A Christmas Banner

Perhaps it would have been better named "Post Christmas Banner", but nevertheless here it is.  I had it made in November, but wasn't overly happy with it so I took it apart and re-jigged it a bit. 

Just Add Ink are looking for a Christmas project as are the girls at Sunny Challenges, so I thought this might fit both bills.

I started the project with a Banner Kit from Stampin Up and all of the elements are from SU too.  Not an easy one to take a photo of, but I am sure you get the idea.

Happy New Year to everyone !!
Cheers
Mary

Some rain must fall

"Into each life some rain must fall,
Some days must be dark and dreary."
............................ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Without further ado I will try to catch up on my paper crafting.

I guess it is paper of a different kind - a "cake" for a baby shower.  Very cute and very easy to construct.

Yes, it is made of disposable nappies - so cute as well as practical.

On St Patrick's Day we had a great celebration for which I made this banner.  As per usual my photography is pretty ordinary (how on earth do you photograph something like this??), but I am sure you will get the general idea.

Will be back later with some more pictures.

Mary

..and so this was Christmas ...

... and now it's all over for another year.  Reminder to self "I must start Christmas cards earlier next year, I must start Christmas cards earlier ...".

I did do some cards early in December for our Christmas stitching night - mostly large tags, but forgot to take a photo as I was in a hurry to finish them.

I spent (wasted ??) an inordinate amount of time just trying to decide on the design for the majority of my Christmas cards - the ones that were to be mailed to family and friends both here and in England.  Those cards needed to be "mail" friendly so this was the design I made.  I cased this from a card I saw at a paper show a few months ago, so not an original idea, but I liked it at the time and bought the necessary bits, ie. silver stamp pad, stickles etc.  The tree stamp used is a Penny Black "snow dust" and the words are also Penny Black "a wonderful Christmas".

Not the best of photos but here is a close up of all that glitter.

and here it is on the production line along with my other card which is not at all mail friendly and so only hand deliverable. 

The other card is a lovely little folded number which features Dasher from Stampin Up - just love him!  I got the idea of the folded card from Sandi's blog and then had to decide what to put on the front.  Dasher only just fitted.  In retrospect I should have made the card a bit bigger.  Isn't hind sight a wonderful thing?

The designer paper is also from Stampin Up but it is from last year - and it looks so good with the Real Red.

Again, I had a production line happening for these.  Stamped my greetings on the reverse with the white kraft ink.

and just to keep it all matching, I used Dasher again for my gift tags, along with the new SU Finial Press embossing folder - believe me it looks fabulous on the real red but you can't see it from my photo.  

 I was pretty happy with them, but as I said earlier, I just need to start much sooner next year, so I can enjoy the process.

Back in November my Brother had a gift of chocolates delivered to me.  They were from "Lollypotz" and were a novel idea with Ferrero Rocher chocolates wrapped in tissue and wired into a little bucket to look like a pot of flowers.  They have been sitting on my bench since then because I knew I just had to have a go at doing something like it.  I bought a kilo of Heritage chocolate bells and this is what I came up with.

I have made five of these now and while I don't think the other company is likely to be worried about my competition, I think they turned out well.  They are quite time comsuming because everything has to be wired (not good on the fingers!) (and this is why they are so expensive to purchase). 

I was determined to make a banner for Christmas !!! but I didn't get around to the one in my head because I needed to do something for our "front door decoration competition".  Obviously a normal banner wasn't going to fit across my front door so I made this funny little one .  I reversed the pennant shape into a tree shape and just went with "Ho Ho Ho", but I should have made it a lot bigger as it didn't have the same impact as a banner.



So that's about my lot for now.  Thanks to all of you who have made it to the end of this posting.  I will be much briefer next time.

I wish all of you a very happy 2011 - may it bring you good health and happiness and lots of paper crafting.

Cheers,

Mary

Thanks

The majority of Australians don't celebrate Thanksgiving, but my Daughter's friend was born in America and so they always do.  This year I made a banner for them.  Yes, I know I have the banner bug, but I do find them a lot of fun.

Evidently it fitted perfectly across their mantlepiece and is still up on show now, so I guess they liked it.

The next card I want to show you was a request from a friend and she gave me the lovely little centrepiece that she wanted on it.  I had bought that lovely striped paper a few weeks beforehand and had it on the floor with my Christmas papers and it just jumped up at me.  Once I had chosen the background paper, the layering seemed perfect.

so now on to the Christmas bits and pieces.

Mary

Halloween Banner

I started to make this Halloween banner for the children but needed to fly out to Darwin in the middle of doing it.  I finished it off and I guess it will be ready for next year.

Mary

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

I am a very long way behind in my postings but thought I would just pop this one in quickly so that at least it will be on time.

I know it's a funny picture, but it was really hard to photograph.  I propped it up in the garden but then the photo was too small so I have just had a quick play with GIMP and this is probably as good as I am going to get.

I'll be back soon with a few other bits and pieces.

Mary

A trivial hobby

We held a trivia night and I decided to make a banner for the event.  I have to say I quite enjoyed all the fiddling with it, and my SU Owl punch arrived in time for me to use some of them across the top.

I have used the Outlaw designer papers from SU.  I cut out my own letters and used a variety of glitters etc to tizz it up a bit.

As usual I am disappointed with my photographs as this does look much better in real life. 

I am now busy working on another banner for Halloween and have promised to do one for Thanksgiving.

  

And finally, I teamed the Two Step Bird punch with the top note die for this little card.

Mary

The quick and the (dreadfully) long

Spent a good bit of yesterday making a card for a little girl who is having a cheer leader type party and although I knew what I wanted to do with Tilda it took me ages to get the rest of it to gel.  Used the lovely SU Ginger Blossom dsp on this one - it is lovely when everything matches.  I thought her dress was too red so I went over it with Twinklings which is why it looks shiny/funny in the photo.

I realised when I was finished that it was not the one that was needed for this weekend.  The one I needed was this one which I then threw together very quickly by just running an image through the copier twice and cutting out the second 'Ben" and layering him up for a 3D effect.  Actually did run the SU Stars wheel over the front of the card as well as inside and called it done.

Sorry about the glare but it is on glossy paper.

While I was on a roll (sort of) I made two identical cards with the lovely little birdcage from the Saleabration set.  I had some images stamped out already so just had to tie it up with some Rose Red card and designer paper.  A couple of layers, some ribbon and two

 more were done.

In my hurry to photograph it I have knocked the bow sideways, but I guess you get the idea.  Another simple one.

I have a few more to get done before the 31st March !!