Stampin Up Demo Christmas Party

My Stampin Up upline demo threw her Christmas party for all of us in her downline. We got to hang out, do a make and take, did a card swap, and participated in a homemade white elephant exchange. For the exchange, the item had to use mostly Stampin Up products.

Since my craft room is mostly boxed up at the moment, (see post about my closet) I was somewhat limited on what all I could make since there was only so much I could actually FIND and get to. :) Thanks to Pinterest, I saw an idea about making bookmarks out of ribbon. Since my Stampin Up ribbon is in a big box, I grabbed out the first ones I saw and got to work.

These we super easy to make so I made a bunch of them. Great gifts or gift toppers for the readers you know. I did a mix of sizes depending on how big the pendant I used.

  

I love the polka dot ribbon. Anything with polka dots makes me smile. The crosses, butterfly, and clear flower were pendants I've had in my jewelry box forever. I've either lost the chains or use them for other pendants so I figured I'd give them new life.

 

The velvet ribbon is from a package that was on the SU clearance rack for awhile. I bought the pack for the ruffled ribbon, but never found a use for the velvet until now. The love, #1 mom, shoe, and purse were all part of a charm bracelet I bought for like $8 so I took them all off to use for multiple gifts instead. There's still more charms on the bracelet which means more bookmarks in the future :)

These were so easy to make. A few jump rings, some jewelry pliers, and the ribbon clamps are the only extra things you need. It's a great way to reuse jewelry that's no longer your style or that pair of earrings where you lost the mate.

I've had these magnetic picture frames forever so finally put them to use. I put some stickers from the Simply Scrappin kit on some coordinating paper and slid them into the frames. They are reversible so 2 patterns per frame.

 

I hot glued on the mini clips from SU. I think I got these from the clearance rack too? Then clipped in some Whisper White cardstock for memos. These are super easy to switch out for different seasons and since they are magnetic, they are really handy. 

Instead of buying gift bags or trying to wrap the items, I decided to re-purpose some more of my JewelMint boxes. I have 100's of these lying around my house and they are too nice to just toss. I made a post before where I covered some, but I'm also using them for Christmas gifts.

 They have a magnetic closure and are the perfect size for little gifts.

 

Since my gifts for the white elephant were pretty simple, I made them for my demo as well. 

 

Bonus on the JewelMint boxes: they are the PERFECT size for my cards. So I decided to put my cards for the swap in one too since I would need a way to bring my new cards home. 

Now I just need to cover a ton more to "wrap" other packages for family/friends. The boxes are so sturdy that they can easily be reused or they can be used for decor to hold small items during the holidays.

For the card swap, I stuck to the Simply Scrappin kit since it was what I could find. I also used the Jolly Bingo Bits stamp set.

 

They were all slightly different because I used all the bingo stamps. The rickrack was from the same ribbon set as the velvet from SU and the twine was from my recent SU order. 

Considering I had limited resources with my craft room a mess, I think I turned out pretty good gifts/cards. I only used 1 Simply Scrappin kit for all 16 cards, the card boxes, and the frames and I still have some left over! The only other paper I added was Whisper White card stock. So those SS kits really are a great deal even if you aren't using them for scrapbooking!

If you are wanting to buy any of the Stampin Up products, please shop my website: http://www.stampinup.net/esuite/home/crystalmincher/ or contact me! And if you are interested in signing up for a demo, let me know. I don't do workshops like some do, I just enjoy the discount and it's worth it! I love it.

Where have I been?

Yep, I've been busy. I have been a super bad blogger and haven't posted in MONTHS! I was crazy with school and after some set backs, I'm taking online classes this semester. My husband also came home on leave which is always fun, but also always hectic! We only had 2 weeks this time so it was the shortest leave yet. We spent most of our time doing house stuff since as anyone who owns a home knows, it's never really finished. lol

In about March, I had pretty much all the rooms most of the way done. They were organized, things puts away, etc. Just needed some accent walls painted and some extra decorations on the wall. Well, then the hubby decided to give me the greatest gift EVER. It's like my Christmas, Birthday, Anniversary, etc gift for the next year or 2. He gave me a room turned into a closet!!! One of the only things I didn't like about our house is the small master closet. It's not really THAT small, but compared to my old closet, it's tiny. So I told him if I got my own room for a closet, he could turn our closet into a gun space. I never thought he'd actually go for it though. So, now I'm in the process of completely moving 3 rooms full of stuff around. By myself. While taking classes. And around the holidays. haha So, very little has been finished so far.

Of course the rooms I'm moving are some of the hardest rooms because of all the STUFF. The craft room is going to take the longest because everything is so small. And as I move my closet, I'm going through and getting rid of clothes and switching everything over to matching pink hangers. It all looks more pretty that way. lol

 Almost all the building is now finished in the closet. I have a few shelves and bars to still hang. Most of the delay is because Ikea's stock is terrible. I've had to make so many trips for out of stock items. I'm also having the hardest time finding seating for that room. I really really want pink chairs/chaise but the few I've found are way out of my budget. I *might* attempt reupholstering so I can pick my fabric. We'll see how that goes.

Here's a sneak peak of my dream closet. This was just the beginning with only 1 wall done. I wanted pink walls, but hubby and my mom convinced me that blue would look better so I'm accenting with pinks and purples.

Final pics will prob be up after the holidays. Not sure I'll finish before then.

Nurse thank you card and cake toppers

For our clinical group for nursing school, we had a fab teacher and hospital to help at. So, we wanted to show our appreciation. For our instructor, we took a group pic and framed it. I bought a plain frame from Michael's and decorated it.

I made the scrubs for the paper doll nurse to match our school uniforms.

 

Card to match

 

Since it was such a large staff, we brought them some baked goods so I made these toppers to put on them. Just taped them to toothpicks and I was good to go. I made a bunch of them, but these were all the different patterns. Super easy.

I was so busy the weeks coming up to that day that I made all these the night before so they were definitely simpler than I had planned.

Baby shower decor to wall art

Since I've been a terrible blogger, I have a bunch of posts that I haven't made in forever. One of them is this pic from a few months ago. I posted about the baby shower me and another friend hosted. We made really cute 12 x 12 hangings for decor. I LOVE that the mom framed them and used them for decor in the baby's nursery.

It's also a super inexpensive way to decorate. Baby stuff can get pricey. Cute paper + frames=great deal!