I didn't post anything yesterday because I was enjoying myself at a family reunion.  I saw people I hadn't seen in quite a few years.  And before they left we decided that we need to do this every couple of years.  Kids grow up way to fast.

But here's a couple more Halloween cards for you.

 

More Halloween cards

Here's a couple more Halloween cards.  Have you started on yours yet?

 

To Old???

So maybe I'm getting to old to do this.  Every day I think "I need to post something on my blog" and believe me I've got a ton of pictures that haven't made it on here.  But the next thing I know is 10:30pm and I'm just to tired.  So I think "I"ll do it tomorrow".  But as you all know, tomorrow never comes.  So now I'm thinking that since Halloween is the next big holiday and I've got a bunch of swap card that are Halloween I'm going to start posting them.  You're gonna get tired of Halloween.  Here's the first two.  I'm sorry that I don't know who did these but they're really cute.

 

Stampin' Up! rewards

Stampin' Up! rewards us for our achievements and this is what I got for recruiting during August.  And my recruit, Carolyn, got one also.  It's the Halloween kit consisting of the printer's tray, the paper, some buttons, some bakers twine and a stamp set.  How cool is that.  So tonight I put my kit together and I followed one of Janet Wakelands ideas and use velcro to attach the paper to the printers tray.  That way I can take the paper out after Halloween and switch it to a Christmas tray. 

 

 

And below is a close up of the cute spiders web.  It's the glitter paper. 

Snow Festival tags

On page 12 of the Holiday catalog you'll see these Snow Festival designer printed tags.  And while these make great gift tags they can be used on cards and on scrapbook pages.  Here are six cards that we made at Creative Convention where we used the tags on the front of the cards.  Just add a greeting or other Christmas stamps, maybe some embellishments and ribbon and you're good to go. 

 

 

The best part of this idea is that you get 25 tags for only $3.95. 

 

Why are these ladies all smiling?  Because they've just made some Finnish stars like the one below.  We did this after the Creative Convention last Sat. night.  Big thanks to Julie M?? (second from left in the front row) for bringing all the supplies and showing us how to do it.  But some of the Rubber Queens had already left and they wanted to know how to do it.  So I'm going to try and explain it.  But if it's just to confusing you can always go to You Tube and search for Finnish Star.

 

 

You need 12 strips that are 1/2" X 6".  Julie had our strips already cut for us and she made the strips out of 2 pieces of fabric that had been adhered to each side of a piece of card stock.  The easiest way is to use Heat and Bond.  This makes a real stiff star that will last for a long time.  For this blog I just used designer series paper but it's really flimsy. 

Julie made it real easy for us by having the template below so that we could see exactly where we had to put our strips.

 

Here are my strips woven together.  Put adhesive on each joint.  When we did the fabric ones we used Lock Tight super glue.  But be careful not to use to much because you run a chance of glueing your fingers together or to the star.  You need two of these woven pieces.

 

 

Now you're going to take the corner pieces and glue them together.  I'm not sure just how to explain this but in the picture below you can see what I mean by corners.  In the picture above you'll see how the corner strips are glued together.  You're going to twist the strips so that what was face up is now face down.  And glue them so that they are square corners. Do this to both woven pieces.

 

 

Now lay the two pieces together with the twisted pieces off set.  One piece should be face up and one piece should be face down.

 

Now you're going to glue the single strips to the opposite twisted piece.  Got it?  This is where the video might come in very handy.  If the single strip extends beyond the edge of the twisted piece just use scissors and trim the corners.

 

Here's my finished paper star.  The fabric stars are much sturdier and it's so much fun to look for two pieces of fabric to use.  At this point you could add some embellishments to the center of the woven pieces. 

Back to Spool Time

Now that the kids are back to school it's time to get crafting for the upcoming Holidays.  And Stampin' Up! wants to help.  For every $40.00 that you spend in the month of September you can get a FREE bolt of the stitched satin ribbon.  This ribbon comes in the newest in colors, Summer Starfruit, Midnight Muse, Gumball Green, Primrose Petals and Raspberry Ripple.  Just think of all the things you can embellish with this beautiful ribbon.

Here's a cute little bag/purse that I displayed at the Creative Convention over the weekend.  Some people wanted the directions so here we go.  Hope you can figure it out.

 

 

It takes an 81/2" X 11" piece of paper.  Now you're going to score it at 2" and 61/2" on the long side.  And then score it at 3/4". 41/2", 61/2", and 101/4" on the short side.  Make a mark at 21/2" on each side and at 81/2" on each side of the short side.   I hope that's the right way to explain it so here's a picture of the score lines. 

 

The diagonal score lines go from the junction of the 2" and 41/2" (2" and 61/2") score line to the mark that you made at 21/2" and 81/2".  I hope the diagram helps and if you're using the Simply Scoring Tool it's real easy (using the diagonal plate) to just put the tool at the junction and score out to the side.  Clear as mud, right?

 

Well, if I haven't confused you enough yet we'll move on to the next step.  You're going to adhere the sides down but only from the spot where the diagonal lines are to the outside edge.  The picture show where I used the sticky strip. 

 

After you've adhered the sides down it should look like this.  Now you're ready to decorate.  In the first picture I made the bag look like a little purse.  I didn't think this up by myself but I didn't write down where I found it or who made it.  Sorry about that.  But you can just make the bag and decorate it however you want like the green bag in the picture below. 

 

I hope you have fun with this but if you have any questions or there's a place where I should put in more direction please let me know by commenting.  Thanks so much for your interest.

Creative Convention

Here's some pictures of my display table at Creative Convention.  My theme was Christmas gifts.  I tried to show some things that you could make for Christmas and some ways to wrap gifts.

 

 

Here's my favorite item.  It holds lots of candy for someone.  I had the idea and then I saw an ornament at Bronners that was a Christmas train and I just copied some of their ideas.  The wheels I made out of 4 or 5 layers of card stock to give them some strength.  The trees on the log car are also multi layers. 

 

This candle is what I demonstrated.  It's pretty simple but it can be ramped up for a more elegant look.

 

And these two candles are ones that I had on display.  They're more detailed.

 

And here's a really great idea for that guy who's hard to buy for.  It's reinbeer.  But these bottles aren't beer because I don't like beer.  But look how easy these are to make.  Just some antlers, eye's and red noses.  I've got a ton of other pictures for you so keep watching all week.

Creative Convention

Go and look on the Paper Palace Stampers Facebook page for some pictures of the first day of the Creative Convention.  There's some awesome displays (even if I do say so myself) and some wonderful make and takes.  Tomorrow I'll have more pictures for you.  It's almost time for supper.

Handy storage tool.

Here's a tool that you all need and you'll love.  It's called a K-cup carousel and it's made by Keurig.  It's made to hold the little cups of flavored coffee or creamer or whatever.  Can you tell that I don't drink coffee?  Anyhow, here it is.  It's perfect for holding all of your Stampin' Up! embossing powder.  It won't hold the glitter jars because they don't have a lid that is larger than the bottom and they slide right on through.  And it spins so you can turn it to find what you're looking for.  And they sell these where ever they sell coffee pots.  I got this one at Wal-Mart. 

 

 

The reason that I haven't been posting anything lately is because everything that I've been working on is for Ronda's Creative Convention this weekend.  But starting tomorrow I should have lots to show you.  We're doing three different swaps and there will be five displays so I'll be taking lots of pictures.  I'm going to have a great weekend and I hope that you do too.