Homespun Holiday: Keepsake Ornaments

I'm very excited about today's post. Lizzie Jones, formerly a designer for Papertrey Ink, started her own company called Poshta Design and released a collection of stitching ornament dies. These were an investment, but I am glad I got them because they are SO fun! The collection is called Homespun Holiday: Keepsake Ornaments Kit. It includes dies to create four different ornament shapes, many different embellishment dies, felt, sequins, beads, needles, an inspiration guide, everything you need to start creating right out of the box!

I think my favorite way to embellish the ornaments was with this snowflake design. Isn't it gorgeous?! I used white thread and sparkly clear sequins and beads; it glistens beautifully in real life. 

When you purchase the kit, you pick a "color story" to go with it. This is a collection of felt in a certain color family with coordinating thread, sequins and beads. But for this ornament I actually used some MFT felt I already had because I wanted to make a pink ornament and the color story I chose didn't include pink felt. Any quality wool felt I think would work fine. Both the felt that came in the kit and the MFT felt cut beautifully. 

This ornament uses the "Frost" color story, which is a collection of blues and creams. You can add the beads and sequins anywhere you like. Once all my felt was stitched, it was so fun to play around with the sequins and beads to figure out which colors and placement looked best. 

You can see how different each of these three round ornaments look, just by changing which embellishment dies I used! This one uses the tiny snowflake three times across the band. In addition to the color story that comes with your kit, you can purchase felt rolls individually, which is what I did here so that I would also have some green felt to work with. It was easy to find DMC thread to match. 

My favorite ornaments tended to be the ones like this, that had a very simple color palette. I thought a single sequin and bead at the center was all this tear drop ornament needed. 

This is the last one I made. I was going for a more traditional color palette and used the thread as an accent color rather than matching it to the felt. All of my ornaments I sewed flat, instead of stuffing with fiber fill. But you can do either, and both my boys have requested I make them "puffy" ornaments next. 

I made these ornaments as gifts for close family and special teachers. I hope they bring happy memories as they put them on their Christmas tree each year!

Peppermint Soap Gift Bags

These are the Christmas gifts I put together for my oldest son's teachers this year. Each glassine bag holds a bar of homemade peppermint soap and then I embellished the bags with some festive stamped and die cut tags.

The candy cane is from The Stamp Market's No Peeking set. I love that the tag gives a little clue about what is inside!

I used a variety of sentiments from the Candy Cane Christmas set, stamped onto a banner die cut.

The holly leaves are an MFT die called Holly Berries, with sequins for the berries. 

I used gold and white baker's twine to hold everything together, including the card tied onto the back of each bag. I hope the teacher's enjoyed their gift and know how appreciated they are!
 

SUPPLIES:

Stamps: No Peeking, Candy Cane Christmas (The Stamp Market)

Paper: Stamper's Select White, Green Parakeet (PTI)

Ink: Real Red (SU!), Versa Fine Onxy Black

Dies: No Peeking (The Stamp Market), Holly Berries die namic, Starburst Sentiment Strip (MFT)

Other: Sequins, white & gold baker's twine, crop-a-dile, glassine bags

Peace on Earth

I have a few more Christmas projects to share this week. I loved how the sky background turned out so much on my last card that I decided I wanted to use it again! This time I used just two blues instead of three to create a cool wintery background. I started by blending Blueprint Sketch distress oxide at the top of a white card panel, then blended in some Broken China, and faded to almost white at the very bottom. 

After my ink blending was done I stamped the Paint Splatter Background in Sweet Tooth ink to create some soft snow flurries. Then I die cut the entire ink blended panel with the largest Nordic Frames die. I also added three sparkly snowflakes cut from some very old SU! silver glimmer paper using Honey Bee Stamp's Layering Snowflakes die. These are so pretty in real life!

For the sentiment, I used The Greetery's lovely set Written in Ribbons Holiday. The word "Peace" is stamped in Blueprint Sketch distress oxide ink as well as Bashful Blue ink by SU!. I die cut the word a second time from white fun foam and adhered the two together with liquid glue. The final stamping was adding "on earth" in Blueprint Sketch ink. Lastly, the focal panel was adhered to a white card base. 

Anyone else still making last minute holiday projects? 

SUPPLIES: 

Stamps: Written in Ribbons Holiday (The Greetery), Paint Splatter Background (MFT)

Paper: Stamper's Select White (PTI), Silver Glimmer (SU!)

Ink: Blueprint Sketch, Broken China (Distress Oxide), Bashful Blue (SU!), Sweet Tooth (MFT)

Dies: Written in Ribbons Holiday, Nordic Frames (The Greetery), Layering Snowflakes (Honey Bee Stamps)

Stay Cozy

Today we got our first big snow of the season (in fact it is still snowing!), so it seemed fitting to share this card. I recently bought the new Mini Delights: Polar Bear bundle by Altenew because both my boys love polar bears, and it was fun to get to play with it!

I started by cutting a panel of white card stock to 5 1/2" x 4 1/4" and then got to work ink blending my arctic blue sky. I started with Chipped Sapphire at the top, then Blueprint Sketch in the middle, and ended with Broken China at the bottom. I went back and added a touch of Black Soot at the very top to darken it a bit more. 

To create the snow flurries I used the Paint Splatter Background by MFT, stamped in Sweet Tooth ink. I also embossed one of the sentiments from the Mini Delights: Polar Bear set in the upper right corner with white embossing powder. 

I die cut the polar bear from white card stock and added his face in Black Soot ink. Then I made the snowy hills by cutting white card stock with the In the Meadow dies by PTI. I used a very light touch to blend more Broken China along the tops of the hills to give them definition. 

I adhered the snowy hills to my sky panel and trimmed the part that hung over the sides. Then I glued on my polar bear and added that entire panel to a white note card. 

I hope you are staying warm and cozy wherever you are. Happy first day of December!

SUPPLIES:

Stamps: Mini Delight: Polar Bear (Altenew), Paint Splatter Background (MFT)

Paper: Stamper's Select White (PTI)

Ink: Chipped Sapphire, Blueprint Sketch, Broken China, Black Soot (Distress Oxide), Sweet Tooth (MFT), VersaMark

Dies: Mini Delight: Polar Bear (Altenew), In the Meadow (PTI)

Other: white embossing powder