Barb's Stamping Spot: Christmas Gifts

A couple of weeks ago, I met with the ladies in my Stamp Club and gave them each a little package of goodies that I created. This first photo shows the box that contained everything. These gable boxes were once sold by SU, so of course, I have a few remaining in my stash! The greeting is from Many Merry Messages....I'm in love with this stamp....it's probably the reason I purchased the set a couple of years ago! The bird in the corner is NOT an SU stamp, but one I couldn't resist last year when visiting a stamp store. The wide ribbon is also from last year's collection, although is currently available in various other colors.

While on a trip to the Christmas Tree Shoppe, I found this cute little frame in the bargain bin. It is just the cutest! And the color works perfectly with last year's In Color, Riding Hood Red. So, just a bit of DSP from the Merry Moments collection, a bit of Riding Hood Red CS, and a stamped image (non SU....rec'd it at CHA last summer from the Hero Arts booth) and it came together nicely! I used

my Chocolate Chip and my Garden Green markers to "ink" up the image and then the Blender Pen to "color" in the pine cone. Then I stamped over the image again in Versamark and embossed with Clear Embossing Powder, which gave it a rich and polished look. (If you click on the image, you can view the detail.) Although this image is not from the SU line, this technique can easily be used for many images in the SU line!

This next gift is first shown without the wrapping.....it started out as a simple glass holder purchased off of the clearance rack in Ikea a few months back. I'm almost embarassed to tell you how much I bought them for....but, I'll share anyway: $.25! Can you believe it?!! I wasn't sure what I was going to do with them, but I bought a bunch and knew that one day they would be made into something spectacluar. So, with some etching cream, a punch, and a gold pen, this simple glass holder was transformed into a votive holde

I have to admit that the punch is from Martha Stewart, but I purchased it because it closely resembles the Jumbo Snowflake Punch in the SU collection, which unfortunately, was way too big for this project. I simply punched a few snowflakes out of computer paper and used a bit of glue from the Anywhere Glue Stick to adhere them. Then I glopped on the etching cream. I've etched glass before and always followed the directions with various results. This time around my little glass projects came out much better and more evenly.....I left the etching cream on for about 30-40 minutes. Then I washed off the etching cream and glued on paper. The only issue was that the rim around the top wasn't as even as I had hoped, but the Ziggy Gold Paint Pen (retired) did the trick! Add in a sparkly red votive from the Christmas Tree Shoppe and the project was done.

Below are all the gifts together and how they looked when placed inside the gable box. The little tin was wrapped with some retired DSP and I added in some home-made toffee. Check out this post for more info on this gift.