Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Template by Fran


This template is created by Frans New beginnings. She is a wonderful temlate maker and giving the credit to her
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Same template decorated

Same Template as the last one



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Another basket Decorated


here is a cute smaller basket I decorated for you
or you can decorate your own
with rubber stamps or
digitally.




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Template


They put the handle side to side...I did long ways, can go either way


I added an extra set of these to decorate so you can have the top of the flaps decorated also,
this is a template by The daily digi and is for personal use only and credit for it should be given to them.

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Baskets for Valentines Day





You can print out mine or you can use the original template from Frans New beginnings
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Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Templates-sites and purse template

I promised I would share some of the printable sites I have used to decorate the templates and give the items as gifts. First I have a board on pinterest called templates you can find here
http://pinterest.com/cottageatheart/templates/

Here is one of my favs
http://www.jersgirl.com/temps.html

Another one, a little more unique designs but still very cool
http://www.ruthannzaroff.com/mirkwooddesigns/templates.htm

And here is one I talked about that I created of a small purse

Sunday, January 8, 2012

Card holder

I designed these to fit gift cards or debit cards, etc to give them some nice look. I used all four of these for the christmas gifts--2 for gift cards--the other 2 i cut off the edges and made simple gift tags out of them, didn't think about it but they folded backwards but figured they could handle it hehe.
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My handmade items

I got these cool pink and green strs and trees marshmellows so I separated them out to make the colors not mix and the kids seemed to enjoy them. They also enjoyed.the fluffy blankets I got each one of them. We had total 14 there for dinner turned out good and yummy mexican food.

The recipe for thes are soooo easy...

melt 3 TB of butter and one package of marshmellows in large pan
when melted add 6 cups of rice cripspies, make sure you butter everything including your own fingers/hands so things won't stick.

Pur into a shaped pan, or just a casserole dish. Wait till cool, take out of pan to cut.

To make them REALLY yummy add one cup of peanut butter into the melted mixture before adding the rice cripsies.

EASY AS PIE>>>>>>wait pie is hard, Easy as abc haha

Saturday, January 7, 2012

Orthodox Christmas


This is my first year of celebrating The day Orthodox Churches have been celebrating for centuries. According to the calendar they follow, today would be December 25, so we are going to spend the day with Jim's family since we spent the OTHER Christmas day with my family. I am going to bring up what day it is and ask them to consider what gift in their lives they can give to the Lord this y ear. I'm not going to ask them to name it as I think they should really think about it, and not feel badly if they do not believe in the whole thing.



Anyone remember the movie "the littlest Angle"? I LOVED that movie as a child. Of course they have the doctrine all wrong but the meaning all right. Funny hadn't even started to go to church yet.

It had Johnny Whitaker in it (he was about 10 or so remember him?) and it was about him dying very young and going to heaven and it was "christmas time" and all the big angels were making the fanciest gold things, and beautiful jewels etc. He felt sad because he had nothing to give. He talked his guardian angel (who was helping him learn the role of being an angel) into letting him go back home and get his little box from under his bed holding all this simple little boy treasures, a special rock he found, a sling shot, a few other things. Very simple and crude.

The movie ends with him walking through all the fancy gifts, and angels kind of looking down on his gift as it was so little and rough, and of course the king saying it was the largest gift he had ever received because it was the most important things the child had.

I know I'm babbling but its because the gifts that God wants from us are not big huge things, its little things, its things from our heart, its reaching out to the poor, the homeless, whatever is done to the least of these is done unto me he has said.

So thats it...thats my orthodox christmas idea. I haven't formulated my gift  yet...will do so today at dinner when everyone is around. I have a million ideas, want to choose one that I believe he wants me to choose.

Friday, January 6, 2012

Sharing from Pinterest

Tanya Felsheim wants you to see a pin 'Sizzix old school die cut system', on Pinterest

"The message on this cracked me up! Says "old school" my goodness! Already considered "old school" was innovative only a few years ago!"

Encouraging words



My friend has been battling through returning cancer and the whole thought of her having to go through all of that again has really made me MAD! I sat down and did a subway art image of encouraging words for her, but anyone can use it if any of you wish to print it yourself you are welcome to. Helps you when you are getting down I think.



Just some of my traditional Watercolors

I have found my style of watercolor is not everyone's "cup of tea" as it tends to be loose, fluffy, and soft, but its me. The first one I call "Grandma's Window" as my 96 year old grandmother lives most of her time in a nice large room in my aunt's house and has this wonderful window that she can look outside and see who is coming and going, and can see my aunts garden and flowers. I sent this to her in a card and before she opened it up she said "Its my window!" So at least she got it hehe. Inside I told her I named it Grandma's window.







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Votive Holder

First I suggest you fold everything back and forth. Gives much better straight strong folds, looks more professional. Then since I was using the little glue tabs (glue itself would have been better and stronger but I was in a hurry) I put all the glue tabs on at one time, then took all the tops off at one time. Really saved a lot of time.










Here I started making the corners, Holding each stage together to make a good strong bond.









Same Here showing the flap this time is small.....







Here is the topper just folded it and put glue tabs on top, If I would have read the instructions, I would have read that they glue along the entire bottom edge which would have made mine much stronger!
The votives I got from the dollar store are smaller than some so it didnt' fill the box completely so you can't see it but I snuck in the extra tealights from my last jobs (was able to use the 4 leftover) but normally I wouldn't do that







Again if I had paid attention I would have glued the topper on the outside instead of on the inside.....oh well you get the idea. it makes a nice handle on top
having it set up this way.



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Thursday, January 5, 2012

Christmas Gift for my mom

I decided to try to make silhouette images of the whole family for my mom for Christmas, but right as I got started and got some proper side shots of my brothers family is when I went through my "thing" whatever it was. I was able to finally finish these THE DAY BEFORE CHRISTMAS for my mom. I printed them, put them each in 5 x 7 inch frames and made sure they could be set up to be placed looking at each other in several ways.



I printed on my laser printer with laser printer photo paper, and once I placed in the frame they told me they looked as though I had actually cut them out not just printed. I made an extra set for my sister in law. I can add the rest of the family later just need to purchase similar frames so they all look the same and get the photos I need. I made a print of this above to send to my grandmother as a single page, even that way it looked cool.

Tealight holder








Decided I would do 2 of these tealight holders for may aunts as my mom was headed up there. I got the tealights at the dollar store 8 for $1 and only used 6 for this.


A few things I learned, fold all the folds first, backwards from the way you want, then forwards the way you want. I used the scrapbooking tabs to be quick but if I had time I would have used glue woud have made this so much stronger. I used photo paper to print on and looked very professional.

After creating the box, I put a tab where it says glue, I also put one on the other side of the flap and I held each corner and kind of pressed it inward to give it more strength.

I found on this particular one I should have not cut so close on the top outsides, I should have made sure it had plenty of room. I think I might even change the template to add flaps to fold inside the box to make it look better on top and bottom


This is how it all fit, and when all together really looked nice. I think I might make some of these up ahead and have ready for little pick me up gifts for people I meet. Whole thing cost me less than $1!


Bag Topper, so easy to make.



Oh Thanks Marley you sure help a lot! I am trying to find a bag to show you what this
would look like on different items, and Marley is checking it out to see if it fits.

Oh, and I figured out I should have folded the
item BEFORE I cut the slits for the hand hold,
then cut the handholds at the same time. Much
more stable.









Marley thinks this one fits pretty good. She likes cheese much better than sweets....
did you know that cats can't taste sweet tastes? Harkens back to jungle days so I have
been told...but she seems to love a lot of stuff like cheese......This topper is a coastal
holiday topper. I would like it better on some good chocolate or fudge or something.















Here is the chocolate but bummer it is too small...Marley is no where in sight for
testing out my chocolate bag. Oh well, just have to eat the chocolate and not give away. Breaks my heart....


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