the angels said: peace.

I thought I was all done showing off Christmas cards, but I found a couple that I didn't share on the blog yet.

I illustrated a pair of angels, just for fun, and matched them up with a lawn fawn sentiment:



I did some ink blending around the banner and angels, to make it look like an evening sky, and then printed the pair again so that I could give dimension to their wings:

They said:

"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men."

♥.

woodsy holiday tags

Hi there!  I think we're all past the point of making holiday cards (if not, chop chop!) so I thought I'd share a set of tags you can whip up with lawn fawn stamps and dies.

It all started with a stroll through Target, where I spotted the plaid wrapping paper. I love a woodland-themed Christmas, and Lawn Fawn's Joy to the Woods is perfect for creating tags to compliment that theme.



These are the pieces you need to create these tags. I find it easier to work systematically: I stamped a sheet of cardstock with all of the birch trees and cardinals that I would need and colored them very quickly. Just a few swipes of a warm grey copic marker for the trees (W1) and 2 tones of red for the cardinals (R24 and R29.)

Then, I die-cut the circles and all of the snow-drifts, and stamped the greeting ("merry christmas" from this set, and the "to" from Birthday Tags.) I placed them all on the same block for easy mass-producing.  Some of the tags feature heat-embossing, but I got lazy halfway through the project and switched to a red ink. No fuss.


When the tags are assembled, add the falling snow with a white gel pen.  Then, you could just handwrite the recipient's name on the front, or you could die-cut letters if you're feeling fancy:

I die-cut the letters in black to compliment the black outlines of the stamped images, as well as the plaid wrapping.



I hope you like what I created!

♥.

talk nerdy to me {new lawn fawn!}

I love anything bookworm-themed. As soon as I saw the cute little worm from Bugs and Kisses, I knew I would have him draped over the Science of Love textbook.

It's the last day of Lawn Fawn's December release reveals, and I bring you:

The nerdiest valentine's day card ever. Maybe we've stepped away from the kiddie class valentines on this one, hee hee. Especially since every time my hubs walks by this card, he starts with the horn riff from that song.



I love lawn fawn's new stitched circle dies! The come as a nested set, so it's not hard to fit the right size to frame your focal image.  I also used Riley's ABCs to create my custom sentiment, and the library card from Check This Out.

I hope you like it!

There's more to see on the Lawn Fawn blog today!

tear-away valentines {new lawn fawn}

Hi there, and welcome back to another day of Lawn Fawn's December release.

Today's we're showing off the mini-set, whale you be mine.



Again, I kept things simple to show how I would use the set for a class valentine.



I colored the whales separately (giving one a bow from Sweet Christmas!) and then die-cut them and set them aside.

I then die-cut 2 of the new stitched circles (from a thinner-weighted card stock) and a bunch of different Mermaid-colored papers with the scallop border (keeping the "negatives" because they look like waves.)

To assemble the treat bags, I sewed around the circles (the stitching lines are excellent guides!) and left an opening to stuff candy through before closing the whole thing up.

I like the idea of giving kids something that looks nice, but contains way less candy than they would think. ha.



I hope you like it!

Visit the lawn fawn blog today for more inspiration.

♥.

bugs and kisses {new lawn fawn!}

Welcome to Lawn Fawn's December release! It's a mini release, with 2 stamp sets and 6 dies, but so cute.



Today's feature is "bugs and kisses," a full-sized set that features different insects and bugs in lawn fawn's trademark style.

I decided to keep things simple today and tomorrow, and show how I would use the sets for my kids' class valentines.



I made myself a tiny little bag, just big enough for a small amount of treats. Separately, I stamped the jar and colored it with a few simple swipes of light blue and grey markers. I stamped the insect and the heart (from woodgrain backdrops) and then opted to stamp and cut out the critter again so that his tail-end could overlap the banner die-cut.



I just love this worm - he's my favorite! I custom-created the sentiment on my computer - it barely fits into the banner, haha!

I hope you like what I created! There's so much more inspiration on the lawn fawn blog today - click!

polar bear christmas.

Hi there! I think, by fluke, this turned into the week where I show off my digital illustrations. I hope you don't mind!



I illustrated a very simple bear wearing a striped party hat. I printed him out times four and cut him out with scissors.

I highlighted some areas in blue, gave him blushy cheeks and popped him up onto snowy/starry lawn fawn paper. A simple sentiment by Avery Elle right onto his belly, and a pom pom on his hat, and he was ready for gifting.

It feels good to make something quick and simple sometimes!

ps, If you missed the post where you could download my christmas-pyjama-clad-kids, click *here*

♥.

Paper Crafts and Scrapbooking Magazine special thanks! blog hop

Today's blog hop feels like a funeral. Tears will be shed, laughs will be shared, and memories will touch our hearts.

I don't know how to put into words how I feel about the closing of Paper Crafts & Scrapbooking magazine.

It is a sad thing. PC&S was the cornerstone of our card-making industry. There was validation for the artists who found themselves published within those pages, and so much inspiration for the rest of us. We also found a sense of community within those pages, cheering each other on, even though we were all competing to see our own artwork there.

I only submitted for publication a handful of times, but each time, when Susan sent out that email, I got chills. They picked me! The first time was for a card that was published in the November/December 2012 issue. I used lawn fawn's Cozy Christmas, so I thought that it was only fitting to say goodbye using products from Lawn Fawn, and my other favorite company, Mama Elephant.

I also have a special gift to offer up at the end, since PC&S always offered us free digis, I thought it would be fitting to offer up a few of my own here today.



I illustrated the little girl holding a giant gingerbread cookie and paired her together with a custom sentiment of thanks.  I wanted the card to be season-appropriate. How's that for the mag in mind!

I have 3 different Christmas kid-in-pyjama images to offer you today. You can see how I used the others *here* and *here.*

To download any of the images, click on the JPEG or PNG link - your choice! And right-click to save the image to your computer. I hope you enjoy them this holiday season - they are my special gift to you:

Boy in Christmas pjs: JPEG/PNG

Girl in Christmas pjs: JPEG/PNG

Girl holding gingerbread cookie: JPEG/PNG

Now. There are so many people expressing their own thanks and love to the PC&S team. The hop started with Jennifer McGuire's blog, and goes on 200 bloggers strong.

If you're following the hop order, you should have come from Lyndal's blog, and will now be heading over to my oh-so-talented friend's Kara's blog.

♥.

Dear Santa... {free digi}

Hi there!

I have all all-digi card to share today:



You may remember that I used this sweet girl before, and even offered her as a free digital stamp - click!

I colored her dress a Christmas red, and printing her out along with a cheeky sentiment.

I printed her twice, so that I could cut her out and pop her up. I added her onto a woodgrain notecard (it seemed fitting, with her bear hat!) and added an extra pop of red with the red and white twine.

If you want to use her for yourself, click over to *this blog post* and follow the download link.

I'll see you back here tomorrow for a new free digi! woot!

♥.

cookie exchange 2014

It's time to show off our annual Christmas cookie exchange party!



Our group changes houses every year, to give a turn to a new hostess. This year's party was held at my friend Chantalle's beautiful house.  When I got there, she had the basic decoration done, and I helped her tweak the placement of the cookies and added the cookie labels I made on her request. We love to make it as pretty as it is tasty. I love that about this group of girls!

She set us up around the table - a grown-up tea party with so many yummy cookies to sample.

Everyone outdid themselves this year!



For the cookie labels, I used a simple, classic waffleflower frame and gold embossed it. In the same set, I found the little leaf&berry image, which I also gold-embossed for a simple accent.

These chewy gingerbread cookies with candied ginger on top were my fave. Warm and spicy, and everything you want out of a holiday cookie.





I made the caramel thumbprint cookies. When I spied them on Pinterest, I had to try out the recipe. The caramel in the middle was so gooey and delicious!

We had such a fantastic time together!

I hope you've enjoyed checking out this year's cookie exchange. You might like to look back at our past parties:

A woodsy cookie exchange, xmas 2013

A traditional cookie exchange xmas 2012

♥.

you make things so colorful {lawn fawn's black friday sale!}

Lawn Fawn is offering a Black Friday shipping sale, and a *freeee* mini set, with every 35$ or more purchase. Check it out:

I made a card set to show it off. 

wait. before I show you, you have to understand 2 things: yes, i know what it looks like. and second, kids like that kind of stuff.

ok?

I matched the patterned paper to the crayon on each one,



and added a face in the middle. The oval and smiley face are already part of the original crayon, all I had to do was add a swipe of hair to the top of the oval.

The sentiment is an original. I grabbed "everything is" and "with you" from love you S'more, and used Milo's ABCs to fill in the "more colorful."

I hope it put a smile on your face.



And that you aren't thinking: ew. does she know what that looks like?

yes I do. hahaha.

♥.

by the fire {25 days of Christmas tags guest post}

Hi there! I'm joining some of the lawn fawn girls for Tracey's 25 days of Christmas tags bonanza. (Because, 25 days of anything can clearly be labelled a bonanza.)

I grabbed lawn fawn stamps, and mama elephant dies and got to creating another gigantic tag:

I have loved Cozy Christmas for so long - it's still a classic Christmas set, in my opinion. To limit the number of smiley faces, I opted for the woodsier fire from Love You S'more.



I didn't bother masking anything; I stamped the stockings and note to santa separately and snipped them out.  Because figuring out how to stamp and mask everything perfectly was making my head hurt.

Plus, I love the hint of texture you get from glueing the stockings onto the fireplace. It's subtle, but makes a handmade tag a little more special.

I hope you like it!

Tracey's tag bonanza comes complete with prizes from amazing companies like:

lawn fawn ♥ paper smooches ♥ neat and tangled ♥ cas-ual fridays ♥ clearly besotted ♥ reverse confetti

She's allowing me to choose a winner from commenters on this blog post! So, leave me a comment by the end of the day today and when I wake up tomorrow morning, I'll randomly pick a name to forward to Tracey. That person will be included in the prize draw that she will be doing tomorrow.

Good luck!

♥.

Gingerbread party! {with lawn fawn and montreal confections}

Gingerbread is one of those holiday sweet staples, like eggnog and candy canes. And the holidays are always full of excuses to throw parties! So get ready, you are invited to check out our sweet holiday gingerbread spread:

I'm always so excited to get to work with Marlyn (of Montreal Confections.) Her cakes and cookies make any paper decorations I craft look so much better.

And I create these monthly parties for Lawn Fawn, using their stamps and dies.



Can you see the sparkle in the background?  We hung cheap, white garland in back of the table to frame the cake. If you were looking for a holiday photobooth idea, add a few extra garlands and I think it would be perfect!  The tablecloth is actually wrapping paper, and purchased at Target (they have the most amazing patterns this year!)

Marlyn made this amazing gingerbread house cake! She's right - who wants to actually eat a dry, cookie gingerbread house? But a cake in the shape of? Oh, yes. It was delicious.

With spritz cookies for roof shingles, and red and green candy accents, it was perfect.

She created a how-to video on her youtube channel - click to watch it!

I created these gingerbread drink labels, with straws to match the little swirled lollipop that he is holding.  Just for a different look, I used a copic pen to draw in some icing at the top of his head. I love him with icing hair!



Of course, the bottles were filled with chocolate milk. I mean, if the kids are gonna get sugared up, you may as well do it right. ha. And, it matches the gingerbread brown color better.



I found these swirly lollipops at our local dollarstore - they were the inspiration for the entire party! In all of the decorations, the gingerbread man is holding a similar lollipop. I love cookies and candy for cupcake toppers!  It's like candyland up in here!

The cupcake wrappers were so simple, but add to the gingerbread feel, I cut them out of kraft paper, sponged the edges in brown ink and added scallops with a white gel pen.



I made dessert labels for each of the table elements.  I used the partial die-cut technique to cut the gingerbread house and the banner together, and attached a second gingerbread house die-cut to the back to it would stand up.  They match perfectly with Marlyn's house cookies:



These cookies are so cute, with their sparkling snow accents! Marlyn has a video for these as well as the cupcakes you saw earlier - click!

The video will also show you how to turn these cookies into a sweet parting gift.

I created some elements to add to the packaged cookie:



Easy and cute! I hope you've enjoyed our gingerbread party, and thanks for stopping by!

♥.