Christmas Knick Knacks and Chocolates...

I have a few pictures to show you of things that I guess can best be classed as Christmas knick knacks, or maybe stocking stuffers. Some of them I bought for others, some I bought for myself ;-). Some were given to me at Christmas. Some are cute, some are yummy, some can be used for crafting, some can not. What ever their purpose...they made me smile!

Cute, shaped paperclips. Which I got from Pepe's Paperie, a lovely little shop that sells stationery and other papery goodies here in Canberra.

Groovy-doovey Valentine-themed masking tape...from Pepe's.

Pretty-coloured Jute Twine...also from Pepe's. I love Pepe's a lot!

Eco-friendly, easy stow-away shopping bags by Envirosax. I got these up in a little shop in Balgowlah in Sydney, but I have seen similar ones in several kitchen-type shops too. I love the pretty oriental designs on these ones.

Haigh's Chocolate Frogs. A lovely gift from my sister in-law. They even come in their own beautiful cardboard bookish-box! Drool....I have been very good, and haven't touched these yet at all.

...and last, but certainly not least...one of my all time favourites the Darrell Lea Christmas Nougat Pudding! They make these at Easter-time too....same delicious taste, just a different design.

Thanks for sitting through my little fest of pretties and yummies. I hope you got some lovely pretties and yummies under your tree this year too!

Papertrey December Blog Hop Challenge

Today I thought I might take part in my first ever Papertrey Ink Blog Hop Challenge:

The Challenge for this month is the:

...annual holiday leftovers challenge! Use scraps of wrapping paper, parts of holiday cards, recycle gift tags or bits of ribbon on a paper crafting project.  We all have plenty of it laying around after all the holiday excitement and this is your chance to incorporate some of those pretty little things into an amazing piece of art!

I wandered around the house, looked in my recycle bin, ummmed and ahhhed a good bit, then finally decided to use:

Now, I must add here, we had more than one box of these little yummies floating around the house this Christmas Season (Woolies had a special on them ;-).  This is just the only unopened one I had left!  I also checked on the box because I had no idea if these chocolates were an Aussie thing, but it seems they are made in Canada, so I am sure my O/S stamping friends have heard of them before too. I decided to use the leftover gold foil from the chocolates to add to my creation. With some ingenuity they could also probably be a chocolatey scratch and sniff accessory!

This is the card that I made for this challenge:

List of Ingredients:

Cardstock: Stamper's Select White Cardstock (PTI), Kraft and Real Red (SU)
Ink: Timber Brown (Stazon)
Stamps: Believe (PTI)
Accessories: Both sides of the Background Basics: Diamonds Impression Plate (PTI), Embossing Pad Kit (PTI), All three of the Beautiful Blooms II #3 Die Collection (PTI), Fillable Frames #9 (cut down to size)(PTI), Pure Poppy Felt (PTI), Dimensionals (SU), Mini Glue Dots (SU), Tombow Adhesive (Penwa), Gold Cord (SU) and recycled Gold Foil (Ferrero Rocher chocolates).

I had fun making this card because every time I get my Cuttlebug out the kids flock to my craft table and ask if they can run various things through it. I have run the recycled gold foil dots through the Cuttlebug, to make them nice and flat for the card too.

Well, Thanks for dropping by today. I hope that you all had a lovely peaceful Christmas, and very best wishes for a happy 2011!

(Blogged to: Modern Love -  David Bowie, Don't Leave Me This Way - The Communards, and Absolutely Fabulous - Pet Shop Boys).

Scoopedy Scoops of Yummy Elf Poop...

I've been working on a little project to hand out to some of my work colleagues this Christmas. I finally managed to get them all done today, and I'll distribute them tomorrow. I think they'll put some smiles on some dials :-)...

List of Ingredients:

Cardstock: Real Red, Kiwi Kiss Textured, Whisper White, Basic Black and Blush Blossom cardstock (all from SU)
Punches: 1 3/8" Circle, Two-Step owl, Curly Label, Boho Blossoms, 5-Petal Flower and Scallop Oval (all SU)
Accessories: Real Red Stampin' Pastels (SU), White Gel Pen, Black Stampin' Write Marker (SU), Crystal Effects (SU), Dazzling Diamonds (SU),  Chocolate Chip Taffeta Ribbon (SU), Diamonds Impression Plate (PTI), Spellbinders Nested Labels 8 (Bizzy Becs), Mini Glue Dots (SU), Dimensionals (SU), Tombow Adhesive (Penwa), Medium Cello Bags (SU) and Malteesers (Milk and Dark Chocolate).

The Elf Poop verse is all over the net...I've no idea where it started. The punch art elf head is the same as that used in my Elliot Elf Christmas cards, and was sourced from Marie Shaughnessy.

Thanks for visiting!

(Blogged to: Great Southern Land - Steve McNaughton and Around the World - Daft Punk).

A present for the kindy teacher...

I have lots of projects in various stages of disarray here...but its organised disarray if you know what I mean? To the untrained eye....my desk and surrounds would certainly look like they were in disarray...but I KNOW what's what! Seriously!!

Just thought I'd pop on here quickly and put up a few pics of the gift I made for Miss 6's Kindergarten teacher this year:

List of Ingredients:

Cardstock: Riding Hood Red, Old Olive and Very Vanilla (All from SU)
Accessories: Jolly Holiday DSP (SU), Small Oval Punch (SU), 1 3/8 inch Circle Punch (SU), 1 1/4 inch Circle Punch (SU), 1 inch Circle Punch (SU), Gold Cord (retired SU), Brights Collection Designer Buttons (SU), Twill Tape (SU), Mini Glue Dots (SU), Dimensionals (SU) and Tombow Adhesive (Penwa).

The gorgeous earth-toned focal beads on the bracelet are from SueBeads on Etsy, and were a custom order (this teacher wears lots of earth-tones and they suit her beautifully). The silver is all Sterling, and the crystals are from Swarovski. I really hope she likes it!

If you check out the photos closely you will see that the bracelet is slightly different in pictures 2 and 3. You are not imagining things, I needed to make it smaller for her, so had to take out a few beads.

Better get back to my other project now...15 bags of Elf Poop ;-).

(Blogged to: Watcha Say - Jason Derulo and Babooshka - Kate Bush).

Kim's Christmas Goody Bags...

We had an afternoon tea get-together here on Sunday. It was mean't to be a dinner BBQ, but with the weather being as poopy as it has been, and more rain and thunderstorms forecast for Sunday afternoon I downgraded the event to afternoon tea...which of course ENSURED that not a single drop of rain would fall at all on Sunday ;-).

I thought I'd show you the lovely little goody bags that Kim brought to hand out to the kids:

Kim has blogged the full list of ingredients that she used to make these gorgeous little creations here on her blog!

Thanks so much Kim! And, now that I've managed to photograph them...I can let the kids rip in to the bags of home cooked goodies that she stashed inside (aren't I a mean mummy for making them wait this long? ;-).

I also wanted to let you know that yesterday I managed to reduce the size of Kim's birthday bracelet. I only NEEDED to remove a few beads from the ends, but I dropped the whole dang thing on the floor. I then spent 10 minutes on my hands and knees trying to find the tiny silver and crystal beads that were scattered liberally about, and then reconstructed the design using my blog photographs (thank goodness I had the photos to use as a reference). I was also very pleased that they fell on a carpeted floor....I am sure it reduced the bounce and scatter factor significantly!

Okey dokey....almost time for school pick-up, better run. Have a good one!

(Blogged to: Girl U Want - Devo and Sweat - John Tejada).

Birthday Gift and Hair Elastic

I finally managed to catch up with a friend today, Kim, and pass along her very late birthday present!

Here are some pictures of her gift, the card and wrapping:

List of Ingredients:

Cardstock: Elegant Eggplant, Tempting Turquoise (textured) and Whisper White
Ink: Elegant Eggplant Classic Ink
Stamps: I wish I could remember what sets those two Happy Birthday sentiments are from, but I can't. I can't even tell if they are SU or PTI. If you know, please do tell!
Accessories: Carrot Felt (Felt on the Fly), Vintage Cream Felt (PTI),  Picnic Plaid Impression Plate (PTI), Blossom Nestabilities (Spellbinders), Beautiful Blooms II #1 Die Collection (PTI), Hawaiian Shores Buttons (PTI), Pretties Kit (SU), Eyelet Border Punch (SU), District Ribbon Originals (SU), Tag Punch (SU), Crop-a-dile, Mini Glue Dots (SU),  Sticky Strip (SU), Tombow Adhesive (Penwa) and Dimensionals (SU).

You might recognise the bracelet...I blogged it ages ago here, and it has been sitting in its little box ever since. The lampwork beads are by Avaline at imakebeads on Etsy. I have to re-size the bracelet for Kim's wrist...because as it is, it just slides right off (Oooppps...sorry Kim!).

While I'm rambling about handicrafts, I thought I'd show you some simple Christmassy hair elastics I recently made for Miss 6...who is going to be a Christmas Kangaroo in her school end-of-year concert:

The red and green felt are both from Felt on the Fly, and the buttons are Pure Poppy from PTI.

 Hope you had a lovely weekend!

(Blogged to: Send Me an Angel - Real Life, I Got You - Split Enz and I'm Still Standing - Elton John).