A Christmas gift

Happy Sunday, and happy holidays! Have you finished all your Christmas shopping yet? How about a homemade gift?

I've made a small set of cards for todays post, and It's wrapped up too:) We still have a few days until christmas, so why not create something special for someone you care about?

I used one of my all time favorite Flourishes sets, the Poinsetta and Boxwood for my gift.

I made a simple gift box from cardstock, and created an acetate window, to give the recipient a "sneak peek" at the contents...


I decorated the box with elegant Satin Ribbon and Spellbinders Fleur De Lis Pendants die cuts.


A close-up of the window. The poinsetta was colored with Le Plume Markers and cut out.


Inside the box.... You`ll find several of the dies used in the Flourishes store.


The set of cards...








...so now I just want to wish all of you a MERRY CHRISTMAS!! And thank you so much to the Flourishes Ladies for having me here in the Limelight, I so enjoyed it! ...And thank you to everyone who has visited me here and at my blog!! I'm wishing you all a happy, creative new year too!

Grab a cup of cocoa, and let's chat.

Today I got my first ever Christmas e-card. I must say, it's not the same. Even if I printed it out, and hung it with the rest of our Christmas cards, it's just not the same. One reason I love Christmas is that so many people return to handwritten correspondence for this one special holiday. As I'm going through my stack of mail, sorting through the junk and bills, my heart is warmed each time I am gifted with a festive card that wishes me health and happiness this holiday season.

Handmade cards especially bring glad tidings. I cherish those cards because I'm not simply receiving the card, but what it represents: my friend's time and talent and bit of her own heart and holiday joy. I've been so inspired by the many cards you've shared with us. If you haven't started, it's not too late! Get going!

Over the next day or two, begin making a mental list of all the people who have impacted your life for the good. There are many people that I don't necessarily speak with often, but I can't imagine my life without them. My eleventh grade English teacher who inspired me to love reading, my dear neighbors when we were stationed in Germany. Perhaps you've whittled down your list over the last few years. I challenge you to add those dear people back to your list. Once you've made your list, carve out some time from your busy schedule to touch these lives with a bit of your talent!

Each time I take time to count my blessings, I am overwhelmed. The Christmas season is all about love and joy coming into the world. I hope this season you make a conscious effort to love the people in your life.

"We can give without loving, but we cannot love without giving."
~Amy Carmichael

p.s. If you liked the cards featured in today's post, they were created by Julie Koerber using the Santa, I Believe set and by Christine Okken using the Drummer Boy set. Both are perfect offerings for this magical and joyous time year!

Nesties, Needle and Thread

I love my Nesties! Who doesn't, right? Today I am sharing a few simple ways to enhance Nestie Die Cuts. Yes, I said needle and thread in the title, which is usually a turn off to me -- but all of these tips are simple and easy. I am showing three different ways to "dress up" your Nesties.

I started my card out by creating a simple background, stamping the Flourishy Outline image from Oranamental Elements set. I colored the flourish in using a R29 Copic and then used a fine tip red pen to fill in the really small lines as needed.

I gold embossed the sentiment from the Holiday Greetings set.
I used Versamark ink and Gold Detail Embossing Powder.

I die cut all my elements to build my card using various Nestie shapes.

When I die cut the Gold Square Scallop, I left it in the Nestie Die.... using the die's edge as a guide to place holes in each scallop. I used my Japanese Screw Punch, but you could easily use a hole punch for this as well.

Using some red fuzzy fiber and a large craft needle, I just threaded the fiber around the square Nestie, going up through the back of each hole. I used a little piece of tape to hold the start and finish of the fiber string to the back of the Square.

On the Oval for the Sentiment. I used the Petite Scallops - there are four die cuts here and they are already adhered together as seen in this picture. I used some gold sparkly embroidery floss for this one - separating two strands to use from the group of floss.

Again, secure the end of your floss on the back of the oval using a piece of tape and just start winding the floss around the oval, using the notch in between each scallop for your floss to "nest" in. Continue until the floss nests between each scallop of the oval.

This picture shows a red scallop square glued to an ivory base. I then used my Japanese Screw Punch, with the 1/16" hole tip, to add little hole punches around the edge.

Using one strand of the gold floss doubled up, I then used my craft needle to stitch around the edges of the Ivory Square. I use a large paper crafting needle to to all of the threading. It is large, with a dull point, easy to handle and most importantly has a large eye to easily thread your fiber or floss through. It is not as tedious as sometimes a small sewing needle can be.

I am starting to pull all my elements together, building the card from the base upwards. I added some pearls to cover up the holes on the Ivory Square to give it a "different" threaded look. I use the tip of my craft knife to pick up and place my adhesive pearls on to the card.

Not having any Ivory pearls in my stash, I used a Copic to color some white pearls..... adding these now "ivory" pearls to the outermost Red Square's edge.

Here is an up close pic of how it all came together. Finishing it off with a tiny silk bow. Final card size is 4.75" Square. Click on any pictures above to enlarge for a better view.

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Thanks for letting me share my tips on Nesties and Needles! I hope you picked up something useful from the pictures or my instructions!

--Jenny Gropp--
visit my little corner in Blogville: One Krafty Kat

Tag.... you're it!

Hi all! Julie here! And.... welcome to another Friday Flourishes Focus! This time, instead of sharing a technique or highlighting a fun product, I thought I'd just throw a whole bunch of ideas your way to get you ready for holiday gift giving.

I absolutely love using bags to "wrap" my gifts. Why? Because you don't have to wrap! ;-) I am an awful gift wrapper. What's funny is -I was trained to be a professional gift wrapper at a department store while I was in high school. I never made it.

So, what I do now instead is, I buy bags! When I see a cute one, I pick it up knowing I can deck it out with a fun tag or some fabulous ribbon!

I gathered up some of my favorite Flourishes holiday stamps and went to town!


And, see what you can create? I picked up this plain brown bag for 50 cents. Add some fun holiday ribbon by running it through your Xyron and attach it to the front of your bag for a dash of holiday color!

Both of the tags above were created literally in minutes thanks to a little prep work! I decided that I would stamp off some images on some marbled ivory/tan paper that I got for free from my brother-in-law (works to have family in the printing business -- you get free paper sometimes!)

Using Vivid Red, Green and Taupe inks I stamped the poinsettia from Poinsettia and Boxwood, the Christmas Music background, the Santa from Santa, I Believe, and the Holly Background. Some of these I didn't use, mind you, but I have them now on standby!

Using these fun shipping tags I picked up for .50 cents, I started my journey!

I covered the front of my tag with a portion of the stamped off poinsettias and then used a scrap of that same paper to stamp not only some fun brackets from the Fancy Labels set but a great sentiment from the Holiday Greetings set! Add some rhinestones, mat it up using the Labels 4 Nestabilities die, punch a hole and add some ribbon and... done!

The santa tag was done by coloring with chalks, and then just matting it up with part of my Holly background and then some fun decorative paper. Again, punch a hole and add some ribbon and... voila!

Another thing I love to do is color! I will stamp off some images just to have on hand so that when the moment hits and I need a coloring break, I have something that I can color up easily. I always give my images some space because I have no idea when I stamp them what I will use them for.

So, I took the stacked cups from Christmas Tea and colored it up! The image was accented by a little bit of chalk. To color my image, I used Copics - R24, R27, and R29; Y03 and y63; B000 and B00; and E33. These are markers in the Poppy, Spring Greens, Pastel, Flesh Tones 2 and Sky Copic Collections.

I love the little tag with the fun sentiment... also from the Christmas Tea set!

Isn't it fun when you can find a bag that matches your stamp set? Look at this fun bag I picked up at the dollar store! It just is a perfect match to the Christmas Borders set! I colored up the candy using the Poppy, Spring Greens, Daffodil, Meadow and Holly collections. I did use the lightest shade too from the Dahlia collection. Use some Distress inks in Tea Dye and Antique Linen to antique it. Add fun Christmas ribbon and some stitching and you're almost done....

I added some faux sugar (it's a chunk glitter that is actually called faux snow -- but looks more like sugar!) to my gum drops! The "dots" of antique ink were created by a really old stamp that is just that... dots! Sometimes I turn to it to just create some extra "texture" on my image.

This next one was super fun! I wanted my drummer from the Drummer Boy set to have a monochromatic look. So, I stamped him in Memento Tuxedo Black and colored him up with Copics! I edged my drummer with chalk, masked him and then stamped over top of him with the Christmas Music background stamp. I added some silver stitching, a tab, a fun glittered button and silver cording to attach my tag and... done!

This last tag is really pretty in real life but didn't photograph all that well. I took some of the 7 Gypsies paper and stamped the angel from the Rejoice set over top with Versamark and silver detail embossing powder. Add some rhinestones and some fun sheer ribbon and silver cording and that's it! I did line the edge of my decorative paper with some silver leaf pen. I also added a punched snowflake and a larger rhinestone for a little something extra.

I hope you've enjoyed seeing how I like to deck out my holiday packages! For those packages that "have" to be wrapped, I love getting a simple silver or gold wrapping and letting my ribbon and tags do the talking! I am glad I have some tags ready in my holiday gift wrapping arsenal -- ready to go for Black Friday! :-)


Be sure to stop by to see what some of the other members of our fine and fabulous DT have created to help get you in the spirit!!


Latisha
Christine
Laura
Stacy
Leslie

See you back here soon!

~Julie

Bringing Santa To Life...

I had to literally pick my jaw up off the floor recently when I laid my eyes on one of Linda Duke's recent creations. I couldn't believe that with the help of her Prismacolor pencils, she literally brought Santa from the Santa, I Believe set to life!

I love how she added Polar White Flower Soft and Liquid Applique to give this Santa texture!
Can you believe the depth in her coloring? I can't! If you'd like to check out all the details on this card, all you need to do is head on over to Linda's place HERE!

Thanks for stopping by! We'll be back tomorrow with another Flourishes Focus and this one will have you getting ready for all that holiday wrapping! :-)

~Julie

Frame it with Ribbon!

Today I have some ribbon tips to share with you. I do love ribbon, any and all kinds! I am using the new Christmas Tea set on this card and working with some yummy Red Velvet Ribbon.

I first stamped my teapot image, I knew I was going to paper piece the teapot so why mask it if you don't need to??? Shortcut is my middle name! So you can see I just added in the holly branch images under the tea pot.

I colored the holly with Copics. I was going for a centerpiece type look with this image. So I wanted to ground it by adding a line to use as the base. I just added a simple Black line using a Fine Tip pen and a ruler. I used a Rectangle Nestie to cut out my image, drawing an inner frame before removing from my die.

Hmmm... a little explaining for this pic, at the end I decided that I did not like the paper I used for the Tea Pot.... it was too grey, so in the end I switched it out. Sometimes things just don't look right and you have to change it up! You can see I added color to my Holly Berries and also airbrushed a bottom layer in my picture using Copic W5.

Using my drawn frame line around the edge as a guide to keep me straight... I used double sided adhesive tape to line the edges of the stamped panel.

Removing the adhesive backing one side at a time as I worked around the frame, I added my velvet ribbon. I let the ends overlap on each other in each corner. Gently lifting them up a tiny bit, enough only to get my scissor tip in there.... I cut the two ribbons at the same time, insuring the cut ends would match up just right. This leaves a perfectly clean looking mitered corner.

My little scalloped table cloth was made using the same Velvet Ribbon and cutting it with a Scalloped Oval nestie. Then I attached it to my stamped image, lining the straight edge of the ribbon up with the straight line I drew in the middle of the panel.

I blinged it up with some mini crystals over the berries. And you can see the new tea pot, from my DP switch-a-roo! Finished by adding the sentiment with velvet touches to that as well!

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Thanks for letting me share my Ribbon Tips!
I hope you picked up something useful from the pictures or my instructions!
Jenny Gropp

visit my little corner in Blogville: One Krafty Kat

Holiday Magnets

Welcome to my first Limelight project with Flourishes!

I had fun creating these Holiday magnets and hope you like them too! I used the beautiful Holiday Ornament Set, All that Glitters. I know I seem get more and more Holiday photo cards each year. I stick my faves up on the Fridge, so I thought these magnets might be fun to use with those photo cards. Pack 'em up with your Christmas decorations and then you will have them again for next season. Another option would be to incorporate a magnet on to a card. Enough rambling, let's move on to the project....

All of the backgrounds were created by airbrushing with two shades of Copic markers. It wasn't neat or pretty, but I wanted to just get color down on the paper, moving from light to dark.

For the Blue Ornament : BG72 Ice Ocean, B39 Prussian Blue

For the Green Ornament: YG95 Pale Olive, G99 Olive

For the Red Ornament: R29 Lipstick Red, R89 Dark Red

Before I stamped the image, I used an anti static bag to rub over the airbrushed color, to prevent my embossing powder from sticking where it should not stick. I used Versamark Ink and then heat embossed using Gold or Silver Detail Embossing Powder.

After heat embossing the image and cutting it out. I glued the ornament to chipboard to add some thickness and also adding a layer of black card stock to the back, then I trimmed the image out again. Now it is sturdy, where as the card stock would not be strong enough to support the magnets and not bend.

I don't want an ugly edge to my ornaments, so I used a brush tip marker along the edge in a coordinating color to cover the dingy chipboard layer edges.

Now the FUN stuff.... On the red ornament I left it as is allowing the pretty swirls and graduating red color to stand own their own. The green ornament I added a little glitter to spice it up, using a toothpick to apply just a little in just the right spots - I used a mixture of Crystal Lacquer and Ultra Fine Glitter. On the Blue Ornament, I went to town adding Crystals everywhere I could.

After dressing the ornaments up with their embellishments, I brushed on two coats of Glass Kote. This is thicker than Crystal Lacquer and it dries totally clear and with out any air bubbles. It does not curl the paper at all, and leaves a high gloss smooth finish. Just like glass!

After the two coats of Glass Kote dried, I moved on to the finishing touches. The ornaments are only about two inches long, and when I looked at using ribbon with them, the ribbon just overwhelmed the size of the ornaments. I had to have some kind of bow on the top, so I scaled it down and used Embroidery Floss and also some Skinny Silver Cording. I used the smallest notch on the Bow Easy to create my multiple loop bows and then glued them to the top of the ornaments.

Next came the magnets. You can find these plain magnets in packages at the craft stores or in a hardware store. They are inexpensive and come in all shapes and sizes. You can see some of them are scored and can be broken to a smaller size to accommodate your project as needed. I glued the magnets to the back using my glue of choice, Crafter's Pick Ultimate.
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And that wraps it up for today!

Here are some close up pics of each finished Holiday Magnet.

Click on the pics to see more detail.

I think the Blue "Bling" Ornament is my fave.

The glitter is really eye catching in person, since I used Ultra Fine Glitter, it does not have that "chunky" glitter look to it, the small pieces catch and reflect the light perfectly.

I did add one small gold metal embellishment to the center of the bow on the red and green ornaments, just to help highlight the gold embossing.

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I hope I have inspired you to try creating some magnets, for any season or occasion. They are fun, small projects to create, with lots of options to choose from: coloring techniques, using pattern paper, any and all sorts of embellishments can be worked in to the magnets, beads could hang off it.... anything your creative mind can think doing!

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If you have a minute and liked today's project, please head over and check my out my little corner in Blogville.... One Krafty Kat.