CHRISTMAS IS COMING!

Thanksgiving is over which means it's now full steam ahead to Christmas. YIKES!!! Wasn't it just Christmas 2006 a few weeks ago? This year has really flew by.


















In getting ready for the Christmas decorating and gift giving season I've been working on ornaments. These are three of the four ornaments that I am working o for this year. The Snowflake and Scallop Circle ornaments are ideas I picked up from Split Coast Stampers. The ball with pictures of quilts decoupaged on it is a ornament I have been making for quilting friends for several years now.

All three of these ornaments are very easy to make once you figure out a few tricks to make them so. I will try and share these tricks with you here so that you can maybe by pass the mistakes I made at first.

For the Snowflake ornament you need both size tag punches from Stampin'Up. Here is a link to the detailed instructions on SCS: Snowflakes. I will not go into detail but tell you some hints to maybe make your experience making them easier. I found that if I left at least 1/2 ich between punches I didn't make so many miss punches. Also do use some sort of grid paper under your project. It really helps to keep things straight. If you don't use a vellum you can see through for the back of your snowflake do your best. So far I have only used vellum.

If you want to use glitter like I did put it on before you put the two star layers together. I found either Stickles worked well or you can outline star shape with thin lines of liquid glue and then pour liberal amount of Dazzling Diamonds over top of star shapes. Let dry fully and then assemble. I used two SU dimentionals between the layers and laid the cording over the top of them before putting the two layers together.

The center of the ornaments was fun to do. I found sheets of sticky strip on the Oriental Trading website and I used my punches to punch out the flower shapes. I then removed the backing of the sticky strip and places the shape on white card stock. I carefully repunched the shape than removed the red covering of the sticky strip and lid the sticky side down into the Dazzling Diamond glitter. Before I layered the center piece I placed a half pearl from my Pretties kit in the center of the small flower using Crystal effects. I did discover if I put the pearl on after everything was layered together it was hard to keep it from sliding off center.

Okay, it supposed to be a relaxing and crafty day for me here and my fingers are getting tired of typing so I guess you will all have to patiently await the tips for the other two ornaments. While you are waiting you can make a few snowflake ornaments....right?