I have been watching Rich struggling to make his video and am sorry to say his first attempt went poorly.  He made his card on video but the files on his memory card were corrupt.  I can’t tell you how many times that’s happened to me and I was really hoping he wouldn’t suffer the same problems I’ve had.  His card is simple and he shouldn’t have any trouble making it again, but I feel badly that he has to…

We were going to make a nice dinner at home, but after all of the problems he’s been having with his video, I decided we’d go out to eat instead.  Our family tradition for the last probably 25 years, has been to make crab legs at home….A year ago, Rich put frozen crab legs in our refrigerator to thaw and they did….and the juice drained out of the bags and into the refrigerator making it smell horribly.  It literally took us three months to kill the smell, and it took several industrial cleaners to do so.  With that being said, we didn’t want to buy them until the day of our dinner so we could avoid a repeat performance, but still wanted to make them.  Our intent was to go to the supermarket and buy them, but this system will be so much easier…After all, isn’t that what Red Lobster is for? I wish we had more seafood restaurants in our area, but we don’t….

I’ve finished just about everything I need to do for Christmas, with the exception of helping Rich finish his video…once that’s done and uploaded, we’re going to spend the evening opening our presents, watching the dogs rip the tissue paper off theirs and probably go to a movie.  Tomorrow, we’re spending the day with good friends and the day after will be with our closest friends/family.

I’m wishing all of you a very Merry Christmas, and will be back with updates on my video ideas after the 26th…

I’ve talked about this many times, but since Rich and I don’t have a lot family, I like to make and donate a lot (as many as possible) of gifts to nursing homes, for them to decorate their rooms for the holidays. This wreath and the bookmarks I made in an earlier video, (I’ll link it to this video) are most of the things we donated. I didn’t want to make a bunch of similar videos, but if you see any of the items at the end that you would like a full how to video made, I’d be happy to do so.

I started with the foam ring from the Dollar Tree…The red ribbon came from the Dollar Tree and the gold is inexpensive and might have also come from the Dollar Tree last year. I am gluing on the back of the wreath, even though I didn’t say that. I start by gluing the gold ribbon on an angle, and continue by leaving a gap between the rows of gold and red ribbon. After gluing both ribbons, I filled the initial gap with another piece of gold ribbon and then made a loop on the top and hot glued it to the back of the wreath, creating a hanger. The gold ribbon is super pliable, so they can turn that loop to hang it on their door or on a nail… I added the gold snowflake from the Dollar Tree, plus red bells (also from the DT), and then a piece of rubber coppery fern that I sprayed adhesive on, and added gold glitter to. I also added a couple of gold small round ornaments that I got at a garage sale.

I wanted to show the things I’d taken to the nursing home, so added a small video of them at the end. The frame with the snowman in the corner wasn’t finished, as I added “Let it snow” to it with die cut gold letters….it was cute once the words were added. When we delivered the goodies to the nursing home, my girlfriend’s mother, whose 95, chose two items, the deer framed with tree paper in the background and the Santa on a mirror. I bought the mirror at the Dollar Tree and the Santa there too… I took four bookmarks with one large print book, so they knew how it worked (plus they’d have another book for their library) and will attach that video at the end.

As it gets closer to Christmas, I realize how exhausting this time of year can be.  My friends who have health issues are struggling, as am I.  I have pushed myself too hard and need to take a couple of days off until I feel more like myself again.

Yesterday, my girlfriend and I delivered the gifts I had made to our local nursing home where her mom is currently a patient.  I let her choose the items she wanted first, and at 95, she definitely knew which she wanted.  She chose a Santa framed on a mirror and a deer framed on a tree lined paper background.  My girlfriend found their social worker and we gave her the rest of the things I had made (you’ll see photos of them at the end of my last Christmas video), as she would know which patients don’t have visitors or family to decorate their rooms.  I thought she’d want us to visit some of the people to deliver the goodies, but she took them and would be delivering them herself (and kind of a relief for me).  After, we went out to lunch and then Rich and I went to visit a friend whose just had a partial knee replacement, and by then, we were getting sleet, and I was ready to come home.

My sister got her box of birthday and Christmas gifts from us and called to talk about it and her cards….Once I got off the phone with her, it was time for date night and I was exhausted.  We started watching a movie and I fell asleep…I feel really bad when that happens, but I was just too tired to do anything.  Rich thought it would be better to delay date night until tonight, and I agreed….I decided I should answer some YouTube comments and carried my laptop to another room, where I realized I’d put the cord inside the laptop and laid it on our bed.  I think the dogs must have leaned against it and the cord inside crushed the screen, thereby ruining my laptop.  I’m really sad about it, as I had inherited it from Rich’s dad and loved that machine.  I’d bought a replacement from Dell that I’m currently using, and it just makes me crazy with pop up windows and screens I don’t want to see.  It took me two hours this AM to upload my notes on a video, something that normally takes about half an hour…Needless to say, I’m disappointed in myself for making such a stupid mistake and allowing the dogs to destroy my laptop….drat…

We were invited to a friend’s house tonight, to see all of our college friends, but I’m just not up for it, and the weather is still kind of crappy, and I just can’t do another two hour drive…I hate it when I whine this much, but it’s the state of exhaustion I’m in.  I need a large break where I sleep too much and then do almost nothing and then I think I’ll feel better.    I have to wrap some gifts at some point, but so far, haven’t found the momentum to do so….It’s going to have to happen in the next day or two…as otherwise, I’m out of time.

I wanted to make a special Christmas card for my sister and her husband and thought you could watch whenever you have the time.
I started by taking a retired Carolyn Shores Wright stamp called Holly House #90129 and stamping it on watercolor paper that was 4 3/4″ wide by 6 3/4″. Then I created a mask using Avery Removable Labels link https://tinyurl.com/ya7crvfr They are a full size sheet label so you can make a ton of masks where the entire back stays sticky (vs. a post-it-note). To make the mask, I stamped the bird stamp on it and cut it out as close to the inside of the lines as possible (so I don’t leave inked lines if my mask is too large, since you have to press over the masking paper.)
I laid the mask aside for now and used mostly Prismacolor watercolor pencils to color my image. I used the picture on the back of the stamp as my reference. I had Rich fast forward through the coloring…I used a Stampin’ Up blender pen for activating the watercolors. Here’s a link to a Stampin’ Up representative and his online ordering if you don’t have a representative. http://www.stampinup.com/ecweb/default.aspx?dbwsdemoid=2104107
blender pens: https://tinyurl.com/yafy5m93
After liquifying the watercolors with my blender pen, I laid the mask over my image and used Distress Inks Stormy Sky on a Stampin’ Up retired weathered background stamp and inking over the top portion of the cardstock. I tried to make a mark where my stamping ended and stamp the rest of the cardstock, but overlapped a little bit.. I took the 1″ chip brush in blue that I buy from Harbor Freight Liquidators, and put more of the Stormy Sky ink over the entire image to blend out some of the lines and make the entire background blue, then used Iced Spruce Distess Ink and my green brush on the bottom portion to make it look like grass. I removed the mask and then stamped a couple of small evergreen trees near the house with an old foam backed stamp that came in a nature set of inexpensive stamps…You can use any small evergreen tree stamp for this. I removed the mask and used my Kadomaru Pro corner rounder link https://tinyurl.com/yaql2lc5 to round the corners, then took a piece of red embossed cardstock 4 7/8 x 6 7/8″ with rounded corners, and glued it to a white card base that is 5 x 7″ with rounded corners. I added a layer of foam tape on the back of the house image, and used a matching blue ribbon to wrap around the top and glued to the back with AdTech fine line glue and washi tape, then added an old sentiment from Stampin’ Up that I’d first used an oval punch on (and the sentiment was too wide), so used a round paper punch to make the image smaller, then scissors to fix the rough spots. I stamped another sentiment inside the card and put my Made by Sandy Parker punch on the back and called it done.  My sister and her husband loved the card, and I hope you enjoyed the process.

I know it’s really close to Christmas, but I’ve made this wreath and didn’t get the video put up until now. I was just at our Dollar Tree and they still had the components for the wreath..You’ll need one big snowflake and six smaller foam snowflakes plus a metal snowflake for the center. I used hot glue and then glued silver ribbon to the back to maintain the integrity of the wreath. I used small snowflake embellishments that I glued to the centers of the outside snowflakes and then put a rhinestone in the centers of each for a little extra bling.  You really don’t need to do this step as it’s kind of hard to see.
In the end it’s really large…much larger than I anticipated. I don’t think you could put it outdoors, but it would be great over a fireplace or on an accent wall.

I know this sounds like a lie, but I have been a crazy crafty girl the last few days.  I wanted to make a lot of decorations to deliver to our local nursing home where my girlfriend’s mother is currently living, and started with one or two things that turned into fifteen to twenty.  I’m really happy with some of the things I’ve created and OK with a few and only one, Rich and I decided should be tossed.  I have been in the craft room literally all afternoon and evening yesterday and today.  I didn’t make videos of every single crazy thing I made, but I did do one video that I’m including a recap, and maybe if you’re interested, I can recreate whatever interests you next year.

Hey, I’m just happy my sister and her husband’s birthday presents arrived there day, and only three months late for my brother-in-law’s birthday….So the fact that I’m finally finished with my senior gifts and delivering them tomorrow, is quite a moment to celebrate.  After all, I still have a few Christmas cards I haven’t finished.

I’m not sure if I already whined about this or not, but when I took my haul to the post office and needed to send several international cards, the post office sold me several of the same stamp.  I really don’t believe they’ll get to their destinations, and that will really make me sad if they don’t.  At the time, it didn’t occur to me to ask, but could it really cost the same to send a card to Canada and Romania?  Just a thought…So I’ve been fretting about this for the last few days as only a cardmaker can.  After all, if I’d just gone to the Dollar Tree and bought a box of cards and mailed them, I wouldn’t really care, but my blood sweat and tears are wrapped up in those cards, and it will break my heart if they don’t get where they are intended.

So to recap my last two days, I’ve ruined two pairs of pants with hot glue, burned one thumb and one index finger and have glitter almost everywhere.  All in all, it’s a job well done.

When I was a kid, my mom taught Sunday school and always made these cute little trees. Rich asked me why I didn’t hot glue them together and that would be a lot easier, but this is how I learned to do it, and it makes the tree pliable, and I think that’s kind of fun.

You’ll need to have several sizes of red and green buttons…I used two of the same size green that were a little larger than the next two smaller green buttons, as they make the base of the tree…Then you take your largest red button and a matching size green button and layer the next smaller size red then green button, and continue until your smallest size and put something on top for a tree topper…I used two Stampin’ Up ivy leaves. I started with two strands of green embroidery thread with a large knot on the end..I ran the needle up through the tree that I’d already laid out in order and tried to keep as many buttons on the needle as possible until I got to the top…once there, I put the two ivy charms on, then ran the needle back down through all of the buttons to the bottom, and then back up through as many of the buttons had four holes. My knot was too small, so the base of the tree came out of the thread and I had to rethread it… I knotted it near the top and put a dollop of hot glue on the very bottom and where the knot was at the top. After it was done, I ran some red and white twine through the ivy loops and created a hanger for the tree.
I bought my buttons from Joanns and they were in a package called the big bag of buttons.

I found a set of four cute headbands at the Dollar Tree and decided they would make really great bookmarks as a fast, last minute stocking stuffer for people who read books (not Kindles) or could also be used as decorated headbands.

I used buttons and button covers that I found at garage sales, but you can buy pretty decorator buttons at craft stores or from your mom’s button box, and I’ve seen large buttons at the Dollar Tree from time to time as well.

I used a double strand of embroidery thread to sew one of the large buttons on to the headband,  far enough away from the seam that you won’t see the seam when you put it on a book. I ran the needle through the button three times for each hole to ensure it stays in place then knotted it on the back.

I also used old button covers from the 1980’s, and popped the metal latch off the back with my hand, then used my hot glue gun to adhere it to the headband. If I was making this into an actual decorated headband, I would have turned the button covers side way so they hangs correctly on a girl’s head.  If you look at the one I made in the photo with Noah’s Ark, I would have turned Noah’s Ark side way for a head band as an fyi..the others would work well turned in any direction.

I made a tag using a stamp set that I bought at Oriental Trading, but unfortunately, it’s no longer available there. I used Versafine Onyx black ink and clear embossing powder and heat set it then ran a loop of ribbon through a hole I punched near the end and pulled the two ends of the ribbon through the loop and pulled them tight, then tied it to the headband.

I’ve been on a crafty bender the last couple of days, making several videos every night.  I didn’t get finished this morning until 1AM, as I was finishing my sister’s Christmas card and decided to make the most complicated, time consuming card you can imagine.  Basically I took one of my Carolyn Shores Wright Christmas bird stamps that are large and highly ornate, and decided I need to watercolor pencil them to the picture on the stamp.  It involved using around twenty colors of watercolors and took literally, hours to color.  I wouldn’t have done it more than once, I’ll tell you that much, as it looks OK, but my expectations were much higher than the results.  (Isn’t that always the way it goes.)

I wanted to make some last minute stocking stuffer ideas, so played with that idea last night as well….and I had a vision for a large wreath made only out of Dollar Tree materials, none of which are normally used for a wreath.  I really like the end result, it’s super blingy, haha.  I’m not sure if I’ll keep it or give it away, but you’ll be able to see it for yourself to determine if it’s something you’d want to try.

I made a few decorated frames that I love making, and will donate those to our local nursing homes.  I have a few more to finish, then I’m delivering my Christmas goodies.  Oh, and did I mention I made more covered note pads?  I swear those are my absolute favorite things to make.  I could play with those and different ideas as often as I’d have the materials to do so….I almost wish I could find a local store that would sell them, as they’re easy and fun to make and most of all, cute. And honestly, how many covered note pads can I give to friends and family as gifts?

I have to apologize for being so far behind on the blog.  I’ve never missed this many days in a row, and I can only chalk it up to trying to get so many things done in such a short amount of time.  I’m trying to make a lot of last minute craft videos for stocking stuffers and at the same time, realized that almost all of my Christmas stamps are on wood blocks, and I’m just sick of the space they take up…So I’ve been taking them of the wood and putting them in binders and hoping before the end of the year that I’ve finished that project.  To be honest, I can’t find any of my Christmas things, because they are all in different vintage suitcases.  I have three large ones and one small one just for Christmas things.  I need to downsize them by taking out the wood blocks and so far, I think I’ll be able to get rid of one of the suitcases, and it needs to go, as it’s falling apart.

So today, after taking a few more stamp sets of their blocks, I decided to make some stocking stuffers, and ended up making four videos.  I think at least two of the items will be things viewers will try to make and hopefully more.  I made a Christmas tree ornament out of buttons, covered small notebooks, made a Santa mirror and book marks out of hair bands from the Dollar Tree.  All of the gifts take less than 10 minutes to make, so hopefully people will be able to fit some of these ideas into their gift giving…and they are very inexpensive to make.