My First Set of Christmas Cards

I am way behind in making my Christmas cards this year.  This is the first batch.  I had 16 to do.  A group that I belong to decided to do a card exchange vs Secret Santa since the economy is so bad.  I don't know what I was thinking when I signed up for this exchange, since I normally do @80 cards to send out each year.  So what was doing another 16 .  Yeah right!

I had another great idea, but it didn't pan out for me.... so I scrapped that and pulled out more paper, punches, and everything else that I could get my hands on.

I'm trying to use up what I have in my stash, but its not working too well because I keep finding that I need this or that.  LOL!  Or maybe its because I just like to shop.
So this is what I came up with for this set.

Recipe:

Plantin School Cricut Cartridge - Noel

MS Punch Rings

Coredinations Red Glitter Cardstock

DCWV White Cardstock

Holiday Inspirations Ribbon - Joanns

Patterned Holly Paper - Heidi Grace 2006

A Recipe Book ala Kathy Orta Style

While searching some of my favorite blogs today, I stumbled upon another fine tutorial and videos by Kathy Orta of Paperphenomenon .  She does some great stuff and I draw inspiration from her all the time.  She's been showing how to do mini books of all sorts and I've been intrigued and bitten to do a few.

A few days ago, she did this Cupcake box .   Please check out her blog for detailed instructions and dimensions necessary to make one of your own.  So tonite, I sat down, pulled out my chipboard, some colorful papers and went to work.

I had bought some 12" x 24" from my local hangout, Michael's, a while back.    It's a designer paperpad by K&Company.  It has a glossy finish to it.  I originally bought it so that I can make some larger purses using my Cricut machine, but hadn't gotten around to it.  While watching the video, Kathy pieced together 2 pieces of paper so she'd have the correct length for this box.  But since I had this paper on hand, I decided to give it a go.

I embellished the book with a layered flowered that I cut with my cricut using Plantin Schoolbook.  I used a Velcro Hook and Loop circle and adhered it to the flap for closure.

I then made my own recipe cards to go in the envelopes.  I hand drew the lines on the back of the cardstock and added matching tags.

Here is the box opened with the cards sticking out.

Recipe:

K & Company 12" x 24" Paper Pad

Chipboard

Envelopes from Michaels

Tacky Tape

Scotch Quik-dry Adhesive

Plantin Schoolbook for the flower

Bazzill cardstock for the recipe cards

Miscellaneous Rhinestone (from my stash)

Velcro Hook and Loop Circles

Tri-Fold Shutter Card

Today, I had to go across town to the other LSS to pick up some Hero Art Acrylic stamps that they ordered for me.  I had gotten 2 calls and still hadn't gotten around to driving over there.  So today, I made the trek.  While I was there, I found there was going to be a 1 hr card making class.  I inquired and found there was a space, so I stayed.

Todays lesson was on the Tri-fold shutter card.  I've made quite a few of these, but wanted to take the class anyway.  I didn't have all the supplies I would have loved to fancy it up, but I did the best with what I had available.  I think it turned out ok, but need to do some touch-ups to it.

All the parts were pre-cut for us and I believe the instructor used the cricut for the flower and the top-note saying (which was layered).  She had used the Swiss dot cuttlebug folder on one of the flowers, so to make it uniform, I cuttlebugged one of the layers of the sentiment top note layers.  What was funny was, no one had thought of doing this til I asked to do it and everyone wanted to jump on that bandwagon.   I had my brads with me and pulled one out to use as the center for the flower.   I pop-dotted the flower off of the card along with the sentiment.  The other ladies there thought that was a good idea and chose to do the same. 

Found the class handout.  The paper used was Bazzill Glaze Pink Dot.   The 6-petal flowers were cut from Plantin Schoolbook.  The rectangles for the sentiments were cut from Accent Essentials.

The original instructions for making these types of cards can be found at http://craftiblog.wordpress.com/2009/04/23/2009-04-23-quad-fold-card-sample-tutorial/