Hot Cocoa Mugs and keychains for Christmas

Good afternoon friends,

Just wanted to bring you a quick project I made this afternoon for my dart team.  Every year I like to give the girls on my team something handmade by me.  I've done ornaments, cards, key chains, etc.  This year I decided to do some glass etching and also another key chain.

I started out with some mugs I got at the dollar tree.  I love shopping there, there are so many possibilities with a little imagination!

A couple of years ago I made some hot cocoa bottles and you can see how the etching process works here.  This is what it looks like on my mugs

Photographing etched glass is somewhat tricky, therefore I placed a piece of paper in the mug so you can get the idea of the etched snowflake. 

I added some carmels, a hot cocoa packet and a candy cane to the mug.

It still wasn't enough for me, so I decided to make them each a keychain also. 

I started out with a mold that I made using the Amazing Mold Putty.  

I bought this stamp from Viva Las Vegas YEARS ago and still use it quite frequently.  

Some Stazon black ink and some flatback rhinestones should do the trick! 

Using the Amazing Casting Resin I made the tags, stamped my dartboard image directly onto the resin piece.  I redrilled the holes and added a keychain.  I also added the flatback rhinestone in the center where the bullseye should be with each girls' favorite color.  Now I hope they get the hint to hit that bullseye!  LOL  I'm just kidding.  We have a lot of fun throwing darts together! 

The dollar tree celophane bags come in very handy as a simple gift wrapping.  This way they can see what they got and not have to open it up at the bar.  Unless they really want to dig their keychains out!!! 

I'll be giving them their presents tonight and I'm pretty sure they will love them!

I hope you've found my quick project inspirational and I love reading comments, so please leave one.

As always, have a great day and 

Lasting Memories #49 "Christmas in July"

Good morning fellow scrapbookers and guests,

Today is another Lasting Memories post and it's all about Christmas.  Seems like I've been doing a few Christmas posts lately...hahaha, guess that's why it's Christmas in July.

Here is a layout I did with the last Christmas family picture before my DD moved, boy am I behind on scrapbooking older stuff.  Now she and her family are back and I will have a new Christmas family pictures this year with grandchild.  So excited about seeing Miss Bella's face at Christmas time this year.  Last year she was too little to really understand Christmas so I am looking forward to that.

Austyn's shirt was sooo white and stood out too much in the picture,
so I used rubons and placed the sentiment right on the photo.
I like the way that turned out.

I hope you liked my layout, it was cricutless, but I have so many cutsie Christmas embellishments that I need to use up.  I have an entire box of miscellaneous tags, ribbons, stamps, etc.  I kinda like shopping my stash right now.

I hope I've inspired you to shop your stash and create a Christmas layout.  Then head on over to Lasting Memories and link up your Christmas layouts.  If you are anything like me, you probably have some older pictures you need to scrap anyway.

Christmas in July Blog Hop

Good morning and welcome to the "Christmas in July" Blog Hop hosted by Jazzy from Jazzy's Cards. If you are coming from Libby then you are in the right place, but if you are just checking on my blog and stumbled across this, go start at the beginning. This is Jazzy's first time hosting a hop, and I know she would appreciate the love.

The theme for the hop was something Christmas related that included the colors green and red. This is what I came up with...

I remember as a kid I couldn't wait for Christmas Eve.  In Germany, my family celebrated Christmas Eve with a real tree that the Christchild brought and decorated while we ate sandwiches and soup in the kitchen.  Then the Christchild would ring a bell letting us know we could now enter the livingroom.  The room would be dark except for the tree with it's real candles and beautiful glistening ornaments.  I remember the smell of the fresh pine tree and the baked goods in a basket on the table, usually cookies and small cakes.  Boy do I miss those days...my parents still celebrate Christmas Eve, but we, at home, celebrate Christmas morning.  When we still lived in MN near my parents, we would celebrate Christmas Eve at my mom's house and then we would take the kiddos home and prepare for Christmas morning.  Now, we have changed our tradition a bit since we don't live close to family anymore.  The weather can be so unpredictable in the MN and SD areas that we do not go home for Christmas anymore.  We still have a real tree, but no real candles and we usually get the tree the first Saturday in December and decorate it the next day after church.  Now we usually have a munchy night on Christmas Eve.  Everyone in the family gets to choose up to 3 items they love the best.  Mine is usually shrimp cocktail, brie cheese with crackers and herring.  I know, odd combination, but when you get 4-6 people with up to 3 choices, there is a lot of food.  Most of the time we have mini hotdogs, bbq smokies, meatballs, rye bread with swiss cheese melted ontop, pizza poppers, breaded mushrooms, veggie tray, cookies, my 3 items and then there are some various items that get added or deleted each year.  It just depends on their moods.  (Just writing this is making me hungry)  Every year, since my kiddos were babies, we have bought brand new pajamas for everyone for Christmas eve.  This way everyone has new jamies for pictures on Christmas morning.  We usually change into them, and then we have a new family game to play or new movie to watch.  When that is done, we all help clean up and get ready for bed.  When the kids are in bed or have gone home to their own place, hubby and I finish wrapping any Santa gifts that are still needed and head off to bed ourselves.  Christmas morning we all get up, make coffee, mamossas, and usually monkey bread and then the fun begins.  I love watching the kids' faces when they get to come downstairs and see what Santa brought.  Remember, if you don't believe, you don't receive.  That's the motto in our house...it's getting close to that non-believing for our youngest, but thank goodness we now have grandkids to keep up the tradition!  The rest of the day is usually spent just lounging, playing with any new toys or gadgets and watching Christmas movies all day.  All the left over food (and there is usually a ton yet) from the night before gets brought out again and we just munch all day long.  I hope I haven't bored you with my Christmas tradition, but I just wanted to share what we do.  Leave me a comment and tell me what your favorite tradition is.

Now onto my project; it started like this:

On of our neighbors is selling her house, so she has been
cleaning out any unneeded things.  She knows how much I
love redoing things, so she thought of me.  Isn't that so sweet?
Hubby doesn't understand my obsession of other people's junk,
but wait till you see what I did.  She had two of these and this is
what I made with one of them.

and ended like like this:

This will be great to put some Christmas food on and carry from upstairs to downstairs, or just to have sitting on the coffee table with Christmas cookies and tea for holiday guests.

Here are some more pictures if you are interested.  I used my E-craft to cut the vinyl.  LOVE IT!!!

Not a single miss cut or bad cut.  Other than the fact that I have a lot of cricut carts, I might be using the E-Craft exclusively.  

Thank you so much for checking out my project... now head on over to Darlene but first I hope you remembered to wish everyone a "Merry Christmas" in order to be eligible for Jazzy's Cricut Cartridge Blog Candy.

1. Jazzy - www.JazzysCards.Blogspot.com
2. Amy - http://www.lovetocrop.com/
3. Gina - http://californiascrappin-gcinderella21.blogspot.com/
4. Theresa - www.thescrapbookingqueen.com
5. Nadia - www.nadiasbeautifulmess.blogspot.com
6. Elizabeth - http://visionsofpaper.blogspot.com/
7. Anita-http://www.anitaandbugs.blogspot.com
8. Libby - www.psastampcamp.blogspot.com
9. Brenda - http://createbyburffrau.blogspot.com/
10. Darlene  Simple Southern Blessings
11. LaKesha at Scrapping Diva

Festive Fridays 7-8

Good morning and welcome to another edition of Festive Fridays. If you are new to us, sit back, grab a cup of coffee, relax and enjoy some wonderful Christmas Cards. Yes, I did say Christmas...Festive Fridays will be every other Friday with samples of Christmas cards. This way, you can be making your cards all year long and you will avoid the mad rush when you could be enjoying the Christmas Season. You should have just come from Debbie. If you stumbled upon this post you can go back to Terri and start at the beginning. There is also a complete list of the Festive Friday hop on the left sidebar under the Festive Fridays blinkie in case you get lost along the way.

This was super simple.  I used the Christmas cart on my gypsy and cut the tree as a background at 5 inches in plain green cardstock.  Then I cut the layer in a glittery paper also at 5 inches.  I used scraps for the background and added a bit of lace.  The tree is pop dotted to the card base and embellished with flat back pearls.  The sentiment came from a Christmas paper pack and fit nicely. 


I hope you like my Festive Friday card and hope to see you back in two weeks for another christmas card.  Now head on over to Angela and check out what she has for you. 

Festive Fridays 6-24

Good morning and welcome to another edition of Festive Fridays. If you are new to us, sit back, grab a cup of coffee, relax and enjoy some wonderful Christmas Cards. Yes, I did say Christmas...Festive Fridays will be every other Friday with samples of Christmas cards for the entire year. This way, you can be making your cards all year long and you will avoid the mad rush when you could be enjoying the Christmas Season. You should have just come from Debbie. If you stumbled upon this post you can go back to Terri and start at the beginning. There is also a complete list of the Festive Friday hop on the left sidebar under the Festive Fridays blinkie in case you get lost along the way.

Today I made a gift within a card so to say.  You all know how much I love my cricut and I do love my SCAL program just a little bit more, hehehe.  The possibilities are just endless when you can create your own files, etc.  I had purchased a year subscription over at Scrapping Table and just love, love, love her files.  I used a simple "gift" cut 2 times for the base of my card to create a pocket.  I then cut just the "bow" out again in a different color and adhered it ontop of the front piece and added a ribbon around the bow.  I also added a sentiment "Season's greetings" and a cute little tag found in my christmas box stash and some green rhinestones.

Then I took that same gift and created 4 little gifts and welded them onto a rectangle shape.  I cut this out of cream cardstock (all scraps) and created a bookmark.  Then I cut these 4 little gifts again in various christmas paper, added a few ribbons, bows, bling and pearls and layered them onto the bookmark.  

I plan on purchasing a book for one of my friends and thought this would be a cute way for her to keep her place when she is reading it.  Isn't that cute?

I hope you like my Festive Friday card and hope to see you back in two weeks for another christmas card.  Now head on over to Angela and check out what she has for you. 

Festive Friday 6-10

Good morning and welcome to another edition of Festive Fridays. If you are new to us, sit back, grab a cup of coffee, relax and enjoy some wonderful Christmas Cards. Yes, I did say Christmas...Festive Fridays will be every other Friday with samples of Christmas cards. This way, you can be making your cards all year long and you will avoid the mad rush when you could be enjoying the Christmas Season. You should have just come from Debbie. If you stumbled upon this post you can go back to Terri and start at the beginning. There is also a complete list of the Festive Friday hop on the left sidebar under the Festive Fridays blinkie in case you get lost along the way.

As most of you know I also design for a company called Creative Paperclay...well I used something I made out of the paperclay.  I thought it would be fun to make some christmas tree ornaments.  All you need is some paperclay, cookie cutter and your imagination.  Hehehe.  After it dried, about 24 hours, I painted the tree and added some puffy white paint and then "blotted" it a bit to look kinda like snow.  I added a piece of gold embroidery floss for the hanger and there you have it. 
 
I just made a basic card using some real cute christmas tree paper and a little bit of ribbon.  I used a simple stamp and attached a little sentiment tag.  Then I attached the christmas tree ornament to the front of the card with removable tape.  Now you have a simple gift with a card.
 
I hope you like my Festive Friday card and hope to see you back in two weeks for another christmas card.  Now head on over to Angela and check out what she has for you.