on her chart.  I am in LOVE with chalk ink.  Wow!  What a difference.  I'm convinced.   The colors coordinate well, but the crispness and great coverage of the stamp are exceptional.

I'm a changed woman.