Today I'm sharing the last of the projects we made at last weekend's Christmas workshop: a stamped clay ornament and a decorated kraft gift box to put it in. Here's a photograph of the ornament:

These clay ornaments have a natural finish and can be stamped straight onto the surface, without any additional preparation. As we were going all out for Christmas, once we had stamped our design onto the ornament we stamped the pattern again with Versamark, sprinkled with Heat and Stick Powder and heated with the heat gun, then sprinkled with Iridescent Ice glitter and heated once more. This gives the finished item a more muted colour and a lovely sparkle that catches the light.

We also decorated one of the lovely ready-made kraft boxes from the catalogue to go with it - here's the top of mine:

Together they would make a lovely gift for someone, if you could bear to part with them of course! I will be using mine to decorate my tree during the festive season, but I'm sure I can make another one or something else to go in the box! I hope you liked my first Christmas projects of the season - there will be lots more where this came from. If you would like to join any of my classes, do get in touch for more details; my September card classes will be featuring the Mosaic Madness stamp set and then from October we will be doing Christmas cards all the way through until the end of the year.

Back tomorrow with the first of the weekend birthday cards: my brother-in-law is celebrating his 'big 40' with a party tomorrow and then my own 'Baby James' will be 6 on Sunday, so I've a few birthday cards to share. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up Supplies:

Stamps: Sweet Essentials, Four Seasons (hostess - retired)

Cardstock: Cherry Cobbler, Be of Good Cheer Designer Series Paper (retired)

Ink/Stampin' Write Markers: Real Red

Tools: Simply Scored, Big Shot, 1 1/4" Circle Punch, 7/8" and 1 3/4" Scallop Circle Punches, Merry Minis (star)

Finishing Touches: Champagne Glimmer Paper, 3/4" Cherry Cobbler Chevron Ribbon,  Cherry Cobbler 1/2" Scallop Dots Ribbon (retired)

Another week, another late post - I'm loving the summer holidays but when school's out it sure is tricky to keep everything else on track! So today I'm posting nice and early, so that I don't run out of time again!

Today I'm sharing another of the makes from my Christmas workshop that I held last weekend: a lovely set of four tea lights in a handmade box. This workshop was less about the stamping and much more about the scoring - if my ladies weren't proficient with their Simply Scored scoreboard beforehand, they sure are now! So here is our finished box:

We made a box with a sliding sleeve cover, from which we cut out an oval aperture with the Oval Framelits and backed with a window sheet, to allow a glimpse of our lovely hand-stamped candles inside. Here's a picture of the open box, with a peek at our 'dressed up' tea lights:

We edged each of them with a strip of DSP; I'll be making more of these when my festive washi tape arrives, as this is perfect for this kind of project. The candle stamping was really easy to achieve and as none of the ladies present had done this before, was a real 'wow' moment for them. I suspect lots of their friends and neighbours will be receiving stamped tea light gift sets for Christmas now that they've learned this clever technique!

I love this spotted star/snowflake paper from the retired 'Be of Good Cheer' paper set; with so many designs to choose from, we all made different ones though - here's one of the other finished sets made by Kathy during the workshop:

These papers are just so lovely, but don't be too sad that they are now retired; I have had a 'sneak peek' of the new Autumn-Winter seasonal catalogue and can honestly say, you will not be disappointed with this year's offerings!

All being well, I will be back tomorrow with the last of my Christmas workshop projects. I'm off to have a quick spot of making before meeting friends in the park for a picnic - lovely! Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up Supplies:

Stamps: Four Seasons (hostess - retired)

Cardstock: Cherry Cobbler, Be of Good Cheer Designer Series Paper (retired)

Ink/Stampin' Write Markers: Cherry Cobbler

Tools: Simply Scored, Big Shot, 1 1/4" Circle Punch, 1 3/4" Scallop Circle Punches, Oval Framelits

Finishing Touches: Creped Filter Paper, Window Sheet,  Cherry Cobbler 1/2" Scallop Dots Ribbon (retired)

A short departure from my love affair with my Spring Sampler set today to bring you a card made with the Spring stamp in the Four Seasons set. I know it's already officially British Summer Time, but the weather seems to have only reached Spring-like proportions this week, so I don't think I'm too tardy:

I used a So Saffron card base and used a section of one of the Print Poetry Designer Paper sheets as a background for interest, but only across half of the card so that it didn't overwhelm or detract from the stamp whihc is the focal point. The Print Poetry papers in the Spring-Summer catalogue are great value: 48 sheets of 11.4 x 16.5 cm paper, 4 each of 12 designs for just £6.25 and the perfect size for card making. To add depth to the Spring stamp, I firstly inked the centre circle with my marker pens and cut out using a 1 1/4" punch. Then I inked the stamp in Gumball Green and punched out with the Scalloped Circle punch, then removed the centre with the 1" punch and overlaid on the original nesting bird using Dimensionals.

I coloured this little bird blue as I'm hoping he will be a good omen: last year we had a family of blue tits nesting in the cavity wall of our house and as blue tits are known to return to nesting sites year after year, this year we mounted a nest box with bird cam over the hole in the wall. This week we have seen definite signs that the bird box has been visited, so here's hoping we get to see a blue tit family in the making - I'll keep you posted!

I'll be featuring the other stamps in the Four Seasons set in coming months; this set is exclusive to hostesses and is one of a number of products that can be yours free* if you host a party. So if you'd like to get you're hands on one, simply give me a call or contact me at joanne@thecraftyowl.co.uk and invite your friends round for a night of creativity, shopping and fun!

Back tomorrow with another card - until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up Supplies:

Stamps: Four Seasons: Spring (hostess set)

Cardstock: So Saffron, Whisper White, Print Poetry Designer Series Paper

Ink/Stampin' Write Markers: Gumball Green, Easrly Espresso, Crumb Cake, Marina Mist, So Saffron, Wild Wasabi

Tools: 1" Circle Punch, 1 1/4" Circle Punch, 2 3/8" Scallop Circle Punch

*Hostess sets are products available exclusively to party hostesses. Hostess credits are awarded on a sliding scale based on overall party sales. See online catalogue for more details.