Puppy Pollyanna

 When my DH and I travel and are unable able to bring our 7 year old Yorkie (Piper), he stays at a local pet boarding facility named Best Friends.  Our local Best Friends offers day camp for dogs and we use this service whenever he stays over night and occasionally when we will be away from the house for an extended period of time on a particular day.  It's a great way for him to interact with other dogs (although when we do spy on him via their webcams, most of the time we see him snuggling on the camp counselor's lap).  He really enjoys the people dogs and we are thankful they take such great care of him.

Piper was invited to participate in this years Puppy Pollyanna (say that three times fast!) for day campers at Best Friends.   Pollyanna is the same concept as "secret Santa".   Piper "chose" little Lucy the Cockapoo who likes toys that are not filled with stuffing for his Pollyanna.  It's a secret who picked Piper!

I cut a few doggy images from the Cricut cartridge Create A Critter and affixed them to a clear paint can.  I wrapped the inside of the can with some sheer ribbon attached with glue dots, tied little bows on each side of the handles, and then filled the can with the goodies.

I sure hope little Lucy loves the items Piper personally picked for her at PetSmart.

Snowman Gift Tags

These snowman gift tags were made using the Snowman Shape Up Die Collection and Snowman Accessories Stamp Set from Papertrey Ink.  I cut the snowman base from white cardstock, the arms from dark chocolate cardstock and the mittens from felt.  I wanted his hat to coordinate with his mittens, and for both to coordinate with the great wrapping paper I found at Hobby Lobby.  First I cut the hat base from white cardstock and stamped a pattern on the middle, using the snowflake label stamp from the Holiday Treats Stamp Set.  Next I cut out the trim of the hat with glitter cardstock.  For the words I used the To: and From: stamps from the 2011 Birthday Tags Stamp Set.  As a finishing touch, I used enamel accents as buttons down his middle. 

A piece of score tape on the backs of the snowmen adhere them to the packages.  

Here's a shot of a few of the packages under our tree located in our foyer!  We now have three decorated Christmas trees in our house: this one in the foyer, one in our living room and another in our family room.  My DH has set them all up on timers.  As soon as it is dark outside they automatically turn on...love that!

Peppermint Candy Wreath

 I'm on a candy wreath roll for 2012!  During a recent trip to a restaurant supply store (I don't own or work at a restaurant - I just LOVE finding great basic house supplies there), I came across a huge 5 pound, 650 piece bag of peppermint candies (Hospitality Mints at the restaurant supply store).  This entire bag cost $6.







The wreath form I used was Styrofoam.   Although the color was perfect, I dislike getting flakes of Styrofoam all over, so I covered the wreaths with white satin ribbon first.  Next I unwrapped 250 candies and went to town hot gluing them onto the form.  I love this type of project.  It's easy, fun and now my kitchen smells like peppermint!!! 

Thanksgiving Place Cards

Thanksgiving in the US is a little less than two weeks away.  *insert slight panic here*  Our prep has begun:  we gathered and tested new recipes, made the annual card to send to family and friends, and placed the order from our favorite local, family owned butcher for our center of attention - Tom the Turkey.

This weekend I finished making the place cards for the table.  I enjoy having place cards for all of our large family meals, as I think it is just a small way for each guest to feel a little special and everyone knows exactly where they are sitting when they sit down for dinner.

Papertrey Ink came out with a really cute Shape Up Series in their die collection and this year they introduced the Pumpkin Die Collection.  I used this die collection to create my greeting card as well as matching place cards for the table.

Here's what I did.   First I cut an A2 card base and then aligned it with the dashed line on the die, and ran it through my Cuttlebug.  Next, I used the same die on non-folded card stock and cut the pumpkin followed by the stem.  This collection has a companion die called Pumpkin Sections Die.  I used patterned paper and cut each section in a different pattern.  I inked each of the edges of the sections with some brown ink to make them stand out.  I glued the pattern sections and stem to the solid pumpkin shape and adhered that to the A2 card base.  Finally, I cut brown felt letters from the Modern Alphabet Die set.  Although this pumpkin die collection is intended for a greeting card, I think it will work well for my place cards.

Trick or Treat Card

Wrapping up my posts for Halloween, I'm sharing the card I sent out to our family and friends this year.  The card was made with everything from Papertrey Ink!  Since my card was a single layer, it made it easy to mass produce.  I fell in love with the Spider Web Trio Dies and knew I just had to do something with them on a card!  Instead of using the large web as a traditional die, I decided to emboss the front of the card with it!  The sentiment and spider came from the Been Boo'd stamp set.  I heat embossed the scary cute little spider with black embossing powder.

Happy Halloween!

Organization - Ribbon Storage

I am constantly looking online for better ways to organize my craft room.  I'm not sure why but I always feel like there is just some genius way of organizing that I haven't thought of yet and I'm missing out!  I think I've got it perfect with my ribbon storage though!

My craft room is a mix of different furniture from Pottery Barn (the Bedford Collection) and Ikea (the Expedit series).  When we moved into our home in 2006 I purchased this Craft Organizer from Pottery Barn.  (I should probably warn that this item comes and goes every year at PB around Christmas time.  If you are reading this after Christmas, the link may not work).  Thankfully I did not pay full price for this baby.  If you have patience, it most likely will go on sale closer to Christmas (at least it has every year since I've purchased it).  When I originally bought it, I used the lower portion for wrapping paper. The unit includes 4 dowels, but I removed two so that I can perch my ribbon on them.  All of my ribbon comes from Papertrey Ink, I love having my paper, ink, ribbon and button match.  This system allows me to quickly view and grab the colors I need and as you can see, I still have a little room to grow.

Glitter Ornament Balls

I've been showing various pictures of the tea cart in our foyer and the displays I change out for each holiday and season (here, here and here).  Decorating with apothecary jars make it easy, quick and fun to change the theme each month.  One of the jars is usually filled with candy and one is always filled with these Glitter Ornament Balls.

Here's what you'll need to make these ornaments:
clear glass ornaments, glitter, Pledge Floor Finish

Remove the top of the ornament clip.  Pour a small amount of Pledge into the ball.  Swirl (don't shake) the Pledge around the entire inside of the ball.   Shaking the Pledge will cause bubbles and will not cover completely.  Empty remaining Pledge back into the bottle.  (I've been using the same bottle for dozens of ornaments and have only used a small bit).  Pour glitter into the ball and swirl it around, adding more glitter as needed to cover the entire inside.  Empty any extra glitter from the ball onto a folded piece of scrap paper (this glitter can be used for the next ball).  When finished, discard remaining glitter, do not return it to the bottle. Set the ornaments aside to dry before replacing the clip on top.   I use the original container the ornaments come in as a drying rack.  I love this technique because I love the look and the sparkle, but I don't like the mess of the glitter.