New Year's Eve - Are you Ready for 2014?

It's the last day of 2013 and it was a year filled with many challenges.  I am looking forward to moving into the New Year and have great plans to get back to projects that have been on hold due to family commitments this year.  I may even try doing a daily photo project again.

If your plans for the coming year include doing a "photo a day" or Project Life style of scrapbook album, you should take a look at the new planner that Traci Reed has designed to organize your photos and stories and help you to plan your pages.

Traci has included a wide variety of grids that you can use for the project.  Some of these are available in page protector form and some you would use digitally.

The planner includes both weekly and monthly calendars and you can choose different grids to use in each weekly planner.  She has even included a printable sheet of colorful stickers to help you mark both everyday and special events.

The design is clean and simple to allow plenty of room for your words.  It is colorful but not too heavy on ink usage.  There two options for weekly pages, Monday to Sunday or Sunday to Saturday.  You can print the pages at 8 1/2 x 11 or print two to a page for a smaller binder.  Traci has a handy explanation of how to set up the pages to print for a smaller binder on her blog HERE.

You can purchase the planner HERE at Sweet Shoppe Designs, download the files and print out what you need to get started right away.  Be sure to check out the rest of Traci's digital products while you are there.  One of my projects for today is putting my binder together so I'll be ready for Wednesday.

A few more end of the year reminders...

If you own the Creative Memories Memory Manager or StoryBook Creator software and haven't yet activated it, today is the last day to activate the software online.

This Year-End FAQ from Panstoria (the company that developed the software and licensed it to Creative Memories) will explain what you need to do.  Click HERE to see the FAQs.

The Creative Memories versions of the program are no longer being updated.  You will eventually need to upgrade to the Panstoria programs Artisan (for StoryBook) and Historian (for Memory Manager).  You do not have to do this today - the deadline tonight is for the online activation of either of the Creative Memories programs.

If there is some digital content that you missed buying before the Creative Memories bankruptcy, you can purchase the Creative Memories digital artwork from Panstoria through March of 2014.

Lettering Delights Dollar Sale

The Lettering Delights site-wide Dollar Sale is coming to an end.  Don't miss this great chance to stock up on the graphics, papers, alphabets and cutting files that you can use for your creative projects.

 

 

You can save even more if your purchase totals $33 or more - just use the code GoodBye 2013 and you will get $13 off.  That's an amazing deal on top of the Dollar Day savings.

Click HERE to go to the Lettering Delights site and start shopping.  The sale continues until the 1st of January, 2014.

 

Do you have special plans for New Year's Eve?  We will celebrate with some neighbors but I don't think we will last much past midnight.  It is very cold here so I am not tempted to go into Boston for the First Night festivities.  Have a great evening - whatever you do!

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Lettering Delights Dollar Days - Great Deals!

I hope you had a lovely Christmas.  We had several Christmas celebrations this year - the actual day isn't as important as celebrating with as many family members as possible. 

one of my favorite Lettering Delights Cut It projects - Tiskets and Taskets

I wanted to let you know that  Lettering Delights  is having a great sale for their entire site.  Everything is just $1 or $2 from now until January 1, 2014.  This is a chance that doesn't come around very often so if you have been thinking about adding to your collection you can save a lot and get exactly the files you want.

 the titles on this layout were done with the "American Love"Alphabet

I use Lettering Delights digital cutting files as well as their graphics, alphabets and papers for all sorts of projects.  The graphic elements work well with my Artisan software (formerly sold as StoryBook Creator by Creative Memories) and the cut files come in a variety of formats that work with most cutting machines.  (The formats are .ai, .dxf, .eps, .gsd, .pdf, and .svg so they don't work with the Cricut unless you have a third party software such as Make the Cut or Sure Cuts A Lot that was purchased prior to the lawsuits that required the ability to cut with a Cricut to be removed from these programs).

You can pick and choose from all of these types of files:

 Alphabets are just $1 - a 75% savings

Fonts and Doodlebats are $1 - a 66% to 75% savings

 Graphics sets are $1 - a 75% savings

 Cut-It Sets are $2 - a 60% savings

 

You can save even more if your purchase totals $33 or more - just use the code GoodBye 2013 and you will get $13 off.  That's an amazing deal on top of the Dollar Day savings.

Click HERE to go to the Lettering Delights site and start shopping.  The sale continues until the 1st of January (2014 is just around the corner!).

The Santa figures in the photo at the top of this post are from Russia.  I collected this style of Santa when we were living in England.  I love the intricate details in the painting on each figure.  I think one of my projects for next year will be a photo book of some of the collections I have put together over the years.  It will be fun to do and will also be a good thing to have for insurance purposes.

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Merry Christmas!

I hope that you can be with family and friends today - have a very Merry Christmas!

luminaria along our street on Christmas Eve

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This post may contain affiliate links. If you purchase a product using the link I may receive a commission. I only participate in affiliate programs for products that I use or can recommend without reservation. 

Brown Paper Packages with Big Fluffy Bows

With only a couple of days left before Christmas, you may be busy wrapping packages today.  I love to wrap gifts and my mother used to give me boxes to wrap and "ribbon up" to help her get everything done in time for Christmas (sometimes I even wrapped my own presents - without knowing they were for me!).   My favorite topper used to be curling ribbon - it was always a thrill to see the flat ribbon turned into a pretty curl.

One of the challenges of having your first Christmas in a new home is figuring out where to put all of your holiday decorations.  I've been helping my husband's parents with some of their decorations and I suggested that their tree should be put up on a table to take advantage of the double height ceiling in the living room.  It really helped to break up the line between the doorway and the large armoire but we needed to skirt the table (actually an old desk and a plywood circle) and to stabilize the tree with some weights.

If you look closely, you can see some bricks on the base of the tree.  These work fine when the tree is on the ground with a blanket or other cover around the base of the tree.  I had some tablecloths to use but I didn't want to cut the topper to make it into a tree skirt.  So we decided to put the bricks in some odd boxes and wrap them up as "presents".

The boxes sit on the tree base on top of the tablecloth.  When I tied up the bows, my sister-in-law suggested that I post photos to show how I made the bows.  It isn't complicated but there are a couple of important tips to share.

 First, I tied a long piece of ribbon around the package by putting the center of the ribbon on the top of the box, pulling the ribbon down the sides and crossing the tails on the bottom to come up on the other two sides of the box and tying them together at the intersection on the top.  I use wire edged ribbon that you can usually find at a good price at warehouse stores like Costco, Sam's and BJ's.

Next, I wind ribbon off the spool and accordion fold it at a length about as long as the package top - usually I make four or five folds.

I do the same thing with a second length of ribbon, making this section shorter to create the center of the bow.

The next step is the most important - you need to cut a notch into the ribbon on either side of the center.  The center section that remains should be about half the original width of the ribbon.  Be sure you have scissors sharp enough to cut smoothly through the ribbon and the thin wire in the edge.

Then, place the two sections of ribbon on top of the package with the notches at the center where the tails have been tied.

Use the two tails to tie the folded ribbon to the package, pulling it tight.

Starting with the center loops, twist and turn each ribbon section and pull them around the anchoring ribbon to create a nice fluffy center.  The notches in the ribbon allow you to make these loops sit prettily since the bulk is reduced by half.

Keep twisting and turning the loops until they are all in position.  You can shape them by putting your fingers inside the loop and adjusting the size and angle.

Here is the box with all of the center loops fluffed.

Then do the same with the lower set of loops that will form the outer edges of the bow.  There is no right or wrong - just twist and fluff until the bow looks pretty to you.  In the photo above, the right side is finished and there are just the four loops on the left to pull into place.

Here is the finished bow on the package.  You can keep adjusting it until it looks just right.  I give the long tail ends a little bit of a crinkle by looping them over my fingers.

When all three boxes were wrapped and ribboned, they completely concealed the base of the tree.  They look pretty but anyone who opened one of these presents would probably be disappointed with the contents (!)  The boxes can be stored away with the other decorations and used for several years to anchor the tree.  With the wire-edged ribbon you can always reshape the bows if they get a little crushed in storage.

The most important thing to remember is to cut the notches in the folded ribbon before you tie it on and start to fluff the bow.

Here is the tree with the tablecloth, round topper and packages - now it looks finished!

Last Minute Gift Idea...

If you still need a gift for a crafty friend (or want to treat yourself!) the classes from True Scrap 5 are available individually now and at the special price of $9.99 until Christmas!  Click HERE to see all of the class descriptions.

The True Scrap 5 classes included classes by all of these great instructors -

 Heidi Swapp
Noell Hyman
Nichol Magouirk
Layle Koncar
Bev Gray
Monica Bradford
Jennifer Gallacher
Stephanie Ackerman
Katrina Kennedy
Doris Sander
Traci Reed
Tracy Banks
Stephenie Hamen
Windy Robinson
Tammy Tutterow

You can read the descriptions for all of the classes HERE.

Free Scrapinar for December

Are you thinking about attempting a "photo a day" type of project in the new year?  If you are, the December free Scrapinar from Layout a Day will be a great help for starting off the year on the right foot.  Professional photographer, Katrina Kennedy (founder of CaptureYour365.com) will share tips, ideas and strategies to make your project both manageable and rewarding.

The free Scrapinar for December is on December 30th.  You must register in advance for this event.  If you can't attend live, a replay will be made available for a short time but only to those who register in advance.  Click HERE to register.

Don't forget to pick up the 12 Days of Christmas freebies at Lettering Delights  and the Silhouette Online Store.

Good luck with all of your last minute preparations - the days went so quickly after the late Thanksgiving this year! 

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Custom Soap Dispensers with Square1

It's always fun to find that you can use your crafting tools and products to solve a problem.  I have been helping my husband's parents get settled in their new home and we were having trouble finding a soap dispenser for the powder room.

There is a pretty pedestal sink  but the area where you can sit the soap is quite narrow.  We bought a nice round dispenser that just wouldn't fit, even though it was a fairly small size.  My mother-in-law found some liquid soap that was in a plastic container with a more oval shaped base.  It fits, but it isn't particularly attractive...

I put my thinking cap on and decided I could improve on a store label by printing a custom design on some Square1 Masterpiece adhesive fabric.  I found these taller and thinner shaped bottles of Dial soap that had clear tops (my mother-in-law doesn't particularly care for the brown top on the first container).

When the label are peeled off the bottles they are prettier but I wanted to dress them up for the holidays.  One tip for taking off the labels - I found that the back labels came off more easily than the front labels.  When taking off any sort of label, the adhesive will tend to stick to itself so I use the removed label to pick up excess adhesive. For these soaps, I used the back label to clean up the sticky residue on the front.  In the end, there was just a tiny bit of adhesive left and I put some "Goo Gone" on a paper towel and used that to get rid of the last traces of adhesive.

I used my Panstoria Artisan software to create some colorful holiday labels for the soap dispensers.  The Santa images are from Twisted Papers (find them HERE),  The ornaments are from Lettering Delights (Swell Noel Ornaments by Sheri McCulley) and the background papers and word art are from various Creative Memories digital kits that will be available through Panstoria until the end of March, 2014.

I printed the designs on a sheet of 8 1/2 x 11 Square1 Masterpiece  repositionable adhesive fabric.  I didn't set them up as a print and cut since I could simply use a trimmer to cut the rectangular shapes.

The Square1 fabric takes the ink from the inkjet printer very well.    You can cut it with scissors, dies or a die cutting machine.

I followed the directions on the back of the package, setting the print quality to best and paper type to matte photo paper then allowing the print to dry (it says 10 - 15 minutes but I left it overnight before I finished my project).

The printing is water resistant on the fabric but I did heat fix the printing with a low temperature iron since the soap labels will be used around water.  Don't keep the iron on the fabric very long - just a quick swipe with low heat.

I put the two non-traditional color labels on one side of the dispensers...

...and the more traditional Santa designs on the other side.

You could print any image you like to create labels to suit various seasons and occasions.  The material can be repositioned many times so you could even save the seasonal designs and use them year after year.

Have you tried Square1 Printable yet?  You can find it and other vinyl alternative products on their website HERE.  The customization possibilities make it a great choice for all sorts of projects.  I am a member of their Creative Team and will be sharing more ideas and projects over the next few months.  Please leave a comment if you have any questions about the products they offer.



Don't forget to pick up the 12 Days of Christmas freebies at Lettering Delights  and in the Silhouette Online Store.

free today in the Silhouette Online Store

There is so much snow here - our deck lights are partially buried.  We got another 8 or so inches on Tuesday.  I think the temperature will be warm enough today to melt the ice in the driveway but I am hoping that we keep the snow on the lawn for a White Christmas.  I hope you are staying warm if you are also in a snowy area.  It does make it seem more like winter!


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This post may contain affiliate links. If you purchase a product using the link I may receive a commission. I only participate in affiliate programs for products that I use or can recommend without reservation